CHAPTER VII
THE VOLUNTARY WITNESS
Everybody present, not excluding Brent, knew the man at whom the Superintendent of Police was staring, and who evidently wished to address the Coroner. He was Mr. Samuel John Epplewhite, an elderly, highly respectable tradesman of the town, and closely associated with that Forward Party in the Town Council of which the late Mayor had become the acknowledged leader; a man of substance and repute, who would not break in without serious reason upon proceedings of the sort then going on. The Coroner, following Hawthwaite's glance, nodded to him.
"You wish to make some observation, Mr. Epplewhite?" he inquired.
"Before you adjourn, sir, if you please," replied Epplewhite, "I should like to make a statement—evidence, in fact, sir. I think, after what we've heard, that it's highly necessary that I should."
"Certainly," answered the Coroner. "Anything you can tell, of course. Then, perhaps you'll step into the witness-box?"
The folk who crowded the court to its very doors looked on impatiently while Epplewhite went through the legal formalities. Laying down the Testament on which he had taken the oath, he turned to the Coroner. But the Coroner again nodded to him.
"You had better tell us what is in your mind in your own way, Mr. Epplewhite," he said. "We are, of course, in utter ignorance of what it is you can tell. Put it in your own fashion."
Epplewhite folded his hands on the ledge of the witness-box and looked around the court before finally settling his eyes on the Coroner: it seemed to Brent as if he were carefully considering the composition, severally and collectively, of his audience.
"Well, sir," he began, in slow, measured accents, "what I have to say, as briefly as I can, is this: everybody here, I believe, is aware that our late Mayor and myself were on particularly friendly terms. We'd always been more or less of friends since his first coming to the town: we'd similar tastes and interests. But our friendship had been on an even more intimate basis during the last year or two, and especially of recent months, owing, no doubt, to the fact that we belonged to the same party on the Town Council, and were both equally anxious to bring about a thorough reform in the municipal administration of the borough. When Mr. Wallingford was elected Mayor last November, he and I, and our supporters on the Council, resolved that during his year of office we would do our best to sweep away certain crying abuses and generally get the affairs of Hathelsborough placed on a more modern and a better footing. We were all–"
The Coroner held up his hand.
"Let us have a clear understanding," he said. "I am gathering—officially, of course—from what you are saying that in Hathelsborough Town Council there are two parties, opposed to each other: a party pledged to Reform, and another that is opposed to Reform. Is that so, Mr. Epplewhite?"
"Precisely so," answered the witness. "And of the Reform party, the late Mayor was the leader. This is well known in the town—it's a matter of common gossip. It is also well known to members of the Town Council that Mr. Wallingford's proposals for reform were of a very serious and drastic nature, that we of his party were going to support them through thick and thin, and that they were bitterly opposed by the other party, whose members were resolved to fight them tooth and nail."
"It may be as well to know what these abuses were which you proposed to reform?" suggested the Coroner. "I want to get a thorough clearing-up of everything."
"Well," responded the witness, with another glance around the court, "the late Mayor had a rooted and particular objection to the system of payments and pensions in force at present, which, without doubt, owes its existence to favouritism and jobbery. There are numerous people in the town drawing money from the borough funds who have no right to it on any ground whatever. There are others who draw salaries for what are really sinecures. A great deal of the ratepayers' money has gone in this way—men in high places in the Corporation have used their power to benefit relations and favourites: I question if there's another town in the country in which such a state of things would be permitted. But there is a more serious matter than that, one which Mr. Wallingford was absolutely determined, with the help of his party, and backed by public opinion, if he could win it over—no easy thing, for we had centuries of usage and tradition against us!—to bring to an end. That is, the fact that the financial affairs of this town are entirely controlled by what is virtually a self-constituted body, called the Town Trustees. They are three in number. If one dies, the surviving two select his successor—needless to say, they take good care that they choose a man who is in thorough sympathy with their own ideas. Now the late Mayor was convinced that this system led to nothing but—well, to put it mildly, to nothing but highly undesirable results, and he claimed that the Corporation had the right to deprive the existing Town Trustees of their power, and to take into its own hands the full administration of the borough finances. And of course there was much bitter animosity aroused by this proposal, because the Town Trustees have had a free hand and done what they liked with the town's money for a couple of centuries!"
The Coroner, who was making elaborate notes, lifted his pen.
