SHE WAS THE ONLY WITNESS TO A
MURDER!
Standing with his back to her was a man. His hands were around a
woman's throat. He was slowly, relentlessly strangling her. As Mrs.
McGillicuddy watched, fascinated, the end came. The body went limp and
crumpled in the man's hands.
Nobody believed Mrs. McGillicuddy . . . because there was no corpse.
Nobody, that is, except Miss Jane Marple, who figured out where the
body was hidden—and then showed Scotland Yard how to trap the killer!
What
Mrs.
McGillicuddy
Saw!
(Original British Title: 4:50 from Paddington)
Agatha
Christie
Copyright © 1957 by
Agatha Christie Limited
CAST
OF CHARACTERS:
Elspeth McGillicuddy—She was
the kind of sensible old lady who knew what she saw—and she had seen
murder.
Jane Marple —A dithery, fluffy
octogenarian, she was addicted to homemade wine, pots of tea— and
undercover sleuthing.
Lucy Eyelesbarrow —An
Oxford-educated up-stairs-downstairs-and-in-between maid, she pampered
the young, the old, habitual drunkards and spoiled dogs with equal ease.
Emma Crackenthorpe —Almost—but
not quite— an old maid, she pretended her father, Luther, was really
the invalid he wanted to be.
Luther Crackenthorpe —The
cantankerous old skinflint busied himself counting his gold sovereigns
and hoping to outlive his three sons.
Alexander Eastley —Bryan's son
thought the Yorkshire pudding "simply wizard," the treacle tart "good
oh," but considered finding a murder clue the most "smashing" thing of
all.
Dr. Quimper —The family doctor
had an offhand, cynical manner and a habit of calling even when people
weren't sick.
Cedric Crackenthorpe —A lusty,
bohemian painter living on an island in the Mediterranean, he had no
use for women—he said.
Harold Crackenthorpe —A
correct City gentleman, he seemed to believe the murder was a
deliberate insult to his family's honor.
Alfred Crackenthorpe —While
not exactly dishonest, he was a sharp customer—so sharp that he
sometimes cut himself.
Bryan Eastley —Although an
ex-fighter pilot and D.F.C. winner, he behaved most of the time like an
unhappy little boy.
Detective Inspector Dermot Craddock —He
made a great show of presenting a small portion of the facts and
implying it was the whole truth.
Mrs. McGillicuddy panted along the platform in the wake of the porter
carrying her suitcase. Mrs. McGillicuddy was short and stout, the
porter was tall and free-striding. In addition, Mrs. McGillicuddy was
burdened with a large quantity of parcels; the result of a day's
Christmas shopping. The race was, therefore, an uneven one, and the
porter turned the corner at the end of the platform while Mrs.
McGillicuddy was still coming up the straight.
No. 1 platform was not at the moment unduly crowded, since a train had
just gone out; but, in the no man's land beyond, a milling crowd was
rushing in several directions at once, to and from undergrounds,
left-luggage offices, tea rooms, inquiry offices, indicator boards and
the two outlets, Arrival and Departure, to the outside world.
Mrs. McGillicuddy and her parcels were buffeted to and fro, but she
arrived eventually at the entrance to No. 3 platform, and deposited one
parcel at her feet while she searched her bag for the ticket that would
enahle her to pass the stern, uniformed guardian at the gate.
At that moment, a voice, raucous yet refined, burst into speech over
her head.
"The train standing at Platform 3," the voice told her, "is the 4:54
for Brackhampton, Milchester, Waverton, Carvil Junction, Roxeter and
stations to Chadmouth. Passengers for Brackhampton and Milchester
travel at the rear of the train. Passengers for Vanequay change at
Roxeter." The voice shut itself off with a click, and then reopened
conversation by announcing the arrival at Platform 9 of the
4:35 from Birmingham and Wolverhampton.
Mrs. McGillicuddy found her ticket and presented it. The man clipped
it, murmured: "On the right—
rear portion."
Mrs. McGillicuddy padded up the platform and found her porter, looking
bored and staring into space, outside the door of a third-class
carriage.
"Here you are, lady."
"I'm traveling first class," said Mrs. McGillicuddy.
"You didn't say so," grumbled the porter. His eye swept her
masculine-looking pepper-and-salt tweed
coat disparagingly.
Mrs. McGillicuddy, who had said so, did not argue the point. She was
sadly out of breath.
The porter retrieved the suitcase and marched with it to the adjoining
coach where Mrs. McGillicuddy was installed in solitary splendor. The
4:54 was not much patronized, the first-class clientele preferring
either the faster morning express or the 6:40 with dining cars. Mrs.
McGillicuddy handed the porter his
tip which he received with disappointment, clearly considering it more
applicable to third-class than to first-class travel. Mrs.
McGillicuddy, though prepared to spend money on comfortable travel
after a
night journey from the North and a day's feverish shopping was at no
time an extravagant tipper.
She settled herself back on the plush cushions with a sigh and opened a
magazine. Five minutes later, whistles blew and the train started. The
magazine slipped from Mrs. McGillicuddy's hand, her head dropped
sideways, three minutes later she was asleep. She slept for thirty-five
minutes and awoke refreshed. Resettling her hat, which had slipped
askew, she sat up and looked out of the window at what she could see of
the flying countryside. It was quite dark now, a dreary, misty December
day—Christmas was only five days ahead. London had been dark and
dreary; the country was no less so, though occasionally rendered
cheerful with its constant clusters of lights as the train flashed
through towns and stations.
"Serving last tea now," said an attendant, whisking open the corridor
door like a jinni. Mrs. McGillicuddy had already partaken of tea at a
large department store. She was for the moment amply nourished. The
attendant went on down the corridor uttering his monotonous cry. With a
pleased expression, Mrs. McGillicuddy looked up at the rack where her
various parcels reposed. The face towels had been excellent value and
just what Margaret wanted, the space gun for Robby and the rabbit for
Jean were highly satisfactory, and that evening coatee was just the
thing she herself wanted, warm but dressy. The pullover for Hector, too
. . . her mind dwelt with approval on the soundness of her purchases.
Her satisfied gaze returned to the window, a train traveling in the
opposite direction rushed by with a screech, making the windows rattle
and causing her to start. The train clattered over points and passed
through a station.
Then it began suddenly to slow down, presumably in obedience to a
signal. For some minutes it crawled along, then stopped, presently it
began to move forward again. Another up train passed them, though with
less vehemence than the first one. The train gathered speed again. At
that moment another train, also on
a down line, swerved inward toward them; for a moment with almost
alarming effect. For a time the two trains ran parallel, now one
gaining a little, now the other. Mrs. McGillicuddy looked from her
window through the windows of the parellel carriages. Most of the
blinds were down, but occasionally the occupants of the carriages were
visible. The other train was not very full and there were many empty
carriages.
At the moment when the two trains gave the illusion of being
stationary, a blind in one of the carriages flew up with a snap. Mrs.
McGillicuddy looked into the lighted first-class carriage that was only
a few
feet away.
Then she drew her breath in with a gasp and half rose to her feet.
Standing with his back to the window and to her was a man. His hands
were round the throat of a
woman who faced him, and he was slowly, remorselessly, strangling her.
Her eyes were starting from their sockets, her face was purple and
congested. As Mrs. McGillicuddy watched, fascinated, the end came, the
body went limp and crumpled in the man's hands.
At the same moment, Mrs. McGillicuddy's train slowed down again and the
other began to gain speed.
It passed forward and a moment or two later it had vanished from sight.
Almost automatically Mrs. McGillicuddy's hand went up to the
communication cord, then paused, irresolute. After all, what use would
it be ringing the cord of the train in which she was traveling? The
horror of what she had seen at such close quarters and the unusual
circumstances made her feel paralyzed. Some immediate action was
necessary—but what?
The door of her compartment was drawn back and a ticket collector said,
"Ticket, please."
Mrs. McGillicuddy turned to him with vehemence.
"A woman has been strangled," she said. "In a train that has just
passed. I saw it."
The ticket collector looked at her doubtfully.
"I beg your pardon, Madam?"
"A man strangled a woman! In a train. I saw it— through there." She
pointed to the window.
The ticket collector looked extremely doubtful.
"Strangled?" he said disbelievingly.
"Yes, strangled! I saw it, I tell you. You must do something at once!"
The ticket collector coughed apologetically.
"You don't think, Madam, that you may have had a little nap and—er—" he
broke off tactfully.
"I have had a nap, but if you think this was a dream, you're quite
wrong. I saw it, I tell you."
The ticket collector's eyes dropped to the open magazine lying on the
seat. On the exposed page was
a girl being strangled while a man with a revolver threatened the pair
from an open doorway.
He said persuasively: "Now don't you think, Madam, that you'd been
reading an exciting story, and that you just dropped off, and awaking a
little confused—"
Mrs. McGillicuddy interrupted him. "I saw it," she said. "I was as wide
awake as you are. And I looked out of the
window into the window of the train alongside, and a man was strangling
a woman. And what
I want to know is, what are you going to do about
it?"
"Well—Madam—"
"You're going to do something, I suppose?" The ticket collector sighed
reluctantly and glanced at his watch.
"We shall be in Brackhampton in exactly seven minutes. I'll report what
you've told me. In what direction was the train you mention going?"
"This direction, of course. You don't suppose I'd have been able to see
all this if a train had flashed past going in the other direction?"
The ticket collector looked as though he thought Mrs. McGillicuddy was
quite capable of seeing anything anywhere as the fancy took her. But he
remained polite.
"You can rely on me, Madam," he said. "I will report your statement.
Perhaps I might have your name and address—just in case—"
Mrs. McGillicuddy gave him the address where she would be staying for
the next few days and her permanent address in Scotland, and he wrote
them down. Then he withdrew with the air of a man who has done his duty
and dealt successfully with a tiresome member of the traveling public.
Mrs. McGillicuddy remained frowning and vaguely unsatisfied. Would the
ticket collector really report her statement? Or had he just been
soothing her down? There were, she supposed vaguely, a lot of elderly
women traveling around, fully convinced that they had unmasked
Communist plots, were in danger of being murdered, saw flying saucers
and secret spaceships, and reported murders that had never taken place:
If the man dismissed her as one of those . . .
The train was slowing down now, passing over points, and running
through the bright lights of a large town.
Mrs. McGillicuddy opened her handbag, pulled out a receipted bill which
was all she could find, wrote
a rapid note on the back of it with her ball-point pen, put it into a
spare envelope that she fortunately happened to have, stuck the
envelope down and wrote on it.
The train drew slowly into a crowded platform. The usual ubiquitous
voice was intoning:
"The train now arriving at Platform 1 is the 5:38 for Milchester,
Waverton, Roxeter and stations to Chadmouth. Passengers for Market
Basing take the train now waiting at No. 3 platform. No. 1 Bay for
stopping train to Carbury."
Mrs. McGillicuddy looked anxiously along the platform. So many
passengers and so few porters. Ah, there was one! She hailed him
authoritatively.
"Porter! Please take this at once to the stationmaster's office."
She handed him the envelope and with it a shilling. Then, with a sigh,
she leaned back. Well, she had done what she could. Her mind lingered
with an instant's regret on the shilling. Sixpence would really
have been enough . . .
Her mind went back to the scene she had witnessed. Horrible, quite
horrible. She was a strong-nerved woman, but she shivered. What a
strange—what a fantastic thing to happen to her, Elspeth McGillicuddy.
If the blind of the carriage had not happened to fly up . . . But that,
of course, was Providence.
Providence had willed that she, Elspeth McGillicuddy, should be a
witness of the crime. Her lips set grimly.
Voices shouted, whistles blew, doors were banged shut. The 5:38 drew
slowly out of Brackhampton Station. An hour and five minutes later it
stopped at Milchester.
Mrs. McGillicuddy collected her parcels and her suitcase and got out.
She peered up and down the platform. Her mind reiterated its former
judgment: not enough porters. Such porters as there were
seemed to be engaged with mailbags and luggage vans. Passengers
nowadays seemed always expected
to carry their own cases. Well, she couldn't carry her suitcase and her
umbrella and all her parcels. She would have to wait. In due course she
secured a porter.
"Taxi?"
"There will be something to meet me, I expect."
Outside Milchester Station, a taxi driver who had been watching the
exit came forward. He spoke in a
soft local voice.
"Is it Mrs. McGillicuddy? For St. Mary Mead?"
Mrs. McGillicuddy acknowledged her identity. The porter was
recompensed, adequately if not handsomely. The car, with Mrs.
McGillicuddy, her suitcase and her parcels, drove off into the night.
It was a nine-mile drive. Sitting bolt upright in the car, Mrs.
McGillicuddy was unable to relax. Her feelings yearned for expression.
At last the taxi drove along the familiar village street and finally
drew up at its destination; Mrs. McGillicuddy got out and walked up the
brick path to the door. The driver deposited
the cases inside as the
door was opened by an elderly maid. Mrs. McGillicuddy passed straight
through the hall to where, at the open sitting-room door, her hostess
awaited her: an elderly, frail old lady.
"Elspeth!"
"Jane!"
They kissed, and without preamble or circumlocution, Mrs. McGillicuddy
burst into speech.
"Oh Jane!" she wailed. "I've just seen a murder!"
True to the precepts handed down to her by her mother and
grandmother—to wit: that a true lady can neither be shocked nor
surprised—Miss Marple merely raised her eyebrows and shook her head, as
she said:
"Most distressing for you, Elspeth, and surely most unusual. I think
you had better tell me about it at once."
That was exactly what Mrs. McGillicuddy wanted to do. Allowing her
hostess to draw her nearer to the fire, she sat down, pulled off her
gloves and plunged into a vivid narrative.
Miss Marple listened with close attention. When Mrs. McGillicuddy at
last paused for breath, Miss Marple spoke-with decision.
"The best thing, I think, my dear, is for you to go upstairs and take
off your hat and have a wash. Then we will have supper—during which We
will not discuss this at all. After supper we can go into the matter
thoroughly and discuss it from every aspect."
Mrs. McGillicuddy concurred with this suggestion. The two ladies had
supper, discussing as they ate various aspects of life as lived in the
village of St. Mary Mead. Miss Marple commented on the general distrust
of the new organist, related the recent scandal about the chemist's
wife, and touched on the hostility between the schoolmistress and the
Village Institute. They then discussed Miss Marple's and
Mrs. McGillicuddy's gardens.
"Peonies," said Miss Marple as she rose from table, "are most
unaccountable. Either they do—or they
don't do. But if they do establish themselves, they are with you for
life, so to speak, and really most beautiful varieties nowadays."
They settled themselves by the fire again, and Miss Marple brought out
two old Waterford glasses from
a corner cupboard, and from another cupboard produced a bottle.
"No coffee tonight for you, Elspeth," she said. "You are already
overexcited—and no wonder!—and probably would not sleep. I prescribe a
glass of my cowslip wine, and later, perhaps, a cup of camomile tea."
Mrs. McGillicuddy acquiescing in these arrangements, Miss Marple poured
out the wine.
"Jane," said Mrs. McGillicuddy, as she took an appreciative sip, "you
don't think, do you, that I dreamed it, or imagined it?"
"Certainly not," said Miss Marple with warmth.
Mrs. McGillicuddy heaved a sigh of relief.
"That ticket collector," she said, "he thought so. Quite polite, but
all the same—"
"I think, Elspeth, that that was quite natural under the circumstances.
It sounded—and indeed was—a most unlikely story. And you were a
complete stranger to him. No, I have no doubt at all that you saw what
you've told me you saw. It's very extraordinary—but not at all
impossible. I recollect myself being interested, when a train ran
parallel to one in which I was traveling, to notice what a vivid and
intimate picture one got of what was going on in one or two of the
carriages. A little girl, I remember once, was playing with a Teddy
Bear and suddenly she threw it deliberately at a fat man who was asleep
in the corner, and he bounced up and looked most indignant, and the
other passengers looked so amused. I
saw them all quite vividly. I could have described afterward exactly
what they looked like and what they had on."
Mrs. McGillicuddy nodded gratefully.
"That's just how it was."
"The man had his back to you, you say. So you didn't see his face?"
"No."
"And the woman, you can describe her? Young? Old?"
"Youngish. Between thirty and thirty-five, I should think. I couldn't
say closer than that."
"Good looking?"
"That again, I couldn't say. Her face, you see, was all contorted and—"
Miss Marple said quickly: "Yes, yes, I quite understand. How was she
dressed?"
"She had on a fur coat of some kind, a palish fur. No hat. Her hair was
blond."
"And there was nothing distinctive that you can remember about the man?"
Mrs. McGillicuddy took a little time to think carefully before she
replied.
"He was tallish—and dark, I think. He had a heavy coat on so that I
couldn't judge his build very well." She added despondently, "It's not
really very much to go on, is it?"
"It's something," said Miss Marple. She paused before saying: "You feel
quite sure, in your own mind, that the girl was—dead?"
"She was dead, I'm sure of it. Her tongue came out and—I'd rather not
talk about it . . ."
"Of course not. Of course not," said Miss Marple quickly. "We shall
know more, I expect, in the morning."
"In the morning?"
"I should imagine it will be in the morning papers. After this man had
attacked and killed her, he would have a body on his hands. What would
he do? Presumably he would leave the train quickly at the first station
—by the way, can you remember if it was a corridor carriage?"
"No, it was not."
"That seems to point to a train that was not going far afield. It would
almost certainly stop at Brackhampton. Let us say he leaves the train
at Brackhampton, perhaps arranging the body in a corner seat, with the
face hidden by the fur collar to delay discovery. Yes—I think that that
is what he would do. But of course it will be discovered before very
long—and I should imagine that the news of a murdered woman discovered
on a train would be almost certain to be in the morning papers. We
shall see."
* * *
But it was not in the morning papers.
Miss Marple and Mrs. McGillicuddy, after making sure of this, finished
their breakfast in silence. Both were reflecting.
After breakfast, they took a turn round the garden. But this, usually
an absorbing pastime, was today somewhat half-hearted. Miss Marple did
indeed call attention to some new and rare species she had acquired for
her rock garden but did so in an almost absent-minded manner. And Mrs.
McGillicuddy
did not, as was customary, counterattack with a list of her own recent
acquisitions.
"The garden is not looking at all as it should," said Miss Marple, but
still speaking absent-mindedly. "Doctor Haydock has absolutely
forbidden me to do any stooping or kneeling—and really, what can you do
if you don't stoop or kneel? There's old Edwards, of course—but so
opinionated. And all this jobbing gets them into bad habits, lots of
cups of tea and so much pottering—not any real work."
"Oh I know," said Mrs. McGillicuddy. "Of course there's no question of
my being forbidden to stoop,
but really, especially after meals—and having put on weight"—she looked
down at her ample proportions— "it does bring on heartburn."
There was a silence and then Mrs. McGillicuddy planted her feet
sturdily, stood still, and turned on her friend.
"Well?" she said.
It was a small, insignificant word but it acquired full significance
from Mrs. McGillicuddy's tone, and
Miss Marple understood its meaning perfectly. "I know," she said. The
two ladies looked at each other.
"I think," said Miss Marple, "we might walk down to the police station
and talk to Sergeant Cornish.
He's intelligent and patient, and I know him very well and he knows me.
I think he'll listen—and pass
the information on to the proper quarter."
Accordingly some three quarters of an hour later, Miss Marple and Mrs.
McGillicuddy were talking to
a fresh-faced, grave man between thirty and forty who listened
attentively to what they had to say.
Frank Cornish received Miss Marple with cordiality and even deference.
He set chairs for the two ladies
and said: "Now, what can we do for you, Miss Marple?"
Miss Marple said: "I would like you, please, to listen to my friend
Mrs. McGillicuddy's story."
And Sergeant Cornish had listened. At the close of the recital he
remained silent for a moment or two. Then he said: "That's a very
extraordinary story." His eyes, without seeming to do
so, had sized Mrs. McGillicuddy up while she was telling it.
On the whole, he was favorably impressed. A sensible woman, able to
tell a story clearly, not, so far
as he could judge, an overimaginative or a hysterical woman. Moreover,
Miss Marple, so it seemed,
believed in the accuracy of her friend's story and he knew all about
Miss Marple. Everybody in St.
Mary Mead knew Miss Marple; fluffy and
dithery in appearance, but inwardly as sharp and as
shrewd as they make
them. He cleared his throat and spoke.
"Of course," he said, "you may have been mistaken —I'm not saying you
were, mind—but you may
have been. There's a lot of horseplay goes on. It mayn't have been
serious or fatal."
"I know what I saw," said Mrs. McGillicuddy grimly.
"And you won't budge from it," thought Frank Cornish, "and I'd say that
likely or unlikely, you may be right."
Aloud he said: "You reported it to the railway officials, and you've
come and reported it to me. That's
the proper procedure and you may rely on me to have inquiries
instituted."
He stopped. Miss Marple nodded her head gently, satisfied. Mrs.
McGillicuddy was not quite so satisfied, but she did not say anything.
Sergeant Cornish addressed Miss Marple, not so much because he wanted
her ideas, as because he wanted to hear what she would say.
"Granted the facts are as reported," he said. "What do you think has
happened to the body?"
"There seem to be only two possibilities," said Miss Marple without
hesitation. "The more likely one,
of course, is that the body was left in the train, but that seems
improbable now, for it would have been found sometime last night by
another traveler or by the railway staff at the train's ultimate
destination."
Frank Cornish nodded.
"The only other course open to the murderer would be to push the body
out of the train on to the line.
It must, I suppose, be still on the track somewhere as yet
undiscovered—though that does seem a little unlikely. But there would
be, as far as I can see, no other way of dealing with it."
"You read about bodies being put in trunks," said Mrs. McGillicuddy,
"but no one travels with trunks nowadays, only suitcases, and you
couldn't get a body into a suitcase."
"Yes," said Cornish. "I agree with you both. The body, if there is a
body, ought to have been discovered
by now, or will be very soon. I'll let you know any developments there
are—though I daresay you'll read about them in the papers. There's the
possibility, of course, that the woman, though savagely attacked, was
not actually dead. She may have been able to leave the train on her own
feet."
"Hardly without assistance," said Miss Marple. "And if so, it will have
been noticed. A man, supporting
a woman who he says is ill."
"Yes, it will have been noticed," said Cornish. "Or if a woman was
found unconscious or ill in a carriage and was removed to a hospital,
that, too, will be on record. I think you may rest assured that you'll
hear about it all in a very short time."
But that day passed and the next day. On that evening Miss Marple
received a note from Sergeant Cornish.
In
regard to the matter on which you consulted me, full inquiries have
been made, with no result. No woman's body has been found. No hospital
has administered treatment to a woman such as
you describe, and no case of a woman suffering from shock or taken ill,
or leaving a station supported by a man has been observed. You may take
it that the fullest inquiries have been made. I suggest that your
friend may have witnessed a scene such as she described but that it was
much less serious than she supposed.
"Less serious? Fiddlesticks!" said Mrs. McGillicuddy. "It was murder!"
She looked defiantly at Miss Marple and Miss Marple looked back at her.
"Go on, Jane," said Mrs. McGillicuddy. "Say it was all a mistake! Say I
imagined the whole thing!
That's what you think now, isn't it?"
"Anyone can be mistaken," Miss Marple pointed out gently. "Anybody,
Elspeth, even you. I think we must bear that in mind. But I still
think, you know, that you were most probably not mistaken. You
use
glasses for reading, but you've got very good far sight—and what you
saw impressed you very powerfully. You were definitely suffering from
shock when you arrived here."
"It's a thing I shall never forget," said Mrs. McGillicuddy with a
shudder. "The trouble is, I don't see
what I can do about it!"
"I don't think," said Miss Marple thoughtfully, "that there's anything
more you can do about it." (If Mrs. McGillicuddy had been alert to the
tones of her friend's voice, she might have noticed a very faint stress
laid on the you.) "You've
reported what you saw—to the railway people and to the police. No,
there's nothing more you can do."
"That's a relief, in a way," said Mrs. McGillicuddy, "because, as you
know, I'm going out to Ceylon immediately after Christmas to stay with
Roderick and I certainly do not want to put that visit off—I've been
looking forward to it so much. Though of course I would put it off if I
thought it was my duty,"
she added conscientiously.
"I'm sure you would, Elspeth, but as I say, I consider you've done
everything you possibly could do."
"It's up to the police," said Mrs. McGillicuddy. "And if the police
choose to be stupid—"
Miss Marple shook her head decisively.
"Oh no," she said, "the police aren't stupid. And that makes it
interesting, doesn't it?"
Mrs. McGillicuddy looked at her without comprehension and Miss Marple
reaffirmed her judgment of
her friend as a woman of excellent principles and no imagination.
"One wants to know," said Miss Marple, "what really happened."
"She was killed."
"Yes, but who killed her, and why, and what happened to her body? Where
is it now?"
"That's the business of the police to find out."
"Exactly! And they haven't found out. That means, doesn't it, that the
man was clever—very clever. I can't imagine, you know," said Miss
Marple knitting her brows, "how he disposed of it. You kill a
woman in a fit of passion—it must have been unpremeditated; you'd never
choose to kill a woman in such circumstances just a few minutes before
running into a big station. No, it must have been a quarrel—jealousy—
something of that kind. You strangle her—and there you are, as I say,
with a dead body on your hands and on the point of running into a
station. What could you do except as I said at
first, prop the body up in a corner as though asleep, hiding the face,
and then yourself leave the train as quickly as possible. I don't see
any other possibility. And yet there must have been one ..."
Miss Marple lost herself in thought.
Mrs. McGillicuddy spoke to her twice before Miss Marple answered.
"You're getting deaf, Jane."
"Just a little, perhaps. People do not seem to me to enunciate their
words as clearly as they used to do. But it wasn't that I didn't hear
you. I'm afraid I wasn't paying attention."
"I just asked about the trains to London tomorrow. Would the afternoon
be all right? I'm going to Margaret's and she isn't expecting me before
teatime."
"I wonder, Elspeth, if you would mind going up by the 12:15? We could
have an early lunch."
"Of course and—"
Miss Marple went on, drowning her friend's words:
"And I wonder, too, if Margaret would mind if you didn't arrive for
tea—if you arrived about seven, perhaps?"
Mrs. McGillicuddy looked at her friend curiously.
"What's on your mind, Jane?"
"I suggest, Elspeth, that I should travel up to London with you, and
that we should travel down again as far as Brackhampton in the train
you traveled by the other day. You would then return to London from
Brackhampton and I would come on here as you did. I, of course, would
pay the fares." Miss Marple stressed this point firmly.
Mrs. McGillicuddy ignored the financial aspect.
"What on earth do you expect, Jane?" she asked. "Another murder?"
"Certainly not," said Miss Marple, shocked. "But I confess I should
like to see for myself, under your guidance, the—the—really it is most
difficult to find the correct term—the terrain of the crime."
So accordingly on the following day Miss Marple and Mrs. McGillicuddy
found themselves in two opposite corners of a first-class carriage
speeding out of London by the 4:54 from Paddington. Paddington had been
even more crowded than on the preceding Friday, as there were now only
two days to go before
Christmas, but the 4:54 was comparatively peaceful —at any rate in the
rear portion.
On this occasion no train drew level with them, or they with another
train. At intervals trains flashed past them toward London. On two
occasions trains flashed past them the other way going at high speed.
At intervals Mrs. McGillicuddy consulted her watch doubtfully.
"It's hard to" tell just when— We'd passed through a station I know . .
." But they were continually passing through stations.
"We're due in Brackhampton in five minutes," said Miss Marple.
A ticket collector appeared in the doorway. Miss Marple raised her eyes
interrogatively. Mrs. Gillicuddy shook her head. It was not the same
ticket collector. He clipped their tickets and passed on, staggering
just a little as the train swung round a long curve. It slackened speed
as it did so.
"I expect we're coming into Brackhampton,"' said Mrs. McGillicuddy.
"We're getting into the outskirts, I think," said Miss Marple.
There were lights flashing past outside, buildings, an occasional
glimpse of streets and trams. Their speed slackened further. They began
crossing points.
"We'll be there in a minute," said Mrs. McGillicuddy, "and I can't
really see this journey has been any good at all. Has it suggested
anything to you, Jane?"
"I'm afraid not," said Miss Marple in a rather doubtful voice.
"A sad waste of good money," said Mrs. McGillicuddy but with less
disapproval than she would have used had she been paying for herself.
Miss Marple had been quite adamant on that point.
"All the same," said Miss Marple, "one likes to see with one's own eyes
where a thing happened. This train's just a few minutes late. Was yours
on time on Friday?"
"I think so. I didn't really notice." The train drew slowly into the
busy length of Brackhampton Station. The loud-speaker announced
hoarsely, doors opened and shut, people got in and out, milled up and
down the platform. It was a busy, crowded scene.
Easy, thought Miss Marple, for a murderer to merge into that crowd, to
leave the station in the midst of that pressing mass of people, or even
to select another carriage and go on in the train to wherever its
ultimate destination might be. Easy to be one male passenger among
many. But not so easy to make a body vanish into thin air. That body
must be somewhere.
Mrs. McGillicuddy had descended. She spoke now from the platform,
through the open window.
"Now take care of yourself, Jane," she said. "Don't catch a chill. It's
a nasty treacherous time of year,
and you're not so young as you were."
"I know," said Miss Marple.
"And don't let's worry ourselves any more over all this. We've done
what we could."
Miss Marple nodded and said: "Don't stand about in the cold, Elspeth.
Or you'll be
the one to catch a chill. Go and get yourself a good hot cup of tea in
the refreshment room. You've got
time, twelve
minutes before your train back to town."
"I think perhaps
I will. Good-by, Jane."
"Good-by, Elspeth. A happy Christmas to you. I hope you find Margaret
well. Enjoy yourself in Ceylon, and give my love to dear Roderick—if he
remembers me at all which I doubt."
"Of course he remembers you—very well. You helped him in some way when
he was at school— something to do with money that was disappearing from
a locker. He's never forgotten it."
"Oh, that!" said Miss Marple. Mrs. McGillicuddy turned away, a whistle
blew, the train began to move. Miss Marple watched the sturdy thick-set
body of her friend recede. Elspeth could go to Ceylon with a clear
conscience—she had done her duty and was freed from further obligation.
Miss Marple did not lean back as the train gathered speed. Instead she
sat upright and devoted herself seriously to thought. Though in speech
Miss Marple was woolly and diffuse, in mind she was clear and sharp.
She had a problem to solve, the problem of her own future conduct; and,
perhaps strangely, it presented itself to her as it had to Mrs.
McGillicuddy, as a question of duty.
Mrs. McGillicuddy had said that they had both done all that they could
do. It was true of Mrs. McGillicuddy, but about herself Miss Marple did
not feel so sure.
It was a question, sometimes, of using one's special gifts. But perhaps
that was conceited. After all,
what could she do? Her friend's words came back to her, "You're not so
young as you were . . ."
Dispassionately, like a general planning a campaign, or an accountant
assessing a business, Miss Marple weighed up and set down in her mind
the facts for and against further enterprise. On the credit side were
the following:
1)
My long experience of life and human nature.
2) Sir Henry dithering and his nephew (now at Scotland
Yard, I believe), who was so very nice in the Little Paddocks case.
3) My nephew Raymond's second boy, David, who is, I am
almost sure, in British Railways.
4) Griselda's boy Leonard who is so very knowledgeable
about maps.
Miss Marple reviewed these assets and approved them. They were all very
necessary to reinforce the weaknesses of the debit side—in particular
her own bodily weakness.
"It's not," thought Miss Marple, "as though I could go here, there and
everywhere, making inquiries and finding out things."
Yes, that was the chief objection, her own age and weakness. Although,
for her age, her health was good, yet she was old. And if Doctor
Haydock had strictly forbidden her to do practical gardening he would
hardly approve of her starting out to track down a murderer. For that,
in effect, was what she was planning to do—and it was there that her
loophole lay. For if heretofore murder had, so to speak, been forced
upon her, in this case it would be that she herself set out
deliberately to seek it. And she was not sure that she wanted to do so.
She was old—old and tired. She. felt at this moment, at the end of a
tiring day, a great reluctance to enter upon any project at all. She
wanted nothing at all but to reach home and sit by the fire with a nice
tray of supper, and go to bed, and potter about the next day just
snipping off a few things in the garden, tidying up in a very mild way,
without stooping, without exerting herself.
"I'm too old for any more adventures," said Miss Marple to herself,
watching absently out of the
window the curving line of an embankment.
A curve.
Very faintly something stirred in her mind. Just after the ticket
collector had clipped their tickets . . .
It suggested an idea. Only an idea. An entirely different idea. . . .
A little pink flush came into Miss Marple's face. Suddenly she did not
feel tired at all!
"I'll write to David tomorrow morning," she said to herself.
And at the same time another valuable asset flashed through her mind.
"Of course. My faithful Florence!"
* * *
Miss Marple set about her plan of campaign methodically and making due
allowance for the Christmas season which was a definitely retarding
factor.
She wrote to her great-nephew, David West, combining Christmas wishes
with an urgent request for information.
Fortunately she was invited, as on previous years, to the vicarage for
Christmas dinner, and here she
was able to tackle young Leonard, home for the Christmas season, about
maps.
Maps of all kinds were Leonard's passion. The reason for the old lady's
inquiry about a large-scale map
of a particular area did not rouse his curiosity. He discoursed on maps
generally with fluency, and wrote down for her exactly what would suit
her purpose best. In fact, he did better. He actually found that he had
such a map among his collection and he lent it to her, Miss Marple
promising to take great care of it and return it in due course.
* * *
"Maps," said his mother Griselda who still, although she had a grown-up
son, looked strangely young
and blooming to be inhabiting the shabby old vicarage. "What does she
want with maps? I mean, what does she want them for?"
"I don't know," said young Leonard, "I don't think she said exactly."
"I wonder now . . ." said Griselda. "It seems very fishy to me. At her
age the old pet ought to give up
that sort of thing."
Leonard asked what sort of thing, and Griselda said elusively:
"Oh, poking her nose into things. Why maps, I wonder?"
In due course Miss Marple received a letter from her great-nephew David
West. It ran affectionately:
Dear
Aunt Jane. Now what are you up to? I've got the information you wanted.
There are only
two trains that can possibly
apply—the 4:33 and the 5 o'clock. The former is a slow train and stops
at Haling Broadway, Barwell Heath, Brackhampton and then stations to
Market Basing.
The 5 o'clock is the Welsh
express for Cardiff, Newport and Swansea. The former might be overtaken
somewhere by the 4:54, although it is due in Brackhampton five minutes
earlier
and the latter passes the 4:54 just before Brackhampton.
In all this do I smell some scandal of
a fruity character? Did you, returning from a shopping spree in town by the 4:54, observe in a passing
train the mayor's wife being embraced by the sanitary inspector? But
why does it matter which train it was? A weekend at Porthcawl,
perhaps? Thank you for the pullover. Just what I wanted.
How's the garden? Not very active this
time of year, I should imagine.
Miss Marple smiled a little, then considered the information thus
presented to her. Mrs. McGillicuddy
had said definitely that the carriage had not been a corridor one.
Therefore—not the Swansea express. The 4:33 was indicated.
Also, some more traveling seemed unavoidable. Miss Marple sighed, but
made her plans.
She went up to London as before on the 12:15, but this time returned
not by the 4:54, but by the 4:33
as far as Brackhampton. The journey was uneventful, but she registered
certain details. The train was
not crowded—4:33 was before the evening rush hour. Of the first-class
carriages only one had an occupant—a very old gentleman reading the New Statesman. Miss Marple traveled
in an empty compartment and at the two stops, Haling Broadway and
Barwell Heath, leaned out of the window to observe passengers entering
and leaving the train. A small number of third-class passengers got in
at Haling Broadway. At Barwell Heath several third-class passengers got
out. Nobody entered or left a first-class carriage except the old
gentleman carrying his New Statesman.
As the train neared Brackhampton, sweeping around a curve of line, Miss
Marple rose to her feet and stood experimentally with her back to the
window over which she had drawn down the blind.
Yes, she decided, the impetus of the sudden curving of the line and the
slackening of speed did throw one off one's balance back against the
window and the blind might, in consequence, very easily fly up. She
peered out into the night. It was lighter than it had been when Mrs.
McGillicuddy had made the same journey—only just dark, but there was
little to see. For observation she must make a daylight journey.
On the next day she went up by the early-morning train, purchased four
linen pillowcases (tut-tutting at the price!) so as to combine
investigation with the provision of household necessities, and returned
by a train leaving Paddington at 12:15. Again she was alone in a
first-class carriage. "This taxation," thought Miss Marple, "that's
what it is. No one can afford to travel first class except businessmen
in the rush hours. I suppose they can charge it to expenses."
About a quarter of an hour before the train was due at Brackhampton,
Miss Marple got out the map with which Leonard had supplied her and
began to observe the countryside. She had studied the map very
carefully beforehand, and after noting the name of a station they
passed through, she was soon able to identify where she was just as the
train began to slacken for a curve. It was a very considerable curve,
indeed. Miss Marple, her nose glued to the window, studied the ground
beneath her (the train was running on a fairly high embankment) with
close attention. She divided her attention between the country outside
and her map until the train finally ran into Brackhampton.
That night she wrote and posted a letter addressed to Miss Florence
Hill, 4 Madison Road, Brackhampton. On the following morning, going to
the county library, she studied a Brackhampton
Directory and Gazetteer, and a county history.
Nothing so far had contradicted the very faint and sketchy idea that
had come to her. What she had imagined was possible. She would go no
farther than that.
But the next step involved action—a good deal of action—the kind of
action for which she, herself, was physically unfit. If her theory were
to be definitely proved or disproved, she must at this point have help
from some other person. The question was—who? Miss Marple reviewed
various names and possibilities, rejecting them all with a vexed shake
of the head. The intelligent people, on whose intelligence she could
rely, were all far too busy. Not only had they all got jobs of varying
importance, their leisure hours were usually apportioned long
beforehand. The unintelligent who had time'on their hands were simply,
Miss Marple decided, no good.
She pondered in growing vexation and perplexity.
Then suddenly her forehead cleared. She ejaculated aloud a name.
"Of course!" said Miss Marple. "Lucy Eyelesbarrow!"
The name of Lucy Eyelesbarrow had already made itself felt in certain
circles.
Lucy Eyelesbarrow was thirty-two. She had taken a First in mathematics
at Oxford, was acknowledged
to have a brilliant mind and was confidently expected to take up a
distinguished academic career.
But Lucy Eyelesbarrow, in addition to scholarly brilliance, had a core
of good, sound common sense.
She could not fail to observe that a life of academic distinction was
singularly ill rewarded. She had no desire whatever to teach and she
took pleasure in contacts with minds much less brilliant than her own.
In short, she had a taste for people, all sorts of people—and not the
same people the whole time. She also, quite frankly, liked money. To
gain money one must exploit shortage.
Lucy Eyelesbarrow hit at once upon a very serious shortage—the shortage
of any kind of skilled
domestic labor. To the amazement of her friends and fellow scholars,
Lucy Eyelesbarrow entered the field of domestic labor.
Her success was immediate and assured. By now, after a lapse of some
years, she was known all over
the British Isles. It was quite customary for wives to say joyfully to
husbands, "It will be all right. I can
go with you to the States. I've got
Lucy Eyelesbarrow!" The point of Lucy Eyelesbarrow was that once
she came into a house, all worry, anxiety and hard work went out of it.
Lucy Eyelesbarrow did everything, saw to everything, arranged
everything. She was unbelievably competent in every conceivable sphere.
She looked after elderly parents, accepted the care of young children,
nursed the sickly, cooked divinely, got on well with any old crusted
servants there might happen to be (there usually weren't), was tactful
with impossible people, soothed habitual drunkards, was wonderful with
dogs. Best of all she
never minded what she did. She scrubbed the
kitchen floor, dug in the garden, cleaned up dog messes
and carried
coals!
One of her rules was never to accept an engagement for any long length
of time. A fortnight was her
usual period—a month at most under exceptional circumstances. For that
fortnight you had to pay the earth! But, during that fortnight, your
life was heaven. You could relax completely, go abroad, stay at home,
do as you pleased, secure that all was going well on the home front in
Lucy Eyelesbarrow's capable hands.
Naturally the demand for her services was enormous. She could have
booked herself up if she chose for about three years ahead. She had
been offered enormous sums to go as a permanency. But Lucy Irad no
intention of being a permanency, nor would she book herself for more
than six months ahead. And within that period, unknown to her clamoring
clients, she always kept certain free periods which enabled her either
to take a short luxurious holiday (since she spent nothing otherwise
and was handsomely paid and kept) or to accept any position at short
notice that happened to take her fancy, either by reason of its
character, or because she "liked the people." Since she was at liberty
to pick and choose among the vociferous claimants for her services, she
went very largely by personal liking. Mere riches would not
buy you the services of Lucy Eyelesbarrow. She could pick and choose
and she did pick and choose.
She enjoyed her life very much and found in it a continual source of
entertainment.
Lucy Eyelesbarrow read and reread the letter from Miss Marple. She had
made Miss Marple's acquaintance two years ago when her services had
been retained by Raymond West, the novelist, to go and look after his
old aunt who was recovering from pneumonia. Lucy had accepted the job
and had
gone down to St. Mary Mead. She had liked Miss Marple very much. As for
Miss Marple, once she
had caught a glimpse out of her bedroom window of Lucy Eyelesbarrow
really trenching for sweet peas
in the proper way, she had leaned back on her pillows with a sigh of
relief, eaten the tempting little meals that Lucy Eyelesbarrow brought
to her, and listened, agreeably surprised, to the tales told by her
elderly irascible maid-servant of how "I taught that Miss Eyelesbarrow
a crocket pattern what she'd never heard of! Proper grateful she was."
