Staverley is the Hampshire village whose closeness to Merroway Court makes it both the setting for Frankie Derwent’s staged accident and a place where an outsider’s arrival is hard to hide. Its village scale shapes the investigation: Frankie uses the crash to gain access to the house, while Bobby Jones later takes up quarters at the Anglers' Arms and listens for local talk.

Setting and Connection to Merroway Court

Merroway Court stands in Staverley, and the estate’s position near the village makes the two closely linked in the plot. Roger Bassington-ffrench’s address is given as Merroway Court, Staverley, Hampshire; Frankie later identifies the house as belonging to his brother and explains that Roger lives there with his brother and sister-in-law. The address first helps distinguish this Roger from the Bassington-ffrench Frankie had expected to find, then becomes the destination around which her plan is built.

Frankie has already reconnoitred Staverley before attempting to enter the household. She judges it to be a small village where strangers arriving to stay would immediately attract notice, and where an unfamiliar lodging arrangement would be out of place. That constraint gives the setting a practical role: an accidental-looking emergency offers a more plausible route into Merroway Court than simply arriving in the village as a visitor.

The Staged Accident

Frankie puts that plan into action by driving her car into the wall near the gates of Merroway Court. Dr George Arbuthnot arrives as part of the scheme and presents himself as a doctor who must take charge; a passing boy, about seventeen and riding a bicycle, stops to help. When he asks where they are, he is told that the house is Merroway Court and that it belongs to Mr Bassington-ffrench, a justice of the peace. Dr George directs him to lend a hand, and the two carry Frankie up the drive.

The scene turns the village’s proximity to the house into an immediate advantage: help can be recruited from the road, and the crash supplies a reason for Frankie to be carried inside. What appears to the boy to be an accident is, as the narration makes clear, deliberate. Staverley is therefore not just a backdrop to the deception; its roads, local knowledge, and close connection to the estate make the deception workable.

The Village as a Source of Information

After Frankie’s entry into Merroway Court, Bobby takes up quarters at the Anglers' Arms under the assumed role of Edward Hawkins, Lady Frances Derwent’s chauffeur. His disguise includes a small moustache, chauffeur’s livery, a changed voice, and a stiff manner intended to make him seem unlike himself. The inn provides a base for the role, while the attention he receives from young women employed there encourages him to maintain it.

Frankie and her accident have become the principal topic of conversation in Staverley since the crash. Bobby uses that local interest to draw information from the inn’s landlord, Thomas Askew. The village’s tendency to notice an unusual event thus has two effects: it makes an unannounced visitor difficult to conceal, but it also spreads news that Bobby can exploit while investigating the household.