复仇女神36
时间：2026-01-29 07:29:11
（单词翻译:单击）
Twenty
MISS MARPLE HAS IDEAS
Having had lunch in the dining room, Miss Marple went out on the terrace
to drink her coffee. She was just sipping her second cup when a tall, thin
figure came striding up the steps, and approached her, speaking rather
breathlessly. She saw that it was Anthea Bradbury-Scott.
“Oh, Miss Marple, we’ve only just heard, you know, that you didn’t go
with the coach, after all. We thought you were going on with the tour. We
had no idea you were staying on here. Both Clotilde and Lavinia sent me
here to say we do so hope you will come back to The Old Manor House
and stay with us. I’m sure it will be nicer for you to be there. There are so
many people coming and going here always, especially over a weekend
and things like that. So we’d be very, very glad—we really would—if you
would come back to us.”
“Oh, that’s very kind of you,” said Miss Marple. “Really very kind, but
I’m sure—I mean, you know it was just a two-day visit. I meant originally
to go off with the coach. I mean, after the two days. If it hadn’t been for
this very, very tragic accident but—well, I really felt I couldn’t go on any
longer. I thought I must have at least, well at least one night’s rest.”
“But I mean it would be so much better if you came to us. We’d try and
make you comfortable.”
“Oh, there’s no question of that,” said Miss Marple. “I was extremely
comfortable staying with you. Oh yes, I did enjoy it very much. Such a
beautiful house. And all your things are so nice. You know, your china and
glass and furniture. It’s such a pleasure to be in a home and not a hotel.”
“Then you must come with me now. Yes, you really must. I could go and
pack your things for you.”
“Oh—well, that’s very kind of you. I can do that myself.”
“Well, shall I come and help you?”
“That would be very kind,” said Miss Marple.
They repaired to her bedroom where Anthea, in a somewhat slapdash
manner, packed Miss Marple’s belongings together. Miss Marple, who had
her own ways of folding things, had to bite her lip to keep an air of com-
placency on her face. Really, she thought, she can’t fold anything properly.
Anthea got hold of a porter from the hotel and he carried the suitcase
round the corner and down the street to The Old Manor House. Miss
Marple tipped him adequately and, still uttering fussy little speeches of
thanks and pleasure, rejoined the sisters.
“The Three Sisters!” she was thinking, “here we are again.” She sat down
in the drawing room, and closed her eyes for a minute, breathing rather
fast. She appeared to be somewhat out of breath. It was only natural, she
felt at her age, and after all Anthea and the hotel porter had set a fast
pace. But really she was trying to acquire through her closed eyes what
the feeling was she had on coming into this house again. Was something
in it sinister? No, not so much sinister as unhappy. Deep unhappiness. So
much so it was almost frightening.
She opened her eyes again and looked at the two other occupants of the
room. Mrs. Glynne had just come in from the kitchen, bearing an after-
noon tea tray. She looked as she had looked all along. Comfortable, no par-
ticular emotions or feelings. Perhaps almost too devoid of them, Miss
Marple thought. Had she accustomed herself, through perhaps a life of
some stress and difficulty, to show nothing to the outer world, to keep a
reserve and let no one know what her inner feelings were?
She looked from her to Clotilde. She had a Clytemnestra look, as she had
thought before. She had certainly not murdered her husband for she had
never had a husband to murder and it seemed unlikely that she had
murdered the girl to whom she was said to have been extremely attached.
That, Miss Marple was quite sure, was true. She had seen before how the
tears had welled from Clotilde’s eyes when the death of Verity had been
mentioned.
And what about Anthea? Anthea had taken that cardboard box to the
post office. Anthea had come to fetch her. Anthea—she was very doubtful
about Anthea. Scatty? Too scatty for her age. Eyes that wandered and
came back to you. Eyes that seemed to see things that other people might
not see, over your shoulder. She’s frightened, thought Miss Marple.
Frightened of something. What was she frightened of? Was she perhaps a
mental case of some kind? Frightened perhaps of going back to some insti-
tution or establishment where she might have spent part of her life?
Frightened of those two sisters of hers feeling that it was unwise for her to
remain at liberty? Were they uncertain, those two, what their sister
Anthea might do or say?
There was some atmosphere here. She wondered, as she sipped the last
of her tea, what Miss Cooke and Miss Barrow were doing. Had they gone
to visit that church or was that all talk, meaningless talk? It was odd. Odd
the way they had come and looked at her at St. Mary Mead so as to know
her again on the coach, but not to acknowledge that they had ever seen or
met her before.
