The Greatest Works of Anna Katharine Green. Анна Грин

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      I uttered an indignant “No!” which seemed to surprise her. Immediately becoming humble again, she replied it was no matter, that she had tea enough and that the shop would supply cakes and crackers; to all of which I responded with a look which awed her so completely that she almost dropped the dishes with which she was endeavoring to set one of the tables.

      “She does so hate to talk about the murder that it will be a perfect godsend to her to drop into good company like this with no prying neighbors about. Shall I set a chair for you, ma’am?”

      I declined the honor, saying that I would remain seated where I was, adding, as I saw her about to go:

      “Let her walk straight in, and she will be in the middle of the room before she sees me. That will suit her and me too; for after she has once seen me, she won’t be frightened. But you are not to listen at the door.”

      This I said with great severity, for I saw the woman was becoming very curious, and having said it, I waved her peremptorily away.

      She didn’t like it, but a thought of the five dollars comforted her. Casting one final look at the table, which was far from uninvitingly set, she slipped out and I was left to contemplate the dozen or so photographs that covered the walls. I found them so atrocious and their arrangement so distracting to my bump of order, which is of a pronounced character, that I finally shut my eyes on the whole scene, and in this attitude began to piece my thoughts together. But before I had proceeded far, steps were heard in the shop, and the next moment the door flew open and in popped Mrs. Boppert, with a face like a peony in full blossom. She stopped when she saw me and stared.

      “Why, if it isn’t the lady——”

      “Hush! Shut the door. I have something very particular to say to you.”

      “O,” she began, looking as if she wanted to back out. But I was too quick for her. I shut the door myself and, taking her by the arm, seated her in the corner.

      “You don’t show much gratitude,” I remarked.

      I did not know what she had to be grateful to me for, but she had so plainly intimated at our first interview that she regarded me as having done her some favor, that I was disposed to make what use of it I could, to gain her confidence.

      “I know, ma’am, but if you could see how I’ve been harried, ma’am. It’s the murder, and nothing but the murder all the time; and it was to get away from the talk about it that I came here, ma’am, and now it’s you I see, and you’ll be talking about it too, or why be in such a place as this, ma’am?”

      “And what if I do talk about it? You know I’m your friend, or I never would have done you that good turn the morning we came upon the poor girl’s body.”

      “I know, ma’am, and grateful I am for it, too; but I’ve never understood it, ma’am. Was it to save me from being blamed by the wicked police, or was it a dream you had, and the gentleman had, for I’ve heard what he said at the inquest, and it’s muddled my head till I don’t know where I’m standing.”

      What I had said and what the gentleman had said! What did the poor thing mean? As I did not dare to show my ignorance, I merely shook my head.

      “Never mind what caused us to speak as we did, as long as we helped you. And we did help you? The police never found out what you had to do with this woman’s death, did they?”

      “No, ma’am, O no, ma’am. When such a respectable lady as you said that you saw the young lady come into the house in the middle of the night, how was they to disbelieve it. They never asked me if I knew any different.”

      “No,” said I, almost struck dumb by my success, but letting no hint of my complacency escape me. “And I did not mean they should. You are a decent woman, Mrs. Boppert, and should not be troubled.”

      “Thank you, ma’am. But how did you know she had come to the house before I left. Did you see her?”

      I hate a lie as I do poison, but I had to exercise all my Christian principles not to tell one then.

      “No,” said I, “I didn’t see her, but I don’t always have to use my eyes to know what is going on in my neighbor’s houses.” Which is true enough, if it is somewhat humiliating to confess it.

      “O ma’am, how smart you are, ma’am! I wish I had some smartness in me. But my husband had all that. He was a man—O what’s that?”

      “Nothing but the tea-caddy; I knocked it over with my elbow.”

      “How I do jump at everything! I’m afraid of my own shadow ever since I saw that poor thing lying under that heap of crockery.”

      “I don’t wonder.”

      “She must have pulled those things over herself, don’t you think so, ma’am? No one went in there to murder her. But how came she to have those clothes on. She was dressed quite different when I let her in. I say it’s all a muddle, ma’am, and it will be a smart man as can explain it.”

      “Or a smart woman,” I thought.

      “Did I do wrong, ma’am? That’s what plagues me. She begged so hard to come in, I didn’t know how to shut the door on her. Besides her name was Van Burnam, or so she told me.”

      Here was a coil. Subduing my surprise, I remarked:

      “If she asked you to let her in, I do not see how you could refuse her. Was it in the morning or late in the afternoon she came?”

      “Don’t you know, ma’am? I thought you knew all about it from the way you talked.”

      Had I been indiscreet? Could she not bear questioning? Eying her with some severity, I declared in a less familiar tone than any I had yet used:

      “Nobody knows more about it than I do, but I do not know just the hour at which this lady came to the house. But I do not ask you to tell me if you do not want to.”

      “O ma’am,” she humbly remonstrated, “I am sure I am willing to tell you everything. It was in the afternoon while I was doing the front basement floor.”

      “And she came to the basement door?”

      “Yes, ma’am.”

      “And asked to be let in?”

      “Yes, ma’am.”

      “Young Mrs. Van Burnam?”

      “Yes, ma’am.”

      “Dressed in a black and white plaid silk, and wearing a hat covered with flowers?”

      “Yes, ma’am, or something like that. I know it was very bright and becoming.”

      “And why did she come to the basement door—a lady dressed like that?”

      “Because she knew I couldn’t open the front door; that I hadn’t the key. O she talked beautiful, ma’am, and wasn’t proud with me a bit. She made me let her stay in the house, and when I said it would be dark after a while and that СКАЧАТЬ