A Murder Is Announced mm-5

by Agatha Christie

  At the very beginning Miss Blacklock had leaped to the conclusion that her nephew Patrick had been behind the insertion of that advertisement. That kind of instinctive belief was often justified, or so Miss Marple believed. Because, if you knew people fairly well, you knew the kind of things they thought of?

  Patrick Simmons?

  A handsome young man. An engaging young man. A young man whom women liked, both young women and old women. The kind of man, perhaps, that Randall Goedler's sister had married. Could Patrick Simmons be 'Pip'? But he'd been in the Navy during the war. The police could soon check up on that.

  Only—sometimes—the most amazing impersonations did happen.

  You could get away with a great deal if you had enough audacity?

  The door opened and Miss Blacklock came in. She looked, Miss Marple thought, many years older. All the life and energy had gone out of her.

  'I'm very sorry, disturbing you like this,' said Miss Marple. 'But the Vicar had a dying parishioner and Bunch had to rush a sick child to hospital. The Vicar wrote you a note.'

  She held it out and Miss Blacklock took it and opened it.

  'Do sit down, Miss Marple,' she said. 'It's very kind of you to have brought this.'

  She read the note through.

  'The Vicar's a very understanding man,' she said quietly. 'He doesn't offer one fatuous consolation?Tell him that these arrangements will do very well. Her—her favourite hymn was Lead Kindly Light.'

  Her voice broke suddenly.

  Miss Marple said gently:

  'I am only a stranger, but I am so very very sorry.'

  And suddenly, uncontrollably, Letitia Blacklock wept. It was a piteous overmastering grief, with a kind of hopelessness about it. Miss Marple sat quite still.

  Miss Blacklock sat up at last. Her face was swollen and blotched with tears.

  'I'm sorry,' she said. 'It—it just came over me. What I've lost. She—she was the only link with the past, you see. The only one who—who remembered. Now that she's gone I'm quite alone.'

  'I know what you mean,' said Miss Marple. 'One is alone when the last one who remembers is gone. I have nephews and nieces and kind friends—but there's no one who knew me as a young girl—no one who belongs to the old days. I've been alone for quite a long time now.'

  Both women sat silent for some moments.

  'You understand very well,' said Letitia Blacklock. She rose and went over to her desk. 'I must write a few words to the Vicar.' She held the pen rather awkwardly and wrote slowly.

  'Arthritic,' she explained. 'Sometimes I can hardly write at all.'

  She sealed up the envelope and addressed it.

  'If you wouldn't mind taking it, it would be very kind.'

  Hearing a man's voice in the hall she said quickly:

  'That's Inspector Craddock.'

  She went to the mirror over the fireplace and applied a small powder puff to her face.

  Craddock came in with a grim, angry face.

  He looked at Miss Marple with disapprobation.

  'Oh,' he said. 'So you're here.'

  Miss Blacklock turned from the mantelpiece.

  'Miss Marple kindly came up with a note from the Vicar.'

  Miss Marple said in a flurried manner:

  'I am going at once—at once. Please don't let me hamper you in any way.'

  'Were you at the tea party here yesterday afternoon?'

  Miss Marple said, nervously:

  'No-no, I wasn't. Bunch drove me over to call on some friends.'

  'Then there's nothing you can tell me.' Craddock held the door open in a pointed manner, and Miss Marple scuttled out in a somewhat abashed fashion.

  'Nosey Parkers, these old women,' said Craddock.

  'I think you're being unfair to her,' said Miss Blacklock. 'She really did come with a note from the Vicar.'

  'I bet she did.'

  'I don't think it was idle curiosity.'

  'Well, perhaps you're right, Miss Blacklock, but my own diagnosis would be a severe attack of Nosey Parker it is?'

  'She's a very harmless old creature,' said Miss Blacklock.

  'Dangerous as a rattlesnake if you only knew,' the Inspector thought grimly. But he had no intention of taking anyone into his confidence unnecessarily. Now that he knew definitely there was a killer at large, he felt that the less said the better. He didn't want the next person bumped off to be Jane Marple.

  Somewhere—a killer?Where?

