THE COLLECTED WORKS OF ETHEL LINA WHITE. Ethel Lina White
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name. It was 'Victoria'. Please keep it a secret, for her sake...But although no one here knows that fact, the envelope which contained the anonymous letter was addressed to 'Miss D. V. Asprey'."
In the pause which followed, the postman's double-knock shook the hall. Then Ignatius became aware, from the fixity of the doctor's expression, and the flicker of his eyes behind his glasses, that he was really thinking rapidly, while he affected to register shocked surprise.
Although he disliked to rush a dramatic situation, he hastened to make his point.
"That letter was written by someone who knew Miss Asprey in her youth. She and Miss Corner were old school-fellows. Now what is the obvious inference?"
He was too late, for the doctor had reached his mental goal.
"Nothing," he said. "Miss Corner's non-complicity is proved by the fact that two other anonymous letters have been received after her death."
"Exactly." Ignatius made the catch for which he had bowled. "Innocuous affairs, to the padre and Blair, both containing a vague childish threat, which the writer has never followed up. Don't they rather give the show away?"
"What show?" asked the doctor.
"That they were written by a loyal friend of Miss Corner's, in order to prove her innocent of writing the first letter to Miss Asprey."
Dr. Perry bit his lip.
"If you mean that I wrote those letters," he said, "I absolutely deny it."
Ignatius rose.
"That settles it," he said. "I can only thank you for wasting your time over our little problem."
As, in his turn, the doctor got up, the door of the study was thrown open, and Mrs. Perry rushed in, followed by the Rector.
"Horatio," she cried, "do look at this letter. It's printed. I believe it's one of them."
In tense silence, Dr. Perry tore open the envelope and crossed to the window, in order to read what was written on the sheet of paper.
While he frowned, in hesitation, unable to decide the wiser course—whether to show the letter which vindicated him from Ignatius' charge, or to keep its contents a secret—Marianne, who was looking over his shoulder, put an end to his difficulty.
One bare arm thrown around her husband's neck, she read it aloud, in triumphant tones:
"'Every one in the village knows that you poisoned Miss Corner for her money'."
The words had scarcely left her lips, when she realised her mistake. The swirl of her orange gown was like a flame licking the dust, as she spun round and held the letter in the fire. Then she caught her husband's arm.
"Well, darling," she cried, "that lets you out. You were in London, today, so you couldn't have written this letter...Oh, don't flutter at me. We know, and they know what they've been hinting in the village."
Her voice suddenly shook with fury, as she turned to Ignatius with a choked command.
"Stop suspecting my husband and find out who wrote this cruel, wicked lie."
CHAPTER XVIII — THE TRAP
"I was wrong to distrust a matrimonial alliance," chuckled Ignatius, when he and the Rector had returned to the study, where the faithful Charles was guarding the biscuits. "Mrs. Perry spilled the beans most effectively. I like the doctor. Poor devil, I wonder he has a patient left, or a shilling in his pocket."
"But she's really kind-hearted," said the Rector. "She sits up with the doctor's poor patients, and is always first with beef-tea."
"Made from the best cut," remarked Ignatius acidly. Then he filled his glass and held it up. "Here's to our anonymous friend. He's finding his range."
"How? That letter was an infamous lie."
"Yes, but it was a definite charge, and not a vague warning. What we have to do is to try and wander in the labyrinth of a chocked mind. If he aims to create an atmosphere of general fear and suspicion, he has spread some useful poison this time."
"'He'?" repeated the Rector. "Then you think it's a man?"
"I do not. On a numerical basis, the chances are the writer is a woman. I use the masculine pronoun solely for convenience...What a confounded nuisance that woman is."
"Who?"
"Miss Corner."
"Remember she's dead, Ignatius."
"Dead or alive, she's nothing but a name, to me. Hang it, I can't be sentimental over your excellent Miss Corner. If she hadn't blundered it, and confused the issues, I could have easily solved your little problem."
It was plain to the Rector that his friend was in excellent spirits; his peaked face wore an elfin grin as he waved his cigarette.
"Your mystery," he said, "is a snake, which I'm out to scotch. But the miserable Miss Corner has chopped it in two, and the halves go wriggling off in opposite directions. I don't know whether to follow the harmless tail, or the poisonous head."
"Then it may be harmless?" asked the Rector eagerly.
"My dear fellow, all the facts point to a mere village storm in a teacup. Jealousy between two single women. One writes the other a spite-letter—gets suspected—so writes one to herself. Then, most unfortunately dies. So a loyal friend writes two foolish anonymous letters, to clear her name."
"We'll give them their names," said the Rector. "Miss Asprey, Miss Corner and the doctor. How have you established your facts?"
As he listened to Ignatius, he kept rubbing his eyeballs and pulling his lids, in the way of a man troubled with nerves.
"Well," he said. "It seems to be Q.E.D. Only Miss Corner could have known Miss Asprey's second name."
"That is the assumption," agreed Ignatius. "But I must know it for a fact. The full name was written in the fly-leaf of all Miss Asprey's old books that I had time to examine. I wanted to find out about what period she suppressed the second. If she was then in her teens, it is unlikely Miss Corner would know it, for Miss Asprey was a senior girl when they first met, and she left the school soon afterwards."
He hit the arm of his chair.
"Confound the Corner woman. Why did she go and die? If I'd a monkey's paw, and could bring her back from the grave, to speak, I wouldn't weaken."
The Rector could believe the boast as he looked at the little man's grim lips.
"But why is all this so important?" he asked.
"Because," declared Ignatius, "everything hinges on the fact as to who wrote that first letter."
He stopped to point to the moths winging around the lamp.
"I'm like one of them—attracted by a lurid possibility. Your little problem may take the wrong turning, and develop into a sinister plot of a malignant personality."
"And you want it to be the poison-head?"
"Heaven forbid." Ignatius spoke piously, but insincerely. "But, if it is, I should count it rare luck to be on the spot, to help."
Although he stressed the last word, the Rector appeared lost to a sense of gratitude.
"It seems commonsense to concentrate on the tail-end," he said. "If you're right about Miss Corner, I suppose the letters will cease, and the village will slowly return to normal."
Ignatius gave a gleeful chuckle.
"That was the position, until tonight," he reminded his friend. "But we have evidence that the anonymous letter-writer is still active. You see, Perry couldn't have written his own letter, because he was in London today. And only a lunatic