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Twelve
1
“So Mr. Serrocold has been asking you to act as watchdog,” he said.
“Well, yes,” she added apologetically. “I hope you don’t mind—”
“I don’t mind. I think it’s a very good idea. Does Mr. Serrocold know just
“I don’t quite understand, Inspector.”
“I see. He thinks you’re just a very nice, elderly lady who was at school
with his wife.” He shook his head at her. “We know you’re a bit more than
that, Miss Marple, aren’t you? Crime is right down your street. Mr. Serro-
a bit sick, sometimes. Daresay I’m wrong and old-fashioned. But there are
plenty of good decent lads about, lads who could do with a start in life. But
there, honesty has to be its own reward—millionaires don’t leave trust
funds to help the worthwhile. Well—well, don’t pay any attention to me.
I’m old- fashioned. I’ve seen boys — and girls — with everything against
win through. That’s the kind I shall leave my packet to, if I ever have one.
But then, of course, that’s what I never shall have. Just my pension and a
nice bit of garden.”
He nodded his head at Miss Marple.
“Superintendent Blacker told me about you last night. Said you’d had a
lot of experience of the seamy side of human nature. Well now, let’s have
your point of view. Who’s the nigger in the woodpile? The G.I. husband?”
“That,” said Miss Marple, “would be very convenient for everybody.”
Inspector Curry smiled softly to himself.
“A G.I. pinched my best girl,” he said reminiscently. “Naturally, I’m pre-
judiced. His manner doesn’t help. Let’s have the amateur point of view.
Who’s been secretly and systematically7 poisoning Mrs. Serrocold?”
“Well,” said Miss Marple judicially8, “one is always inclined, human
nature being what it is, to think of the husband. Or if it’s the other way
round, the wife. That’s the first assumption, don’t you think, in a poisoning
case?”
“I agree with you every time,” said Inspector Curry.
“But really—in this case—” Miss Marple shook her head. “No, frankly—I
cannot seriously consider Mr. Serrocold. Because you see, Inspector, he
—but it isn’t a parade. It’s very quiet, but it’s genuine. He loves his wife,
and I’m quite certain he wouldn’t poison her.”
so. She’s made over her money to him already.”
tleman wanting his wife out of the way. An attachment12 to a young woman,
for instance. But I really don’t see any signs of it in this case. Mr. Serrocold
does not act as though he had any romantic preoccupation. I’m really
afraid,” she sounded quite regretful about it, “we shall have to wash him
out.”
“Regrettable, isn’t it?” said the Inspector. He grinned. “And anyway, he
couldn’t have killed Gulbrandsen. It seems to me that there’s no doubt that
the one thing hinges on the other. Whoever is poisoning Mrs. Serrocold
killed Gulbrandsen to prevent him spilling the beans. What we’ve got to
get at now is who had an opportunity to kill Gulbrandsen last night. And
our prize suspect—there’s no doubt about it—is young Walter Hudd. It
was he who switched on a reading lamp which resulted in a fuse going,
box. The fuse box is in the kitchen passage which opens off from the main
corridor. It was during his absence from the Great Hall that the shot was
“And suspect No 2?” asked Miss Marple.
and the house and took too long getting there.”
“Anybody else?” Miss Marple leaned forward eagerly—remembering to
add, “It’s very kind of you to tell me all this.”
“It’s not kindness,” said Inspector Curry. “I’ve got to have your help. You
put your finger on the spot when you said ‘Anybody else?’ Because there
I’ve got to depend on you. You were there, in the Hall last night, and you
can tell me who left it….”
“Yes—yes, I ought to be able to tell you … but can I? You see—the cir-
cumstances—”
“You mean that you were all listening to the argument going on behind
the door of Mr. Serrocold’s study.”
Miss Marple nodded vehemently16.
“Yes, you see we were all really very frightened. Mr. Lawson looked—he
really did—quite demented. Apart from Mrs. Serrocold who seemed quite
was shouting, you know, and saying the most terrible things—we could
hear them quite plainly—and what with that and with most of the lights
being out—I didn’t really notice anything else.”
“You mean that whilst that scene was going on, anybody could have
slipped out of the Hall, gone along the corridor, shot Mr. Gulbrandsen, and
slipped back again?”
“I think it would have been possible….”
“Could you say definitely that anybody was in the Great Hall the whole
time?”
Miss Marple considered.
“I could say that Mrs. Serrocold was—because I was watching her. She
was sitting quite close to the study door, and she never moved from her
seat. It surprised me, you know, that she was able to remain so calm.”
“And the others?”
“Miss Bellever went out—but I think—I am almost sure—that that was
after the shot. Mrs. Strete? I really don’t know. She was sitting behind me,
you see. Gina was over by the far window. I think she remained there the
whole time but, of course, I cannot be sure. Stephen was at the piano. He
stopped playing when the quarrel began to get heated—”
“We mustn’t be misled by the time you heard the shot,” said Inspector
Curry. “That’s a trick that’s been done before now, you know. Fake up a
shot so as to fix the time of a crime, and fix it wrong. If Miss Bellever had
cooked up something of that kind (farfetched—but you never know) then
she’d leave as she did, openly, after the shot was heard. No, we can’t go by
to the moment when Miss Bellever found him dead, and we can only elim-
inate those people who were known not to have had opportunity. That
gives us Lewis Serrocold and young Edgar Lawson in the study, and Mrs.
Serrocold in the Hall. It’s very unfortunate, of course, that Gulbrandsen
should be shot on the same evening that this schemozzle happened
between Serrocold and this young Lawson.”
“Just unfortunate, you think?” murmured Miss Marple.
“Oh? What do you think?”
“It occurred to me,” murmured Miss Marple, “that it might have been
“So that’s your idea?”
“Well, everybody seems to think it very odd that Edgar Lawson should
quite suddenly have a relapse, so to speak. He’d got this curious complex,
or whatever the term is, about his unknown father. Winston Churchill and
Viscount Montgomery—all quite likely in his state of mind. Just any fam-
ous man he happened to think of. But suppose somebody puts it into his
head that it’s Lewis Serrocold who is really his father, that it’s Lewis Serro-
cold who has been persecuting20 him—that he ought, by rights, to be the
crown prince, as it were, of Stonygates. In his weak mental state he’ll ac-
make the kind of scene he did make. And what a wonderful cover that will
that is developing—especially if somebody has thoughtfully supplied him
with a revolver.”
“Hm, yes. Walter Hudd’s revolver.”
“Oh yes,” said Miss Marple, “I’d thought of that. But you know, Walter is
really think he’s stupid.”
“So you don’t think it’s Walter?”
“I think everybody would be very relieved if it was Walter. That sounds
very unkind, but it’s because he is an outsider.”
“What about his wife?” asked Inspector Curry. “Would she be relieved?”
Miss Marple did not answer. She was thinking of Gina and Stephen Re-
thought of the way Alex Restarick’s eyes had gone straight to Gina as he
had entered the Hall last night. What was Gina’s own attitude?
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