There were quite a lot of difficult things going on. Presently Mrs. Glynne
removed the tea tray, Anthea went out into the garden and Miss Marple
was left alone with Clotilde.
“I think,” said Miss Marple, “that you know an Archdeacon Brabazon, do
you not?”
“Oh yes,” said Clotilde, “he was in church yesterday at the service. Do
you know him?”
“Oh no,” said Miss Marple, “but he did come to the Golden Boar and he
came and spoke to me there. I gather he had been to the hospital and was
enquiring about poor Miss Temple’s death. He wondered if Miss Temple
had sent any message to him. I gather she was thinking of paying him a
visit. But of course I told him that although I did go there in case I could do
anything there was nothing that could be done except sit by poor Miss
Temple’s bed. She was unconscious, you know. I could have done nothing
to help her.”
“She didn’t say — say anything — any explanation of what had
happened?” asked Clotilde.
She asked without much interest. Miss Marple wondered if she felt more
interest than she expressed, but on the whole she thought not. She thought
Clotilde was busy with thoughts of something quite different.
“Do you think it was an accident?” Miss Marple asked, “Or do you think
there is something in that story that Mrs. Riseley- Porter’s niece told?
About seeing someone pushing a boulder.”
“Well, I suppose if those two said so, they must have seen it.”
“Yes. They both said so, didn’t they,” said Miss Marple, “though not quite
in the same terms. But perhaps that’s quite natural.”
Clotilde looked at her curiously.
“You seem to be intrigued by that.”
“Well, it seems so very unlikely,” said Miss Marple, “an unlikely story,
unless—”
“Unless what?”
“Well, I just wondered,” said Miss Marple.
Mrs. Glynne came into the room again.
“You just wondered what?” she asked.
“We’re talking about the accident, or the nonaccident,” said Clotilde.
“But who—”
“It seems a very odd story that they told,” said Miss Marple again.
“There’s something about this place,” said Clotilde suddenly. “Something
about this atmosphere. We never got over it here. Never. Never since—
since Verity died. It’s years but it doesn’t go away. A shadow’s here.” She
looked at Miss Marple. “Don’t you think so too? Don’t you feel a shadow
here?”
“Well, I’m a stranger,” said Miss Marple. “It’s different for you and your
sisters who’ve lived here and who knew the dead girl. She was, I gather, as
Archdeacon Brabazon was saying—a very charming and beautiful girl.”
“She was a lovely girl. A dear child too,” said Clotilde.
“I wish I’d known her better,” said Mrs. Glynne. “Of course I was living
abroad at that time. My husband and I came home on leave once, but we
were mostly in London. We didn’t come down here often.”
Anthea came in from the garden. She was carrying in her hand a great
bunch of lilies.
“Funeral flowers,” she said. “That’s what we ought to have here today,
isn’t it? I’ll put them in a great jar. Funeral flowers,” and she laughed sud-
denly. A queer, hysterical little giggle.
“Anthea,” said Clotilde, “don’t—don’t do that. It’s not—it’s not right.”
“I’ll go and put them in water,” said Anthea, cheerfully. She went out of
the room.
“Really,” said Mrs. Glynne, “Anthea! I do think she’s—”
“She’s getting worse,” said Clotilde.
Miss Marple adopted an attitude of not listening or hearing. She picked
up a small enamel box and looked at it with admiring eyes.
“She’ll probably break a vase now,” said Lavinia.
She went out of the room. Miss Marple said,
“You are worried about your sister, about Anthea?”
“Well yes, she’s always been rather unbalanced. She’s the youngest and
she was rather delicate as a girl. But lately, I think, she’s got definitely
worse. She hasn’t got any idea, I think, of the gravity of things. She has
these silly fits of hysteria. Hysterical laughter at things one ought to be ser-
ious about. We don’t want to—well, to send her anywhere or—you know.
She ought to have treatment, I think, but I don’t think she would like to go
away from home. This is her home, after all. Though sometimes it’s—it’s
very difficult.”
“All life is difficult sometimes,” said Miss Marple.
“Lavinia talks of going away,” said Clotilde. “She talks of going to live
abroad again. At Taormina, I think. She was there with her husband a lot
and they were very happy. She’s been at home with us now for many
years, but she seems to have this longing to get away and to travel. Some-
times I think—sometimes I think she doesn’t like being in the same house
as Anthea.”
