N Or M? Part 7

"Not with her on the job," said Tuppence. "It's not the kind of thing you'd bring a child into. I'm quite sure about that, Tommy. I know. You'd keep a child out of it."

"I withdraw," said Tommy. "I'll give you Mrs Sprot and Miss Minton, but I'm not so sure about Mrs Cayley."

"No, she might be a possibility. Because she really does overdo it. I mean there can't be many women quite as idiotic as she seems."

"I have often noticed that being a devoted wife saps the intellect," murmured Tommy.

"And where have you noticed that?" demanded Tuppence.

"Not from you, Tuppence. Your devotion has never reached those lengths."

"For a man," said Tuppence kindly, "you don't really make an undue fuss when you are ill."

Tommy reverted to a survey of possibilities.

"Cayley," said Tommy thoughtfully. "There might be something fishy about Cayley."

"Yes, there might. Then there's Mrs O'Rourke."

"What do you feel about her?"

"I don't quite know. She's disturbing. Rather fee fo fum, if you know what I mean."

"Yes, I think I know. But I rather fancy that's just the predatory note. She's that kind of woman."

Tuppence said slowly: "She - notices things."

She was remembering the remark about knitting.

"Then there's Bletchley," said Tommy.

"I've hardly spoken to him. He's definitely your chicken."

"I think he's just the ordinary pukka old school tie. I think so."

"That's just it," said Tuppence, answering a stress rather than actual words. "The worst of this sort of show is that you look at quite ordinary everyday people and twist them to suit your morbid requirements."

"I've tried a few experiments on Bletchley," said Tommy.

"What sort of thing? I've got some experiments in mind myself."

"Well - just gentle ordinary little traps - about dates and places - all that sort of thing."

"Could you condescend from the general to the particular?"

"Well, say we're talking of duck shooting. He mentions the Fayum - good sport there such and such a year, such and such a month. Some other time I mention Egypt in quite a different connection. Mummies, Tutankhamen, something like that - has he seem that stuff? When was he there? Check up on the answers. Or P.& O. boats - I mention the names of one or two, say so-and-so was a comfortable boat. He mentions some trip or other, later I check that. Nothing important, or anything that puts him on his guard - just a check up on accuracy."

"And so far he hasn't slipped up in any way?"

"Not once. And that's a pretty good test, let me tell you, Tuppence."

"Yes, but I suppose if he was N, he would have his story quite pat."

"Oh, yes - the main outlines of it. But it's not so easy not to trip up on unimportant details. And then occasionally you remember too much - more, that is, than a bona fide person would do. An ordinary person doesn't usually remember offhand whether they took a certain shooting trip in 1926 or 1927. They have to think a bit and search their memory."

"But so far you haven't caught Bletchley out?"

"So far he's responded in a perfectly normal manner."

"Result - negative."

"Exactly."

"Now," said Tuppence. "I'll tell you some of my ideas."

And she proceeded to do so.

III.

On her way home, Mrs Blenkensop stopped at the post office. She bought stamps and on her way out, went into one of the public call boxes. There she rang up a certain number, and asked for "Mr Faraday." This was the accepted method of communication with Mr Grant. She came out smiling and walked slowly homewards, stopping on the way to purchase some knitting wool.

It was a pleasant afternoon with a light breeze. Tuppence curbed the natural energy of her own brisk trot to that leisurely pace that accorded with her conception of the part of Mrs Blenkensop. Mrs Blenkensop had nothing on earth to do with herself except knit (not too well) and write letters to her boys. She was always writing letters to her boys - sometimes she left them about half finished.

Tuppence came slowly up the hill towards Sans Souci. Since it was not a through road (it ended at Smugglers' Rest, Commander Haydock's house) there was never much traffic - a few tradesmen's vans in the morning. Tuppence pa.s.sed house after house, amusing herself by noting their names. Bella Vista (inaccurately named, since the merest glimpse of the sea was to be obtained, and the main view was the vast Victorian bulk of Edenholme on the other side of the road). Karachi was the next house. After that came s.h.i.+rley Tower. Then Sea View (appropriate this time), Castle Clare (somewhat grandiloquent, since it was a small house), Trelawny, a rival establishment to that of Mrs Perenna, and finally the vast maroon bulk of Sans Souci.

