‘Then on Monday . . .’—the girl was speaking faster now and her cheeks were very bright, ‘. . . two queer things happened. First of all there was a telegram for Uncle Andrew. Alice brought it straight to me because that was an arrangement Uncle Andrew had with us so that great-aunt shouldn’t know about the bookmaker. Any telegram that came when he was out used to be taken straight to me. I opened it, and it said: “Turkey Carpet won 75-1. Congratulations. Cheque following. Syd.”
‘As it was from the bookmaker it didn’t seem to help much, so I put it in the drawer of the writing-table in his room. The next morning I had to look out for the letter.’
She paused and looked at Mr Campion with unflinching youthful eyes. ‘It wasn’t just curiosity,’ she said, ‘and I didn’t steam it or anything—I j
