“Oh, that’s very kind of you,” said Miss Marple. “Really very kind, but I’m sure—I mean, you know it was just a two-day visit. I meant originally to go off with the coach. I mean, after the two days. If it hadn’t been for this very, very tragic accident but—well, I really felt I couldn’t go on any longer. I thought I must have at least, well at least one night’s rest.”
“But I mean it would be so much better if you came to us. We’d try and make you comfortable.”
“Oh, there’s no question of that,” said Miss Marple. “I was extremely comfortable staying with you. Oh yes, I did enjoy it very much. Such a beautiful house. And all your things are so nice. You know, your china and glass and furniture. It’s such a pleasure to be in a home and not a hotel.”
“Then you must come with me now. Yes, you really must. I could go and pack your things for you.”
“Oh—well, that’s very kind of you. I can do that myself.”
“Well, shall I come and help you?”
“That would be very kind,” said Miss Marple.
They repaired to her bedroom where Anthea, in a somewhat slapdash manner, packed Miss Marple’s belongings together. Miss Marple, who had her own ways of folding things, had to bite her lip to keep an air of complacency on her face. Really, she thought, she can’t fold anything properly.
Anthea got hold of a porter from the hotel and he carried the suitcase round the corner and down the street to The Old Manor House. Miss Marple tipped him adequately and, still uttering fussy little speeches of thanks and pleasure, rejoined the sisters.
“The Three Sisters!” she was thinking, “here we are again.” She sat down in the drawing room, and closed her eyes for a minute, breathing rather fast. She appeared to be somewhat out of breath. It was only natural, she felt at her age, and after all Anthea and the hotel porter had set a fast pace. But really she was trying to acquire through her closed eyes what the feeling was she had on coming into this house again. Was something in it sinister? No, not so much sinister as unhappy. Deep unhappiness. So much so it was almost frightening.
She opened her eyes again and looked at the two other occupants of the room. Mrs. Glynne had just come in from the kitchen, bearing an afternoon tea tray. She looked as she had looked all along. Comfortable, no particular emotions or feelings. Perhaps almost too devoid of them, Miss Marple thought. Had she accustomed herself, through perhaps a life of some stress and difficulty, to show nothing to the outer world, to keep a reserve and let no one know what her inner feelings were?
She looked from her to Clotilde. She had a Clytemnestra look, as she had thought before. She had certainly not murdered her husband for she had never had a husband to murder and it seemed unlikely that she had murdered the girl to whom she was said to have been extremely attached. That, Miss Marple was quite sure, was true. She had seen before how the tears had welled from Clotilde’s eyes when the death of Verity had been mentioned.
And what about Anthea? Anthea had taken that cardboard box to the post office. Anthea had come to fetch her. Anthea—she was very doubtful about Anthea. Scatty? Too scatty for her age. Eyes that wandered and came back to you. Eyes that seemed to see things that other people might not see, over your shoulder. She’s frightened, thought Miss Marple. Frightened of something. What was she frightened of? Was she perhaps a mental case of some kind? Frightened perhaps of going back to some institution or establishment where she might have spent part of her life? Frightened of those two sisters of hers feeling that it was unwise for her to remain at liberty? Were they uncertain, those two, what their sister Anthea might do or say?
There was some atmosphere here. She wondered, as she sipped the last of her tea, what Miss Cooke and Miss Barrow were doing. Had they gone to visit that church or was that all talk, meaningless talk? It was odd. Odd the way they had come and looked at her at St. Mary Mead so as to know her again on the coach, but not to acknowledge that they had ever seen or met her before.
There were quite a lot of difficult things going on. Presently Mrs. Glynne removed the tea tray, Anthea went out into the garden and Miss Marple was left alone with Clotilde.
“I think,” said Miss Marple, “that you know an Archdeacon Brabazon, do you not?”
“Oh yes,” said Clotilde, “he was in church yesterday at the service. Do you know him?”