"Who are the Town Trustees at present, Mr. Epplewhite?" he inquired.
Epplewhite smiled, as a man might smile who knows that a question is only asked as a mere formality.
"The Town Trustees at present, sir," he answered quietly, "are Mr. Alderman Crood, Deputy Mayor; Mr. Councillor Mallett, Borough Auditor; and Mr. Councillor Coppinger, Borough Treasurer."
Amidst a curious silence, broken only by the scratching of the Coroner's pen, Alderman Crood rose heavily in his place amongst the spectators.
"Mr. Coroner," he said, with some show of injured feeling, "I object, sir, to my name being mentioned in connection with this here matter. You're inquiring, sir–"
"I'm inquiring, Mr. Crood, into the circumstances surrounding the death of John Wallingford," said the Coroner. "If you can throw any light on them, I shall be glad to take your evidence. At present I am taking the evidence of another witness. Yes, Mr. Epplewhite?"
"Well, sir, I come to recent events," continued Epplewhite, smiling grimly as the Deputy-Mayor, flushed and indignant, resumed his seat. "The late Mayor was very well aware that his proposals were regarded, not merely with great dislike, but with positive enmity. He, and those of us who agreed with him, were constantly asked in the Council Chamber what right we had to be endeavouring to interfere with a system that had suited our fathers and grandfathers? We were warned too, in the Council Chamber, that we should get ourselves into trouble–"
"Do you refer to actual threats?" asked the Coroner.
"Scarcely that, sir—hints, and so on," replied the witness. "But of late, in the case of the late Mayor, actual threats have been used. And to bring my evidence to a point, Mr. Coroner, I now wish to make a certain statement, on my oath, and to produce a certain piece of evidence, to show that Mr. Wallingford's personal safety was threatened only a few days before his murder!"
Thus saying, Epplewhite thrust a hand into the inner pocket of his coat, and, producing a letter, held it out at arm's length, so that every one could see it. So holding it, he turned to the Coroner.
"It is just a week ago, sir," he proceeded, "that Mr. Wallingford came to supper at my house. After supper, he and I, being alone, began talking about the subject which was uppermost in our minds—municipal reform. That day I had had considerable talk with two or three fellow-members of the Council who belonged to the opposite party, and as a result I showed to Wallingford that opposition to our plans was growing more concentrated, determined and bitter. He laughed a little satirically. 'It's gone beyond even that stage with me, personally, Epplewhite,' he said. 'Don't you ever be surprised, my friend, if you hear of my being found with a bullet through my head or a knife between my ribs!' 'What do you mean?' said I. 'Nonsense!' He laughed again, and pulled out this envelope. 'All right,' he answered. 'You read that!' I read what was in the envelope, sir—and I now pass it to you!"
The Coroner silently took the letter which was passed across to him from the witness, withdrew a sheet of paper from it, and read the contents with an inscrutable face and amidst a dead silence. It seemed a long time before he turned to the jury. Then, he held up the sheet of paper and the envelope which had contained it.
"Gentlemen!" he said. "I shall have to draw your particular attention to this matter. This is an anonymous letter. From the date on the postmark, it was received by the late Mayor about a week before he showed it to Mr. Epplewhite. It is a typewritten communication. The address on the envelope is typewritten; the letter itself is typewritten. I will now read the letter to you. It is as follows:
"'Mr. Mayor,
"'You are a young man in an old town, but you are old enough and sharp enough to take a hint. Take one now, and mind your own business. What business is it of yours to interfere with good old customs in a place to which you don't belong and where you're still a comparative stranger? You only got elected to the Mayoral chair by one vote, and if you are fool enough to think that you and those behind you are strong enough to upset things you'll find yourself wrong, for you won't be allowed. There's something a deal stronger in this town than what you and them are, and that you'll see proved—or happen you won't see it, for if you go on as you are doing, putting your nose in where you've no right, you'll be made so that you'll never see nor hear again. Things is not going to be upset here for want of putting upsetters out of the way; there's been better men than you quietly sided for less. So take a quiet warning, leave things alone. It would become you a deal better if you'd be a bit more hospitable to the Council and give them a glass of decent wine instead of the teetotal stuff you disgraced the table with when you gave your Mayoral banquet—first time any Mayor of this good old borough ever did such a thing. There's them that's had quite enough of such goings-on, and doesn't mind how soon you're shifted. So mend your ways before somebody makes them as they'll never need mending any more.'
