The Mirror Crack'd - Agatha Christie [82]
‘It’s odd you should say that,’ said Craddock thoughtfully.
‘Why, has it made you remember something?’
‘I was thinking of when my mother died. I was five I think. Five or six. I was having dinner in the nursery, jam roll pudding. I was very fond of jam roll pudding. One of the servants came in and said to my nursery governess, “Isn’t it awful? There’s been an accident and Mrs Craddock has been killed.”…Whenever I think of my mother’s death, d’you know what I see?’
‘What?’
‘A plate with jam roll pudding on it, and I’m staring at it. Staring at it and I can see as well now as then, how the jam oozed out of it at one side. I didn’t cry or say anything. I remember just sitting there as though I’d been frozen stiff, staring at the pudding. And d’you know, even now if I see in a shop or a restaurant or in anyone’s house a portion of jam roll pudding, a whole wave of horror and misery and despair comes over me. Sometimes for a moment I don’t remember why. Does that seem very crazy to you?’
‘No,’ said Miss Marple, ‘it seems entirely natural. It’s very interesting, that. It’s given me a sort of idea…’
II
The door opened and Miss Knight appeared bearing the tea tray.
‘Dear, dear,’ she exclaimed, ‘and so we’ve got a visitor, have we? How very nice. How do you do, Inspector Craddock. I’ll just fetch another cup.’
‘Don’t bother,’ Dermot called after her. ‘I’ve had a drink instead.’
Miss Knight popped her head back round the door.
‘I wonder — could you just come here a minute, Mr Craddock?’
Dermot joined her in the hall. She went to the dining-room and shut the door.
‘You will be careful, won’t you?’ she said.
‘Careful? In what way, Miss Knight?’
‘Our old dear in there. You know, she’s so interested in everything but it’s not very good for her to get excited over murders and nasty things like that. We don’t want her to brood and have bad dreams. She’s very old and frail, and she really must lead a very sheltered life. She always has, you know. I’m sure all this talk of murders and gangsters and things like that is very, very bad for her.’
Dermot looked at her with faint amusement.
‘I don’t think,’ he said gently, ‘that anything that you or I could say about murders is likely unduly to excite or shock Miss Marple. I can assure you, my dear Miss Knight, that Miss Marple can contemplate murder and sudden death and indeed crime of all kinds with the utmost equanimity.’
He went back to the drawing-room, and Miss Knight, clucking a little in an indignant manner, followed him. She talked briskly during tea with an emphasis on political news in the paper and the most cheerful subjects she could think of. When she finally removed the tea tray and shut the door behind her, Miss Marple drew a deep breath.
‘At last we’ve got some peace,’ she said. ‘I hope I shan’t murder that woman some day. Now listen, Dermot, there are some things I want to know.’
‘Yes? What are they?’
‘I want to go over very carefully what happened on the day of the fête. Mrs Bantry has arrived, and the vicar shortly after her. Then come Mr and Mrs Badcock, and on the stairs at that time were the mayor and his wife, this man Ardwyck Fenn, Lola Brewster, a reporter from the Herald & Argus of Much Benham, and this photographer girl, Margot Bence. Margot Bence, you said, had her camera at an angle on the stairs, and was taking photographs of the proceedings. Have you seen any of those photographs?’
‘Actually I brought one to show you.’
He took from his pocket an unmounted print. Miss Marple looked at it steadfastly. Marina Gregg with Jason Rudd a little behind her to one side, Arthur Badcock, his hand to his face, looking