  'I won't waste time offering sympathy, Miss Blacklock,' he said. 'As a matter of fact I feel pretty bad about Miss Bunner's death. We ought to have been able to prevent it.'

  'I don't see what you could have done.'

  'No—well, it wouldn't have been easy. But now we've got to work fast. Who's doing this, Miss Blacklock? Who's had two shots at killing you, and will probably, if we don't work fast enough, soon have another?'

  Letitia Blacklock shivered. 'I don't know, Inspector—I don't know at all!'

  'I've checked up with Mrs Goedler. She's given me all the help she can. It wasn't very much. There are just a few people who would definitely profit by your death. First Pip and Emma. Patrick and Julia Simmons are the right age, but their background seems clear enough. Anyway, we can't concentrate on these two alone. Tell me, Miss Blacklock, would you recognize Sonia Goedler if you saw her?'

  'Recognize Sonia? Why, of course—' She stopped suddenly. 'No,' she said slowly, 'I don't know that I would. It's a long time. Thirty years?She'd be an elderly woman now.'

  'What was she like when you remember her?'

  'Sonia?' Miss Blacklock considered for some moments. 'She was rather small, dark?'

  'Any special peculiarities? Mannerisms?'

  'No-no, I don't think so. She was gay—very gay.'

  'She mayn't be so gay now,' said the Inspector. 'Have you got a photograph of her?'

  'Of Sonia? Let me see—not a proper photograph. I've got some old snapshots—in an album somewhere—at least I think there's one of her.'

  'Ah. Can I have a look at it?'

  'Yes, of course. Now where did I put that album?'

  'Tell me, Miss Blacklock, do you consider it remotely possible that Mrs Swettenham might be Sonia Goedler?'

  'Mrs Swettenham?' Miss Blacklock looked at him in lively atonishment. 'But her husband was in the Government Service—in India first, I think, and then in Hong Kong.'

  'What you mean is, that that's the story she's told you. You don't, as we say in the Courts, know it of your own knowledge, do you?'

  'No,' said Miss Blacklock slowly. 'When you put it like that, I don't?But Mrs Swettenham? Oh, it's absurd!'

  'Did Sonia Goedler ever do any acting? Amateur theatricals?'

  'Oh, yes. She was good.'

  'There you are! Another thing, Mrs Swettenham wears a wig. At least,' the Inspector corrected himself, 'Mrs Harmon says she does.'

  'Yes-yes, I suppose it might be a wig. All those little grey curls. But I still think it's absurd. She's really very nice and exceedingly funny sometimes.'

  'Then there's Miss Hinchcliffe and Miss Murgatroyd. Could either of them be Sonia Goedler?'

  'Miss Hinchcliffe is too tall. She's as tall as a man.'

  'Miss Murgatroyd then?'

  'Oh, but—oh no, I'm sure Miss Murgatroyd couldn't be Sonia.'

  'You don't see very well, do you, Miss Blacklock?'

  'I'm shortsighted; is that what you mean?'

  'Yes. What I'd like to see is a snapshot of this Sonia Goedler, even if it's a long time ago and not a good likeness. We're trained, you know, to pick out resemblances, in a way no amateur can ever do.'

  'I'll try and find it for you.'

  'Now?'

  'What, at once?'

  'I'd prefer it.'

  'Very well. Now, let me see. I saw that album when we were tidying a lot of books out of the cupboard. Julia was helping me. She laughed, I remember, at the clothes we used to wear in those days?The books we put in the shelf in the drawing-room. Where did w
e put the albums and the big bound volumes of the Art Journal? What a wretched memory I have! Perhaps Julia will remember. She's at home today.'

  'I'll find her.'

  The Inspector departed on his quest. He did not find Julia in any of the downstairs rooms. Mitzi, asked where Miss Simmons was, said crossly that it was not her affair.

  'Me! I stay in my kitchen and concern myself with the lunch. And nothing do I eat that I have not cooked myself. Nothing, do you hear?'

  The Inspector called up the stairs 'Miss Simmons,' and getting no response, went up.

  He met Julia face to face just as he turned the corner of the landing. She had just emerged from a door that showed behind it a small twisty staircase.