“Oh dear,” said Miss Marple. “Yes, I have heard of cases like that where
these difficulties do arise.”
“She’s afraid of Anthea,” said Clotilde. “Definitely afraid of her. And
really, I keep telling her there’s nothing to be afraid of. Anthea’s just
rather silly at times. You know, has queer ideas and says queer things. But
I don’t think there’s any danger of her—well, I mean of—oh, I don’t know
what I mean. Doing anything dangerous or strange or queer.”
“There’s never been any trouble of that kind?” enquired Miss Marple.
“Oh no. There’s never been anything. She gets nervous fits of temper
sometimes and she takes rather sudden dislikes to people. She’s very jeal-
ous, you know, over things. Very jealous of a lot of—well, fuss being made
over different people. I don’t know. Sometimes I think we’d better sell this
house and leave it altogether.”
“It is sad for you, isn’t it,” said Miss Marple. “I think I can understand
that it must be very sad for you living here with the memory of the past.”
“You understand that, do you? Yes, I can see that you do. One cannot
help it. One’s mind goes back to that dear, lovable child. She was like a
daughter to me. She was the daughter, anyway, of one of my best friends.
She was very intelligent too. She was a clever girl. She was a good artist.
She was doing very well with her art training and designing. She was tak-
ing up a good deal of designing. I was very proud of her. And then—this
wretched attachment, this terrible mentally afflicted boy.”
“You mean Mr. Rafiel’s son, Michael Rafiel?”
“Yes. If only he’d never come here. It just happened that he was staying
in this part of the world and his father suggested he might look us up and
he came and had a meal with us. He could be very charming, you know.
But he always had been a sad delinquent, a bad record. He’d been in
prison twice, and a very bad history with girls. But I never thought that
Verity … just a case of infatuation. I suppose it happens to girls of that age.
She was infatuated with him. Insisted that everything that had happened
to him had not been his fault. You know the things girls say. ‘Everyone is
against him,’ that’s what they always say. Everyone’s against him. Nobody
made allowances for him. Oh, one gets tired of hearing these things said.
Can’t one put a little sense into girls?”
“They have not usually very much sense, I agree,” said Miss Marple.
“She wouldn’t listen. I—I tried to keep him away from the house. I told
him he was not to come here any more. That of course was stupid. I real-
ized that afterwards. It only meant that she went and met him outside the
house. I don’t know where. They had various meeting places. He used to
call for her in his car at an agreed spot and bring her home late at night.
Once or twice he didn’t bring her home until the next day. I tried to tell
them it must stop, that it must all cease, but they wouldn’t listen. Verity
wouldn’t listen. I didn’t expect him to, of course.”
“She intended to marry him?” asked Miss Marple.
“Well, I don’t think it ever got as far as that. I don’t think he ever wanted
to marry her or thought of such a thing.”
“I am very sorry for you,” said Miss Marple. “You must have suffered a
lot.”
“Yes. The worst was having to go and identify the body. That was some
time after—after she’d disappeared from here. We thought of course that
she’d run away with him and we thought that we’d get news of them some
time. I knew the police seemed to be taking it rather seriously. They asked
Michael to go to the police station and help them with enquiries and his
account of himself didn’t seem to agree with what local people were say-
ing.
“Then they found her. A long way from here. About thirty miles away.
In a kind of ditchy hedgy spot down an unfrequented lane where anyone
hardly ever went. Yes, I had to go and view the body in the mortuary. A
terrible sight. The cruelty, the force that had been used. What did he want
to do that to her for? Wasn’t it enough that he strangled her? He strangled
her with her own scarf. I can’t—I can’t talk about it any more. I can’t bear
it, I can’t bear it.”
Tears rained suddenly down her face.
“I’m sorry for you,” said Miss Marple. “I’m very, very sorry.”
“I believe you are.” Clotilde looked at her suddenly. “And even you don’t
know the worst of it.”
“In what way?”
“I don’t know—I don’t know about Anthea.”
“What do you mean about Anthea?”
“She was so queer at that time. She was—she was very jealous. She sud-
denly seemed to turn against Verity. To look at her as though she hated
her. Sometimes I thought—I thought perhaps—oh no, it’s an awful thing to
think, you can’t think that about your own sister—she did once attack
someone. You know, she used to get these storms of rage. I wondered if it
could have been—oh, I mustn’t say such things. There’s no question of any
such thing. Please forget what I’ve said. There’s nothing in it, nothing at
all. But—but—well, she’s not quite normal. I’ve got to face that. When she
was quite young queer things happened once or twice—with animals. We
had a parrot. A parrot that said things, silly things like parrots do say and
she wrung its neck and I’ve never felt the same since. I’ve never felt that I
could trust her. I’ve never felt sure. I’ve never felt—oh, goodness, I’m get-
ting hysterical, too.”
