Body in the Library - Agatha Christie [58]
Miss Marple nodded.
Florence went on:
“So it was all arranged. Pam was to go into Danemouth after the rally and meet him at his hotel and he’d take her along to the studios (they’d got a small testing studio in Danemouth, he told her). She’d have her test and she could catch the bus home afterwards. She could say she’d been shopping, and he’d let her know the result of the test in a few days, and if it was favourable Mr. Harmsteiter, the boss, would come along and talk to her parents.
“Well, of course, it sounded too wonderful! I was green with envy! Pam got through the rally without turning a hair—we always call her a regular poker face. Then, when she said she was going into Danemouth to Woolworth’s she just winked at me.
“I saw her start off down the footpath.” Florence began to cry. “I ought to have stopped her. I ought to have stopped her. I ought to have known a thing like that couldn’t be true. I ought to have told someone. Oh dear, I wish I was dead!”
“There, there.” Miss Marple patted her on the shoulder. “It’s quite all right. No one will blame you. You’ve done the right thing in telling me.”
She devoted some minutes to cheering the child up.
Five minutes later she was telling the story to Superintendent Harper. The latter looked very grim.
“The clever devil!” he said. “By God, I’ll cook his goose for him. This puts rather a different aspect on things.”
“Yes, it does.”
Harper looked at her sideways.
“It doesn’t surprise you?”
“I expected something of the kind.”
Superintendent Harper said curiously:
“What put you on to this particular girl? They all looked scared to death and there wasn’t a pin to choose between them as far as I could see.”
Miss Marple said gently:
“You haven’t had as much experience with girls telling lies as I have. Florence looked at you very straight, if you remember, and stood very rigid and just fidgeted with her feet like the others. But you didn’t watch her as she went out of the door. I knew at once then that she’d got something to hide. They nearly always relax too soon. My little maid Janet always did. She’d explain quite convincingly that the mice had eaten the end of a cake and give herself away by smirking as she left the room.”
“I’m very grateful to you,” said Harper.
He added thoughtfully: “Lemville Studios, eh?”
Miss Marple said nothing. She rose to her feet.
“I’m afraid,” she said, “I must hurry away. So glad to have been able to help you.”
“Are you going back to the hotel?”
“Yes—to pack up. I must go back to St. Mary Mead as soon as possible. There’s a lot for me to do there.”
Fifteen
I
Miss Marple passed out through the french windows of her drawing room, tripped down her neat garden path, through a garden gate, in through the vicarage garden gate, across the vicarage garden, and up to the drawing room window, where she tapped gently on the pane.
The vicar was busy in his study composing his Sunday sermon, but the vicar’s wife, who was young and pretty, was admiring the progress of her offspring across the hearthrug.
“Can I come in, Griselda?”
“Oh, do, Miss Marple. Just look at David! He gets so angry because he can only crawl in reverse. He wants to get to something and the more he tries the more he goes backwards into the coal box!”
“He’s looking very bonny, Griselda.”
“He’s not bad, is he?” said the young mother, endeavouring to assume an indifferent manner. “Of course I don’t bother with him much. All the books say a child should be left alone as much as possible.”
“Very wise, dear,” said Miss Marple. “Ahem, I came to ask if there was anything special you are collecting for at the moment.”
The vicar’s wife turned somewhat