Adders on the Heath

thin man with charming manners and a somewhat foxy smile. His wife was arranging bronze chrysanthemums in a heavily gilded, extremely ugly vase. There was neither sight nor sound of Clive.

Dame Beatrice came to the point at once by telling them that she had just come from the school.

Involuntarily they exchanged glances, then Maidston said,

'Oh, yes? In what way, Dame Beatrice, should that concern us? Our foster-son left the school, at my request, a good many months ago.'

'In one sense it does not concern you at all,' Dame Beatrice replied in equable tones, 'except in so far as it may (quite indirectly, of course), concern Clive.' The Maidstons again exchanged glances. 'You see,' she continued, 'I have learnt a rather disturbing fact, and so has the Headmaster. It seems that, while he was at the school, Clive informed the other boys that he had managed to obtain possession of a small quantity of hydrocyanic acid and another of potassium cyanide from a cupboard in the chemistry laboratory.'

'He did bring home a couple of test-tubes with some stuff in them,' admitted Maidston, after a slight pause. His wife drew in her breath sharply, but her husband's steady eyes did not waver. 'He did not tell us what was in them and he did not show them to us. My wife found them under some clothing in the tall-boy in his bedroom. She brought them to me without the boy's knowledge and we threw them away because she was afraid of broken glass among his things. Of course, we certainly never thought of them as containing poison. We simply supposed them to hold the results of some experiment or other which had been carried out in one of the chemistry lessons and which the boys had been allowed to keep.'

'Although I wouldn't put it past Clive to have kept the test-tubes, whether with permission or not,' said Mrs Maidston, who appeared to have received some sort of cue from her husband. 'He's a very naughty boy at times and very disobedient. I'm afraid he also tells lies.'

'He asked several times to be taken away from the school, I believe,' said Dame Beatrice. She had no direct evidence of this, but the Headmaster's reference to Clive's letters home had given her that impression. Mr Maidston nodded, and his wife observed,

'He said the other boys didn't like him. He was bullied, he said, and got into trouble for the misdeeds of others.'

'We didn't believe him at first,' put in Maidston. 'I remember saying to my wife that, if anybody did any bullying, it would be Clive, and that, if anybody got another boy into trouble, it would again be Clive.'

'In the end, though,' said Mrs Maidston, 'the letters got so hysterical that we were forced to believe him.'

'So we took him away. It's been a great nuisance, of course. Had to pay a tutor. Turned out to be a real young rogue. Don't wonder he was dismissed his post at the school. Didn't know what he was like when we took him on, but found out soon enough and he had to go,' said Maidston.

'Ah, yes, you refer to Mr Richardson. I understood that Clive liked him, though.'

'He would!' said Mrs Maidston. Dame Beatrice wondered what Clive had been up to since her last visit.

'I suppose you will eventually find another school for him,' she said, 'as the tutoring was so unsatisfactory.'

'Oh, he's no longer with us,' said Maidston. 'Did you not notice how peaceful everything is?'

'Not with you?'

'No. His mother, a former servant of ours, came along a few days ago and demanded the boy back. Said she was now married and that her husband was prepared to have Clive live with them. We tried to persuade her that we could do a great deal more for the boy than she could, but she wouldn't be convinced. In fact, she became extremely abusive to my wife-I was not at home at the time, unfortunately-so my wife asked her to wait while she telephoned me and as soon as I heard the story I agreed that the woman should take the boy away. There seemed nothing else for it, and really, as my wife will tell you, Clive had been such a little pest and nuisance, since the tutor went, that I was not altogether sorry to see the back of him.'

'I asked the girl for her address and said we should like to keep in touch-write to Clive, you know, and send to him for Christmas and his birthday, take him out sometimes, all that sort of thing-but she refused to give me her address and told me, very rudely, to mind my own business,' said Mrs Maidston.

'I see. Have you no idea where he has gone?'

'I have not. It could be Southampton or even London, or, of course, it might be one of the villages round here. I couldn't do more than ask for the address, could I?'

'How long had you had Clive? Since babyhood?' asked Dame Beatrice.

'Oh, no! I couldn't possibly look after a baby! I told the girl before she left us to go into hospital to have the child, that if she put in into an orphanage until it was old enough to wash itself and so on, I would consider adopting it, whether boy or girl. I heard from her again when Clive was six. Well, I went to see him and it was arranged that we should have him on trial with a view to adoption later.'

'We have had him for nearly four years,' said Maidston. 'It was only my wife's kind heart and my own rooted objection to giving in without a struggle, which caused us to keep him so long. Actually, as I have indicated, it was a great relief to me to come home the other evening and find that the boy had gone. Of course,' he added with some suddenness, 'Richardson could have known about those test-tubes you mentioned. He had complete charge of the boy for several hours a day.'

'Ah, yes,' said Dame Beatrice. Maidston narrowed his eyes and asked,

'What is all this about the test-tubes, anyway? It couldn't by any chance, have anything to do with the inquest on those two chaps found dead in the Forest, could it? I read about that in the local paper.'

'A most curious affair,' said Dame Beatrice. 'Yes, you have made a correct deduction.' Maidston raised his eyebrows questioningly, but she did not say anything more. She thanked the couple for having accorded her what she described as a fruitful interview and took leave of them. Maidston, however, insisted upon seeing her to her car and said, on the way out to the drive, 'Is young Richardson involved more deeply than we know?'