IS t. Mary Mead1 was having the most exciting morning it had known for a long time.
Miss Wetherby, a long-nosed, acidulated spinster, was the first to spread the intoxicating2 information. She droppedin upon her friend and neighbour Miss Hartnell.
“Forgive me coming so early, dear, but I thought, perhaps, you mightn’t have heard the news.”
“What news?” demanded Miss Hartnell. She had a deep bass3 voice and visited the poor indefatigably4, howeverhard they tried to avoid her ministrations.
“About the body in Colonel Bantry’s library—a woman’s body—”
“In Colonel Bantry’s library?”
“Yes. Isn’t it terrible?”
“His poor wife.” Miss Hartnell tried to disguise her deep and ardent5 pleasure.
“Yes, indeed. I don’t suppose she had any idea.”
Miss Hartnell observed censoriously:
“She thought too much about her garden and not enough about her husband. You’ve got to keep an eye on a man—all the time—all the time,” repeated Miss Hartnell fiercely.
“I know. I know. It’s really too dreadful.”
“I wonder what Jane Marple will say. Do you think she knew anything about it? She’s so sharp about these things.”
“Jane Marple has gone up to Gossington.”
“What? This morning?”
“Very early. Before breakfast.”
“But really! I do think! Well, I mean, I think that is carrying things too far. We all know Jane likes to poke6 her noseinto things—but I call this indecent!”
“Oh, but Mrs. Bantry sent for her.”
“Mrs. Bantry sent for her?”
“Well, the car came—with Muswell driving it.”
“Dear me! How very peculiar….”
They were silent a minute or two digesting the news.
“Whose body?” demanded Miss Hartnell.
“You know that dreadful woman who comes down with Basil Blake?”
“That terrible peroxide blonde?” Miss Hartnell was slightly behind the times. She had not yet advanced fromperoxide to platinum7. “The one who lies about in the garden with practically nothing on?”
“Yes, my dear. There she was—on the hearthrug—strangled!”
“But what do you mean—at Gossington?”
Miss Wetherby nodded with infinite meaning.
“Then—Colonel Bantry too—?”
Again Miss Wetherby nodded.
“Oh!”
There was a pause as the ladies savoured this new addition to village scandal.
“What a wicked woman!” trumpeted8 Miss Hartnell with righteous wrath9.
“Quite, quite abandoned, I’m afraid!”
“And Colonel Bantry—such a nice quiet man—”
Miss Wetherby said zestfully10:
“Those quiet ones are often the worst. Jane Marple always says so.”
II
Mrs. Price Ridley was among the last to hear the news.
A rich and dictatorial11 widow, she lived in a large house next door to the vicarage. Her informant was her little maidClara.
“A woman, you say, Clara? Found dead on Colonel Bantry’s hearthrug?”
“Yes, mum. And they say, mum, as she hadn’t anything on at all, mum, not a stitch!”
“That will do, Clara. It is not necessary to go into details.”
“No, mum, and they say, mum, that at first they thought it was Mr. Blake’s young lady—what comes down for theweekends with ’im to Mr. Booker’s new ’ouse. But now they say it’s quite a different young lady. And thefishmonger’s young man, he says he’d never have believed it of Colonel Bantry—not with him handing round theplate on Sundays and all.”
“There is a lot of wickedness in the world, Clara,” said Mrs. Price Ridley. “Let this be a warning to you.”
“Yes, mum. Mother, she never will let me take a place where there’s a gentleman in the ’ouse.”
“That will do, Clara,” said Mrs. Price Ridley.
III
It was only a step from Mrs. Price Ridley’s house to the vicarage.
Mrs. Price Ridley was fortunate enough to find the vicar in his study.
The vicar, a gentle, middle-aged12 man, was always the last to hear anything.
“Such a terrible thing,” said Mrs. Price Ridley, panting a little, because she had come rather fast. “I felt I must haveyour advice, your counsel about it, dear vicar.”
Mr. Clement13 looked mildly alarmed. He said:
“Has anything happened?”
“Has anything happened?” Mrs. Price Ridley repeated the question dramatically. “The most terrible scandal! Noneof us had any idea of it. An abandoned woman, completely unclothed, strangled on Colonel Bantry’s hearthrug.”
