Murder at the Vicarage

  “I was there all right. Fancy your not seeing me. Didn’t you see me? I feel a bit hurt about that. Yes, I do. A gentleman, even if he is a clergyman, ought to have eyes in his head.”

  “Were you present also?” I asked Dr. Stone, in an effort to escape from this playful badinage. Young women like Miss Cram always make me feel awkward.

  “No, I’m afraid I feel very little interest in such things. I am a man very wrapped up in his own hobby.”

  “It must be a very interesting hobby,” I said.

  “You know something of it, perhaps?”

  I was obliged to confess that I knew next to nothing.

  Dr. Stone was not the kind of man whom a confession of ignorance daunts. The result was exactly the same as though I had said that the excavation of barrows was my only relaxation. He surged and eddied into speech. Long barrows, round barrows, stone age, bronze age, paleolithic, neolithic kistvaens and cromlechs, it burst forth in a torrent. I had little to do save nod my head and look intelligent—and that last is perhaps over optimistic. Dr. Stone boomed on. He was a little man. His head was round and bald, his face was round and rosy, and he beamed at you through very strong glasses. I have never known a man so enthusiastic on so little encouragement. He went into every argument for and against his own pet theory—which, by the way, I quite failed to grasp!

  He detailed at great length his difference of opinion with Colonel Protheroe.

  “An opinionated boor,” he said with heat. “Yes, yes, I know he is dead, and one should speak no ill of the dead. But death does not alter facts. An opinionated boor describes him exactly. Because he had read a few books, he set himself up as an authority—against a man who has made a lifelong study of the subject. My whole life, Mr. Clement, has been given up to this work. My whole life—”

  He was spluttering with excitement. Gladys Cram brought him back to earth with a terse sentence.

  “You’ll miss your train if you don’t look out,” she observed.

  “Oh!” The little man stopped in mid speech and dragged a watch from his pocket. “Bless my soul. Quarter to? Impossible.”

  “Once you start talking you never remember the time. What you’d do without me to look after you, I really don’t know.”

  “Quite right, my dear, quite right.” He patted her affectionately on the shoulder. “This is a wonderful girl, Mr. Clement. Never forgets anything. I consider myself extremely lucky to have found her.”

  “Oh! Go on, Dr. Stone,” said the lady. “You spoil me, you do.”

  I could not help feeling that I should be in a material position to add my support to the second school of thought—that which foresees lawful matrimony as the future of Dr. Stone and Miss Cram. I imagined that in her own way Miss Cram was rather a clever young woman.

  “You’d better be getting along,” said Miss Cram.

  “Yes, yes, so I must.”

  He vanished into the room next door and returned carrying a suitcase.

  “You are leaving?” I asked in some surprise.

  “Just running up to town for a couple of days,” he explained. “My old mother to see tomorrow, some business with my lawyers on Monday. On Tuesday I shall return. By the way, I suppose that Colonel Protheroe’s death will make no difference to our arrangements. As regards the barrow, I mean. Mrs. Protheroe will have no objection to our continuing the work?”

  “I should not think so.”

  As he spoke, I wondered who actually would be in authority at Old Hall. It was just possible that Protheroe might have left it to Lettice. I felt that it would be interesting to know the contents of Protheroe’s will.

  “Causes a lot of trouble in a family, a death does,” remarked Miss Cram, with a kind of gloomy relish. “You wouldn’t believe what a nasty spirit there sometimes is.”

  “Well, I must really be going.” Dr. Stone made ineffectual attempts to control the suitcase, a large rug and an unwieldy umbrella. I came to his rescue. He protested.

  “Don’t trouble—don’t trouble. I can manage perfectly. Doubtless there will be somebody downstairs.”

  But down below there was no trace of a boots or anyone else. I suspect that they were being regaled at the expense of the Press. Time was getting on, so we set out together to the station, Dr. Stone carrying the suitcase, and I holding the rug and umbrella.

  Dr. Stone ejaculated remarks in between panting breaths as we hurried along.