  'I was up in the attic,' she explained. 'What is it?'

  Inspector Craddock explained.

  'Those old photograph albums? Yes, I remember them quite well. We put them in the big cupboard in the study, I think. I'll find them for you.'

  She led the way downstairs and pushed open the study door. Near the window there was a large cupboard. Julia pulled it open and disclosed a heterogenous mass of objects.

  'Junk,' said Julia. 'All junk. But elderly people simply will not throw things away.'

  The Inspector knelt down and took a couple of old-fashioned albums from the bottom shelf.

  'Are these they?'

  'Yes.'

  Miss Blacklock came in and joined them.

  'Oh, so that's where we put them. I couldn't remember.'

  Craddock had the books on the table and was turning the pages.

  Women in large cartwheel hats, women with dresses tapering down to their feet so that they could hardly walk. The photos had captions neatly printed underneath them, but the ink was old and faded.

  'It would be in this one,' said Miss Blacklock. 'On about the second or third page. The other book is after Sonia had married and gone away.' She turned a page. 'It ought to be here.' She stopped.

  There were several empty spaces on the page. Craddock bent down and deciphered the faded writing. 'Sonia?Self?R.G.' A little further along, 'Sonia and Belle on beach'. And again on the opposite page, 'Picnic at Skeyne'. He turned over another page, 'Charlotte, Self, Sonia, R.G.'

  Craddock stood up. His lips were grim.

  'Somebody has removed these photographs—not long ago, I should say.'

  'There weren't any blank spaces when we looked at them the other day. Were there, Julia?'

  'I didn't look very closely—only at some of the dresses. But no?you're right, Aunt Letty, there weren't any blank spaces.'

  Craddock looked grimmer still.

  'Somebody,' he said, 'has removed every photo of Sonia Goedler from this album.'

  Chapter 18. The Letters

  'Sorry to worry you again, Mrs Haymes.'

  'It doesn't matter,' said Phillipa coldly.

  'Shall we go into this room here?'

  'The study? Yes, if you like, Inspector. It's very cold. There's no fire.'

  'It doesn't matter. It's not for long. And we're not so likely to be overheard here.'

  'Does that matter?'

  'Not to me, Mrs Haymes. It might to you.'

  'What do you mean?'

  'I think you told me, Mrs Haymes, that your husband was killed fighting in Italy?'

  'Well?'

  'Wouldn't it have been simpler to have told me the truth—that he was a deserter from his regiment.'

  He saw her face grow white, and her hands close and unclose themselves.

  She said bitterly:

  'Do you have to rake up everything?'

  Craddock said dryly:

  'We expect people to tell us the truth about themselves.'

  She was silent. Then she said:

  'Well?'

  'What do you mean by "Well?", Mrs Haymes?'

  'I mean, what are you going to do about it? Tell everybody? Is that necessary—or fair—or kind?'

  'Does nobody know?'

  'Nobody here. Harry'—her voice changed—'my son, he doesn't know. I don't want him to know. I don't want him to know—ever.'

  'Then let me tell you that you're taking a very big risk, Mrs Haymes. When the boy is old enough to understand, tell him the truth. If he finds out by himself some day—it won't be good for him. If you go on stuffing him up with tales of his father dying like a hero—'

  'I don't do that. I'm not completely dishonest. I just don't talk about it. His father was—killed in the war. After all, that's what it amounts to—for us.'

  'But your husband is still alive?'

  'Perhaps. How should I know?'

  'When did you see him last, Mrs Haymes?'

  Phillipa said quickly:

  'I haven't seen him for years.'

  'Are you quite sure that's true? You didn't, for instance, see him about a fortnight ago?'

  'What are you suggesting?'

  'It never seemed to me very likely that you met Rudi Scherz in the summerhouse here. But Mitzi's story was very emphatic. I suggest, Mrs Haymes, that the man you came back from work to meet that morning was your husband.'

  'I didn't meet anybody in the summerhouse.'

  'He was hard up for money, perhaps, and you supplied him with some?'

  'I've not seen him, I tell you. I didn't meet anybody in the summerhouse.'

