命案目睹记3
时间：2025-10-20 07:15:17
（单词翻译:单击）
Two
True to the precepts handed down to her by her mother and grandmother
— to wit: that a true lady can neither be shocked nor surprised — Miss
Marple merely raised her eyebrows and shook her head, as she said:
“Most distressing for you, Elspeth, and surely most unusual. I think you
had better tell me about it at once.”
That was exactly what Mrs. McGillicuddy wanted to do. Allowing her
hostess to draw her nearer to the fire, she sat down, pulled off her gloves
and plunged into a vivid narrative.
Miss Marple listened with close attention. When Mrs. McGillicuddy at
last paused for breath, Miss Marple spoke with decision.
“The best thing, I think, my dear, is for you to go upstairs and take off
your hat and have a wash. Then we will have supper—during which we
will not discuss this at all. After supper we can go into the matter thor-
oughly and discuss it from every aspect.”
Mrs. McGillicuddy concurred with this suggestion. The two ladies had
supper, discussing, as they ate, various aspects of life as lived in the village
of St. Mary Mead. Miss Marple commented on the general distrust of the
new organist, related the recent scandal about the chemist’s wife, and
touched on the hostility between the schoolmistress and the village insti-
tute. They then discussed Miss Marple’s and Mrs. McGillicuddy’s gardens.
“Paeonies,” said Miss Marple as she rose from table, “are most unac-
countable. Either they do—or they don’t do. But if they do establish them-
selves, they are with you for life, so to speak, and really most beautiful
varieties nowadays.”
They settled themselves by the fire again, and Miss Marple brought out
two old Waterford glasses from a corner cupboard, and from another cup-
board produced a bottle.
“No coffee tonight for you, Elspeth,” she said. “You are already overex-
cited (and no wonder!) and probably would not sleep. I prescribe a glass
of my cowslip wine, and later, perhaps, a cup of camo-mile tea.”
Mrs. McGillicuddy acquiescing in these arrangements, Miss Marple
poured out the wine.
“Jane,” said Mrs. McGillicuddy, as she took an appreciative sip, “you
don’t think, do you, that I dreamt it, or imagined it?”
“Certainly not,” said Miss Marple with warmth.
Mrs. McGillicuddy heaved a sigh of relief.
“That ticket collector,” she said, “he thought so. Quite polite, but all the
same—”
“I think, Elspeth, that that was quite natural under the circumstances. It
sounded—and indeed was—a most unlikely story. And you were a com-
plete stranger to him. No, I have no doubt at all that you saw what you’ve
told me you saw. It’s very extraordinary—but not at all impossible. I recol-
lect myself being interested when a train ran parallel to one on which I
was travelling, to notice what a vivid and intimate picture one got of what
was going on in one or two of the carriages. A little girl, I remember once,
playing with a teddy bear, and suddenly she threw it deliberately at a fat
man who was asleep in the corner and he bounced up and looked most in-
dignant, and the other passengers looked so amused. I saw them all quite
vividly. I could have described afterwards exactly what they looked like
and what they had on.”
Mrs. McGillicuddy nodded gratefully.
“That’s just how it was.”
“The man had his back to you, you say. So you didn’t see his face?”
“No.”
“And the woman, you can describe her? Young, old?”
“Youngish. Between thirty and thirty-five, I should think. I couldn’t say
closer than that.”
“Good-looking?”
“That again, I couldn’t say. Her face, you see, was all contorted and—”
Miss Marple said quickly:
“Yes, yes, I quite understand. How was she dressed?”
“She had on a fur coat of some kind, a palish fur. No hat. Her hair was
blonde.”
“And there was nothing distinctive that you can remember about the
man?”
Mrs. McGillicuddy took a little time to think carefully before she replied.
“He was tallish—and dark, I think. He had a heavy coat on so that I
couldn’t judge his build very well.” She added despondently, “It’s not
really very much to go on.”
“It’s something,” said Miss Marple. She paused before saying: “You feel
quite sure, in your own mind, that the girl was—dead?”
“She was dead, I’m sure of it. Her tongue came out and—I’d rather not
talk about it….”
“Of course not. Of course not,” said Miss Marple quickly. “We shall know
more, I expect, in the morning.”
“In the morning?”
“I should imagine it will be in the morning papers. After this man had
attacked and killed her, he would have a body on his hands. What would
he do? Presumably he would leave the train quickly at the first station—by
the way, can you remember if it was a corridor carriage?”
“No, it was not.”
“That seems to point to a train that was not going far afield. It would al-
most certainly stop at Brackhampton. Let us say he leaves the train at
Brackhampton, perhaps arranging the body in a corner seat, with her face
hidden by the fur collar to delay discovery. Yes—I think that that is what
he would do. But of course it will be discovered before very long—and I
should imagine that the news of a murdered woman discovered on a train
would be almost certain to be in the morning papers—we shall see.”
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