4_50 From Paddington - Agatha Christie [3]
“Elspeth!”
“Jane!”
They kissed and, without preamble or circumlocution, Mrs. McGillicuddy burst into speech.
“Oh, Jane!” she wailed. “I’ve just seen a murder!”
Two
True to the precepts handed down to her by her mother and grandmother—to wit: that a true lady can neither be shocked nor surprised—Miss Marple merely raised her eyebrows and shook her head, as she said:
“Most distressing for you, Elspeth, and surely most unusual. I think you had better tell me about it at once.”
That was exactly what Mrs. McGillicuddy wanted to do. Allowing her hostess to draw her nearer to the fire, she sat down, pulled off her gloves and plunged into a vivid narrative.
Miss Marple listened with close attention. When Mrs. McGillicuddy at last paused for breath, Miss Marple spoke with decision.
“The best thing, I think, my dear, is for you to go upstairs and take off your hat and have a wash. Then we will have supper—during which we will not discuss this at all. After supper we can go into the matter thoroughly and discuss it from every aspect.”
Mrs. McGillicuddy concurred with this suggestion. The two ladies had supper, discussing, as they ate, various aspects of life as lived in the village of St. Mary Mead. Miss Marple commented on the general distrust of the new organist, related the recent scandal about the chemist’s wife, and touched on the hostility between the schoolmistress and the village institute. They then discussed Miss Marple’s and Mrs. McGillicuddy’s gardens.
“Paeonies,” said Miss Marple as she rose from table, “are most unaccountable. Either they do—or they don’t do. But if they do establish themselves, they are with you for life, so to speak, and really most beautiful varieties nowadays.”
They settled themselves by the fire again, and Miss Marple brought out two old Waterford glasses from a corner cupboard, and from another cupboard produced a bottle.
“No coffee tonight for you, Elspeth,” she said. “You are already overexcited (and no wonder!) and probably would not sleep. I prescribe a glass of my cowslip wine, and later, perhaps, a cup of camo-mile tea.”
Mrs. McGillicuddy acquiescing in these arrangements, Miss Marple poured out the wine.
“Jane,” said Mrs. McGillicuddy, as she took an appreciative sip, “you don’t think, do you, that I dreamt it, or imagined it?”
“Certainly not,” said Miss Marple with warmth.
Mrs. McGillicuddy heaved a sigh of relief.
“That ticket collector,” she said, “he thought so. Quite polite, but all the same—”
“I think, Elspeth, that that was quite natural under the circumstances. It sounded—and indeed was—a most unlikely story. And you were a complete stranger to him. No, I have no doubt at all that you saw what you’ve told me you saw. It’s very extraordinary—but not at all impossible. I recollect myself being interested when a train ran parallel to one on which I was travelling, to notice what a vivid and intimate picture one got of what was going on in one or two of the carriages. A little girl, I remember once, playing with a teddy bear, and suddenly she threw it deliberately at a fat man who was asleep in the corner and he bounced up and looked most indignant, and the other passengers looked so amused. I saw them all quite vividly. I could have described afterwards exactly what they looked like and what they had on.”
Mrs. McGillicuddy nodded gratefully.
“That’s just how it was.”
“The man had his back to you, you say. So you didn’t see his face?”
“No.”
“And the woman, you can describe her? Young,