Your Secret Friend (Timothy Herring) Read online

  “Opinions, for once, don’t differ. Think Constance is dangerous?”

  “Well, if it is Miss Vere, she seems to be sending anonymous letters all over the place, and that’s never a very good sign of mental health.”

  “I couldn’t agree with you more. Has she sent you one? Yes? And to me. And to my godson. And now, if you please, she’s begun to send them to the gals.”

  “Not—you don’t mean the children?”

  “Don’t I? Read this. Remember that thing by What-Name—American woman—saw it on television—some rumour about lesbians—wouldn’t mean a thing nowadays, I suppose, but it emptied a school inside a matter of days. Well, murder is worse. We must put a stopper on Vere Pallis. Don’t want my school emptied. What was that thing?”

  “The book was called The Children’s Hour.”

  “Macabre. Well, now, what’s the plan of campaign?”

  “In some circumstances I would suggest the police, but in this case . . .”

  “Yes, bad publicity for my school and not much fun for Alison. Poor Vere is potty, of course, but that don’t help matters. On the contrary. Well, what do you think?”

  “A personal encounter and the use of lurid threats—not, of course, before witnesses.”

  “You prepared to have a go?”

  “Our solicitor has opted to take first knock. He wants to collect the poison-pen letters and take them with him.”

  “He’s welcome to mine, and he can have this one which was sent to the child.”

  “Why are we so certain it’s Vere Pallis? Couldn’t there be anybody else?”

  “Who?”

  “Well, some relative or close friend of Bennison. We aren’t justified in condemning Vere Pallis out of hand.”

  “That’s true. I suppose the police are still hunting for clues? I still say it was murder, not suicide.”

  “Oh, I think they are taking it for granted that they were right the first time, and that it was a suicide pact. After all, Alison has been cleared of complicity, but that doesn’t prove, from their point of view, that she and Bennison hadn’t planned to die together. I don’t see why murder should occur to them.”

  “Wish you’d arrange to go and talk to Vere yourself. Be better than that dry lawyer fellow.”

  “All right. I’ll go and see him. I think, with you, that one of us should have a try before we stick a solicitor on to the job. Trouble is that he’s had one of the letters himself, and is probably a bit ruffled in consequence.”

  “This is no time for a solicitor to get touchy. Go and see him at once.”

  Timothy had found no difficulty, at that wintry time of the year, in reserving a room at the George. He went back to the hotel as soon as he had left the school, and telephoned the solicitor as soon as he arrived.

  “Something else has come up about those letters. Can you meet me at Phisbe’s place some time tomorrow afternoon? Three o’clock? Right. I’ve collected two more of the beastly things. I’ll bring them with me.”

  Before he kept the tryst at Phisbe’s London headquarters he paid another visit to the school and waited for Miss Pomfret-Brown until she came out from the morning assembly.

  “I’m seeing my chap today,” he said, “but, before I do, there’s something I wanted to ask you. Do you think this letter that you showed me yesterday is the only one of these anonymous things to come to the school, apart from your own and Alison’s?”

  “No. My deputy, Hildegarde Salter, has had one. She brought it to me before assembly. I have warned anyone else who gets one to bring it straight along.”

  “I wonder whether I might take a look at the envelope?”

  “The post-mark won’t help. It’s Southampton.”

  There was a tap at the door. Timothy’s cousin came in.

  “You asked us in assembly,” she began.

  “Right. Hand it over.”

  April did so, and entered into explanations.

  “The letter addressed to me is from Vere Pallis. She encloses an anonymous letter which she says she found when she got back to her flat in Newcastle.”

  “I’ll deal with it. Thank you, Miss Bounty. You may embrace Mr. Herring, if that is your cousinly custom, but then you must make yourself scarce. I take it you have a class?”

  “Oh, yes, Miss Pomfret-Brown.”

  “Go to it. Give them of your best. Close the door quietly. Now, Timothy, anything else?”

