Murder at the Vicarage - Agatha Christie [68]
‘I know that,’ I said.
‘Well, why ask me, then? Anne must have dropped it.’
‘Mrs Protheroe has only been in my study once since the murder, and then she was wearing black and so would not have been likely to have had on a blue ear-ring.’
‘In that case,’ said Lettice, ‘I suppose she must have dropped it before.’ She added: ‘That’s only logical.’
‘It’s very logical,’ I said. ‘I suppose you don’t happen to remember when your stepmother was wearing these ear-rings last?’
‘Oh!’ She looked at me with a puzzled, trustful gaze. ‘Is it very important?’
‘It might be,’ I said.
‘I’ll try and think.’ She sat there knitting her brows. I have never seen Lettice Protheroe look more charming than she did at that moment. ‘Oh, yes!’ she said suddenly. ‘She had them on – on Thursday. I remember now.’
‘Thursday,’ I said slowly, ‘was the day of the murder. Mrs Protheroe came to the study in the garden that day, but if you remember, in her evidence, she only came as far as the study window, not inside the room.’
‘Where did you find this?’
‘Rolled underneath the desk.’
‘Then it looks, doesn’t it,’ said Lettice coolly, ‘as though she hadn’t spoken the truth?’
‘You mean that she came right in and stood by the desk?’
‘Well, it looks like it, doesn’t it?’
Her eyes met mine serenely.
‘If you want to know,’ she said calmly, ‘I never have thought she was speaking the truth.’
‘And I know you are not, Lettice.’
‘What do you mean?’
She was startled.
‘I mean,’ I said, ‘that the last time I saw this earring was on Friday morning when I came up here with Colonel Melchett. It was lying with its fellow on your stepmother’s dressing-table. I actually handled them both.’
‘Oh –!’ She wavered, then suddenly flung herself sideways over the arm of her chair and burst into tears. Her short fair hair hung down almost touching the floor. It was a strange attitude – beautiful and unrestrained.
I let her sob for some moments in silence and then I said very gently:
‘Lettice, why did you do it?’
‘What?’
She sprang up, flinging her hair wildly back. She looked wild – almost terrified.
‘What do you mean?’
‘What made you do it? Was it jealousy? Dislike of Anne?’
‘Oh! – Oh, yes!’ She pushed the hair back from her face and seemed suddenly to regain complete self-possession. ‘Yes, you can call it jealousy. I’ve always disliked Anne – ever since she came queening it here. I put the damned thing under the desk. I hoped it would get her into trouble. It would have done if you hadn’t been such a Nosey Parker, fingering things on dressing-tables. Anyway, it isn’t a clergyman’s business to go about helping the police.’
It was a spiteful, childish outburst. I took no notice of it. Indeed, at that moment, she seemed a very pathetic child indeed.
Her childish attempt at vengeance against Anne seemed hardly to be taken seriously. I told her so, and added that I should return the ear-ring to her and say nothing of the circumstances in which I had found it. She seemed rather touched by that.
‘That’s nice of you,’ she said.
She paused a minute and then said, keeping her face averted and evidently choosing her words with care:
‘You know, Mr Clement, I should – I should get Dennis away from here soon, if I were you I – think it would be better.’
‘Dennis?’ I raised my eyebrows in slight surprise but with a trace of amusement too.
‘I think it would be better.’ She added, still in the same awkward manner: ‘I’m sorry about Dennis. I didn’t think he – anyway, I’m sorry.’
We left it at that.
Chapter 23
On the way back, I proposed to Griselda that we should make a detour and go round by the barrow. I was anxious to see if the police were at work and if so, what they had found. Griselda, however, had things to do at home, so I was left to make the expedition on my own.
I found Constable Hurst in charge of operations.
‘No sign so far, sir,’ he reported. ‘And yet it stands to reason that this is the only place for a cache.’