The vicar stared. He said:
“You—you are feeling quite well?”
“No wonder you can’t believe it! I couldn’t at first. The hypocrisy14 of the man! All these years!”
“Please tell me exactly what all this is about.”
Mrs. Price Ridley plunged15 into a full-swing narrative16. When she had finished Mr. Clement said mildly:
“But there is nothing, is there, to point to Colonel Bantry’s being involved in this?”
“Oh, dear vicar, you are so unworldly! But I must tell you a little story. Last Thursday—or was it the Thursdaybefore? well, it doesn’t matter—I was going up to London by the cheap day train. Colonel Bantry was in the samecarriage. He looked, I thought, very abstracted. And nearly the whole way he buried himself behind The Times. Asthough, you know, he didn’t want to talk.”
The vicar nodded with complete comprehension and possible sympathy.
“At Paddington I said good-bye. He had offered to get me a taxi, but I was taking the bus down to Oxford17 Street—but he got into one, and I distinctly heard him tell the driver to go to—where do you think?”
Mr. Clement looked inquiring.
“An address in St. John’s Wood!”
Mrs. Price Ridley paused triumphantly18.
The vicar remained completely unenlightened.
“That, I consider, proves it,” said Mrs. Price Ridley.
IV
At Gossington, Mrs. Bantry and Miss Marple were sitting in the drawing room.
“You know,” said Mrs. Bantry, “I can’t help feeling glad they’ve taken the body away. It’s not nice to have a bodyin one’s house.”
Miss Marple nodded.
“I know, dear. I know just how you feel.”
“You can’t,” said Mrs. Bantry; “not until you’ve had one. I know you had one next door once, but that’s not thesame thing. I only hope,” she went on, “that Arthur won’t take a dislike to the library. We sit there so much. What areyou doing, Jane?”
For Miss Marple, with a glance at her watch, was rising to her feet. “Well, I was thinking I’d go home. If there’snothing more I can do for you?”
“Don’t go yet,” said Mrs. Bantry. “The fingerprint19 men and the photographers and most of the police have gone, Iknow, but I still feel something might happen. You don’t want to miss anything.”
The telephone rang and she went off to answer. She returned with a beaming face.
“I told you more things would happen. That was Colonel Melchett. He’s bringing the poor girl’s cousin along.”
“I wonder why,” said Miss Marple.
“Oh, I suppose, to see where it happened and all that.”
“More than that, I expect,” said Miss Marple.
“What do you mean, Jane?”
“Well, I think—perhaps—he might want her to meet Colonel Bantry.”
Mrs. Bantry said sharply:
“To see if she recognizes him? I suppose—oh, yes, I suppose they’re bound to suspect Arthur.”
“I’m afraid so.”
“As though Arthur could have anything to do with it!”
Miss Marple was silent. Mrs. Bantry turned on her accusingly.
“And don’t quote old General Henderson—or some frightful20 old man who kept his housemaid—at me. Arthur isn’tlike that.”
“No, no, of course not.”
“No, but he really isn’t. He’s just—sometimes—a little silly about pretty girls who come to tennis. You know—rather fatuous21 and avuncular22. There’s no harm in it. And why shouldn’t he? After all,” finished Mrs. Bantry ratherobscurely, “I’ve got the garden.”
Miss Marple smiled.
“You must not worry, Dolly,” she said.
“No, I don’t mean to. But all the same I do a little. So does Arthur. It’s upset him. All these policemen prowlingabout. He’s gone down to the farm. Looking at pigs and things always soothes23 him if he’s been upset. Hallo, here theyare.”
The Chief Constable’s car drew up outside.
Colonel Melchett came in accompanied by a smartly dressed young woman.
“This is Miss Turner, Mrs. Bantry. The cousin of the—er—victim.”
“How do you do,” said Mrs. Bantry, advancing with outstretched hand. “All this must be rather awful for you.”
Josephine Turner said frankly24: “Oh, it is. None of it seems real, somehow. It’s like a bad dream.”
Mrs. Bantry introduced Miss Marple.
Melchett said casually25: “Your good man about?”
“He had to go down to one of the farms. He’ll be back soon.”
“Oh—” Melchett seemed rather at a loss.