“Oh no,” said Miss Marple, “but he did come to the Golden Boar and he came and spoke to me there. I gather he had been to the hospital and was enquiring about poor Miss Temple’s death. He wondered if Miss Temple had sent any message to him. I gather she was thinking of paying him a visit. But of course I told him that although I did go there in case I could do anything there was nothing that could be done except sit by poor Miss Temple’s bed. She was unconscious, you know. I could have done nothing to help her.”
“She didn’t say—say anything—any explanation of what had happened?” asked Clotilde.
She asked without much interest. Miss Marple wondered if she felt more interest than she expressed, but on the whole she thought not. She thought Clotilde was busy with thoughts of something quite different.
“Do you think it was an accident?” Miss Marple asked, “Or do you think there is something in that story that Mrs. Riseley-Porter’s niece told? About seeing someone pushing a boulder.”
“Well, I suppose if those two said so, they must have seen it.”
“Yes. They both said so, didn’t they,” said Miss Marple, “though not quite in the same terms. But perhaps that’s quite natural.”
Clotilde looked at her curiously.
“You seem to be intrigued by that.”
“Well, it seems so very unlikely,” said Miss Marple, “an unlikely story, unless—”
“Unless what?”
“Well, I just wondered,” said Miss Marple.
Mrs. Glynne came into the room again.
“You just wondered what?” she asked.
“We’re talking about the accident, or the nonaccident,” said Clotilde.
“But who—”
“It seems a very odd story that they told,” said Miss Marple again.
“There’s something about this place,” said Clotilde suddenly. “Something about this atmosphere. We never got over it here. Never. Never since—since Verity died. It’s years but it doesn’t go away. A shadow’s here.” She looked at Miss Marple. “Don’t you think so too? Don’t you feel a shadow here?”
“Well, I’m a stranger,” said Miss Marple. “It’s different for you and your sisters who’ve lived here and who knew the dead girl. She was, I gather, as Archdeacon Brabazon was saying—a very charming and beautiful girl.”
“She was a lovely girl. A dear child too,” said Clotilde.
“I wish I’d known her better,” said Mrs. Glynne. “Of course I was living abroad at that time. My husband and I came home on leave once, but we were mostly in London. We didn’t come down here often.”
Anthea came in from the garden. She was carrying in her hand a great bunch of lilies.
“Funeral flowers,” she said. “That’s what we ought to have here today, isn’t it? I’ll put them in a great jar. Funeral flowers,” and she laughed suddenly. A queer, hysterical little giggle.
“Anthea,” said Clotilde, “don’t—don’t do that. It’s not—it’s not right.”
“I’ll go and put them in water,” said Anthea, cheerfully. She went out of the room.
“Really,” said Mrs. Glynne, “Anthea! I do think she’s—”
“She’s getting worse,” said Clotilde.
Miss Marple adopted an attitude of not listening or hearing. She picked up a small enamel box and looked at it with admiring eyes.
“She’ll probably break a vase now,” said Lavinia.
She went out of the room. Miss Marple said,
“You are worried about your sister, about Anthea?”
“Well yes, she’s always been rather unbalanced. She’s the youngest and she was rather delicate as a girl. But lately, I
think, she’s got definitely worse. She hasn’t got any idea, I think, of the gravity of things. She has these silly fits of hysteria. Hysterical laughter at things one ought to be serious about. We don’t want to—well, to send her anywhere or—you know. She ought to have treatment, I think, but I don’t think she would like to go away from home. This is her home, after all. Though sometimes it’s—it’s very difficult.”
“All life is difficult sometimes,” said Miss Marple.
“Lavinia talks of going away,” said Clotilde. “She talks of going to live abroad again. At Taormina, I think. She was there with her husband a lot and they were very happy. She’s been at home with us now for many years, but she seems to have this longing to get away and to travel. Sometimes I think—sometimes I think she doesn’t like being in the same house as Anthea.”
“Oh dear,” said Miss Marple. “Yes, I have heard of cases like that where these difficulties do arise.”
