Would he do it again? Did he really mean to do it?
He knew suddenly that he didn't. For no reason. Perhaps the right reason was the one she had given out of her specialised knowledge. Suicides didn't do it again.
All the more he felt determined to force an admission from her on the ethical side.
"At any rate, I've got a right to do what I like with my own life."
"No - no, you haven't."
"But why not, my dear girl, why?"
She flushed. She said, her fingers playing with the little gold cross that hung round her neck: "You don't understand. God may need you."
He stared - taken aback. He did not want to upset her child-like faith. He said mockingly: "I suppose that one day I may stop a runaway horse and save a golden-haired child from death - eh? Is that it?"
She shook her head. She said with vehemence and trying to express what was so vivid in her mind and so halting on her tongue: "It may be just by being somewhere - not doing anything - just by being at a certain place at a certain time - oh, I can't say what I mean, but you might just - just walk along a street some day and just by doing that accomplish something terribly important -perhaps even without knowing what it was."
The red-haired little nurse came from the west coast of Scotland and some of her family had "the sight."
Perhaps, dimly, she saw a picture of a man walking up a road on a night in September and thereby saving a human being from a terrible death ...
February 14th.
There was only one person in the room and the only sound to be heard was the scratching of that person's pen as it traced line after line across the paper.
There was no one to read the words that were being traced. If there had been, they would hardly have believed their eyes. For what was being written was a clear, carefully detailed project for murder.
There are times when a body is conscious of a mind controlling it - when it bows obedient to that alien something that controls its actions. There are other times when a mind is conscious of owning and controlling a body and accomplishing its purpose by using that body.
The figure sitting writing was in the last-named state. It was a mind, a cool, controlled intelligence. This mind had only one thought and one purpose - the destruction of another human being. To the end that this purpose might be accomplished, the scheme was being worked out meticulously on paper. Every eventuality, every possibility was being taken into account. The thing had got to be absolutely fool-proof. The scheme, like all good schemes, not absolutely cut and dried. There were certain actions at certain points. Moreover, since the mind was intelligent, it realised that there must be intelligent provision left for the unforeseen. But the main lines were clear and had been closely tested. The time, the place, the method, the victim! ...
The figure raised its head. With its hand, it picked up the sheets of paper and read them carefully through. Yes, the thing was crystal clear.
Across the serious face a smile came. It was a smile that was not quite sane. The figure drew a deep breath.
As man was made in the image of his Maker, so there was now a terrible travesty of a creator's joy.
Yes, everything planned - everyone's reaction foretold and allowed for, the good and evil in everybody played upon and brought into harmony with one evil design.
There was one thing lacking still...
With a smile the writer traced a date - a date in September.
Then, with a laugh, the paper was torn in pieces and the pieces carried across the room and put into the heart of the glowing fire. There was no carelessness. Every single piece was consumed and destroyed. The plan was now only existent in the brain of its creator.
March 8th.
Superintendent Battle was sitting at the breakfast table. His jaw was set in a truculent fashion and he was reading, slowly and carefully, a letter that his wife had just tearfully handed to him. There was no expression visible on his face, for his face never did register any expression. It had the aspect of a face carved out of wood. It was solid and durable and, in some way, impressive. Superintendent Battle had never suggested brilliance; he was, definitely, not a brilliant man, but he had some other quality, difficult to define, that was nevertheless forceful.
"I can't believe it," said Mrs. Battle, sobbing. "Sylvia!"
Sylvia was the youngest of Superintendent and Mrs. Battle's five children. She was sixteen and at school near Maidstone.
The letter was from Miss Amphrey, headmistress of the school in question. It was a clear, kindly and extremely tactful letter. It set out, in black and white, that various small thefts had been puzzling the school authorities for some time, that the matter had been at last cleared up, that Sylvia Battle had confessed, and that Miss Amphrey would like to see Mr. and Mrs. Battle at the earliest possible opportunity "to discuss the position."