And had surprised her doctor by the rapidity of her convalescence.
Miss Marble wrote asking if Miss Eyelesbarrow could undertake a certain
task for her—rather an unusual one. Perhaps Miss Eyelesbarrow could
arrange a meeting at which they could discuss the matter.
Lucy Eyelesbarrow frowned for a moment or two as she considered. She
was in reality fully booked up. But the word unusual, and her
recollection of Miss Marple's personality, carried the day and she rang
up Miss Marple straightaway explaining that she could not come down to
St. Mary Mead as she was at the moment working, but that she was free
from two to four on the following afternoon and could meet Miss Marple
anywhere in London. She suggested her own club, a rather nondescript
establishment which had the advantage of having several small, dark
writing rooms which were usually empty.
Miss Marple accepted the suggestion and on the following day the
meeting took place.
Greeting were exchanged; Lucy Eyelesbarrow led her guest to the
gloomiest of the writing rooms, and said: "I'm afraid I'm rather booked
up just at present, but perhaps you'll tell me what it is you want me
to undertake?"
"It's very simple, really," said Miss Marple. "Unusual, but simple. I
want you to find a body."
For a moment the suspicion crossed Lucy's mind that Miss Marple was
mentally unhinged, but she rejected the idea. Miss Marple was eminently
sane. She meant exactly what she had said.
"What kind of a body?" asked Lucy Eyelesbarrow with admirable composure.
"A woman's body," said Miss Marple. "The body of a woman who "was
murdered—strangled actually— in a train."
Lucy's eyebrows rose slightly.
"Well, that's certainly unusual. Tell me about it."
Miss Marple told her. Lucy Eyelesbarrow listened attentively without
interrupting. At the end she said:
"It all depends on what your friend saw—or thought she saw?—"
She left the sentence unfinished with a question in it.
"Elspeth McGillicuddy doesn't imagine things," said Miss Marple.
"That's why I'm relying on what she said. If it had been Dorothy
Cartwright, now, it would have been quite a different matter. Dorothy
always has a good story and quite, often believes it herself, and there
is usually a kind of basis of truth
but certainly no more. But Elspeth is the kind of woman who finds it
very hard to make herself believe that anything at all extraordinary or
out of the way could happen. She's most unsuggestible, rather like
granite."
"I see," said Lucy thoughtfully. "Well, let's accept it all. Where do I
come in?"
"I was very much impressed by you," said Miss Marple, "and you see I
haven't got the physical strength nowadays to get about and do things."
"You want me to make inquiries? That sort of thing? But won't the
police have done all that? Or do you think they have been just slack?"
"Oh no," said Miss Marple. "They haven't been slack. It's just that
I've got a theory about the woman's body. It's got to be somewhere. If
it wasn't found in the train, then it must have been pushed or thrown
out of the train—but it hasn't been discovered anywhere on the line. So
I traveled down the same way
to see if there was anywhere where the body could have been thrown off
the train and yet wouldn't
have been found on the line—and there was. The railway line makes a big
curve before getting into Brackhampton, on the edge, of a high
embankment. If a body were thrown out there, when the train
was leaning at an angle, I think it would pitch right down the
embankment."
"But surely it would still be found—even there?"
"Oh yes. It would have to be taken away. But we'll come to that
presently. Here's the place—on this map."
Lucy bent to study where Miss Marple's finger pointed.
"It is right in the outskirts of Brackhampton now," said Miss Marple,
"but originally it was a country house with extensive park and grounds
and it's still there, untouched—ringed round now with building estates
and small suburban houses. It's called Rutherford Hall. It was built by
a man called Crackenthorpe, a very rich manufacturer, in 1884. The
original Crackenthorpe's son, an elderly man,
is living there still with, I understand, a daughter. The railway
encircles quite half of the property."
"And you want me to do—what?"
Miss Marple replied promptly.
"I want you to get a post there. Everyone is crying out for efficient
domestic help. I should not imagine
it would be difficult."
"No, I don't suppose it would be difficult."
"I understand that Mr. Crackenthorpe is said locally to be somewhat of
a miser. If you accept a low salary, I will make it up to the proper
figure which should, I think, be rather more than the current rate."
"Because of the difficulty?"
"Not the difficulty so much as the danger. It might, you know, be
dangerous. It's only right to warn you of that."
"I don't know," said Lucy pensively, "that the idea of danger would
deter me."
"I didn't think it would," said Miss Marple. "You're not that kind of
person."
"I dare say you thought it might even attract me? I've encountered very
little danger in my life. But do you really believe it might be
dangerous?"
"Somebody," Miss Marple pointed out, "has committed a very successful
crime. There as been no hue and cry, no real suspicion. Two elderly
ladies have told a rather improbable story, the police have
investigated it and found nothing in it. So everything is nice and
quiet. I don't think that this somebody, whoever he may be, will care
about the matter being raked up—especially if you are successful."
"What do I look for exactly?"
"Any signs along the embankment, a scrap of clothing, broken
bushes—that kind of thing."
Lucy nodded.
"And then?"
"I shall be quite close at hand," said Miss Marple. "An old maidservant
of mine, my faithful Florence, lives in Brackhampton. She has looked
after her old parents for years. They are now both dead, and
she takes in lodgers—all most respectable people. She has arranged for
me to have rooms with her. She
will look after me most devotedly, and I feel I should like to be close
at hand. I would suggest that you mention you have an elderly aunt
living in the neighborhood, and that you want a post within easy
distance of her, and also that you stipulate for a reasonable amount of
spare time so that you can go
and see her often." Again Lucy nodded.
"I was going to Taormina the day after tomorrow," she said. "The
holiday can wait. But I can only promise three weeks. After that, I am
booked up."
"Three weeks should be ample," said Miss Marple.
"If we can't find out anything in three weeks, we might as well give up
the whole thing as a mare's nest."
Miss Marple departed, and Lucy, after a moment's reflection, rang up a
registry office in Brackhampton, the manageress of which she knew very
well. She explained her desire for a post in the neighborhood so as to
be near her "aunt." After she had turned down, with a little difficulty
and a good deal of ingenuity, several more desirable places, Rutherford
Hall was mentioned.
"That sounds exactly what I want," said Lucy firmly.
The registry office rang up Miss Crackenthorpe, Miss Crackenthorpe rang
up Lucy.
Two days later Lucy left London en route for Rutherford Hall.
* * *
Driving her own small car, Lucy Eyelesbarrow turned through an imposing
pair of vast iron gates. Just inside them was what had originally been
a small lodge which now seemed completely derelict, whether through war
damage or merely through neglect, it was difficult to be sure. A long,
winding drive led through large gloomy clumps of rhododendrons up to
the house. Lucy caught her breath in a slight gasp when she saw the
house which was a kind of miniature Windsor Castle. The stone steps in
front of the door could have done with attention and the gravel sweep
was green with neglected weeds.
She pulled an old-fashioned wrought-iron bell, and its clamor sounded
echoing away inside. A slatternly woman, wiping her hands on her apron,
opened the door and looked at her suspiciously.
"Expected, aren't you?" she said. "Miss Something-barrow, she told me."
"Quite right," said Lucy.
The house was desperately cold inside. Her guide led her along a dark
hall and opened a door on the
right. Rather to Lucy's surprise, it was quite a pleasant sitting room,
with books and chintz-covered
chairs.
"I'll tell Her," said the woman, and went away shutting the door after
having given Lucy a look of profound disfavor.
After a few minutes the door opened again. From the first moment Lucy
decided that she liked Emma Crackenthorpe.
She was a middle-aged woman with no very outstanding characteristics,
neither good looking nor plain, sensibly dressed in tweeds and
pullover, with dark hair swept back from her forehead, steady hazel
eyes and a very pleasant voice.
She said: "Miss Eyelesbarrow?" and held out her hand.
Then she looked doubtful,
"I wonder," she said, "if this post is really what you're looking for?
I don't want a housekeeper, you know, to supervise things. I want
someone to do the work."
Lucy said that that was what most people needed.
Emma Crackenthorpe said apologetically: "So many people, you know, seem
to think that just a little
light
dusting will answer the case, but I can do all the light dusting
myself."
"I quite understand," said Lucy. "You want cooking and washing up, and
housework and stoking the boiler. That's all right. That's what I do.
I'm not at all afraid of work."
"It's a big house, I'm afraid, and inconvenient. Of course we only live
in a portion of it—my father and myself, that is. He is rather an
invalid. We live quite quietly, and there is an Aga stove. I have
several brothers, but they are not here very often. Two women come in,
a Mrs. Kidder in the morning and
Mrs. Hart three days a week, to do brasses and things like that. You
have youi own car?"
"Yes. It can stand out in the open it there's nowhere tc put it. It's
used to it."
"Oh, there are any amount of old stables. There's no trouble about
that." She frowned a moment, then said, "Eyelesbarrow—rather an unusual
name. Some friends of mine were telling me about a Lucy
Eyelesbarrow—the Kennedys?"
"Yes. I was with them in North Devon when Mrs. Kennedy was having a
baby."
Emma Crackenthorpe smiled.
"I know they said they'd never had such a wonderful time as when you
were there seeing to everything. But I had the idea that you were
terribly expensive. The sum I mentioned—"
"That's quite all right," said Lucy. "I want particularly, you see, to
be near Brackhampton. I have an elderly aunt in a critical state of
health and I want to be within easy distance of her. That's why the
salary is a secondary consideration. I can't afford to do nothing. If I
could be sure of having some time
off most days?"
"Oh, of course. Every afternoon, till six, if you like?"
"That seems perfect."
Miss Crackenthorpe hesitated a moment before saying: "My father is
elderly and a little—difficult—sometimes. He is very keen on economy,
and he says things sometimes that upset neople. I wouldn't like—"
Lucy broke in quickly.
"I'm quite used to elderly people of all kinds," she said. "I always
manage to get on well with them."
Emma Crackenthorpe looked relieved.
"Trouble with father!" diagnosed Lucy. "I bet he's an old "tartar."
She was apportioned a large, gloomy bedroom which a small electric
heatei did its inadequate best to warm, and was shown round the house,
a vast uncomfortable mansion. As they passed a dooi in the
hall a voice roared out:
"That you, Emma? Got the new girl there? Bring hei in. I want to look
at her."
Emma flushed, glanced at Lucy apologetically.
The two women entered the room. It was richly upholstered in dark
velvet, the narrow windows let in very little light, and it was full of
heavy mahogany Victorian furniture.
Old Mr. Crackenthorpe was stretched out in an invalid's chair, a
silverheaded stick by his side.
He was a big gaunt man, his flesh hanging in loose folds. He had a face
rather like a bulldog, with a pugnacious chin. He had thick, dark hair
flecked with gray, and small suspicious eyes.
"Let's have a look at you, young lady."
Lucy advanced, composed and smiling.
"There's just one thing you'd better understand straight away. Just
because "we live in a big house
doesn't mean we're rich. We're not rich. We live simply —do you
hear?—simply! No good coming here with a lot of highfalutin ideas.
Cod's as good a fish as turbot any day and don't you forget it. I don't
stand for waste. I live here because my father built the house and I
like it. After I'm dead they can sell it up if they want to—and I
expect they will want to. No sense of family. This house is well
built—it's solid, and we've got our own land round us. Keeps us
private. It would bring in a lot for building land but not while I'm
alive. You won't get me out of here until you take me out feet first."
He glared at Lucy.
"Your house is your castle," said Lucy.
"Laughing at me?"
"Of course not. I think it's very exciting to have a real country place
all surrounded by town."
"Quite so. Can't see another house from here, can you? Fields with cows
in them—right in the middle
of Brackhampton. You hear the traffic a bit when the wind's that way,
but otherwise it's still country."
He added, without pause or change of tone, to his daughter:
"Ring up that damnfool of a doctor. Tell him that last medicine's no
good at all."
Lucy and Emma retired. He shouted after them:
"And don't let. that damned woman who sniffs dust in here. She's
disarranged all my books."
Lucy asked: "Has Mr. Crackenthorpe been an invalid long?"
Emma said, rather evasively: "Oh, for years now . . . This is the
kitchen."
The kitchen was enormous. A vast kitchen range stood cold and
neglected. An Aga stood demurely
beside it.
Lucy asked times of meals and inspected the larder. Then she said
cheerfully to Emma Crackenthorpe:
"I know everything now. Don't bother. Leave it all to me."
Emma Crackenthorpe heaved a sigh of relief as she went up to bed that
night.
"The Kennedys were quite right," she said. "She's wonderful."
Lucy rose at six the next morning. She did the house, prepared
vegetables, assembled, cooked and
served breakfast. With Mrs. Kidder she made the beds and at eleven
o'clock they sat down to strong
tea and biscuits in the kitchen. Mollified by the fact that Lucy "had
no airs about her" and also by the strength and sweetness of the tea,
Mrs. Kidder relaxed into gossip. She was a small, spare woman with
a sharp eye and tight lips.
"Regular old skinflint he is. What She has to put up with! All the
same, She's not what I call downtrodden. Can hold her own all right
when she has to. When the gentlemen come down She sees
to it there's something decent to eat."
"The gentlemen?"
"Yes. Big family it was. The eldest, Mr. Edmund, he was killed in the
war. Then there's Mr. Cedric,
he lives abroad somewhere. He's not
married. Paints pictures in foreign parts, Mr. Harold's in the City,
lives in London—married an earl's daughter. Then there's Mr. Alfred,
he's got a nice way with him,
but he's a bit of a black sheep, been in
trouble once or twice—rand there's Miss Edith's husband, Mr. Bryan,
ever so nice he is. She died some years ago, but he's always stayed one
of the family. And
there's Master Alexander, Miss Edith's little boy.
He's at school, comes here for part of the holidays always; Miss Emma's
terribly set on him."
Lucy digested all this information, continuing to press tea on her
informant. Finally, reluctantly,
Mrs. Kidder rose to her feet.
"Seem to have got along a treat we do, this morning," she said
wonderingly. "Want me to give you a
hand with the potatoes, dear?"
"They're already done."
"Well, you are a one for getting on with things! I might as well be
getting along myself as there doesn't seem anything else to do."
Mrs. Kidder departed and Lucy, with time on her hands, scrubbed the
kitchen table which she had been longing to do, but which she had put
off so as not to offend Mrs. Kidder whose job it properly was.
Then she cleaned the silver till it shone radiantly. She cooked lunch,
cleared it away, washed up, and at two-thirty was ready to start
exploration. She had set out the tea things ready on a tray, with
sandwiches and bread and butter covered over with a damp napkin to keep
them moist.
She strolled first round the gardens which would be the normal thing to
do. The kitchen garden was sketchily cultivated with a few vegetables.
The hothouses were in ruins. The paths everywhere were overgrown with
weeds. A herbaceous border near the house was the only thing that
showed free of
weeds and in good condition and Lucy suspected that that had been
Emma's hand. The gardener was a very old man, somewhat deaf, who was
only making a show of working. Lucy spoke to him pleasantly. He lived
in a cottage adjacent to the big stable yard.
Extending out from the stable yard, a back drive led through the park,
which was fenced on either side
of it, and under a railway arch into a small back lane.
Every few minutes a train thundered along the main line over the
railway arch. Lucy watched the trains
as they slackened speed going round the sharp curve that encircled the
Crackenthorpe property. She passed under the railway arch and out into
the lane. It seemed a little-used track. On the one side was
the railway embankment, on the other was a high wall which enclosed
some tall factory buildings. Lucy followed the lane until it came out
into a street of small houses. She could hear a short distance away
the busy hum of main-road traffic. She glanced at her watch. A woman
came out of a house nearby
and Lucy stopped her.
"Excuse me, can you tell me if there is a public telephone near here?"
"Post office just at the corner of the road."
Lucy thanked her and walked along until she came to the post office,
which was a combination shop
and post office. There was a telephone box at one side. Lucy went into
it and made a call. She asked to speak to Miss Marple. A woman's voice
spoke in a sharp bark.
"She's resting. And I'm not going to disturb her! She needs her
rest—she's an old lady. Who shall I say called?"
"Miss Eyelesbarrow. There's no need to disturb her. Just tell her that
I've arrived and everything is going on well and that I'll let her know
when I've any news."
She replaced the receiver and made her way back to Rutherford Hall.
"I suppose it will be all right if I just practice a few iron shots in
the park?" asked Lucy.
"Oh yes, certainly. Are you fond of golf?"
"I'm not much good, but I like to keep in practice. It's a more
agreeable form of exercise than just going for a walk."
"Nowhere to walk outside this place," growled Mr. Crackenthorpe.
"Nothing but pavements and miserable little band-boxes of houses. Like
to get hold of my land and build more of them. But they won't until I'm
dead. And I'm not going to die to oblige anybody. I can' tell you that!
Not to oblige anybody!"
Emma Crackenthorpe said mildly:
"Now, Father."
"I know what they think—and what they're waiting for. All of 'em.
Cedric, and that sly fox Harold with his smug face. As for Alfred I
wonder he hasn't had a shot at bumping me off himself. Not sure he
didn't, at Christmastime. That was a very odd turn I had. Puzzled old
Quimper. He asked me a lot of discreet questions."
"Everyone gets these digestive upsets now and again, Father."
"All right, all right, say straight out that I ate too much! That's
what you mean. And why did I eat too much? Because there was too much
food on the table, far too much. Wasteful and extravagant. And that
reminds me—you, young woman. Five potatoes you sent in for
lunch—good-sized ones, too. Two potatoes are enough for anybody. So
don't send in more than four in the future. The extra one was wasted
today."
"It wasn't wasted, Mr. Crackenthorpe. I've planned to use it in a
Spanish omelet tonight."
"Urgh!" As Lucy went out of the room carrying the coffee tray she heard
him say, "Slick young woman, that, always got all the answers. Cooks
well, though —and she's a handsome kind of girl."
Lucy Eyelesbarrow took a light iron out of the set of golf clubs she
had had the forethought to bring with her and strolled out into the
park, climbing over the fencing.
She began playing a series of shots. After five minutes or so, a ball,
apparently sliced, pitched on the
side of the railway embankment. Luck went up and began to hunt about
for it. She looked back toward the house. It was a long way off and
nobody was in the least interested in what she was doing. She continued
to hunt for the ball. Now and then she played shots from the embankment
down into the
grass. During the afternoon she searched about a third of the
embankment. Nothing. She played her
ball back toward the house.
. Then, on the next day, she came upon something. A thorn-bush growing
about halfway up the bank
had been snapped off. Bits of it lay scattered about. Lucy exarnined
the tree itself. Impaled on one of the thorns was a torn scrap of fur.
It was almost the same color as the wood, a pale brownish color. Lucy
looked at it for a moment, then she took a pair of scissors out of her
pocket and snipped it carefully in half. The half she had snipped off
she put in an envelope which she had in her pocket. She came down the
steep slope searching about for anything else. She looked carefully at
the rough grass of the field.
She thought she could distingish a kind of track which someone had made
walking through the long
grass. But it was very faint—not nearly so clear as her own tracks
were. It must have been made some time ago and it was too sketchy for
her to be sure that it was not merely imagination on her part.
She began to hunt carefully down in the grass at the foot of the
embankment just below the broken thornbush. Presently her search was
rewarded. She found a powder compact, a small cheap enameled affair.
She wrapped it in her handkerchief and put it in her pocket. She
searched on but did not find anything more.
On the following afternoon, she got into her car and went to see her
invalid aunt. Emma Crackenthorpe said kindly, "Don't hurry back. We
shan't want you until dinnertime."
"Thank you, but I shall be back at six by the latest." No. 4 Madison
Road was a small drab house in a small drab street. It had very clean
Notthingham lace curtains, a shining white doorstep and a well-polished
brass door-handle. The door was opened by a tall, grim-looking woman,
dressed in black with a large knob of iron-gray hair.
She eyed Lucy in suspicious appraisal as she showed her in to Miss
Marple.
Miss Marple was occupying the back sitting room which looked out on to
a small, tidy square of garden. It was aggressively clean with a lot of
mats and doilies, a great many china ornaments, a rather big Jacobean
suite and two ferns in pots. Miss Marple was sitting in a big chair
by'the fire busily engaged in crocheting.
Lucy came in and shut the door. She sat down in the chair facing Miss
Marple.
"Well!" she said, "it looks as though you were right." She produced her
findings and gave the details of . their discovery.
A faint flush of achievement came into Miss Marple's cheeks.
"Perhaps one ought not to feel so," she said, "but it is rather
gratifying to form a theory and get proof
that it is correct!"
She fingered the small tuft of fur. "Elspeth said the woman was wearing
a light-colored fur coat. I
suppose the compact was in the pocket of the coat and fell out as the
body rolled down the slope. It doesn't seem distinctive in any way, but
it may help. You didn't take all the fur?"
"No, I left half of it on the thornbush."
Miss Marple nodded approval.
"Quite right. You are very intelligent, my dear. The police will want
to check exactly."
"You are going to the police—with these things?"
"Well—not quite yet. . . ." Miss Marple considered. "It would be
better, I think, to find the body first. Don't you?"
"Yes, but isn't that rather a tall order? I mean, granting that your
estimate is correct. The murderer
pushed the body out of the train, then presumably got out himself at
Brackhampton and at some time—probably that same night—came along and
removed the body. But what happened after that? He may have taken it
anywhere."
"Not anywhere," said Miss Marple. "I don't think you've followed the
thing to its logical conclusion, my dear Miss Eyelesbarrow."
"Do call me Lucy. Why not anywhere?"
"Because, if so, he might much more easily have killed the girl in some
lonely spot and driven the body away from there. You haven't
appreciated—"
Lucy interrupted. "Are you saying—do you mean—that this was a
premeditated crime?"
"I didn't think so at first," said Miss Marple. "One
wouldn't—naturally. It seemed like a quarrel and a
man losing control and strangling the girl and then being faced with
the problem of disposing of his victim—a problem which he had to solve
within a very few minutes. But it really is too much of a coincidence
that he should kill the girl in a fit of passion, and then look out of
the window and find the train was going round a curve exactly at a spot
where he could tip the body out, and where he could be sure of finding
his way later and removing it! If he'd just thrown her out there by
chance, he'd have
done no more about it, and the body would, long before now, have been
found."
She paused. Lucy stared at her.
"You know," said Miss Marple thoughtfully, "it's really quite a clever
way to have planned a crime—
and I think it was very carefully planned. There's something so
anonymous about a train. If he'd killed
her in the place where she lived or was staying, somebody might have
noticed him come or go. Or if
he'd driven her out into the country somewhere, someone might have
noticed the car and its number
and make. But a train is full of strangers coming and going. In a
noncorridor carriage, alone with her,
it was quite easy —especially if you realize that he knew exactly what
he was going to do next. He knew—he must have known—all about
Rutherford Hall—its geographical position, I mean, its queer isolation:
an island bounded by railway lines."
"It is exactly like that," said Lucy. "It's an anachronism out of the
past. Bustling urban life goes on all around it, but doesn't touch it.
The tradespeople deliver in the mornings and that's all."
"So we assume, as you said, that the murderer comes to Rutherford Hall
that night. It is already dark when the body falls and no one is likely
to discover it before the next day."
"No, indeed."
"The murderer would come—how? In a car? Which way?"
Lucy considered.
"There's a rough lane, alongside a factory wall. He'd probably come
that way, turn in under the railway arch and along the back drive. Then
he could climb the fence, go along at the foot of the embankment, find
the body, and carry it back to the car."
"And then," continued Miss Marple, "he took it to some place he had
already chosen beforehand. This was all thought out, you know. And I
don't think, as I say, that he would take it away from Rutherford Hall,
or if so, not very far. The obvious thing, I suppose, would be to bury
it somewhere?" She looked inquiringly at Lucy.
"I suppose so," said Lucy considering. "But it wouldn't be quite as
easy as it sounds."
Miss Marple agreed.
"He couldn't bury it in the park. Too hard work and very noticeable.
Somewhere where the earth was turned already?"
"The kitchen garden, perhaps, but that's very close to the gardener's
cottage. He's old and deaf—but
still it might be risky."
"Is there a dog?"
"No."
"Then in a shed, perhaps, or an outhouse?"
"That would be simpler and quicker. There are a lot of unused old
buildings: broken down pigsties, harness rooms, workshops that nobody
ever goes near. Or he might perhaps have thrust it into a clump
of rhododendrons or shrubs somewhere."
Miss Marple nodded.
"Yes, I think that's much more probable."
There was a knock on the door and the grim Florence came in with a tray.
"Nice for you to have a visitor," she said to Miss Marple, "I've made
you my special scones you used
to like."
"Florence always made the most delicious teacakes," said Miss Marple.
Florence, gratified, creased her features into a totally unexpected
smile and left the room.
"I think, my dear," said Miss Marple, "we won't talk any more about the
murder during tea. Such an unpleasant subject!"
* * *
After tea Lucy rose.
"I'll be getting back," she said. "As I've already told you, there's no
one actually living at Rutherford Hall who could be the man we're
looking for. There's only an old man and a middle-aged woman, and an
old, deaf gardener."
"I didn't say he was actually living there," said Miss Marple. "All I
mean is that he's someone who knows Rutherford Hall very well. But we
can go into that after you've found the body."
"You seem to assume quite confidently that I shall find it," said Lucy.
"I don't feel nearly so optimistic."
"I'm sure you will succeed, my dear Lucy. You are such an efficient
person."
"In some ways, but I haven't had any experience in looking for bodies."
"I'm sure all it needs is a little common sense," said Miss Marple
encouragingly.
Lucy looked at her, then laughed. Miss Marple smiled back at her.
Lucy set to work systematically the next afternoon.
She poked around outhouses, prodded the briars which wreathed the old
pigsties, and was peering into
the boiler room under the greenhouse when she heard a dry cough and
turned to find old Hillman, the gardener, looking at her disapprovingly.
"You be careful you don't get a nasty fall, Miss," he warned her. "Them
steps isn't safe, and you was
up in the loft just now and the floor there ain't safe neither."
Lucy was careful to display no embarrassment.
"I expect you think I'm very nosy," she said cheerfully. "I was just
wondering if something couldn't be made out of this place—growing
mushrooms for the market, that sort of thing. Everything seems to
have been let go terribly."
"That's the master, that is. Won't spend a penny. Ought to have two men
and a boy here, I ought, to
keep the place proper, but won't hear of it, he won't. Had all I could
do to make him get a motor mower. Wanted me to mow all that front grass
by hand, he did."
"But if the place could be made to pay—with some repairs?"
"Won't get a place like this to pay—too far gone. And he wouldn't care
about that, anyway. Only cares about saving. Knows well enough what'll
happen after he's gone—the young gentlemen'll sell up as fast
as they can. Only waiting for him to pop off, they are. Going to come
into a tidy lot of money when he dies, so I've heard."
"I suppose he's a very rich man?" said Lucy.
"Crackenthorpe's Fancies, that's what they are. The old gentleman
started it, Mr. Crackenthorpe's father. A sharp one he was,'by all
accounts. Made his fortune and built this place. Hard as nails, they
say, and never forgot an injury. But with all that, he was open-handed.
Nothing of the miser about him. Disappointed in both his sons, so the
story goes. Give 'em an education and brought 'em up to be
gentlemen—Oxford and all. But they were too much of gentlemen to want
to go into the business. The younger one married an actress and then
smashed himself up in a car accident when he'd been drinking. The elder
one, our one here, his father never fancied so much. Abroad a lot, he
was, bought a lot of heathen statues and had them sent home. Wasn't so
close with his money when he was young— come
on him more in middle age, it did. No, they never did hit it off, him
and his father, so I've heard."
Lucy digested this information with an air of polite interest. The old
man leaned against the wall and prepared to go on with his saga. He
much preferred talking to doing any work.
"Died afore the war, the old gentleman did. Terrible temper he had.
Didn't do to give him any sauce,
he wouldn't stand for it."
"And after he died, this Mr. Crackenthorpe came and lived here?"
"Him and his family, yes. Nigh to grown up they was by then."
"But surely— Oh, I see, you mean the 1914 war."
"No, I don't. Died in 1928, that's what I mean."
Lucy supposed that 1928 qualified as "before the war" though it was not
the way she would have described it herself.
She said: "Well, I expect you'll be wanting to go on with your work.
You mustn't let me keep you."
"Ar," said old Hillman without enthusiasm, "not much you can do this
time of day. Light's too bad."
Lucy went back to the house, pausing to investigate a likely looking
copse of birch and azalea on
her way.
She found Emma Crackenthorpe standing in the hall reading a letter. The
afternoon post had just been delivered.
"My nephew will be here tomorrow—with a school friend. Alexander's room
is the one over the porch. The one next to it will do for James
Stoddart-West. They'll use the bathroom just opposite."
"Yes, Miss Crackenthorpe. I'll see the rooms are prepared."
"They'll arrive in the morning before lunch." She hesitated. "I expect
they'll be hungry."
"I bet they will," said Lucy. "Roast beef, do you think? And perhaps
treacle tart?"
"Alexander's very fond of treacle tart."
The two boys arrived on the following morning. They both had
well-brushed hair, suspiciously angelic faces, and perfect manners.
Alexander Eastley had fair hair and blue eyes, Stoddart-West was dark
and spectacled.
They discoursed gravely during lunch on events in the sporting world,
with occasional references to the latest space fiction. Their manner
was that of elderly professors discussing paleolithic implements. In
comparison with them, Lucy felt quite young.
The sirloin of beef vanished in no time and every crumb of the treacle
tart was consumed.
Mr. Crackenthorpe grumbled: "You two will eat me out of house and home."
Alexander gave him a blue-eyed reproving glance.
"We'll have bread and cheese if you can't afford meat, Grandfather."
"Afford it? I can afford it. I don't like waste."
"We haven't wasted any, sir," said Stoddart-West, looking down at his
plate which bore clear testimony
of that fact.
"You boys both eat twice as much as I do."
"We're at the body-building stage," Alexander explained. "We need a big
intake of proteins."
The old man grunted.
As the two boys left the table, Lucy heard Alexander say apologetically
to his friend:
"You mustn't pay any attention to my grandfather. He's on a diet or
something and that makes him
rather peculiar. He's terribly mean, too.
I think it must be a complex of some kind."
Stoddart-West said comprehendingly: "I had an aunt who kept
thinking she was going bankrupt. Really, she
had oodles of money. Pathological, the doctor said. Have you got that
football, Alex?"
After she had cleared away and washed up lunch, Lucy went out. She
could hear the boys calling out
in the distance on the lawn. She
herself went in the opposite direction, down the front drive and from
there she struck across to some clumped masses of rhododendron bushes.
She began to hunt carefully, holding back the leaves and peering
inside. She moved from clump to clump systematically, and was raking
inside with a golf club when the polite voice of Alexander Eastley made
her start.
"Are you looking for something, Miss Eyelesbarrow?"
"A golf ball," said Lucy promptly. "Several golf balls, in fact. I've
been practicing golf shots most afternoons and I've lost quite a lot of
balls. I thought that today I really must find some of them."
"We'll help you," said Alexander obligingly.
"That's very kind of you. I thought you were playing football."
"One can't go on playing footer," explained Stoddart-West. "One gets
too hot. Do you play a lot of golf?"
"I'm quite fond of it. I don't get much opportunity."
"I suppose you don't. You do the cooking here, don't you?"
"Yes."
"Did you cook the lunch today?"
"Yes. Was it all right?"
"Simply wizard," said Alexander. "We get awful meat at school, all
dried up. I love beef that's pink and juicy inside. That treacle tart
was pretty smashing, too."
"You must tell me what things you like best."
"Could we have apple meringue one day? It's my favorite thing."
"Of course."
Alexander sighed happily.
"There's a clock golf set under the stairs," he said. "We could fix it
up on the lawn and do some putting. What about it, Stodders?"
"Good oh!" said Stoddart-West.
"He isn't really Australian," explained Alexander courteously. "But
he's practicing talking that way in case his people take him out to see
the Test Match next year."
Encouraged by Lucy, they went off to get the clock golf set. Later, as
she returned to the house, she found them setting it out on the lawn
and arguing about the position of the numbers.
"We don't want it like a clock," said Stoddart-West. "That's kid stuff.
We want to make a course of it. Long holes and short ones. It's a pity
the numbers are so rusty. You can hardly see them."
"They need a lick of white paint," said Lucy. "You might get some
tomorrow and paint them."
"Good idea." Alexander's face lighted up. "I say, I believe there are
some old pots of paint in the Long Barn—left there by the painters.
Shall we see?"
"What's the Long Barn?" asked Lucy.
Alexander pointed to a long, stone building a little way from the house
near the back drive.
"It's quite old," he said. "Grandfather calls it a Leak Barn and says
it's Elizabethan, but that's just swank. It belonged to the farm that
was here originally. My great-grandfather pulled it down and built this
awful house instead."
He added: "A lot of Grandfather's collection is in the barn. Thingshe
had sent home from abroad when
he was a young man. Most of them are pretty frightful, too. The Long
Barn is used sometimes for whist drives and things like that. Women's
Institute stuff. And Conservative Sales of Work. Come and see it." Lucy
accompanied them willingly. There was a big oak, nail-studded door to
the barn. Alexander raised his hand and detached a key on a nail just
under some ivy to the right hand of the top of the door. He turned it
in the lock, pushed the door open and they went in.
At a first glance Lucy felt that she was in a singularly bad museum.
The heads of two Roman emperors
in marble glared at her out of bulging eyeballs, there was a huge
sarcophagus of decadent Greco-Roman period, a simpering Venus stood on
a pedestal clutching her falling draperies. Besides these works of art,
there were a couple of trestle tables, some stacked-up chairs, and
sundry oddments such as a rusted
hand mower, two buckets, a couple of moth-eaten car seats, and a
green-painted, iron garden seat that had lost a leg.
"I think I saw the paint over here," said Alexander vaguely. He went to
a corner and pulled aside a tattered curtain that shut it off.
They found a couple of paint pots and brushes; the latter dry and stiff.
"You really need some turpentine," said Lucy. They could not, however,
find any. The boys suggested bicycling off to get some, and Lucy urged
them to do so. Painting the clock golf numbers would keep them amused
for some time, she thought. The boys went off, leaving her in the barn.
"This really could do with a clear up," she had murmured.
"I shouldn't bother," Alexander advised her. "It gets cleaned up if
it's going to be used for anything, but it's practically never used
this time of year."
"Do I hang the key up outside the door again? Is that where it's kept?"
"Yes. There's nothing to pinch here, you see. Nobody would want those
awful marble things and
anyway they weigh a ton."
Lucy agreed with him. She could hardly admire old Mr. Crackenthorpe's
taste in art. He seemed to
have an unerring instinct for selecting the
worst specimen of any period.
She stood looking round her after the boys had gone. Her eyes came to
rest on the sarcophagus and stayed there.
That sarcophagus. ...
The air in the barn was faintly musty as though un-aired for a long
time. She went over to the sarcophagus. It had a heavy, close-fitting
lid. Lucy looked at it speculatively.
Then she left the barn, went to the kitchen, found a heavy crowbar, and
returned.
It was not an easy task but Lucy toiled doggedly.
Slowly the lid began to rise, pried up by the crowbar. . .
It rose sufficiently for Lucy to see what was inside.
A few minutes later Lucy, rather pale, left the barn, locked the door
and put the key back on the nail.
She went rapidly to the stables, got out her car and drove down the
back drive. She stopped at the post office at the end of the road. She
went into the telephone box, put in the money and dialed.
"I want to speak to Miss Marple."
"She's resting, Miss. It's Miss Eyelesbarrow, isn't it?"
"Yes."
"I'm not going to disturb her and that's flat, Miss. She's an old lady
and she needs her rest."
"You must disturb her. It's urgent."
"I'm not—"
"Please do what I say at once."
When she chose, Lucy's .voice could be as incisive as steel. Florence
knew authority when she heard it.
Presently Miss Marple's voice spoke.
"Yes, Lucy?"
Lucy drew a deep breath.
"You were quite right," she said. "I've found it."
"A woman's body?"
"Yes. A woman in a fur coat. It's in a stone sarcophagus in a kind of
Barn-CMtfi-Museum near the
house. What do you want me to do? I ought to inform the police, I
think."
"Yes. You must inform the police. At once."
"But what about the rest of it? About you? The first thing they'll want
to know is why I was prying up
a lid that weighs tons for apparently no reason. Do you want me to
invent a reason? I can."
"No. I think, you know," said Miss Marple in her gentle, serious voice,
"that the only thing to do is to
tell the exact truth."
"About you?"
"About everything."
A sudden grin split the whiteness of Lucy's face.
"That will be quite simple for me," she said. "But I imagine they'll
find it quite hard to believe!"
She rang off, waited a moment, and then rang and got the police station.
"I have just discovered a dead body in a sarcophagus in the Long Barn
at Rutherford Hall."
"What's that?"
Lucy repeated her statement and anticipating the next question gave her
name.
She drove back, put the car away and entered the house.
She paused in the hall for a moment, thinking.
Then she gave a brief sharp nod of the head and went to the library
where Miss Crackenthorpe was sitting helping her father to do the Times crossword.
"Can I speak to you a moment, Miss Crackenthorpe?"
Emma looked up, a shade of apprehension on her face. The apprehension
was, Lucy thought, purely domestic. In such words do useful household
staff announce their imminent departure.
"Well, speak up, girl, speak up," said Mr. Crackenthorpe irritably.
Lucy said to Emma, "I'd like to speak to you alone, please."
"Nonsense," said Mr. Crackenthorpe. "You say straight out here what
you've got to say."
"Just a moment, Father." Emma rose and went toward the door.
"All nonsense. It can wait," said the old man angrily. "I'm afraid it
can't wait," said Lucy. Mr. Crackenthorpe said, "What impertinence!"
Emma came out into the hall. Lucy followed her and shut the door behind
them.
"Yes?" said Emma. "What is it? If you think there's too much to do with
the boys here, I can help you and—"
"It's not that at all," said Lucy. "I didn't want to speak before your
father because I understand he is an invalid and it might give him a
shock. You see, I've just discovered the body of a murdered woman in
that big sarcophagus in the Long Barn."
Emma Crackenthorpe stared at her.
"In the sarcophagus? A murdered woman? It's impossible!"
"I'm afraid it's quite true. I've rung up the police. They will be here
at any minute."
A slight flush came into Emma's cheek.
"You should have told me first—before notifying the police."
"I'm sorry," said Lucy.
"I didn't hear you ring up—" Emma's glance went to the telephone on the
hall table.
"I rang up from the post office just down the road."
"But how extraordinary—why not from here?"
Lucy thought quickly.
"I was afraid the boys might be about—might hear —if I rang up from the
hall here."
"I see. . . . Yes—I see. They are coming—the police, I mean?"
"They're here now," said Lucy, as with a squeal of brakes a car drew up
at the front door and the bell pealed through the house.
* * *
"I'm sorry, very sorry—to have asked this of you," said Inspector Bacon.
His hand under her arm, he led Emma Crackenthorpe out of the barn.
Emma's face was very pale; she looked sick, but she walked firmly erect.
"I'm quite sure that I've never seen the woman before in my life."
"We're very grateful to you, Miss Crackenthorpe. That's all I wanted to
know. Perhaps you'd like to lie down?"
"I must go to my father. I telephoned to Doctor Quirnper as soon as I
heard about this and he is with him now."
Doctor Quimper came out of the library as they crossed the hall. He was
a tall, genial man, with a casual, offhand, cynical manner that his
patients found very stimulating.
He and the Inspector nodded to each other.
"Miss Crackenthorpe has performed an unpleasant task very bravely,"
said Bacon.
"Well done, Emma," said the doctor, patting her on the shoulder. "You
can take things. I've always known that. Your father's all right. Just
go in and have a word with him, and then go into the dining
room and get yourself a glass of brandy. That's a prescription."
Emma smiled at him gratefully and went into the library.
"That woman's the salt of the earth," said the doctor looking after
her. "A thousand pities she's never married. The penalty of being the
only female in a family of men. The other sister got clear, married at
seventeen, I believe. This one's quite a handsome woman, really. She'd
have been a success as a wife
and mother."
"Too devoted to her father, I suppose," said Inspector Bacon.
"She's not really as devoted as all that—but she's got the instinct
some women have to make their men folk happy. She sees that her father
likes being an invalid, so she lets him be an invalid. She's the same
with her brothers. Cedric feels he's a good painter, what's-his-name,
Harold, knows how much she relies
on his sound judgment—she lets Alfred shock her with his stories of his
clever deals. Oh yes, she's a clever woman—no fool. Well, do you want
me for anything? Want me to have a look at your corpse
now Johnstone has done with it" (Johnstone was the police surgeon) "and
see if it happens to be one of my medical mistakes?"
"I'd like you to have a look, yes, Doctor. We want to get her
identified. I suppose it's impossible for old Mr. Crackenthorpe? Too
much of a strain?"
"Strain? Fiddlesticks. He'd never forgive you or me if you didn't let
him have a peep. He's all agog. Most exciting thing that's happened to
him for fifteen years or so—and it won't cost him anything!"
"There's nothing really much wrong with him, then?"
"He's seventy-two," said the doctor. "That's all, really, that's the
matter with him. He has odd rheumatic twinges—who doesn't? So he calls
it arthritis. He has palpitations after meals —as well he may—he puts
them down to 'heart.' But he can always do anything he wants to do!