It was just as she came near to it that Tuppence became aware of a woman standing by the gate peering inside. There was something tense and vigilant about the figure.

Almost unconsciously. Tuppence softened the sound of her own footsteps, stepping cautiously upon her toes.

It was not until she was close behind her, that the woman heard her and turned. Turned with a start.

She was a tall woman, poorly, even meanly dressed, but her face was unusual. She was not young - probably between forty and fifty - but there was a contrast between her face and the way she was dressed. She was fair-haired, with wide cheekbones and had been - indeed still was - beautiful. Just for a minute Tuppence had a feeling that the woman's face was somehow familiar to her, but the feeling faded. It was not, she thought, a face easily forgotten.

The woman was obviously startled, and the flash of alarm that flitted across her face was not lost on Tuppence. (Something odd here?) Tuppence said: "Excuse me, are you looking for someone?"

The woman spoke in a slow foreign voice, p.r.o.nouncing the words carefully as though she had learned them by heart.

"This 'ouse is Sans Souci?"

"Yes. I live here. Did you want someone?"

There was an infinitesimal pause, then the woman said: "You can tell me, please. There is a Mr Rosenstein there, no?"

"Mr Rosenstein?" Tuppence shook her head. "No. I'm afraid not. Perhaps he has been there and left. Shall I ask for you?"

But the strange woman made a quick gesture of refusal. She said: "No - no. I make mistake. Excuse, please."

Then, quickly, she turned and walked rapidly down the hill again.

Tuppence stood staring after her. For some reason, her suspicions were aroused. There was a contrast between the woman's manner and her words. Tuppence had an idea that "Mr Rosenstein" was a fiction, that the woman had seized at the first name that came into her head.

Tuppence hesitated a minute, then she started down the hill after the other. What she could only describe as a "hunch" made her want to follow the woman.

Presently, however, she stopped. To follow would be to draw attention to herself in a rather marked manner. She had clearly been on the point of entering Sans Souci when she spoke to the woman; to reappear on her trail would be to arouse suspicion that Mrs Blenkensop was something other than appeared on the surface - that is to say if this strange woman was indeed a member of the enemy plot.

No, at all costs Mrs Blenkensop must remain what she seemed.

Tuppence turned and retraced her steps up the hill. She entered Sans Souci and paused in the hall. The house seemed deserted, as was usual early in the afternoon. Betty was having her nap, the elder members were either resting or had gone out.

Then, as Tuppence stood in the dim hall thinking over her recent encounter, a faint sound came to her ears. It was a sound she knew quite well - the faint echo of a ting.

The telephone at Sans Souci was in the hall. The sound that Tuppence had just heard was the sound made when the receiver of an extension is taken off or replaced. There was one extension in the house - in Mrs Perenna's bedroom.

Tommy might have hesitated. Tuppence did not hesitate for a minute. Very gently and carefully she lifted off the receiver and put it to her ear.

Someone was using the extension. It was a man's voice. Tuppence heard: "- everything going well. On the Fourth, then, as arranged."

A woman's voice said: "Yes, carry on."

There was a click as the receiver was replaced.

Tuppence stood there frowning. Was that Mrs Perenna's voice? Difficult to say with only those three words to go upon. If there had been only a little more to the conversation. It might, of course, be quite an ordinary conversation - certainly there was nothing in the words she had overheard to indicate otherwise.

A shadow obscured the light from the door. Tuppence jumped and replaced the receiver as Mrs Perenna spoke.

"Such a pleasant afternoon. Are you going out, Mrs Blenkensop, or have you just come in?"

So it was not Mrs Perenna who had been speaking from Mrs Perenna's room. Tuppence murmured something about having had a pleasant walk and moved to the staircase.

Mrs Perenna moved along the hall after her. She seemed bigger than usual. Tuppence was conscious of her as a strong athletic woman.

