"No. It was done whilst I was out."
"Mrs. Biggs, do you think" Mrs. Biggs was the cleaning woman who looked after the top floor bedrooms.
"It was not Mrs. Biggs. It was not even my own ink. That is here on the shelf by my bed. It has not been touched. It was done by someone who brought ink here and did it deliberately." Mrs. Hubbard was shocked.
"What a very wicked-and cruel thing to do."
"Yes, it is a bad thing." The girl spoke quite quietly, but Mrs. Hubbard did not make the mistake of underrating her feelings.
"Well, Elizabeth, I hardly know what to say. I am shocked, badly shocked, and I shall do my utmost to find out who did this wicked malicious thing. You've no ideas yourself as to that?" The girl replied at once.
"This is green ink, you saw that."
"Yes, I noticed that."
"It is not very common, this green ink. I know one person here who uses it. Nigel Chapman."
"Nigel? Do you think Nigel would do a thing like that?"
"I should not have thought so-no. But he writes his letters and his notes with green ink."
"I shall have to ask a lot of questions. I'm very sorry, Elizabeth, that such a thing should happen in this house and I can only tell you that I shall do my best to get to the bottom of it."
"Thank you, Mrs. Hubbard. There have been-other things, have there not?"
"Yes-er-yes." Mrs. Hubbard left the room and started towards the stairs. But she stopped suddenly before proceeding down and instead went along the passage to a door at the end of the corridor. She knocked and the voice of Miss Sally Finch bid her enter.
The room was a pleasant one and Sally Finch herself, a cheerful redhead, was a pleasant person.
She was writing on a pad and looked up with a bulging cheek. She held out an open box of sweets and said indistinctly, "Candy from home. Have some."
"Thank you, Sally. Not just now."
"I'm rather upset." She paused. "Have you heard what's happened to Elizabeth Johnston?"
"What's happened to Black Bess?" The nickname was an affectionate one and had been accepted as such by the girl herself.
Mrs. Hubbard described what had happened.- Sally showed every sign of sympathetic anger.
"I'll say that's a mean thing to do. I wouldn't believe anyone would do a thing like that to our Bess. Everybody likes her. She's quiet and doesn't get around much, or join in, but I'm sure there's no one who dislikes her."
"That's what I should have said."
"Well-it's all of a piece, isn't it, with the other thinegs. That's why-"
