The Starvel Hollow tragedy

by Freeman Wills Crofts

Ruth’s feelings were harrowed by these recitals, which seemed to bring home the tragedy to her in all its grim starkness. But she had not time to dwell on the terrible pictures, as after the tramp had signed his deposition and stepped down from the box, her own name was called.

With her heart beating rapidly she left her seat and entered the little pulpit-like enclosure. There she stood while the sergeant repeated a phrase about truth, and then, having given her name, she was told to sit down. The coroner bent towards her.

“I am sorry, Miss Averill,” he said kindly, “to have to ask you to attend and give evidence in this tragic inquiry, but I promise you I shall not keep you longer than I can help. Now, sergeant.”

In spite of this reassuring beginning, Ruth soon began to think Sergeant Kent’s questions would never cease.

Half the things he asked seemed to have no connection whatever with the tragedy. She stated that she was the late Simon Averill’s niece, the daughter of his brother Theodore, that she was aged twenty, and that she had come to Starvel when she was four. She told of her schooldays in Leeds, saying that it was now over a year since she had returned to Starvel and that she had lived there ever since.

Her uncle had recently been in very poor health. She thought his heart was affected. At all events, to save climbing the stairs he had had a room on the first floor fitted up as a bed-sitting room. For the last year he had not been downstairs and some days he did not get up. Recently he had been particularly feeble, and she told of his condition when she saw him two mornings before the tragedy. Then she described her visit to York, mentioning Mrs. Palmer-Gore’s invitation and the episode of the ten pounds.

There seemed no end to Sergeant Kent’s inquisition. He switched over next to the subject of the house and elicited the facts that her uncle’s and the Ropers’ beds were situated in the extremities of the southern and western wings respectively.

“You heard the last witness describe where the bodies were found,” he went on. “Would I be correct in saying that if Mr. Averill and the Ropers had been in bed when the fire took place their bodies would have been found in just those positions?”

Ruth assented, and then the sergeant asked how the house was lighted. There was oil, Ruth told him, oil for the lamps other than Mr. Averill’s and for the cooker which was used sometimes instead of the range. There was also petrol. Her uncle’s sight was bad and he used a petrol lamp. The oil and petrol were kept in a cellar. This cellar was under the main building, and if a fire were to start there, in her opinion the whole house would become involved. The lamps were attended to by Roper, who had always been most careful in handling them.

“Now, Miss Averill,” the sergeant became more impressive than ever, “I think you said that during the last fourteen months, when you were living at Starvel, Roper and his wife were in charge of the house?”