  “Really too good of you—didn’t mean—to trouble you … Hope we shan’t miss—the train—Gladys is a good girl—really a wonderful girl—a very sweet nature—not too happy at home, I’m afraid—absolutely—the heart of a child—heart of a child. I do assure you, in spite of—difference in our ages—find a lot in common….”

  We saw Lawrence Redding’s cottage just as we turned off to the station. It stands in an isolated position with no other houses near it. I observed two young men of smart appearance standing on the doorstep and a couple more peering in at the windows. It was a busy day for the Press.

  “Nice fellow, young Redding,” I remarked, to see what my companion would say.

  He was so out of breath by this time that he found it difficult to say anything, but he puffed out a word which I did not at first quite catch.

  “Dangerous,” he gasped, when I asked him to repeat his remark.

  “Dangerous?”

  “Most dangerous. Innocent girls—know no better—taken in by a fellow like that—always hanging round women … No good.”

  From which I deduced that the only young man in the village had not passed unnoticed by the fair Gladys.

  “Goodness,” ejaculated Dr. Stone. “The train!”

  We were close to the station by this time and we broke into a fast sprint. A down train was standing in the station and the up London train was just coming in.

  At the door of the booking office we collided with a rather exquisite young man, and I recognized Miss Marple’s nephew just arriving. He is, I think, a young man who does not like to be collided with. He prides himself on his poise and general air of detachment, and there is no doubt that vulgar contact is detrimental to poise of any kind. He staggered back. I apologized hastily and we passed in. Dr. Stone climbed on the train and I handed up his baggage just as the train gave an unwilling jerk and started.

  I waved to him and then turned away. Raymond West had departed, but our local chemist, who rejoices in the name of Cherubim, was just setting out for the village. I walked beside him.

  “Close shave that,” he observed. “Well, how did the inquest go, Mr. Clement?”

  I gave him the verdict.

  “Oh! So that’s what happened. I rather thought that would be the verdict. Where’s Dr. Stone off to?”

  I repeated what he had told me.

  “Lucky not to miss the train. Not that you ever know on this line. I tell you, Mr. Clement, it’s a crying shame. Disgraceful, that’s what I call it. Train I came down by was ten minutes late. And that on a Saturday with no traffic to speak of. And on Wednesday—no, Thursday—yes, Thursday it was—I remember it was the day of the murder because I meant to write a strongly-worded complaint to the company—and the murder put it out of my head—yes, last Thursday. I had been to a meeting of the Pharmaceutical Society. How late do you think the 6:50 was? Half an hour. Half an hour exactly! What do you think of that? Ten minutes I don’t mind. But if the train doesn’t get in till twenty past seven, well, you can’t get home before half past. What I say is, why call it the 6:50?”

  “Quite so,” I said, and wishing to escape from the monologue I broke away with the excuse that I had something to say to Lawrence Redding whom I saw approaching us on the other side of the road.

  Nineteen

  “Very glad to have met you,” said Lawrence. “Come to my place.”

  We turned in at the little rustic gate, went up the path, and he drew a key from his pocket and inserted it in the lock.

  “You keep the door locked now,” I observed.

 
“Yes.” He laughed rather bitterly. “Case of stable door when the steed is gone, eh? It is rather like that. You know, padre,” he held the door open and I passed inside, “there’s something about all this business that I don’t like. It’s too much of—how shall I put it—an inside job. Someone knew about that pistol of mine. That means that the murderer, whoever he was, must have actually been in this house—perhaps even had a drink with me.”

  “Not necessarily,” I objected. “The whole village of St. Mary Mead probably knows exactly where you keep your toothbrush and what kind of tooth powder you use.”

  “But why should it interest them?”

  “I don’t know,” I said, “but it does. If you change your shaving cream it will be a topic of conversation.”

  “They must be very hard up for news.”

  “They are. Nothing exciting ever happens here.”

  “Well, it has now—with a vengeance.”

  I agreed.

  “And who tells them all these things anyway? Shaving cream and things like that?”

  “Probably old Mrs. Archer.”

  “That old crone? She’s practically a half-wit, as far as I can make out.”