She said: "I must get my things off," and hurried up the stairs. As she turned the corner of the landing she collided with Mrs O'Rourke, whose vast bulk barred the top of the stairs.

"Dear, dear, now, Mrs Blenkensop, it's a great hurry you seem to be in."

She did not move aside, just stood there smiling down at Tuppence just below her. There was, as always, a frightening quality about Mrs O'Rourke's smile.

And suddenly, for no reason, Tuppence felt afraid.

The big smiling Irishwoman, with her deep voice, barring her way and below Mrs Perenna closing in at the foot of the stairs.

Tuppence glanced over her shoulder. Was it her fancy that there was something definitely menacing in Mrs Perenna's upturned face? Absurd, she told herself, absurd. In broad daylight - in a commonplace seaside boarding house. But the house was so very quiet. Not a sound. And she herself here on the stairs between the two of them. Surely there was something a little queer in Mrs O'Rourke's smile - some fixed ferocious quality about it. Tuppence thought wildly, "Like a cat with a mouse."

And then suddenly the tension broke. A little figure darted along the top landing uttering shrill squeals of mirth. Little Betty Sprot in vest and knickers, darting past Mrs O'Rourke, shouting happily "Peek Bo," as she flung herself on Tuppence.

The atmosphere had changed. Mrs O'Rourke, a big genial figure, was crying out: "Ah, the darlin'. It's a great girl she's getting."

Below, Mrs Perenna had turned away to the door that led into the kitchen. Tuppence, Betty's hand clasped in hers, pa.s.sed Mrs O'Rourke and ran along the pa.s.sage to where Mrs Sprot was waiting to scold the truant.

Tuppence went in with the child.

She felt a queer sense of relief at the domestic atmosphere - the child's clothes lying about, the woolly toys, the painted crib, the sheeplike and somewhat unattractive face of Mr Sprot in its frame on the dressing- table, the burble of Mrs Sprot's denunciation of laundry prices and really she thought Mrs Perenna was a little unfair in refusing to sanction guests having their own electric irons - All so normal, so rea.s.suring, so everyday.

And yet - just now - on the stairs.

"Nerves," said Tuppence to herself. "Just nerves!"

But had it been nerves? Someone had been telephoning from Mrs Perenna's room. Mrs O'Rourke? Surely a very odd thing to do. It ensured, of course, that you would not be overheard by the household.

It must have been, Tuppence thought, a very short conversation. The merest brief exchange of words.

"Everything going well. On the fourth a arranged."

It might mean nothing - or a good deal.

The fourth. Was that a date? The fourth, say of a month?

Or it might mean the fourth seat, or the fourth lamppost, or the fourth breakwater - impossible to know.

It might just conceivably mean the Fourth Bridge. There had been an attempt to blow that up in the last war.

Did it mean anything at all?

It might quite easily have been the confirmation of some perfectly ordinary appointment. Mrs Perenna might have told Mrs O'Rourke she could use the telephone in her bedroom any time she wanted to do so.

And the atmosphere on the stairs, that tense moment, might have been just her own overwrought nerves...

The quiet house - the feeling that there was something sinister - something evil...

"Stick to facts, Mrs Blenkensop," said Tuppence sternly. "And get on with your job."

Chapter 5.

Commander Haydock turned out to be a most genial host. He welcomed Mr Meadowes and Major Bletchley with enthusiasm and insisted on showing the former "all over my little place."

"Smugglers' Rest" had been originally a couple of coastguards' cottages standing on the cliff overlooking the sea. There was a small cove below, but the access to it was perilous, only to be attempted by adventurous boys.

Then the cottages had been bought by a London business man who had thrown them into one and attempted half-heartedly to make a garden. He had come down occasionally for short periods in summer.

After that the cottages had remained empty for some years, being let with a modic.u.m of furniture to summer visitors.

"Then in 1926," explained Haydock, "it was sold to a man called Hahn. He was a German, and if you ask me, he was neither more nor less than a spy."