Mrs. Bantry said to Josie: “Would you like to see where—where it happened? Or would you rather not?”
Josephine said after a moment’s pause:
“I think I’d like to see.”
Mrs. Bantry led her to her library with Miss Marple and Melchett following behind.
“She was there,” said Mrs. Bantry, pointing dramatically; “on the hearthrug.”
“Oh!” Josie shuddered26. But she also looked perplexed27. She said, her brow creased28: “I just can’t understand it! Ican’t!”
“Well, we certainly can’t,” said Mrs. Bantry.
Josie said slowly:
“It isn’t the sort of place—” and broke off.
Miss Marple nodded her head gently in agreement with the unfinished sentiment.
“That,” she murmured, “is what makes it so very interesting.”
“Come now, Miss Marple,” said Colonel Melchett goodhumouredly, “haven’t you got an explanation?”
“Oh yes, I’ve got an explanation,” said Miss Marple. “Quite a feasible one. But of course it’s only my own idea.
Tommy Bond,” she continued, “and Mrs. Martin, our new schoolmistress. She went to wind up the clock and a frogjumped out.”
Josephine Turner looked puzzled. As they all went out of the room she murmured to Mrs. Bantry: “Is the old lady abit funny in the head?”
“Not at all,” said Mrs. Bantry indignantly.
Josie said: “Sorry; I thought perhaps she thought she was a frog or something.”
Colonel Bantry was just coming in through the side door. Melchett hailed him, and watched Josephine Turner as heintroduced them to each other. But there was no sign of interest or recognition in her face. Melchett breathed a sigh ofrelief. Curse Slack and his insinuations!
In answer to Mrs. Bantry’s questions Josie was pouring out the story of Ruby29 Keene’s disappearance30.
“Frightfully worrying for you, my dear,” said Mrs. Bantry.
“I was more angry than worried,” said Josie. “You see, I didn’t know then that anything had happened to her.”
“And yet,” said Miss Marple, “you went to the police. Wasn’t that—excuse me—rather premature31?”
Josie said eagerly:
“Oh, but I didn’t. That was Mr. Jefferson—”
Mrs. Bantry said: “Jefferson?”
“Yes, he’s an invalid32.”
“Not Conway Jefferson? But I know him well. He’s an old friend of ours. Arthur, listen—Conway Jefferson. He’sstaying at the Majestic33, and it was he who went to the police! Isn’t that a coincidence?”
Josephine Turner said:
“Mr. Jefferson was here last summer too.”
“Fancy! And we never knew. I haven’t seen him for a long time.” She turned to Josie. “How — how is he,nowadays?”
Josie considered.
“I think he’s wonderful, really—quite wonderful. Considering, I mean. He’s always cheerful—always got a joke.”
“Are the family there with him?”
“Mr. Gaskell, you mean? And young Mrs. Jefferson? And Peter? Oh, yes.”
There was something inhibiting34 Josephine Turner’s usual attractive frankness of manner. When she spoke35 of theJeffersons there was something not quite natural in her voice.
Mrs. Bantry said: “They’re both very nice, aren’t they? The young ones, I mean.”
Josie said rather uncertainly:
“Oh yes—yes, they are. I—we—yes, they are, really.”
V“And what,” demanded Mrs. Bantry as she looked through the window at the retreating car of the Chief Constable,“did she mean by that? ‘They are, really.’ Don’t you think, Jane, that there’s something—”
Miss Marple fell upon the words eagerly.
“Oh, I do—indeed I do. It’s quite unmistakable! Her manner changed at once when the Jeffersons were mentioned.
She had seemed quite natural up to then.”
“But what do you think it is, Jane?”
“Well, my dear, you know them. All I feel is that there is something, as you say, about them which is worrying thatyoung woman. Another thing, did you notice that when you asked her if she wasn’t anxious about the girl beingmissing, she said that she was angry! And she looked angry—really angry! That strikes me as interesting, you know. Ihave a feeling—perhaps I’m wrong—that that’s her main reaction to the fact of the girl’s death. She didn’t care forher, I’m sure. She’s not grieving in any way. But I do think, very definitely, that the thought of that girl, Ruby Keene,makes her angry. And the interesting point is—why?”
