“Now,” said Peter, “what I want to know is just this. When Uncle John brought you and Mary here, did you have a lease or anything like that?”
“It’s such a long time ago-I’m sure I never thought-”
“Think now,” he said. “Think as hard as you can. Are you sure there wasn’t a lease?”
“Oh, I don’t know-oh, I’m sure there wasn’t-but if there had been-Mary would have known-and she didn’t always tell me things-of course she ought to have-but she didn’t-”
Peter patted her again.
“Don’t bother. If Mary had anything, I’ll find it-it’ll be somewhere in the welter. But think. Did Uncle John ever write to you about your coming here?”
“Oh, no-he was so kind-he came to see us. We were in very poor lodgings, you know-up in Birmingham -after Papa’s death. He failed, you know-and then he died”-and dear John came and fetched us away and gave us these flats-”
“He gave you the flats? What did he say?”
“Oh, I don’t remember,” said Lucy Craddock, and burst into a fresh flood of tears.
She really knew nothing. It took Peter another quarter of an hour to make quite sure of this. If there was any evidence as to John David’s intention with regard to the flats, it would be somewhere in the muddle of papers Mary Craddock had left for him to sort. He very much feared that there wasn’t going to be any evidence.
“And I don’t know what to do,” said Lucy, sobbing-“because I’ve got my tickets-and I’m all packed up-and the train goes at half past seven-but I can’t go away now-can I?”
“Of course you can! Now look here, Lucinda, you’ve got to pull yourself together and carry on. You promised Mary you’d go away for a change, and you’ve got to keep your promise. Don’t you see it’s the very best thing you can do? If you go away you tie Ross’s hands. He can’t very well put your furniture out in the street, and anyhow I’ll be here to see he doesn’t. And you’ll be giving me time to go through the rest of the papers. There may be something that’ll give you a case. So you see, you couldn’t do anything better than be out of the way for a bit. Now if you’ve still got anything to pack you’d better hop along and get on with it.”