  'Deserters are often rather desperate men. They often take part in robberies, you know. Hold-ups. Things of that kind. And they have foreign revolvers very often that they've brought back from abroad.'

  'I don't know where my husband is. I haven't seen him for years.'

  'Is that your last word, Mrs Haymes?'

  'I've nothing else to say.'

  ***

  Craddock came away from his interview with Phillipa Haymes feeling angry and baffled.

  'Obstinate as a mule,' he said to himself angrily.

  He was fairly sure that Phillipa was lying, but he hadn't succeeded in breaking down her obstinate denials.

  He wished he knew a little more about ex-Captain Haymes. His information was meagre. An unsatisfactory Army record, but nothing to suggest that Haymes was likely to turn criminal.

  And anyway Haymes didn't fit in with the oiled door.

  Someone in the house had done that, or someone with easy access to it.

  He stood looking up the staircase, and suddenly he wondered what Julia had been doing up in the attic. An attic, he thought, was an unlikely place for the fastidious Julia to visit.

  What had she been doing up there?

  He ran lightly up to the first floor. There was no one about. He opened the door out of which Julia had come and went up the narrow stairs to the attic.

  There were trunks there, old suitcases, various broken articles of furniture, a chair with a leg off, a broken china lamp, part of an old dinner service.

  He turned to the trunks and opened the lid of one.

  Clothes. Old-fashioned, quite good-quality women's clothes. Clothes belonging, he supposed, to Miss Blacklock, or to her sister who had died.

  He opened another trunk.

  Curtains.

  He passed to a small attaché-case. It had papers in it and letters. Very old letters, yellowed with time.

  He looked at the outside of the case which had the initials C.L.B. on it. He deduced correctly that it had belonged to Letitia's sister Charlotte. He unfolded one of the letters. It began

  Dearest Charlotte.

  Yesterday Belle felt well enough to go for a picnic. R.G. also took a day off. The Asvogel flotation has gone splendidly, R.G. is terribly pleased about it. The Preference shares are at a premium.

  He skipped the rest and looked at the signature:

  Your loving sister, Letitia.

  He picked up another.

  Darling Charlotte.

  I wish you would sometimes make up your mind to see people. You do exaggerate, you know. It isn't nearly as bad as you think. And people really don't mind things like that. It's not the disfigurement you think it is.

&nb
sp; He nodded his head. He remembered Belle Goedler saying that Charlotte Blacklock had a disfigurement or deformity of some kind. Letitia had, in the end, resigned her job, to go and look after her sister. These letters all breathed the anxious spirit of her affection and love for an invalid. She had written her sister, apparently, long accounts of everyday happenings, of any little detail that she thought might interest the sick girl. And Charlotte had kept these letters. Occasionally odd snapshots had been enclosed.

  Excitement suddenly flooded Craddock's mind. Here, it might be, he would find a clue. In these letters there would be written down things that Letitia Blacklock herself had long forgotten. Here was a faithful picture of the past and somewhere amongst it, there might be a clue that would help him to identify the unknown. Photographs, too. There might, just possibly, be a photograph of Sonia Goedler here that the person who had taken the other photos out of the album did not know about.

  Inspector Craddock packed the letters up again, carefully, closed the case, and started down the stairs.

  Letitia Blacklock, standing on the landing below, looked at him in amazement.

  'Was that you up in the attic? I heard footsteps. I couldn't imagine who—'

  'Miss Blacklock, I have found some letters here, written by you to your sister Charlotte many years ago. Will you allow me to take them away and read them?'

  She flushed angrily.

  'Must you do a thing like that? Why? What good can they be to you?'

  'They might give me a picture of Sonia Goedler, of her character—there may be some allusion—some incident—that will help.'

  'They are private letters, Inspector.'

  'I know.'

  'I suppose you will take them anyway?You have the power to do so, I suppose, or you can easily get it. Take them—take them! But you'll find very little about Sonia. She married and went away only a year or two after I began to work for Randall Goedler.'

  Craddock said obstinately:

  'There may be something.' He added, 'We've got to try everything. I assure you the danger is very real.'