Superintendent Battle folded up the letter, put it in his pocket, and said: "You leave this to me, Mary."
He got up, walked round the table, patted her on the cheek and said, "Don't worry, dear, it will be all right."
He went from the room, leaving comfort and reassurance behind him.
That afternoon, in Miss Amphrey's modern and individualistic drawing-room, Superintendent Battle sat very squarely on his chair, his large wooden hands on his knees, confronting Miss Amphrey, and managing to look, far more than usual, every inch a policeman.
Miss Amphrey was a very successful headmistress. She had personality - a great deal of personality, she was enlightened and up to date, and she combined discipline with modern ideas of self-determination.
Her room was representative of the spirit of Meadway. Everything was of a cool oatmeal colour - there were big jars of daffodils and bowls of tulips and hyacinths. One or two good copies of the antique Greek, two pieces of advanced modern sculpture, two Italian primitives on the walls. In the midst of all this, Miss Amphrey herself, dressed in a deep shade of blue, with an eager face suggestive of a conscientious greyhound, and clear blue eyes looking serious through thick lenses.
"The important thing," she was saying in her clear, well-modulated voice, "is that this should be taken the right way. It is the girl herself we have to think of, Mr. Battle. Sylvia herself! It is most important - most important - that her life should not be crippled in any way. She must not be made to assume a burden of guilt -blame must be very, very sparingly meted out, if at all. We must arrive at the reason behind these quite trivial pilferings. A sense of inferiority, perhaps? She is not good at games, you know - an obscure wish to shine in a different sphere -the desire to assert her ego? We must be very, very careful. That is why I wanted to see you alone first - to impress upon you to be very, very careful with Sylvia. I repeat again, it's very important to get at what's behind this."
"That, Miss Amphrey," said Superintendent Battle, "is why I have come down."
His voice was quiet, his face unemotional, his eyes surveyed the schoolmistress appraisingly.
"I have been very gentle with her," said Miss Amphrey.
Battle said laconically. "Good for you, M'am."
"You see, I really love and understand these young things."
Battle did not reply directly. He said: "I'd like to see my girl now, if you don't mind. Miss Amphrey."
With renewed emphasis Miss Amphrey admonished him to be careful - to go slow - not to antagonise a child just budding into womanhood. Superintendent Battle showed no signs of impatience. He just looked blank.
She took him at last to her study. They passed one or two girls in the passages. They stood politely to attention, but their eyes were full of curiosity. Having ushered Battle into a small room, not quite so redolent of personality as the one downstairs, Miss Amphrey withdrew and said she would send Sylvia to him.
Just as she was leaving the room. Battle stopped her.
"One minute, M'am; how did you come to pitch upon Sylvia as the one responsible for these - er - leakages?"
"My methods, Mr. Battle, were psychological."
Miss Amphrey spoke with dignity.
"Psychological? H'm. What about the evidence, Miss Amphrey?"
"Yes, yes, I quite understand, Mr. Battle - you would feel that way. Your - er -profession steps in. But psychology is beginning to be recognised in criminology. I can assure you that there is no mistake - Sylvia freely admits the whole thing."
Battle nodded.
"Yes, yes -I know that. I was just asking how you came to pitch upon her to begin with."
"Well, Mr. Battle, this business of things being taken out of the girls' lockers was on the increase. I called the school together and told them the facts. At the same time, I studied their faces unobtrusively. Sylvia's expression struck me at once. It was guilty - confused. I knew at that moment who was responsible. I wanted, not to confront her with her guilt, but to get her to admit it herself. I set a little test for her - a word test association."
Battle nodded to show he understood.
"And finally the child admitted it all."
Her father said: "I see."
Miss Amphrey hesitated a minute, then went out.
Battle was standing looking out of the window when the door opened again. He turned round slowly and looked at his daughter.
Sylvia stood just inside the door, which she had closed behind her. She was tall, dark, angular. Her face was sullen and bore marks of tears. She said timidly rather than defiantly: "Well, here I am."