"Now, gentlemen," continued the Coroner, as he laid down the letter, "there are one or two things about that communication to which I wish to draw your attention. First of all, it is the composition of a vulgar and illiterate, or, at any rate, semi-illiterate person. I don't think its phrasing and illiteracy are affected; I think it has been written in its present colloquial form without art or design, by whoever wrote it; it is written, phrased, expressed, precisely as a vulgar, coarse sort of person would speak. That is the first point. The second is—it is typewritten. Now, in these days, there are a great many typewriting machines in use in the town; small as the town is, we know there are a great many, in offices, shops, institutions, banks, even private houses. It is not at all likely that the sender of this letter would employ a professional typist to write it, not even a clerk, nor any employé—therefore he typed it himself. I will invite your attention to the letter, which I now hand to you, and then I will place it in the custody of the police, who will, of course, use their best endeavours to trace it."
He passed the letter over to the foreman of the jury, and turned to the witness-box.
"I conclude, Mr. Epplewhite, that the late Mayor left that letter in your possession?" he asked.
"He did, sir," replied Epplewhite. "He said, half jokingly, 'You can keep that, Epplewhite! If they sacrifice me on the altar of vested interests, it'll be a bit of evidence.' So I locked up the letter in my safe there and then, and it has remained there until this morning."
"You, of course, have no idea as to the identity of the sender?"
"None, sir!"
"Had Mr. Wallingford?"
"Neither of us, sir, formed any conclusion. But we both thought that the letter emanated from some member of the opposition."
"Did Mr. Wallingford take it as a serious threat?"
Epplewhite looked doubtful.
"I scarcely know," he said. "He seemed half-minded about it. To regard it, you know, as half a joke and half serious. But I feel certain that he knew he had enemies who might become—well, deadly. That's my distinct impression, Mr. Coroner."
The typewritten letter went its round of the jury and presently came back to the Coroner. He replaced it in its envelope and handed the envelope to Hawthwaite.
"You must leave no stone unturned in your effort to trace that letter to its source," he said. "That's of the highest importance. And now I think we had better adjourn for–"
But Tansley rose from his seat at Brent's elbow.
"I should like to draw attention to a somewhat pertinent fact, Mr. Coroner," he said. "It seems to have a distinct bearing on what has just transpired. During a search of the deceased's private papers, made by Mr. Brent and myself, yesterday afternoon, we found Mr. Wallingford's will. It was drawn up by himself, in very concise terms, and duly executed, only a few days before his death. It suggests itself to me that he was impelled to this by the threat which is distinctly made in the letter you have just read."
"I think we may take it that the late Mayor felt that he was in some personal danger," answered the Coroner. "What you say, Mr. Tansley, appears to corroborate that."
Then with a few words of counsel to the jury, he adjourned the inquest for ten days, and presently the folk who had listened to the proceedings streamed out into the market-place, excited and voluble. Instead of going away, the greater number of those who had been present lingered around the entrance, and Brent, leaving in Tansley's company a few minutes later, found high words being spoken between Alderman Crood and Epplewhite, who, prominent on the pavement, were haranguing each other amidst a ring of open-mouthed bystanders.
"You were at that game all through what you called your evidence!" vociferated Alderman Crood, who was obviously excited and angry far beyond his wont. "Nice evidence, indeed! Naught is it but trying to fasten blame on to innocent folk!"
"Suggesting!" sneered Mallett, close on his leader's right elbow. "Insinuating!"
"Hinting at things!" said Coppinger, close on the left. "Implying!"
"Dirty work!" shouted Alderman Crood. "Such as nobody but the likes o' you—Radicals and teetotallers and chapel folk!—'ud ever think o' doing. You say straight out before the town what's in your mind, Sam Epplewhite, and I'll see what the law has to say to you! I'm none going to have my character taken away by a fellow o' your sort. Say your say, here in public–"
"I'll say my say at the right time and place, Alderman Crood!" retorted Epplewhite. "This thing's going through! We'll find out who murdered John Wallingford yet—there's no need to go far away to find the murderer!"
