Free Sweet Danger by Margery Allingham

realized that Amanda was not alone. But the next moment, as she caught sight of the young men, a smile spread over her face and she laughed like a girl.
    â€˜There’s four of them,’ said Amanda. ‘And they’re paying three guineas a week each, and they don’t mind there not being a bath. Oh, wait a minute: Mr Campion, this is Aunt Hatt – Miss Huntingforest. And this is Mr Wright, Aunt. Where’s Mary? Over the mill?’
    Miss Huntingforest ignored the question. She was surveying the young men with critical, but friendly eyes.
    â€˜You’re on holiday, I suppose?’ she enquired.
    Mr Campion repeated his little speech about Eager-Wright’s history of Suffolk, and Miss Huntingforest seemed reassured.
    â€˜Really? An author?’ she said, looking at the young man with quickening interest. ‘Well, isn’t that nice.’
    Eager-Wright looked uncomfortable and muttered a few words of modest depreciation.
    Aunt Hatt relieved his embarrassment by offering them all a bun. As they stood round in the kitchen nibbling her gift, the slight formality which had momentarily fallen on the party was dispelled.
    Miss Huntingforest went on with her cooking, talking the whole time with that complete lack of self-consciousness which seemed to be the keynote of the whole household.
    â€˜You’ll forgive my enquiring what you are doing down here,’ she said, stooping down to peer into the enormous oven. ‘I’m not a nervous woman as a rule, but since that attack on me the other day I have certainly been a little alarmed.’
    â€˜Oh yes,’ said Amanda quickly. ‘I ought to have asked you; do you mind burglars?’
    â€˜Not at all,’ said Mr Campion easily. ‘Do you have many?’
    â€˜Only one so far,’ said Miss Huntingforest grimly. ‘But that was enough. If he hadn’t struck me down before I realized what he was up to I could have managed him. But you don’t expect such things in a civilized country. I was alone in the house,’ she hurried on. ‘The children were in the village and I’d just come out here to see if the bread was rising, when I saw him come creeping out of the dairy. He must have got in by the back window. I said: “Young man, will you please inform me what you’re doing?” He spun round and looked at me and I had just time to see that he was a stranger, and had the most remarkable peak of hair coming down right over his forehead, and then, as I went for him, he put up his hand and caught me on the chin. I went down and hit my head on the table, rendering me completely unconscious. It’s a miracle I didn’t swallow my dentures and choke to death. I wrote to every paper in London about it.’
    She paused.
    â€˜A horrible experience,’ said Eager-Wright, while Mr Campion looked foolish and sympathetic at the same time.
    â€˜And, of course, he didn’t take a thing,’ said the good lady.
    â€˜Adding insult to injury,’ put in Amanda, and she and her aunt laughed immoderately.
    Miss Huntingforest turned to the young men. ‘I don’t know whether Amanda’s put you wise to the family,’ she said. ‘It’s a rather curious arrangement, but it works very well.’
    â€˜I told them practically everything,’ said Amanda consideringly. ‘You see,’ she went on, turning to the guests, ‘when mother died four years ago we decided we’d have to make the mill a going concern and take paying guests and carry on generally. Well, so far the paying guest department is the only really paying line. We’ve only had one guest of course – Aunt Hatt – but from our point of view that’s been a howling success.’
    Miss Huntingforest seemed to think it was her turn toexplain a little, although why either of them should have been so courteous was beyond Mr Campion’s powers of divination.
    â€˜Well, it was like