Silence in Court by Patricia Wentworth Page A

shadow had obviously not touched her yet. Dr. Adams was an old fuss, the inquest something which Aunt Honoria would have hated, and she was sorry about Den being worried. They fought as they had fought in the nursery they had shared at the top of this very house, but under the scratches and the rough and tumble there was the old, strong, authentic brother-and-sister tie, unnoticed when things go smoothly, but tough enough to take a strain when it came.
    From that point the day began to darken into nightmare—a police inspector asking questions, and, after the post mortem, his return and the taking of statements from everyone in the house. Because Dr. Adam wasn’t an old fuss—he was right. Honoria Maquisten had died in the night because she had had about three times the number of tabloids she ought to have taken, and nobody who knew her could believe that she would have committed suicide.
    Since there could be no question of accident, there came in the word which was to stay with them through all the hours and days and weeks to come—the word Murder. One of the old words coming down out of remote dark ages—used, and used, and over used, but never without its secret, dreadful thrill. Because, however casually spoken, however hackneyed, its syllables by their own black magic can still call up the ghosts of all the crimes which sweep in pale or red or black procession across the underworld of history. When it is spoken in a house, that house is linked with the haunted houses of all time. The shadow which has grown old since Cain comes there and broods upon it.
    This house no longer belonged to those who lived in it. It belonged for all present purposes to the law, whose servants came and went, and transacted their business in the family rooms, interviewing everyone, taking statements. Most of these interviews took place in the study, leaving to the family a choice between the dining-room, where there was no place to sit except at the table as if perpetually waiting for a meal, and the big drawing-room with its chandeliers tied up in bags and its yellow satin furniture shrouded in dust-sheets.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN
    In the study Chief Inspector McGillivray interviewed Magda Brayle. A large man with a bright blue eye and hair which must have been fiery when he was young. It was mellowed now and streaked with grey, but his moustache betrayed him. For the rest, he had high, flushed cheek-bones, a blunt nose, a blunter tongue, and the accents of his native land—the fine rolling r’s which have slipped from southern speech, and the fine broad vowels which do justice to a well constructed sentence. A diffident young man who never uttered sat by and wrote rapidly in shorthand. His name presently emerged as Dowling—a negligible person, deriving his sole importance from the fact that he too served the law.
    â€œNow, Nurrse,”—McGillivray rolled several r’s—“you can tell me in yer own worrds just what happened, so far as ye know it, from a quarter past two yesterrday afternoon.”
    Magda had an upright chair. She sat up straight against its straight back, cap collar and apron immaculately white and stiff, features sedately composed, voice professionally cool.
    â€œI was in the bathroom, with the door into Mrs. Maquisten’s bedroom a little ajar.”
    â€œWhat were ye doing there?”
    A shade of surprise came into her voice.
    â€œI was washing out some handkerchiefs. I heard Molly come in and say, ‘There’s a letter,’ and I heard Mrs. Maquisten call her back.”
    â€œHow?”
    â€œVery angrily. I knew at once that something was wrong. I was wondering whether to go in, when she asked for Miss King or Mrs. Hull. When Molly said they were both out she asked for Mr. Harland, and then for Miss Silence. They had gone out to lunch together, and she said that whoever came in first was to come up to her at once.”
    â€œNow, Nurrse—was there any