4_50 From Paddington - Agatha Christie [78]
Emma said: “You think we ought to have sent your son home earlier?”
“No, no, that is not what I mean at all. Oh, it is difficult for me, this! But what I have to say must be said. You see, they have picked up a good deal, the boys. They told me that this woman—the murdered woman—that the police have an idea that she may be a French girl whom your eldest brother—who was killed in the war—knew in France. That is so?”
“It is a possibility,” said Emma, her voice breaking slightly, “that we are forced to consider. It may have been so.”
“There is some reason for believing that the body is that of this girl, this Martine?”
“I have told you, it is a possibility.”
“But why—why should they think that she was Martine? Did she have letters on her—papers?”
“No. Nothing of that kind. But you see, I had had a letter, from this Martine.”
“You had had a letter—from Martine?”
“Yes. A letter telling me she was in England and would like to come and see me. I invited her down here, but got a telegram saying she was going back to France. Perhaps she did go back to France. We do not know. But since then an envelope was found here addressed to her. That seems to show that she had come down here. But I really don’t see…” She broke off.
Lady Stoddart-West broke in quickly:
“You really do not see what concern it is of mine? That is very true. I should not in your place. But when I heard this—or rather, a garbled account of this—I had to come to make sure it was really so because, if it is—”
“Yes?” said Emma.
“Then I must tell you something that I had never intended to tell you. You see, I am Martine Dubois.”
Emma stared at her guest as though she could hardly take in the sense of her words.
“You!” she said. “You are Martine?”
The other nodded vigorously. “But, yes. It surprises you, I am sure, but it is true. I met your brother Edmund in the first days of the war. He was indeed billeted at our house. Well, you know the rest. We fell in love. We intended to be married, and then there was the retreat to Dunkirk, Edmund was reported missing. Later he was reported killed. I will not speak to you of that time. It was long ago and it is over. But I will say to you that I loved your brother very much….
“Then came the grim realities of war. The Germans occupied France. I became a worker for the Resistance. I was one of those who was assigned to pass Englishmen through France to England. It was in that way that I met my present husband. He was an Air Force officer, parachuted into France to do special work. When the war ended we were married. I considered once or twice whether I should write to you or come and see you, but I decided against it. It could do no good, I thought, to take up old memories. I had a new life and I had no wish to recall the old.” She paused and then said: “But it gave me, I will tell you, a strange pleasure when I found that my son James’s greatest friend at his school was a boy whom I found to be Edmund’s nephew. Alexander, I may say, is very like Edmund, as I dare say you yourself appreciate. It seemed to me a very happy state of affairs that James and Alexander should be such friends.”
She leaned forward and placed her hand on Emma’s arm. “But you see, dear Emma, do you not, that when I heard this story about the murder, about this dead woman being suspected to be the Martine that Edmund had known, that I had to come and tell you the truth. Either you or I must inform the police of the fact. Whoever the dead woman is, she is not Martine.”
“I can hardly take it in,” said Emma, “that you, you should be the Martine that dear Edmund