‘What rhymes with “supercilious”?’ asked Veronica sweetly.
Mr Goodman considered, stroking chin reflectively.
‘Bilious?’ he suggested.
Miss Elvery gave a despairing cluck.
‘That won’t do at all. It’s such an ugly word.’
‘And such an ugly feeling,’ shuddered Mr Goodman. Then: ‘What are you writing?’ he asked.
She confessed to her task.
‘Good heavens!’ he said despairingly. ‘Fancy writing poetry at this time in the morning! It’s almost like drinking before lunch. Who is it about?’
She favoured him with an arch smile. ‘You’ll think I’m an awful cat if I tell you.’ And, as he reached out to take her manuscript: ‘Oh, I really couldn’t—it’s about somebody you know.’
Mr Goodman frowned.
‘“Supercilious” was the word you used. Who on earth is supercilious?’
Veronica sniffed—she always sniffed when she was being unpleasant.
‘Don’t you think she is—a little bit? After all, her father only keeps a boarding house.’
‘Oh, you mean Miss Redmayne?’ asked Goodman quietly. He put down his paper. ‘A very nice girl. A boarding house, eh? Well, I was the first boarder her father ever had, and I’ve never regarded this place as a boarding house.’
There was a silence, which the girl broke. ‘Mr Goodman, do you mind if I say something?’
‘Well, I haven’t objected so far, have I?’ he smiled.
‘I suppose I’m naturally romantic,’ she said. ‘I see mystery in almost everything. Even you are mysterious.’ And, when he looked alarmed: ‘Oh, I don’t mean sinister!’
He was glad she did not.
‘But Colonel Redmayne is sinister,’ she said emphatically.
He considered this.
‘He never struck me that way,’ he said slowly.
‘But he is,’ she persisted. ‘Why did he buy this place miles from everywhere and turn it into a boarding house?’
‘To make money, I suppose.’
She smiled triumphantly and shook her head.
‘But he doesn’t. Mamma says that he must lose an awful lot of money. Monkshall is very beautiful, but it has got an awful reputation. You know that it is haunted, don’t you?’
He laughed good-naturedly at this. Mr Goodman was an old boarder and had heard this story before.
‘I’ve heard things and seen things. Mamma says that there must have been a terrible crime committed here. It is!’ She was more emphatic.
Mr Goodman thought that her mother let her mind dwell too much on murders and crimes. For the stout and fussy Mrs Elvery wallowed in the latest tragedies which filled the columns of the Sunday newspapers.
‘She does love a good murder,’ agreed Veronica. ‘We had to put off our trip to Switzerland last year because of the River Bicycle Mystery. Do you think Colonel Redmayne ever committed a murder?’
‘What a perfectly awful thing to say!’ said her shocked audience.
‘Why is he so nervous?’ asked Veronica intensely. ‘What is he afraid of? He is always refusing boarders. He refused that nice young man who came yesterday.’
‘Well, we’ve got a new boarder coming tomorrow,’ said Goodman, finding his newspaper again.
‘A parson!’ said Veronica contemptuously. ‘Everybody knows that parsons have no money.’
He could chuckle at this innocent revelation of Veronica’s mind.
‘The colonel could make this place pay, but he won’t.’ She grew confidential. ‘And I’ll tell you something more. Mamma knew Colonel Redmayne before he bought this place. He got into terrible trouble over some money—Mamma doesn’t exactly know what it was. But he had no money at all. How did he buy this house?’
Mr Goodman beamed.
‘Now that I happen to know all about! He came into a legacy.’
Veronica was disappointed and made no effort to hide the fact. What comment she might have offered was silenced by the arrival of her mother.
Not that Mrs Elvery ever ‘arrived’. She bustled or exploded into a room, according to the measure of her exuberance. She came straight across to the settee where Mr Goodman was unfolding his paper again.
‘Did you hear anything last night?’ she asked dramatically.
He nodded.
‘Somebody in the next room to me was snoring like the devil,’ he began.
‘I occupy the next room to you, Mr Goodman,’ said the lady icily. ‘Did you hear a shriek?’
‘Shriek?’ He was startled.
‘And I heard the organ again last night!’
Goodman sighed.
‘Fortunately I am a little deaf. I never hear any organs or shrieks. The only thing I can hear distinctly is the dinner gong.’
‘There is a mystery here.’ Mrs Elvery was even more intense than her daughter. ‘I saw that the day I came. Originally I intended staying a week; now I remain here until the mystery is solved.’
He smiled good-humouredly.
‘You’re a permanent fixture, Mrs Elvery.’
