Three Little Maids(79)

Thora had come into the library without Alice and this was most unusual. Was her sister ill?

She wasn’t left in doubt for long. ‘Mrs Sherlborne you’ve known my sister and I for some years now.’ Thora paused delicately. ‘Alice, how can I explain it- has not been at all well lately. She has- these desires, you see. She likes pretty things. Small trinkets. She’s attracted and-and she takes a fancy to them sometimes.’

‘I see.’

‘I don’t think you do.’ Thora took a deep breath and patted a thread of hair back under her cream straw boater. ‘To be truthful, my sister Alice is a kleptomaniac.’

‘Miss Wilberforce.’ Viviane hoped it didn’t show on her face how shaken she was by this. ‘I don’t know what to say.’

‘I’ve avoided thinking of it like this before. But I have to face up to it.’ Thora sighed. ‘She takes things that don’t belong to her, Mrs Sherlborne. Which so far I have managed to return. I-I have to keep an eye on her. She’s in bed this morning. She says she has a sore throat. But I think she is still sulking. She doesn’t like the thought that I’m telling someone what she does. But I have to do this. I can’t keep it to myself any longer.’

‘Why are you telling me this, Miss Wilberforce?’ Viviane said with an eye on the clock. ‘She needs help. Are you really worried about her behaviour lately?’

‘It’s something she has managed to keep from me during this past day or so. We never keep secrets from each other. Not as a rule. She usually comes clean after a short while. It’s a childish game to her. I always keep a weather eye out and return things to their owners.’

Viviane recalled the worried look that she’d seen on Thora’s face as they walked around the stalls at the Antique fair on the pier.

‘I can’t stop her from looking around at things in sales or shops but it is difficult keeping an eye on her. She is so sorry when I have to scold her. And this time I was really angry.’ Thora took another deep breath and closed her eyes for a second or so.

‘What is the matter, Miss Wilberforce? What has she done?’

‘She has found something which I think now is pertinent to one of the murders.’

‘She’s found something important?’

‘Yes. I’m sure it is. Alice was especially cunning this time. She must have taken a real fancy to it. She hid it in under my black straw in my room. When I felt that she was hiding something from me I searched her room carefully. It was only when I thought of the Carey girl’s funeral. And my black hat for that sad occasion.’ She paused delicately for a moment. ‘That was when I found the anklet in the hat box. She couldn’t deny she’d put it there.’

‘An anklet?’

‘A delicate gold chain anklet and it has a name inscribed on it. Yvette.’

‘The French girl?’

‘Yes- I think it belonged to her. So what was it doing down the side of the sofa in our chapel rest room? That’s what I would like to know, Mrs Sherlborne? And I have been so worried about it.’

‘So where is it now?’

‘I gave it to Mrs Ludlam straight away. That was yesterday. It was property lost in our chapel. And apologized for not doing it sooner. But now, in the light of the investigations, I think I ought to have told the police, shouldn’t I? But how do I explain my sister’s weakness; her bad habits to them without getting her into further trouble? So I thought of you.’

‘But why me, Miss Wilberforce?’

She coloured up with embarrassment. ‘Yes. Well, I understand that the Police Inspector is staying with you. And if you could explain to him how my sister found it then he might be more understanding. Coming from you.’

‘He’s my tenant, Miss Wilberforce. Not my guest. So when did your sister actually find it? Did she tell you?’

‘Last Sunday evening after the service. While we were having a cup of tea upstairs in the committee room. But I only got hold of it yesterday.’

The day after Yvette was killed. And nearly a week gone by. ‘And you say that Gwynith took it from you yesterday?’

‘Yes. I asked her to give it to Aiden to hand into the police station.’

‘So you could have left it at that.’

‘Yes, I know. But I couldn’t sleep last night. Alice is so upset. She won’t discuss it with me. I’ve never scolded her so much before. I feel terrible. And she is so overwrought with guilt now that she realises that it belonged to the dead girl. She had a fit of hysterics when I explained to her the importance of finding it.’

‘Don’t let it worry you anymore. Tell your sister that it was lucky she found it even if she took her time handing it over. You could tell her it might help to catch the wicked man who killed the girl,’ Viviane fibbed. Her heart sank the more she thought of it.