“She’s afraid of Anthea,” said Clotilde. “Definitely afraid of her. And really, I keep telling her there’s nothing to be afraid of. Anthea’s just rather silly at times. You know, has queer ideas and says queer things. But I don’t think there’s any danger of her—well, I mean of—oh, I don’t know what I mean. Doing anything dangerous or strange or queer.”
“There’s never been any trouble of that kind?” enquired Miss Marple.
“Oh no. There’s never been anything. She gets nervous fits of temper sometimes and she takes rather sudden dislikes to people. She’s very jealous, you know, over things. Very jealous of a lot of—well, fuss being made over different people. I don’t know. Sometimes I think we’d better sell this house and leave it altogether.”
“It is sad for you, isn’t it,” said Miss Marple. “I think I can understand that it must be very sad for you living here with the memory of the past.”
“You understand that, do you? Yes, I can see that you do. One cannot help it. One’s mind goes back to that dear, lovable child. She was like a daughter to me. She was the daughter, anyway, of one of my best friends. She was very intelligent too. She was a clever girl. She was a good artist. She was doing very well with her art training and designing. She was taking up a good deal of designing. I was very proud of her. And then—this wretched attachment, this terrible mentally afflicted boy.”
“You mean Mr. Rafiel’s son, Michael Rafiel?”
“Yes. If only he’d never come here. It just happened that he was staying in this part of the world and his father suggested he might look us up and he came and had a meal with us. He could be very charming, you know. But he always had been a sad delinquent, a bad record. He’d been in prison twice, and a very bad history with girls. But I never thought that Verity … just a case of infatuation. I suppose it happens to girls of that age. She was infatuated with him. Insisted that everything that had happened to him had not been his fault. You know the things girls say. ‘Everyone is against him,’ that’s what they always say. Everyone’s against him. Nobody made allowances for him. Oh, one gets tired of hearing these things said. Can’t one put a little sense into girls?”
“They have not usually very much sense, I agree,” said Miss Marple.
“She wouldn’t listen. I—I tried to keep him away from the house. I told him he was not to come here any more. That of course was stupid. I realized that afterwards. It only meant that she went and met him outside the house. I don’t know where. They had various meeting places. He used to call for her in his car at an agreed spot and bring her home late at night. Once or twice he didn’t bring her home until the next day. I tried to tell them it must stop, that it must all cease, but they wouldn’t listen. Verity wouldn’t listen. I didn’t expect him to, of course.”
“She intended to marry him?” asked Miss Marple.
“Well, I don’t think it ever got as far as that. I don’t think he ever wanted to marry her or thought of such a thing.”
“I am very sorry for you,” said Miss Marple. “You must have suffered a lot.”
“Yes. The worst was having to go and identify the body. That was some time after—after she’d disappeared from here. We thought of course that she’d run away with him and we thought that we’d get news of them some time. I knew the police seemed to be taking it rather seriously. They asked Michael to go to the police station and help them with enquiries and his account of himself didn’t seem to agree with what local people were saying.
“Then they found her. A long way from here. About thirty miles away. In a kind of ditchy hedgy spot down an unfrequented lane where anyone hardly ever went. Yes, I had to go and view the body in the mortuary. A terrible sight. The cruelty, the force that had been used. What did he want to do that to her for? Wasn’t it enough that he strangled her? He strangled her with her own scarf. I can’t—I can’t talk about it any more. I can’t bear it, I can’t bear it.”
Tears rained suddenly down her face.
“I’m sorry for you,” said Miss Marple. “I’m very, very sorry.”
“I believe you are.” Clotilde looked at her suddenly. “And even you don’t know the worst of it.”
“In what way?”
“I don’t know—I don’t know about Anthea.”
“What do you mean about Anthea?”
