Miss Silver had finished casting on and was knitting rapidly after the continental fashion. She said in her pleasant voice,

‘Pray, what can I do for you?’

Mrs Smith said, ‘Well, I don’t know.’ She was pleating the edge of the linen handkerchief. ‘I’ve come to see you professionally.’

‘Yes?’

‘I heard about you from a friend – no need to say who it was. In fact from first to last of my business it’s a case of least said soonest mended.’

Knitting was so much second nature to Miss Silver that she was able to give full attention to her client. She said,

‘It does not matter at all who recommended you to consult me, but I must warn you that my ability to help you will depend a good deal on whether you can make up your mind to be frank.’

Mrs Smith’s head came up in the manner which used to be called bridling. She said,

‘Oh, well, that would depend-’

Miss Silver smiled.

‘Upon whether you felt that you could trust me? I cannot help you at all unless you do so. Half measures are quite useless. As Lord Tennyson so beautifully puts it, “Oh trust me all in all, or not at all”.’

‘That,’ said Mrs Smith, ‘is a bit of a tall order.’

‘Perhaps. But you will have to make up your mind. You did not really come here to consult me, did you? You came because you had been told about me, and because you wished to make up your mind as to whether you could trust me or not.’

‘What makes you think of that?’

‘It is the case with so many of my clients. It is not easy to speak to a stranger of one’s private affairs.’

Mrs Smith said with energy,

‘That’s just it – they are private. I wouldn’t want it to get about that I’d been seeing a detective.’

There seemed suddenly to be a considerable distance between herself and Miss Silver. Without word or movement, this small governessy-looking person appeared to have receded. With her neat curled fringe, her dated dress – olive-green cashmere – the bog-oak brooch in the shape of a rose with a pearl at its heart, the black thread stockings, and the glacé shoes, too small for the modern foot, she might have stepped out of any old-fashioned photograph-album.