His remarks on the subject of Miss Marple as we left the house were far
from complimentary.
"I really believe that wizened-up old maid thinks she knows everything
there is to know. And hardly been out of this village all her life.
Preposterous. What can she know of life?"
I said mildly that, though doubtless Miss Marple knew next to nothing
of life with a capital L, she knew practically everything that went on
in St. Mary Mead.
Melchett admitted that grudgingly. She was a valuable
witness--particularly valuable from Mrs. Protheroe's point of view.
"I suppose there's no doubt about what she says, eh?"
"If Miss Marple says she had no pistol with her, you can take it for
granted that it is so," I said. "If there was the least possibility of
such a thing, Miss Marple would have been on to it like a knife."
"That's true enough. We'd better go and have a look at the studio."
The so-called studio was a mere rough shed with a skylight. There were
no windows, and the door was the only means of entrance or egress.
Satisfied on this score, Melchett announced his intention of visiting
the Vicarage with the Inspector.
I nodded.
"I'm going to the police station now."
As I entered through the front door, a murmur of voices caught my ear.
I opened the drawing-room door.
On the sofa beside Griselda, conversing animatedly, sat Miss Gladys
Cram. Her legs, which were encased in particularly shiny pink
stockings, were crossed, and I had every opportunity of observing that
she wore pink striped silk knickers.
"Hullo, Len," said Griselda.
"Good morning, Mr. Clement," said Miss Cram. "Isn't the news about the
Colonel reely too awful? Poor old gentleman."
"Miss Cram," said my wife, "very kindly came in to offer to help us
with the Guides. We asked for helpers last Sunday, you remember."
I did remember, and I was convinced, and so, I knew from her tone, was
Griselda, that the idea of enrolling herself among them would never
have occurred to Miss Cram but for the exciting incident which had
taken place at the Vicarage.
"I was only just saying to Mrs. Clement," went on Miss Cram, "you could
have struck me all of a heap when I heard the news. A murder? I said.
In this quiet, one-horse village--for quiet it is, you must admit--not
so much as a picture house, and as for Talkies! And then when I heard
it was Colonel Protheroe--why, I simply couldn't believe it. He didn't
seem the kind, somehow, to get murdered."
I don't know what Miss Cram considers are the necessary qualifications
for being murdered. It has never struck me that the murdered belong to
a special class, but doubtless she had some idea in her golden shingled
head.
"And so," said Griselda, "Miss Cram came round to find out all about
it."
I feared this plain speaking might offend the lady, but she merely
flung her head back and laughed uproariously, showing every tooth she
possessed.
"That's too bad. You're a sharp one, aren't you, Mrs. Clement? But it's
only natural, isn't it, to want to hear the ins and outs of a case like
this? And I'm sure I'm willing enough to help with the Guides in any
way you like. Exciting, that's what it is. I've been stagnating for a
bit of fun. I have; reely I have. Not that my job isn't a very good
one, well paid, and Dr. Stone quite the gentleman in every way. But
a girl wants a bit of life out of office hours, and, except for you,
Mrs. Clement, who is there in the place to talk to, except a lot of old
cats?"
"There's Lettice Protheroe," I said.
Gladys Cram tossed her head.
"She's too high and mighty for the likes of me. Fancies herself the
County, and wouldn't demean herself by noticing a girl who had to
work for her living. Not but what I _did_ hear her talking of earning
her living herself. And who'd employ her, I should like to know? Why,
she'd be fired in less than a week. Unless she went as one of those
mannequins, all dressed up and sidling about. She could do that, I
expect."
"She'd make a very good mannequin," said Griselda. "She's got such a
lovely figure." There's nothing of the cat about Griselda. "When was
she talking of earning her own living?"
Miss Cram seemed momentarily discomfited, but recovered herself with
her usual archness.
"That would be telling, wouldn't it?" she said. "But she did say so.
Things not very happy at home, I fancy. Catch me living at home with a
stepmother. I wouldn't sit down under it for a minute."
"Ah! but you're so high spirited and independent," said Griselda
gravely, and I looked at her with suspicion.
Miss Cram was clearly pleased.
"That's right. That's me all over. Can be led, not driven. A palmist
told me that not so very long ago. No, I'm not one to sit down and be
bullied. And I've made it clear all along to Dr. Stone that I must have
my regular times off. These scientific gentlemen, they think a girl's a
kind of machine--half the time they just don't notice her or remember
she's there."
"Do you find Dr. Stone pleasant to work with? It must be an interesting
job if you are interested in archæology."
"Of course, I don't know much about it," confessed the girl. "It still
seems to me that digging up people that are dead and have been dead
for hundreds of years isn't--well, it seems a bit nosey, doesn't it?
And there's Dr. Stone so wrapped up in it all that half the time he'd
forget his meals if it wasn't for me."
"Is he at the barrow this morning?" asked Griselda.
Miss Cram shook her head.
"A bit under the weather this morning," she explained. "Not up to doing
any work. That means a holiday for little Gladys."
"I'm sorry," I said.
"Oh! it's nothing much. There's not going to be a second death. But
do tell me, Mr. Clement, I hear you've been with the police all the
morning. What do they think?"
"Well," I said slowly. "There is still a little--uncertainty."
"Ah!" cried Miss Cram. "Then they don't think it is Mr. Lawrence
Redding after all. So handsome, isn't he? Just like a movie star. And
such a nice smile when he says good morning to you. I really couldn't
believe my ears when I heard the police had arrested him. Still one
always hears they're very stupid--the country police."
"You can hardly blame them in this instance," I said. "Mr. Redding came
in and gave himself up."
"What?" the girl was clearly dumbfounded. "Well--of all the poor fish!
If I'd committed the murder, I wouldn't go straight off and give myself
up. I should have thought Lawrence Redding would have had more sense.
