Three Little Maids(77)

What did it all mean? She had to tell the Inspector that there was a letter he needed to find and the gold anklet. He would have to believe her. If he was a sceptic; she couldn’t help him. Or Yvette, who was trying to form these impressions in her mind. She had to help them both.

She would phone him about it. First thing. And trust that he would understand how she received this information. And not think she was trying to con him to suit her own purpose.





59





‘Alice Wilberforce, you’re hiding something from me and I mean to find out what it is before this day is out.’

Thora Wilberforce stood over her sister’s bed, with a threatening look on her gaunt face, her arms folded tightly across her bony chest. She meant what she said. Alice shrunk back against the pillows, her lips were pursed together tightly, and there was a rebellious look in her tear washed eyes.

‘Go away, Thora Wilberforce. I’m not listening. Shut the door after you. I’ve got nothing to say to you.’

‘It’s no use behaving like a silly child, Alice,’ Thora said grimly. ‘If you won’t tell me, I’ll have to look for it, won’t I? And find it I shall.’

‘You’re wrong. You won’t find anything.’

Alice’s bottom lip trembled and her eyes filled with tears afresh as she watched Thora going through her wardrobe. All the pockets in her suit jackets and coats were searched. And the suit case and hat boxes taken out and the contents examined meticulously as if Thora’s life depended on it. The chest of drawers followed. Thora was unable to hide her agitation. Alice sniffed and gulped, and snatched out clumps of tissues from the box beside her on the bed.

‘I know you’ve got it hidden away somewhere I can tell,’ Thora said when her search revealed nothing.

What could she do about it? Nothing at all. Unless her sister co-operated. What would their dear father, the Colonel, have said if he knew the dire trouble Alice had brought on them? It had caused her so much anxiety during the last few years. It was the little things that attracted her. Alice had the sharp eyes and the habits of a magpie. Usually, Thora could control this by making her sister turn out her handbag and pockets on return from any shopping trip. Luckily, supermarkets didn’t come into it. Alice was not interested in such a mundane thing as food. All their daily needs were supplied by the hotel. And they were so fortunate, that through the kindness of the proprietor, Mrs Frost, to be allowed special rates all year round.

Alice usually did as she was told except for occasional lapses in Charity shops. Where an apologetic Thora retrieved and replaced her sister’s light-fingered fancies under the pretence of absent mindedness in old age before they left the premises. But this was different. Thora knew that Alice had managed to evade her sister’s ever watchful eyes. And it had happened sometime on the weekend. Soon after this she started to show by her childish behaviour that she’d picked something up, and managed to keep it from her.

Like a naughty child, she enjoyed keeping her secret from her sister. She was smiling serenely now. She was pleased with herself. Why was that? It must be something special. And she’d stumped Thora for the time being. It was a lost cause without her full co-operation.

Thora was desperate. Feeling by now sick with worry. One of these days, Alice was going to pick up something really valuable that Thora couldn’t excuse her for. The disgrace that would follow if the police were brought in she couldn’t bear to think about. Perhaps this was about to happen now.

‘You can stop smirking, Alice. I shall find it. Wherever you’ve hidden it. You can’t keep it out of sight forever.’

Alice said nothing. She obviously thought silence was her best weapon. She lay back against the pillows. This was a tussle of strong wills. And Thora knew that this time, if she couldn’t find the object, Alice would hold out on her. She sighed heavily.

She decided to let it drop for a while. Alice must be pretty sure of herself. She usually gave up her acquisition straight away. She wondered if it was anything of Esmeralda’s. The clairvoyant, since she’d been staying at the hotel, had given Thora some real cause of alarm.

Esmeralda liked to show off some valuable ivory and jade Netsuke pieces to anyone interested but refused to put them in the hotel safe. Instead she kept them in the capacious tapestry bag she carried around with her. And Esmeralda liked to handle them often. It calmed her, she said, during a trying day. A tiny carved jade figure of a mouse fell beneath her chair on one occasion in the TV room. Alice pounced on it. Thora breathed a sigh of relief when her sister handed it back to Esmeralda immediately.