concert. Of course, I got a shock when Miss Ferris didn’t come on the stage, and more of a shock when she never came home that night, and the police told me she was dead. But there was the letter on the mat, and I put it in her room as usual, and there it is now, I suppose. I’ll go and see.”
She returned in a few moments.
“It had fallen into the hearth and slipped under the front of the fender,” she said. “That’s why nobody found it, I suppose. Here it is, anyway. I don’t suppose it matters much who reads it now everything legal is over.”
The letter was long and rambling, and beyond conveying an impression that the man Helm was a thoroughly undesirable person, gave no more help than the telegram had done. The letter did not give any clue to the whereabouts of Helm, nor any definite reason why Miss Ferris should avoid his society. The aunt had stated vaguely: “Things have come out about him which nobody suspected, but he seemed to me a bold, undesirable fellow,” but she had not committed herself further, except to confess that her partner at the boarding-house had given him Miss Ferris’s school address.
Mrs. Bradley read the letter twice, made a note of the aunt’s address, paid a week’s rent for the rooms and returned in a very thoughtful mood. It was a quarter-past four by the time she reached the school gate, and the junior forms had been dismissed and came past her in groups. One child of about twelve accosted her.
“Please, Mrs. Bradley, was Miss Ferris really murdered?”
Mrs. Bradley smiled in the manner of a well-disposed and kindly boa-constrictor, and poked her small interlocutor in the ribs.
“Go and ask your Headmaster,” she said. But when Moira Malley, the sixth-form girl who had taken part in the opera, stopped her outside the Headmaster’s room and put the same question, Mrs. Bradley was a good deal more interested.
“What is your name?” she asked. And when the girl had told her, she said: “Why, you are one of the people I want to talk to. Can you keep a secret?”
The Irish girl smiled.
“Yes, I think I can,” she answered. She looked pale, Mrs. Bradley thought, but was an attractive creature, with a wide mouth, grey eyes and dark-brown hair.
“Wait downstairs in my form-room—you know which one?—for a quarter of an hour. If I am not with you by that time, come back here and knock for me.”
Moira descended the stairs, and Mrs. Bradley tapped at the Headmaster’s door.
“Nothing to report,” she announced, “but that your opinion is shared by Miss Ferris’s landlady. The landlady knew Miss Ferris for eight years, and is certain that she would never have committed suicide. One other question arises which may be important. Was Miss Ferris pregnant, do you know? Was it suggested that that might have been a reason for her suicide?”
“She was not pregnant,” replied Mr. Cliffordson. “The coroner asked the question at the inquest, and I myself heard both the question and the doctor’s reply.”
“Thank you,” said Mrs. Bradley. She made an illegible note on a clean page of the notebook which, together with a small silver pencil on a chain, she drew from the capacious pocket of her skirt. “With your permission I am now going to have a talk with Moira Malley.”
“There’s something worrying that girl,” said Mr. Cliffordson. “She hasn’t been herself since the dress rehearsal.”
“When was that?” asked Mrs. Bradley.
“On the Tuesday. It was rather a failure, you know. Poor Moira was dreadfully nervous, and hasn’t been right since. I’m sorry for that child. Her mother lives in Ireland, on nothing a year, more or less, and the girl is here on a foundation scholarship. Her books and most of her clothes come out of the grant she receives, and, for the rest, an aunt with a family of her own takes her in. Last summer holiday things were in such a bad way that the girl got herself a holiday post as nursery governess, as it was not possible for her mother to find the return fare for Moira to visit her home. She is a clever girl and a very nice girl. We’re going to see whether she can win the scholarship to Girton which the governing body offers, and, if she does, I am going to give her a post here later on, if she’ll take it. She is a girl of excellent character and is exceedingly popular here, both with the staff and the boys and girls.”
It was less than the specified quarter of an hour later when Mrs. Bradley walked into the form-room of the Lower Third Commercial. Moira Malley had switched on the lights and was reading. She put the book down, rose to her feet and smiled a little nervously as Mrs. Bradley came in. The little old woman shut the door and Moira drew forward a chair for her. Mrs. Bradley sat down, but the girl remained standing. Mrs. Bradley looked at the clock. It was ten minutes to five.
“What about your people?” she asked. Moira shrugged.
“Aunt doesn’t mind. Often she doesn’t know whether I’m in the house or not until supper-time. I get my own tea. The others have theirs earlier.”
“I see,” said Mrs. Bradley. “Well, sit down, child, and tell me what’s the matter.”
“What’s the matter?” the girl echoed. She flushed painfully. “I don’t think there’s anything—”
“Why did you ask me whether Miss Ferris had been murdered?” was Mrs. Bradley’s next question.
“Well, everybody from the Third Form upwards is saying so. And you—you’re not really a mistress, are you?”
“No,” said Mrs. Bradley. “I’m not. And Miss Ferris may have been murdered.”
“That’s what everybody says,” said the girl. “John Lestrange said nobody would have sent for you if there hadn’t been murder in the air.”
“The graceless child!” said Mrs. Bradley, laughing. “I didn’t know he was at school here. He was at Rugby when last I heard from him.”
“Yes; he’s only been here a term, and he’s jolly sick about it,” said Moira. “His mother, Lady Selina Lestrange, thought he ought to have co-education. She’d heard a lot about it, or something, so she sent John here. His sister is an awfully nice girl, I believe, but she did not come here. Her name’s Sallie.”