To give in like that! What did he kill Protheroe for? Did he say? Was
it just a quarrel?"
"It's not absolutely certain that he did kill him," I said.
"But surely--if he says he has--why really, Mr. Clement, he ought to
know."
"He ought to, certainly," I agreed. "But the police are not satisfied
with his story."
"But why should he say he'd done it if he hasn't?"
That was a point on which I had no intention of enlightening Miss Cram.
Instead I said rather vaguely:
"I believe that in all prominent murder cases, the police receive
numerous letters from people accusing themselves of the crime."
Miss Cram's reception of this piece of information was:
"They must be chumps!" in a tone of wonder and scorn.
She added, "I'd never do a thing like that."
"I'm sure you wouldn't," I said.
"Well," she said with a sigh. "I suppose I must be trotting along." She
rose. "Mr. Redding accusing himself of the murder will be a bit of news
for Dr. Stone."
"Is he interested?" asked Griselda.
Miss Cram furrowed her brows perplexedly.
"He's a queer one. You never can tell with him. All wrapped up in the
past. He'd a hundred times rather look at a nasty old bronze knife out
of one of those humps of ground than he would see the knife Crippen cut
up his wife with, supposing he had a chance to."
"Well," I said. "I must confess I agree with him."
Miss Cram's eyes expressed incomprehension and slight contempt. Then,
with reiterated good-byes, she took her departure.
"Not such a bad sort, really," said Griselda as the door closed behind
her. "Terribly common, of course, but one of those big, bouncing,
good-humoured girls that you can't dislike. I wonder what really
brought her here?"
"Curiosity."
"Yes, I suppose so. Now, Len, tell me all about it. I'm simply dying to
hear."
I sat down and recited faithfully all the happenings of the morning,
Griselda interpolating the narrative with little exclamations of
surprise and interest.
"So it was Anne Lawrence was after all along! Not Lettice. How blind
we've all been. That must have been what old Miss Marple was hinting at
yesterday. Don't you think so?"
"Yes," I said, averting my eyes.
Mary entered.
"There's a couple of men here--come from a newspaper, so they say. Do
you want to see them?"
"No," I said. "Certainly not. Refer them to Inspector Slack at the
police station."
Mary nodded and turned away.
"And when you've got rid of them," I said, "come back here. There's
something I want to ask you."
Mary nodded again.
It was some few minutes before she returned.
"Had a job getting rid of them," she said. "Persistent. You never saw
anything like it. Wouldn't take 'no' for an answer."
"I expect we shall be a good deal troubled with them," I said. "Now,
Mary, what I want to ask you is this: Are you quite certain you didn't
hear the shot yesterday evening?"
"The shot that killed him? No, of course I didn't. If I had of done, I
should have gone in to see what had happened."
"Yes, but--" I was remembering Miss Marple's statement that she had
heard a shot "in the wood." I changed the form of my question. "Did you
hear any other shot--one down in the wood, for instance?"
"Oh! that." The girl paused. "Yes, now I come to think of it, I believe
I did. Not a lot of shots, just one. Queer sort of bang it was."
"Exactly," I said. "Now what time was that?"
"Time?"
"Yes, time."
"I couldn't say, I'm sure. Well after tea time. I do know that."
"Can't you get a little nearer than that?"
"No, I can't. I've got my work to do, haven't I? I can't go on looking
at clocks the whole time--and it wouldn't be much good anyway--the
alarm loses a good three quarters every day, and what with putting it
on, and one thing and another, I'm never exactly sure what time it is."
This perhaps explains why our meals are never punctual. They are
sometimes too late and sometimes bewilderingly early.
"Was it long before Mr. Redding came?"
"No, it wasn't long. Ten minutes--a quarter of an hour--not longer than
that."
I nodded my head, satisfied.
"Is that all?" said Mary. "Because what I mean to say is, I've got the
joint in the oven and the pudding boiling over as likely as not."
"That's all right. You can go."
She left the room and I turned to Griselda.
"Is it quite out of the question to induce Mary to say 'sir' or 'm'am'?"
"I have told her. She doesn't remember. She's just a raw girl,
remember."
"I am perfectly aware of that," I said. "But raw things do not
necessarily remain raw forever. I feel a tinge of cooking might be
induced in Mary."
"Well, I don't agree with you," said Griselda. "You know how little we
can afford to pay a servant. If once we got her smartened up at all,
she'd leave. Naturally. And get higher wages. But as long as Mary can't
cook and has these awful manners--well, we're safe; nobody else would
have her."
I perceived that my wife's methods of housekeeping were not so entirely
haphazard as I had imagined. A certain amount of reasoning underlay
them. Whether it was worth while having a maid at the price of her not
being able to cook, and having a habit of throwing dishes and remarks
at one with the same disconcerting abruptness was a debatable matter.
"And anyway," continued Griselda, "you must make allowances for her
manners being worse than usual just now. You can't expect her to feel
exactly sympathetic about Colonel Protheroe's death when he jailed her
young man."
"Did he jail her young man?"
"Yes, for poaching. You know, that man Archer. Mary has been walking
out with him for two years."
"I didn't know that."
"Darling Len, you never know anything."
"It's queer," I said, "that everyone says the shot came from the woods."
"I don't think it's queer at all," said Griselda. "You see, one so
often does hear shots in the wood. So, naturally, when you do hear a
shot, you just assume as a matter of course that it _is_ in the wood.
It probably just sounds a bit louder than usual. Of course, if you were
in the next room, you'd realize that it was in the house, but from
Mary's kitchen, with the window right the other side of the house, I
don't believe you'd ever think of such a thing."
The door opened again.
"Colonel Melchett's back," said Mary. "And that police Inspector with
him, and they say they'd be glad if you'd join them. They're in the
study."