The Mirror Crack'd - Agatha Christie [62]
The girl’s eyes turned swiftly on to Dermot. He thought they had a wary, searching look but that, as he well knew, was nothing extraordinary. It was a fairly common reaction to detective-inspectors. She was a thin girl, all elbows and angles, but was an interesting shape for all that. A heavy curtain of black hair fell down either side of her face. She looked dirty as well as sallow and not particularly prepossessing, to his eyes. But he acknowledged that there was character there. She raised her eyebrows which were slightly raised by art already and remarked:
‘And what can I do for you, Detective-Inspector Craddock?’
‘How do you do, Miss Bence. I wanted to ask you if you would be so kind as to answer a few questions about that very unfortuante business at Gossington Hall, near Much Benham. You went there, if I remember, to take some photographs.’
The girl nodded. ‘Of course. I remember quite well.’ She shot him a quick searching look. ‘I didn’t see you there. Surely it was somebody else. Inspector — Inspector —’
‘Inspector Cornish?’ said Dermot.
‘That’s right.’
‘We were called in later.’
‘You’re from Scotland Yard?’
‘Yes.’
‘You butted in and took over from the local people. Is that it?’
‘Well, it isn’t quite a question of butting in, you know. It’s up to the Chief Constable of the County to decide whether he wants to keep it in his own hands or whether he thinks it’ll be better handled by us.’
‘What makes him decide?’
‘It very often turns on whether the case has a local background or whether it’s a more — universal one. Sometimes, perhaps, an international one.’
‘And he decided, did he, that this was an international one?’
‘Transatlantic, perhaps, would be a better word.’
‘They’ve been hinting that in the papers, haven’t they? Hinting that the killer, whoever he was, was out to get Marina Gregg and got some wretched local woman by mistake. Is that true or is it a bit of publicity for their film?’
‘I’m afraid there isn’t much doubt about it, Miss Bence.’
‘What do you want to ask me? Have I got to come to Scotland Yard?’
He shook his head. ‘Not unless you like. We’ll go back to your studio if you prefer.’
‘All right, let’s do that. My car’s just up the street.’
She walked rapidly along the footpath. Dermot went with her. Jethroe called after them.
‘So long darling, I won’t butt in. I’m sure you and the Inspector are going to talk big secrets.’ He joined the two models on the pavement and began an animated discussion with them.
Margot got into the car, unlocked the door on the other side, and Dermot Craddock got in beside her. She said nothing at all during the drive back to Tottenham Court Road. She turned down the cul-de-sac and at the bottom of it drove through an open doorway.
‘Got my own parking place here,’ she remarked. ‘It’s a furniture depository place really, but they rent me a bit of space. Parking a car is one of the big headaches in London, as you probably know only too well, though I don’t suppose you deal with traffic, do you?’
‘No, that’s not one of my troubles.’
‘I should think murder would be infinitely preferable,’ said Margot Bence.
She led the way back to the studio, motioned him to a chair, offered him a cigarette and sank down on the large pouffe opposite him. From behind the curtain of dark hair she looked at him in a sombre questioning way.
‘Shoot, stranger,’ she said.
‘You were taking photographs on the occasion of this death, I understand.’
‘Yes.’
‘You’d been engaged professionally?’
‘Yes. They wanted someone to do a few specialized shots. I do quite a lot of that stuff. I do some work for film studios sometimes, but this time I was just taking photographs of the fête, and afterwards a few shots of special people being greeted by Marina Gregg and Jason Rudd. Local notabilities or other personalities. That sort of thing.’
‘Yes. I understand that. You had your camera on the stairs, I understand?’
‘A part of the time, yes. I got a very good angle from there. You get people coming up the stairs below you and you could swivel round and get Marina shaking hands with