  “That’s merely the camouflage of the poor,” I explained. “They take refuge behind a mask of stupidity. You’ll probably find that the old lady has all her wits about her. By the way, she seems very certain now that the pistol was in its proper place midday Thursday. What’s made her so positive all of a sudden?”

  “I haven’t the least idea.”

  “Do you think she’s right?”

  “There again I haven’t the least idea. I don’t go round taking an inventory of my possessions every day.”

  I looked round the small living room. Every shelf and table was littered with miscellaneous articles. Lawrence lived in the midst of an artistic disarray that would have driven me quite mad.

  “It’s a bit of a job finding things sometimes,” he said, observing my glance. “On the other hand, everything is handy—not tucked away.”

  “Nothing is tucked away, certainly,” I agreed. “It might perhaps have been better if the pistol had been.”

  “Do you know I rather expected the coroner to say something of the sort. Coroners are such asses. I expected to be censured or whatever they call it.”

  “By the way,” I asked, “was it loaded?”

  Lawrence shook his head.

  “I’m not quite so careless as that. It was unloaded, but there was a box of cartridges beside it.”

  “It was apparently loaded in all six chambers and one shot had been fired.”

  Lawrence nodded.

  “And whose hand fired it? It’s all very well, sir, but unless the real murderer is discovered I shall be suspected of the crime to the day of my death.”

  “Don’t say that, my boy.”

  “But I do say it.”

  He became silent, frowning to himself. He roused himself at last and said:

  “But let me tell you how I got on last night. You know, old Miss Marple knows a thing or two.”

  “She is, I believe, rather unpopular on that account.”

  Lawrence proceeded to recount his story.

  He had, following Miss Marple’s advice, gone up to Old Hall. There, with Anne’s assistance, he had had an interview with the parlourmaid. Anne had said simply:

  “Mr. Redding wants to ask you a few questions, Rose.”

  Then she had left the room.

  Lawrence had felt somewhat nervous. Rose, a pretty girl of twenty-five, gazed at him with a limpid gaze which he found rather disconcerting.

  “It’s—it’s about Colonel Protheroe’s death.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “I’m very anxious, you see, to get at the truth.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “I feel that there may be—that someone might—that—that there might be some incident—”

  At this point Lawrence felt that he was not covering himself with glory, and heartily cursed Miss Marple and her suggestions.

  “I wondered if you could help me?”

  “Yes, sir?”

  Rose’s demeanour was still that of the perfect servant, polite, anxious to assist, and completely uninterested.

  “Dash it all,” said Lawrence, “haven’t you talked the thing over in the servants’ hall?”

  This method of attack flustered Rose slightly. Her perfect poise was shaken.

  “In the servants’ hall, sir?”

  “Or the housekeeper’s room, or the bootboy’s dugout, or wherever you do talk? There must be some place.”

  Rose displayed a very faint disposition to giggle, and Lawrence felt encouraged.

  “Look here, Rose, you’re an awfully nice girl. I’m sure you must understand what I’m feeling like. I don’t want to be hanged. I didn’t murder your master, but a lot of people think I did. Can’t you help me in any way?”

  I can imagine at this point that Lawrence must have looked extremely appealing. His handsome head thrown back, his Irish blue eyes appealing. Rose softened and capitulated.

  “Oh, sir! I’m sure—if any of us could help in any way. None of us think you did it, sir. Indeed we don’t.”

  “I know, my dear girl, but that’s not going to help me with the police.”

  “The police!” Rose tossed her head. “I can tell you, sir, we don’t think much of that Inspector. Slack, he calls himself. The police indeed.”

  “All the same, the police are very powerful. Now, Rose, you say you’ll do your best to help me. I can’t help feeling that there’s a lot we haven’t got yet. The lady, for instance, who called to see Colonel Protheroe the night before he died.”

  “Mrs. Lestrange?”

  “Yes, Mrs. Lestrange. I can’t help feeling there’s something rather odd about that visit of hers.”

  “Yes, indeed, sir, that’s what we all said.”

  “You did?”

  “Coming the way she did. And asking for the Colonel. And of course there’s been a lot of talk—nobody knowing anything about her down here. And Mrs. Simmons, she’s the housekeeper, sir, she gave it as her opinion that she was a regular bad lot. But after hearing what Gladdie said, well, I didn’t know what to think.”