I've plenty of patients like that. The ones who are really ill usually
insist desperately that they're perfectly well. Come on, let's go and
see this body of yours. Unpleasant, I suppose?"
"Johnstone estimates she's been dead between a fortnight and three
weeks."
The doctor stood by the sarcophagus and looked down with frank
curiosity, professionally unmoved by what he had named the
"unpleasantness."
"Never seen her before. No patient of mine. I don't remember ever
seeing her about in Brackhampton. She must have been quite good-looking
once—hm— Somebody had it in for her all right."
They went out again into the air. Doctor Quimper glanced up at the
building.
"Found in the—what do they call it?—the Long Barn—in a sarcophagus!
Fantastic! Who found her?"
"Miss Lucy Eyelesbarrow."
"Oh, the latest lady help? What was she doing, poking about in
sarcophagi?"
"That," said Inspector Bacon grimly, "is just what I am going to ask
her. Now, about Mr. Crackenthorpe. Will you—?"
"I'll bring him along."
Mr. Crackenthorpe, muffled in scarves, came walking at a brisk pace,
the doctor beside him.
"Disgraceful," he said. "Absolutely disgraceful! I brought back that
sarcophagus from Florence in—let
me see—it must have been in 1908—or
was it 1909?"
"Steady now," the doctor warned him. "This isn't going to be nice, you
know."
"No matter how ill I am, I've got to do my duty, haven't I?"
A very brief visit inside the Long Barn was, however, quite long
enough. Mr. Crackenthorpe shuffled
out into the air again with remarkable speed.
"Never saw her before in my life!" he said. "What's it mean? Absolutely
disgraceful. It wasn't Florence—
I remember now—it was Naples. A very fine specimen. And some fool of a
woman has to come and
get herself killed in it!"
He clutched at the folds of his overcoat on the left side.
"Too much for me . . . My heart . . . Where's Emma? Doctor. . . ."
Doctor Quimper took his arm.
"You'll be all right," he said. "I prescribe a little stimulant.
Brandy."
They went back together toward the house.
"Sir. Please, sir."
Inspector Bacon turned. Two boys had arrived, breathless, on bicycles.
Their faces were full of eager pleading.
"Please, sir, can we see the body?"
"No, you can't," said Inspector Bacon.
"Oh sir, please, sir. You never know. We might know who she was. Oh
please, sir, do be a sport. It's
not fair. Here's a murder, right in
our own barn. It's the sort of chance that might never happen again.
Do
be a sport, sir."
"Who are you two?"
"I'm Alexander Eastley and this is my friend James Stoddart-West."
"Have you ever seen a blond woman wearing a light-colored, dyed
squirrel coat anywhere about the place?"
"Well—I can't remember exactly," said Alexander astutely. "If I were to
have a look—"
"Take 'em in, Sanders," said Inspector Bacon to the constable who was
standing by the barn door.
"One's only young once!"
"Oh sir, thank you, sir." Both boys were vociferous. "It's very kind of
you, sir."
Bacon turned away toward the house.
"And now," he said to himself grimly, "for Miss Lucy Eyelesbarrow!"
* * *
After leading the police to the Long Barn and giving a brief account of
her actions, Lucy had retired into the background, but she was under no
illusion that the police had finished with her.
She was preparing potatoes for chips that evening when word was brought
to her that Inspector Bacon required her presence. Putting aside the
large bowl of cold water and salt in which the chips were reposing,
Lucy followed the policeman to where the Inspector awaited her. She sat
down and awaited
his questions composedly.
She gave her name, her address in London, and added of her own accord:
"I will give you some names and addresses of reference if you want to
know all about me."
The names were very good ones. An Admiral of the Fleet, the provost of
an Oxford college and a Dame of the British Empire. In spite of himself
Inspector Bacon was impressed.
"Now, Miss Eyelesbarrow, you went into the Long Barn to find some
paint—is that right? And after
having found the paint you got a crowbar, forced up the lid of this
sarcophagus and found the body.
What were you looking for in the sarcophagus?"
"I was looking for a body," said Lucy.
"You were looking for a body—and you found one! Doesn't that seem to
you a very extraordinary story?"
"Oh yes, it is an extraordinary story. Perhaps you will let me explain
it to you."
"I certainly think you had better do so."
Lucy gave him a precise recital of the events which had led up to her
sensational discovery.
The Inspector summed it up in an outraged voice.
"You were engaged by an elderly lady to obtain a post here and to
search the house and grounds for a dead body? Is that right?"
"Yes."
"Who is this elderly lady?"
"Miss Jane Marple. She is at present living at 4 Madison Road."
The Inspector wrote it down.
"You expect me to believe this story?"
Lucy said gently:
"Not, perhaps, until after you have interviewed Miss Marple and got her
confirmation of it."
"I shall interview her all right. She must be cracked."
Lucy forbore to point out that to be proved right is not really a proof
of mental incapacity. Instead she said:
"What are you proposing to tell Miss Crackenthorpe? About me, I mean?"
"Why do you ask?"
"Well, as far as Miss Marple is concerned I've done my job. I've found
the body she wanted found. But I'm still engaged by Miss Crackenthorpe,
and there are two hungry boys in the house and probably some more of
the family will soon be coming down after all this upset. She needs
domestic help. If you go and tell her that I only took this post in
order to hunt for dead bodies she'll probably throw me out. Otherwise I
can get on with my job and be useful."
The Inspector looked hard at her.
"I'm not saying anything to anyone at present," he said "I haven't
verified your statement yet. For all I know you may be making the whole
thing up."
Lucy rose.
"Thank you. Then I'll go back to the kitchen and get on with things."
"We'd better have the Yard in on it; is that what you think, Bacon?"
The Chief Constable looked inquiringly at Inspector Bacon. The
Inspector was a big solid man—his expression was that of one utterly
disgusted with humanity.
"The woman wasn't a local, sir," he said. "There's some reason to
believe—from her underclothing—
that she might have been a foreigner. Of course," added Inspector Bacon
hastily, "I'm not letting on
about that yet awhile. We're keeping it up our sleeves until after the
inquest."
The Chief Constable nodded.
"The inquest will be purely formal, I suppose?"
"Yes, sir. I've seen the coroner."
"And it's fixed for—when?"
"Tomorrow. I understand the other members of the Crackenthorpe family
will be here for it. There's
just a chance one of them might be able to identify her. They'll all be
here."
He consulted a list he held in his hand.
"Harold Crackenthorpe, he's something in the City —quite an important
figure, I understand. Alfred— don't quite know what he does.
Cedric—that's the one who lives abroad. Paints!" The Inspector invested
the word with its full quota of sinister significance. The Chief
Constable smiled into his mustache.
"No reason, is there, to believe the Crackenthorpe family are connected
with the crime in any way?"
he asked.
"Not apart from the fact that the body was found on the premises," said
Inspector Bacon. "And of
course it's just possible that this artist
member of the family might be able to identify her. What beats
me is
the extraordinary rigmarole about the train."
"Ah yes. You've been to see this old lady, this—er" —he glanced at the
memorandum lying on his
desk— "Miss Marple?"
"Yes, sir. And she's quite set and definite about the whole thing.
Whether she's barmy or not, I don't know, but she sticks to her
story—about what her friend saw and all the rest of it. As far as all
that goes, I dare say it's just make believe—sort of thing old ladies
do make up, like seeing flying saucers at the bottom of the garden, and
Russian agents in the lending library. But it seems quite clear that
she did engage this young woman, the lady help, and told her to look
for a body —which the girl did."
"And found one," observed the Chief Constable. "Well, it's all a very
remarkable story. Marple, Miss
Jane Marple—the name seems familiar somehow. . . . Anyway, I'll get on
to the Yard. I think you're
right about its not being a local case—though we won't advertise the
fact just yet. For the moment
we'll tell the press as little as
possible."
* * *
The inquest was a purely formal affair. No one came forward to identify
the dead woman. Lucy was called to give evidence of finding the body
and medical evidence was given as to the cause of death—strangulation.
The proceedings were then adjourned.
It was a cold, blustery day when the Crackenthorpe family came out of
the hall where the inquest had been held. There were five of them all
told: Emma, Cedric, Harold, Alfred and Bryan Eastley, the husband of
the dead daughter Edith. There was also Mr. Wimborne, the senior
partner of the firm of solicitors who dealt with the Crackenthorpes'
legal affairs. He had come down specially from London at great
inconvenience to attend the inquest. They all stood for a moment on the
pavement, shivering. Quite a crowd had assembled; the piquant details
of the "Body in the Sarcophagus" had been fully reported in both the
London and the local press.
A murmur went round: "That's them . . ."
Emma said sharply: "Let's get away."
The big hired Daimler drew up to the curb. Emma got in and motioned to
Lucy. Mr. Wimborne, Cedric and Harold followed. Bryan Eastley said:
"I'll take Alfred with me in my little bus." The chauffeur shut the
door and the Daimler prepared to roll away.
"Oh, stop!" cried Emma. "There are the boys!"
The boys, in spite of aggrieved protests, had been left behind at
Rutherford Hall, but they now appeared grinning from ear to ear.
"We came on our bicycles," said Stoddart-West. "The policeman was very
kind and let us in at the back of the hall. I hope you don't mind, Miss
Crackenthorpe," he added politely.
"She doesn't mind," said Cedric, answering for his sister. "You're only
young once. Your first inquest,
I expect?"
"It was rather disappointing," said Alexander. "All over so soon."
"We can't stay here talking," said Harold irritably. "There's quite a
crowd. And all those men with cameras."
At a sign from him, the chauffeur pulled away from the curb. The boys
waved cheerfully.
"All over so soon!" said Cedric. "That's what they think, the young
innocents! It's just beginning."
"It's all very unfortunate. Most unfortunate," said Harold. "I suppose—"
He looked at Mr. Wimborne who compressed his thin lips and shook his
head with distaste.
"I hope," he said sententiously, "that the whole matter will soon be
cleaned up satisfactorily. The police are very efficient. However, the
whole thing, as Harold says, has been most unfortunate."
He looked, as he spoke, at Lucy, and there was distinct disapproval in
his glance. "If it had not been for this young woman," his eyes seemed
to say, "poking about where she had no business to be, none of this
would have happened."
This sentiment, or one closely resembling it, was voiced by Harold
Crackenthorpe.
"By the way—er—Miss er—er Eyelesbarrow, just what made you go looking
in that sarcophagus?"
Lucy had already wondered just when this thought would occur to one of
the family. She had known
that the police would ask it first thing: what surprised her was that
it seemed to have occurred to no one else until this moment.
Cedric, Emma, Harold and Mr. Wimborne all looked at her.
Her reply, for what it was worth, had naturally been prepared for some
time.
"Really," she said in a hesitating voice, "I hardly know. ... I did
feel that the whole place needed a thorough clearing out and cleaning.
And there was"— she hesitated—"a very peculiar and disagreeable smell—"
She had counted accurately on the immediate shrinking of everyone from
the unpleasantness of this idea.
Mr. Wimborne murmured: "Yes, yes, of course . . . about three weeks the
police surgeon said. I think, you know, we must all try and not let our
minds dwell on this thing." He smiled encouragingly at Emma who had
turned very pale. "Remember," he said, "this wretched young woman was
nothing to do with any of us."
"Ah, but you can't be so sure of that, can you?" said Cedric.
Lucy Eyelesbarrow looked at him with some interest.
She had already been intrigued by the rather startling differences
between the three brothers. Cedric was
a big man with a weather-beaten, rugged face, unkempt dark hair and a
jocund manner. He had arrived from the airport unshaven, and though he
had shaved in preparation for the inquest, he was still wearing the
clothes in which he had arrived and which seemed to be the only ones he
had: old gray-flannel trousers and a patched and rather threadbare
baggy jacket. He looked the stage Bohemian to the life and proud of it.
His brother Harold, on the contrary, was the perfect picture of a city
gentleman and a director of important companies. He was tall with a
neat, erect carriage, had dark hair going slightly bald on the temples,
a small black mustache, and was impeccably dressed in a dark, well-cut
suit and a pearl-gray
tie. He looked what he was, a shrewd and
successful businessman.
He now said stiffly:
"Really, Cedric, that seems a most uncalled-for remark."
"Don't see why. She was in our barn after all. What did she come there
for?"
Mr. Wimborne coughed and said:
"Possibly some—er—assignation. I understand that it was a matter of
local knowledge that the key was kept outside on a nail."
His tone indicated outrage at the carelessness of such procedure. So
clearly marked was this that Emma spoke apologetically.
"It started during the war. For the air-raid wardens. There was a
little spirit stove and they made themselves hot cocoa. And afterward,
since there was really nothing there anybody could have wanted
to take,
we went on leaving the key hanging up. It was convenient for the
Women's Institute people. If we'd kept it in the house it might have
been awkward—when there was no one at home to give it them when they
wanted it to get the place ready. With only daily women and no resident
servants . . ."
Her voice tailed away. She had spoken mechanically, giving a wordy
explanation without interest, as though her mind was elsewhere.
Cedric gave her a quick, puzzled glance.
"You're worried, Sis. What's up?"
Harold spoke with exasperation:
"Really, Cedric, can you ask?"
"Yes, I do ask. Granted a strange young woman has got herself killed in
the barn at Rutherford Hall (sounds like a Victorian melodrama) and
granted it gave Emma a shock at the time—but Emma's
always been a
sensible girl—I don't see why she goes on being worried now. Dash it,
one gets used
to everything."
"Murder takes a little more getting used to by some people than it may
in your case," said Harold
acidly. "I dare say murders are two a penny
in Majorca and—"
"Iviza, not Majorca."
"It's the same thing."
"Not at all—it's quite a different island."
Harold went on talking:
"My point is that though murder may be everyday commonplace to you,
living among hot-blooded
Latin people, nevertheless in England we take
such things seriously." He added with increasing irritation, "And
really, Cedric, to appear at a public inquest in those clothes—"
"What's wrong with my clothes? They're comfortable."
"They're unsuitable."
"Well, anyway, they're the only clothes I've got with me. I didn't pack
my wardrobe trunk when I came rushing home to stand in with the family
over this business. I'm a painter and painters like to be comfortable
in their clothes."
"So you're still trying to paint?"
"Look here, Harold, when you say trying to paint—"
Mr. Wimborne cleared his throat in an authoritative manner.
"This discussion is unprofitable," he said reprovingly. "I hope, my
dear Emma, that you will tell me if there is any further way in which I
can be of service to you before I return to town?"
The reproof had its effect. Emma Crackenthorpe said quickly: "It was
most kind of you to come down."
"Not at all. It was advisable that someone should be at the inquest to
watch the procedings On behalf of the family. I have arranged for an
interview with the Inspector at the house. I have no doubt that,
distressing as all this has been, the situation will soon be clarified.
In my own mind, there seems little doubt as to what occurred. As Emma
has told us, the key of the Long Barn was known locally to hang outside
the door. It seems highly probable that the place was used in the
winter months as a place of assignation by local couples. No doubt
there was a quarrel and some young man lost control of himself.
Horrified at what he had done, his eye lit on the sarcophagus and he
realized that it would make an excellent place of concealment."
Lucy thought to herself, "Yes, it sounds most plausible. That's just
what one might think."
Cedric said, "You say a local couple—but nobody's been able to identify
the girl locally."
"It's early days yet. No doubt we shall get an identification before
long. And it is possible, of course, that the man in question was a
local resident, but that the girl came from nowhere, perhaps from some
other part of Brackhampton. Brackhampton's a big place—it's grown
enormously in the last twenty years."
"If I were a girl coming to meet my young man, I'd not stand for being
taken to a freezing-cold barn
miles from anywhere," Cedric objected. "I'd stand out for a nice bit of
cuddle in the cinema, wouldn't you, Miss Eyelesbarrow?"
"Do we need to go into all this?" Harold demanded plaintively.
And with the voicing of the question the car drew up before the front
door of Rutherford Hall and they
all got out.
On entering the library Mr. Wimborne blinked a little as his shrewd old
eyes went past Inspector Bacon whom he had already met, to the
fair-haired, good-looking man beyond him.
Inspector Bacon performed introductions.
"This is Detective Inspector Craddock of New Scotland Yard," he said.
"New Scotland Yard—hm." Mr. Wimborne's eyebrows rose.
Dermot Craddock, who had a pleasant manner, went easily into speech.
"We have been called in on the case, Mr. Wimborne," he said. "As you
are representing the Cracken-thorpe family, I feel it is only fair that
we should give you a little confidential information."
Nobody could make a better show of presenting a very small portion of
the truth and implying that it
was the whole truth than young Inspector Craddock.
"Inspector Bacon will agree, I am sure," he added, glancing at his
colleague.
Inspector Bacon agreed with all due solemnity and not at all as though
the whole matter were prearranged.
"It's like this," said Craddock. "We have reason to believe, from
information that has come into our
possession, that the dead woman is not a native of these parts, that
she actually traveled down here
from London and that she had recently
come from abroad. Probably—though we are not sure of that—from France."
Mr. Wimborne again raised his eyebrows. "Indeed," he said. "Indeed?"
"That being the case," explained Inspector Bacon, "the Chief Constable
felt that the Yard was better
fitted to investigate the matter."
"I can only hope," said Mr. Wimborne, "that the case will be solved
quickly. As you can no doubt appreciate, the whole business has been a
source of much distress to the family. Although not
personally
concerned in any way, they are—"
He paused for a bare second, but Inspector Craddock filled the gap
quickly.
"It's not a pleasant thing to find a murdered woman on your property. I
couldn't agree with you more. Now I should like to have a brief
interview with the various members of the family—"
"I really cannot
see—"
"What they can tell me? Probably nothing of interest—but one never
knows. I dare say I can get most
of the information I want from you, sir. Information about this house
and the family."
"And what can that possibly have to do with an unknown young woman
coming from abroad and getting herself killed here?"
"Well, that's rather the point," said Craddock. "Why did she come here?
Had she once had some connection with this house? Had she been, for
instance, a servant here at one time? A lady's maid, for instance. Or
did she come here to meet a former occupant of Rutherford Hall—"
Mr. Wimborne said coldly that Rutherford Hall had been occupied by the
Crackenthorpes ever since Josiah Crackenthorpe built it in 1884.
"That's interesting in itself," said Craddock. "If you'd just give me a
brief outline of the family history—"
Mr. Wimborne shrugged his shoulders.
"There is very little to tell. Josiah Crackenthorpe was a manufacturer
of sweet and savory biscuits, relishes, pickles, etc. He accumulated a
vast fortune. He built this house. Luther Crackenthorpe, his
eldest son, lives here now."
"Any other sons?"
"One other son, Henry, who was killed in a motor accident in 1911."
"And the present Mr. Crackenthorpe has never thought of selling the
house?"
"He is unable to do so," said the lawyer dryly. "By the terms of his
father's will."
"Perhaps you'll tell me about the will?"
"Why should I?"
Inspector Craddock smiled.
"Because I can look it up myself if I want to at Somerset House."
Against his will, Mr. Wimborne gave a crabbed little smile.
"Quite right, Inspector. I was merely protesting that the information
you ask for is quite irrelevant. As to Josiah Crackenthorpe's will,
there is no mystery about it. He left his very considerable fortune in
trust,
the income from it to be paid to his son Luther for life, and after
Luther's death the capital to be divided equally among Luther's
children, Edmund, Cedric, Harold, Alfred, Emma and Edith. Edmund was
killed in the war and Edith died four years ago, so that on Luther
Crackenthorpe's decease the money will be divided among Cedric, Harold,
Alfred, Emma and Edith's son Alexander Eastley."
"And the house?"
"That will go to Luther Crackenthorpe's eldest surviving son or his
issue."
"Was Edmund Crackenthorpe married?"
"No."
"So the property will actually go—?"
"To the next son—Cedric."
"Mr. Luther Crackenthorpe himself cannot dispose of it?"
"No."
"And he has no control of the capital."
"No."
"Isn't that rather unusual? I suppose," said Inspector Craddock
shrewdly, "that his father didn't like him."
"You suppose correctly," said Mr. Wimborne. "Old Josiah was
disappointed that his eldest son showed
no interest in the family business—or indeed in business of any kind.
Luther spent his time traveling abroad and collecting objets d'art. Old Josiah was very
unsympathetic to that kind of thing. So he left
his money in trust for the next generation."
"But in the meantime the next generation have no income except what
they make or what their father allows them, and their father has
considerable capital but no power of disposal of it."
"Exactly. And what all this has to do with the murder of an unknown
young woman of foreign origin I cannot imagine!"
"It doesn't seem to have anything to do with it," Inspector Craddock
agreed promptly. "I just wanted to ascertain all the facts."
Mr. Wimborne looked at him sharply; then, seemingly satisfied with the
result of his scrutiny, rose to
his feet.
"I am proposing now to return to London," he said. "Unless there is
anything further you wish to know?"
He looked from one man to the other.
"No, thank you, sir."
The sound of the gong rose fortissimo from the hall outside.
"Dear me," said Mr. Wimborne. "One of the boys, I think, must be
performing."
Inspector Craddock raised his voice to be heard above the clamor, as he
said:
"We'll leave the family to have lunch in peace, but Inspector Bacon and
I would like to return after it—
say at 2:15—and have a short interview with every member of the family."
"You think that is necessary?"
"Well—" Craddock shrugged his shoulders. "It's just an off chance.
Somebody might remember something that would give us a clue to the
woman's identity."
"I doubt it, Inspector. I doubt it very much. But I wish you good luck.
As I said just now, the sooner
this distasteful business is cleared up, the better for everybody."
Shaking his head, he went slowly out of the room.
* * *
Lucy had gone straight to the kitchen on getting back from the inquest,
and was busy with preparations for lunch when Bryan Eastley put his
head in.
"Can I give you a hand in any way?" he asked. "I'm handy about the
house."
Lucy gave him a quick, slightly preoccupied glance. Bryan had arrived
at the inquest direct in his small M.G. car and she had not as yet had
much time to size him up.
What she saw was likeable enough. Eastley was an amiable-looking young
man of thirty-odd with brown hair, rather plaintive blue eyes and an
enormous fair mustache.
"The boys aren't back yet," he said, coming in and sitting on the end
of the kitchen table. "It will take
'em another twenty minutes on their bikes."
Lucy smiled.
"They were certainly determined nof to miss anything."
"Can't blame them. I mean to say—first inquest in their young lives and
right in the family, so to speak."
"Do you mind getting off the table, Mr. Eastley? I want to put the
baking dish down "there."
Bryan obeyed.
"I say, that fat's corking hot. What are you going to put in it?"
"Yorkshire pudding."
"Good old Yorkshire. Roast beef of old England, is that the menu of
today?"
"Yes."
"The funeral baked meats, in fact. Smells good," he sniffed
appreciatively. "Do you mind my gassing away?"
"If you came in to help I'd rather you helped." She drew another pan
from the oven. "Here—turn all these potatoes over so that they brown on
the other side."
Bryan obeyed with alacrity.
"Have all these things been fizzling away in here while we've been at
the inquest? Supposing they'd been all burned up."
"Most improbable. There's a regulating number on the oven."
"Kind of
electric brain, eh what? Is that right?"
Lucy threw a swift look in his direction.
"Quite right. Now put the pan in the oven. Here, take the cloth. On the
second shelf—I want the top
one for the Yorkshire pudding."
Bryan obeyed, but not without uttering a shrill yelp.
"Burn yourself?"
"Just a bit. It doesn't matter. What a dangerous game cooking is!"
"I suppose you never do your own cooking?"
"As a matter of fact I do—quite often. But not this sort of thing. I
can boil an egg, if I don't forget to
look at the clock. And I can do eggs and bacon. And I can put a steak
under the grill or open a tin of soup. I've got one of those little
electric whatnots in my flat."
"You live in London?"
"If you call it living—yes."
His tone was despondent. He watched Lucy shoot in the dish with the
Yorkshire pudding mixture.
"This is awfully jolly," he said, and sighed. Her immediate
preoccupations over, Lucy looked at him
with more attention.
"What is—this kitchen?"
"Yes—reminds me of our kitchen at home—when I was a boy."
It struck Lucy that there was something strangely forlorn about Bryan
Eastley. Looking closely at him, she realized that he was older than
she had at first thought. He must be close on forty. It seemed
difficult to think of him as Alexander's father. He reminded her of
innumerable young pilots she had known during the war when she had been
at the impressionable age of fourteen. She had gone on and grown up
into a postwar world—but she felt as though Bryan had not gone on but
had been overtaken in the passage of years. His next words confirmed
this. He had subsided on to the kitchen table again.
"It's a difficult sort of world," he said, "isn't it? To get your
bearings in, I mean. You see, one hasn't
been trained for it."
Lucy recalled what she had heard from Emma.
"You were a fighter pilot, weren't you?" she said. "You've got a D.F.C."
"That's the sort of thing that puts you wrong. You've got a decoration
and so people try to make it easy for you. Give you a job and all that.
Very decent of them. But they're all white-collar jobs, and one simply
isn't any good at that sort of thing. Sitting at a desk getting tangled
up in figures. I've had ideas
of my own, you know, tried out a wheeze or two. But you can't get the
backing. Can't get the chaps to come in and put down the money. If I
had a bit of capital—"
He brooded.
"You didn't know Edie, did you? My wife. No, of course you didn't. She
was quite different from all
this lot. Younger, for one thing. She was in the Air Force. She always
said her old man was an Ebenezer Scrooge. He is, you know. Mean as hell
over money. And it's not as though he could take it with him.
It's got to be divided up when he dies. Edie's share will go to
Alexander, of course. He won't be able to touch the capital until he's
twenty-one, though."
"I'm sorry, but will you get off the table again. I want to dish up and
make gravy."
At that moment Alexander and Stoddart-West arrived with rosy faces and
very much out of breath.
"Hello, Bryan," said Alexander kindly to his father. "So this is where
you've got to. I say, what a smashing piece of beef. Is there Yorkshire
pudding?"
"Yes, there is."
"We have awful Yorkshire pudding at school—all damp and limp."
"Get out of my way," said Lucy. "I want to make the gravy."
"Make lots of gravy. Can we have two sauceboats full?"
"Yes."
"Good oh!" said Stoddart-West, pronouncing the words carefully.
"I don't like it pale," said Alexander anxiously.
"It won't be pale."
"She's a smashing cook," said Alexander to his father.
Lucy had a momentary impression that their roles were reversed.
Alexander spoke like a kindly father
to his son.
"Can we help you, Miss Eyelesbarrow?" asked Stoddart-West politely.
"Yes, you can. Alexander, go and sound the gong. James, will you carry
this tray into the dining room? And will you take the joint in, Mr.
Eastley? I'll bring the potatoes and the Yorkshire pudding."
"There's a Scotland Yard man here," said Alexander. "Do you think he
will have lunch with us?"
"That depends on what your aunt arranges."
"I don't suppose Aunt Emma would mind. She's very hospitable. But I
suppose Uncle Harold wouldn't like it. He's being very sticky over this
murder." Alexander went out through the door with the tray, adding a
little additional information over his shoulder. "Mr. Wimborne's in the
library with the Scotland Yard men now. But he isn't staying to lunch.
He said he had to get back to London. Come on, Stodders. Oh, he's gone
to do the gong."
At that moment the gong took charge. Stoddart-West was an artist; he
gave it everything he had and all further conversation was inhibited.
Bryan carried in the joint, Lucy followed with the vegetables—returned
to the kitchen to get the two brimming sauceboats of gravy.
Mr. Wimborne was standing in the hall putting on his gloves as Emma
came quickly down the stairs.
"Are you really sure you won't stop for lunch, Mr. Wimborne? It's all
ready."
"No. I've an important appointment in London. There is a restaurant car
on the train."
"It was very good of you to come down," said Emma gratefully.
The two police officers emerged from the library.
Mr. Wimborne took Emma's hand in his.
"There's nothing to worry about, my dear," he said. "This is Detective
Inspector Craddock from New Scotland Yard who has come down to take
charge of the case. He is coming back at 2:15 to ask you for any facts
that may assist him in his inquiry. But as I say, you have nothing to
worry about." He looked toward Craddock. "I may repeat to Miss
Crackenthorpe what you have told me?"
"Certainly, sir."
"Inspector Craddock has just told me that this almost certainly was not
a local crime. The murdered woman is thought to have come from London
and was probably a foreigner."
Emma Crackenthorpe said sharply, "A foreigner. Was she French?"
Mr. Wimborne had clearly meant his statement to be consoling. He looked
slightly taken aback; Dermot Craddock's glance went quickly from him to
Emma's face.
He wondered why she had leaped to the conclusion that the murdered
woman was French, and why
that "thought disturbed her so much?
The only people who really did justice to Lucy's excellent lunch were
the two boys and Cedric Cracken-thorpe, who appeared completely
unaffected by the circumstances which had caused him to return to
England. He seemed, indeed, to regard the whole thing as a rather good
joke of a macabre nature.
This attitude, Lucy noted, was most unpalatable to his brother Harold.
Harold seemed to take the
murder as a kind of personal insult to the
Crackenthorpe family and so great was his sense of outrage
that he ate
hardly any lunch. Emma looked worried and unhappy and also ate very
little. Alfred seemed lost in a train of thought of his own and spoke
very little. He was a
good-looking man with a thin, dark face and eyes set rather too close
together.
After lunch the police officers returned and politely asked if they
could have a few words with Mr.
Cedric Crackenthorpe.
Inspector Craddock was very pleasant and friendly.
"Sit down, Mr. Crackenthorpe. I understand you have just come back from
the Balearics? You live out there?"
"Have done for the last six years In Iviza. Suits me better than this
dreary country."
"You get a good deal more sunshine than we do, I expect," said
Inspector Craddock agreeably. "You were home not so very long ago, I
understand—for Christmas, to be exact. What made it necessary for you
to come back again so soon?"
Cedric grinned.
"Got a wire from Emma—my sister. We've never had a murder on the
premises before. Didn't want to miss anything—so along I came."
"You are interested in criminology?"
"Oh, we needn't put it in such highbrow terms! I just like murders.
Whodunnits and all that! With a whodunnit parked right on the family
doorstep, it seemed the chance of a lifetime. Besides I thought
poor old Em might need a spot of help—managing the old man and the
police and all the rest of it."
"I see. It appealed to your sporting instincts and also to your family
feelings. I've no doubt your sister
will be very grateful to you—although her two other brothers have also
come to be with her."
"But not to cheer and comfort," Cedric told him. "Harold is
terrifically put out. It's not at all the thing
for a city magnate to be mixed up with the murder of a questionable
female."
Craddock's eyebrows rose gently.
"Was she—a questionable female?"
"Well, you're the authority on that point. Going by the facts, it
seemed to me likely."
"I thought perhaps you might have been able to make a guess at who she
was?"
"Come now, Inspector, you already know—or your colleagues will tell
you—that I haven't been able
to identify her."
"I said a guess, Mr. Crackenthorpe. You might never have seen the woman
before, but you might have been able to make a guess at who she was—or
who she might have been?"
Cedric shook his head.
"You're barking up the wrong tree. I've absolutely no idea. You're
suggesting, I suppose, that she may have come to the Long Barn to keep
an assignation with one of us? But we none of us live here—the only
people in the house were a woman and an old man. You don't seriously
believe that she came here to keep a date with my revered Pop?"
"Our point is—Inspector Bacon agrees with me— that the woman may once
have had some association with this house. It may have been a
considerable number of years ago. Cast your mind back, Mr.
Crackenthorpe—"
Cedric thought a moment or two, then shook his head.
"We've had foreign help from time to time, like most people, but I
can't think of any likely possibility. Better ask the others. They'd
know more than I would."
"We shall do that, of course."
Craddock leaned back in his chair and went on: "As you have heard
at the inquest, the medical evidence cannot fix the
time of death very accurately. Longer than two weeks, less than
four—which brings it somewhere around Christmastime. You have told me
you came home for Christmas. When did you arrive in England and
when did you leave?"
Cedric reflected.
"Let me see ... I flew. Got here on the Saturday before Christmas—-that
would be the twenty-first."
"You flew straight from Majorca?"
"Yes. Left at five in the morning and got here midday."
"And you left?"
"I flew back on the following Friday, the twenty-seventh."
"Thank you."
Cedric grinned.
"Leaves me well within the limit, unfortunately. But really, Inspector,
strangling young women is not
my favorite form of Christmas fun."
"I hope not, Mr. Crackenthorpe."
Inspector Bacon merely looked disapproving.
"There would be a remarkable absence of peace and good will about such
an action, don't you agree?"
Cedric addressed this question to Inspector Bacon who merely grunted.
Inspector Craddock said
politely: "Well, thank you, Mr. Crackenthorpe. That will be all."
"And what do you think of him?" Craddock asked as Cedric shut the door
behind him.
Bacon grunted again.
"Cocky enough for anything," he said. "I don't care for the type,
myself. A loose living lot, these artists, and very likely to be mixed
up with a disreputable class of women."
Craddock smiled.
"I don't like the way he dresses, either," went on Bacon. "No
respect—going to an inquest like that. Dirtiest pair of trousers I've
seen in a long while. And did you see his tie? Looked as though it was
made of colored string. If you ask me, he's the kind that would easily
strangle a woman and make no bones about it."
"Well, he didn't strangle this one—if he didn't leave Majorca until the
twenty-first. And that's a thing we can verify easily enough."
Bacon threw him a sharp glance.
"I notice that you're not tipping your hand yet about the actual date
of the crime."
"No, we'll keep that dark for the present. I always like to have
something up my sleeve in the early stages."
Bacon nodded in full agreement.
"Spring it on 'em when the time comes," he said. "That's the best plan."
"And now," said Craddock, "we'll see what our correct City gentleman
has to say about it all."
Harold Crackenthorpe, thin-lipped, had very little to say about it. It
was most distasteful—a very unfortunate incident. The newspapers, he
was afraid— Reporters, he understood, had already been asking for
interviews. All that sort of thing . . . Most regrettable ....
Harold's staccato unfinished sentences ended. He leaned back in his
chair with the expression of a man confronted with a very bad smell.
The Inspector's probing produced no result. No, he had no idea who the
woman was or could be. Yes,
he had been at Rutherford Hall for Christmas. He had been unable to
come down until Christmas Eve, but had stayed on over the following
weekend.
"That's that, then," said Inspector Craddock, without pressing his
questions further. He had already
made up his mind that Harold Crackenthorpe was not going to be helpful.
He passed on to Alfred, who came into the room with a nonchalance that
seemed just a trifle overdone.
Craddock looked at Alfred Crackenthorpe with a faint feeling of
recognition. Surely he had seen this particular member of the family
somewhere before. Or had it been his picture in the paper? There was
something discreditable attached to the memory. He asked Alfred his
occupation and Alfred's answer
was vague.
"I'm in insurance at the moment. Until recently I've been interested in
putting a new type of talking machine on the market. Quite
revolutionary. I did very well out of that, as a matter of fact."
Inspector Craddock looked appreciative, and no one could have had the
least idea that he was noticing
the superficially smart apperance of
Alfred's suit and gauging correctly the low price it had cost. Cedric's
clothes had been disreputable, almost threadbare, but they had been
originally of good cut and excellent material. Here there was a cheap
smartness that told its own tale. Craddock passed pleasantly on to his
routine questions. Alfred seemed interested, even slightly amused.
"It's quite an idea, that the woman might once have had a job here. Not
as a lady's maid; I doubt if my sister has ever had such a thing. I
don't think anyone has nowadays. But of course there is a good deal of
foreign domestic labor floating about. We've had Poles, and a
temperamental German or two. As Emma definitely didn't recognize the
woman, I think that washes your idea out, Inspector. Emma's got a very
good memory for a face. No, if the woman came from London . . . What
gives you the idea she came from London, by the way?"
He slipped the question in quite casually, but his eyes were sharp and
interested.
Inspector Craddock smiled and shook his head.
Alfred looked at him keenly.
"Not telling, eh? Return ticket in her coat pocket, perhaps, is that
it?"
"It could be, Mr. Crackenthorpe."
"Well, granting she came from London, perhaps the chap she came to meet
had the idea that the Long Barn would be a nice place to do a quiet
murder. He knows the setup here, evidently. I should go
looking for him if I were you, Inspector."
"We are," said Inspector Craddock, and made the two little words sound
quiet and confident.
He thanked Alfred and dismissed him.
"You know," he said to Bacon, "I've seen that chap somewhere before. .
. ."
Inspector Bacon gave his verdict.
"Sharp customer," he said. "So sharp that he cuts himself sometimes."
* * *
"I don't suppose you want to see me," said Bryan Eastley
apologetically, coming into the room and hesitating by the door. "I
don't exactly belong to the family."
"Let me see, you are Mr. Bryan Eastley, the husband of Miss Edith
Crackenthorpe, who died four
years ago?"
"That's right."
"Well, it's very kind of you, Mr. Eastley, especially if you know
something that you think could assist
us in some, way?"
"But I don't. Wish I did. Whole thing seems so ruddy peculiar, doesn't
it? Coming along and meeting some fellow in that drafty old barn in the
middle of winter. Wouldn't be my cup of tea!"
"It is certainly very perplexing," Inspector Craddock agreed.
"Is it true that she was a foreigner? Word seems to have got round to
that effect."
"Does that fact suggest anything to you?" The Inspector looked at him
sharply, but Bryan seemed amiably vacuous.
"No, it doesn't, as a matter of fact."
"Maybe she was French," said Inspector Bacon, with dark suspicion.
Bryan was roused to slight animation. A look of interest came into his
blue eyes, and he tugged at his
big, fair mustache.
"Really? Gay Paree?" He shook his head. "On the whole, it seems to make
it even more unlikely,
doesn't it? Messing about in the barn, I mean. You haven't had any
other sarcophagus murders, have you? One of these fellows with an
urge—or a complex? Thinks he's Caligula or someone like that?"
Inspector Craddock did not even trouble to reject this speculation.
Instead, he asked in a casual manner:
"Nobody in the family got any French connections, or—or—relationships
that you know of?"
Bryan said that the Crackenthorpes weren't a very gay lot.
"Harold's respectably married," he said. "Fish-faced woman, some
impoverished peer's daughter. Don't think Alfred cares about women
much—spends his life going in for shady deals which usually go wrong
in the end. I dare say Cedric's got a few Spanish señoritas
jumping
through hoops for him in Iviza. Women rather fall for Cedric. Doesn't
always shave and looks as though he never washes. Don't see
why that should be attractive to women, but apparently it is—I say, I'm
not being very helpful, am I?"
He grinned at them. "Better get young Alexander on the job. He and
James Stoddart-West are out
hunting for clues in a big way. Bet you they turn up something."
Inspector Craddock said he hoped they would. Then he thanked Bryan
Eastley and said he would like
to speak to Miss Emma Crackenthorpe.
* * *
Inspector Craddock looked with more attention at Emma Crackenthorpe
than he had done previously.
He was still wondering about the expression that he had surprised on
her face before lunch.
A quiet woman. Not stupid. Not brilliant, either. One of those
comfortable, pleasant women whom men were inclined to take for granted,
and who had the art of making a house into a home, giving it an
atmosphere of restfulness and quiet harmony. Such, he thought, was Emma
Crackenthorpe.
Women such as this were often underrated. Behind their quiet exterior
they had force of character, they were to be reckoned with. Perhaps,
Craddock thought, the clue to the mystery of the dead woman in
the
sarcophagus was hidden away in the recesses of Emma's mind.
While these thoughts were passing through his head, Craddock was asking
various unimportant questions.
"I don't suppose there is much that you haven't already told Inspector
Bacon," he said. "So I needn't worry'you with many questions."
"Please ask me anything you like."
"As Mr. Wimborne told you, we have reached the conclusion that the dead
woman was not a native of these parts. That may be a relief to you—Mr.
Wimborne seemed to think it would be—but it makes it really more
difficult for us. She's less easily identified."
"But didn't she have anything? A handbag? Papers?"
Craddock shook his head.
"No handbag, nothing in her pockets."
"You've no idea of her name—of where she came from—anything at all?"
Craddock thought to himself: She wants to know— she's very anxious to
know—who the woman is.
Has she felt like that all along, I wonder?
Bacon didn't give me that impression—and he's a shrewd
man. . . .
"We know nothing about her," he said. "That's why we hoped one of you
could help us. Are you sure you can't? Even if you didn't recognize
her, can you think of anyone she might be?"
He thought, but perhaps he imagined it, that there was a very slight
pause before she answered.
"I've absolutely no idea," she said.
Imperceptibly, Inspector Craddock's manner changed. It was hardly
noticeable except as a slight
hardness in his voice.
"When Mr. Wimborne told you that the woman was a foreigner, why did you
assume that she was French?"
Emma was not disconcerted. Her eyebrows rose slightly.
"Did I? Yes„ I believe I did. I don't really know why, except that one
always tends to think foreigners
are French until one finds out what nationality they really are. Most
foreigners in this country are
French, aren't they?"
"Oh, I really wouldn't say that was so, Miss Crackenthorpe. Not
nowadays. We have so many nationalities over here. Italians, Germans,
Austrians, all the Scandinavian countries."
"Yes, I suppose you're right."
"You didn't have some special reason for thinking that this woman was
likely to be French?"
She didn't hurry to deny it. She just thought a moment then shook her
head almost regretfully.
"No," she said. "I really don't think so."
Her glance met his placidly, without flinching.
Craddock looked toward Inspector Bacon. The latter leaned forward and
presented a small, enamel powder compact.
"Do you recognize this, Miss Crackenthorpe?"
She took it and examined it.
"No. It's certainly not mine."
"You've no idea to whom it belonged?"
"No."
"Then I don't think we need worry you any more —for the present."