Battle looked at her thoughtfully for a minute or two.
He sighed.
"I should never have sent you to this place," he said. "That woman's a fool."
Sylvia lost sight of her own problems in sheer amazement.
"Miss Amphrey? Oh, but she's wonderful. We all think so."
"H'm," said Battle. "Can't be quite a fool, then, if she sells the idea of herself as well as that. All the same, Meadway wasn't the place for you - although I don't know - this might have happened anywhere."
Sylvia twisted her hands together. She looked down. She said: "I'm - I'm sorry, father. I really am."
"So you should be," said Battle shortly. "Come here."
She came slowly and unwillingly across the room to him. He took her chin in his great square hand and looked closely into her face.
"Been through a good deal, haven't you?" he said gently. Tears started into her eyes.
Battle said slowly: "You see, Sylvia, I've known all along with you that there was something. Most people have got a weakness of some kind or another. Usually it's plain enough. You can see when a child's greedy, or bad-tempered, or got a streak of the bully in him. You were a good child, very quiet - very sweet-tempered - no trouble in any way - and sometimes I've worried. Because if there's a flaw you don't see, sometimes it wrecks the whole show when the article is tried out."
"Like me!" said Sylvia.
"Yes, like you. You've cracked under strain - and in a damned queer way, too. It's a way, oddly enough, I've never come across before."
The girl said suddenly and scornfully: "I should think you'd come across thieves often enough!"
"Oh, yes -I know all about them. And that's why, my dear - not because I'm your father (fathers don't know much about their children), but because I'm a policeman I know well enough you're not a thief! You never took a thing in this place. Thieves are of two kinds, the kind that yields to sudden and overwhelming temptation (and that happens damned seldom - it's amazing what temptation the ordinary normal honest human being can withstand) - and there's the kind that just takes what doesn't belong to them almost as a matter of course. You don't belong to either type. You're not a thief. You're a very unusual type of liar."
Sylvia began, "But -" He swept on.
"You've admitted it all? Oh, yes, I know that. There was a Saint once - went out with bread for the poor. Husband didn't like it. Met her and asked what there was in her basket. She lost her nerve and said it was roses - he tore open her basket and roses it was - a miracle! Now, if you'd been Saint Elizabeth and were out with a basket of roses, and your husband had come along and asked you what you'd got, you'd have lost your nerve and said, 'Bread.'"
He paused and then said gently: "That's how it happened, isn't it?" There was a longer pause and then the girl suddenly bent her head. Battle said: "Tell me, child. What happened exactly?"
"She had us all up. Made a speech. And I saw her eyes on me and I knew she thought it was me! I felt myself getting red - and I saw some of the girls looking at me. It was awful. And then the others began looking at me and whispering in corners. I could see they all thought so. And then the Amp had me up here with some of the others one evening and we played a sort of word-game - she said words and we gave answers -"
Battle gave a disgusted grunt.
"And I could see what it meant - and - and I sort of got paralysed. I tried not to give the wrong word -I tried to think of things quite outside - like squirrels or flowers - and the Amp was there watching me with eyes like gimlets - you know, sort of boring inside one. And after that - oh, it got worse and worse, and one day the Amp talked to me quite kindly and so - so understandingly - and - and I broke down and said I had done it - and, oh! Daddy, the relief!"
Battle was stroking his chin.
"I see."
"You do understand?"
"No, Sylvia, I don't understand, because I'm not made that way. If anyone tried to make me say I'd done something I hadn't I'd feel more like giving them a sock on the jaw. But I see how it came about in your case - and that gimlet-eyed Amp of yours has had as pretty an example of unusual psychology shoved under her nose as any half-baked exponent of misunderstood theories could ask for. The thing to do now is to clear up this mess. Where's Miss Amphrey?"
Miss Amphrey was hovering tactfully near at hand. Her sympathetic smile froze on her face as Superintendent Battle said bluntly: "In justice to my daughter, I must ask that you call in your local police over this."