  “Only one point, and it may have no significance. Would there be any particular reason for singling out this one child to receive a letter?”

  “Oh, most probably. That’s another reason for thinking that Vere Pallis is the author. This particular child, Sandra Davidson, used to be one of the most gifted trouble-makers in the lower school. She would have made the perfect vehicle, in Constance Pallis’s time, for spreading alarm among the others and, from them, to their parents.”

  “I gather that this has not happened.”

  “No. Sandra and I have an alliance founded upon a certain amount of mutual respect and liking, and, on her part, upon a certain well-defined fear. I have discovered that Sandra is afraid of being smacked.”

  “Is that an euphemism for . . .?”

  “Oh, no. It means exactly what it sounds like. Physically, nothing. As a blow to self-esteem, amour propre and acceptance as a leader of the sinful, something quite impossible of contemplation. Sometimes I wish I could feel that it would have the same effect upon Alison! Fancy falling in and then out of love with a shrimp like poor Simon Bennison, and causing me all this trouble!”

  “You think she had fallen out of love with him, then?”

  “What do you think?”

  “What I think isn’t evidence.”

  “Well, Sir Modesty, be off and see this lawyer fellow. We’re wasting time. By the way, if you take her on, I must warn you you’ll find Alison cussed to the point of obstinacy, quick-tempered, nervous, proud, unreasonable . . .”

  “Sensitive, unapproachable, and, of course, strangely beautiful. I know. I’ve got a blood mare exactly like that.”

  “What do you do?—belt her?”

  “You’re too good a horsewoman to believe that.”

  “Well,” said the solicitor, at the end of three-quarters of an hour, “you may be right. After all, as you point out, we have no real proof. You say you are going to confront her with the letters you’ve collected and tell her you think she sent them. I don’t know how you’ll get on. Don’t be surprised if she immediately calls up her lawyer and they talk about unwarrantable suspicions and defamation of character. If you do run into trouble, let me know at once. Good luck—and for goodness’ sake don’t stick your neck out further than you can help.”

  Timothy, having turned over in his mind several angles of approach, finally settled upon one and, on arrival in Newcastle after an overnight stop at Nottingham, the first thing he did was to look for Vere Pallis’s name in the local telephone directory, half-expecting that it might not yet have been inserted. If it were not there, he decided that he must contact her through her school, but this he was not at all anxious to do, since he had no intention of bringing her name into prominence if this could be avoided. He had obtained the name of the school, however, from Miss Pomfret-Brown. Timothy had decided not to ask Alison for it, thinking that it would be better if she did not know (at any rate until after it was over) of his visit to her sister.

  Vere Pallis, however, was in the book, so, hoping that he would find her at home, he rang the number immediately he had finished his dinner.

  “Miss Vere Pallis?”

  “Speaking.”

  “This is Timothy Herring.”

  “I don’t think I—Oh, yes, I know.”

  “May I come round and see you?”

  “May I ask why?”

  “Some business I can’t discuss over the telephone. It’s very important, or I wouldn’t bother you.”

  “Where are you speaking from?”

  “My hotel. I am in Newcastle.�
�

  “I can’t think why you want to see me.”

  “Shall we say in about half-an-hour’s time, then?”

  “Is it about my sister?”

  “Yes, in a way.”

  “Oh, dear! Surely Alison can manage her own affairs!”

  “It doesn’t seem much like it. All right, then. In about half-an-hour. Thanks very much. Goodbye!”

  Not knowing the city, he left his car in the hotel garage and called a taxi. Vere’s flat was in a new block a long way from the city centre and was on the fourth floor. She opened the door to him herself and invited him in.

  “I suppose it’s about this wretched house she’s bought,” she observed. “If she wants financial help she won’t get it from me. If she hadn’t had this ridiculous idea of living there with Simon Bennison, there would never have been all this trouble. But do sit down. Is this going to take very long? I’ve a stack of exercise books to mark.”