"Thank you."
She smiled briefly at them, got up, and left the room. Again he may
have imagined it, but Craddock thought she moved rather quickly, as
though a certain relief hurried her.
"Think she knows anything?" asked Bacon.
Inspector Craddock said ruefully: "At a certain stage one is
inclined to think everyone knows a little
more than they are willing to tell you."
"They usually do, too," said Bacon out of the depth of his experience.
"Only," he added, "it quite often isn't anything to do with the
business in hand. It's some family peccadillo or some silly scrape that
people are afraid is going to be dragged into the open."
"Yes, I know. Well, at least—"
But whatever Inspector Craddock had been about to say never got said,
for the door was flung open
and old Mr. Crackenthorpe shuffled in, in a
high state of indignation.
"A pretty pass," he said. "Things have come to a pretty pass when
Scotland Yard comes down and doesn't have the courtesy to talk to the
head of the family first! Who's the master of this house, I'd like
to know? Answer me that. Who's master here?"
"You are, of course, Mr. Crackenthorpe," said Craddock soothingly and
rising as he spoke. "But we understood that you had already told
Inspector Bacon all you knew, and that your health not being
good, we must not make too many demands upon it. Doctor Quimper said—"
"I dare say. I dare say. I'm not a strong man. As for Doctor Quimper,
he's a regular old woman—perfectly good doctor, understands my case—but
inclined to wrap me up in cotton wool. Got
a bee in his bonnet about food. Went on at me Christmastime when I had
a bit of a turn. What did I eat? When? Who cooked it? Who served it?
Fuss, fuss fuss! But though I may have indifferent health, I'm well
enough to give you all the help that's in my power. Murder in my own
house, or at any rate in my own barn! Interesting building, that.
Elizabethan. Local architect says not—but the fellow doesn't know what
he's talking about. Not a day later than 1580—but that's not what we're
talking about. What do
you want to know? What's your present theory?"
"It's a little too early for theories, Mr. Crackenthorpe. We are still
trying to find out who the woman
was."
"Foreigner, you say?"
"We think so."
"Enemy agent?"
"Unlikely, I should say."
"You'd say! You'd say! They're everywhere, these people. Infiltrating!
Why the Home Office lets them
in beats me. Spying on industrial secrets, I'd bet. That's what she was
doing."
"In Brackhampton?"
"Factories everywhere. One outside my own back gate."
Craddock shot an inquiring glance at Bacon, who responded:
"Metal boxes."
"How do you know that's what they're really making? Can't swallow all
these fellows tell you. All right,
if she wasn't a spy, who do you think she was? Think she was mixed up
with one of my precious sons?
It would be Alfred, if so. Not Harold, he's too careful. And Cedric
doesn't condescend to live in this country. All right, then, she was
Alfred's bit of skirt. And some violent fellow followed her down here,
thinking she was coming to meet him, and did her in. How's that?"
Inspector Craddock said diplomatically that it was certainly a theory.
But Mr. Alfred Crackenthorpe,
he said, had not recognized her.
"Pah! Afraid, that's all! Alfred always was a coward. But he's a liar,
remember, always was! Lie himself black in the face. None of my sons
are any good. Crowd of vultures, waiting for me to die, that's their
real occupation in life:" He chuckled. "And they can wait. I won't die
to oblige them! Well, if that's all I can do for you . . . I'm tired.
Got to rest."
He shuffled out again.
"Alfred's bit of skirt?" said Bacon questioningly. "In my opinion the
old man just made that up." He paused, hesitated. "I think, personally,
Alfred's quite all right—perhaps a shifty customer in some ways, but
not our present cup of tea. Mind you, I did just wonder about that Air
Force chap."
"Byran Eastley?"
"Yes. I've run into one or two of his type. They're what you might call
adrift in the world—had danger and death and excitement too early in
life. Now they find it tame. Tame and unsatisfactory. In a way, we've
given them a raw deal. Though I don't really know what we could do
about it. But there they are, all past and no future, so to speak. And
they're the kind that don't mind taking chances. The ordinary fellow
plays safe by instinct, it's not so much morality as prudence. But
these fellows aren't afraid—playing safe isn't really in their
vocabulary. If Eastley were mixed up with a woman and wanted to kill
her—" He stopped, threw out a hand hopelessly. "But why should he want
to kill her? And if you do kill a woman, why plant her in your
father-in-law's sarcophagus? No, if you ask me, none of this lot had
anything to do with the murder. If they had, they wouldn't have gone to
all the trouble of planting
the body on their own back doorstep, so to
speak."
Craddock agreed that that hardly made sense.
"Anything more you want to do here?"
Craddock said there wasn't.
Bacon suggested coming back to Brackhampton and having a cup of tea,
but Inspector Craddock said
that he was going to call on an old acquaintance.
Miss Marple, sitting erect against a background of China dogs and
presents from Margate, smiled approvingly at Inspector Dermot Craddock.
"I'm so glad," she said, "that you have been assigned to the case. I
hoped you would be."
"When I got your letter," said Craddock, "I took it straight to the
Assistant Commissioner. As it
happened he had just heard from the
Brackhampton people calling us in. They seemed to think it
wasn't a
local crime. The A.C. was very interested in what I had to tell him
about you. He'd heard
about you, I gather, from my uncle."
"Dear Sir Henry," murmured Miss Marple affectionately.
"He got me to tell him all about the Little Paddocks business. Do you
want to hear what he said next?"
"Please tell me if it is not a breach of confidence."
"He said, 'Well, as this seems a completely cockeyed business, all
thought up by a couple of old ladies who've turned out, against all
probability, to be right, and since you already know one of these old
ladies, I'm sending you down on the case.' So here I am! And now, my
dear Miss Marple, where do
we go from here? This is not, as you probably appreciate, an official
visit.
I haven't got my henchmen with me. I thought you and I might take down
our back hair together first."
Miss Marple smiled at him.
"I'm sure," she said, "that no one who only knows you officially would
ever guess that you could be so human, and better-looking than
ever—don't blush. Now what, exactly, have you been told so far?"
"I've got everything, I think. Your friend Mrs. Gillicuddy's original
statement to the police at St. Mary Mead, confirmation of her statement
by the ticket collector and also the note to the stationmaster at
Brackhampton. It may say that all the proper inquiries were made by the
people concerned—the railway people and the police. But there's no
doubt that you outsmarted them all by a most fantastic process of
guesswork."
"Not guesswork," said Miss Marple. "And I had a great advantage. I knew
Elspeth McGillicuddy.
Nobody else did. There was no obvious
confirmation of her story, and if there was no question of any woman
being reported missing, then quite naturally they would think it was
just an elderly lady imagining things—as elderly ladies often do, but
not Elspeth McGillicuddy."
"Not Elspeth McGillicuddy," agreed the Inspector. "I'm looking forward
to meeting her, you know. I
wish she hadn't gone to Ceylon. We're arranging for her to be
interviewed there by the way."
"My own process of reasoning was not really original," said Miss
Marple. "It's all in Mark Twain. The boy who found the horse. I just
imagined where I would go if I were a horse and I went there and there
was the horse."
"You imagined what you'd do if you were a cruel and cold-blooded
murderer?" said Craddock, looking thoughtfully at Miss Marple's pink
and white elderly fragility. "Really, your mind—"
"Like a sink, my nephew Raymond used to say," Miss Marple agreed,
nodding her head briskly. "But
as I always told him, sinks are necessary domestic equipment and
actually very hygienic."
"Can you go a little further still, put yourself in the murderer's
place, and tell me just where he is now?"
Miss Marple sighed.
"I wish I could. I've no idea—no idea at all. But he must be someone
who has lived in, or knows all
about Rutherford Hall."
"I agree. But that opens up a very wide field. Quite a succession of
daily women have worked there. There's the Women's Institute and the
air-raid wardens before them. They all know the Long Barn and the
sarcophagus and where the key was kept. The whole setup there is widely
known locally. Anybody living roundabout might hit on it as a good spot
for his purpose."
"Yes, indeed. I quite understand your difficulties."
Craddock said: "We'll never get anywhere until we identify the body."
"And that, too, may be difficult?"
"Oh, we'll get there—in the end. We're checking up on all the reported
disappearances of a woman of
the age and appearance. There's no one outstanding who fits the bill.
The Medical officer puts her down as about thirty-five, healthy,
probably a married woman, has had at least one child. Her fur coat is a
cheap one, purchased at a London store. Hundreds of such coats were
sold in the last three months, about sixty per cent of them to blonde
women. No salesgirl can recognize the photograph of the dead woman, or
is likely to if the purchase were made just before Christmas. Her other
clothes seem mainly
of foreign manufacture, mostly purchased in Paris. There are no English
laundry marks. We've communicated with Paris and they are checking up
there for us. Sooner or later, of course, someone
will come forward with a missing relative or lodger. It's just a matter
of time."
"The compact wasn't any help?"
"Unfortunately no. It's a type sold by the hundred in the rue de
Rivoli, quite cheap. By the way, you ought to have turned that over to
the police at once, you know, or rather Miss Eyelesbarrow should
have done so."
Miss Marple shook her head.
"But at that moment there wasn't any question of a crime having been
committed," she pointed out.
"If a young lady, practicing golf shots, picks up an old compact of no
particular value in the long grass, surely she doesn't rush straight
off to the police with it?"
Miss Marple paused, and then added firmly: "I thought it much wiser to
find the body first."
Inspector Craddock was tickled.
"You don't seem to have ever had any doubts that it would be found?"
"I was sure it would. Lucy Eyelesbarrow is a most efficient and
intelligent person."
"I'll say she is! She scares the life out of me, she's so devastatingly
efficient. No man will ever dare
marry that girl."
"Now you know, I wouldn't say that. It would have to be a special type
of man, of course." Miss Marple brooded on this thought a moment. "How
is she getting on at Rutherford Hall?"
"They're completely dependent upon her as far as I can see. Eating out
of her hand—literally as you might say. By the way, they know nothing
about her connection with you. We've kept that dark."
"She has no connection now with me. She has done what I asked her to
do."
"So she could hand in her notice and go if she wanted to?"
"Yes."
"But she stays on. Why?"
"She has not mentioned her reasons to me. She is a very intelligent
girl. I suspect that she has become interested."
"In the problem? Or in the family?"
"It may be," said Miss Marple, "that it is rather difficult to separate
the two."
Craddock looked hard at her.
"Have you got anything particular in mind?" . "Oh no—oh, dear me, no."
"I think you have."
Miss Marple shook her head.
Dermot Craddock sighed. "So all I can do is to 'prosecute my
inquiries'—to put it in jargon. A
policeman's life is a dull one!"
"You'll get results, I'm sure."
"Any ideas for me? More inspired guesswork?"
"I was- thinking of things like theatrical companies," said Miss Marple
rather vaguely. "Touring from place to place and perhaps not many home
ties. One of those young women would be much less likely
to be missed."
"Yes. Perhaps you've got something there. We'll pay special attention
to that angle." He added, "What
are you smiling about?"
"I was thinking," said Miss Marple, "of Elspeth McGillicuddy's face
when she hears we've found
a body!"
* * *
"Well!" said Mrs. McGillicuddy. "Well!"
Words failed her. She looked across at the nicely spoken, pleasant
young man who had called upon her with official credentials and then
down at the photographs that he had handed her.
"That's her all right," she said. "Yes, that's her. Poor soul. Well, I
must say I'm glad you've found her body. Nobody believed a word I said!
The police or the railway people or anyone else. It's very galling not
to be believed. At any rate, nobody could say I didn't do all I
possibly could."
The nice young man made sympathetic and appreciative noises.
"Where did you say the body was found?"
"In a barn at a house called Rutherford Hall, just outside
Brackhampton."
"Never heard of it. How did it get there, I wonder?"
The young man did not reply.
"Jane Marple, found it, I suppose. Trust Jane."
"The body," said the young man, referring to some notes, "was found by
a Miss Lucy Eyelesbarrow."
"Never heard of her either," said Mrs. McGillicuddy. "I still think
Jane Marple had something to do
with it."
"Anyway, Mrs. McGillicuddy, you definitely identify this picture as
that of the woman whom you saw
in a train?"
"Being strangled by a man. Yes, I do."
"Now, can you describe this man?"
"He was a tall man," said Mrs. McGillicuddy.
"Yes?"
"And dark."
"Yes?"
"That's all I can tell you," said Mrs. McGillicuddy. "He had his back
to me. I didn't see his face."
"Would you be able to recognize him if you saw him?"
"Of course I shouldn't! He had his back to me, I never saw his face."
"You've no idea at all as to his age?"
Mrs. McGillicuddy considered.
"No—not really—I mean, I don't know. He wasn't, I'm almost sure, very
young. His shoulders looked— well, set, if you know what I mean." The
young man nodded. "Thirty and upward, I can't get closer
than that. I wasn't really looking at him, you see. It was her —with
those hands round her throat and
her face— all blue. . . . You know, sometimes I dream of it even now."
"It must have been a very distressing experience," said the young man
sympathetically.
He closed his notebook and said, "When are you returning to England?"
"Not for another three weeks. It isn't necessary, is it, for me?"
He quickly reassured her.
"Oh no. There's nothing you could do at present. Of course, if we make
an arrest. . ."
It was left like that.
The mail brought a letter from Miss Marple to her friend. The writing
was spiky and spidery and heavily underlined. Long practice made it
easy for Mrs. McGillicuddy to decipher. Miss Marple wrote a very
full
account to her friend who devoured every word with great satisfaction.
She and Jane had shown them all right!
"I simply can't make you out," said Cedric Crackenthorpe.
He eased himself down on the decaying wall of a long-derelict pigsty
and stared at Lucy Eyelesbarrow.
"What can't you make out?"
"What you're doing here."
"I'm earning my living."
"As a skivvy?" he spoke disparagingly.
"You're out of date," said Lucy. "Skivvy, indeed! I'm a household help,
a professional domestician,
or an answer to prayer, mainly the latter."
"You can't like all the things you have to do— cooking and making beds
and whirring about with a Hoover cleaner and sinking your arms up to
the elbows in greasy water."
Lucy laughed.
"Not the details, perhaps, but cooking satisfies my creative instincts,
and there's something in me that really revels in clearing up mess."
"I live in a permanent mess," said Cedric. "I like it," he added
defiantly.
"You look as though you did."
"My cottage in Iviza is run on simple straightforward lines. Three
plates, two cups and saucers, a bed, a table and a couple of chairs.
There's dust everywhere and smears of paint and chips of stone—I sculpt
as well as paint—and nobody's allowed to touch a thing. I won't have a
woman near the place."
"Not in any capacity?"
"Just what do you mean by that?"
"I was assuming that a man of such artistic tastes presumably had some
kind of love life."
"My love life, as you call it, is my own business," said Cedric with
dignity. "What I won't have is a woman in her tidying-up, interfering,
bossing capacity!"
"How I'd love to have a go at your cottage," said Lucy. "It would be a
challenge!"
"You won't get the opportunity."
"I suppose not."
Some bricks fell out of the pigsty. Cedric turned his head and looked
into its nettle-ridden depths.
"Dear old Madge," he said. "I remember her well. A sow of most
endearing disposition and a prolific mother. Seventeen in the last
litter, I remember. We used to come here on fine afternoons and scratch
Madge's back with a stick. She loved it."
"Why has this whole place been allowed to get into the state it's in?
It can't only be the war?"
"You'd like to tidy this up, too, I suppose? What an interfering female
you are. I quite see now why you would be the person to discover a
body! You couldn't even leave a Greco-Roman sarcophagus alone."
He paused and then went on. "No, it's not only the war. It's my father.
What do you think of him, by
the way?"
"I haven't had much time for thinking."
"Don't evade the issue. He's as mean as hell and in my opinion a bit
crazy as well. Of course he hates
all of us, except perhaps Emma. That's because of my grandfather's
will."
Lucy looked inquiring.
"My grandfather was the man who mada-da-monitch. With the Crunchies and
the Cracker Jacks and
the Cozy Crisps. All the afternoon-tea delicacies, and then, being
farsighted, he switched on very early
to cheesies and canapes so that now we cash in on cocktail parties in a
big way. Well, the time came when father intimated that he had a soul
above Crunchies. He traveled in Italy and the Balkans and Greece and
dabbled in art. My grandfather was peeved. He decided my father was no
man of business and a rather poor judge of art (quite right in both
cases), so left all his money in trust for his grandchildren. Father
had the income for life, but he couldn't touch the capital. Do you know
what he did? He stopped spending money. He came here and began to save.
I'd say that by now he's accumulated nearly as big a fortune as my
grandfather left. And in the meantime all of us, Harold, myself, Alfred
and Emma haven't got a penny of grandfather's money. I'm a stony-broke
painter. Harold went into business and is now a prominent man in the
City—he's the one with the money-making touch, though I've heard rumors
that he's in Queer Street lately. Alfred. Well, Alfred is usually known
in the privacy of the fsimily as Flash Alf."
"Why?"
"What a lot of things you want to know! The answer is that Alf is the
black sheep of the family. He's
not actually been to prison yet, but
he's been very near it. He was in the Ministry of Supply during the
war, but left it rather abruptly under questionable circumstances. And
after that there were some dubious deals in tinned fruits, and trouble
over eggs. Nothing in a big way— just a few doubtful deals on the side."
"Isn't it rather unwise to tell strangers all these things?"
"Why? Are you a police spy?"
"I might be."
"I don't think so. You were here slaving away before the police began
to take an interest in us. I should say—"
He broke off as his sister Emma came through the door of the kitchen
garden.
"Hullo, Em? You're looking very perturbed about something."
"I am. I want to talk to you, Cedric."
"I must get back to the house," said Lucy, tactfully. "Don't go," said
Cedric. "Murder has made you practically one of the family."
"I've got a lot to do," said Lucy. "I only came out to get some
parsley."
She beat a rapid retreat to the kitchen garden. Cedric's eyes followed
her.
"Good-looking girl," he said. "Who is she really?"
"Oh, she's quite
well known," said Emma. "She's made a specialty of this kind of thing.
But never mind Lucy
Eyelesbarrow, Cedric. I'm terribly worried. Apparently the police think
that this girl was a foreigner, perhaps French. Cedric, you don't think
that she could possibly be—Martine?"
* * *
For a moment or two Cedric stared as though uncomprehending.
"Martine? But who on earth—oh, you mean Martine?"
"Yes. Do you think—" "Why on earth should it be Martine?"
"Well, her sending that telegram was odd when you come to think of it.
It must have been roughly about the same time. Do you think that she
may, after all, have come down here and . . ."
"Nonsense. Why should Martine come down here and find her way into the
Long Barn? What for? It seems wildly unlikely to me."
"You don't think, perhaps, that I ought to tell Inspector Bacon, or the
other one?"
"Tell him what?"
"Well—about Martine. About her letter."
"Now don't you go complicating things, Sis, by bringing up a lot of
irrelevant stuff that has nothing to
do with all this. I was never very convinced about that letter from
Martine, anyway."
"I was."
"You've always been good at believing impossible things before
breakfast, old girl. My advice to you
is, sit tight and keep your mouth shut. It's up to the police to
identify their precious corpse. And I bet
Harold would say the same."
"Oh, I know Harold would. And Alfred, also. But I'm worried, Cedric, I
really am worried. I don't
know what I ought to do."
"Nothing," said Cedric promptly. "You keep your mouth shut, Emma. Never
go halfway to meet trouble, that's my motto."
Emma Crackenthorpe sighed. She went slowly back to the house, uneasy in
her mind.
As she came into the drive, Doctor Quimper emerged from the house and
opened the door of his
battered Austin car. He paused when he saw her; then, leaving the car,
he came toward her.
"Well, Emma," he said. "Your father's in splendid shape. Murder suits
him. It's given him an interest in life. I must recommend it for more
of my patients."
Emma smiled mechanically. Doctor Quimper was always quick to notice
reactions.
"Anything particular the matter?" he asked. Emma looked up at him. She
had come to rely a lot on the kindliness and sympathy of the doctor. He
had become a friend on whom to lean, not only a medical attendant. His
calculated brusqueness did not deceive her; she knew the kindness that
lay behind it.
"I am worried, yes," she admitted.
"Care to tell me? Don't, if you don't want to."
"I'd like to tell you. Some of it you know already. The point is I
don't know what to do."
"I should say your judgment was usually most reliable. What's the
trouble?"
"You remember—or perhaps you don't—what I once told you about my
brother—the one who was
killed in the war?"
"You mean about his having married, or wanting to marry, a French girl?
Something of that kind?"
"Yes. Almost immediately after I got that letter, he was killed. We
never heard anything of or about the
girl. All we knew, actually, was her Christian name. We always expected
her to write or to turn up, but she didn't. We never heard
anything—until about a month ago, just before Christmas."
"I remember. You got a letter, didn't you?"
"Yes. Saying she was in England and would like to come and see us. It
was all arranged and then, at the last minute, she sent a wire that she
had to return unexpectedly to France."
"Well?"
"The police think that this woman who was killed —was French."
"They do, do they? She looked more of an English type to me, but one
can't really judge. What's worrying you, then, is that just possibly
the dead woman might be your brother's girl?"
"Yes."
"I think it's most unlikely," said Doctor Quimper, adding: "But all the
same, I understand what you feel."
"I'm wondering if I ought not to tell the police about —about it all.
Cedric and the others say it's quite unnecessary. What do you think?"
"Hm." Doctor Quimper pursed up his lips. He was silent for a moment or
two, deep in thought. Then he said, almost unwillingly, "It's much
simpler, of course, if you say nothing. I can understand what your
brothers feel about it. All the same—"
"Yes."
Quimper looked at her. His eyes had an affectionate twinkle in them.
"I'd go ahead and tell 'em," he said. "You'll go on worrying if you
don't. I know you."
Emma flushed a little.
"Perhaps I'm foolish."
"You do what you want to do, my dear, and let the rest of the family go
hang! I'd back your judgment" against the lot of them any day."
"Girl! You, Girl! Come in here."
Lucy turned her head, surprised. Old Mr. Cracken-thorpe was beckoning
to her fiercely from just
inside a door.
"You want me, Mr. Crackenthorpe?"
"Don't talk so much. Come in here."
Lucy obeyed the imperative finger. Old Mr. Crackenthorpe took hold of
her arm and pulled her inside
the door and shut it.
"Want to show you something," he said.
Lucy looked round her. They were in a small room evidently designed to
be used as a study, but equally evidently not used as such for a very
long time. There were piles of dusty papers on the desk and cobwebs
festooned from the corners of the ceiling. The air smelled damp and
musty.
"Do you want me to clean this room?" she asked.
Old Mr. Crackenthorpe shook his head fiercely.
"No, you don't! I keep this room locked up. Emma would like to fiddle
about in here, but I don't let her. It's my room. See these stones?
They're geological specimens."
Lucy looked at a collection of twelve or fourteen lumps of rock, some
polished and some rough.
"Lovely," she said kindly. "Most interesting."
"You're quite right. They are interesting. You're an intelligent girl.
I don't show them to everybody. I'll show you some more things."
"It's very kind of you, but I ought really to get on with what I was
doing. With six people in the house—"
"Eating me out of house and home.
That's all they do when they come down here! Eat. They don't offer to
pay for what they eat, either. Leeches! All waiting for me to die.
Well, I'm not going to die just yet—I'm not going to die to please
them. I'm a lot stronger than even Emma knows."
"I'm sure you are."
"I'm not so old, either. She makes out I'm an old man, treats me as an
old man. You don't think I'm
old, do you?"
"Of course not," said Lucy.
"Sensible girl. Take a look at this." He
indicated a large, faded chart which hung on the wall. It was,
Lucy
saw, a genealogical tree; some of it done so finely that one would have
had to have a magnifying glass to read the names. The remote forebears,
however, were written in large, proud capitals with crowns over the
names.
"Descended from kings," said Mr. Crackenthorpe. "My mother's family
tree, that is, not my father's. He was a vulgarian! Common old man!
Didn't like me. I was cut above him always. Took after my mother's
side. Had a natural feeling for art and classical sculpture—he couldn't
see anything in it, silly old fool. Don't remember my mother—died when
I was two. Last of her family. They were sold up and she married my
father. But you look here—Edward the Confessor —Ethelred the
Unready—whole lot of them. And that was before the Normans came. Before
the Normans— that's something, isn't it?"
"It is indeed."
"Now I'll show you something else." He guided her across the room to an
enormous piece of dark oak furniture. Lucy was rather uneasily
conscious of the strength of the fingers clutching her arm. There
certainly seemed nothing feeble about old Mr. Crackenthorpe today. "See
this? Came out of Lushington—that was my mother's people's place.
Elizabethan, this is. Takes four men to move it.
You don't know what I
keep inside it, do you? Like me to show you?"
"Do show me," said Lucy politely.
"Curious, aren't you? All women are curious." He took a key from his
pocket and unlocked the door of the lower cupboard. From this he took
out a surprisingly new-looking cash box. This, again, he unlocked.
"Take a look here, my dear. Know what these are?"
He lifted out a small, paper-wrapped cylinder and pulled away the paper
from one end. Gold coins trickled out into his palm.
"Look at these, young lady. Look at 'em, hold 'em, touch 'em. Know what
they are? Bet you don't! You're too young. Sovereigns—that's what they
are. Good, golden sovereigns. What we used before all these dirty bits
of paper came into fashion. Worth a lot more than silly pieces of
paper. Collected them a long time back. I've got other things in this
box, too. Lots of things put away in here. All ready for the future.
Emma doesn't know. Nobody knows. It's our secret, see, girl? D'you know
why I'm telling you and showing you?"
"Why?"
"Because I don't want you to think I'm a played-out, sick old man. Lots
of life in the old dog yet. My wife's been dead a long time. Always
objecting to everything, she was. Didn't like the names I gave the
children— good Saxon names. No interest in that family tree. I never
paid any attention to what she said, though, and she was a
poor-spirited creature—always gave in. Now you're a spirited filly—a
very nice filly, indeed. I'll give you some advice. Don't throw
yourself away on a young man. Young men are fools! You want to take
care of your future. You wait—" His fingers pressed into Lucy's arm. He
leaned to her ear. "I don't say more than that. Wait. Those silly fools
think I'm going to die soon. I'm not. Shouldn't be surprised if f
outlived the lot of them. And then we'll see! Oh yes, then we'll see.
Harold's got no children, Cedric and Alfred aren't married. Emma—Emma
will never marry now. She's a bit sweet on Quimper, but Quimper will
never think of marrying Emma. There's Alexander, of course. Yes,
there's Alexander. But, you know, I'm fond of Alexander. Yes, that's
awkward. I'm fond of Alexander."
He paused for a moment, frowning, then said: "Well, girl, what
about it? What about it, eh?"
"Miss Eyelesbarrow . . ."
Emma's voice came faintly through the closed study door. Lucy seized
gratefully at the opportunity.
"Miss Crackenthorpe's calling me. I must go. Thank you so much for all
you have shown me."
"Don't forget . . . our secret . . ."
"I won't," said Lucy and hurried out into the hall, not quite certain
as to whether she had or had not
just received a conditional proposal
of marriage.
* * *
Dermot Craddock sat at his desk in his room at New Scotland Yard. He
was slumped sideways in an
easy attitude and was talking into the telephone receiver which he held
with one elbow propped up on
the table. He was speaking in French, a language in which he was
tolerably proficient.
"It was only an idea, you understand," he said.
"But decidedly it is an idea," said the voice at the other end, from
the Prefecture in Paris. "Already I
have set inquiries in motion in those circles. My agent reports that he
has two or three promising lines
of inquiry. Unless there is some family life or a lover, these women
drop out of circulation very easily
and no one troubles about them. They have gone on tour, or there is
some new man—it is no one's business to ask. It is a pity that the
photograph you sent me is so difficult for anyone to recognize.
Strangulation, it does not improve the appearance. Still, that cannot
be helped. I go now to study the
latest reports of my agents on this matter. There will be, perhaps,
something. Au revoir, mon cher."
As Craddock reiterated the farewell politely, a slip of paper was
placed before him on the desk. It read:
Miss Emma Crackenthorpe
To see Detective Inspector Craddock.
Rutherford Hall case.
He replaced the receiver and said to the police constable:
"Bring Miss Crackenthorpe up." As he waited, he leaned back in his
chair, thinking. So he had not been mistaken; there was something that
Emma Crackenthorpe knew—not much, perhaps, but something.
And she had decided to tell him.
He rose to his feet as she was shown in, shook hands, settled her in a
chair and offered her a cigarette which she refused. Then there was a
momentary pause. She was trying, he decided, to find just the words she
wanted. He leaned forward.
"You have come to tell me something, Miss Crackenthorpe? Can I help
you? You've been worried
about something, haven't you? Some little thing, perhaps, that you feel
probably has nothing to do with the case, but on the other hand just
might be related to it. You've come here to tell me about it, haven't
you? It's to do, perhaps, with the identity of the dead woman. You
think you know who she was?"
"No, no, not quite thaat. I think really it's most unlikely. But—"
"But there is some p6ssibility that worries you. You'd better tell me
about it, because we may be able
to set your mind at rest."
Emma took a moment or two before speaking. Then she said: "You
have seen three of my brothers. I had another brother, Edmund, who
was killed in the war. Shortly before he was killed, he wrote to me
from France."
She opened her handbag and took out a worn and faded letter. She read
from it:
"I hope this won't be a shock to you, Emmie, but I'm getting married—to
a French girl. It's all been
very sudden, but I know you'll be fond of
Martine and look after her if anything happens to me. Will write you
all the details in my next, by which time I shall be a married man!
Break it gently to the old man, won't you? He'll probably go up in
smoke."
Inspector Craddock held out a hand. Emma hesitated, then put the letter
into it. She went on, speaking rapidly.
"Two days after receiving this letter, we had a telegram saying Edmund
was missing, believed killed. Later he was definitely reported killed.
It was just before Dunkirk and a time of great "confusion.
There was no
Army record, as far as I could find out, of his having been married,
but as I say, it was a confused time. I never heard anything from the
girl. I tried, after the war, to make some inquiries, but I only knew
her Christian name and that part of France had been occupied by the
Germans and it was difficult to find out anything, without knowing the
girl's surname and more about her. In the end I assumed that the
marriage had never taken place and that the girl had probably married
someone else before the end of the war, or might possibly herself have
been killed."
Inspector Craddock nodded.
Emma went on. "Imagine my surprise to receive a letter, just
about a month ago,
signed Martine Crackenthorpe."
"You have it?"
Emma took it from her bag and handed it to him. Craddock read it with
interest. It was written in a slanting French hand, an educated hand.
Dear
Mademoiselle,
I hope it will not be a shock to you
to get this letter. I do not even know if your brother Edmund told you that we were married. He said he was
going to do so. He was killed only a few days
after our marriage, and at the same time the Germans occupied our
village. After the war ended,
I decided that I would not write to you or approach you, though Edmund
had told me to do so.
But by then I had made a new
life for myself, and it was not necessary. But now things have changed.
For my son's sake I write this letter. He is your brother's son, you
see, and I can no longer give him the advantages he ought to have. I am
coming to England early next week. Will you let me know if I can come
and see you? My address for letters is 126 Elvers Crescent, N. 10.
I hope again this will not be the great shock to you.
I remain with assurance of my
excellent sentiments,
Martine
Crackenthorpe
Craddock was silent for a moment or two. He reread the letter carefully
before handing it back.
"What did you do on receipt of this letter, Miss Crackenthorpe?"
"My brother-in-law, Bryan Eastley, happened to be saying with me at the
time and I talked to him about it. Then I rang up my brother Harold in
London and consulted him about it. Harold was rather skeptical about
the whole thing and advised extreme caution. We must, he said, go
carefully into this woman's credentials."
Emma paused and then went on:
"That, of course, was only common sense and I quite agreed. But if this
girl—woman—was really the Martine about whom Edmund had written to me,
I felt that we must make her welcome. I wrote to the address she gave
in her letter, inviting her to come down to Rutherford Hall and meet
us. A few days
later I received a telegram from London—Very sorry forced to return to France
unexpectedly. Martine. There was no further letter or news of
any kind."
"All this took place, when?"
Emma frowned.
"It was shortly before Christmas. I know, because I wanted to suggest
her spending Christmas with us. But my father would not hear of it, so
I suggested she should come down the weekend after Christmas while the
family would still be there. I think the wire saying she was returning
to France came actually
a few days before Christmas."
"And you believe that this woman whose body was found in the
sarcophagus might be this Martine?"
"No, of course I don't. But when you said she was probably a foreigner,
well, I couldn't help wondering ... if perhaps—"
Her voice died away.
Craddock spoke quickly and reassuringly.
"You did quite right to tell me about this. We'll look into it. I
should say there is probably little doubt that the woman who wrote to
you actually did go back to France and is there now, alive and well. On
the other hand, there is a certain coincidence of dates, as you
yourself have been clever enough to realize.
As you heard at the inquest, the woman's death, according to the police
surgeon's evidence, must have occurred about three to four weeks ago.
Now don't worry, Miss Crackenthorpe, just leave it to us." He added
casually, "You consulted Mr. Harold Crackenthorpe. What about your
father and your other brothers?"
"I had to tell my father, of course. He got very worked up," she smiled
faintly. "He was convinced it was a put-up thing to get money out of
us. My father gets very excited about money. He believes, or pretends
to believe, that he is a very poor man and that he must save every
penny he can. I believe elderly people do get obsessions of that kind
sometimes. It's not true, of course; he has a very large income and
doesn't actually spend a quarter of it, or used not to until these days
of high income tax. Certainly he has a large amount of savings put by."
She paused and then went on. "I told my other two brothers also. Alfred
seemed to consider it rather a joke, though he, too, thought it was
almost certainly an imposture.
Cedric just wasn't interested. He's inclined to be self-centered. Our
idea was that the family would
receive Martine, and that our lawyer, Mr. Wimborne, should also be
asked to be present."
"What did Mr. Wimborne think about the matter?"
"We hadn't got as far
as discussing the matter with him. We were on the point of doing so
when
Martine's telegram arrived."
"You have taken no further steps?"
"Yes. I wrote to the address in
London with Please forward on
the envelope, but I have had no reply
of any kind."
"Rather a curious business. Hm . . ." He looked at her sharply. "What
do you yourself think about it?"
"I don't know what to think."
"What were your reactions at the time? Did you think the letter was
genuine, or did you agree with your father and brothers? What about
your brother-in-law, by the way, what did he think?"
"Oh, Bryan thought that the letter was genuine."
"And you?"
"I wasn't sure."
"And what were your feelings about it, supposing that this girl really
was your brother Edmund's
widow?" Emma's face softened.
"I was very fond of Edmund. He was my favorite brother. The letter
seemed to me exactly the sort of letter that a girl like Martine would
write under the circumstances. The course of events she described were
entirely natural. I assumed that by the time the war ended she had
either married again or was with some man who was protecting her and
the child. Then, perhaps, this man had died or left her, and it then
seemed right to her to apply to Edmund's family, as he himself had
wanted her to do. The letter seemed genuine and natural to me, but of
course, Harold pointed out that if it was written by an impostor, it
would be written by some woman who had known Martine and who was in
possession of all the facts, and so could write a thoroughly plausible
letter. I had to admit the justice of that, but all the same—"
She stopped.
"You wanted it to be true?" said Craddock gently.
She looked at him gratefully.
"Yes, I wanted it to be true. I would be so glad if Edmund had left a
son."
Craddock nodded.
"As you say, the letter, on the face of it, sounds genuine enough. What
is surprising is the sequel; Martine Crackenthorpe's abrupt departure
for Paris and the fact that you have never heard from her since. You
had replied kindly to her, were prepared to welcome her. Why, even if
she had to return to France, did she not write again? That is,
presuming her to be the genuine article. If she were an impostor, of
course, it's easier to explain. I thought perhaps that you might have
consulted Mr. Wimborne, and that he might have instituted inquiries
which alarmed the woman. That, you tell me, is not so. But it's still
possible that one or other of your brothers may have done something of
the kind. It's possible that this Martine may have had a background
that would not stand investigation. She may have assumed that she would
be dealing only with Edmund's affectionate sister, not with hardheaded,
suspicious businessmen. She may have hoped-to get sums of money out of
you for the child—hardly a child now, a boy presumably of fifteen or
sixteen—without many questions being asked. But instead she found she
was going to run up against something quite different. After all, I
should imagine that serious legal aspects would arise. If Edmund
Crackenthorpe left a son, born in wedlock, he would be one of the heirs
to your grandfather's estate?"
Emma nodded.
"Moreover, from what I have been told, he would in due course inherit
Rutherford Hall and the land round it, very valuable building land,
probably, by now."
Emma looked slightly startled.
"Yes, I hadn't thought of that."
"Well, I shouldn't worry," said Inspector Craddock. "You did quite
right to come and tell me. I shall
make inquiries, but it seems to me highly probable that there is no
connection between the woman who wrote the letter—and who was probably
trying to cash in on a swindle—and the woman whose body
was found in the sarcophagus."
Emma rose with a sigh of relief.
"I'm so glad I've talked you. You've been very kind."
Craddock accompanied her to the door.
Then he rang for Detective Sergeant Wetherall.
"Bob, I've got a job for you. Go to 126 Elvers Crescent, N. 10. Take
photographs of the Rutherford
Hall woman with you. See what you can find out about a woman calling
herself Mrs. Crackenthorpe—
Mrs. Martine Crackenthorpe—who was either living there or calling for
letters there, between the dates of, say the fifteenth to the end of
December."
"Right, sir."
Craddock busied himself with various other matters that were waiting
attention on his desk: In the afternoon he went to see a theatrical
agent who was a friend of his. His inquiries were not fruitful.
Later in the day when he returned to his office he found a wire from
Paris on his desk.
PARTICULARS GIVEN BY YOU MIGHT
APPLY TO ANNA STRAVINSKA OF
BALLET MARITSKI. SUGGEST YOU COME OVER. DESSIN, PREFECTURE.
Craddock heaved a big sigh of relief and his brow cleared.
At last! So much, he thought, for the Martine Crackenthorpe hare. He
decided to take the night ferry
to Paris.
"It's so very kind of you to have asked me to take tea with you," said
Miss Marple to Emma Crackenthorpe.
Miss Marple was looking particularly woolly and fluffy, a picture of a
sweet old lady. She beamed as
she looked round her: at Harold Crackenthorpe in his well-cut dark
suit, at Alfred handing her sandwiches with a charming smile, at Cedric
standing by the mantelpiece in a ragged tweed jacket, scowling at the
rest of his family.
"We are very pleased that you could come," said Emma politely.
There was no hint of the scene which had taken place after lunch that
day when Emma had exclaimed: "Dear me, I quite forgot. I told Miss
Eyelesbarrow that she could bring her old aunt to tea today."
"Put her off," said Harold brusquely. "We've still got a lot to talk
about. We don't want strangers here."
"Let her have tea in the kitchen or somewhere with the girl," said
Alfred.
"Oh no, I couldn't do that," said Emma firmly. "That would be very
rude."
"Oh, let her come," said Cedric. "We can draw her out a little about
the wonderful Lucy. I should like
to know more about that girl, I must say. I'm not sure that I trust
her. Too smart by half."
"She's very well connected and quite genuine," said Harold. "I've made
it my business to find out. One wanted to be sure. Poking about and
finding the body the way she did . . ."
"If we only knew who this damned woman was," said Alfred.
Harold added angrily, "I must say, Emma, that I think you were out of
your senses, going and suggesting to the police that the dead woman
might be Edmund's French girl friend. It will make them convinced
that she came here, and that probably one or other of us killed her."
"Oh no, Harold. Don't exaggerate."
"Harold's quite right," said Alfred. "Whatever possessed you, I don't
know,, I've a feeling I'm being followed everywhere I go by
plain-clothes men."
"I told her not to do it," said Cedric. "Then Quimper backed her up."
"It's no business of his," said Harold angrily. "Let him stick to pills
and powders and national health."
"Oh, do stop quarreling," said Emma wearily. "I'm really glad this old
Miss What's-her-name is coming
to tea. It will do us all good to have a stranger here and be prevented
from going over and over the same things again and again. I must go and
tidy myself up a little."
She left the room.
"This Lucy Eyelesbarrow," said Harold and stopped. "As Cedric says, it
is odd that she should nose
about in the barn and go opening up a sarcophagus—really a Herculean
task. Perhaps we ought to take steps. Her attitude, I thought, was
rather antagonistic at lunch."
"Leave her to me," said Alfred. "I'll soon find out if she's up to
anything."
"I mean, why open up that sarcophagus?"
"Perhaps she isn't really Lucy Eyelesbarrow at all," suggested Cedric.
"But what would be the point—" Harold looked thoroughly upset. "Oh
damn!"
They looked at each other with worried faces.
"And here's this pestilential old woman coming to tea. Just when we
want to think."
"We'll talk things over this evening," said Alfred. "In the meantime,
we'll pump the old aunt about Lucy."
So Miss Marple had duly been fetched by Lucy and installed by the fire,
and she was now smiling up at Alfred as he handed her sandwiches with
the approval she always showed toward a good-looking man.
"Thank you so much. May I ask—? Oh, egg and sardine, yes that will be
very nice. I'm afraid I'm
always rather greedy over my tea. As one gets
on, you know— and of course, at night only a very
light meal— I have to be careful. I shall be ninety next year. Yes,
indeed."
"Eighty-seven," said Lucy.
"No, dear, ninety. You young people don't know best about everything."
