“Have you heard what’s been happening in the night, sir? The doctor left a note on the table to say as how cook’s been taken ill and has had to be sent to the hospital. Such goings-on there must have been, the kitchen window smashed, and the doors standing wide open when I come down this morning. I don’t know what we’re all coming to, I’m sure. Do you know what it’s all about, sir?”
“Ah, you must sleep very soundly, Annie,” I answered. “Tell me now, what was cook doing when you went up-stairs to bed last night?”
“Me, sir? I’m sure I couldn’t tell you, sir. I kept away from the kitchen, I did. There’s all my washing up to do yet, but I wasn’t going near cook as she was last night if I could help it, and when I’d cleared away I went and sat by myself in the work room.”
“And where was cook then, Annie?”
“She was in the kitchen, sir. I locked the back door and fastened all the windows except the kitchen window before I went to bed, but I never heard her come up-stairs at all. What was it broke the window, sir?”
“She never went to bed at all, Annie. She must have been too far gone to get up-stairs, and apparently she turned on the gas at the stove and then forgot to light it, and nearly paid the penalty.” I told her exactly what had taken place during the early hours of the morning, but I could get no useful information in return. Annie had not gone into the kitchen and could not tell me anything of cook’s condition when she went up-stairs to bed.
“My goodness, sir, we might all have been exploded up in our beds. I told Miss Ethel it wasn’t safe to have her about the house,” was Annie’s comment, and she added rather maliciously, “She won’t get none of her whisky in the hospital.”
“No, Annie, you may be quite certain of that.”
“And my kitchen isn’t half in a mess with broken glass all over the floor. You don’t know what became of the table-cloth, do you, sir?”
“The table-cloth, Annie?”