The Mirror Crack'd - Agatha Christie [44]
Tiddler grinned. ‘Nothing to what you can read in a film magazine any day of the week.’
‘I think I’ll have to read a few,’ said Dermot, ‘to get the atmosphere.’
‘The things they say and hint!’ said Tiddler.
‘I wonder,’ said Dermot thoughtfully, ‘if my Miss Marple reads film magazines.’
‘Is that the old lady who lives in the house by the church?’
‘That’s right.’
‘They say she’s sharp,’ said Tiddler. ‘They say there’s nothing goes on here that Miss Marple doesn’t hear about. She may not know much about the film people, but she ought to be able to give you the low-down on the Badcocks all right.’
‘It’s not as simple as it used to be,’ said Dermot. ‘There’s a new social life springing up here. A housing estate, big building development. The Badcocks are fairly new and come from there.’
‘I didn’t hear much about the locals, of course,’ said Tiddler. ‘I concentrated on the sex life of film stars and such things.’
‘You haven’t brought back very much,’ grumbled Dermot. ‘What about Marina Gregg’s past, anything about that?’
‘Done a bit of marrying in her time but not more than most. Her first husband didn’t like getting the chuck, so they said, but he was a very ordinary sort of bloke. He was a realtor or something like that. What is a realtor, by the way?’
‘I think it means in the real estate business.’
‘Oh well, anyway, he didn’t line up as very glamorous so she got rid of him and married a foreign count or prince. That lasted hardly any time at all but there don’t seem to be any bones broken. She just shook him off and teamed up with number three. Film star Robert Truscott. That was said to be a passionate love match. His wife didn’t much like letting go of him, but she had to take it in the end. Big alimony. As far as I can make out everybody’s hard up because they’ve got to pay so much alimony to all their ex-wives.’
‘But it went wrong?’
‘Yes. She was the broken-hearted one, I gather. But another big romance came along a year or two later. Isidore Somebody — a playwright.’
‘It’s an exotic life,’ said Dermot. ‘Well, we’ll call it a day now. Tomorrow we’ve got to get down to a bit of hard work.’
‘Such as?’
‘Such as checking a list I’ve got here. Out of twenty-odd names we ought to be able to do some elimination and out of what’s left we’ll have to look for X.’
‘Any idea who X is?’
‘Not in the least. If it isn’t Jason Rudd, that is.’ He added with a wry and ironic smile, ‘I shall have to go to Miss Marple and get briefed on local matters.’
Chapter 12
Miss Marple was pursuing her own methods of research.
‘It’s very kind, Mrs Jameson, very kind of you indeed. I can’t tell you how grateful I am.’
‘Oh, don’t mention it, Miss Marple. I’m sure I’m glad to oblige you. I suppose you’ll want the latest ones?’
‘No, no, not particularly,’ said Miss Marple. ‘In fact I think I’d rather have some of the old numbers.’
‘Well, here you are then,’ said Mrs Jameson, ‘there’s a nice armful and I can assure you we shan’t miss them. Keep them as long as you like. Now it’s too heavy for you to carry. Jenny, how’s your perm doing?’
‘She’s all right, Mrs Jameson. She’s had her rinse and now she’s having a good dry-out.’
‘In that case, dear, you might just run along with Miss Marple here, and carry these magazines for her. No, really, Miss Marple, it’s no trouble at all. Always pleased to do anything we can for you.’
How kind people were, Miss Marple thought, especially when they’d known you practically all their lives. Mrs Jameson, after long years of running a hairdressing parlour had steeled herself to going as far in the cause of progress as to repaint her sign and call herself
‘DIANE. Hair Stylist.’
Otherwise the shop remained much as before and catered in much the same way to the needs of its clients. It turned you out with a nice firm perm: it accepted the task of shaping and cutting for the younger generation and the resultant mess was accepted without too much recrimination. But the bulk of Mrs Jameson’s clientele was a bunch of solid, stick in the mud middle-aged ladies who