At Bertram's Hotel - Agatha Christie [80]
“By whom?”
Miss Marple closed her lips. She looked at Chief-Inspector Davy, and it was almost a pleading glance. “If it must be done, you do it,” the glance said, “but I can’t….”
“Your daughter was in the other chair,” said Chief-Inspector Davy.
“Oh no!” The cry came out sharply. “Oh no. Not Elvira! I see—yes, I see. She must have thought—”
“She thought seriously enough of what she had overheard to go to Ireland and search for the truth. It wasn’t difficult to discover.”
Again Bess Sedgwick said softly: “Oh no…” And then: “Poor child…Even now, she’s never asked me a thing. She’s kept it all to herself. Bottled it up inside herself. If she’d only told me I could have explained it all to her—showed her how it didn’t matter.”
“She mightn’t have agreed with you there,” said Chief-Inspector Davy. “It’s a funny thing, you know,” he went on, in a reminiscent, almost gossipy manner, looking like an old farmer discussing his stock and his land, “I’ve learnt after a great many years’ trial and error—I’ve learned to distrust a pattern when it’s simple. Simple patterns are often too good to be true. The pattern of this murder the other night was like that. Girl says someone shot at her and missed. The commissionaire came running to save her, and copped it with a second bullet. That may be all true enough. That may be the way the girl saw it. But actually behind the appearances, things might be rather different.
“You said pretty vehemently just now, Lady Sedgwick, that there could be no reason for Ladislaus Malinowski to attempt your daughter’s life. Well, I’ll agree with you. I don’t think there was. He’s the sort of young man who might have a row with a woman, pull out a knife and stick it into her. But I don’t think he’d hide in an area, and wait cold-bloodedly to shoot her. But supposing he wanted to shoot someone else. Screams and shots—but what actually has happened is that Michael Gorman is dead. Suppose that was actually what was meant to happen. Malinowski plans it very carefully. He chooses a foggy night, hides in the area and waits until your daughter comes up the street. He knows she’s coming because he has managed to arrange it that way. He fires a shot. It’s not meant to hit the girl. He’s careful not to let the bullet go anywhere near her, but she thinks it’s aimed at her all right. She screams. The porter from the hotel, hearing the shot and the scream, comes rushing down the street and then Malinowski shoots the person he’s come to shoot. Michael Gorman.”
“I don’t believe a word of it! Why on earth should Ladislaus want to shoot Micky Gorman?”
“A little matter of blackmail, perhaps,” said Father.
“Do you mean that Micky was blackmailing Ladislaus? What about?”
“Perhaps,” said Father, “about the things that go on at Bertram’s Hotel. Michael Gorman might have found out quite a lot about that.”
“Things that go on at Bertram’s Hotel? What do you mean?”
“It’s been a good racket,” said Father. “Well planned, beautifully executed. But nothing lasts forever. Miss Marple here asked me the other day what was wrong with this place. Well, I’ll answer that question now. Bertram’s Hotel is to all intents and purposes the headquarters of one of the best and biggest crime syndicates that’s been known for years.”
Chapter Twenty-seven
There was silence for about a minute and a half. Then Miss Marple spoke.
“How very interesting,” she said conversationally.
Bess Sedgwick turned on her. “You don’t seem surprised, Miss Marple.”
“I’m not. Not really. There were so many curious things that didn’t seem quite to fit in. It was all too good to be true—if you know what I mean. What they call in theatrical circles, a beautiful performance. But it was a performance—not real.
“And there were a lot of little things, people claiming a friend or an acquaintance—and turning out to be wrong.”
“These things happen,” said Chief-Inspector Davy, “but they happened too often. Is that right, Miss Marple?”
“Yes,” agreed Miss Marple. “People like Selina Hazy do make that kind of mistake. But there were so many other people doing