Fear by Night by Patricia Wentworth Page A

whatever other words there were. She waited for it to die away, and all at once she heard Gale Anderson’s voice: “You should encourage her to learn to swim. As it is, I suppose it’ll have to be a boating accident.” And then, whether because he turned his head or because he moved, the sound fell back into confusion. Once someone said, “I won’t,” and, “What’s the hurry?” And then there was nothing but the whisper, whisper, whisper of two voices, and upon that there came to her, sharp and clear, the recollection of how she had sat in the lounge at the Luxe waiting for Charles and heard two voices whispering on the other side of a group of palms. What had they said?… “ You must get her away at once.”—“And then ?” And after that a silence, and she had felt afraid without knowing why. And one of the voices had said, “ Well, devil take the hindmost .” And then they had gone away.…
    What nonsense to think of that now! All whispering voices sound the same. Those voices had said something about a will, and, “ He’s never seen her ,” and “ He’s not going to . You must get her away at once.” What had it got to do with her? It couldn’t possibly have anything to do with her. One of those voices had said, “ It’s a pity you can’t marry her.” … One of those voices? Or—one of these voices echoing faintly in the cleft?… “ It’s a pity you can’t marry her .” …
    Ann turned giddy. She was too crouched together to fall, but for a moment she was not fully conscious. What had she heard? What had she really heard? Had she heard someone say, “ It’s a pity you can’t marry her ,” or had she only remembered hearing a whispering voice say it long ago at the Luxe?… It wasn’t really long ago, but it seemed so. She felt immeasurably removed from the places she had known.
    And what place was this, and what things were talked of here?… Murder … The word had ceased to echo in the hidden places of the rock, but in the hidden places of her thought it echoed still.
    The whispering fell to faint sound that just fretted the edge of her consciousness, and then the sounds of the air and of the water lapped over it and blotted it out.
    Ann felt how stiff she was. She had only been crouching down in the cleft, but she seemed to have strained every muscle of her body. She crawled round the jutting corner, clung and scrambled a few more yards, and came out by the side of the house. She went up to her room, and was glad to get there unnoticed. She shut the door and sat down on the floor beside the window. She was shaking all over, and her thoughts shook too. She couldn’t order them or get them to keep still.
    The sun shone upon the lawn, and the sky was a clear, pure blue. The air came softly off the water. There were patches of green on the hills, and streaks of red, and black, and purple. Every now and then a scent of pines mixed with the faint salt smell of the sea.
    Ann got up and looked at herself in the glass. There was a smudge of green slime across her forehead. Her eyes stared back at her.
    â€œOh, Ann! What a fool you are!” she said.
    She poured cold water into the basin and washed her face and hands. Then she came back to the window again and leaned upon the sill. Her thoughts had stopped shaking and she began to sort them out.
    She thought that the whispering voices she had heard in the cleft were the voices she had heard at the Luxe. She thought that the Luxe voice and the cleft voice had said the same thing—“ What a pity you can’t marry her .” She thought those two things, but she wasn’t sure. It was maddening not to be sure. She tried to piece together what she had heard.
    First of all, at the Luxe: “ What a pity you can’t marry her .” And then, “ You’re sure about the will