“We’ll find out!” said Mrs. Bantry. “We’ll go over to Danemouth and stay at the Majestic—yes, Jane, you too. Ineed a change for my nerves after what has happened here. A few days at the Majestic—that’s what we need. Andyou’ll meet Conway Jefferson. He’s a dear—a perfect dear. It’s the saddest story imaginable. Had a son and daughter,both of whom he loved dearly. They were both married, but they still spent a lot of time at home. His wife, too, wasthe sweetest woman, and he was devoted36 to her. They were flying home one year from France and there was anaccident. They were all killed: the pilot, Mrs. Jefferson, Rosamund, and Frank. Conway had both legs so badly injuredthey had to be amputated. And he’s been wonderful—his courage, his pluck! He was a very active man and now he’s ahelpless cripple, but he never complains. His daughter-in-law lives with him—she was a widow when Frank Jeffersonmarried her and she had a son by her first marriage—Peter Carmody. They both live with Conway. And Mark Gaskell,Rosamund’s husband, is there too most of the time. The whole thing was the most awful tragedy.”
“And now,” said Miss Marple, “there’s another tragedy—”
Mrs. Bantry said: “Oh yes—yes—but it’s nothing to do with the Jeffersons.”
“Isn’t it?” said Miss Marple. “It was Mr. Jefferson who went to the police.”
“So he did … You know, Jane, that is curious….”
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1
mead
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| n.蜂蜜酒 | |
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intoxicating
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| a. 醉人的,使人兴奋的 | |
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bass
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| n.男低音(歌手)；低音乐器；低音大提琴 | |
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indefatigably
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| adv.不厌倦地，不屈不挠地 | |
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ardent
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| adj.热情的，热烈的，强烈的，烈性的 | |
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6
poke
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| n.刺，戳，袋；vt.拨开，刺，戳；vi.戳，刺，捅，搜索，伸出，行动散慢 | |
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7
platinum
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| n.白金 | |
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trumpeted
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| 大声说出或宣告（trumpet的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
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wrath
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| n.愤怒，愤慨，暴怒 | |
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zestfully
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| adv.有辛辣味的； 有风趣的； 有风味的； 有滋味的 | |
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dictatorial
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| adj. 独裁的，专断的 | |
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middle-aged
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| adj.中年的 | |
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clement
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| adj.仁慈的；温和的 | |
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hypocrisy
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| n.伪善，虚伪 | |
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15
plunged
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| v.颠簸( plunge的过去式和过去分词 )；暴跌；骤降；突降 | |
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narrative
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| n.叙述，故事；adj.叙事的，故事体的 | |
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17
Oxford
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| n.牛津（英国城市） | |
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triumphantly
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| ad.得意洋洋地；得胜地；成功地 | |
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fingerprint
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| n.指纹；vt.取...的指纹 | |
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frightful
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| adj.可怕的；讨厌的 | |
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fatuous
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| adj.愚昧的；昏庸的 | |
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avuncular
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| adj.叔伯般的，慈祥的 | |
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soothes
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| v.安慰( soothe的第三人称单数 )；抚慰；使舒服；减轻痛苦 | |
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frankly
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| adv.坦白地，直率地；坦率地说 | |
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casually
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| adv.漠不关心地，无动于衷地，不负责任地 | |
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shuddered
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| v.战栗( shudder的过去式和过去分词 )；发抖；（机器、车辆等）突然震动；颤动 | |
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perplexed
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| adj.不知所措的 | |
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creased
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| （使…）起折痕，弄皱( crease的过去式和过去分词 )； （皮肤）皱起，使起皱纹； 皱皱巴巴 | |
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ruby
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| n.红宝石，红宝石色 | |
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disappearance
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| n.消失，消散，失踪 | |
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premature
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| adj.比预期时间早的；不成熟的，仓促的 | |
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invalid
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| n.病人，伤残人；adj.有病的，伤残的；无效的 | |
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majestic
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| adj.雄伟的，壮丽的，庄严的，威严的，崇高的 | |
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inhibiting
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| 抑制作用的，约束的 | |
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spoke
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| n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说 | |
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devoted
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| adj.忠诚的，忠实的，热心的，献身于...的 | |
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