The Withdrawing Room by Charlotte MacLeod Read Free Book Online Page B

away and not pester you again. And thank you for at least not laughing in my face.”
    “But I’m not laughing at all,” said Sarah. “The awful part of it is, I can believe you because I know how obnoxious Mr. Quiffen could be. He had a natural gift for making enemies. I know of only two people in the world who had a good word for him and they’re such old sweeties they’d like anybody.”
    Miss Smith nodded. “That doesn’t surprise me. He was always writing the nastiest letters to the papers, mostly about dumb little mistakes anybody could make. I’d read them and think how somebody was going to get in trouble with the boss over that letter, and wonder if this Barnwell Augustus Quiffen had the faintest idea what he might be doing to some poor slob with six kids to support.”
    “I’m sure he neither knew nor cared. If I’d realized what he was like, I’d never have let myself be talked into taking him on as a boarder. But please don’t broadcast that, Miss Smith. I haven’t said that to anyone else, and I shouldn’t have said it to you.”
    “Don’t fret yourself,” the woman replied. “I have nobody left to tell. I don’t visit my old neighbors anymore because I wouldn’t want them seeing what I’ve come down to and thinking I was after a handout, and anybody who knows me well enough to say hello to now thinks I’m just another harmless nut. Then you do think Mr. Quiffen might have pestered somebody into doing something desperate to get rid of him?”
    “I don’t know that I think so. I simply can’t say it’s impossible. You didn’t happen to catch a glimpse of the person you say pushed him?”
    “All I can swear to is a pair of dark leather gloves and the cuffs of a dark overcoat. That’s not much to go on, because no doubt half the men in the crowd were wearing leather gloves and dark coats. I’m not even sure it was a man, though the gloves and coat seemed more like a man’s than a woman’s. I may have jumped to the conclusion that it must be, I suppose, because men are more apt to be violent than women. But there was so much confusion and milling around, and I was right next to him and I was scared I’d get pushed under the train, too, and I was trying to get back and people were pressing me forward. It was such an awful moment I couldn’t think straight, or I might have had sense enough to try for a better look.”
    “How could you have? It must have been utterly terrifying.”
    “Well, I hope I never have to go through another one like that,” Miss Smith agreed. And it was no accident, Mrs. Kelling, and I’m sure he never did it on purpose, either, no matter what the papers say. I mean, here’s this pompous old prune, which is a fine way to speak of the dead and it’s as well my poor mother isn’t alive to hear me, but that’s what he was. And he wasn’t thinking about anything except keeping his distance from me so I wouldn’t contaminate his nice overcoat. And mind you, he wasn’t moving forward, he was stepping back. And I saw what I saw and I’d swear to it on a stack of Bibles, no matter what anybody says.”
    Miss Smith drank off the last of her sherry and set down the glass. And now I must go along, and thank you very kindly.”
    “No,” said Sarah. “I can’t simply let you go like this, after what you’ve told me. First, you’ve got to promise that you won’t make any further attempt to tell anybody else, this story. If someone did in fact push Mr. Quiffen under that train and you’re the only person who’s willing to come forward and say so, then don’t you see that you constitute a threat to the murderer?”
    “Why, I—”
    “You say you didn’t see the face, but how can he be sure of that? How can you, for that matter? You might remember more than the gloves and the coat sleeves once you’ve got over your shock and had a chance to think about it. You’ve already called attention to yourself by trying to tell somebody in authority what you