At Bertram's Hotel - Agatha Christie [60]
“All right?”
“Quite all right.”
“You know why I suggested it?”
“You thought—very kindly—that it was too hot for me by the fire. Besides,” she added, “our conversation cannot be overheard here.”
“Have you got something you want to tell me, Miss Marple?”
“Now why should you think that?”
“You looked as though you had,” said Davy.
“I’m sorry I showed it so plainly,” said Miss Marple. “I didn’t mean to.”
“Well, what about it?”
“I don’t know if I ought to do so. I would like you to believe, Inspector, that I am not really fond of interfering. I am against interference. Though often well-meant, it can cause a great deal of harm.”
“It’s like that, is it? I see. Yes, it’s quite a problem for you.”
“Sometimes one sees people doing things that seem to one unwise—even dangerous. But has one any right to interfere? Usually not, I think.”
“Is this Canon Pennyfather you’re talking about?”
“Canon Pennyfather?” Miss Marple sounded very surprised. “Oh no. Oh dear me no, nothing whatever to do with him. It concerns—a girl.”
“A girl, indeed? And you thought I could help?”
“I don’t know,” said Miss Marple. “I simply don’t know. But I’m worried, very worried.”
Father did not press her. He sat there looking large and comfortable and rather stupid. He let her take her time. She had been willing to do her best to help him, and he was quite prepared to do anything he could to help her. He was not, perhaps, particularly interested. On the other hand, one never knew.
“One reads in the papers,” said Miss Marple in a low clear voice, “accounts of proceedings in court; of young people, children or girls ‘in need of care and protection.’ It’s just a sort of legal phrase, I suppose, but it could mean something real.”
“This girl you mentioned, you feel she is in need of care and protection?”
“Yes. Yes I do.”
“Alone in the world?”
“Oh no,” said Miss Marple. “Very much not so, if I may put it that way. She is to all outward appearances very heavily protected and very well cared for.”
“Sounds interesting,” said Father.
“She was staying in this hotel,” said Miss Marple, “with a Mrs. Carpenter, I think. I looked in the register to see the name. The girl’s name is Elvira Blake.”
Father looked up with a quick air of interest.
“She was a lovely girl. Very young, very much, as I say, sheltered and protected. Her guardian was a Colonel Luscombe, a very nice man. Quite charming. Elderly of course, and I am afraid terribly innocent.”
“The guardian or the girl?”
“I meant the guardian,” said Miss Marple. “I don’t know about the girl. But I do think she is in danger. I came across her quite by chance in Battersea Park. She was sitting at a refreshment place there with a young man.”
“Oh, that’s it, is it?” said Father. “Undesirable, I suppose. Beatnik—spiv—thug—”
“A very handsome man,” said Miss Marple. “Not so very young. Thirty-odd, the kind of man that I should say is very attractive to women, but his face is a bad face. Cruel, hawklike, predatory.”
“He mayn’t be as bad as he looks,” said Father soothingly.
“If anything he is worse than he looks,” said Miss Marple. “I am convinced of it. He drives a large racing car.”
Father looked up quickly.
“Racing car?”
“Yes. Once or twice I’ve seen it standing near this hotel.”
“You don’t remember the number, do you?”
“Yes, indeed I do. FAN 2266. I had a cousin who stuttered,” Miss Marple explained. “That’s how I remember it.”
Father looked puzzled.
“Do you know who he is?” demanded Miss Marple.
“As a matter of fact I do,” said Father slowly. “Half French, half Polish. Very well-known racing driver, he was world champion three years ago. His name is Ladislaus Malinowski. You’re quite right in some of your views about him. He has a bad reputation where women are concerned. That is to say, he is not a suitable friend for a young girl. But it’s not easy to do anything about that sort of thing. I suppose she is meeting him on the sly, is that it?”
“Almost certainly,” said Miss Marple.
“Did you approach