“She was so queer at that time. She was—she was very jealous. She suddenly seemed to turn against Verity. To look at her as though she hated her. Sometimes I thought—I thought perhaps—oh no, it’s an awful thing to think, you can’t think that about your own sister—she did once attack someone. You know, she used to get these storms of rage. I wondered if it could have been—oh, I mustn’t say such things. There’s no question of any such thing. Please forget what I’ve said. There’s nothing in it, nothing at all. But—but—well, she’s not quite normal. I’ve got to face that. When she was quite young queer things happened once or twice—with animals. We had a parrot. A parrot that said things, silly things like parrots do say and she wrung its neck and I’ve never felt the same since. I’ve never felt that I could trust her. I’ve never felt sure. I’ve never felt—oh, goodness, I’m getting hysterical, too.”
“Come, come,” said Miss Marple, “don’t think of these things.”
“No. It’s bad enough to know—to know that Verity died. Died in that horrible way. At any rate, other girls are safe from that boy. Life sentence he got. He’s still in prison. They won’t let him out to do anything to anyone else. Though why they couldn’t bring it in as some mental trouble—diminished responsibility—one of these things they use nowadays. He ought to have gone to Broadmoor. I’m sure he wasn’t responsible for anything that he did.”
She got up and went out of the room. Mrs. Glynne had come back and passed her sister in the doorway.
“You mustn’t pay any attention to Clotilde,” she said. “She’s never quite recovered from that ghastly business years ago. She loved Verity very much.”
“She seems to be worried about your other sister.”
“About Anthea? Anthea’s all right. She’s—er—well, she’s scatty, you know. She’s a bit—hysterical. Apt to get worked up about things, and she has queer fancies, imagination sometimes. But I don’t think there’s any need for Clotilde to worry so much. Dear me, who’s that passing the window?”
Two apologetic figures suddenly showed themselves in the french window.
“Oh do excuse us,” said Miss Barrow, “we were just walking round the house to see if we could find Miss Marple. We had heard she’d come here with you and I wonder—oh, there you are, my dear Miss Marple. I wanted to tell you that we didn’t get to that church after all this afternoon. Apparently it’s closed for cleaning, so I think we shall have to give up any other expedition today and go on one tomorrow. I do hope you don’t mind us coming in this way. I did ring at the front doorbell but it didn’t seem to be ringing.”
“I’m afraid it doesn’t sometimes,” said Mrs. Glynne. “You know, it’s rather temperamental. Sometimes it rings and sometimes it doesn’t. But
do sit down and talk to us a little. I’d no idea that you hadn’t gone with the coach.”
“No, we thought we would do a little sightseeing round here, as we had got so far, and going with the coach would really be rather—well, rather painful after what has happened just a day or two ago.”
“You must have some sherry,” said Mrs. Glynne.
She went out of the room and presently returned. Anthea was with her, quite calm now, bringing glasses and a decanter of sherry, and they sat down together.
“I can’t help wanting to know,” said Mrs. Glynne, “what really is going to happen in this business. I mean of poor Miss Temple. I mean, it seems so very impossible to know what the police think. They still seem to be in charge, and I mean the inquest being adjourned, so obviously they are not satisfied. I don’t know if there’s anything in the nature of the wound.”
“I shouldn’t think so,” said Miss Barrow. “I mean a blow on the head, bad concussion—well, I mean that came from the boulder. The only point is, Miss Marple, if the boulder rolled itself down or somebody rolled it.”
“Oh,” said Miss Cooke, “but surely you can’t think that—who on earth would want to roll a boulder down, do that sort of thing? I suppose there are always hooligans about. You know, some young foreigners or students. I really wonder, you know, whether—well—”
“You mean,” said Miss Marple, “you wondered if that someone was one of our fellow travellers.”
“Well, I—I didn’t say that,” said Miss Cooke.
“But surely,” said Miss Marple, “we can’t help—well, thinking about that sort of thing. I mean, there must be some explanation. If the police seem sure it wasn’t an accident, well then it must have been done by somebody and—well, I mean, Miss Temple was a stranger to this place here. It doesn’t seem as if anyone could have done it—anyone local I mean. So it really comes back to—well, I mean, to all of us who were in the coach, doesn’t it?”