Nemesis - Agatha Christie [17]
Miss Marple felt doubtful of going on, and yet she must somehow or other try and get a little helpful knowledge.
‘Well, no, not because of that, but afterwards, perhaps, he wondered about the psychology of these things. Or he got interested in the cases where justice had not been administered properly or — oh, well…’
She sounded more scatty every minute.
‘Why should he take the least interest in anything of that kind? And don’t let’s talk about that horrible business in St Honoré.’
‘Oh no, I think you are quite right. I’m sure I’m very sorry. I was just thinking of some of the things that Mr Rafiel sometimes said. Queer turns of phrase, sometimes, and I just wondered if he had any theories, you know…about the causes of crime?’
‘His interests were always entirely financial,’ said Esther shortly. ‘A really clever swindle of a criminal kind might have interested him, nothing else — ’
She was looking coldly still at Miss Marple.
‘I am sorry,’ said Miss Marple apologetically. ‘I — I shouldn’t have talked about distressing matters that are fortunately past. And I must be getting on my way,’ she added. ‘I have got my train to catch and I shall only just have time. Oh dear, what did I do with my bag — oh yes, here it is.’
She collected her bag, umbrella and a few other things, fussing away until the tension had slightly abated. As she went out of the door, she turned to Esther who was urging her to stay and have a cup of tea.
‘No thank you, my dear, I’m so short of time. I’m very pleased to have seen you again and I do offer my best congratulations and hopes for a very happy life. I don’t suppose you will be taking up any post again now, will you?’
‘Oh, some people do. They find it interesting, they say. They get bored when they have nothing to do. But I think I shall rather enjoy living a life of leisure. I shall enjoy my legacy, too, that Mr Rafiel left me. It was very kind of him and I think he’d want me — well, to enjoy it even if I spent it in what he’d think of perhaps as a rather silly, female way! Expensive clothes and a new hairdo and all that. He’d have thought that sort of thing very silly.’ She added suddenly, ‘I was fond of him, you know. Yes, I was quite fond of him. I think it was because he was a sort of challenge to me. He was difficult to get on with, and therefore I enjoyed managing it.’
‘And managing him?’
‘Well, not quite managing him, but perhaps a little more than he knew I was.’
Miss Marple trotted away down the road. She looked back once and waved her hand — Esther Anderson was still standing on the doorstep, and she waved back cheerfully.
‘I thought this might have been something to do with her or something she knew about,’ said Miss Marple to herself. ‘I think I’m wrong. No. I don’t think she’s concerned in this business, whatever it is, in any way. Oh dear, I feel Mr Rafiel expected me to be much cleverer than I am being. I think he expected me to put things together — but what things? And what do I do next, I wonder?’ She shook her head.
She had to think over things very carefully. This business had been, as it were, left to her. Left to her to refuse, to accept, to understand what it was all about? Or not understand anything, but to go forward and hope that some kind of guidance might be given to her. Occasionally she closed her eyes and tried to picture Mr Rafiel’s face. Sitting in the garden of the hotel in the West Indies, in his tropical suit; his bad-tempered corrugated face, his flashes of occasional humour. What she really wanted to know was what had been in his mind when he worked up this scheme, when he set out to bring it about. To lure her into accepting it, to persuade her to accept it, to — well, perhaps one should say — to bully her into accepting it. The third was much the most likely, knowing Mr Rafiel. And yet, take it that he had wanted something done and he had chosen her, settled upon her to do it. Why? Because she had suddenly come into his mind? But why should she have come into his mind?
She thought back to Mr Rafiel and the things that had occurred