The Watersplash by Patricia Wentworth - Miss Silver 21 - The Watersplash

Author:Patricia Wentworth - Miss Silver 21 - The Watersplash [Wentworth, Patricia]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781258096694
Google: hHzOb18DGTkC
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Goodreads: 1440136
Publisher: Open Road Media
Published: 1950-12-31T16:00:00+00:00

TWENTY-THREE

‘SO THEY’VE ASKED us to take over the case.’

Chief Detective Inspector Lamb sat back in the chair which he filled with so much solid worth and looked across the intervening writing-table at Inspector Abbott, who was at the moment engaged in expert ministrations to a sulky fire. He stood up now, dusting his hands with one of those handkerchiefs which his Chief derided as ‘posh’.

‘Yes, sir?’

Lamb frowned.

‘I used to know Nayler pretty well. He’s the Superintendent at Embank, and he’s a bit of a Mr Facing-both-ways. Not that you’ll be any the wiser for that. Children aren’t brought up on the Pilgrim’s Progress these days like they used to be, and more’s the pity.’

‘Well, sir, I was. Anyhow the name speaks for itself. Which two ways does Nayler face?’

‘He don’t want to upset the county people, and more especially he don’t want to upset Lord Burlingham.’

Frank allowed himself a disrespectful whistle.

‘Oh, he’s in it, is he? Rather the heavy armoured car type and all that.’

‘This young man they suspect is his agent. Old county family, and relations all over the place. Just the kind of thing that Nayler wouldn’t like. On the other hand he don’t want the Labour people to have any handle for saying there’s one law for the rich and another for the poor, and all that kind of thing. The Chief Constable is in pretty much the same mind – he don’t want to offend anyone. So between them they’re tumbling over each other to hand the bomb over to us before it goes off.’

Frank put his handkerchief back into his breast pocket. Then he said in a meditative tone,

‘The Greenings case – girl drowned in a watersplash. Sounds quite a feat, doesn’t it? Name of Clarice Dean. Not an indigenous product. Down there nursing a Miss Ora Blake.’

Lamb fixed him with a suspicious eye.

‘Got it all pat, haven’t you?’

‘I read the papers, sir. The case made good headlines. Also’ – his tone was negligent in the extreme – ‘I had tea with Maudie yesterday.’

The November light striking through a tall window disclosed the thinning patch on the Chief Inspector’s crown. Strong dark hair with a tendency to curl surrounded it, but just at the top there was a definite thinning. When his colour deepened as it did now from crimson to plum the patch glowed too. Frank Abbott from his standing position was able to observe this danger signal and to be inwardly amused by it. His Chief’s rather protuberant eyes stared at him.

‘Miss Silver? You’re not going to tell me she’s mixed up with this!’

‘The girl met her in a tea-shop a couple of days before the drowning and told her a very odd story.’

‘In a tea-shop?’ Lamb’s tone was both angry and incredulous.

‘Well, it appears she did know her by sight. Some ass had pointed her out as a famous detective, and the girl just sat down at her table and proceeded to spill the beans.’

‘What did she say?’

Frank repeated the outpourings of Miss Clarice Dean.

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