Miss Marple spoke with a faint acidity. Then she turned to her hostess
once more. "What a beautiful house you have. And so many beautiful
things in it. Those bronzes, now, they remind me of some my father
bought at the Paris Exhibition. Really, your grandfather did? In the
classical style, aren't they? Very handsome. How delightful for you
having your brothers with you. So often families are scattered—India,
though I
suppose that is all done with now, and Africa—the West Coast, such a
bad climate."
"Two of my brothers live in London."
"That is very nice for you."
"But my brother Cedric is a painter and lives in Iviza, one of the
Balearic Islands."
"Painters are so fond of islands, are they not?" said Miss Marple.
"Chopin—that was Majorca, was it
not? but he was a musician. It is Gauguin I am thinking of. A sad life;
misspent, one feels. I myself
never really care for paintings of native women, and although I know he
is very much admired, I have never cared for that lurid mustard color.
One really feels quite bilious looking at his pictures."
She eyed Cedric with a slightly disapproving air.
"Tell us about Lucy as a child, Miss Marple," said Cedric.
She smiled up at him delightedly. "Lucy was always so clever," she
said. "Yes, you were, dear. Now don't interrupt. Quite remarkable at
arithmetic. Why I remember when the butcher overcharged me for topside
of beef—"
Miss Marple launched full steam ahead into reminiscences of Lucy's
childhood and from there to experiences of her own in village life.
The stream of reminiscence was interrupted by the entry of Bryan and
the boys, rather wet and dirty
as a result of an enthusiastic search for clues. Tea was brought in and
with it came Doctor Quimper
who raised his eyebrows slightly as he looked round after acknowledging
his introduction to the old lady.
"Hope your father's not under the weather, Emma?"
"Oh no—that is, he
was just a little tired this afternoon."
"Avoiding visitors, I expect," said Miss Marple with a roguish smile.
"How well I remember my own
dear father. 'Got a lot of old pussies coming?' he would say to my
mother. 'Send my tea into the study.' Very naughty about it, he was."
"Please don't think—" began Emma, but Cedric cut in.
"It's always tea in the study when his dear sons come down.
Psychologically to be expected, eh, Doctor?"
Doctor Quimper, who was devouring sandwiches and coffee cake with the
frank appreciation of a man who has usually too little time to spend on
his meals, said: "Psychology's all right if it's left to the
psychologists. Trouble is, everyone is an amateur psychologist
nowadays. My patients tell me exactly what complexes and neuroses
they're suffering from, without giving me a chance to tell them.
Thanks, Emma, I will have another cup. No time for lunch today."
"A doctor's life, I always think, is so noble and self-sacrificing,"
said Miss Marple.
"You can't know many doctors," said Doctor Quimper. "Leeches they used
to be called and leeches they often are! At any rate we do get paid
nowadays, the state sees to that. No sending in of bills that you know
won't ever be met. Trouble is that all one's patients are determined to
get everything they can 'out of the government,' and as a result if
little Jenny coughs twice in the night, or little Tommy eats a couple
of green apples, out the poor doctor has to come in the middle of the
night. O well! Glorious cake, Emma. What a cook you are!"
"Not mine. Miss Eyelesbarrow's."
"You make 'em just as good," said Quimper loyally.
"Will you come and see Father?"
She rose and the doctor followed her. Miss Marple watched them leave
the room.
"Miss Crackenthorpe is a very devoted daughter, I see," she said.
"Can't imagine how she sticks the old man, myself," said the outspoken
Cedric.
"She has a very comfortable home here, and Father is very much attached
to her," said Harold quickly.
"Em's all right," said Cedric. "Born to be an old maid."
There was a faint twinkle in Miss Marple's eye as she said:
"Oh, do you think so?"
Harold said quickly:
"My brother didn't use the term old maid in any derogatory sense, Miss
Marple."
"Oh, I wasn't offended," said Miss Marple. "I just wondered if he was
right. I shouldn't say myself that Miss Crackenthorpe would be an old
maid. She's the type, I think, that's quite likely to marry late in
life, and make a success of it."
"Not very likely living here," said Cedric. "Never sees anybody she
could marry."
Miss Marple's twinkle became more pronounced than ever.
"There are always clergymen and doctors."
Her eyes, gentle and mischievous, went from one to another.
It was clear that she had suggested to them something that they had
never thought of and which they
did not find overpleasing.
Miss Marple rose to her feet, dropping as she did so several little
woolly scarves and her bag.
The three brothers were most attentive picking things up.
"So kind of you," fluted Miss Marple. "Oh yes, and my little blue
muffler. Yes, as I say, so kind to ask me here. I've been picturing,
you know, just what your home was like, so that I can visualize dear
Lucy working here."
"Perfect home conditions, with murder thrown in," said Cedric.
"Cedric!" Harold's voice was angry.
Miss Marple smiled up at Cedric.
"Do you know who you remind me of? Young Thomas Eade, our bank
manager's son. Always out to shock people. It didn't do in banking
circles, of course, so he went to the West Indies. He came home when
his father died and inherited quite a lot of money. So nice for him. He
was always better at spending money than making it."
* * *
Lucy took Miss Marple home. On her way back a figure stepped out of the
darkness and stood in the glare of the headlights just as she was about
to turn into the back lane. He held up his hand and Lucy recognized
Alfred Crackenthorpe.
"That's better," he observed, as he got in. "Brr, it's cold! I fancied
I'd like a nice bracing walk. I didn't. Taken the old lady home all
right?"
"Yes. She enjoyed herself very much."
"One could see that. Funny what a taste old ladies have for any kind of
society, however dull. And
really, nothing could be duller than Rutherford Hall. Two days here is
about as much as I can stand.
How do you manage to stick it out, Lucy? Don't mind if I call you Lucy,
do you?"
"Not at all. I don't find it dull. Of course with me it's not a
permanency."
"I've been watching you. You're a smart girl. Lucy. Too smart to waste
yourself cooking and cleaning."
"Thank you, but I prefer cooking and cleaning to the office desk."
"So would I. But there are other ways of living. You could be a free
lance."
"I am."
"Not this way. I mean, working for yourself, pitting your wits against—"
"Against what?"
"The powers that be! All the silly pettifogging rules and regulations
that hamper us all nowadays. The interesting thing is there's always a
way round them if you're smart enough to find it. And you're smart.
Come now, does the idea appeal to you?"
"Possibly."
Lucy maneuvered the car into the stable yard.
"Not going to commit yourself?"
"I'd have to hear more."
"Frankly, my dear girl, I could use you. You've got the sort of manner
that's invaluable, creates confidence."
"Do you want me to help you sell gold bricks?"
"Nothing so risky. Just a little bypassing of the law —no more." His
hand slipped up her arm. "You're
a damned attractive girl, Lucy. I'd like you as a partner."
"I'm flattered."
"Meaning, nothing doing? Think about it. Think of the fun, the pleasure
you'd get out of outwitting all
the sobersides. The trouble is, one needs capital."
"I'm afraid I haven't got any."
"Oh, it wasn't a touch! I'll be laying my hands on some before long. My
revered Papa can't live forever, mean old brute. When he pops off, I
lay my hands on some real money. What about it, Lucy?"
"What are the terms?"
"Marriage if you fancy it. Women seem to, no matter how advanced and
self-supporting they are. Besides, married women can't be made to give
evidence against their husbands."
"Not so flattering!"
"Come off it, Lucy. Don't you realize I've fallen for you?"
Rather to her surprise Lucy was aware of a queer fascination. There was
a quality of charm about
Alfred, perhaps due to sheer animal magnetism.
She laughed and slipped from his encircling arm.
"This is no time for dalliance. There's dinner to think about."
"So there is, Lucy, and you're a lovely cook. What's for dinner?"
"Wait and see! You're as bad as the boys!" They entered the house and
Lucy hurried to the kitchen.
She was rather surprised to be interrupted
in her preparations by Harold Crackenthorpe.
"Miss Eyelesbarrow, can I speak to you about something?"
"Would later do, Mr. Crackenthorpe? I'm rather behind-hand."
"Certainly. Certainly. After dinner?" "Yes, that will do."
Dinner was duly served and appreciated. Lucy finished washing up and
came out into the hall to find Harold Crackenthorpe waiting for her.
"Yes, Mr. Crackenthorpe?"
"Shall we come in here?" He opened the door of the drawing room and led
the way. He shut the door behind her.
"I shall be leaving early in the morning," he explained, "but I want to
tell you how struck I have been by your ability."
"Thank you," said Lucy feeling a little surprised. "I feel that your
talents are wasted here—definitely wasted."
"Do you? I don't."
At any rate, he can't ask me to marry him, thought Lucy. He's got a
wife already.
"I suggest that having very kindly seen us through this lamentable
crisis, you call upon me in London.
If you will ring up and make an appointment, I will leave instructions
with my secretary. The truth is
that we could use someone of your outstanding ability in the firm. We
could discuss fully in what field your talents would be most ably
employed. I can offer you, Miss Eyelesbarrow, a very good salary
indeed with brilliant prospects. I think you will be agreeably
surprised."
His smile was magnanimous.
Lucy said demurely, "Thank you, Mr. Crackenthorpe, I'll think about it."
"Don't wait too long. These opportunities should not be missed by a
young woman anxious to make
her way in the world."
Again his teeth flashed.
"Good night, Miss Eyelesbarrow, sleep well."
"Well," said Lucy to herself, "well. . . . This is all very
interesting."
On her way up to bed, Lucy encountered Cedric on the stairs.
"Look here, Lucy, there's something I want to say to you."
"Do you want me to marry you and come to Iviza and look after you?"
Cedric looked very much taken aback and slightly alarmed.
"I never thought of such a thing."
"Sorry. My mistake."
"I just wanted to know if you've a timetable in the house?"
"Is that all? There's one on the hall table."
"You know," said Cedric, reprovingly, "you shouldn't go about thinking
everyone wants to marry you. You're quite a good-looking girl but not
as good-looking as all that. There's a name for that sort of thing. It
grows on you and you get worse. Actually you're the last girl in the
world I should care to marry. The last girl."
"Indeed?" said Lucy. "You needn't rub it in. Perhaps you'd prefer me as
a stepmother?"
"What's that?" Cedric stared at her, stupefied.
"You heard me," said Lucy, and went into her room and shut the door.
Dermot Craddock was fraternizing with Armand Dessin of the Paris
Prefecture. The two men had met
on one or two occasions and got on well together. Since Craddock spoke
French fluently, most of their conversation was conducted in that
language.
"It is an idea only," Dessin warned him. "I have a picture here of the
corps de ballet. That is she, the fourth from the left. It says
anything to you, yes?"
Inspector Craddock said that actually it didn't. A strangled young
woman is not easy to recognize, and in this picture all the young women
concerned were heavily made up and were wearing extravagant bird
headdresses.
"It could be," he said. "I can't go further than that. Who was she?
What do you know about her?"
"Almost less than nothing," said the other cheerfully. "She was not
important, you see. And the Ballet Maritski—it is not important,
either. It plays in suburban theaters and goes on tour. It has no real
names, no stars, no famous ballerinas. But I will take you to see
Madame Joliet who runs it."
Madame Joliet was a brisk businesslike Frenchwoman with a shrewd eye, a
small mustache, and a
ood deal of adipose tissue.
"Me, I do not like the police!" She scowled at them, without
camouflaging her dislike of the visit. "Always, if they can, they make
me embarrassments."
"No, no, Madame, you must not say that," said Dessin who was a tall,
thin, melancholy looking man. "When have I ever caused you
embarrassments?"
"Over that little fool who drank the carbolic acid," said Madame Joliet
promptly. "And all because she
has fallen in love with the chef
d'orchestre, who does not care for women and has other tastes.
Over
that you made the big brouhaha! Which is not good for my beautiful
ballet."
"On the contrary, big box-office business," said Dessin. "And that was
three years ago. You should not bear malice. Now about this girl, Anna
Stravinska."
"Well, what about her?"
"Is she Russian?" asked Inspector Craddock.
"No, indeed. You mean, because of her name? But they all call
themselves names like that, these girls. She was not important, she did
not dance well, she was not particularly good-looking. Elle etait assez Men, c'est tout.
She danced well enough for the corps de ballet, but no solos."
"Was she French?"
"Perhaps. She had a French passport. But she told me once that she had
an English husband."
"She told you that she had an English husband? Alive or dead?"
Madame Joliet shrugged her shoulders. "Dead, or he had left her. How
should I know which? These girls—there is always some trouble with men."
"When did you last see her?"
"I take my company to London for six weeks. We play at Torquay, at
Bournemouth, at Eastbourne, at somewhere else I forget and at
Hammersmith. Then we come back to France, but Anna, she does not come.
She sends a message only that she leaves the company, that she goes to
live with her husband's family, some nonsense of that kind. I did not
think it is true, myself. I think it more likely that she has
met a man, you understand."
Inspector Craddock nodded. He perceived that that was what Madame
Joliet would invariably think.
"And it is no loss to me. I do not care. I can get girls just as good
and better to come and dance, so I shrug the shoulders and do not think
of it any more. Why should I? They are all the same, these girls, mad
about men."
"What date was this?"
"When we return to France? It was—yes—the Sunday before Christmas. And
Anna she leaves two, or
is it three, days before that? I cannot remember exactly. But the end
of the week at Hammersmith we have to dance without her, and it means
rearranging things. It was very naughty of her, but these girls—the
moment they meet a man they are all the same. Only I say to everybody,
'Zut, I do not take her back, that one!' "
"Very annoying for you."
"Ah! me—I do not care. No doubt she passes the Christmas holiday with
some man she has picked up.
It is not my affair. I can find other girls—girls who will leap at the
chance of dancing in the Ballet
Maritski and who can dance as well or better than Anna."
Madame Joliet paused and then asked with a sudden gleam of interest,
"Why do you want to find her? Has she come into money?"
"On the contrary," said Inspector Craddock politely. "We think she may
have been murdered."
Madame Joliet relapsed into indifference.
"Qa se peut! It happens. Ah
well! She was a good Catholic. She went to Mass on Sundays, and no
doubt to confession."
"Did she ever speak to you, Madame, of a son?"
"A son? Do you mean she had a child? That, now, I should consider most
unlikely. These girls, all—
all of them—know a useful address to which to go. M. Dessin knows that
as well as I do."
"She may have had a child before she adopted a stage life," said
Craddock. "During the war, for instance."
"Ah! dans la guerre. That is
always possible. But if so, I know nothing about it."
"Who among the other girls were her closest friends?"
"I can give you two or three names, but she was not very intimate with
anyone."
They could get nothing else useful from Madame Joliet.
Shown the compact, she said Anna had one of that kind, but so had most
of the other girls. Anna had perhaps bought a fur coat in London, she
did not know. "Me, I occupy myself with the rehearsals, with the stage
lighting, with all the difficulties of my business. I have not time to
notice what my artists wear."
After Madame Joliet, they interviewed the girls whose names she had
given them. One or two of them had known Anna fairly well, but they all
said that she had not been one to talk too much about herself, and that
when she did, it was, so one girl said, mostly lies.
"She liked to pretend things—stories about having been the mistress of
a grand duke or of a great
English financier or how she worked for the Resistance in the war, even
a story about being a film star
in Hollywood."
Another girl said: "I think that really she had had a very tame
bour-geoise existence. She
liked to be in ballet because she thought it was romantic, but she was
not a good dancer. You understand that if she were to say, 'My father
was a draper in Amiens,' that would not be romantic! So instead she
made up things."
"Even in London," said the first girl, "she threw out hints about a
very rich man who was going to take her on a cruise round the world,
because she reminded him of his dead daughter who had died in a car
accident. Quelle blague!"
"She told me she was going to stay with a rich lord in Scotland," said
the second girl. "She said she
would shoot the deer there."
None of this was helpful. All that seemed to emerge from it was that
Anna Stravinska was a proficient liar. She was certainly not shooting
deer with a peer in Scotland, and it seemed equally unlikely that she
was on the sundeck of a liner cruising round the world. But neither was
there any real reason to believe that her body had been found in a
sarcophagus at Rutherford Hall. The identification by the girls and
Madame Joliet was very uncertain and hesitating. It looked something
like Anna, they all agreed. But really! All swollen up—it might be
anybody!
The only fact that was established was that, on December 19, Anna
Stravinska had decided not to return to France, and that on the
twentieth of December a woman resembling her in appearance had traveled
to Brackhampton by the 4:54 train and had been strangled.
If the woman in the sarcophagus was not Anna Stravinska, where was Anna
now?
To that, Madame Joliet's answer was simple and inevitable: "With
a man!"
And it was probably the correct answer, Craddock reflected ruefully.
One other possibility had to be considered, raised by the casual remark
that Anna had once referred to having an English husband.
Had that husband been Edmund Crackenthorpe?
It seemed unlikely, considering the word picture of Anna that had been
given him by those who knew
her. What was much more probable was that Anna had at one time known
the girl Martine sufficiently intimately to be acquainted with the
necessary details. It might have been Anna who wrote that letter to
Emma Crackenthorpe and, if so, Anna would have been quite likely to
have taken fright at any question of an investigation. Perhaps she had
even thought it prudent to sever her connection with the Ballet
Maritski. Again, where was she now?
And again, inevitably, Madame Joliet's answer seemed the most likely.
With a man.
* * *
Before leaving Paris, Craddock discussed with Dessin the question of
the woman named Martine. Dessin was inclined to agree with his English
colleague that the matter had probably no connection with the woman
found in the sarcophagus. All the same, he agreed, the matter ought to
be investigated.
He assured Craddock that the Surete would do their best to discover if
there actually was any record of
a marriage between Lieutenant Edmund Crackenthorpe of the 4th
Southshire Regiment and a French
girl whose Christian name was Martine. Time: just prior to the fall of
Dunkirk.
He warned Craddock, however, that a definite answer was doubtful. The
area in question had not only been occupied by the Germans at almost
exactly that time, but subsequently that part of France had suffered
severe war damage at the time of the invasion. Many buildings and
records had been destroyed.
"But rest assured, my dear colleague, we shall do our best."
With this, he and Craddock took leave of each other.
* * *
On Craddock's return Sergeant Wetherall was waiting to report with
gloomy relish:
"Accommodation address, sir—that's what 126 Elvers Crescent is. Quite
respectable and all that."
"Any identifications?"
"No. Nobody could recognize the photograph as that of a woman who had
called for letters, but I don't think they would anyway. It's a month
ago, very near, and a good many people use the place. It's
actually a boardinghouse for students."
"She might have stayed there under another name."
"If so, they didn't recognize her as the original of the photograph."
He added: "We circularized the hotels—nobody registering as
Martine Crackenthorpe
anywhere. On receipt of your call from Paris, we checked up on Anna
Stravinska. She was
registered with other members of the company in a cheap hotel off Brook
Green—mostly theatrical there. She cleared out
on the night of Thursday
the nineteenth after the show. No further record."
Craddock nodded. He suggested a line of further inquiries, though he
had little hope of success from them.
After some thought, he rang up Wimborne, Henderson and Carstairs and
asked for an appointment with Mr. Wimborne.
In due course, he was ushered into a particularly airless room where
Mr. Wimborne was sitting behind
a large old-fashioned desk covered with bundles of dusty-looking
papers. Various deed boxes labeled
Sir John ffouldes, dec. Lady Derrin,
George Rowbotham, Esq., ornamented the walls; whether as relics
of a bygone era or as part of present-day legal affairs, the Inspector
did not know.
Mr. Wimborne eyed his visitor with the polite wariness characteristic
of a family lawyer toward the
police.
"What can I do for you, Inspector?"
"This letter." Craddock pushed Martine's letter across the table. Mr.
Wimborne touched it with a distasteful finger but did not pick it up.
His color rose very slightly and his lips tightened.
"Quite so," he said, "quite so! I received a letter from Miss Emma
Crackenthorpe yesterday morning, informing me of her visit to Scotland
Yard and of—ah —all the circumstances. I must say that I am at a loss
to understand—quite at a loss—why I was not consulted about this letter
at the time of its arrival! Most extraordinary! I should have been
informed immediately."
Inspector Craddock repeated soothingly such platitudes as seemed best
calculuated to reduce Mr. Wimborne to an amenable frame of mind.
"I'd no idea that there was ever any question of Edmund's having
married," said Mr. Wimborne in an injured voice.
Inspector Craddock said that he supposed, in wartime . . . and left it
to trail away vaguely.
"Wartime!" snapped Mr. Wimborne with waspish acerbity. "Yes, indeed, we
were in Lincoln's Inn
Fields at the outbreak of war and there was a direct hit on the house
next door, and a great number of
our records were destroyed. Not the really important documents, of
course; they had been removed to
the country for safety. But it caused a great deal of confusion. Of
course, the Crackenthorpe business
was in my father's hands at that time. He died six years ago. I dare
say he may have been told about
this so-called marriage of Edmund's, but on the face of it, it looks as
though that marriage, even if contemplated, never took place, and so,
no doubt my father did not consider the story of any importance. I
m.ust say, all this sounds very fishy to me. This coming forward, after
all these years, and claiming a marriage and a legitimate son. Very
fishy, indeed. What proofs had she got, I'd like to know?"
"Just so," said Craddock. "What would her position or her son's
position be?"
"The idea was, I suppose, that she would get the Crackenthorpes to
provide for her and for the boy."
"Yes, but I meant, what would she and the son be entitled to, legally
speaking, if she could prove her claim?"
"Oh, I see." Mr. Wimborne picked up his spectacles which he had laid
aside in his irritation, and put
them on, staring through them at Inspector Craddock with shrewd
attention. "Well, at the moment, nothing. But if she could prove that
the boy was the son of Edmund Crackenthorpe, born in lawful wedlock,
then the boy would be entitled to his share of Josiah Crackenthorpe's
trust, on the death of Luther Crackenthorpe. More than that, he'd
inherit Rutherford Hall, since he's the son of the eldest son."
"Would anyone want to inherit the house?"
"To live in? I should say, certainly not. But that estate, my dear
Inspector, is worth a considerable
amount of money. Very considerable. Land for industrial and building
purposes. Land which is now
in the heart of Brackhampton. Oh yes, a very considerable inheritance."
"If Luther Crackenthorpe dies, I believe you told me that Cedric gets
it?"
"He inherits the real estate, yes, as the eldest surviving son."
"Cedric Crackenthorpe, I have been given to understand, is not
interested in money?"
Mr. Wimborne gave Craddock a cold stare.
"Indeed? I ani inclined, myself, to take statements of such a nature
with what I might term a grain of
salt. There are doubtless certain unworldly people who are indifferent
to money. I myself have never
met one."
Mr. Wimborne obviously derived a certain satisfaction from this remark.
Inspector Craddock hastened to take advantage of this ray of sunshine.
"Harold and Alfred Crackenthorpe," he ventured, "seem to have been a
good deal upset by the arrival
of this letter?"
"Well they might be," said Mr. Wimborne. "Well they might be."
"It would reduce their eventual inheritance?"
"Certainly. Edmund Crackenthorpe's son—always presuming there is a
son—would be entitled to a
fifth share of the trust money."
"That doesn't really seem a very serious loss?"
Mr. Wimborne gave him a shrewd glance.
"It is a totally inadequate motive for murder, if that is what you
mean."
"But I suppose they're both pretty hard up," Craddock murmured.
He sustained Mr. Wimborne's sharp glance with perfect impassivity.
"Oh! So the police have been making inquiries? Yes, Alfred is almost
incessantly in low water. Occasionally he is very flush of money for a
short time, but it soon goes. Harold, as you seem to have discovered,
is at present somewhat precariously situated."
"In spite of his appearance of financial prosperity?"
"Facade. All facade! Half these City concerns don't even know if
they're solvent or not. Balance sheets can be made to look all right to
the inexpert eye. But when the assets that are listed aren't really
assets—when those assets are trembling on the brink of a crash—where
are you?"
"Where, presumably, Harold Crackenthorpe is, in bad need of money."
"Well, he wouldn't have got it by strangling his late brother's widow,"
said Mr. Wimborne. "And nobody's murdered Luther Crackenthorpe which is
the only murder that would do the family any good. So really,
Inspector, I don't quite see where your ideas are leading you."
The worst of it was, Inspector Craddock thought, that he wasn't very
sure himself.
Inspector Craddock had made an appointment with Harold Crackenthorpe at
his office, he and Sergeant Wetherall arrived there punctually. The
office was on the fourth floor of a big block of City offices.
Inside everything showed prosperity and the acme of modern business
taste.
A neat young woman took his name, spoke in a discreet murmur through a
telephone, and then rising, showed them into Harold Crackenthorpe's own
private office.
Harold was sitting behind a large leather-topped desk and was looking
as impeccable and self-confident
as ever. If, as the Inspector's private knowledge led him to surmise,
he was close upon Queer Street, no trace of it showed.
He looked up with a frank, welcoming interest.
"Good morning,, Inspector Craddock. I hope this means that you have
some definite news for us at last."
"Hardly that, I am afraid, Mr. Crackenthorpe. It's just a few more
questions I'd like to ask."
"More questions? Surely by now we have answered everything imaginable."
"I dare say it feels like that to you, Mr. Crackenthorpe, but it's just
a question of our regular routine."
"Well, what is it this time?" He spoke impatiently.
"I should be glad if you could tell me exactly what you were doing on
the afternoon and evening of December the twentieth last, say between
the hours of three p.m. and midnight."
Harold Crackenthorpe went an angry shade of plum red.
"That seems to be a most extraordinary question to ask me. What does it
mean, I should like to know?"
Craddock smiled gently.
"It- just means that I should like to know where you were between the
hours of three p.m. and midnight on Friday, December the twentieth." ,
"Why?"
"It would help to narrow things down."
"Narrow them down? You have extra information, then?"
"We hope that we're getting a little closer, sir,"
"I'm not at all sure that I ought to answer your question. Not, that
is, without having my solicitor present."
"That, of course, is entirely up to you," said Craddock. "You are not
bound to answer any questions
and you have a perfect right to have a solicitor present before you do
so."
"You are not—let me be quite clear—er—warning me in any way?"
"Oh no, sir." Inspector Craddock looked properly shocked. "Nothing of
that kind. The questions I am asking you I am asking of several other
people as well. There's nothing directly personal about this. It's just
a matter of necessary eliminations."
"Well, of course, I'm anxious to assist in any way I can. Let me see
now. Such a thing isn't easy to answer offhand, but we're very
systematic here. Miss Ellis, I expect, can help."
He spoke briefly into one of the telephones on his desk and almost
immediately a streamlined young woman in a welUcut black suit entered
with a notebook.
"My secretary, Miss Ellis, Inspector Craddock. Now, Miss Ellis, the
Inspector would like to know what
I was doing on the afternoon and evening of—what was the date?"
"Friday, December the twentieth." "Friday, December the twentieth. I
expect you will have some record."
"Oh yes." Miss Ellis left the room, returned with an office memorandum
calendar and turned the pages.
"You were in the office in the morning of December the twentieth. You
had a conference with Mr.
Goldie about the Cromartie merger, you lunched with Lord Forthville at
the Berkeley—"
"Ah, it was that day, yes."
"You returned to the office at about three o'clock and dictated half a
dozen letters. You then left to
attend Sotheby's sale rooms where you were interested in some rare
manuscripts which were coming up for sale that day. You did not return
to the office again, but I have a note to remind you that you were
attending the Catering Club dinner that evening." She looked up
interrogatively.
"Thank you, Miss Ellis."
Miss Ellis glided from the room.
"That is all quite clear in my mind," said Harold. "I went to Sotheby's
that afternoon but the items I wanted there went for far too high a
price. I had tea in a small place in Jermyn Street—Russell's, I think
it is called. I dropped into a News Theatre for about half an hour or
so, then went home. I live at 43 Cardigan Gardens. The Catering Club
dinner took place at seven-thirty at Caterers' Hall, and after it
I returned home to bed. I think that should answer your questions?"
"That's all very clear, Mr. Crackenthorpe. What time was it when you
returned home to dress?"
"I don't think I can remember exactly. Soon after six, I should think."
"And after the dinner?"
"It was, I think, half-past eleven when I got home."
"Did your manservant let you in? Or perhaps Lady Alice Crackenthorpe?"
"My wife, Lady Alice, is abroad in the South of France and has been
since early in December. I let myself in with my latchkey."
"So there is no one who can vouch for your return-inghome when you say
you did?"
Harold gave him a cold stare.
"I dare say the servants heard me come in. I have a man and wife. But
really, Inspector—"
"Please, Mr. Crackenthorpe, I know these questions are annoying, but I
have nearly finished. Do you own a car?"
"Yes, a Humber Hawk."
"You drive it yourself?"
"Yes. I don't use it much except at weekends. Driving in London is
quite impossible nowadays."
"I presume you use it when you go down to see your father and sister at
Brackhampton?"
"Not unless I am going to stay there for some length of time. If I just
go down for the night, as, for instance, to the inquest the other day,
I always go by train. There is an excellent train service and it is
far quicker than going by car. The car my sister hires meets me at the
station."
"Where do you keep your car?"
"I rent a garage in the mews behind Cardigan Gardens. Any more
questions?"
"I think that's all for now," said Inspector Craddock smiling and
rising. "I'm very sorry for having to bother you."
When they were outside, Sergeant Wetherall, a man who lived in a state
of dark suspicion of all and sundry, remarked meaningly:
"He didn't like those questions—didn't like them at all. Put out, he
was."
"If you have not committed a murder, it naturally annoys you if
it-seems someone thinks that you have," said Inspector Craddock mildly.
"It would particularly annoy an ultrarespectable man like Harold
Crackenthorpe. There's nothing in that. What we've got to find out now
is if anyone actually saw Harold Crackenthorpe at the sale that
afternoon, and the same applies to the teashop place. He could easily
have traveled by the 4:54, pushed the woman out of the train and caught
a train back to London in time to appear at the dinner. In the same way
he could have driven his car down that night, moved the body to the
sarcophagus and driven back again. Make inquiries in the mews."
"Yes, sir. Do you think that's what he did do?"
"How do I know?" asked Inspector Craddock. "He's a tall' dark man. He
could have been on that train and he's got a connection with Rutherford
Hall. He's a possible suspect in this case. Now for brother Alfred."..
* * *
Alfred Crackenthorpe had a flat in West Hampstead, in a big modern
building of slightly jerry-built type with a large courtyard in which
the owners of flats parked their cars with a certain lack of
consideration for others.
The flat was of the modern built-in type, evidently rented furnished.
It had a long plywood table that let down from the wall, a divan bed,
and various chairs of improbable proportions.
Alfred Crackenthorpe met them with engaging friendliness but was, the
Inspector thought, nervous.
"I'm intrigued," he said. "Can I offer you a drink, Inspector
Craddock?" He held up various bottles invitingly.
"No, thank you, Mister Crackenthorpe."
"As bad as that?" He laughed at his own little joke, then asked what it
was all about.
Inspector Craddock said his little piece.
"What was I doing on the afternoon and evening of December the
twentieth? How should I know?
Why, that's—what?—over three weeks ago."
"Your brother Harold has been able to tell us very exactly."
"Brother Harold, perhaps. Not brother Alfred." He added with a touch of
something, envious malice possibly: "Harold is the successful member of
the family —busy, useful, fully employed, a time for everything and
everything at that time. Even if he were to commit a murder, shall we
say? It would be carefully timed and exact."
"Any particular reason for using that example?"
"Oh no—it just came into my mind as a supreme absurdity."
"Now about yourself."
Alfred spread out his hands.
"It's as I tell you, I've no memory for times or places. If you were to
say Christmas Day now, then I should be able to answer you—there's a
peg to hang it on. I know where I was Christmas Day. We
spent that with my father at Brackhampton. I really don't know why. He
grumbles at the expense of having us, and would grumble that we never
came near him if we didn't come. We really do it to
please my sister."
"And you did it this year?"
"Yes."
"But unfortunately your father was taken ill, was he not?"
Craddock was pursuing a side line deliberately, led by the kind of
instinct that often came to him in his profession.
"He was taken ill. Living like a sparrow in the glorious cause of
economy, sudden full eating and
drinking had its effect."
"That was all it was, was it?"
"Of course. What else?"
"I gathered that his doctor was—worried."
"Oh, that old fool Quimper," Alfred spoke quickly and scornfully. "It's
no use listening to him, Inspector. He's an alarmist of the worst kind."
"Indeed? He seemed a rather sensible kind of man tome."
"He's a complete fool. Father's not really an invalid, there's nothing
wrong with his heart, but he takes
in Quimper completely. Naturally, when father really felt ill, he made
a terrific fuss, and had Quimper going and coming, asking questions,,
going into everything he'd eaten and drunk. The whole thing was
ridiculous!" Alfred spoke with unusual heat.
Craddock was silent for a moment or two, rather effectively; Alfred
fidgeted, shot him a quick glance,
and then said petulantly:
"Well, what is all this? Why do you want to know where I was on a
particular Friday, three or four
weeks ago?"
"So you do remember that it was a Friday?"
"I thought you said so."
"Perhaps I did," said Inspector Craddock. "At any rate, Friday the
twentieth is the day I am asking about."
"Why?"
"A routine inquiry."
"That's nonsense. Have you' found out something more about this woman?
About where she came from?"
"Our information is not yet complete."
Alfred gave him a sharp glance.
"I hope you're not being led aside by this wild theory of Emma's that
she might have been my brother Edmund's widow. That's complete
nonsense."
"This Martine did not at any time apply to you?"
"To me? Good Lord, no. That would have been a laugh."
"She would be more likely, you think, to go to your brother Harold?"
"Much more likely. His name's frequently in the papers. He's well off.
Trying a touch there wouldn't surprise me. Not that she'd have got
anything. Harold's as tightfisted as the old man himself. Emma, of
course, is the softhearted one of the family, and she was Edmund's
favorite sister. All the same, Emma isn't credulous. She was quite
alive to the_ possibility of this woman being phony. She had it all
laid on for the entire family to be there—and a hardheaded solicitor as
well."
"Very wise," said Craddock. "Was there a definite date fixed for
this'meeting?"
"It was to be soon after Christmas. The weekend of the twenty-seventh—"
He stopped.
"Ah," said Craddock pleasantly. "So I see some dates have a meaning to
you."
"I've told you no definite date was fixed."
"But you talked about it—when?"
"I really can't remember."
"And you can't tell me what you yourself were doing on Friday, December
the twentieth?"
"Sorry, my mind's an absolute blank."
"You don't keep an engagement book?"
"Can't stand the things."
"The Friday before Christmas—it shouldn't be too difficult."
"I played golf one day with a likely prospect." Alfred shook his head.
"No, that was the week before.
I probably just mooched around. I spend a lot of my time doing that. I
find one's business gets done in bars more than anywhere else."
"Perhaps the people here, or some of your friends, may be able to help?"
"Maybe. I'll ask them. Do what I can."
Alfred seemed more sure of himself now.
"I can't tell you what I was doing that day," he said, "but I can tell
you what I wasn't doing. I wasn't murdering anyone in the Long Barn."
"Why should you say that, Mr. Crackenthorpe?"
"Come now, my dear Inspector. You're investigating this murder, aren't
you? And when you begin to
ask 'Where were you on such and such a day at such and such a time?'
you're narrowing down things.
I'd very much like to know why you've hit on Friday the twentieth
between—what?—lunch-time and midnight? It couldn't be medical evidence,
not after all this time. Did somebody see the deceased
sneaking into the barn that afternoon? She went in and she never came
out, etc.? Is that it?"
The sharp, black eyes were watching him narrowly, but Inspector
Craddock was far too old a hand to react to that sort of thing.
"I'm afraid we'll have to let you guess about that," he said pleasantly.
"The police are so secretive."
"Not only the police. I think, Mr. Crackenthorpe, you could remember
what you were doing on that Friday if you tried. Of course, you may
have reasons for not wishing to remember—"
"You won't catch me that way, Inspector. It's very suspicious, of
course, very suspicious, indeed, that I can't remember, but there it
is! Wait a minute now! I went to Leeds that week, stayed at a hotel
close to the town hall—can't remember its name, but you'd find it
easily enough. That might have been on the Friday."
"We'll check up," said the Inspector unemotionally.
He rose. "I'm sorry you couldn't have been more cooperative, Mr.
Crackenthorpe."
"Most unfortunate for me! There's Cedric with a safe alibi in Iviza,
and Harold, no doubt, checked with business appointments and public
dinners every hour, and here am I with no alibi at all. Very sad. And
all so silly. I've already told you I don't murder people. And why
should I murder an unknown woman anyway? What for? Even if the corpse
is the corpse of Edmund's widow, why should any of us wish to do away
with her? Now if she'd been married to Harold in the war and had
suddenly reappeared, then it might have been awkward for the
respectable Harold—bigamy and all that. But Edmund! Why, we'd all have
enjoyed making Father stump up a bit to give her an allowance and send
the boy to a decent school. Father would have been wild, but he
couldn't in decency refuse to do something. Won't you have a drink
before you go, Inspector? Sure? Too bad I haven't been able to help
you."
* * *
"Sir, listen, do you know what?"
Inspector Craddock looked at his excited sergeant.
"Yes, Wetherall, what is it?"
"I've placed him, sir. That chap. All the time I was trying to fix it
and suddenly it came. He was mixed
up in that tinned-food business with Dicky Rogers. Never got anything
on him—too cagey for that. And he's been in with one or more of the
Soho lot. Watches and that Italian sovereign business."
Of course! Craddock realized now why Alfred's face had seemed vaguely
familiar from the first. It had
all been small-time stuff, never anything that could be proved. Alfred
had always been on the outskirts
of the racket with a plausible, innocent reason for having been mixed
up in it at all. But the police had been quite sure that a small,
steady profit came his way.
"That throws rather a light on things," Craddock said.
"Think he done it?"
"I shouldn't have said he was the type to do murder. But it explains
other things—the reason why he couldn't come up with an alibi."
"Yes, that looks bad for him."
"Not really," said Craddock. "It's quite a clever line, just to say
firmly you can't remember. Lots of
people can't remember what they did and where they were even a week
ago. It's especially useful if
you don't particularly want to call attention to the way you spend your
time—interesting rendezvous
at lorry pull ups with the Dicky Rogers crowd, for instance."
"So you think he's all right?"
"I'm not prepared to think anyone's all right just yet," said Inspector
Craddock. "You've got to work
on it, Wetherall."
Back at his desk, Craddock sat frowning, and making little notes on the
pad in front of him.
Murderer
(he wrote) .... A tall, dark man!!!
Victim? . . . Could have
been' Martine, Edmund Crackenthorpe's girl friend or widow.
or
Could have been Anna Stravinska. Went out of circulation at
appropriate time, right age and appearance, clothing, etc. No
connection with Rutherford Hall as far as is known.
Could be Harold's first wife!
Bigamy! "
" " " mistress, Blackmail?! If connection with Alfred,
might be blackmail had knowledge that
could have sent him to jail? If Cedric— have had connection with him
abroad —Paris? Balearics?
or
Victim could be Anna S. posing as Martine
or
Victim is unknown woman killed by unknown murderer!
"And most probably the latter," said Craddock aloud. He reflected
gloomily on the situation. You
couldn't get far with a case until you had the motive. All the motives
suggested so far seemed either inadequate or farfetched.
Now if only it had been the murder of old Mr. Crackenthorpe. Plenty of
motive there.
Something stirred in his memory.
He made further notes on his pad.
Ask Dr. Q. about Christmas illness.
Cedric—alibi.
Consult Miss M. for latest gossip.
When Craddock got to 4 Madison Road he found Lucy Eyelesbarrow with
Miss Marple.
He hesitated for a moment on his plan of campaign and then decided that
Lucy Eyelesbarrow might
prove a valuable ally.
After greetings, he solemnly drew out his notecase, extracted three
pound notes, added three shillings
and pushed them across the table to Miss Marple.
"What's this, Inspector?"
"Consultation fee. You're a consultant—on murder! Pulse, temperature,
local reactions, possible deep-seated cause of said murder. I'm just
the poor harassed local G.P."
Miss Marple looked at him and twinkled. He grinned at her. Lucy
Eyelesbarrow gave a faint gasp and then laughed.
"Why, Inspector Craddock, you're human after all."
"Oh well, I'm not strictly on duty this afternoon."
"I told you we had met before," said Miss Marple to Lucy. "Sir Henry
Clithering is his godfather, a
very old friend of mine."
"Would you like to hear, Miss Eyelesbarrow, what my godfather said
about her, the first time we met?
He described her as just the finest detective God ever made—natural
genius cultivated in a suitable soil. He told me never to despise
the"—Dermot Craddock paused for a moment to seek for a synonym for "old
pussies"—"er—elderly ladies. He said they could usually tell you what
might have happened, what ought to have happened and even what actually
did happen! And, he said, they can tell you why it happened! He added
that this particular—er—elderly lady was at the top of the class."
"Well!" said Lucy, "that seems to be a testimonial all right."
Miss Marple was pink and confused and looked unusually dithery.
"Dear Sir Henry," she murmured. "Always so kind. Really I'm not at all
clever, just, perhaps, a slight knowledge of human nature—living, you
know, in a village."
She added, with more composure:
"Of course, I am somewhat handicapped, by not actually being on the
spot. It is so helpful, I always
feel, when people remind you of other people, because types are alike
everywhere and that is such a valuable guide."
Lucy looked a little puzzled, but Craddock nodded comprehendingly.
"But you've been to tea there, haven't you?" he said.
"Yes, indeed. Most pleasant. I was a little disappointed that I didn't
see old Mr. Crackenthorpe, but one can't have everything."
"Do you feel that if you saw the person who had done the murder, you'd
know?" asked Lucy.