“Come, come,” said Miss Marple, “don’t think of these things.”
“No. It’s bad enough to know—to know that Verity died. Died in that
horrible way. At any rate, other girls are safe from that boy. Life sentence
he got. He’s still in prison. They won’t let him out to do anything to anyone
else. Though why they couldn’t bring it in as some mental trouble—dimin-
ished responsibility—one of these things they use nowadays. He ought to
have gone to Broadmoor. I’m sure he wasn’t responsible for anything that
he did.”
She got up and went out of the room. Mrs. Glynne had come back and
passed her sister in the doorway.
“You mustn’t pay any attention to Clotilde,” she said. “She’s never quite
recovered from that ghastly business years ago. She loved Verity very
much.”
“She seems to be worried about your other sister.”
“About Anthea? Anthea’s all right. She’s — er — well, she’s scatty, you
know. She’s a bit—hysterical. Apt to get worked up about things, and she
has queer fancies, imagination sometimes. But I don’t think there’s any
need for Clotilde to worry so much. Dear me, who’s that passing the win-
dow?”
Two apologetic figures suddenly showed themselves in the french win-
dow.
“Oh do excuse us,” said Miss Barrow, “we were just walking round the
house to see if we could find Miss Marple. We had heard she’d come here
with you and I wonder—oh, there you are, my dear Miss Marple. I wanted
to tell you that we didn’t get to that church after all this afternoon. Appar-
ently it’s closed for cleaning, so I think we shall have to give up any other
expedition today and go on one tomorrow. I do hope you don’t mind us
coming in this way. I did ring at the front doorbell but it didn’t seem to be
ringing.”
“I’m afraid it doesn’t sometimes,” said Mrs. Glynne. “You know, it’s
rather temperamental. Sometimes it rings and sometimes it doesn’t. But
do sit down and talk to us a little. I’d no idea that you hadn’t gone with the
coach.”
“No, we thought we would do a little sightseeing round here, as we had
got so far, and going with the coach would really be rather—well, rather
painful after what has happened just a day or two ago.”
“You must have some sherry,” said Mrs. Glynne.
She went out of the room and presently returned. Anthea was with her,
quite calm now, bringing glasses and a decanter of sherry, and they sat
down together.
“I can’t help wanting to know,” said Mrs. Glynne, “what really is going to
happen in this business. I mean of poor Miss Temple. I mean, it seems so
very impossible to know what the police think. They still seem to be in
charge, and I mean the inquest being adjourned, so obviously they are not
satisfied. I don’t know if there’s anything in the nature of the wound.”
“I shouldn’t think so,” said Miss Barrow. “I mean a blow on the head,
bad concussion—well, I mean that came from the boulder. The only point
is, Miss Marple, if the boulder rolled itself down or somebody rolled it.”
“Oh,” said Miss Cooke, “but surely you can’t think that—who on earth
would want to roll a boulder down, do that sort of thing? I suppose there
are always hooligans about. You know, some young foreigners or stu-
dents. I really wonder, you know, whether—well—”
“You mean,” said Miss Marple, “you wondered if that someone was one
of our fellow travellers.”
“Well, I—I didn’t say that,” said Miss Cooke.
“But surely,” said Miss Marple, “we can’t help—well, thinking about that
sort of thing. I mean, there must be some explanation. If the police seem
sure it wasn’t an accident, well then it must have been done by somebody
and — well, I mean, Miss Temple was a stranger to this place here. It
doesn’t seem as if anyone could have done it—anyone local I mean. So it
really comes back to—well, I mean, to all of us who were in the coach,
doesn’t it?”
She gave a faint, rather whinnying old lady’s laugh.
“Oh surely!”
“No, I suppose I ought not to say such things. But you know, really
crimes are very interesting. Sometimes the most extraordinary things
have happened.”
“Have you any definite feeling yourself, Miss Marple? I should be inter-
ested to hear,” said Clotilde.
“Well, one does think of possibilities.”