Crood's big face grew livid with anger, and his long upper lip began to quiver. He raised his hand, as if to command the attention of the crowd, but just then Hawthwaite and a couple of policemen appeared in the open doorway behind, and Mallett and Coppinger, nudging the big man from either side, led him away along the market-place. And suddenly, from amongst the dispersing crowd, distinct murmurs of disapproval and dislike arose, crystallized in a sharp cry from some man on its outer edge.
"Down wi' the Town Trustees!—they're at t' bottom o' this! Down wi' 'em!"
The Town Trustees retreated before a suddenly awakened chorus of hooting. They disappeared into Mallett's private door at the Bank. Brent, watching and listening with speculative curiosity, felt Tansley touch his arm. He turned, to find the solicitor shaking his head, and with a grave countenance.
"Bad, bad!" muttered Tansley. "Very bad!—once get public opinion set on like that, and–"
"And what?" demanded Brent. He was already so convinced that his cousin had fallen a victim to political hatred that he was rather welcoming the revengeful outburst of feeling. "What, now?"
"There'll be an end of all sensible and practical proceedings in connection with the affair," answered Tansley. "There's a big following of the Reform party in the town amongst the working folk, and if they once get it into their heads that the Conservative lot put your cousin away—well, there'll be hell to pay!"
"Personally," said Brent, with a hardening of his square jaw, "I don't care if there is! If we can only put our hands on the murderers, I don't care if the people hang 'em to those lamp-posts! I shouldn't be sorry to see a little lynch law!"
"Then we shall never get at the truth," retorted Tansley. "We may—only may, mind you!—have got a bit towards it this morning, but not far. If at all—perhaps!"
"That threatening letter?" suggested Brent.
"I attach very little importance to it," said Tansley, "though I wasn't going to say so much in court. In my experience in this town, if I've seen one anonymous letter I've seen a hundred. Hathelsborough folk are given to that sort of thing. No, sir—there's a tremendous lot to come out yet. Don't you be surprised if all sorts of extraordinary developments materialize—perhaps when you're least expecting 'em!"
Brent made no answer. He was not easily surprised, and from the moment of his discovery of the crime he had realized that this was a mystery in the unravelling of which time and trouble would have to be expended freely. But he had a moment of genuine surprise that evening, when, as he sat in his private sitting-room at the Chancellor, he received a note, written in a delicate feminine hand on crested and scented paper, wherein he was requested, in somewhat guarded and mysterious fashion, to step round to the private residence of Mrs. Saumarez.
CHAPTER VIII
MRS. SAUMAREZ
Brent, at that moment, was in a state of mind which made every fibre of his being particularly sensitive to suspicions and speculative ideas—he had no sooner slipped Mrs. Saumarez's note into his pocket than he began to wonder why she had sent for him? Of course, it had something to do with Wallingford's murder, but what? If Mrs. Saumarez knew anything, why did she not speak at the inquest? She had been present all through the proceedings. Brent had frequently turned his eyes on her; always he had seen her in the same watchful, keen-eyed attitude, apparently deeply absorbed in the evidence, and, it seemed to him, showing signs of a certain amount of anxiety. Anxiety—yes, that was it, anxiety. The other spectators were curious, morbidly curious, most of them, but Mrs. Saumarez he felt sure was anxious. And about what? He wondered, but wondering was no good. He must go and see her of course; and presently he made himself ready and set out. But as he crossed the hall of the hotel he encountered Tansley, who was just emerging from the smoking-room. A thought occurred to him, and he motioned Tansley back into the room he had just quitted, and led him to a quiet corner.
"I say," said Brent, "between ourselves, I've just had a note from that Mrs. Saumarez we saw this morning in the Coroner's Court. She wants me to go round to her house at once."
Tansley showed his interest.
"Ah!" he exclaimed. "Then, she's something to tell."
"Why to me?" demanded Brent.
"You're Wallingford's next of kin," said the solicitor laconically. "That's why."
"Wonder what it is?" muttered Brent. "Some feminine fancy maybe."
"Go and find out, man!" laughed Tansley.
"Just so," replied Brent. "I'm going now. But look here—who and what is this Mrs. Saumarez? Post me up."
Tansley waved his cigar in the air, as if implying that you could draw a circle around his field of knowledge.