"Oh, I wouldn't say that, dear. One is always inclined to guess, and
guessing would be very wrong
when it is a question of anything as serious as murder. All one can do
is to observe the people
concerned, or who might have been concerned, and see of whom they
remind you."
"Like Cedric and the bank manager?"
Miss Marple corrected her.
"The bank's manager's son, dear. Mr. Eade himself was far more like Mr.
Harold, a very conservative man, but perhaps a little too fond of
money—the sort of man, too, who would go a long way to avoid scandal."
Craddock smiled and said:
"And Alfred?"
"Jenkins at the garage," Miss Marple replied promptly. "He didn't
exactly appropriate tools, but he used
to exchange a broken or inferior jack for a good one. And I believe he
wasn't very honest over batteries, though I don't understand these
things very well. I know Raymond left off dealing with him and went to
the garage on the Milchester road. As for Emma," continued Miss Marple
thoughtfully, "she reminds
me very much of Geraldine Webb—always very quiet, almost dowdy—and
bullied a good deal by her elderly mother. Quite a surprise to
everybody when the mother died unexpectedly and Geraldine came into a
nice sum of money and went and had her hair cut and permed and went off
on a cruise and came back married to a very nice barrister. They had
two children."
The parallel was clear enough. Lucy said, rather uneasily: "Do you
think you ought to have said what
you did about Emma marrying? It seemed to upset the brothers."
Miss Marple nodded.
"Yes," she said. "So like men, quite unable to see what's going on
under their eyes. I don't believe you noticed yourself."
"No," admitted Lucy. "I never thought of anything of that kind. They
both seemed to me—"
"So old?" said Miss Marple smiling a little. "But Doctor Quimper isn't
much over forty, I should say, though he's going gray on the temples,
and it's obvious that he's longing for some kind of home hfe;
and Emma Crackenthorpe is under forty, not too old to marry and have a
family. The doctor's wife
died quite young having a baby, so I have heard."
"I believe she did. Emma said something about it one day."
"He must be lonely," said Miss Marple. "A busy hardworking doctor needs
a wife, someone sympathetic, not too young."
"Listen, darling," said Lucy. "Are we investigating crime, or are we
matchmaking?"
Miss Marple twinkled.
"I'm afraid I am rather romantic. Because I am an old maid, perhaps.
You know, dear Lucy, that as
far as I am concerned, you have fulfilled your contract. If you really
want a holiday abroad before
taking up your next engagement, you would have time still for a short
trip."
"And leave Rutherford Hall? Never! I'm the complete sleuth by now.
Almost as bad as the boys. They spend their entire time looking for
clues. They looked all through the dustbins yesterday. Most unsavory,
and they hadn't really the faintest idea what they were looking for. If
they come to you in triumph, Inspector Craddock, bearing a torn scrap
of paper with Martine —you value
your life keep away
from the Long Barn! on it,
you'll know that I've taken pity on them and concealed it in the
pigsty!"
"Why the pigsty, dear?" asked Miss Marple with interest. "Do they keep
pigs?"
"Oh no, not nowadays. It's just that I go there sometimes."
For some reason Lucy blushed. Miss Marple looked at her with increased
interest.
"Who's at the house now?" asked Craddock. "Cedric's there, and Bryan's
down for the weekend.
Harold and Alfred are coming down tomorrow. They rang up this morning.
I somehow got the
impression that you had been putting the cat among the pigeons,
Inspector Craddock." Craddock smiled.
"I shook them up a little. Asked them to account for their movements on
Friday, December the twentieth."
"And could they?"
"Harold could. Alfred couldn't or wouldn't."
"I think alibis must be terribly difficult," said Lucy.
"Times and places and dates. They must be hard to check up on, too."
"It takes time and patience, but we manage." He glanced at his watch.
"I'll be coming along to
Rutherford Hall presently to have a word with Cedric, but I want to get
hold of Doctor Quimper first."
"You'll be just about right. He has his surgery at six and he's usually
finished about half-past. I must
get back and deal with dinner."
"I'd like your opinion on one thing, Miss Eyelesbarrow. What's the
family view about this Martine business, among themselves?"
Lucy replied promptly. "They're all furious with Emma for going
to you about it, and with
Doctor Quimper who, it seemed, encouraged her to do so. Harold and
Alfred think it was a try on and not genuine. Emma isn't sure. Cedric
thinks it was phony, too, but he doesn't take it as seriously as
the
other two. Bryan, on the other hand, seems quite sure that it's
genuine."
"Why I wonder?"
"Well, Bryan's rather like that. Just accepts things at their face
value. He thinks it was Edmund's wife,
or rather widow, and that she had suddenly to go back to France, but
that they'll hear from her again sometime. The fact that she hasn't
written or anything up to now seems to him to be quite natural
because he never writes letters himself. Bryan's rather sweet. Just
like a dog that wants to be taken
for a walk."
"And do you take him for a walk, dear?" asked Miss Marple. "To the
pigsties, perhaps?"
Lucy shot a keen glance at her.
"So many gentlemen in the house, coming and going," mused Miss Marple.
When Miss Marple uttered the word "gentlemen" she always gave it its
full Victorian flavor—an echo from an era actually before her own time.
You were conscious at once of dashing, full-blooded (and probably
whiskered) males, sometimes wicked, but always gallant.
"You're such a handsome girl," pursued Miss Marple appraising Lucy. "I
expect they pay you a good
deal of attention, don't they?"
Lucy flushed slightly. Scrappy remembrances passed across her mind.
Cedric leaning against the pigsty wall. Bryan sitting disconsolately on
the kitchen table. Alfred's fingers touching hers as he helped her
collect the coffee cups.
"Gentlemen," said Miss Marple, in the tone of one speaking of some
alien and dangerous species,
"are all very much alike in some ways—even if they are quite old . . ."
"Darling," cried Lucy. "A hundred years ago you would certainly have
been burned as a witch!"
And she told her story of old Mr. Crackenthorpe's conditional proposal
of marriage.
"In fact," said Lucy, "they've all made what you might call advances to
me, in a way. Harold's was very correct; an advantageous financial
position in the City. I don't think it's my attractive appearance; they
must think that I know something."
She laughed.
But Inspector Craddock did not laugh.
"Be careful," he said. "They might murder you instead of making
advances to you."
"I suppose it might be simpler," Lucy agreed.
Then she gave a slight shiver.
"One forgets," she said. "The boys have been having such fun that one
almost thought of it all as a
game. But it's not a game."
"No," said Miss Marple. "Murder isn't a game."
She was silent for a moment or two before she said:
"Don't the boys go back to school soon?"
"Yes, next week. They go tomorrow to lames Stoddart-West's home for the
last few days of the holidays."
"I'm glad of that," said Miss Marple gravely. "I shouldn't like
anything to happen while they're there."
"You mean to old Mr. Crackenthorpe. Do you think he's going to be
murdered next?"
"Oh no!" said Miss Marple. "He'll be all right. I meant to the boys."
"To the boys?"
"Well, to Alexander."
"But surely—"
"Hunting about, you know, looking for clues. Boys love that sort of
thing, but it might be very dangerous."
Craddock looked at her thoughtfully.
"You're not prepared to believe, are you, Miss Marple, that it's a case
of an unknown woman murdered by an unknown man? You tie it up
definitely with Rutherford Hall?"
"I think there's a definite connection, yes."
"All we know about the murderer is that he's a tall, dark man. That's
what your friend says and all she can say. There are three tall, dark
men at Rutherford Hall. On the day of the inquest, you know, I came out
to see the three brothers standing waiting on the pavement for the car
to drive up. They had their backs to me and it was astonishing how, in
their heavy overcoats, they looked all alike. Three tall, dark men. And yet,
actually, they're all three quite different types." He sighed. "It
makes it very difficult."
"I wonder," murmured Miss Marple. "I have been wondering whether it
might perhaps be all much simpler than we suppose. Murders so often are
quite simple, with an obvious rather sordid motive . . ."
"Do you believe in the mysterious Martine, Miss Marple?"
"I'm quite ready to believe that Edmund Crackenthorpe either married,
or meant to marry, a girl called Martine. Emma Crackenthorpe showed you
his letter, I understand, and from what I've seen of her and from what
Lucy tells me, I should say Emma Crackenthorpe is quite incapable of
making up a thing of that kind. Indeed, why should she?"
"So granted Martine," said Craddock thoughtfully, "there is a motive of
a kind. Martine's reappearance with a son would diminish the
Crackenthorpe inheritance, though hardly to a point, one would think,
to activate murder. They're all very hard up."
"Even Harold?" Lucy demanded incredulously.
"Even the prosperous-looking Harold Crackenthorpe is not the sober and
conservative financier he appears to be. He's been plunging heavily and
mixing himself up in some rather undesirable ventures.
A large sum of money, soon, might avoid a crash."
"But if so—" said Lucy and stopped.
"Yes, Miss Eyelesbarrow—"
"I know, dear," said Miss Marple. "The wrong murder, that's what you
mean."
"Yes, Martine's death wouldn't do Harold, or any of the others, any
good. Not until—"
"Not until Luther Crackenthorpe died. Exactly. That occurred to me. And
Mr. Crackenthorpe, senior,
I gather from his doctor, is in much better life than any outsider
would imagine."
"He'll last for years," said Lucy. Then she frowned.
"Yes?" Craddock spoke encouragingly.
"He was rather ill at Christmastime," said Lucy. "He said the doctor
made a lot of fuss about it. 'Anyone would have thought I'd been
poisoned by the fuss he made.' That's what he said."
She looked inquiringly at Craddock.
"Yes," said Craddock. "That's really what I want to ask Doctor Quimper
about."
"Well, I must go," said Lucy. "Heavens, it's late."
Miss Marple put down her knitting and picked up the Times with a half-done crossword
puzzle.
"I wish I had a dictionary here," she murmured. "Tontine and Tokay—I
always mix those two words
up. One, I believe, is a Hungarian wine."
"That's okay," said Lucy looking back from the door. "But one's a
five-letter word and one's a seven. What's the clue?"
"Oh, it wasn't in the crossword," said Miss Marple vaguely. "It was in
my head."
Inspector Craddock looked at her very hard; Then he said good-by and
went.
Craddock had to wait a few minutes while Quimper finished his evening
surgery, and then the doctor came to him. He looked tired and depressed.
He offered Craddock a drink and when the latter accepted he mixed one
for himself as well.
"Poor devils," he said as he sank down in a worn easy chair. "So scared
and so stupid—no sense. Had
a painful case this evening. Woman who ought to have come to me a year
ago. If she'd come then, she might have been operated on successfully.
Now it's too late. Makes me mad. The truth is people are
an extraordinary mixture of heroism and cowardice. She's been suffering
agony and borne it without a word, just because she was too scared to
come and find out that what she feared might be true. At the other end
of the scale are the people who come and waste my time because they've
got a dangerous swelling causing them agony on their little finger
which they think may be cancer and which turns out
to be a common or garden chilblain! Well, don't mind me. I've blown off
steam now. What did you
want to see me about?"
"First, I've got you to thank, I believe, for advising Miss
Crackenthorpe to come to me with the letter
that purported to be from her brother's widow."
"Oh, that? Anything in it? I didn't exactly advise her to come. She
wanted to. She was worried. All the dear little brothers were trying to
hold her back, of course."
"Why should they?"
The doctor shrugged his shoulders.
"Afraid the lady might be proved genuine, I suppose."
"Do you think the letter was genuine?"
"No idea. Never actually saw it. I should say it was someone who knew
the facts, just trying to make
a touch. Hoping to work on Emma's feelings. They were dead wrong,
there. Emma's no fool. She wouldn't take an unknown sister-in-law to
her bosom without asking a few practical questions first."
He added with some curiosity, "But why ask my views? I've got nothing
to do with it."
"I really came to ask you something quite different, but I don't quite
know how to put it."
Doctor Quimper looked interested.
"I understand that not long ago—at Christmastime I think it was—Mr.
Crackenthorpe had rather a bad turn of illness."
He saw a change at once in the doctor's face. It hardened.
"Yes."
"I gather a gastric disturbance of some kind?"
"Yes."
"This is difficult. Mr. Crackenthorpe was boasting of his health,
saying he intended to outlive most of
his family. He referred to you—you'll excuse me, Doctor—"
"Oh, don't mind me. I'm not sensitive as to what my patients say about
me!"
"He spoke of you as an old fuss pot." Quimper smiled. "He said you had
asked him all sorts of
questions, not only as to what he had eaten, but as to who prepared it
and served it."
The doctor was not smiling now. His face was hard again.
"Go on."
"He used some such phrase as 'talked as though he believed someone had
poisoned me.' "
There was a pause.
"Had you any suspicion of that kind?"
Quimper did not answer at once. He got up and walked up and down.
Finally he wheeled round on Craddock.
"What the devil do you expect me to say? Do you think a doctor can go
about flinging accusations of poisoning here and there without any real
evidence?"
"I'd just like to know, off the record, if that idea did enter your
head?"
Doctor Quimper said evasively, "Old Crackenthorpe leads a fairly frugal
life. When the family comes down, Emma steps up the food. Result—a
nasty attack of gastroenteritis. The symptoms were consistent with that
diagnosis."
Craddock persisted.
"I see. You were quite satisfied? You were not at all—shall we
say—puzzled?"
"All right. All right. Yes, I was Yours Truly Puzzled! Does that please
you?"
"It interests me," said Craddock. "What actually did you suspect, or
fear?"
"Gastric cases vary, of course, but there were certain indications that
would have been, shall we say, more consistent with arsenical poisoning
than with plain gastroenteritis. Mind you, the two things are
very much alike. Better men than myself have failed to recognize
arsenical poisoning and have given a certificate in all good faith."
"And what was the result of your inquiries?"
"It seemed that what I suspected could not possibly be true. Mr.
Crackenthorpe assured me that he had had similar attacks before I
attended him, and from the same cause, he said. They had always taken
place when there was too much rich food about."
"Which was when the house was full? With the family? Or guests?"
"Yes. That seemed reasonable enough. But frankly, Craddock, I wasn't
happy. I went so far as to write to old Doctor Morris. He was my senior
partner and retired soon after I joined him. Crackenthorpe was his
patient originally. I asked about these earlier attacks that the old
man had had."
"And what response did you get?"
Quimper grinned.
"I got a flea in the ear. I was more or less told not to be a damned
fool. Well—" he shrugged his shoulders. "Presumably I was a damned
fool."
"I wonder." Craddock was thoughtful.
Then he decided to speak frankly.
"Throwing discretion aside, Doctor, there are people who stand to
benefit pretty considerably from
Luther Crackenthorpe's death." The doctor nodded. "He's an old man and
a hale and hearty one. He
may live to be ninety-odd?"
"Easily. He spends his life taking care of himself, and his
constitution is sound."
"And his sons and daughter are all getting on, and they are all feeling
the pinch?"
"You leave Emma out of it. She's no poisoner. These attacks only happen
when the others are there,
not when she and he are alone."
"An elementary precaution if she's the one," the Inspector thought, but
was careful not to say so aloud.
He paused, choosing his words carefully.
"Surely—I'm ignorant in these matters—but supposing just as a
hypothesis that arsenic was administered, hasn't Crackenthorpe been
very lucky not to succumb?"
"Now there," said the doctor, "you have got something odd. It is
exactly that fact that leads me to believe that I have been, as old
Morris puts it, a damned fool. You see, it's obviously not a case of
small doses
of arsenic administered regularly, which is what you might call the
classic method of arsenic poisoning. Crackenthorpe has never had any
chronic gastric trouble. In a way, that's what makes these sudden
violent attacks seem unlikely. So, assuming they are not due to natural
causes, it looks as though the poisoner is muffing it every time, which
hardly makes sense."
"Giving an inadequate dose, you mean?"
"Yes. On the other hand, Crackenthorpe's got a strong constitution and
what might do in another man doesn't do him in. There's always personal
idiosyncrasy to be reckoned with. But you'd think that by now, the
poisoner—unless he's unusually timid—would have stepped up the dose.
Why hasn't he?
"That is," he added, "if there is a poisoner which there probably
isn't! Probably all my ruddy imagination from start to finish."
"It's an odd problem," the Inspector agreed. "It doesn't seem to make
sense."
* * *
"Inspector Craddock!"
The eager whisper made the Inspector jump.
He had been just on the point of ringing the front-doorbell.
Alexander and his friend Stoddart-West emerged cautiously from the
shadows.
"We heard your car and we wanted to get hold of you."
"Well, let's come inside." Craddock's hand went out to the doorbell
again, but Alexander pulled at his
coat with the eagerness of a pawing dog.
"We've found a clue," he breathed.
"Yes, we've found a clue," Stoddart-West echoed.
"Damn that girl," thought Craddock unamiably. ' "Splendid," he said in
perfunctory manner. "Let's go inside the house and look at it."
"No." Alexander was insistent. "Someone's sure to interrupt. Come to
the harness room. We'll
guide you."
Somewhat unwillingly, Craddock allowed himself to be guided round the
corner of the house and along
to the stable yard. Stoddart-West pushed open a heavy door, stretched
up, and turned on a rather
feeble electric light. The harness room, once the acme of Victorian
spit and polish, was now the sad repository of everything that no one
wanted. "Broken garden chairs, rusted old garden implements, a
vast decrepit mowing machine, rusted spring mattresses, hammocks and
disintegrated tennis nets.
"We come here a good deal," said Alexander. "One can really be private
here."
There were certains tokens of occupancy about. The decayed mattresses
had been piled up to make
a kind of divan, there was an old rusted table on which reposed a large
tin of chocolate biscuits, there
was a hoard of apples, a tin of toffee and a jigsaw puzzle.
"It really is a clue, sir," said Stoddart-West eagerly, his eyes
gleaming behind his spectacles. "We found
it this afternoon."
"We've been hunting for days. In the bushes—"
"And inside hollow trees."
"And we went all through the ashbins."
"There were some jolly interesting things there, as a matter of fact."
"And then we went into the boiler house—"
"Old Hillman keeps a great galvanized tub there full of waste paper."
"For when the boiler goes out and he wants to start it again."
"Any odd paper that's blowing about. He picks it up and shoves it in
there."
"And that's where we found it."
"Found what?" Craddock
interrupted the duet.
"The clue. Careful, Stodders, get your gloves on." Importantly,
Stoddart-West, in the best detective-story tradition, drew a pair of
rather dirty gloves and took from his pocket a Kodak photographic
folder. From this he extracted in his gloved fingers with the utmost
care a soiled and crumpled envelope which he handed importantly to the
Inspector.
Both boys held their breath in excitement. Craddock took it with due
solemnity. He liked the boys
and he was ready to enter into the spirit of the thing.
The letter had been through the post; there was no enclosure inside, it
was just a torn envelope
addressed to Mrs. Martine Crackenthorpe, 126 Elvers Crescent, N. 10.
"You see?" said Alexander breathlessly. "It shows she was here—Uncle
Edmund's French wife,
I mean— the one there's all the fuss about. She must have actually been
here and dropped it
somewhere. So it looks, doesn't it?"
Stoddart-West broke in, "It looks as though she was the one who got
murdered—I mean, don't you
think, sir, that it simply must have been her in the sarcophagus?"
They waited anxiously.
Craddock played up. "Possible, very possible," he said.
"This is important, isn't it?"
"You'll test it for fingerprints, won't you, sir?"
"Of, course," said Craddock.
Stoddart-West gave a deep sigh.
"Smashing luck for us, wasn't it?" he said. "On our last day, too."
"Last day?"
"Yes," said Alexander. "I'm going to Stodders' place tomorrow for the
last "few days of the holidays. Stodders' people have got a smashing
house—Queen Anne, isn't it?"
"William and Mary," said Stoddart-West.
"I thought your mother said—"
"Mum's French. She doesn't really know about English architecture."
"But your father said it was built—"
Craddock was examining the envelope.
Clever of Lucy Eyelesbarrow. How had she managed to fake the postmark?
He peered closely, but
the light was too feeble. Great fun for the boys, of course, but rather
awkward for him. Lucy, drat
her, hadn't considered that angle. If this were genuine, it would
enforce a course of action. There—
Beside him a learned architectural argument was being hotly pursued. He
was deaf to it.
"Come on, boys," he said, "we'll go into the house. You've been very
helpful."
Craddock was escorted by the boys through the back door into the house.
This was, it seemed, their common mode of entrance. The kitchen was
bright and cheerful. Lucy, in a large, white apron, was rolling out
pastry. Leaning against the dresser, watching her with a kind of
doglike attention, was Byran Eastley. With one hand he tugged at his
large fair mustache.
"Hello, Dad," said Alexander kindly. "You out here again?"
"I like it out here," said Bryan, and added: "Miss Eyelesbarrow doesn't
mind."
"Oh, I don't mind," said Lucy. "Good evening, Inspector Craddock."
"Coming to detect in the kitchen?" asked Bryan with interest.
"Not exactly. Mr. Cedric Crackenthorpe is still here, isn't he?"
"Oh yes, Cedric's here. Do you want him?"
"I'd like a word with him, yes, please."
"I'll go and see if he's in," said Bryan. "He may have gone round to
the local pub."
He unpropped himself from the dresser.
"Thank you so much," said Lucy to him. "My hands are all over flour or
I'd go."
"What are you making?" asked Stoddart-West anxiously.
"Peach flan."
"Good oh," said Stoddart-West.
"Is it nearly suppertime?" asked Alexander.
"No."
"Gosh! I'm terribly hungry."
"There's the end of the ginger cake in the larder."
The boys made a concerted rush and collided in the door.
"They're just like locusts," said Lucy.
"My congratulations to you," said Craddock.
"What on, exactly?"
"Your ingenuity over this!"
"Over what?"
Craddock indicated the folder containing the letter.
"Very nicely done," he said.
"What are you talking about?"
"This, my dear girl, this." He half drew it out.
She stared at him uncomprehendingly.
Craddock felt suddenly dizzy.
"Didn't you fake this clue and put it in the boiler room for the boys
to find? Quick—tell me."
"I haven't the faintest idea what you're talking about," said Lucy. "Do
you mean that—"
Craddock slipped the folder quickly back in his pocket as Bryan
returned. ,
"Cedric's in the library," he said. "Go on in."
He resumed his place on the dresser. Inspector Craddock went to the
library.
* * *
Cedric Crackenthorpe seemed delighted to see the Inspector.
"Doing a spot more sleuthing down here?" he asked. "Got any farther?"
"I think I can say we are a little farther on, Mr. Crackenthorpe."
"Found out who the corpse was?"
"We've not got a definite identification, but we have a fairly shrewd
idea."
"Good for you."
"Arising out of our latest information, we want to get a few
statements. I'm starting with you,
Mr. Crackenthorpe, as you're on the spot."
"I shan't be much longer. I'm going back to Iviza in a day or two."
"Then I seem to be just in time."
"Go ahead."
"I should like a detailed account, please, of exactly where you were
and what you were doing on Friday, December the twentieth."
Cedric shot a quick glance at him. Then he leaned back, yawned, assumed
an air of great nonchalance, and appeared to be lost in the effort of
remembrance.
"Well, as I've already told you, I was in Iviza. Trouble is, one day
there is so like another. Painting in
the morning, siesta from three p.m. to five. Perhaps a spot of
sketching if the light's suitable. Then an aperitif, sometimes with the mayor,
sometimes with the doctor, at the cafe in the plaza. After that some
kind of a scratch meal. Most of the evening in Scotty's Bar with some
of my lower-class friends. Will
that do you?"
"I'd rather have the truth, Mr. Crackenthorpe." Cedric sat up.
"That's a most offensive remark, Inspector."
"Do you think so? You told me, Mr. Crackenthorpe, that you left Iviza
on December the twenty-first
and arrived in England that same day?"
"So I did. Em! Hi, Em!"
Emma Crackenthorpe came through the adjoining door from the small
morning room. She looked inquiringly from Cedric to the Inspector.
"Look here, Em. I arrived here for Christmas on the Saturday before,
didn't I? Came straight from the airport?"
"Yes," said Emma wonderingly. "You got here about lunchtime."
"There you are," said Cedric to the Inspector.
"You must think us very foolish, Mr. Crackenthorpe," said Craddock
pleasantly. "We can check on
these things, you know. I think, if you'll show me your passport—"
He paused expectantly.
"Can'f find the damned thing," said Cedric. "Was looking for it this
morning. Wanted to send it to
Cook's."
"I think you could find it, Mr. Crackenthorpe. But it's not actually
necessary. The records show that
you actually entered this country on the evening of December the
nineteenth. Perhaps yo,u will now account to me for your movements
between that time until lunchtime on December the twenty-first
when you arrived here."
Cedric looked very cross indeed.
"That's the hell of life nowadays," he said angrily. "All this red tape
and form filling. That's what comes
of a bureaucratic state. Can't go where you like and do as you please
any more! Somebody's always asking questions. What's all this fuss
about the twentieth, anyway? What's special about the twentieth?"
"It happens to be the day we believe the murder was committed. You can
refuse to answer, of course,
but—"
"Who says I refuse to answer? Give a chap time. And you were vague
enough about the date of the murder at the inquest. What's turned up
new since then?"
Craddock did not reply.
Cedric said, with a sidelong glance at Emma, "Shall we go into the
other room?"
Ernma said quickly: "I'll leave you." At the door, she paused and
turned.
"This is serious, you know, Cedric. If the twentieth was the day of the
murder, then you must tell Inspector Craddock exactly what' you were
doing."
She went through into the next room and closed the door behind her.
"Good old Em," said Cedric. "Well, here goes! Yes, I left Iviza on the
nineteenth all right. Planned to break the journey in Paris and spend a
couple of days routing up some old friends on the Left Bank.
But as a matter of fact, there was a very attractive woman on the
plane. Quite a dish. To put it plainly, she and I got off together. She
was on her way to the States, had to spend a couple of nights in London
to see about some business or other. We got to London on the
nineteenth. We stayed at the Kingsway Palace in case your spies haven't
found that out yet! Called myself John Brown—never does to use
your own name on these occasions."
"And on the twentieth?"
Cedric made a grimace.
"Morning pretty well occupied by a terrific hangover."
"And the afternoon. From three o'clock onward?"
"Let me see. Well, I mooned about, as you might say. Went into the
National Gallery—that's respectable enough, Saw a film. Rowenna of the Range. I've always
had a passion for Westerns. This was a corker. . . . Then a drink or
two in the bar and a bit of a sleep in my room, and out about ten
o'clock with the girl friend and a round of various hot spots. Can't
even remember most of their names—Jumping Frog was one, I think. She
knew 'em all. Got pretty well, plastered and, to tell you the truth,
don't remember much more till I woke up the next morning with an even
worse hangover. Girl friend hopped off to catch her plane and I poured
cold water over my head, got a chemist to give me a devil's brew, and
then started
off for this place, pretending I'd just arrived at
Heathrow. No need to upset Emma, I thought. You know what women are,
always hurt if you don't come straight home. I had to borrow money from
her to pay the taxi. I was completely cleaned out. No use asking the
old man. He'd never cough up. Mean old brute. Well, Inspector,
satisfied?"
"Can any of this be substantiated, Mr. Crackenthorpe? Say, between
three p.m. and seven p.m."
"Most unlikely, I should think," said Cedric cheerfully. "National
Gallery where the attendants look at
you with lackluster eyes and a crowded picture house. No, not likely."
Emma re-entered. She held a small engagement book in her hand.
"You want to know what everyone was doing on December the twentieth, is
that right, Inspector Craddock?"
"Well—er—yes, Miss Crackenthorpe."
"I have just been looking in my engagement book. On the twentieth I
went into Brackhampton to attend
a meeting of the Church Restoration Fund. That finished about a quarter
to one and I lunched with Lady Adington and Miss Bartlett, who was also
on the committee, at the Cadena Cafe. After lunch I did some shopping,
stores for Christmas and also Christmas presents. I went to Greenfold's
and Lyall and Swift's, Boot's, and probably several other shops. I had
tea about a quarter to five in the Shamrock Tea Rooms and then went to
the station to meet Bryan who was coming by train. I got home about six
o'clock and found my father in a very bad temper. I had left lunch
ready for him, but Mrs. Hart who was to come
in in the afternoon and give him his tea had not arrived. He was so
angry that he had shut himself in his room and would not let me in or
speak to me. He does not like my going out in the afternoon, but I
make
a point of doing so now and then."
"You're probably wise. Thank you, Miss Crackenthorpe."
He could hardly tell her that as she was a woman, height five-foot
seven, her movements that afternoon were of no great importance.
Instead he said: "Your other two brothers came down later, I
understand?"
"Alfred came down late on Saturday evening. He tells me he tried to
ring me on the telephone the afternoon I was out, but my father, if he
is upset, will never answer the telephone. My brother Harold
did not come down until Christmas Eve."
"Thank you, Miss Crackenthorpe."
"I suppose I mustn't ask"—she hesitated—"what has come up new that
prompts these inquiries?"
Craddock took the folder from his pocket. Using the tips of his
fingers, he extracted the envelope.
"Don't touch it, please, but do you recognize this?"
"But—" Emma stared at him, bewildered. "That's my handwriting. That's
the letter I wrote to Martine."
"I thought it might be."
"But how did you get it? Did she—? Have you found her—?"
"It would seem possible that we have—found her. This empty envelope was
found here."
"In the house?"
"In the grounds."
"Then, she did come here! She— You mean, it was Martine, there in the
sarcophagus?"
"It would seem very likely, Miss Crackenthorpe," said Craddock gently.
It seemed even more likely when he got back to town. A message was
awaiting him from Armand Dessin.
"One
of the girl friends has had a postcard from Anna Stravinska. Apparently
the cruise story
was true! She has reached
Jamaica and is having, in your phrase, a wonderful time!"
Craddock crumpled up the message and threw it into the wastepaper
basket.
* * *
"I must say," said Alexander, sitting up in bed, thoughtfully consuming
a chocolate bar, "that this has
been the most smashing day ever. Actually finding a real clue!"
His voice was awed.
"In fact the whole holidays have been smashing,"
he added happily. "I don't suppose such a thing will ever happen again."
"I hope it won't happen again to me," said Lucy who was on her knees
packing Alexander's clothes
into a suitcase. "Do you want all this space fiction with you?"
"Not those two top ones. I've read them. The football and my football
boots and the gum boots can go separately."
"What difficult things you boys do travel with."
"It won't matter.
They're sending the Rolls for us. They've got a smashing Rolls. They've
got one of the new Mercedes Benz, too."
"They must be rich."
"Rolling! Jolly nice, too. All the same, I rather wish we weren't
leaving here. Another body might turn up."
"I sincerely hope not."
"Well, it often does in books. I mean somebody who's seen something or
heard something gets done in, too. It might be you," he added,
unrolling a second chocolate bar. "Thank you!"
"I don't want it to be you," Alexander assured her. "I like you very
much and so does Stodders. We
think you're out of this world as a cook. Absolutely lovely grub.
You're very sensible, too."
This last was clearly an expression of high approval. Lucy took it as
such and said: "Thank you. But I don't intend to get killed just to
please you."
"Well, you'd better be careful, then," Alexander told her.
He paused to consume more nourishment and then said in a slightly
offhand voice,
"If Dad turns up from time to time, you'll look after him, won't you?"
"Yes, of course," said Lucy, a little surprised.
"The trouble with Dad is," Alexander informed her, "that London life
doesn't suit him. He gets in, you know, with quite the wrong type of
women." He shook his head in a worried manner.
"I'm very fond of him," he added, "but he needs someone to look after
him. He drifts about and gets in with the wrong people. It's a great
pity Mum died when she did. Bryan needs a proper home life."
He looked solemnly at Lucy and reached out for another chocolate bar.
"Not a fourth one, Alexander," Lucy pleaded. "You'll be sick."
"Oh, I don't think so. I ate six running once and I wasn't. I'm not the
bilious type." He paused and then said, "Bryan likes you, you know."
"That's very nice of him."
"He's a bit of an ass in some ways," said Bryan's son, "but he was a
jolly good fighter pilot. He's awfully brave. And he's awfully
good-natured."
He paused. Then, averting his eyes to the ceiling, he said rather
self-consciously:
"I think really, you know, it would be a good thing if he married
again. Somebody decent. I shouldn't, myself, mind at all having a
stepmother—not, I mean, if she was a decent sort. . . ."
With a sense of shock Lucy realized that there was a definite point in
Alexander's conversation.
"All this stepmother bosh," went on Alexander, still addressing the
ceiling, "is really quite out of date.
Lots of chaps Stodders and I know have stepmothers—divorce and all
that—and they get on quite well together. Depends on the stepmother, of
course. And, of course, it does make a bit of confusion taking you out
and on Sports Day and all that—I mean if there are two sets of parents,
though again it helps if you want to cash in!" He paused, confronted
with the problems of modern life. "It's nicest to have your own home
and your own parents, but if your mother's dead—well, you see what I
mean? If she's a decent sort," said Alexander for the third time.
Lucy felt touched.
"I think you're very sensible, Alexander," she said. "We must try and
find a nice wife for your father."
"Yes," said Alexander noncommittally.
He added in an offhand manner, "I thought I'd just mention it. Bryan
likes you very much. He told me so."
"Really," thought Lucy to herself. "There's too much matchmaking round
here. First Miss Marple and now Alexander!"
For some reason or other, pigsties came into her mind. . . .
She stood up.
"Good night, Alexander. There will be only your washing things and
pajamas to put in in the morning. Good night."
"Good night," said Alexander. He slid down in bed, laid his head on the
pillow, closed his eyes, giving a perfect picture of a sleeping angel,
and was immediately asleep.
"Not what you'd call conclusive," said Sergeant Wetherall with his
usual gloom.
Craddock was reading through the report on Harold Crackenthorpe's alibi
for December 20th.
He had been noticed at Sotheby's about 3:30, but was thought to have
left shortly after that. His photograph had not been recognized at
Russell's teashop, but as they did a busy trade there at teatime
and he was not a habitue, that was hardly surprising. His manservant
confirmed that he had returned to Cardigan Gardens to dress for his
dinner party at a quarter to seven—rather late, since the dinner was
at 7:30, and Mr. Crackenthorpe had been somewhat irritable in
consequence. Did not remember hearing him come in that evening, but as
it was some time ago could not remember accurately and, in any case, he
frequently did not hear Mr. Crackenthorpe come in. He and his wife
liked to retire early whenever they could. The garage in the mews where
Harold kept his car was a private lockup that he rented and there was
no one to notice who came or went or any reason to remember one evening
in particular.
"All negative," said Craddock, with a sigh.
"He was at the Caterers' dinner all night, but left rather early before
the end of the speeches."
"What about the railway stations?"
But there was nothing there, either at Brackhampton or at Paddington.
It was nearly four weeks ago,
and it was highly unlikely that anything would have been remembered.
Craddock sighed and stretched out his hand for the data on Cedric. That
again was negative, though a
taxi driver had made a doubtful recognition of having taken a fare to
Paddington that day some time in
the afternoon "what looked something like that bloke. Dirty trousers
and a shock of hair. Cussed and swore a bit because fares had gone up
since he was last in England." He identified the day because a horse
called Crawler had won the 2:30 and he'd had a tidy bit on. Just after
dropping the gent, he'd
heard it on the radio in his cab and had gone home forthwith to
celebrate.
"Thank God for racing," said Craddock, and put the report aside.
"And here's Alfred," said Sergeant Wetherall.
Some nuance in his voice made Craddock look up sharply. Wetherall had
the pleased appearance of a man who has kept a tidbit until the end.
In the main the check was unsatisfactory. Alfred lived alone in his
flat and came and went at unspecified times. His neighbors were not the
inquisitive kind and were in any case office workers who were out all
day. But toward the end of the report, Wetherall's large finger
indicated the final paragraph.
Sergeant Leakie, assigned to a case of thefts from lorries, had been at
the Load of Bricks, a lorry pullup on the Waddington-Brackhampton Road,
keeping certain lorry drivers under observation. He had
noticed, at an adjoining table, Chick Evans, one of the Dicky Rogers
mob. With him had been Alfred Crackenthorpe whom he knew by sight,
having seen him give evidence in the Dicky Rogers case. He'd wondered
what they were cooking up together. Time: 9:30 P.M., Friday, December
20th. Alfred Crackenthorpe had boarded a bus a few minutes later, going
in the direction of Brackhampton. William Baker, ticket collector at
Brackhampton Station, had clipped ticket of gentleman whom he
recognized
by sight as one of Miss Crackenthorpe's brothers, just before departure
of 11:55 train for Paddington. Remembers day as there had been story of
some batty old lady who swore she had seen somebody murdered in a train
that afternoon.
"Alfred?" said Craddock as he laid the report down. "Alfred? I wonder."
"Puts him right on the spot, there," Wetherall pointed out.
Craddock nodded. Yes, Alfred could have traveled down by the 4:33 to
Brackhampton, committing murder on the way. Then he could have gone out
by bus to the Load of Bricks. He could have left there at 9:30 and
would have had plenty of time to go to Rutherford Hall, move the body
from the embankment to the sarcophagus and get into Brackhampton in
time to catch the 11:55 back to London. One of the Dicky Rogers gang
might have helped him move the body, though Craddock doubted this.
An unpleasant lot, but not killers.
"Alfred?" he repeated speculatively.
* * *
At Rutherford Hall there had been a gathering of the Crackenthorpe
family. Harold and Alfred had come down from London and very soon
voices were raised and tempers were running high.
On her own initiative, Lucy mixed cocktails in a jug with ice and took
them toward the library. The
voices sounded clearly in the hall, and indicated that a good deal of
acrimony was being directed toward Emma.
"Entirely your,fault, Emma." Harold's deep-bass voice rang out angrily.
"How could be so shortsighted and foolish beats me. If you hadn't taken
that letter to Scotland Yard and started all this—"
Alfred's higher-pitched voice said: "You must have been out of your
senses!"
'"Now don't bully her," said Cedric. "What's done is done. Much more
fishy if they'd identified the woman as the missing Martine and we'd
all kept mum about having heard from her."
"It's all very well for you, Cedric," said Harold angrily. "You were
out of the country on the twentieth which seems to be the day they are
inquiring about. But it's very embarrassing for Alfred and myself.
Fortunately I can remember where I was that afternoon and what I was
doing."
"I bet you can," said Alfred. "If you'd arranged a murder, Harold,
you'd arrange your alibi very
carefully, I'm sure."
"I gather you are not so fortunate," said Harold coldly.
"That depends," said Alfred. "Anything's better than presenting a
cast-iron alibi to the police if it isn't really cast iron. They're so
clever at breaking these things down."
"If you are insinuating that I killed the woman—"
"Oh, do stop, all of you," cried Emma. "Of course none of you killed
the woman."
"And just for your information, I wasn't out of England on the
twentieth," said Cedric. "And the police
are wise to it! So we're all under suspicion."
"If it hadn't been for Emma—"
"Oh, don't begin again, Harold," cried Emma.
Doctor Quimper came out of the study where he had been closeted with
old Mr. Crackenthorpe. His
eye fell on the jug in Lucy's hand.
"What's this? A celebration?"
"More in the nature of oil on troubled waters. They're at it hammer and
tongs in there."
"Recriminations?"
"Mostly abusing Emma."
Doctor Quimper's eyebrows rose.
"Indeed?" He took the jug from Lucy's hand, opened the library door and
went in.
"Good evening."
"Ah, Doctor Quimper, I should like a word with you." It was Harold's
voice, raised and irritable. "I
should like to know what you meant by interfering in a private family
matter, and telling my sister to
go to Scotland Yard about it."
Doctor Quimper said calmly, "Miss Crackenthorpe asked my advice. I gave
it to her. In my opinion she did perfectly right."
"You dare to say—"
"Girl!"
It was old Mr. Crackenthorpe's familiar salutation. He was peering out
of the study door just behind Lucy.
Lucy turned rather reluctantly.
"Yes, Mr. Crackenthorpe?"
"What are you giving us for dinner tonight? I want curry. You make a
very good curry. It's ages since we've had curry."
"The boys don't care much for curry, you see."
"The boys, the boys—what do the boys matter? I'm the one who matters.
And anyhow, the boys have gone—good riddance. I want nice hot curry, do
you hear?"
"All right, Mr. Crackenthorpe, you shall have it."
"That's right. You're a good girl, Lucy. You look after me, and I'll
look after you."
Lucy went back to the kitchen. Abandoning the fricassee of chicken
which she had planned, she began
to assemble the preparations for curry. The front doer banged and from
the window she saw Doctor Quimper stride angrily from the house to his
car and drive away.
Lucy sighed. She missed the boys. And in a way she missed Bryan, too.
Oh well! She sat down and began to peel mushrooms.
At any rate she'd give the family a rattling good dinner.
Feed the brutes!
* * *
It was 3:00 a.m. when Doctor Quimper drove his car into the garage,
closed the doors and came in
pulling the front door behind him rather wearily. Well, Mrs. Josh
Simpkins had a fine, healthy pair of twins to add to her present family
of eight. Mr. Simpkins had expressed no elation over the arrival.
"Twins," he had said gloomily. "What's the good of them? Quads now,
they're good for something. All sorts of things you get sent, and the
press comes round and there's pictures in the paper, and they do
say as Her Majesty sends you a telegram. But what's twins except two
mouths to feed instead of one? Never been twins in our family, nor in
the missus's either. Don't seem fair, somehow."
Doctor Quimper walked upstairs to his bedroom and started throwing off
his clothes. He glanced at his watch. Five minutes past three. It had
proved an unexpectedly tricky business bringing those twins into the
world, but all had gone well. He yawned. He was tired, very tired. He
looked appreciatively at his bed.