  “No, it won’t take long, I hope,” said Timothy. “I’ll come to the point at once. I believe you received one of these.” He laid the anonymous letters on the settee beside her.

  “What are they?” she asked. He had seen a tell-tale flicker in her eyes, and felt that he was on the right track.

  “I’d rather you saw for yourself,” he said smoothly. She turned them over.

  “Oh, I see,” she said. “I’ve had one. Not very edifying, are they? What is Alison doing about them?”

  “There is nothing much she can do, until we know who sent them. I suppose you can’t think of anybody who would be nasty-minded and cowardly enough to send things like this to your half-sister’s friends, can you?”

  “Is that what you came all this way to ask me? I should have thought a four-penny stamp would have met the case.”

  “A letter, if any, would have come from a solicitor, of course, and, failing a visit from me, it’s more than probable that you would have received a call from the police.”

  “The police? What utter nonsense!” Her eyes flickered again. “What on earth have I to do with the police?”

  “Well, the references in the letters to a murderess are libellous and therefore actionable.”

  “Well, my dear good man, I didn’t utter the libel!”

  “As next of kin to the libelled person, the police might well be interested in your reaction to the letters, don’t you think?” asked Timothy, smoothly.

  I fail to see why they should contact me. Alison is not mentioned by name in any of the letters, is she? Any one of hundreds of people might be the—the person concerned.”

  “Not by inference, though. I mean, all the pointers are there, and they indicate, quite clearly, your half-sister.”

  “All the same, no names, no pack-drill, I should have thought,” retorted Vere, rallying herself and contriving to smile. “I don’t believe, for a single instant, that the police would come here.”

  “One can’t be sure, though, and those who live in blocks of flats don’t want the neighbours surmising all sorts of things. You’d be surprised at how much surmising goes on when people are visited by the police.”

  “Your acquaintance with the police is doubtless far more extensive than my own. In any case, what is your personal interest in the case? You seem to be making yourself very active in the matter, and, I add, most impertinently so.”

  “People are apt to equate impertinence with impudence, aren’t they? I hope you are not falling into that same error, although I know some dictionaries do. In its original form impertinent means not germane to the issue, beside the point, not on the agenda—that kind of thing—whereas impudent . . .”

  “Thank you! I meant what I said. Your interference is impertinent.”

  “But it isn’t, you know. I have a very real determination and, I believe, a right, to track down the author of these letters. You see, I’ve had one of the beastly things myself.”

  “Well, that’s not very surprising, since it was through you that Alison had this renovation of Little Monkshood done.”

  “Through the Society for the Preservation of Buildings of Historic Interest, you mean.”

  “Are you denying that you had a personal interest in the matter?”

  “In so far as I considered Little Monkshood to be a building of historic importance and recommended it as such to my committee, I had a personal interest as the servant of that committee, therefore what you say is true enough, but we’re wandering from the point. My question was . . .”

  “I remember perfectly well what your question was. My answer, since you pursue the point, is that I know of nobody who would utter anonymous letters.”

  “They are all typewritten, of course, as were the envelopes.”

  “Well, I suppose an anonymous letter-writer would hardly utter the things in manuscript form.”

  “I submitted the letters, before I left town, to an expert. He informed me that, of those I showed him, not one was scripted on the same typewriter as was its envelope. In fact, that each letter, too, had been tapped out on a different machine. Curious, don’t you think?”

  “I have no idea. I know little about typewriters.”

  “Well, my idea, for what it’s worth, is that the letters come from somebody who is in a position to have access to at least ten typewriters.”

  “It sounds like some thwarted spinster in an office.”

  “I wondered whether it could be some thwarted spinster in a school which runs a commercial course. A comprehensive school for girls, perhaps. It would be easy enough, in such a place, I imagine, for a teacher staying there after school hours to obtain access to twenty different typewriters, if she liked. I believe, in a good commercial class, students are trained to use a variety of machines. Isn’t that so?”

