The Case of the Corner Cottage by Christopher Bush

Author:Christopher Bush
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2019-04-16T00:00:00+00:00

Next morning I waited till Bernice had rung the Salon Marguerite. She gave her maiden name of Haire—it had an awkward sound but at least was something she couldn’t forget—and said she was up from the country and was looking for a reliable place to have her hair done whenever she was in town. Her present place in the country was most unsatisfactory. What she wanted at the moment was a shampoo and set. And, if possible, that morning or afternoon.

She was told that it couldn’t be done. Then she was asked to hold on, and it turned out that she could after all be squeezed in at three-thirty that afternoon.

“Who was doing the talking?” I said.

“The secretary. She’d be a kind of receptionist as well. She sounded quite nice.”

I hurried off to Broad Street and looked through the correspondence with Bertha. Just before ten o’clock there was a telephone call. It was Myra Cowle. She made sure it was I who was listening.

“Oh, Mr. Travers, this is You-Know-Who. The one who was in yesterday.”

“You needn’t worry about being overheard,” I told her. “No possible chance of that here. It’s Miss Cowle, isn’t it?”

“Yes,” she said, “and I’m so sorry, Mr. Travers, but I’ve been thinking things over and I think I must change my mind. I don’t think I want to go on with it, so will you let the whole thing drop?”

That was a shock. Somehow or other I had to make time.

“But why?” I said. “It can’t be that ten pound retaining fee that’s bothering you?”

“It isn’t that. It’s because I realise you couldn’t possibly find what I was asking you about—not after all this time. You couldn’t even know where to begin. I wouldn’t even know myself.”

“Plenty of things to begin at,” I said, “if that’s the only reason.”

“Well, there’s my business as well,” she said. “I’m terrified of anyone connecting me with what happened. People get things so twisted round.”

“Listen,” I said. “Let me slip along and see you, just for a moment. Not that you need worry about the Salon. We’d neither see you there or telephone or communicate in any way except by post. We wouldn’t even send in the usual reports unless you specially wished it.”

“Reports?”

“Yes,” I said. “It’s the usual thing. Just to let the client know how we’re getting on. To prove we’re as good as our word and really working on his behalf.”

“I didn’t know that,” she said, and just a bit apologetically. I didn’t see what difference it made, but I did some striking while the iron was hot.

“Even if you are busy, surely you could slip out for a moment some time this morning? Cassoni’s is almost on your door-step. Why not have coffee with me there at, say, eleven o’clock.”

“I couldn’t possibly,” she told me. “But just wait a moment.”

She must have cupped the receiver for I couldn’t hear a sound. In about a minute she was telling me she might manage to spare me a very short time at a quarter-past eleven.

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