“Bertha was always a bit the timid sort—afraid of documents and that sort of thing, and she tried to get out of it. ‘Couldn’t Nurse sign instead of me?’ she says. That was Nurse Philliter, you know, the red-haired one as was the doctor’s fiancée. She was a very nice woman, and we liked her quite a lot. ‘Nurse has gone out for her walk,’ says Miss Whittaker, rather sharp, ‘I want you and Evelyn to do it,’ meaning me, of course. Well, we said we didn’t mind, and Miss Whittaker goes upstairs to Miss Dawson with a whole heap of papers, and Bertha and I followed and waited on the landing, like she said.”
“One moment,” said Mr. Murbles, “did Miss Dawson often have documents to sign?”
“Yes, sir, I believe so, quite frequently, but they was usually witnessed by Miss Whittaker or the nurse. There was some leases and things of that sort, or so I heard. Miss Dawson had a little house-property. And then there’d be the cheques for the housekeeping, and some papers as used to come from the Bank, and be put away in the safe.”
“Share coupons and so on, I suppose,” said Mr. Murbles.
“Very likely, sir, I don’t know much about those business matters. I did have to witness a signature once, I remember, a long time back, but that was different. The paper was brought down to me with the signature ready wrote. There wasn’t any of this to-do about it.”
“The old lady was capable of dealing with her own affairs, I understand?”
“Up till then, sir. Afterwards, as I understood, she made it all over to Miss Whittaker—that was just before she got feeble-like, and was kept under drugs. Miss Whittaker signed the cheques then.”
“The power of attorney,” said Mr. Murbles, with a nod. “Well now, did you sign this mysterious paper?”
“No, sir, I’ll tell you how that was. When me and Bertha had been waiting a little time, Miss Whittaker comes to the door and makes us a sign to come in quiet. So we comes and stands just inside the door. There was a screen by the head of the bed, so we couldn’t see Miss Dawson nor she us, but we could see her reflection quite well in a big looking-glass she had on the left side of the bed.”
Mr. Murbles exchanged a significant glance with Lord Peter.