“Mr. Caspar,” said Miss Cooke. “You know, I didn’t like the look of that
man from the first. He looked to me—well, I thought he might have some-
thing to do with espionage or something. You know, perhaps come to this
country to look for atomic secrets or something.”
“I don’t think we’ve got any atomic secrets round here,” said Mrs.
Glynne.
“Of course we haven’t,” said Anthea. “Perhaps it was someone who was
following her. Perhaps it was someone who was tracking her because she
was a criminal of some kind.”
“Nonsense,” said Clotilde. “She was the Headmistress, retired, of a very
well-known school, she was a very fine scholar. Why should anyone be
trying to track her down?”
“Oh, I don’t know. She might have gone peculiar or something.”
“I’m sure,” said Mrs. Glynne, “that Miss Marple has some ideas.”
“Well, I have some ideas,” said Miss Marple. “It seems to me that—well,
the only people that could be … Oh dear, this is so difficult to say. But I
mean there are two people who just spring into one’s mind as possibilities
logically. I mean, I don’t think that it’s really so at all because I’m sure
they’re both very nice people, but I mean there’s nobody else really logic-
ally who could be suspected, should I say.”
“Who do you mean? This is very interesting.”
“Well, I don’t think I ought to say such things. It’s only a—sort of wild
conjecture.”
“Who do you think might have rolled the boulder down? Who do you
think could have been the person that Joanna and Emlyn Price saw?”
“Well, what I did think was that—that perhaps they hadn’t seen any-
body.”
“I don’t quite understand,” said Anthea, “they hadn’t seen anybody?”
“Well, perhaps they might have made it all up.”
“What—about seeing someone?”
“Well, it’s possible, isn’t it.”
“Do you mean as a sort of joke or a sort of unkind idea? What do you
mean?”
“Well, I suppose—one does hear of young people doing very extraordin-
ary things nowadays,” said Miss Marple. “You know, putting things in
horses’ eyes, smashing Legation windows and attacking people. Throwing
stones, at people, and it’s usually being done by somebody young, isn’t it?
And they were the only young people, weren’t they?”
“You mean Emlyn Price and Joanna might have rolled over that
boulder?”
“Well, they’re the only sort of obvious people, aren’t they?” said Miss
Marple.
“Fancy!” said Clotilde. “Oh, I should never have thought of that. But I see
—yes, I just see that there could be something in what you say. Of course, I
don’t know what those two were like. I haven’t been travelling with
them.”
“Oh, they were very nice,” said Miss Marple. “Joanna seemed to me a
particularly—you know, capable girl.”
“Capable of doing anything?” asked Anthea.
“Anthea,” said Clotilde, “do be quiet.”
“Yes. Quite capable,” said Miss Marple. “After all, if you’re going to do
what may result in murder, you’d have to be rather capable so as to man-
age not to be seen or anything.”
“They must have been in it together, though,” suggested Miss Barrow.
“Oh yes,” said Miss Marple. “They were in it together and they told
roughly the same story. They are the—well, they are the obvious suspects,
that’s all I can say. They were out of sight of the others. All the other
people were on the lower path. They could have gone up to the top of the
hill, they could have rocked the boulder. Perhaps they didn’t mean to kill
Miss Temple specially. They may have meant it just as a—well, just as a
piece of anarchy or smashing something or someone — anyone in fact.
They rolled it over. And then of course they told the story of seeing
someone there. Some rather peculiar costume or other which also sounds
very unlikely and—well, I oughtn’t to say these things but I have been
thinking about it.”
“It seems to me a very interesting thought,” said Mrs. Glynne. “What do
you think, Clotilde?”
“I think it’s a possibility. I shouldn’t have thought of it myself.”
“Well,” said Miss Cooke, rising to her feet, “we must be going back to the
Golden Boar now. Are you coming with us, Miss Marple?”
“Oh no,” said Miss Marple. “I suppose you don’t know. I’ve forgotten to
tell you. Miss Bradbury-Scott very kindly asked me to come back and stay
another night—or two nights—here.”
“Oh, I see. Well, I’m sure that’ll be very nice for you. Much more com-
fortable. They seem rather a noisy lot that have arrived at the Golden Boar
this evening.”
“Won’t you come round and have some coffee with us after dinner?”
suggested Clotilde. “It’s quite a warm evening. We can’t offer you dinner
because I’m afraid we haven’t got enough in the house, but if you’ll come
in and have some coffee with us….”
“That would be very nice,” said Miss Cooke. “Yes, we will certainly avail
ourselves of your hospitality.”
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