  “I have no idea,” said Vere coldly; but she licked lips which had gone very dry.

  “Perhaps, as it is your half-sister who has been involved in all this unpleasantness, you could find out whether that is the position in your own school,” Timothy went on pleasantly. “It might give us a pointer, what? Oh, well, I’ll push off. You’ve work to do. I hoped you’d be able to suggest who the bats-in-the-belfry lady might be, but I suppose it was rather a long shot, actually.”

  “There are two things I can tell you, but they may not be of much help,” said Vere. “My own letter, I remember, bore a Southampton postmark and Simon Bennison’s wife is in a private mental home not seven miles from there, and it is on a bus route. No doubt Alison can give you the exact address.” She rose, and Timothy did the same. “Well, goodbye, Mr. Herring. I am sorry you had such a fruitless journey.”

  “Oh, I wouldn’t call it fruitless,” said Timothy cheerfully. “I’m very glad to have seen you. If anything crops up, you will let me know, won’t you? You see, if we can frighten this misguided lady, it might save her from having to answer awkward questions from the police a bit later on. One’s sorry for these unfortunate women. One doesn’t want to cause them a lot of trouble over what is, after all, a mere mental aberration. I mean, one doesn’t think of comparing it with, for example, blackmail, does one?”

  “Blackmail is an interesting word corning from you,” said Vere Pallis, with extraordinary and venomous bitterness. Timothy smiled at her.

  “There’s such a thing as benevolent blackmail,” he said, “but perhaps you’ve never heard of it.”

  “Benevolence is not much in my line. A working woman has very little scope for it, or inclination, either. Good night, Mr. Herring. Don’t fall down the lift-shaft.”

  “I bet you wish I would!” thought Timothy, grinning to himself.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  Purification Ceremony

  “The brats,” said Miss Pomfret-Brown, when Timothy called on her upon his return from Newcastle, “are giving Alison the devil of a time.”

  “You mean because she was hauled up in court?”

  “Ah, not in the way you mean, so take that scowl from your brow. No, the little nit-wits are lionising her. The
misunderstood heroine. The woman who braved all for love. The soul snatched from the brink of the grave. The trouble is that we couldn’t keep the case out of the papers. Thank God we break up tomorrow. Well, how did you get on with Vere Pallis?”

  Timothy described his visit.

  “I don’t think I did much good,” he said. “I know I scared her once or twice, but she seems pretty tough and, of course, we haven’t a shred of what police or lawyers would call proof.”

  “We have now,” said Miss Pomfret-Brown. “That is, if your letter is anything like mine.”

  “My letter?”

  “Enclosed with the one I received from her yesterday morning. She must have written both directly you left her. Took your time getting back here, didn’t you?”

  I stayed a night at Nottingham and then pushed over to Shrewsbury to see Tom Parsons.”

  “Oh, the architect. Had he had one of the letters?”

  “No. I didn’t really think he would have had one, but I thought I’d make sure. I had another reason for wanting to chat with him, though. As soon as Alison has got over Bennison’s dying like that in Little Monkshood, we shall have to find out what she wants done with the place, and I thought it might be as well to talk it over with Parsons so that we had some suggestions to make.”

  “What conclusion did you reach?”

  “Well, only the obvious one.”

  “For your Society to buy back from Alison, I suppose.”

  “That’s it. Then, of course, we should open the place more than once a week and more than four months in the year. We couldn’t think of any other idea. If she is still of the mind she was when I last spoke to her about it, I think she’ll be more than willing to sell. The place can be nothing better than a white elephant to her now.”

  “She’s furnished it, you know, and at some considerable trouble and expense.”

  “Yes. I want to go and have another look at it, and take a valuer with me for the furniture in case she wants to sell that. Then I shall have to put the whole thing to my committee and, after that, we can get action.”

  “Alison may not want to sell the house.”