“But surely,” put in Parmiter, who seemed more alert, “she was taking chances here? Shearsby might have been away. And the telegram, you imply, has been found.”
“Not the original,” Mr. Tuke said, “though that was a real risk. She herself may have found it in Shearsby’s pocket. If not, and if he had kept it, she must have hoped that it would remain unnoticed until her husband, as the nearest relative available, was notified of the death. This, remember, was to pass as an accident. And she knew her Mortimer— he would rush off, in his fussy way, to take charge, or she would see that he did. If the telegram was among the papers he brought home, no doubt she destroyed it. Anyhow, it has not been found. But there is a copy at Cotfold, the nearest place to Stocking with a telegraph office. Wires to the village are brought out from there, and to reach the cottage the messenger would not pass through Stocking itself. It was not known there that Raymond Shearsby had received a telegram that day.”
“Do you suppose she knew all this beforehand?”
“Oh, no doubt she did. She would hardly risk sending a bogus telegram direct to the village post office. An inquiry at Bedford, and a look at the map, would show her how it would be taken to the cottage. The telegram itself, by the way,” Harvey went on, “began, ‘Am away all day, but must see you.’ That stopped any query by the recipient. Then the touch of mystery in the message was no doubt a draw. And as for Shearsby being away, it was most unlikely. He seldom left the cottage except to walk to the village, or to go to Cambridge to see Darby himself. The odds, in fact, were in our Lilian’s favour, and the trick came off.”
Parmiter had let his pipe go out. He drew absently at it, his eyes half closed again, the shadows in their deep sockets enhancing his look of depression and fatigue.
“Raymond Shearsby,” Harvey went on, “left his cottage for the station before seven o’clock. He called at the pub in the village on the way. Though he looked at the clock there, he did not mention that he was meeting a train, and as to reach the station he would turn back towards the lane in which his cottage stands, it was assumed that when he left the pub a quarter of an hour later he went straight home. In the meantime, Lilian Shearsby had attended her meeting. At a quarter to five, after it was over, she was talking to Mrs. Darby. She then caught the 5.10 train to Whipstead, and changed into her youth’s suiting in a corridor lavatory. The train was crowded, and probably her transformation was not even noticed. If it was, it was nobody’s business. At Whipstead she killed time for an hour, and towards seven she was near the station again, just as a train came in from King’s Cross— to her undoing, but she could not foresee that. I suppose you don’t know that bit of country?”
“No,” Parmiter said.
“Evidently Lilian Shearsby did. She had been to the cottage with her husband, though coming by bus they approached it a different way. But there are always maps, and she may have reconnoitred the ground too. There is a short cut from Stocking to the station, a footpath, which Raymond must have taken that evening, and near the line another path branches off, crosses the local stream, the Gat Ditch, and goes on towards his cottage. No doubt Mrs. Shearsby expected him to come that way. After being near the station again at a quarter to seven, she went to the junction of the paths, close to the footbridge and under a screen of trees. The only house near is the stationmaster’s, a quarter of a mile away. She waited under the trees till she saw Raymond coming to meet the 7.48—coming, not from his cottage, but from the village. Luckily for her, he was alone on the path. No one else was meeting that train, and the local people seldom travel towards London so late. What sort of trap she laid for him,” said Mr. Tuke, examining his diminished cigar, “we can only conjecture. She may tell her story, but I don’t thinlcshe will. I think she will fight to the end. But one can imagine a dozen ways of inveigling him into the cover of the trees. Again, we may never know whether he had time to recognise her. She hit him over the head with whatever weapon she had brought, taking care to stun but not to kill. She is an experienced tennis player, with a strong forearm, and they tell me that at tennis you learn to judge the force of your blow with great accuracy.” Mr. Tuke’s shrug expressed his own opinion of tennis. “She then rolled him into the stream. He was unconscious, and the Gat Ditch would do the rest. It was all over in a minute or two. She was back at the station in time to catch the last train back to Cambridge, changing into her own clothes in a lavatory as before. She took the nine o’clock bus home, establishing the fact that she was in it by talking to a fellow passenger. As far as she knew, everything had gone according to plan.”
CHAPTER XXVI
TAKING breath, Mr. Tuke discarded his cigar. Parmiter shading his eyes with his hand, shuddered involuntarily. “Horrible!” he said.
Harvey looked at him. “I am afraid this is harrowing you.”
“No, no, I want to