"Oh, well," he said, "you saw her to-day. So you're already aware that she's young and pretty and charming—and all that. As for the rest, she's a widow, and a wealthy one. Relict, as we say in the law, of a naval officer of high rank, who, I fancy, was some years older than herself. She came here about two years ago and rents a picturesque old place that was built, long since, out of the ruins of the old Benedictine Abbey that used to stand at the rear of what's now called Abbey Gate—some of the ruins, as you know, are still there. Clever woman—reads a lot and all that sort of thing. Not at all a society woman, in spite of her prettiness—bit of a blue-stocking, I fancy. Scarcely know her myself."
"I think you said my cousin knew her?" suggested Brent.
"Your cousin and she, latterly, were very thick," asserted Tansley. "He spent a lot of time at her house. During nearly all last autumn and winter, though, she was away in the South of France. Oh, yes, Wallingford often went to dine with her. She has a companion who lives with her—that elderly woman we saw this morning. Yes, I suppose Wallingford went there, oh, two or three evenings a week. In fact, there were people—gossipers—who firmly believed that he and Mrs. Saumarez were going to make a match of it. Might be so; but up to about the end of last summer the same people used to say that she was going to marry the doctor—Wellesley."
Brent pricked his ears—he scarcely knew why.
"Wellesley?" he said. "What? Was he a—a suitor?"
"Oh, well," answered Tansley, "I think the lady's one of the sort that's much fonder of men's society than of women's, you know. Anyway, after she came here, she and Wellesley seemed to take to each other, and she used to be in his company a good deal—used to go out driving with him, a lot, and so on. And he used to go to the Abbey House at that time just as much as your cousin did of late. But about the end of last summer Mrs. Saumarez seemed to cool off with Wellesley and take on with Wallingford—fact! The doctor got his nose put out by the lawyer! There's no doubt about it; and there's no doubt, either, that the result was a distinct coolness, not to say dislike, between Wellesley and Wallingford, for up to then those two had been rather close friends. But they certainly weren't after Mrs. Saumarez plainly showed a preference for Wallingford. Yet, in spite of that," continued Tansley, as if some after-thought struck him, "I'll say this for Wellesley: he's never allowed his undoubted jealousy of Wallingford to prevent him from supporting Wallingford on the Town Council. Wellesley, indeed, has always been one of his staunchest and most consistent supporters."
"Oh, Dr. Wellesley's on the Town Council, is he?" asked Brent. "And a Reform man?"
"He's Councillor for the Riverside Ward," answered Tansley, "and a regular Radical. In fact he, Wallingford, and that chap Epplewhite, were the three recognized leaders of the Reform party. Yes, Wellesley stuck to Wallingford as leader even when it became pretty evident that Wallingford had ousted him in Mrs. Saumarez's affections—fact!"
"Affections, eh?" surmised Brent. "You think it had come to as much as that?"
"I do!" affirmed Tansley. "Lord bless you, she and Wallingford were as thick as thieves, as our local saying goes. Oh, yes, I'm sure she threw Wellesley over for Wallingford."
Brent heard all this in silence, and remained for a time in further silence.
"Um!" he remarked at last. "Odd! Mrs. Saumarez is an unusually pretty woman. Dr. Wellesley is a very handsome man. Now, my cousin was about as plain and insignificant a chap to look at as ever I came across—poor fellow!"
"Your cousin was a damned clever chap!" said Tansley incisively. "He'd got brains, my dear sir, and where women—cleverish women, anyhow—are concerned, brains are going to win all the way and come in winners by as many lengths as you please! Mrs. Saumarez, I understand, is a woman who dabbles in politics, and your cousin interested her. And when a woman gets deeply interested in a man–?"
"I guess you're right," assented Brent. "Well, I'll step along and see her."
He left Tansley in the hotel and went away along the market-place, wondering a good deal about the information just given to him. So there was a coolness between his cousin and Wellesley, was there, a coolness that amounted, said Tansley, to something stronger? Did it amount to jealousy? Did the jealousy lead to–? But at that point Brent gave up speculating. If there was anything in this new suggestion, Mrs. Saumarez would hold the key. Once more he was face to face with the fact that had steadily obtruded itself upon him during the last two days: that here in this time-worn old place there were folks who had secrets and did things in a curiously secret fashion.
