The Sittaford Mystery - Agatha Christie [35]
‘Mrs Curtis’s up to Sittaford? I will indeed, Miss. Do anything, that I will. We all feel for you, Miss, more than I can say. All the time I keep saying to myself, “Just fancy if it was you and Fred,” I keep saying. I would be distracted—that I would. The least thing I hears I’ll pass it on to you, Miss.’
‘You angel,’ said Emily.
‘Just like a sixpenny I got at Woolworth’s the other day, The Syringa Murders it was called. And do you know what led them to find the real murderer, Miss. Just a bit of common sealing wax. Your gentleman is good-looking, Miss, isn’t he? Quite unlike his picture in the papers. I’m sure I’ll do anything I can, Miss, for you and for him.’
Thus the centre of romantic attention, Emily left the Three Crowns, having duly gulped down the cup of tea prescribed by Mrs Belling.
‘By the way,’ she said to Enderby as the aged Ford sprang forward, ‘you are my cousin, don’t forget.’
‘Why?’
‘They’ve got such pure minds in the country,’ said Emily. ‘I thought it would be better.’
‘Splendid. In that case,’ said Mr Enderby rising to his opportunities, ‘I had better call you Emily.’
‘All right, cousin—what’s your name?’
‘Charles.’
‘All right, Charles.’
The car went upwards on the Sittaford road.
Chapter 13
Sittaford
Emily was rather fascinated by her first view of Sittaford. Turning off the main road about two miles from Exhampton, they went upwards over a rough moorland road until they reached a village that was situated right on the edge of the moor. It consisted of a smithy, and a combined post office and sweet shop. From there they followed a lane and came to a row of newly built small granite bungalows. At the second of these the car stopped and the driver volunteered the information that this was Mrs Curtis’s.
Mrs Curtis was a small, thin, grey-haired woman, energetic and shrewish in disposition. She was all agog with the news of the murder which had only penetrated to Sittaford that morning.
‘Yes, of course I can take you in, Miss, and your cousin too, if he can just wait until I shift a few duds. You won’t mind having your meals along of us, I don’t suppose? Well, who would have believed it! Captain Trevelyan murdered and an inquest and all! Cut off from the world we’ve been since Friday morning, and this morning when the news came you could have knocked me down with a feather. “The Captain’s dead,” I said to Curtis, “that shows you the wickedness there is in the world nowadays.” But I’m keeping you talking here, Miss. Come away in and the gentleman too. I have got the kettle on and you shall have a cup of tea immediately, for you must be perished by the drive up, though of course, it’s warmer today after what it’s been. Eight and ten feet the snow has been hereabout.’
Drowned in this sea of talk, Emily and Charles Enderby were shown their new quarters. Emily had a small square room, scrupulously clean, looking out and up to the slope of Sittaford Beacon. Charles’s room was a small slit facing the front of the house and the lane, containing a bed and a microscopic chest of drawers and washstand.
‘The great thing is,’ he observed after the driver of the car had disposed his suitcase upon the bed, and had been duly paid and thanked, ‘that we are here. If we don’t know all there is to be known about everyone living in Sittaford within the next quarter of an hour, I’ll eat my hat.’
Ten minutes later, they were sitting downstairs in the comfortable kitchen being introduced to Curtis, a rather gruff-looking, grey-haired old man, and being regaled with strong tea, bread and butter, Devonshire cream and hard-boiled eggs. While they ate and drank they listened. Within half an hour they knew everything there was to be known about the inhabitants of the small community.
First there was a Miss Percehouse, who lived in No. 4, The Cottages, a spinster of uncertain years and temper who had come down here to die, according to Mrs Curtis, six years ago.
‘But believe it or not, Miss, the air of Sittaford is that healthy