Mrs McGinty's Dead - Agatha Christie [76]
‘Not a foreigner, I couldn’t. Not a foreigner.’
‘No, maybe you’re right there.’
A car drew up outside the post office with a squealing of brakes.
Mrs Sweetiman’s face lit up.
‘That’s Major Summerhayes, that is. You tell it all to him and he’ll advise you what to do.’
‘I couldn’t ever,’ said Edna, but with less conviction.
Johnnie Summerhayes came into the post office, staggering under the burden of three cardboard boxes.
‘Good morning, Mrs Sweetiman,’ he said cheerfully. ‘Hope these aren’t overweight?’
Mrs Sweetiman attended to the parcels in her official capacity. As Summerhayes was licking the stamps, she spoke.
‘Excuse me, sir, I’d like your advice about something.’
‘Yes, Mrs Sweetiman?’
‘Seeing as you belong here, sir, and will know best what to do.’
Summerhayes nodded. He was always curiously touched by the lingering feudal spirit of English villages. The villagers knew little of him personally, but because his father and his grandfather and many great-great-grandfathers had lived at Long Meadows, they regarded it as natural that he should advise and direct them when asked so to do.
‘It’s about Edna here,’ said Mrs Sweetiman.
Edna sniffed.
Johnnie Summerhayes looked at Edna doubtfully. Never, he thought, had he seen a more unprepossessing girl. Exactly like a skinned rabbit. Seemed half-witted too. Surely she couldn’t be in what was known officially as ‘trouble’. But no, Mrs Sweetiman would not have come to him for advice in that case.
‘Well,’ he said kindly, ‘what’s the difficulty?’
‘It’s about the murder, sir. The night of the murder. Edna saw something.’
Johnnie Summerhayes transferred his quick dark gaze from Edna to Mrs Sweetiman and back again to Edna.
‘What did you see, Edna?’ he said.
Edna began to sob. Mrs Sweetiman took over.
‘Of course we’ve been hearing this and that. Some’s rumour and some’s true. But it’s said definite as that there were a lady there that night who drank coffee with Mrs Upward. That’s so, isn’t it, sir?’
‘Yes, I believe so.’
‘I know as that’s true, because we had it from Bert Hayling.’
Albert Hayling was the local constable whom Summerhayes knew well. A slow-speaking man with a sense of his own importance.
‘I see,’ said Summerhayes.
‘But they don’t know, do they, who the lady is? Well, Edna here saw her.’
Johnnie Summerhayes looked at Edna. He pursed his lips as though to whistle.
‘You saw her, did you, Edna? Going in—or coming out?’
‘Going in,’ said Edna. A faint sense of importance loosened her tongue. ‘Across the road I was, under the trees. Just by the turn of the lane where it’s dark. I saw her. She went in at the gate and up to the door and she stood there a bit, and then—and then she went in.’
Johnnie Summerhayes’ brow cleared.
‘That’s all right,’ he said. ‘It was Miss Henderson. The police know all about that. She went and told them.’
Edna shook her head.
‘It wasn’t Miss Henderson,’ she said.
‘It wasn’t—then who was it?’
‘I dunno. I didn’t see her face. Had her back to me, she had, going up the path and standing there. But it wasn’t Miss Henderson.’
‘But how do you know it wasn’t Miss Henderson if you didn’t see her face?’
‘Because she had fair hair. Miss Henderson’s is dark.’
Johnnie Summerhayes looked disbelieving.
‘It was a very dark night. You’d hardly be able to see the colour of anyone’s hair.’
‘But I did, though. That light was on over the porch. Left like that, it was, because Mr Robin and the detective lady had gone out together to the theatre. And she was standing right under it. A dark coat she had on, and no hat, and her hair was shining fair as could be. I saw it.’
Johnnie gave a slow whistle. His eyes were serious now.
‘What time was it?’ he asked.
Edna sniffed.
‘I don’t rightly know.’
‘You know about what time,’ said Mrs Sweetiman.
‘It wasn’t nine o’clock. I’d have heard the church. And it was after half-past eight.’
‘Between half-past eight and nine. How long did she stop?’
‘I dunno, sir. Because I didn’t wait no longer. And I didn’t hear nothing. No groans or cries or nothing like that.’
Edna