In the Mayor's Parlour

Chapter 8

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.

"Thank you," she said. "So good of you. Of course, they aren't of the faintest interest to anybody. I can have them, then--when?"

Brent rose to his feet.

"When I was taught my business," he said, with a dry smile, "I'd a motto drummed into my head day in and day out. DO IT NOW! So I guess I'll just go round to my cousin's old rooms and get you that cabinet at once."

Mrs. Saumarez smiled. It was a smile that would have thrilled most men. But Brent merely got a deepened impression of her prettiness.

"I like your way of doing things," she said. "That's business. You ought to stop here, Mr. Brent, and take up your cousin's work."

"It would be a fitting tribute to his memory, wouldn't it?" answered Brent. "Well, I don't know. But this letter business is the thing to do now. I'll be back in ten minutes, Mrs. Saumarez."

"Let yourself in, and come straight here," she said. "I'll wait for you."

Wallingford's old rooms were close at hand--only round the corner, in fact--and Brent went straight to them and into the bedroom. He found the cedar cabinet at once; he had, in fact, seen it the day before, but finding it locked had made no attempt to open it. He carried it back to Mrs. Saumarez, set it on her desk, and laid beside it a bunch of keys.

"I suppose you'll find this key amongst those," he said. "They're all the private keys of his that I have anyway."

"Perhaps you will find it?" she suggested. "I'm a bad hand at that sort of thing."

Brent had little difficulty in finding the right key. Unthinkingly, he raised the lid of the cabinet--and quickly closed it again. In that momentary glimpse of the contents it seemed to him that he had unearthed a dead man's secret. For in addition to a pile of letters he had seen a woman's glove; a knot of ribbon; some faded flowers.

"That's it," he said hurriedly, shutting down the lid and affecting to have seen nothing. "I'll take the key off the bunch."

Mrs. Saumarez took the key from him in silence, relocked the cabinet, and carried it over to a safe let in to the wall of the room.

"Thank you, Mr. Brent," she said. "I'm glad to have those letters."

Brent made as if to leave. But he suddenly turned on her.

"You know a lot," he remarked brusquely. "What's your opinion about my cousin's murder?"

Mrs. Saumarez remained silent so long that he spoke again.

"Do you think, from what you've seen of things in this town, that it was what we may call political?" he asked. "A--removal?"

He was watching her closely, and he saw the violet eyes grow sombre, and a certain hardness settle about the lines of the well-shaped mouth and chin.

"It's this!" she said suddenly. "I told you just now that this town is rotten--rotten and corrupt, as so many of these little old-world English boroughs are! He knew it, poor fellow; he's steadily been finding it out ever since he came here. I dare say you, coming from London, a great city, wouldn't understand, but it's this way: this town is run by a gang, the members of which manoeuvre everything for their own and their friends' benefit, their friends and their hangers-on, their associates, their toadies. They----"

"Do you mean the Town Trustees?" asked Brent.

"Not wholly," replied Mrs. Saumarez. "But all that Epplewhite said to-day about the Town Trustees is true. The three men control the financial affairs of the borough. Wallingford, by long and patient investigation, had come to know how they controlled them, and how utterly corrupt and rotten the whole financial administration is. If you could see some of the letters of his which I have in that safe----"

"Wouldn't it be well to produce them?" suggested Brent.

"Not yet anyway," she said. "I'll consider that--much of it's general statement, not particular accusation. But the Town Trustees question is not all. Until very recently, when a Reform party gradually got into being and increased steadily--though it's still in a minority--the whole representation and administration of the borough was hopelessly bad and unprincipled. For what do you suppose men went into the Town Council? To represent the ratepayer, the townspeople? No, but to look after their own interests; to safeguard themselves; to get what they could out of it: the whole policy of the old councils was one of--there's only one word for it, Mr. Brent, and that's only just becoming Anglicized--Graft! Now, the Corporation of a town is supposed to exist for the good, the welfare, the protection of a town, but the whole idea of these Hathelsborough men, in the past, has been to use their power and privileges as administrators, for their own ends. So here you've had, on the one hand, the unfortunate ratepayer and, on the other, a close Corporation, a privileged band of pirates, battening on them. In plain words, there are about a hundred men in Hathelsborough who have used the seven or eight thousand other folk as a means to their own ends. The town has been a helpless, defenceless thing, from which these harpies have picked whatever they could lay their talons on!"

"That's the conclusion he'd come to?" asked Brent.

"He couldn't come to any other after many years of patient investigation," declared Mrs. Saumarez. "And he was the sort of man who had an inborn hatred of abuses and shams and hypocrisy! And now put it to yourself--when a man stands up against vested interests, such as exist here, and says plainly that he's never going to rest, nor leave a stone unturned, until he's made a radical and thorough reformation, do you think he's going to have a primrose path of it? Bah! But he knew! He knew his danger."

"But--murder?" said Brent. "Murder!"

Mrs. Saumarez shook her head.

"Yes," she answered. "But there are men in this place who wouldn't stick at even that! You don't know. If Wallingford had done all the things he'd vowed to do, there would have been such an exposure of affairs here as would have made the whole country agape. And some men would have been ruined--literally. I know! And things will come out and be tracked down, if no red herrings are drawn across the trail. You're going to get at the truth?"

"By God, yes!" exclaimed Brent, with sudden fervour. "I am so!"

"Look for his murderers amongst the men he intended to show up, then!" she said, with a certain fierce intensity. "And look closely--and secretly! There's no other way!"

Brent presently left her and went off wondering about the contents of the little cabinet. He would have wondered still more if he had been able to look back into the cosy room which he had just left. For when he had gone, Mrs. Saumarez took the cabinet from the safe and carefully emptied the whole of its contents into the glowing heart of the fire. She stood watching as the flames licked round them, and until there was nothing left there but black ash.