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“No, no,” said Miss Marple. “He never had a revolver.”
“But everyone says—” began Rydesdale, and stopped.
“Exactly,” said Miss Marple. “Nobody could possibly have seen a revolver even if he had one. And I don’t think he had. I think that after he’d called ‘Hands up’ somebody came up quietly behind him in the darkness and fired those two shots over his shoulder. It frightened him to death. He swung round and as he did so, that other person shot him and then let the revolver drop beside him….”
The three men looked at her. Sir Henry said softly:
“It’s a possible theory.”
“But who is Mr. X who came up in the darkness?” asked the Chief Constable.
Miss Marple coughed.
“You’ll have to find out from Miss Blacklock who wanted to kill her.”
Good for old Dora Bunner, thought Craddock. Instinct against intelligence every time.
“So you think it was a deliberate attempt on Miss Blacklock’s life,” asked Rydesdale.
“It certainly has that appearance,” said Miss Marple. “Though there are one or two difficulties. But what I was really wondering about was whether there mightn’t be a short cut. I’ve no doubt that whoever arranged this with Rudi Scherz took pains to tell him to keep his mouth shut, but if he talked to anybody it would probably be to that girl, Myrna Harris. And he may—he just may—have dropped some hint as to the kind of person who’d suggested the whole thing.”
“I’ll see her now,” said Craddock, rising.
Miss Marple nodded.
“Yes, do, Inspector Craddock. I’ll feel happier when you have. Because once she’s told you anything she knows she’ll be much safer.”
“Safer?… Yes, I see.”
He left the room. The Chief Constable said doubtfully, but tactfully:
“Well, Miss Marple, you’ve certainly given us something to think about.”
III
“I’m sorry about it, I am really,” said Myrna Harris. “It’s ever so nice of you not to be ratty about it. But you see Mum’s the sort of person who fusses like anything. And it did look as though I’d—what’s the phrase?—been an accessory before the fact” (the words ran glibly off her tongue). “I mean, I was afraid you’d never take my word for it that I only thought it was just a bit of fun.”
Inspector Craddock repeated the reassuring phrase with which he had broken down Myrna’s resistance.
“I will. I’ll tell you all about it. But you will keep me out of it if you can because of Mum? It all started with Rudi breaking a date with me. We were going to the pictures that evening and then he said he wouldn’t be able to come and I was a bit standoffish with him about it—because after all, it had been his idea and I don’t fancy being stood up by a foreigner. And he said it wasn’t his fault, and I said that was a likely story, and then he said he’d got a bit of a lark on that night—and that he wasn’t going to be out of pocket by it and how would I fancy a wristwatch? So I said, what do you mean by a lark? And he said not to tell anyone, but there was to be a party somewhere and he was to stage a sham hold-up. Then he showed me the advertisement he’d put in and I had to laugh. He was a bit scornful about it all. Said it was kid’s stuff, really—but that was just like the English. They never really grew up—and of course, I said what did he mean by talking like that about Us—and we had a bit of an argument, but we made it up. Only you can understand, can’t you, sir, that when I read all about it, and it hadn’t been a joke at all and Rudi had shot someone and then shot himself—why, I didn’t know what to do. I thought if I said I knew about it beforehand, it would look as though I were in on the whole thing. But it really did seem like a joke when he told me about it. I’d have sworn he meant it that way. I didn’t even know he’d got a revolver. He never said anything about taking a revolver with him.”
Craddock comforted her and then asked the most important question.
“Who did he say it was who had arranged this party?”
But there he drew a blank.
“He never said who it was that was getting him to do it. I suppose nobody was, really. It was all his own doing.”
“He didn’t mention a name? Did he say he—or she?”
“He didn’t say anything except that it was going to be a scream. ‘I shall laugh to see all their faces.’ That’s what he said.”
He hadn’t had long to laugh, Craddock thought.
IV
“It’s only a theory,” said Rydesdale as they drove back to Medenham. “Nothing to support it, nothing at all. Put it down as old maid’s vapourings and let it go, eh?”
“I’d rather not do that, sir.”
“It’s all very improbable. A mysterious X appearing suddenly in the darkness behind our Swiss friend. Where did he come from? Who was he? Where had he been?”
“He could have come in through the side door,” said Craddock, “just as Scherz came. Or,” he added slowly, “he could have come from the kitchen.”
“She could have come from the kitchen, you mean?”
“Yes, sir, it’s a possibility. I’ve not been satisfied about that girl all along. She strikes me as a nasty bit of goods. All that screaming and hysterics—it could have been put on. She could have worked on this young fellow, let him in at the right moment, rigged the whole thing, shot him, bolted back into the dining room, caught up her bit of silver and her chamois and started her screaming act.”
“Against that we have the fact that—er—what’s his name—oh, yes, Edmund Swettenham, definitely says the key was turned on the outside of the door, and that he turned it to release her. Any other door into that part of the house?”
“Yes, there’s a door to the back stairs and kitchen just under the stairs, but it seems the handle came off three weeks ago and nobody’s come to put it on yet. In the meantime you can’t open the door. I’m bound to say that story seems correct. The spindle and the two handles were on a shelf outside the door in the hall and they were thickly coated with dust, but of course a professional would have ways of opening that door all right.”
“Better look up the girl’s record. See if her papers are in order. But it seems to me the whole thing is very theoretical.”
Again the Chief Constable looked inquiringly at his subordinate. Craddock replied quietly:
“I know, sir, and of course if you think the case ought to be closed, it must be. But I’d appreciate it if I could work on it for just a little longer.”
Rather to his surprise the Chief Constable said quietly and approvingly:
“Good lad.”
“There’s the revolver to work on. If this theory is correct, it wasn’t Scherz’s revolver and certainly nobody so far has been able to say that Scherz ever had a revolver.”
“It’s a German make.”
“I know, sir. But this country’s absolutely full of Continental makes of guns. All the Americans brought them back and so did our chaps. You can’t go by that.”
“True enough. Any other lines of inquiry?”
“There’s got to be a motive. If there’s anything in this theory at all, it means that last Friday’s business wasn’t a mere joke, and wasn’t an ordinary hold-up, it was a cold-blooded attempt at murder. Somebody tried to murder Miss Blacklock. Now why? It seems to me that if anyone knows the answer to that it must be Miss Blacklock herself.”
“I understand she rather poured cold water on that idea?”
“She poured cold water on the idea that Rudi Scherz wanted to murder her. And she was quite right. And there’s another thing, sir.”
“Yes?”
“Somebody might try again.”
“That would certainly prove the truth of the theory,” said the Chief Constable dryly. “By the way, look after Miss Marple, won’t you?”
“Miss Marple? Why?”
“I gather she is taking up residence at the Vicarage in Chipping Cleghorn and coming into Medenham Wells twice a week for her treatments. It seems that Mrs. What’shername is the
daughter of an old friend of Miss Marple’s. Good sporting instincts, that old bean. Oh, well, I suppose she hasn’t much excitement in her life and sniffing round after possible murderers gives her a kick.”
“I wish she wasn’t coming,” said Craddock seriously.
“Going to get under your feet?”
“Not that, sir, but she’s a nice old thing. I shouldn’t like anything to happen to her … always supposing, I mean, that there’s anything in this theory.”
Nine
CONCERNING A DOOR
I
“I’m sorry to bother you again, Miss Blacklock—”
“Oh, it doesn’t matter. I suppose, as the inquest was adjourned for a week, you’re hoping to get more evidence?”
Detective-Inspector Craddock nodded.