Mrs. Saumarez's house stood a little way back from the street called Abbey Gate, an old, apparently Early Jacobean mansion, set amidst the elms for which Hathelsborough was famous, so profusely and to such a height did they grow all over the town. A smart parlour-maid, who looked inquisitively at him, and was evidently expecting his arrival, admitted Brent, and led him at once along a half-lighted hall into a little room, where the light of a shaded lamp shone on a snug and comfortable interior and on rows of more books than young and pretty women generally possess. Left alone for a few minutes, Brent glanced round the well-filled shelves, and formed the opinion that Mrs. Saumarez went in for very solid reading, chiefly in the way of social and political economy. He began to see now why she and the murdered Mayor had been such close friends—the subjects that apparently interested her had been those in which Wallingford had always been deeply absorbed. Maybe, then, Mrs. Saumarez had been behind the Reform party in Hathelsborough?—there was a woman wire-puller at the back of these matters as a rule, he believed—that sort of thing, perhaps, was Mrs. Saumarez's little hobby. He turned from these speculations to find her at his elbow.
"Thank you for coming, Mr. Brent," she said softly.
Brent looked attentively at her as he took the hand which she held out to him. Seen at closer quarters he saw that she was a much prettier woman than he had fancied; he saw too that, whatever her tastes might be in the way of politics and sociology, she was wholly feminine, and not above enhancing her charms by punctilious attention to her general appearance and setting. She had been very quietly and even sombrely dressed at the inquest that morning, but she was now in evening dress, and her smart gown, her wealth of fair hair, her violet eyes, and the rose tint of her delicate cheek somewhat dazzled Brent, who was not greatly used to women's society. He felt a little shy and a little awkward.
"Yes, yes, I came at once," he said. "I—of course, I gathered that you wanted me."
Mrs. Saumarez smiled, and pointing to an easy chair in front of the bright fire dropped into another close by it.
"Sit down, Mr. Brent," she said. "Yes, I wanted you. And I couldn't very well go to the Chancellor, could I? So thank you again for coming so promptly. Perhaps"—she turned and looked at him steadily—"you're already aware that your cousin and I were great friends?"
"I've heard it," answered Brent. He nodded at one of the book-cases at which she had found him looking. "Similar tastes, I suppose? He was a great hand at that sort of thing."
"Yes," she said. "We had a good deal in common; I was much interested in all his plans, and so on. He was a very clever man, a deeply interesting man, and I have felt—this—more than I'm going to say. And—but I think I'd better tell you why I sent for you."
"Yes," assented Brent.
"I gathered from what was said at the inquest this morning that you are your cousin's sole executor?" she asked.
"I am," replied Brent. "Sole everything."
"Then, of course, you have entire charge and custody of his papers?" she suggested.
"That's so," answered Brent. "Everything's in my possession."
Mrs. Saumarez sighed gently; it seemed to Brent that there was something of relief in the sigh.
"Last autumn and winter," she continued presently, "I was away from home a long time; I was in the South of France. Mr. Wallingford and I kept up a regular, and frequent, correspondence: it was just then, you know, that he became Mayor, and began to formulate his schemes for the regeneration of this rotten little town–"
"You think it's that, eh?" interrupted Brent, emphasizing the personal pronoun. "That's your conviction?"
Mrs. Saumarez's violet eyes flashed, and a queer little smile played for a second round the corner of her pretty lips.
"Rotten to the core!" she said quietly. "Ripe rotten! He knew it!—knew more than he ever let anyone know!"
"More than he ever let you know?" asked Brent.
"I knew a good deal," she replied evasively. "But this correspondence. We wrote to each other twice a week all the time I was away. I have all his letters—there, in that safe."
"Yes?" said Brent.
Mrs. Saumarez looked down at the slim fingers which lay in her lap.
"He kept all mine," she continued.
"Yes?" repeated Brent.
"I want them," she murmured, with a sudden lifting of her eyelids in her visitor's direction. "I, naturally, I don't want them to—to fall into anybody else's hands. You understand, Mr. Brent?"
"You want me to find them?" suggested Brent.
"Not to find them, that is, not to search for them," she replied quickly. "I know where they are. I want you, if you please, to give them back to me."
"Where are they?" asked Brent.
"He told me where he kept them," answered Mrs. Saumarez. "They are in a cedar-wood cabinet, in a drawer in his bedroom."
"All right," said Brent. "I'll get them."
Was he mistaken in thinking that it was an unmistakable sigh of relief that left Mrs. Saumarez's delicate red lips and that an additional little flush of colour came into her cheeks? But her voice was calm and even enough.