Then the telephone rang.
Doctor Quimper swore and picked up the receiver.
"Doctor Quimper?"
"Speaking."
"This is Lucy Eyelesbarrow from Rutherford Hall. I think you'd better
come over. Everybody seems
to have been taken ill."
"Taken ill? How? What symptoms?"
Lucy detailed them.
"I'll be over straightaway. In the meantime—" He gave her short, sharp
instructions.
Then he quickly resumed his clothes, flung a few extra things into his
emergency bag, and hurried
down to his car.
* * *
It was some three hours later when the doctor and Lucy, both of them
somewhat exhausted, sat down
by the kitchen table to drink large cups
of black coffee.
"Ha." Doctor Quimper drained his cup, set it down with a clatter on the
saucer. "I needed that. Now, Miss Eyelesbarrow, let's get down to brass
tacks."
Lucy looked at him. The lines of fatigue showed clearly on his face,
making him look older than his forty-four years; the dark hair on his
temples was flecked with gray; and there were lines under his eyes.
"As far as I can judge," said the doctor, "they'll be all right now.
But how come? That's what I want to know. Who cooked the dinner?"
"I did," said Lucy.
"And what was it? In detail."
"Mushroom soup. Curried chicken and rice. Sillabubs. A savory of
chicken livers in bacon."
"Canapes Diane," said Doctor
Quimper unexpectedly.
Lucy smiled faintly.
"Yes, Canapes Diane."
"All right, let's go through it. Mushroom soup, out of a tin, I
suppose?"
"Certainly not. I made it."
"You made it. Out of what?"
"Half a pound of mushrooms, chicken stock, milk, a mux of butter and
flour, and lemon juice."
"Ah. And one's supposed to say 'It must have been the mushrooms.' "
"It wasn't the mushrooms. I had some of the soup myself and I'm quite
all right."
"Yes, you're quite all right. I hadn't forgotten that."
Lucy flushed.
"If you mean—"
"I don't mean. You're a highly intelligent girl. You'd be groaning
upstairs, too, if I'd meant what you thought I meant. Anyway, I know
all about you. I've taken the trouble to find out."
"Why on earth did you do that?"
Doctor Quimper's lips were set in a grim line.
"Because I'm making it my business to find out about the people who
come here and settle themselves
in. You're a bona fide young woman who does this particular job for a
livelihood, and you seem never
to have had any contact with the Crackenthorpe family previous to
coming here. So you're not a girl friend of either Cedric, Harold or
Alfred, helping them to do a bit of dirty work."
"Do you really think?"
"I think quite a lot of things," said Quimper. "But I have to be
careful. That's the worst of being a doctor. Now, let's get on. Curried
chicken. Did you have some of that?"
"No. When you've cooked a curry, you've dined off the smell, I find, I
tasted it, of course. I had soup and some sillabub."
"How did you serve the sillabub?"
"In individual glasses."
"Now then, how much of all this is cleared up?"
"If you mean washing up, everything was washed up and put away."
Doctor Quimper groaned.
"There's such a thing as being overzealous," he said.
"Yes, I can see that as things have turned out, but there it is, I'm
afraid."
"What do you have still?"
"There's some of the curry left in a bowl in 'the larder. I was
planning to use it as a basis for mulligatawny soup this evening.
There's some mushroom soup left, too. No sillabub and none of the
savory."
"I'll take the curry and the soup. What about chutney? Did they have
chutney with it?"
"Yes. In one of those stone jars."
"I'll have some of that, too."
He rose. "I'll go up and have a look at them again. After that, can you
hold the fort until morning? Keep an eye on them all? I can have a
nurse round, with full instructions, by eight o'clock."
"I wish you'd tell me straight out. Do you think it's food
poisoning—or—or, well, poisoning."
"I've told you already. Doctors can't think, they have to be sure. If
there's a positive result from these food specimens I can go ahead.
Otherwise—"
"Otherwise?" Lucy repeated.
Doctor Quimper laid a hand on her shoulder.
"Look after two people in particular," he said. "Look after Emma. I'm
not going to have anything happen to Emma . . ."
There was emotion in his voice that could not be disguised. "She's not
even begun to live yet," he said. "And you know, people like Emma
Crackenthorpe are the salt of the earth. Emma—well, Emma means
a lot to me. I've never told her so but I shall. Look after Emma."
"You bet I will," said Lucy.
"And look after the old man. I can't say that he's ever been my
favorite patient but he is my patient and I'm damned if I'm going to
let him be hustled out of the world because one or other of his
unpleasant
sons —or all three of them, maybe—want him out of the way so that they
can handle his money."
He threw her a sudden, quizzical glance.
"There," he said. "I've opened my mouth too wide. But keep your eyes
skinned, there's a good girl and, incidentally, keep your mouth shut."
* * *
Inspector Bacon was looking upset.
"Arsenic?" he said. "Arsenic?"
"Yes. It was in the curry. Here's the rest of the curry, for your
fellow to have a go at. I've only done a very rough test on a little of
it, but the result was quite definite."
"So there's a poisoner at work?"
"It would seem so," said Doctor Quimper dryly.
"And they're all affected, you say, except that Miss Eyelesbarrow."
"Except Miss Eyelesbarrow."
"Looks a bit fishy for her."
"What motive could she possibly have?"
"Might be barmy," suggested Bacon. "Seem all right, they do, sometimes,
and yet all the time they're
right off their rocker, so to speak."
"Miss Eyelesbarrow isn't off her rocker. Speaking as a medical man,
Miss Eyelesbarrow is as sane as
you or I. If Miss Eyelesbarrow is feeding the family arsenic in their
curry, she's doing it for a reason. Moreover, being a highly
intelligent young woman, she'd be careful not to be the only one
unaffected. What she'd do, what arly intelligent poisoner would do,
would be to eat a very little of the poisoned
curry, and then exaggerate the symptoms."
"And then you wouldn't be able to tell?"
"That she'd had less than the others? Probably not. People don't all
react alike to poisons anyway; the same amount will upset some people
more than others. Of course," added Doctor Quimper cheerfully, "once
the patient's dead, you can estimate fairly closely how much was taken."
"Then it might be—" Inspector Bacon paused to consolidate his ideas.
"It might be that there's one of
the family now who's making more fuss than he need, someone who you
might say is mucking in with
the rest so as to avoid arousing suspicion? How's that?"
"The idea has already occurred to me. That's why I'm reporting to you.
It's in your hands now. I've
got a nurse on the job that I can trust, but she can't be everywhere at
once. In my opinion, nobody's
had enough to cause death."
"Made a mistake, the poisoner did?"
"No. It seems to me more likely that the idea was to put enough in the
curry to cause signs of food poisoning, for which probably the
mushrooms would be blamed. People are always obsessed with the idea of
mushroom poisoning. Then one person would probably take a turn for the
worse and die."
"Because he'd been given a second dose?"
The doctor nodded.
"That's why I'm reporting to you at once, and why I've put a special
nurse on the job."
"She knows about the arsenic?"
"Of course. She knows and so does Miss Eyelesbarrow. You know your own
job best, of course, but
if I were you, I'd get out there and make it quite clear to them all
that they're suffering from arsenic poisoning. That will probably put
the fear of the Lord into our murderer and he won't dare to carry out
his plan. He's probably been banking on the food-poisoning theory."
The telephone rang on the Inspector's desk. He picked it up and said:
"O.K. Put her through." He said to Quimper, "It's your' nurse on the
phone. Yes, hullo—speaking . . . what's that? Serious relapse . . . Yes
. . . Doctor Quim-per's with me now ... If you'd like a word with him—"
He handed the receiver to the doctor.
"Quimper speaking ... I see . . . Yes . . . Quite right . . . Yes,
carry on with that. We'll be along."
He put the receiver down and turned to Bacon.
"Who is it?"
"It's Alfred," said Doctor Quimper. "And he's dead."
Over the telephone, Craddock's voice came in sharp disbelief.
"Alfred?" he said. "Alfred?"
Inspector Bacon, shifting the telephone receiver a little, said: "You
didn't expect that?"
"No, indeed. As a matter of fact, I'd just got him taped for the
murderer!"
"I heard about him being spotted by the ticket collector. Looked bad
for him all right. Yes, looked as though we'd got our man."
"Well," said Craddock flatly, "we were wrong."
There was a moment's silence. Then Craddock asked:
"There was a nurse in charge. How did she come to slip up?"
"Can't blame her. Miss Eyelesbarrow was all in and went to get a bit of
sleep. The nurse had got five patients on her hands: the old man, Emma,
Cedric, Harold and Alfred. She couldn't be everywhere at once. It seems
old Mr. Crackenthorpe started creating in a big way. Said he was dying.
She went in,
got him soothed down, came back again and took Alfred in some tea with
glucose. He drank it and
that was that."
"Arsenic again?"
"Seems so. Of course it could have been a relapse, but Quimper doesn't
think so and Johnson agrees."
"I suppose," said Craddock, doubtfully, "that Alfred was meant to be
the victim?"
Bacon sounded interested. "You mean that whereas Alfred's death
wouldn't do anyone a penn'orth of good, the old man's death would
benefit the lot of them? I suppose it might
have been a mistake; somebody might have thought the tea was
intended for the old man."
"Are they sure that's the way the stuff was administered?"
"No, of course they aren't sure. The nurse, like a good nurse, washed
up the whole contraption. Cups, spoons, teapot—everything. But it seems
the only feasible method."
"Meaning?" said Craddock thoughtfully, "that one of the patients wasn't
as ill as the others. Saw his chance and doped the cup."
"Well, there won't be any more funny business," said Inspector Bacon
grimly. "We've got two nurses
on the job now, to say nothing of Miss Eyelesbarrow, and I've got a
couple of men there, too. You coming down?"
"As far as I can make it!"
* * *
Lucy Eyelesbarrow came across the hall to meet Inspector Craddock. She
looked pale and drawn.
"You've been having a bad time of it," said Craddock.
"It's been like one long ghastly nightmare," said Lucy. "I really
thought last night that they were all dying."
"About this curry—"
"It was the curry?"
"Yes, very nicely laced with arsenic. Quite the Borgia touch."
If that's true," said Lucy. "It must—it's got to be—one of the family."
"No other possibility?"
"No, you see I only started making that damned curry quite late, after
six o'clock, because Mr. Cracken-thorpe specially asked for curry. And
I had to open a new tin of curry powder, so that couldn't have been
tampered with. I suppose curry would disguise the taste?"
"Arsenic hasn't any taste," said Craddock absently. "Now—opportunity.
Which of them had the chance
to tamper with the curry while it was cooking?"
Lucy considered.
"Actually," she said, "anyone could have sneaked into the kitchen while
I was laying the table in the
dining room."
"I see. Now who was there in the house? Old Mr. Crackenthorpe, Emma,
Cedric—"
"Harold and Alfred. They'd come down from London in the afternoon. Oh,
and Bryan, Bryan Eastley. But he left just before dinner. He had to
meet a man in Brackhampton."
Craddock said thoughtfully, "It ties up with the old man's illness at
Christmas. Quimper suspected that that was arsenic. Did they all seem
equally ill last night?"
Lucy considered. "I think old Mr. Crackenthorpe seemed the worst.
Doctor Quimper had to work like a maniac on him. He's a jolly good
doctor, I will say. Cedric made far the most fuss. Of course, strong,
healthy people always do."
"What about Emma?"
"She has been pretty bad."
"Why Alfred I wonder?" said Craddock.
"I know," said Lucy. "I suppose it was meant to be Alfred?"
"Funny, I asked that too!"
"It seems, somehow, so pointless."
"If I could only get at the motive for all this business," said
Craddock. "It doesn't seem to tie up. The strangled woman in the
sarcophagus was Edmund Crackenthorpe's widow, Martine. Let's assume
that. It's pretty well proved by now. There must be a connection
between that and the deliberate poisoning
of Alfred. It's all here, in
the family somewhere. Even saying one of them's mad doesn't help."
"Not
really," Lucy agreed.
"Well, look after yourself," said Craddock warmingly. "There's a
poisoner in this house, remember, and one of. your patients upstairs
probably isn't as ill as he pretends to be."
Lucy went upstairs again slowly after Craddock's departure. An
imperious voice, somewhat weakened
by illness, called to her as she passed old Mr. Crackenthorpe's room.
"Girl, girl, is that you? Come here."
Lucy entered the room. Mr. Crackenthorpe was lying in bed well propped
up with pillows. For a sick
man he was looking, Lucy thought, remarkably cheerful.
"The house is full of damned hospital nurses," complained Mr.
Crackenthorpe. "Rustling about, making themselves important, taking my
temperature, not giving me what I want to eat—a pretty penny all that
must be costing. Tell Emma to send 'em away. You could look after me
quite well."
"Everybody's been taken ill, Mr. Crackenthorpe," said Lucy. "I can't
look after everybody, you know."
"Mushrooms," said Mr. Crackenthorpe. "Damned dangerous things,
mushrooms. It was that soup we
had last night. You made it," he added accusingly.
"The mushrooms were quite all right, Mr. Crackenthorpe."
"I'm not blaming you, girl, I'm not blaming you. It's happened before.
One blasted fungus slips in and does it. Nobody can tell. I know you're
a good girl. You wouldn't do it on purpose. How's Emma?"
"Feeling rather better this afternoon."
"Ah. And Harold?"
"He's better too."
"What's this about Alfred having kicked the bucket?"
"Nobody's supposed to have told you that, Mr. Crackenthorpe."
Mr. Crackenthorpe laughed, a high, whinnying laugh of intense
amusement. "I hear things," he said. "Can't keep things from the old
man. They try to. So Alfred's dead, is he? He won't sponge on me any
more, and he won't get any of the money either. They've all been
waiting for me to die, you know;
Alfred in particular. Now he's dead. I call that rather a good joke."
"That's not very kind of you, Mr. Crackenthorpe," said Lucy severely.
Mr. Crackenthorpe laughed again. "I'll outlive them all," he crowed.
"You see if I don't, my girl. You
see if I don't."
Lucy went to her room, took out her dictionary and looked up the word tontine. She closed the book
thoughtfully and stared ahead of her.
* * *
"Don't see why you want to come to me," said Doctor Morris, irritably.
"You've known the Crackenthorpe family a long time," said Inspector
Craddock.
"Yes, yes, I knew all the Crackenthorpes. I remember old Josiah
Crackenthorpe. He was a hard nut—shrewd man, though. Made a lot of
money." He shifted his aged form in his chair and peered under bushy
eyebrows at Inspector Craddock. "So you've been listening to that young
fool, Quimper," he said. "These zealous young doctors! Always getting
ideas in their heads. Got it into his head that somebody was trying to
poison Luther Crackenthorpe. Nonsense! Melodrama! Of course, he had
gastric attacks.
I treated him for them. Didn't happen very often,
nothing peculiar about them."
"Doctor Quimper," said Craddock, "seemed to think there was."
"Doesn't do for a doctor to go thinking. After all, I should hope I
could recognize arsenical poisoning when I saw it."
"Quite a lot of well-known doctors haven't noticed it," Craddock
pointed out. "There was"—he drew upon his memory—"the Greenbarrow
case, Mrs. Reney, Charles Leeds, three people in the Westbury family,
all buried nicely and tidily without the doctors who attended them
having the least suspicion. Those doctors were all good, reputable men."
"All right, all right," said Doctor Morris, "you're saying that I could
have made a mistake. Well, I don't think I did." He paused a minute and
then said, "Who did Quimper think was doing it, if it was being done?"
"He didn't know," said Craddock. "He was worried. After all, you know,"
he added, "there's a great
deal of money there."
"Yes, yes, I know, which they'll get when Luther Crackenthorpe dies.
And they want it pretty badly.
That is true enough, but it doesn't follow that they'd kill the old man
to get it."
"Not necessarily," agreed Inspector Craddock.
"Anyway," said Doctor Morris, "my principle is not to go about
suspecting things without due cause.
Due cause," he repeated. "I'll admit that what you've just told me has
shaken me up a bit. Arsenic on
a big scale, apparently, but I still don't see why you come to me. All
I can tell you is that I didn't suspect it. Maybe I should have. Maybe
I should have taken those gastric attacks of Luther Crackenthorpe's
much more seriously. But you've got a long way beyond that now."
Craddock agreed. "What I really need," he said, "is to know a little
more about the Crackenthorpe family. Is there any queer mental strain
in them, a kink of any kind?"
The eyes under the bushy eyebrows looked at him sharply. "Yes, I can
see your thoughts might run that way. Well, old Josiah was sane enough.
Hard as nails, very much all there. His wife was neurotic, had a
tendency to melancholia. Came of an inbred family. She died soon after
Luther was born. I'd say, you know, that Luther inherited a
certain—well—instability from her. He was commonplace enough as a young
man, but he was always at loggerheads with his father. His father was
disappointed in him and I think he resented that and brooded on it, and
in the end got a kind of obsession about it. He carried that on into
his own married life. You'll notice, if you talk to him at all, that
he's got a hearty dislike for all his own sons. His daughters he was
fond of. Both Emma and Edie, the one who died."
"Why does he dislike the sons so much?" asked Craddock.
"You'll have to go to one of these new-fashioned psychiatrists to find
that out. I'd just say that Luther
has never felt very adequate as a man himself, and that he bitterly
resents his financial position. He has possession of an income but no
power of appointment of capital. If he had the power to disinherit his
sons he probably wouldn't dislike them as much. Being powerless in that
respect gives him a feeling of humiliation."
"That's why he's so pleased at the idea of outliving them all?" said
Inspector Craddock.
"Possibly. It is the root, too, of his parsimony, I think. I should say
that he's managed to save a considerable sum out of his large income,
mostly, of course, before taxation rose to its present giddy heights."
A new idea struck Inspector Craddock. "I suppose he's left his savings
by will to someone? That he can do."
"Oh, yes, though God knows who he has left it to. Maybe to Emma, but I
should rather doubt it. She'll get her share of the old man's money.
Maybe to Alexander, the grandson."
"He's fond of him, is he?" said Craddock.
"Used to be. Of course he was his daughter's child, not a son's child.
That may have made a difference. And he had quite an affection for
Bryan Eastley, Edie's husband. Of course I don't know Bryan well; it's
some years since I've seen any of the family. But it struck me that he
was going to be very much at a loose end after the war. He's got those
qualities that you need in wartime: courage, dash and a tendency to let
the future take care of itself. But I don't think he's got any
stability. He'll probably turn into a drifter."
"As far as you know there's no peculiar kink in any of the younger
generation?"
"Cedric's an eccentric type, one of those natural rebels. I wouldn't
say he was perfectly normal, but you might say, who is? Harold's fairly
orthodox, not what I call a very pleasant character, coldhearted, eye
to the main chance. Alfred's got a touch of the delinquent about him.
He's a wrong 'un, always was. Saw him taking money out of a missionary
box once that they used to keep in the hall. That type of thing.
Ah well, the poor fellow's dead, I suppose I shouldn't be talking
against him."
"What about—" Craddock hesitated. "Emma Crackenthorpe?"
"Nice girl, quiet, one doesn't always know what she's thinking. Has her
own plans and her own ideas
but she keeps them to herself. She's more character than you might
think from her general manner and appearance."
"You knew Edmund, I suppose, the son who was killed in France?"
"Yes. He was the best of the bunch, I'd say. Good-hearted, gay, a nice
boy."
"Did you ever hear that he was going to marry or had married a French
girl just before he was killed?"
Doctor Morris frowned. "It seems as though I remember something about
it," he said, "but it's a long
time ago."
"Quite early on in the war, wasn't it?"
"Yes. Ah well, I daresay he'd have lived to regret it if he had married
a foreign wife."
"There's some reason to believe that he did do just that," said
Craddock.
In a few brief sentences he gave an account of recent happenings.
"I remember seeing something in the papers about a woman found in a
sarcophagus. So it was at Rutherford Hall."
"And there's reason to believe that the woman was Edmund
Crackenthorpe's widow."
"Well, well, that seems extraordinary. More like a novel than real
life. But who'd want to kill the poor thing—I mean, how does it tie up
with arsenical poisoning in the Crackenthorpe family?"
"In one of two ways," said Craddock, "but they are both very
farfetched. Somebody perhaps is greedy and wants the whole of Josiah
Crackenthorpe's fortune."
"Damn fool if he does," said Doctor Morris. "He'll only have to pay the
most stupendous taxes on the income from it."
"Nasty things, mushrooms," said Mrs. Kidder.
Mrs. Kidder had made the same remark about ten times in the last few
days. Lucy did not reply.
"Never touch 'em myself," said Mrs. Kidder, "much too dangerous. It's a
merciful Providence as there's only been one death. The whole lot might
have gone and you too, Miss. A wonderful escape you've had."
"It wasn't the mushrooms," said Lucy. "They were perfectly all right."
"Don't you believe it," said Mrs. Kidder. "Dangerous they are,
mushrooms. One toadstool in among the lot and you've had it.
"Funny," went on Mrs. Kidder, among the rattle of plates and dishes in
the sink, "how things seem to come all together, as it were. My
sister's eldest had measles and our Ernie fell down and broke 'is arm,
and my 'usband came out all over with boils. All in the same week!
You'd hardly believe it, would you. It's been the same thing here,"
went on Mrs. Kidder. "First that nasty murder and now Mr. Alfred dead
with mushroom poisoning. Who'll be next, I'd like to know?" '
Lucy felt rather uncomfortably that she would like to know, too.
"My husband, he doesn't like me coming here now," said Mrs. Kidder,
"thinks it's unlucky, but what
I say is I've known Miss Crackenthorpe a long time now and she's a nice
lady and she depends on me. And I couldn't leave poor Miss
Eyelesbarrow, I said, not to do everything herself in the house. Pretty
hard it is on you, Miss, all these trays."
Lucy was forced to agree that life did seem to consist very largely of
trays at the moment. She was at
the moment arranging trays to take to the various invalids.
"As for
them nurses, they never do a hand's turn," said Mrs. Kidder. "All they
want is pots and pots of tea made strong. And meals prepared. Wore out,
that's what I am." She spoke in a tone of great satisfaction, though
actually she had done very little more than her normal morning's work.
Lucy said solemnly, "You never spare yourself, Mrs. Kidder."
Mrs. Kidder looked pleased. Lucy picked up the first of the trays and
started off up the stairs.
"What's this?" said Mr. Crackenthorpe disapprovingly.
"Beef tea and baked custard," said Lucy.
"Take it away," said Mr.
Crackenthorpe. "I won't touch that sort of stuff. I told that nurse I
wanted a beefsteak."
"Doctor Quimper thinks you ought not to have beefsteak just yet," said
Lucy.
Mr. Crackenthorpe snorted. "I'm practically well again. I'm getting up
tomorrow. How are the others?"
"Mr. Harold's much better," said Lucy.
"He's going back to London tomorrow."
"Good riddance," said Mr. Crackenthorpe. "What about Cedric? Any hope
that he's going back to his island tomorrow?"
"He won't be going just yet."
"Pity. What's Emma doing? Why doesn't she come to see me?"
"She's still in bed, Mr. Crackenthorpe."
"Women always coddle themselves," said Mr. Crackenthorpe, "but you're a
good, strong girl," he added approvingly. "Run about all day, don't
you?"
"I get plenty of exercise," said Lucy.
Old Mr. Crackenthorpe nodded his head approvingly. "You're a good
strong girl," he said, "and don't think I've forgotten what I talked to
you about before. One of these days you'll see what you'll see. Emma
isn't always going to have things her own way. And don't listen to the
others when they tell you I'm a mean old man. I'm careful of my money.
I've got a nice little packet put by and I know who I'm going to spend
it on when the time comes." He leered at her affectionately.
Lucy went rather quickly out of the room, avoiding his clutching hand.
The next tray was taken in to Emma.
"Oh, thank you, Lucy. I'm really feeling quite myself again by now. I'm
hungry, and that's a good sign, isn't it? My dear," went on Emma as
Lucy settled the tray on her knees, "I'm really feeling very upset
about your aunt. You haven't had any time to go and see her, I suppose?"
"No, I haven't, as a matter of fact."
"I'm afraid she must be missing you."
"Oh, don't worry, Miss Crackenthorpe. She understands what a terrible
time we've been through."
"Have you rung her up?"
"No, I haven't just lately."
"We'll, do. Ring her up every day. It makes such a difference to old
people to get news."
"You're very kind," said Lucy. Her conscience smote her a'little as she
went down to fetch the next
tray. The complications of illness in the
house had kept her thoroughly absorbed and she had had no
time to think
of anything else. She decided that she would ring Miss Marple up as
soon as she had
taken Cedric his meal.
There was only one nurse in the house now and she passed Lucy on the
landing, exchanging greetings.
Cedric, looking incredibly tidied up and neat, was sitting up in bed
writing busily on sheets of paper.
"Hullo, Lucy," he said, "what hell brew have you got for me today? I
wish you'd get rid of that
god-awful nurse, she's simply too arch for words. Calls me 'we' for
some reason. 'And how are we this morning? Have we slept well? Oh dear,
we're very naughty, throwing off the bedclothes like that.'" He
imitated the refined accents of the nurse in a high falsetto voice.
"You seem very cheerful," said Lucy. "What are you busy with?"
"Plans," said Cedric. "Plans for what to do with this place when the
old man pops off. It's a jolly good
bit of land here, you know. I can't make up my mind whether I'd like to
develop some of it myself, or whether I'll sell it in lots all in one
go. Very valuable for industrial purposes. The house will do for a
nursing home or a school. I'm not sure I shan't sell half the land and
use the money to do something rather outrageous with the other half.
What do you think?"
"You haven't got it yet," said Lucy, dryly.
"I shall have it, though," said Cedric. "It's not divided up like the
other stuff. I get it outright. And if
I sell it for a good fat price the money will be capital, not income,
so I shan't have to pay taxes on it. Money to burn. Think of it."
"I always understood you rather despised money," said Lucy.
"Of course I despise money when I haven't got any," said Cedric. "It's
the only dignified thing to do. What a lovely girl you are, Lucy, or do
I just think so because I haven't seen any good-looking women for a
long time?"
"I expect that's it," said Lucy.
"Still busy tidying everyone and everything up?"
"Somebody seems to have been tidying, you up," said Lucy, looking at
him.
"That's that damned nurse," said Cedric with feeling. "Have they had
the inquest on Alfred yet? What happened?"
"It was adjourned," said Lucy.
"Police being cagey. This mass poisoning does give one a bit of a turn,
doesn't it? Mentally, I mean.
I'm not referring to more obvious
aspects," he added. "Better look after yourself, my girl."
"I do," said Lucy.
"Has young Alexander gone back to school yet?"
"I think he's still with the Stoddart-Wests. I think it's the day after
tomorrow that school begins."
Before getting her own lunch Lucy went to the telephone and rang up
Miss Marple.
"I'm so terribly sorry I haven't been able to come over, but I've
really been very busy."
"Of course, my dear, of course. Beside there's nothing that can be done
just now. We just have to wait."
"Yes, but what are we waiting for?"
"Elspeth McGillicuddy ought to be home very soon now," said Miss
Marple. "I wrote to her to fly home at once. I said it was her duty. So
don't worry too much, my dear." Her voice was kindly and reassuring.
"You don't think—" Lucy began, but stopped.
"That there will be any more deaths? Oh, I hope not, my dear. But one
never knows, does one? When anyone is really wicked, I mean. And I
think there is great wickedness here."
"Or madness," said Lucy.
"Of course I know that is the modern way of looking at things. I don't
agree myself."
Lucy rang off, went into the kitchen and picked up her tray of lunch.
Mrs. Kidder had divested herself
of her apron and was about to leave.
"You'll be all right, Miss, I hope?" she asked solicitously.
"Of" course I shall be all right," snapped Lucy.
She took her tray not into the big, gloomy dining room but into the
small study. She was just finishing
the meal when the door opened and Bryan Eastley came in.
"Hello," said Lucy, "this is very unexpected."
"I suppose it is," said Bryan. "How is everybody?"
"Oh, much better. Harold's going back to London tomorrow."
"What do you think about it all? Was it really arsenic?"
"It was arsenic all right," said Lucy.
"It hasn't been in the papers yet."
"No, I think the police are keeping it up their sleeves for the moment."
"Somebody must have a pretty good down on the family," said Bryan.
"Who's likely to have sneaked
in and tampered with the food?"
"I suppose I'm the most likely person, really," said Lucy.
Bryan looked at. her anxiously. "But you didn't, did you?" he asked. He
sounded slightly shocked.
"No. I didn't," said Lucy.
Nobody could have tampered with the curry. She had made it alone in the
kitchen and brought it to
table, and the only person who could have tampered with it was one of
the five people who sat down
to the meal.
"I mean, why should you?" said Bryan. "They're nothing to you, are
they? I say," he added, "I hope
you don't mind my coming back here like
this?"
"No, no, of course I don't. Have you come to stay?"
"Well, I'd like to, if it wouldn't be an awful bore to you."
"No. No, we can manage."
"You see, I'm out of a job at the moment and I— well, I get rather fed
up. Are you really sure you
don't mind?"
"Oh, I'm not the person to mind, anyway. It's Emma."
"Oh, Emma's all right," said Bryan. "Emma's always been very nice to
me. In her own way, you know. She keeps things to herself a lot, in
fact she's rather a dark horse, old Emma. This living here and looking
after the old man would get most people down. Pity she never married.
Too late now, I suppose."
"I don't think it's too late at all," said Lucy.
"Well—" Bryan considered. "A clergyman perhaps," he said hopefully.
"She'd be useful in the parish
and tactful with the Mothers' Union. I do mean the Mothers' Union,
don't I? Not that I know what it really is, but you come across it
sometimes in books. And she'd wear a hat in church on Sundays," he
added.
"Doesn't sound much of a prospect to me," said Lucy, rising and picking
up the tray.
"I'll do that," said Bryan, taking the tray from her. They went into
the kitchen together. "Shall I help
you wash up? I do like this kitchen," he added. "In fact, I know it
isn't the sort of thing that people do
like nowadays, but I like this whole house. Shocking taste, I suppose,
but there it is. You could land a plane quite easily in the park," he
added with enthusiasm.
He picked up a glass cloth and began to wipe the spoons and forks.
"Seems a waste, it coming to Cedric," he remarked. "First thing he'll
do is to sell the whole thing and
go beaking off abroad again. Can't see, myself, why England isn't good
enough for anybody. Harold wouldn't want this house either, and of
course it's much too big for Emma. Now if only it came to Alexander, he
and I would be as happy together here as a couple of sandboys. Of
course it would be
nice to-have a woman about the house." He looked thoughtfully at Lucy.
"Oh, well, what's the good of talking? If Alexander were to get this
place it would mean a whole lot of them would have to die first,
and that's not really likely, is it? Though from what I've seen of the
old boy he might easily live to be
a hundred, just to annoy them all. I don't suppose he was much cut up
by Alfred's death, was he?"
Lucy said shortly, "No, he wasn't."
"Cantankerous old devil," said Bryan Eastley cheerfully.
"Dreadful, the things people go about saying," said Mrs. Kidder. "I
don't listen, mind you, more than
I can help. But you'd hardly believe it." She waited hopefully.
"Yes, I suppose so," said Lucy.
"About that body that was found in the Long Barn," went on Mrs. Kidder,
moving crablike backward
on her hands and knees, as she scrubbed the kitchen floor, "saying as
how she'd been Mr. Edmund's fancy piece during the war, and how she
come over here and a jealous husband followed her and did
her in. It is a likely thing as a foreigner would do, but it wouldn't
be likely after all these years, would it?"
"It sound most unlikely to me."
"But there's worse things than that, they say," said Mrs. Kidder. "Say
anything, people will. You'd be surprised. There's those that say Mr.
Harold married somewhere abroad and that she come over and found out
he'd committed bigamy with that Lady Alice, and that she was going to
bring 'im to court
and that he met her down here and did her in and hid her body in the
sarcoffus. Did you ever!"
"Shocking," said Lucy vaguely, her mind elsewhere.
"Of course I don't listen," said Mrs. Kidder-virtuous-Iy, "I wouldn't
put no stock in such tales myself.
It beats me how people think up such things, let alone say them. All I
hope is none of it gets to Miss Emma's ears. It might upset her and I
shouldn't like that. She's a very nice lady, Miss Emma is, and
I've not heard a word against her, not a word. And of course Mr. Alfred
being dead nobody says
anything against him now. Not even that it's a judgment, which they
well might do. But it's awful,
Miss, isn't it, the wicked talk there is."
Mrs. Kidder spoke with immense enjoyment.
"It must be quite painful for you to listen to it," said Lucy.
"Oh, it is," said Mrs. Kidder. "It is, indeed. I says to my husband, I
says, 'However can they?' "
The bell rang.
"There's the doctor, Miss. Will you let 'im in, or shall I?"
"I'll go," said Lucy.
But it was not the doctor. On the doorstep stood a tall, elegant woman
in a mink coat. Drawn up to the gravel sweep was a purring Rolls with a
chauffeur at the wheel.
"Can I see Miss Emma Crackenthorpe, please?"
It was an attractive voice, the R's slightly blurred. The woman was
attractive, too. About thirty-five,
with dark hair and expensively and beautifully made up.
"I'm sorry," said Lucy, "Miss Crackenthorpe is ill in bed and can't see
anyone."
"I know she has been ill, yes, but it is very important that I should
see her."
"I'm afraid," Lucy began.
The visitor interrupted her. "I think you are Miss Eyelesbarrow, are
you not?" She smiled, an attractive smile. "My son has spoken of you,
so I know. I am Lady Stoddart-West and Alexander is staying with
me now."
"Oh, I see," said Lucy.
"And it is really important that I should see Miss Crackenthorpe,"
continued the other. "I know all about her illness and I assure you
this is not just a social call. It is because of something that the
boys have said to me—that my son has said to me. It is, I think, a
matter of grave importance and I would like to speak to Miss
Crackenthorpe about it. Please, will you ask her?"
"Come in." Lucy ushered her visitor into the hall and into the drawing
room. Then she said, "I'll go up and ask Miss Crackenthorpe."
She went upstairs, knocked on Emma's door and entered.
"Lady Stoddart-West is here," she said. "She wants to see you very
particularly."
"Lady Stoddart-West?" Emma looked surprised. A look of alarm came into
her face. "There's nothing wrong, is there, with the boys—with
Alexander?"
"No, no," Lucy reassured her. "I'm sure the boys are all right. It
seems to be something the boys have told her or said to her,"
"Oh. Well—" Emma hesitated. "Perhaps I ought to see her. Do I look all
right, Lucy?"
"You look very nice," said Lucy.
Emma was sitting up in bed, a soft, pink shawl was round her shoulders
and brought out the faint rose-pink of her cheeks. Her dark hair had
been neatly brushed and combed by the nurse. Lucy had placed a bowl of
autumn leaves on the dressing table the day before. Her room looked
attractive and
quite unlike a sickroom.
"I'm really quite well enough to get up," said Emma. "Doctor Quimper
said I could tomorrow."
"You look really quite yourself again," said Lucy. "Shall I bring Lady
Stoddart-West up?"
"Yes, do."
Lucy went downstairs again. "Will you come up to Miss Crackenthorpe's
room?"
She escorted the visitor upstairs, opened the door for her to pass in
and then shut it. Lady
Stoddart-West approached the bed with
outstretched hand.
"Miss Crackenthorpe? I really do apologize for breaking in on you like
this. I have seen you, I think,
at the sports at the school."
"Yes," said Emma, "I remember you quite well. Do sit down."
In the chair conveniently placed by the bed, Lady Stoddart-West sat
down. She said in a quiet low voice, "You must think it very strange of
me coming here like this, but I have a reason. I think it is an
important reason. You see, the boys have been telling me things. You
can understand that they were very excited about the murder that
happened here. I confess I did not like it at the time. I was nervous.
I wanted to bring James home at once. But my husband laughed. He said
that obviously it was a murder that had nothing to do with the house
and the family and he said that from what he remembered from his
boyhood, and from James's letters, both he and Alexander were enjoying
themselves so wildly that it would be sheer cruelty to bring them back.
So I gave in and agreed that they should stay on until the
time arranged for James to bring Alexander back with him."
Emma said: "You think we ought to have sent your son home earlier?"
"No, no, that is not what I mean at all. Oh, it is difficult for me,
this! But what I have to say must be
said. You see, they have picked up a good deal, the boys. They told me
that this.woman—the murdered woman—that the police have an idea that
she may be a French girl whom your eldest brother, who was killed in
the war, knew in France. That is so?"
"It is a possibility," said Emma, her voice breaking slightly, "that we
are forced to consider. It may have
been so."
"There is some reason for believing that the body is that of this girl,
this Martine?"
"I have told you, it is a possibility."
"But why—why should they think that she was this Martine? Did she have
letters on her—papers?"
"No. Nothing of that kind. But you see I had had a letter from this
Martine."
"You had had a letter from Martine?"
"Yes. A letter telling me she was in England and would like to come and
see me. I invited her down
here, but got a telegram saying she was going back to France. Perhaps
she did go back to France. We
do not know. But since then an envelope was found here addressed to
her. That seems to show that
she had come down here. But I really don't see—" She broke off.
Lady Stoddart-West broke in quickly. "You really do not see what
concern it is of mine? That is very true. I
should not, in your place. But when I heard this, or rather, a garbled
account of this, I had to
come to make sure it was really so, because,
if it is—"
"Yes?" said Emma.
"Then I must tell you something that I had never intended to tell you.
You see, I am Martine."
Emma stared at her guest as though she could hardly take in the sense
of her words.
"You!" she said. "You are Martine?"
The other nodded vigorously. "But yes. It surprises you, I am sure, but
it is true. I met your brother Edmund in the first days of the war. He
was indeed billeted at our house. Well, you know the rest. We fell in
love. We intended to be married, and then there was the retreat to
Dunkirk, Edmund was reported missing. Later he was reported killed. I
will not speak to you of that time. It was long ago and it is over. But
I will say to you that I loved your brother very much.
"Then came the grim realities of war. The Germans occupied France. I
became a worker for the Resistance. I was one of those who was assigned
to pass Englishmen through France to England. It was
in that way that I met my present husband. He was an Air Force officer,
parachuted into France to do special work. When the war ended we were
married. I considered once or twice whether I should write
to you or come and see you but I decided against it. It.could do no
good, I thought, to rake up old memories. I had a new life and I had no
wish to recall the old." She paused and then said, "But it gave me, I
will tell you, a strange pleasure when I found that my son James's
greatest friend at his school
was a boy whom I found to be Edmund's nephew. Alexander, I may say, is
very like Edmund, as I dare say you yourself appreciate. It seemed to
me a very happy state of affairs that James and Alexander should be
such friends."
She leaned forward and placed her hand on Emma's arm. "But you see,
dear Emma, do you not, that when I heard this story about the murder,
about this dead woman being suspected to be the Martine that Edmund had
known, that I had to come and tell you the truth. Either you or I must
inform the police of the fact. Whoever the dead woman is, she is not
Martine."
"I can hardly take it in," said Emma, "that you, you should be the
Martine that dear Edmund wrote to
me about." She sighed, shaking her head, then she frowned perplexedly.
"But I don't understand. Was
it you, then, who wrote to me?"
Lady Stoddart-West shook a vigorous head. "No, no, of course I did not
write to you."
"Then—" Emma stopped.
"Then there was someone pretending to be Martine who wanted perhaps to
get money out of you? That is what it must have been. But who can it
be?"
Emma said slowly: "I suppose there were people at the time who knew?"
The other shrugged her shoulders. "Probably, yes. But there was no one
intimate with me, no one very close to me. I have never spoken of it
since I came to England. And why wait all this time? It is curious,
very curious."
Emma said, "I don't understand it. We will have to see what Inspector
Craddock has to say." She looked with suddenly softened eyes at her
visitor. "I'm so glad to know you at last, my dear."
"And I you. Edmund spoke of you very often. He was very fond of you. I
am happy in my new life,
but all the same, I do not quite forget."
Emma leaned back and heaved a deep sigh. "It's a terrible relief," she
said. "As long as we feared that
the dead woman might be Martine, it seemed to be tied up with the
family. But now, oh, it's an absolute load off my back. I don't know
who the poor soul was but she can't have had anything to do with us!"
The streamlined secretary brought Harold Crackenthorpe his usual
afternoon cup of tea.
"Thanks, Miss Ellis, I shall be going home early today."
"I'm sure you ought really not to have come at all, Mr. Crackenthorpe,"
said Miss Ellis. "You look quite pulled down still."
"I'm all right," said Harold Crackenthorpe, but he did feel pulled
down. No doubt about it, he'd had a
very nasty turn. Ah well, that was over.
Extraordinary, he thought broodingly, that Alfred should have succumbed
and the old man should have come through. After all, what was
he?—seventy-three, seventy-four? Been an invalid for years. If there
was one person you'd have thought would have been taken off, it would
have been the old man. But no. It had to be Alfred. Alfred who, as far
as Harold knew, was a healthy, wiry sort of chap. Nothing much the
matter with him.
He leaned back in his chair sighing. That girl was right. He didn't
feel up to things yet, but he had wanted to come down to the office.
Wanted to get the hang of how affairs were going. Touch and go, that's
what it was! Touch and go. All this—he looked round him—the richly
appointed office, the pale gleaming
wood, the expensive modern chairs, it all looked prosperous enough, and
a good thing, too! That's where Alfred had always gone wrong. If you
looked prosperous, people thought you were prosperous. There were no
rumors going around as yet about his financial stability. All the same,
the crash couldn't be delayed very long. Now if only his father had
passed out instead of Alfred, as surely, surely he ought to have done.
