Partners in Crime

"Her name is Crockett. She was with my aunt about eight or ten years. She is an elderly woman, not very pleasant in manner, but a good servant. She is inclined to give herself airs because her sister married out of her station. Crockett has a nephew whom she is always telling us is 'quite the gentleman.' "

"H'm," said Tommy, rather at a loss how to proceed.

Tuppence had been eyeing Monica keenly, now she spoke with sudden decision.

"I think the best plan would be for Miss Deane to come out and lunch with me. It's just on one o'clock. I can get full details from her."

"Certainly, Miss Sheringham," said Tommy. "An excellent plan."

"Look here," said Tuppence when they were comfortably ensconced at a little table in a neighboring restaurant, "I want to know. Is there any special reason why you want to find out about all this?"

Monica blushed.

"Well, you see-"

"Out with it," said Tuppence encouragingly.

"Well-there are two men who-who-want to marry me."

"The usual story, I suppose? One rich, one poor, and the poor one is the one you like!"

"I don't know how you know all these things," murmured the girl.

"That's a sort of law of Nature," explained Tuppence. "It happens to everybody. It happens to me."

"You see, even if I sell the house, it won't bring us enough to live on. Gerald is a dear, but he's desperately poor-though he's a very clever engineer and if only he had a little capital, his firm would take him into partnership. The other, Mr. Partridge, is a very good man, I am sure-and well off, and if I married him it would be an end of all our troubles. But-but-"

"I know," said Tuppence sympathetically. "It isn't the same thing at all. You can go on telling yourself how good and worthy he is, and adding up his qualities as though they were an addition sum-and it all has a simply refrigerating effect."

Monica nodded.

"Well," said Tuppence, "I think it would be as well if we went down to the neighborhood and studied matters upon the spot. What is the address?"

"The Red House, Stourton in the Marsh."

Tuppence wrote down the address in her note book.

"I didn't ask you," Monica began-"about terms-" she ended, blushing a little.

"Our payments are strictly by results," said Tuppence gravely. "If the secret of the Red House is a profitable one, as seems possible from the anxiety displayed to acquire the property, we should expect a small percentage, otherwise-nothing!"

"Thank you very much," said the girl gratefully.

"And now," said Tuppence, "don't worry. Everything's going to be all right. Let's enjoy lunch and talk of interesting things."

21. The Red House

"Well," said Tommy, looking out of the window of the Crown and Anchor, "here we are at Toad in the Hole-or whatever this blasted village is called."

"Let us review the case," said Tuppence.

"By all means," said Tommy. "To begin with, getting my say in first, I suspect the invalid mother!"

"Why?"

"My dear Tuppence, grant that this poltergeist business is all a put up job, got up in order to persuade the girl to sell the house, someone must have thrown the things about. Now the girl said everyone was at dinner-but if the mother is a thoroughgoing invalid, she'd be upstairs in her room."

"If she was an invalid she could hardly throw furniture about."

"Ah! but she wouldn't be a real invalid. She'd be shamming."

"Why?"

"There you have me," confessed her husband. "I was really going on the well known principle of suspecting the most unlikely person."

"You always make fun of everything," said Tuppence severely. "There must be something that makes these people so anxious to get hold of the house. And if you don't care about getting to the bottom of this matter, I do. I like that girl. She's a dear."

Tommy nodded seriously enough.

"I quite agree. But I never can resist ragging you, Tuppence. Of course there's something queer about the house, and whatever it is, it's something that's difficult to get at. Otherwise a mere burglary would do the trick. But to be willing to buy the house means either that you've got to take up floors or pull down walls, or else that there's a coal mine under the back garden!"

"I don't want it to be a coal mine. Buried treasure is much more romantic."

"H'm," said Tommy. "In that case I think that I shall pay a visit to the local Bank Manager, explain that I am staying here over Christmas and probably buying the Red House, and discuss the question of opening an account."

"But why-?"

"Wait and see."

Tommy returned at the end of half an hour. His eyes were twinkling.