“Blackmail,” said Raymond Ferens softly.
“I thought it the most probable explanation,” said Macdonald, “so I looked around to see which persons in the locality might have been susceptible to blackmail to the tune of some £200 yearly over a period of ten years. And I considered that the amount of the sum paid eliminated the village folk at once. The Venners, Mrs. Yeo, Wilson, Doone—would they have paid out nearly £4 weekly for ten years? Of course they wouldn’t. The idea was ludicrous. It represented over three quarters of what any of them earned. Not the villagers, and certainly not Sanderson—he’d only been here two and a half years. Not Dr. Ferens. He was a newcomer. Obviously one’s mind went to the most wealthy—Sir James and Lady Ridding. I eliminated Sir James after some consideration. If there had been any cause or fact which would have resulted in Miss Torrington being able to blackmail Sir James, Lady Ridding herself would not have upheld the Warden through thick and thin. In other words, if Sir James Ridding had had an affair with the Warden in time past, Lady Ridding would have sacked the Warden out of hand. Not for one moment would Lady Ridding have countenanced such an outrage to her own dignity.”
“But if Lady Ridding hadn’t known,” put in Anne.
“She would have known,” put in Macdonald. “You make a great mistake if you think she is stupid. She isn’t anything of the kind. Lady Ridding has the brains which make a profit out of pedigree cattle, dairying and mixed farming as well as market gardening. She is extremely astute. And the rumours which have been going round about her making vast sums out of black market butter seemed to me utterly silly. To make a success out of farming, which she certainly does, makes her very cognisant of regulations and penalties. It simply wouldn’t be worth her while to take the risk of black marketing. And to do her justice, I think she has the commercial honesty which was characteristic of her generation. She’d drive a hard bargain, but she’s too much commonsense to risk her dignity and good name for the profits on butter at 10/- a pound. And anybody who knows anything about dairy farming can tell you there isn’t so very much profit in selling butter at 10/- a pound.”
“Perfectly true,” said Anne, “and I think you’re quite right about her being astute. We tend to laugh at her because of the grande manière cult. But, Mr. Chief Inspector, since she is astute, wouldn’t she have been aware of the goings-on which you postulated in a different quarter altogether, outside her own home?”
It was Reeves who answered this. “She was aware of it,” he said bluntly. “I’ve no evidence for saying so. It’s just that I knew when I heard her talking, like Mrs. Ferens knew the Warden was wicked. And being a perfect lady brought up in the early nineteen hundreds, Lady R. knew when to look the other way, as a lady should. After all, the irregularity wasn’t in her own household, and both Dr. Brown and the Warden were very useful to her.”
Anne Ferens looked at him thoughtfully. “You’re a bit shattering, aren’t you…sitting there making daisy chains.”
3
“I think it’s time we got back to facts,” said Macdonald. “At the moment Reeves is off duty: he can say what he likes. He has no basis in fact to support his statement that Lady Ridding knew that her medical practitioner and her Warden had misconducted themselves in years gone by, but I agree with him that Lady Ridding is past mistress of the art of looking the other way when self-interest prompts her to do so. I also think I’m on firm ground when I maintain that ‘her ladyship’ would not have tolerated irregularities in her own household. The fact that Lady Ridding supported the Warden was an indication to me that Sir James was not involved. I used the same argument about the Vicar and his wife. They both said Miss Torrington was wonderful: ergo, they did not pay her blackmail. All these arguments were hypothetical, so I turned to further facts. Dr. Ferens and the bailiff gave an excellent demonstration that it was highly improbable that deceased collapsed on the bridge. The fact that Sanderson assisted so vigorously in the experiment made it more than ever improbable that he was responsible for the murder. But after I had walked up and down that hill once or twice I pondered over another argument. Reeves and I postulated that deceased had gone to meet somebody near the mill, having met the same person there before. But why at the mill? It seemed to me that the garden at Gramarye, or that seat where I sat and talked to Miss Braithwaite, were much more convenient places to meet. What was there against them? The answer was the steep hill. If a person were aged and infirm that hill would be a tough proposition for them. Dr. Brown was one of the few people concerned whose age and frailty made it very hard for him to walk up that hill, and his car was so old and noisy that everybody in the village knew the sound of it. Again, there was nothing conclusive in that, but it fitted in with other possibilities.”
“You give me the creeps,” said Anne. “I knew you would be very expert fact finders, but I didn’t think you’d argue out all the personal qualities, or that you’d notice