  “What did Gladdie say?”

  “Oh, nothing, sir! It was just—we were talking, you know.”

  Lawrence looked at her. He had the feeling of something kept back.

  “I wonder very much what her interview with Colonel Protheroe was about.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “I believe you know, Rose?”

  “Me? Oh, no, sir! Indeed I don’t. How could I?”

  “Look here, Rose. You said you’d help me. If you overheard anything, anything at all—it mightn’t seem important, but anything … I’d be so awfully grateful to you. After all, anyone might—might chance—just chance to overhear something.”

  “But I didn’t, sir, really, I didn’t.”

  “Then somebody else did,” said Lawrence acutely.

  “Well, sir—”

  “Do tell me, Rose.”

  “I don’t know what Gladdie would say, I’m sure.”

  “She’d want you to tell me. Who is Gladdie, by the way?”

  “She’s the kitchenmaid, sir. And you see, she’d just stepped out to speak to a friend, and she was passing the window—the study window—and the master was there with the lady. And of course he did speak very loud, the master did, always. And naturally, feeling a little curious—I mean—”

  “Awfully natural,” said Lawrence, “I mean one would simply have to listen.”

  “But of course she didn’t tell anyone—except me. And we both thought it very odd. But Gladdie couldn’t say anything, you see, because if it was known she’d gone out to meet—a—a friend—well, it would have meant a lot of unpleasantness with Mrs. Pratt, that’s the cook, sir. But I’m sure she’d tell you anything, sir, willing.”

  “Well, can I go to the kitchen and speak to her?”
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  Rose was horrified by the suggestion.

  “Oh, no, sir, that would never do! And Gladdie’s a very nervous girl anyway.”

  At last the matter was settled, after a lot of discussion over difficult points. A clandestine meeting was arranged in the shrubbery.

  Here, in due course, Lawrence was confronted by the nervous Gladdie who he described as more like a shivering rabbit than anything human. Ten minutes were spent in trying to put the girl at her ease, the shivering Gladys explaining that she couldn’t ever—that she didn’t ought, that she didn’t think Rose would have given her away, that anyway she hadn’t meant no harm, indeed she hadn’t, and that she’d catch it badly if Mrs. Pratt ever came to hear of it.

  Lawrence reassured, cajoled, persuaded—at last Gladys consented to speak. “If you’ll be sure it’ll go no further, sir.”

  “Of course it won’t.”

  “And it won’t be brought up against me in a court of law?”

  “Never.”

  “And you won’t tell the mistress?”

  “Not on any account.”

  “If it were to get to Mrs. Pratt’s ears—”

  “It won’t. Now tell me, Gladys.”

  “If you’re sure it’s all right?”

  “Of course it is. You’ll be glad some day you’ve saved me from being hanged.”

  Gladys gave a little shriek.

  “Oh! Indeed, I wouldn’t like that, sir. Well, it’s very little I heard—and that entirely by accident as you might say—”

  “I quite understand.”

  “But the master, he was evidently very angry. ‘After all these years’—that’s what he was saying—‘you dare to come here—’ ‘It’s an outrage—’ I couldn’t hear what the lady said—but after a bit he said, ‘I utterly refuse—utterly—’ I can’t remember everything—seemed as though they were at it hammer and tongs, she wanting him to do something and he refusing. ‘It’s a disgrace that you should have come down here,’ that’s one thing he said. And ‘You shall not see her—I forbid it—’ and that made me prick up my ears. Looked as though the lady wanted to tell Mrs. Protheroe a thing or two, and he was afraid about it. And I thought to myself, ‘Well, now, fancy the master. Him so particular. And maybe no beauty himself when all’s said and done. Fancy!’ I said. And ‘Men are all alike,’ I said to my friend later. Not that he’d agree. Argued, he did. But he did admit he was surprised at Colonel Protheroe—him being a churchwarden and handing round the plate and reading the lessons on Sundays. ‘But there,’ I said, ‘that’s very often the worst.’ For that’s what I’ve heard my mother say, many a time.”