Page:Fletcher - The Mortover Grange Affair.pdf/135

 given it to him, either. I suppose you'll go there now?"

"At once!" answered Wedgwood.

"Then you might tell her to let me hear from her," said the manageress. "Of course, if she's not well, it can't be helped. But we're short-handed."

Within half an hour Wedgwood was knocking at the door of 350 Mornington Crescent. It was now after dusk, but he could see enough of the house to recognize a typical lodging and boarding establishment of those parts, of the shabby-genteel, seen-better-days order, and he was not surprised when a faded, careworn-looking woman opened the door to him.

"Miss Mortover at home?" enquired Wedgwood. "Miss Avice Mortover!"

Instead of replying the woman held the door open more widely, motioning him to enter. She closed it when he had stepped in, and still preserving silence ushered him into a front parlour and turned up a solitary gas jet.

"Is it some relation of Miss Mortover's?" she asked, eyeing the detective timidly.

"No!" replied Wedgwood. "But Miss Mortover knows me. I want to see her on business."

The woman shook her head in a fashion that denoted perplexity.

"Well, I'm sure I don't know what to say