Practically seemed to thrive on arsenic! Yes, if his father had
succumbed: well, there wouldn't have been anything to worry about.
Still, the great thing was not to seem worried. A prosperous
appearance. Not like poor old Alfred who always looked seedy and
shiftless, who looked in fact exactly what he was. One of those
small-time speculators, never going all out boldly for the big money.
In with a shady crowd here, doing a doubtful deal there, never quite
rendering himself liable to prosecution but going very near the edge.
And where had it got him? Short periods of affluence and then back to
seediness and shabbiness once more. No broad outlook about Alfred.
Taken all in all, you couldn't say Alfred was much loss. He'd never
been particularly fond of Alfred and with Alfred out of the way the
money that was coming to him from that old curmudgeon, his grandfather,
would be sensibly increased, divided not into five shares but into four
shares. Very much better. Harold's face brightened a little. He rose,
took his hat and coat and left the office. Better take it easy for a
day or two. He wasn't feeling too strong yet. His car was waiting below
and very soon he was weaving through the London traffic to his house.
Darwin, his manservant, opened the door. "Her Ladyship has just
arrived, sir," he said. For a moment Harold stared at him. Alice! Good
Heavens, was it today that Alice was coming home? He'd forgotten all
about it. Good thing Darwin had warned him. It wouldn't have looked so
good if he'd gone upstairs and looked too astonished at seeing her. Not
that it really mattered, he supposed. Neither Alice nor he had many
illusions about the feeling they had for each other. Perhaps Alice was
fond of him; be didn't know.
All in all Alice was a great disappointment to him. He hadn't been in
love with her, of course, but though
a plain woman she was quite a pleasant one. And her family and
connections had undoubtedly been useful. Not perhaps as useful as they
might have been, because in marrying Alice he had been considering the
position of hypothetical children. Nice relations for his boys to have"
But there hadn't been any boys, or girls either, and all that had
remained had been him and Alice growing older together without much to
say to each other and with no particular pleasure in each other's
company.
She stayed away a good deal with relations and usually went to the
Riviera in the winter. It suited her
and it didn't worry him.
He went upstairs now into the drawing room and greeted her
punctiliously.
"So you're back, my dear. Sorry I couldn't meet you, but I was held up
in the City. I got back as early
as I could. How was San Raphael?"
Alice told him how San Raphael was. She was a thin woman with
sandy-colored hair, a well-arched nose and vague, hazel eyes. She
talked in a well-bred, monotonous and rather depressing voice. It had
been a good journey back, the Channel a little rough. The customs, as
usual, very trying at Dover.
"You should come by air," said Harold, as he always did. "So much
simpler."
"I dare say, but I don't really like air travel. I never have. Makes me
nervous."
"Saves a lot of time," said Harold.
Lady Alice Grackenthorpe did not answer. It was possible that her
problem in life was not to save time but to occupy time. She inquired
politely after her husband's health.
"Emma's telegram quite alarmed me," she said. "You were all taken ill,
I understand."
"Yes, yes," said Harold.
"I read in the paper the other day," said Alice, "of forty people in a
hotel going down with food poisoning at the same time. All this
refrigeration is dangerous, I think. People keep things too long in
them."
"Possibly," said Harold. Should he, or should he not mention arsenic?
Somehow, looking at Alice, he
felt himself quite unable to do so. In Alice's world, he felt, there
was no place for poisoning by arsenic.
It was a thing you read about in the papers. It didn't happen to you or
your own family. But it had happened in the Crackenthorpe family. ...
He went up to his room and lay down for an hour or two before dressing
for dinner. At dinner,
tete-a-tete with his wife, the conversation ran on much the same lines.
Desultory, polite. The mention
of acquaintances and friends at San Raphael.
"There's a parcel for you on the hall table, a small one," Alice said.
"Is there? I didn't notice it."
"It's an extraordinary thing but somebody was telling me about a
murdered woman having been found
in a barn or something like that. She said it was at Rutherford Hall. I
suppose it must be some other Rutherford Hall."
"No," said Harold, "no, it isn't. It was in our barn, as a matter of
fact."
"Really, Harold! A murdered woman in the barn at Rutherford Hall, and
you never told me anything about it."
"Well, there hasn't been much time, really," said Harold, "and it was
all rather unpleasant. Nothing
to do with us, of course. The press
milled round a good deal. Of course we had to deal with the police and
all that sort of thing."
"Very unpleasant," said Alice. "Did they find out who did it?" she
added, with rather perfunctory interest.
"Not yet," said Harold.
"What sort of a woman was she?"
"Nobody knows. French apparently."
"Oh, French," said Alice, and allowing for the difference in class, her
tone was not unlike that of
Inspector Bacon. "Very annoying for you all," she agreed.
They went out from the dining room and crossed into the small study
where they usually sat when they were alone. Harold ^*as feeling quite
exhausted by now. I'll go up to bed early, he thought.
He picked up the small parcel from the hall table, about which his wife
had spoken to him. It was a small, neatly waxed parcel, done up with
meticulous exactness. Harold ripped it open as he came to sit down in
his usual chair by the fire.
Inside was a small tablet box bearing the label, "Two to be taken nightly." With it
was a small piece of paper with the chemist's heading in Brackhampton. "Sent by request of Doctor Quimper" was
written
on it.
Harold Crackenthorpe frowned. He opened the box and looked at the
tablets. Yes, they seemed to be
the same tablets he had been having. But surely, surely Quimper had
said that he needn't take any
more? "You won't want them now." That's what Quimper had said.
"What is it, dear?" said Alice. "You look worried."
"Oh, it's just some tablets. I've been taking them at night. But I
rather thought the doctor said don't take any more."
His wife said placidly, "He probably said don't forget to take them."
"He may have done, I suppose," said Harold doubtfully.
He looked across at her. She was watching him. Just for a moment or two
he wondered—he didn't
often wonder about Alice—exactly what she was thinking. That mild gaze
of hers told him nothing. Her eyes were like windows in an empty house.
What did Alice think about him, feel about him? Had she been in love
with him once? He supposed she had. Or did she marry him because she
thought he was doing well in the City and she was tired of her own
impecunious existence? Well, on the whole, she'd done quite well out of
it. She'd got a car and a house in London, she could travel abroad when
she felt like it and get herself expensive clothes, though goodness
knows they never looked like anything on Alice. Yes, on the whole,
she'd done pretty well. He wondered if she thought so. She wasn't
really fond of him, of course, but then he wasn't really fond of her.
They had nothing in common, nothing to talk about, no memories to
share. If there had been children, but there hadn't been any children.
Odd that there were
no children in the family except young Edie's boy.
Young Edie. She'd been a silly girl, making that
foolish, hasty wartime
marriage. Well, he'd given her good advice.
He'd said, "It's all very well, these dashing young pilots, glamor,
courage, all that, but he'll be no good
in peacetime, you know.
Probably be barely able to support you."
And Edie had said, what did it matter? She loved Bryan and Bryan loved
her, and he'd probably be killed quite soon. Why shouldn't they have
some happiness? What was the good of looking to the future when they
might all be bombed any minute. And after all, Edie had said, the
future doesn't really matter because some day there'll be all
grandfather's money.
Harold squirmed uneasily in his chair. Really, that will of his
grandfather's had been iniquitous! Keeping them all dangling on a
string. The will hadn't pleased anybody. It didn't please the
grandchildren and it made their father quite livid. The old boy was
absolutely determined not to die. That's what made him take so much
care of himself. But he'd have to die soon. Surely, surely, he'd have
to die soon. Otherwise— All Harold's worries swept over him once more,
making him feel sick and tired and giddy.
Alice was still watching him, he noticed. Those pale, thoughtful eyes,,
they made him uneasy somehow.
"I think I shall go to bed," he said. "It's been my first day out in
the City."
"Yes," said Alice, "I think that's a good idea. I'm sure the doctor
told you to take things easily at first."
"Doctors always tell you that," said Harold.
"And don't forget to take your tablets, dear," said Alice. She picked
up the box and handed it to him.
He said good night and went upstairs. Yes, he needed the tablets. It
would have been a mistake to leave them off too soon. He took two of
them and swallowed them with a glass of water.
"Nobody could have made more of a muck of it than I seem to have done,"
said Dermot Craddock gloomily.
He sat, his long legs stretched out, looking somehow incongruous in
faithful Florence's somewhat overfurnished parlor. He was thoroughly
tired, upset and dispirited.
Miss Marple made soft, soothing noises of dissent. "No, no, you've done
very good work, my dear boy. Very good work, indeed."
"I've done very good work, have I? I've let a whole family be poisoned,
Alfred Crackenthorpe's dead
and now Harold's dead, too. What the hell's going on there? That's what
I should like to know."
"Poisoned tablets," said Miss Marple thoughtfully.
"Yes. Devilishly cunning, really. They looked just like the tablets
that he'd been having. There was a printed slip sent in with them 'by Doctor Quimper's instructions.' Well,
Quimper never ordered them. There were chemist's labels used. The
chemist knew nothing about it, either. No. That box of tablets came
from Rutherford Hall."
"Do you actually know it came from Rutherford Hall?"
"Yes. We've had a thorough checkup. Actually it's the box that held the
sedative tablets prescribed for Emma."
"Oh, I see. For Emma . . ."
"Yes. It's got her fingerprints on it and the fingerprints of both the
nurses and the fingerprint of the chemist who made it up. Nobody
else's, naturally. The person who sent them was careful."
"And the sedative tablets were removed and something else substituted?"
"Yes. That of course is the devil with tablets. One tablet looks
exactly like another."
"You are so right," agreed Miss Marple. "I remember so very well in my
young days, the black mixture and the brown mixture—the cough mixture
that was —and the white mixture, and Doctor So-and-So's pink mixture.
People didn't mix those up nearly as much. In fact, you know, in my
village in St. Mary Mead we still like that kind of medicine. It's a
bottle they always want, not tablets. What were the tablets?" she asked.
"Aconite. They were the kind of tablets that are usually kept in a
poison bottle, diluted one in a hundred for outside application."
"And so Harold took them and died," Miss Marple said thoughtfully.
Dermot Craddock uttered
something like a groan.
"You mustn't mind my letting off steam to you," he said. "Tell it all
to Aunt Jane; that's how I feel!"
"That's very, very nice of you," said Miss Marple, "and I do appreciate
it. As Sir Henry's godson I feel toward you quite differently from the
way I should feel to any ordinary detective inspector."
Dermot Craddock gave her a fleeting grin. "But the fact remains that
I've made the most ghastly mess
of things all along the line," he said. "The Chief Constable down here
calls in Scotland Yard, and what
do they get? They get me making a prize ass of myself!"
"No, no," said Miss Marple.
"Yes, yes. I don't know who poisoned Alfred, I don't know who poisoned
Harold, and to cap it all I haven't the least idea now who the original
murdered woman was! This Martine business seemed a perfectly safe bet.
The whole thing seemed to tie up. And now what happens? The real
Martine shows
up and turns out, most improbably, to be the wife of Sir Robert
Stoddart-West. So who's the woman in the barn now? Goodness knows.
First I go all out on the idea she's Anna Stravinska, and then she's
out
of it."
He was arrested by Miss Marple giving one of her small, peculiarly
significant coughs.
"But is she?" she murmured.
Craddock stared at her. "Well, that postcard from Jamaica."
"Yes," said Miss Marple, "but that isn't really evidence, is it? I
mean, anyone can get a postcard sent
from almost anywhere, I suppose. I remember Mrs. Brierly, such a very
bad nervous breakdown. Finally they said she ought to go to the mental
hospital for observation, and she was so worried about the children
knowing about it and so she wrote about fourteen postcards and arranged
that they should be posted from different places abroad, and told them
that Mummie was going abroad on a holiday." She added, looking at
Dermot Craddock, "You see what I mean."
"Yes, of course," said" Craddock, staring at her. "Naturally we'd have
checked that postcard if it hadn't been for the Martine business
fitting the bill so well."
"So convenient," murmured Miss Marple.
"It tied up," said Craddock. "After all there's the letter Emma
received signed Martine Crackenthorpe. Lady Stoddart-West didn't send
that, but somebody did. Somebody who was going to pretend to be
Martine, and who was going to cash in, if possible, on being Martine.
You can't deny that."
"No, no."
"And then, the envelope of the letter Emma wrote to her with the London
address on it. Found at Rutherford Hall, showing she'd actually been
there."
"But the murdered woman hadn't been there!" Miss Marple pointed out.
"Not in the sense you mean.
She only came to Rutherford Hall after she was dead. Pushed out of a
train on the railway embankment."
"Oh—yes."
"What the envelope really proves is that the murderer was there.
Presumably he took that envelope off her with her other papers and
things, and then dropped it by mistake—or—I wonder now, was it a
mistake? Surely Inspector Bacon, and your men too, made a thorough
search of the place, didn't they, and didn't find it. It only turned up
later in the boiler house."
"That's understandable," said Craddock. "The old gardener chap used to
spear up any odd stuff that was blowing about and shove it in there."
"Where it was very convenient for the boys to find," said Miss Marple
thoughtfully.
"You think we were meant to find it?"
"Well, I just wonder. After all it would be fairly easy to know where
the boys were going to look next,
or even to suggest to them . . . Yes, I do wonder. It stopped you
thinking about Anna Stravinska any more, didn't it?"
Craddock said, "And you think it really may be her all the time?"
"I think someone may have got alarmed when you started making inquiries
about her, that's all. I think somebody didn't want those inquiries
made."
"Let's hold on to the basic fact that someone was going to impersonate
Martine," said Craddock. "And then for some reason didn't. Why?"
"That's a very interesting question," said Miss Marple.
"Somebody sent a wire saying Martine was going back to France, then
arranged to travel down with the girl and kill her on the way. You
agree so far?"
"Not exactly," said Miss Marple. "I don't think, really, you're making
it simple enough."
"Simple!" exclaimed Craddock. "You're mixing me up," he complained.
Miss Marple said in a distressed voice that she wouldn't think of doing
anything like that.
"Come, tell me," said Craddock, "do you or do you not think you know
who the murdered woman was?" Miss Marple sighed. "It's so difficult,"
she said, "to put it the right way. I mean, I don't know who she was,
but at the same time I'm fairly sure who she was, if you know what I
mean."
Craddock threw up his head. "Know what you mean? I haven't the faintest
idea." He looked out through the window. "There's your Lucy
Eyelesbarrow coming to see you," he said. "Well, I'll be off. My amour propre is very low this
afternoon and having a young woman coming in, radiant with efficiency
and success, is more than I can bear."
"I looked up tontine in the dictionary," said Lucy.
The first greetings were over and now Lucy was wandering rather
aimlessly round the room, touching
a china dog here, an antimacassar there, the plastic work box in the
window.
"I thought you probably would," said Miss Marple equably.
Lucy spoke slowly, quoting the words. "Lorenzo Tonti, Italian banker,
originator, 1653, of a form of annuity in which the shares of
subscribers who die are added to the profit shares of the survivors."
She paused. "That's it, isn't it? That fits well enough, and you were
thinking of it even then before the last
two deaths."
She took up once more her restless, almost aimless prowl round the
room. Miss Marple sat watching
her. This was a very different Lucy Eyelesbarrow from the one she knew.
"I suppose it was asking for it really," said Lucy. "A will of that
kind, ending so that if there was only
one survivor left he'd get the lot. And yet, there was quite a lot of
money, wasn't there? You'd think it would be enough shared out—" She
paused, the words tailing off.
"The trouble is," said Miss Marple, "that people are greedy. Some
people. That's so often, you know, how things start. You don't start
with murder, with wanting to do murder or even thinking of it. You
just start by being greedy, by wanting more than you're going to have."
She laid her knitting down on
her knee and stared ahead of her into space. "That's how I came across
Inspector Craddock first, you know. A case in the country. Near
Medenham Spa. That began the same way, just a weak amiable character
who wanted a great deal of money. Money that the person wasn't entitled
to, but there
seemed an easy way to get it. Not murder then. Just something so easy
and simple that it hardly
seemed wrong. That's how things begin. But it ended with three murders."
"Just like this," said Lucy. "We've had three murders now. The woman
who impersonated Martine
and who would have been able to claim a share for her son, and then
Alfred, and then Harold. And
now it only leaves two, doesn't it?"
"You mean," said Miss Marple, "there are only Cedric and Emma left?"
"Not Emma. Emma isn't a tall, dark man. No. I mean Cedric and Bryan
Eastley. I never thought of
Bryan because he's fair. He's got a great, fair mustache and blue eyes,
but you—the other day—" She paused.
"Yes, go on," said Miss Marple. "Tell me. Something has upset you very
badly, hasn't it?"
"It was when Lady Stoddard-West was going away. She had said good-by
and then suddenly turned to me just as she was getting into the car and
asked: "Who was that tall, dark man who was standing on the terrace as
I came in?'
"I couldn't imagine who she meant at first, because Cedric was still
laid up. So I said, rather puzzled,
"You don't mean Bryan Eastley?" and she said, "Of course, that's who it
was, Squadron Leader Eastley. He was hidden in our loft once in France
during the Resistance. I remember the way he stood, and the
set of his shoulders,' and she said, I should like to meet him again,'
but we couldn't find him."
Miss Marple said nothing, just waited.
"And then," said Lucy, "later I looked at him . . . He was standing
with his back to me and I saw what I ought to have seen before. That
even when a man's fair, his hair looks dark because he plasters it down
with stuff. Bryan's hair is a sort of medium brown, I suppose, but it
can look dark. So, you see, it might have been Bryan that your friend
saw in the train. It might. . . ."
"Yes," said Miss Marple. "I had thought of that."
"I suppose you think of everything!" said Lucy bitterly.
"Well, dear, one has to really."
"But I can't see what Bryan would get out of it. I mean, the money
would come to Alexander, not to
him. I suppose it would make an easier life, they could have a bit more
luxury, but he wouldn't be able
to tap the capital for his schemes, or anything like that."
"But if anything happened to Alexander before he was twenty-one, then
Bryan would get the money as his father and next of kin," Miss Marple
pointed out.
Lucy cast a look of horror at her.
"He'd never do that. No father would ever do that just—just to get the
money."
Miss Marple sighed. "People do, my dear. It's very sad and very
terrible, but they do.
"People do very terrible things," Miss Marple continued. "I know a
woman who poisoned three of her children just for a little bit of
insurance money. And then there was an old woman, quite a nice old
woman apparently, who poisoned her son when he came home on leave. Then
there was that old Mrs. Stanwich. That case was in the paper. I dare
say you read about it. Her daughter died and her son, and then she said
she was poisoned herself. There was poison in some gruel, but it came
out, you know,
that she'd put it there herself. She was just planning to poison the
last daughter. That wasn't exactly for money. She was jealous of them
for being younger than she was and alive, and she was afraid—it's a
terrible thing to say but it's true—they would enjoy themselves after
she was gone. She'd always kept a very tight hold on the purse strings.
Yes, of course she was a little peculiar, as they say, but I never see
myself that that's any real excuse. I mean you can be a little peculiar
in so many different ways. Sometimes you just go about giving all your
possessions away and writing checks on bank accounts
that don't exist, just so as to benefit people. It shows, you see, that
behind being peculiar you have quite
a nice disposition. But of course if you're peculiar and behind it you
have a bad disposition, well, there you are. Now, does that help you at
all, my dear Lucy?"
"Does what help me?" asked Lucy bewildered. "What I've been telling
you," said Miss Marple. She
added gently, "You mustn't worry, you know. You really mustn't worry.
Elspeth McGillicuddy will be here any day now."
"I don't see what that has to do with it." "No, dear, perhaps not. But
I think it's important myself."
"I can't help worrying," said Lucy. "You see I've got interested in the
family."
"I know, dear, it's very difficult for you because you are quite
strongly attracted to both of them, aren't you, in very different ways."
"What do you mean?" said Lucy. Her tone was sharp.
"I was talking about the two sons of the house," said Miss Marple. "Or
rather the son and the son-in-law. It's fortunate that the two more
unpleasant members of the family died and the two more attractive ones
are left. I can see that Cedric Crackenthorpe is very attractive. He is
inclined to make himself out worse than he is and has a provocative way
with him."
"He makes me fighting mad sometimes," said Lucy.
"Yes," said Miss Marple, "and you enjoy that, don't you? You're a
girl with a lot of spirit and you enjoy a battle. Yes, I can see where
that attraction lies. And then Mr. Eastley is a rather plaintive type,
rather like an unhappy little boy. That of course is attractive, too."
"And one of them's a murderer," said Lucy bitterly, "and it may be
either of them. There's nothing to choose between them really. There's
Cedric, not caring a bit about his brother Alfred's death or about
Harold's. He just sits back looking thoroughly pleased making plans for
what he'll do with Rutherford Hall, and he keeps saying that it'll need
a lot of money to develop it in the way he wants to do. Of
course I know he's the sort of person who exaggerates his own
callousness and all that. But that could
be a cover, too. I mean everyone says that you're more callous than you
really are. But you mightn't be. You might even be more callous than
you seem!"
"Dear, dear Lucy, I'm so sorry about all this."
"And then Bryan," went on Lucy. "It's extraordinary, but Bryan really
seems to want to live there. He thinks he and Alexander would find it
awfully jolly and he's full of schemes."
"He's always full of schemes of one kind or another, isn't he?"
"Yes, I think he is. They all sound rather wonderful, but I've got an
uneasy feeling that they'd never
really work. I mean, they're not practical. The idea sounds all right,
but I don't think he ever considers
the actual working difficulties."
"They are up in the air, so to speak?"
"Yes, in more ways than one. I mean they are usually literally up in
the air. They are all air schemes. Perhaps a really good fighter pilot
never does quite come down to earth again. . . ."
She added: "And he likes Rutherford Hall so much because it reminds him
of the big rambling Victorian house he lived in when he was a child."
"I see," said Miss Marple thoughtfully. "Yes, I see."
Then, with a quick sideways glance at Lucy, she said with a kind of
verbal pounce, "But that isn't all
of it, is it, dear? There's something else."
"Oh yes, there's something else. Just something that I didn't realize
until just a couple of days ago. Bryan was actually on that train."
"On the 4:33 from Paddington?"
"Yes. You see Emma thought she was required to account for her
movements on December the
twentieth and she went over it all very
carefully—a committee meeting in the morning and then shopping in the
afternoon and tea at the Green Shamrock, and then, she said, she went
to meet Bryan at the station. I worked out when she'd had tea and the
time, and the train she met must have been the 4:33. So I asked Bryan,
quite casually, and he said, Yes it was, and added that his car had had
a bump and was being repaired and so he had to come down by train—an
awful bore, he said, he hates trains. He seemed quite natural about it
all. It may be quite all right, but I wish, somehow, he hadn't been on
that train. . . ."
"Actually on the train," said Miss Marple thoughtfully.
"It doesn't really prove anything. The awful thing is all this
suspicion. Not to know. And perhaps we never shall know!"
"Of course we shall know, dear," said Miss Marple briskly. "I mean, all
this isn't going to stop just at this point. The one thing I do know
about murderers is that they can never let well alone. Or perhaps one
should say, ill alone. At any rate," said Miss Marple with finality,
"they can't once they've done a second murder. Now don't get too upset,
Lucy. The police are doing all they can, and looking after everybody,
and the great thing is that Elspeth McGillicuddy will be here very soon
now!"
"Now, Elspeth, you're quite clear as to what I want you to do?"
"I'm clear enough," said Mrs. McGillicuddy, "but what I say to you is,
Jane, that it seems very odd."
"It's not odd at all," said Miss Marple.
"Well, I think so. To arrive at the house and to ask almost immediately
whether I can—er—go upstairs."
"It's very cold weather," Miss Marple pointed out, "and after all, you
might have eaten something that disagreed with you and—er—have to ask
to go upstairs. I mean, these things happen. I remember poor Louisa
Felby came to see me once and she had to ask to go upstairs five times
during one little half hour. That," added Miss Marple parenthetically,
"was a bad Cornish pasty."
"If you'd just tell me what you're driving at, Jane," said Mrs.
McGillicuddy.
"That's just what I don't want to do," said Miss Marple.
"How irritating you are, Jane. First you make me. come all the way back
to England before I need—"
"I'm sorry about that," said Miss Marple, "but I couldn't do anything
else. Someone, you see, may be killed at any moment. Oh, I know they're
all on their guard and the police are taking all the precautions they
can, but there's always the outside chance that the murderer might be
too clever for them. So you see, Elspeth, it was your duty to come
back. After all, you and I were brought up to do our duty, weren't we?"
"We certainly were," said Mrs. McGillicuddy, "no laxness in our young
days."
"So that's quite all right," said Miss Marple. "And that's the taxi
now," she added, as a faint hoot was heard outside the house.
Mrs. McGillicuddy donned her heavy pepper-and-salt coat and Miss Marple
wrapped herself up with a good many shawls and scarves. Then the two
ladies got into the taxi and were driven to Rutherford Hall.
* * *
"Who can this be driving up?" Emma asked, looking out of the window, as
the taxi swept past it. "I do believe it's Lucy's old aunt."
"What a bore," said Cedric.
He was lying back in a long chair looking at Country Life with his feet reposing
on the side of the mantelpiece.
"Tell her you're not at home."
"When you say tell her I'm not at home, do you mean that I should go
out and say so? Or that I should tell Lucy to tell her aunt so?"
"Hadn't thought of that," said Cedric. "I suppose I was thinking of our
butler-and-footman days, if we ever had them. I seem to remember a
footman before the war. He had an affair with the kitchen maid
and there was a terrific rumpus about it. Isn't there one of those old
hags about the place cleaning?"
But at that moment the door was opened by Mrs. Hart, whose afternoon it
was for cleaning the brasses, and Miss Marple came in, very fluttery,
in a whirl of shawls and scarves, with a tall, uncompromising figure
behind her.
"I do hope," said Miss Marple, taking Emma's hand, "that we are not
intruding. But you see, I'm going
home the day after tomorrow, and I couldn't bear not to come over and
see you and say good-by and thank you again for your goodness to Lucy.
Oh, I forgot. May I introduce my friend, Mrs. McGillicuddy, who is
staying with me?"
"How d'you do," said Mrs. McGillicuddy, looking at Emma with complete
attention and then shifting
her gaze to Cedric, who had now risen to his feet. Lucy entered the
room at this moment.
"Aunt Jane, I had no idea . . ."
"I had to come and say good-by to Miss Crackenthorpe," said Miss
Marple, turning to her, "who has
been so very, very kind to you, Lucy."
"It's Lucy who's been very kind to us," said Emma.
"Yes, indeed," said Cedric. "We've worked her like a galley slave.
Waiting on the sick room, running
up and down the stairs, cooking little invalid messes . . ."
Miss Marple broke in. "I was so very, very sorry to hear of your
illness. I do hope you're quite
recovered now, Miss Crackenthorpe?"
"Oh, we're quite well again now," said Emma.
"Lucy told me you were all very ill. So dangerous, isn't it, food
poisoning? Mushrooms, I understand."
"The cause remains rather mysterious," said Emma.
"Don't you believe it," said Cedric. "I bet you've heard the rumors
that are flying round, Miss—er—"
"Marple," said Miss Marple.
"Well, as I say, I bet you've heard the rumors that are flying round.
Nothing like arsenic for raising
a little flutter in the neighborhood."
"Cedric," said Emma, "I wish you wouldn't. You know Inspector Craddock
said . . ."
"Bah," said Cedric, "everybody knows.. Even you've heard something,
haven't you?" He turned to
Miss Marple and Mrs. McGillicuddy.
"I myself," said Mrs. McGillicuddy, "have, only just returned from
abroad. The day before yesterday," she added.
"Ah, well, you're not up in our local scandal then," said Cedric.
"Arsenic in the curry, that's what it was. Lucy's aunt knows all about
it, I bet."
"Well," said Miss Marple, "I did just hear—I mean, it was just a hint,
but of course I didn't want to embarrass you in any way, Miss
Crackenthorpe."
"You must pay no attention to my brother," said Emma. "He just likes
making people uncomfortable." She gave him an affectionate smile as she
spoke.
The door opened and Mr. Crackenthorpe came in, tapping angrily with his
stick.
"Where's tea?" he said. "Why isn't tea ready? You! Girl!" he addressed
Lucy, "why haven't you brought tea in?"
"It's just ready, Mr. Crackenthorpe. I'm bringing it in now. I was just
setting the table ready."
Lucy went out of the room again and Mr. Crackenthorpe was introduced to
Miss Marple and Mrs. McGillicuddy.
"Like my meals on time," said Mr. Crackenthorpe. "Punctuality and
economy. Those are my watchwords."
"Very necessary, I'm sure," said Miss Marple, "especially in these
times with taxation and everything."
Mr. Crackenthorpe snorted. "Taxation! Don't talk to me of those
robbers. A miserable pauper, that's
what I am. And it's going to get worse, not better. You wait, my boy,"
he addressed Cedric, "when you get this place ten to one the Socialists
will have it off you and turn it into a Welfare Center or something.
And take all your income to keep it up with!"
Lucy reappeared with a tea tray, Bryan Eastley following her carrying a
tray of sandwiches, bread and butter and cake.
"What's this? What's this?" Mr. Crackenthorpe inspected the tray.
"Frosted cake? We having a party today? Nobody told me about it." A
faint flush came into Emma's face. "Doctor Quimper's coming
to tea, Father. It's his birthday today and—"
"Birthday?" snorted the old man, "what's he doing With a birthday?
Birthdays are only for children. I never count my birthdays and I won't
let anyone else celebrate them either."
"Much cheaper," agreed Cedric. "You save the price of candles on your
cake."
"That's enough from you, boy," said Mr. Crackenthorpe.
Miss Marple was shaking hands with Bryan Eastley. "I've heard about
you, of course," she said,
"from Lucy. Dear me, you remind me so much of someone I used to know at
St. Mary Mead. That's
the village where I've lived for so many years, you know. Ronnie Wells,
the solicitor's son. Couldn't
seem to settle somehow when he went into his father's business. He went
out to East Africa and started
a series of cargo boats on the lakes out there. Victoria Nyanza, or is
it Albert I mean? Anyway, I'm sorry to say that it wasn't a success,
and he lost all his capital. Most unfortunate! Not any relation of
yours, I suppose? The likeness is so great."
"No," said Bryan, "I don't think I've any relations called Wells."
"He was engaged to a very nice girl," said Miss Marple. "Very sensible.
She tried to dissuade him, but
he wouldn't listen to her. He was wrong of course. Women have a lot of
sense, you know, when it
comes to money matters. Not high finance, of course. No woman can hope
to understand that, my dear father said. But every day matters. . . .
What a delightful view you have from this window," she added, making
her way across and looking out.
Emma joined her.
"Such an expanse of parkland! How picturesque the cattle look against
the trees. One would never
dream that one was in the middle of a town."
"We're rather an anachronism, I think," said Emma. "If the windows were
open now you'd hear far off the noise of the traffic."
"Oh, of course," said Miss Marple, "there's noise everywhere, isn't
there? Even in St. Mary Mead.
We're now quite close to an airfield, you know, and really the way
those jet planes fly over. Most frightening. Two panes in my little
greenhouse broken the other day. Going through the sound barrier,
or so I understand, though what it means I never have known."
"It's quite simple, really," said Bryan, approaching amiably. "You see,
it's like this."
Miss Marple dropped her handbag and Bryan politely picked it up. At the
same moment Mrs. McGillicud-dy approached Emma and murmured, in an
anguished voice, and the anguish was quite genuine, since Mrs.
McGillicuddy deeply disliked the task which she was now performing:
"I wonder, could I go upstairs for a moment?" "Of course," said Emma.
"I'll take you," said Lucy.
Lucy and Mrs. McGillicuddy left the room together. "Very cold driving
today," said Miss Marple in a vaguely explanatory manner.
"About the sound barrier," said Bryan, "you see, it's like this—Oh,
hello, there's Quimper."
The doctor drove up in his car. He came in rubbing his hands and
looking very cold.
"Going to snow," he said, "that's my guess. Hello, Emma, how are you?
Good lord, what's all this?"
"We made you a birthday cake," said Emma. "D'you remember? You told me
today was your birthday."
"I didn't expect all this," said Quimper. "You know it's years—why, it
must be, yes, sixteen years—
since anyone's remembered my birthday." He
looked almost uncomfortably touched.
"Do you know Miss Marple?" Emma introduced him.
"Oh yes," said Miss Marple, "I met Doctor Quimper here before and he
came and saw me when I had
a very nasty chill the other day and he was most kind."
"All right again now, I hope?" said the doctor. Miss Marple assured him
that she was quite all right now.
"You haven't been to see me lately, Quimper," said Mr. Crackenthorpe.
"I might be dying for all the notice you take of me!"
"I don't see you dying yet awhile," said Doctor Quimper.
"I don't mean to," said Mr. Crackenthorpe. "Come on, let's have tea.
What're we waiting for?"
"Oh, please," said Miss Marple, "don't wait for my friend. She would be
most upset if you did."
They sat down and started tea. Miss Marple accepted a piece of bread
and butter first, and then went
on to a sandwich.
"Are they—?" She hesitated.
"Fish," said Bryan. "I helped make 'em."
Mr. Crackenthorpe gave a cackle of laughter.
"Poisoned fishpaste," he said. "That's what they are. Eat 'em at your
peril."
"Please, Father!"
"You've got to be careful what you eat in this house," said Mr.
Crackenthorpe to Miss Marple. "Two
of my sons have been murdered like flies. Who's doing it—that's what I
want to know."
"Don't let him put you off," said Cedric, handing the plate once more
to Miss Marple. "A touch of
arsenic improves the complexion, they say, so long as you don't have
too much."
"Eat one yourself, boy," said old Mr. Crackenthorpe.
"Want me to be official taster?" said Cedric. "Here goes."
He took a sandwich and put it whole into his mouth. Miss Marple gave a
gentle, ladylike little laugh and took a sandwich. She took and bite
and said: "I do think it's so brave of you all to make these jokes.
Yes, really, I think it's very brave indeed. I do admire bravery so
much."
She gave a sudden gasp and began to choke. "A fish bone," she gasped
out, "in my throat."
Quimper rose quickly. He went across to her, moved her backwards toward
the window and told her
to open her mouth. He pulled out a case from his pocket, selecting some
forceps from it. With quick professional skill he peered down the old
lady's throat. At that moment the door opened and Mrs. McGillicuddy,
followed by Lucy, came in. Mrs. McGillicuddy gave a sudden gasp as her
eyes fell
on the tableau in front of her; Miss Marple leaning back and the doctor
holding her throat and tilting
up her head.
"But that's him," cried Mrs. McGillicuddy. "That's the man in the
train. . . ."
With incredible swiftness Miss Marple slipped from the doctor's grasp
and came toward her friend.
"I thought you'd recognize him, Elspeth!" she said. "No. Don't say
another word." She turned triumphantly round to Doctor Quimper. "You
didn't know, did you, Doctor, when you strangled that woman in the
train, that somebody actually saw you do it? It was my friend here.
Mrs. McGillicuddy.
She saw you. Do you understand? Saw
you with her own eyes. She was in another train that was
running parallel with yours."
"What the hell—" Doctor Quimper made a quick step toward Mrs.
McGillicuddy but again, swiftly,
Miss Marple was between him and her.
"Yes," said Miss Marple. "She saw you, and she recognizes you, and
she'll swear to it in court. It's not often, I believe," went on Miss
Marple in her gentle plaintive voice, "that anyone actually sees a
murder committed. It's usually circumstantial evidence of course. But
in this case the conditions were very unusual. There was actually an
eye witness to rnurder."
"You devilish old hag," said Doctor Quimper. He lunged forward at Miss
Marple but this time it was Cedric who caught him by the shoulder.
"So you're the murdering devil, are you?" said Cedric as he swung him
round. "I never liked you and
I always thought you were a wrong 'un, but Lord knows, I never
suspected you."
Bryan Eastley came quickly to Cedric's assistance. Inspector Craddock
and Inspector Bacon entered
the room from the farther door.
"Doctor Quimper," said Bacon, "I must caution you that . . ."
"You can take your caution to hell," said, Doctor Quimper. "Do you
think anyone's going to believe
what a couple of batty old women say? Who's ever heard of all this
rigmarole about a train!"
Miss Marple said, "Elspeth McGillicuddy reported the murder to the
police at once on the twentieth of December and gave a description of
the man."
Doctor Quimper gave a sudden heave of the shoulders. "If ever a man had
the devil's own luck," said Doctor Quimper.
"But—" said Mrs. McGillicuddy.
"Be quiet, Elspeth," said Miss Marple.
"Why should I want to murder a perfectly strange woman?" said Doctor
Quimper.
"She wasn't a strange woman," said Inspector Craddock. "She was your
wife."
"So you see," said Miss Marple, "It really turned out to be, as I began
to suspect, very, very simple.
The simplest kind of crime. So many men seem to murder their wives."
Mrs. McGillicuddy looked at Miss Marple and Inspector Craddock. "I'd be
obliged," she said, "if you'd put me a little more up to date."
"He saw a chance, you see," said Miss Marple, "of marrying a rich wife,
Emma Crackenthorpe. Only he couldn't marry her because he had a wife
already. They'd been separated for years but she wouldn't divorce him.
That fitted in very well with what Inspector Craddock told me of this
girl who called herself Anna Stravinska. She had an English husband,
so. she told one of her friends, and it was also said she was a very
devout Catholic. Doctor Quimper couldn't risk marrying Emmabigamously,
so he decided, being a very ruthless and cold-blooded man, that he
would get rid of his wife. The idea of murdering her in the train and
later putting her body in the sarcophagus in the barn was really rather
a clever one. He meant it to tie up, you see, with the Crackenthorpe
family. Before that he'd written a letter to Emma which purported to be
from the girl Martine whom Edmund Crackenthorpe had talked of marrying.
Emma had told Doctor Quimper all about her brother, you see. Then, when
the moment arose he encouraged her to go to the police with the story.
He wanted the dead woman identified as Martine. I think he may have
heard that inquiries were being made by the Paris police about Anna
Stravinska, and so he arranged to have a postcard come from her from
Jamaica.
"It was easy for him to arrange to meet his wife in London, to tell her
that he hoped to be reconciled
with her and that he would like her to come down and 'meet his family.'
We won't talk about the next
part of it, which is very unpleasant to think about. Of course he was a
greedy man. When he thought about taxation, and how much it cuts into
income, he began thinking that it would be nice to have a
good deal more capital. Perhaps he'd already thought of that before he
decided to murder his wife. Anyway he started spreading rumors that
someone was trying to. poison old Mr. Crackenthorpe so as
to get the ground prepared, and then he ended by administering arsenic
to the family. Not too much,
of course, for he didn't want old Mr. Crackenthorpe to die."
"But I still don't see how he managed," said Craddock. "He wasn't in
the house when the curry was
being prepared."
"Oh, but there wasn't any arsenic in the curry then," said Miss Marple.
"He added it to the curry afterward when he took it away to be tested.
He probably put the arsenic in the cocktail jug earlier.
Then of course it was quite easy for him in his role of medical
attendant, to poison off Alfred Crackenthorpe and also to send the
tablets to Harold in London, having safeguarded himself by telling
Harold that he wouldn't need any more tablets. Everything he did was
bold and audacious and cruel and greedy, and I am really very, very
glad," finished Miss Marple, looking as fierce as a fluffy old lady can
look, "that they haven't abolished capital punishment yet because I do
feel that if there is anyone who ought to hang, it's Doctor Quimper."
"Hear, hear," said Inspector Craddock.
"It occurred to me, you know," continued Miss Marple, "that even if you
only see anybody from the
back view, so to speak, nevertheless a back view is characteristic. I
thought that if Elspeth were to see Doctor Quimper in exactly the same
position as she'd seen the man in the train, that is, with his back
to her bent over a woman whom he was holding by the throat, then I was
almost sure she would recognize him, or would make some kind of
startled exclamation. That is why I had to lay my little
plan with Lucy's kind assistance."
"I must say," said Mrs. McGillicuddy, "it gave me quite a turn. I said
'That's him' before I could stop myself. And yet, you know, I hadn't
actually seen the man's face and ..."
"I was terribly afraid that you were going to say so, Elspeth," said
Miss Marple.
"I was," said Mrs. McGillicuddy. "I was going to say that of course I
hadn't seen his face."
"That," said Miss Marple, "would have been quite fatal! You see, dear,
he thought you really did recognize him. I mean, he couldn't know that
you hadn't seen his face."
"A good thing I held my tongue then," said Mrs. McGillicuddy.
"I wasn't going to let you say another word," said Miss Marple.
Craddock laughed suddenly. "You two!" he said. "You're a marvelous
pair. What next, Miss Marple? What's the happy ending? What happens to
poor Emma Crackenthorpe, for instance?"
"She'll get over the doctor, of course," said Miss Marple, "and I dare
say if her father were to die—and I don't think he's quite so robust as
he thinks he is—that she'd go on a cruise or perhaps stay abroad like
Geraldine Webb, and I dare say something might come of it. A nicer man
than Doctor Quimper, I hope."
"What about Lucy Eyelesbarrow? Wedding bells there, too?"
"Perhaps," said Miss Maryle. "I shouldn't wonder."
"Which of 'em is she going to choose?" said Dermot Craddock.
"Don't you know?" said Miss Marple.
"No, I don't," said Craddock. "Do you?"
"Oh yes, I think so," said Miss Marple. And she twinkled at him.