A Pocket Full of Rye (Miss Marple 7)

“He was poisoned,” said Inspector Neele.

Rather disconcertingly, Mrs. MacKenzie laughed.

“What nonsense,” she said, “he died of fever.”

“I’m talking about Mr. Rex Fortescue.”

“So am I.” She looked up suddenly and her pale blue eyes fixed his. “Come now,” she said, “he died in his bed, didn’t he? He died in his bed?”

“He died in St. Jude’s Hospital,” said Inspector Neele.

“Nobody knows where my husband died,” said Mrs. MacKenzie. “Nobody knows how he died or where he was buried . . . All anyone knows is what Rex Fortescue said. And Rex Fortescue was a liar!”

“Do you think there may have been foul play?”

“Foul play, foul play, fowls lay eggs, don’t they?”

“You think that Rex Fortescue was responsible for your husband’s death?”

“I had an egg for breakfast this morning,” said Mrs. MacKenzie. “Quite fresh, too. Surprising, isn’t it, when one thinks that it was thirty years ago?”

Neele drew a deep breath. It seemed unlikely that he was ever going to get anywhere at this rate, but he persevered.

“Somebody put dead blackbirds on Rex Fortescue’s desk about a month or two before he died.”

“That’s interesting. That’s very, very interesting.”

“Have you any idea, madam, who might have done that?”

“Ideas aren’t any help to one. One has to have action. I brought them up for that, you know, to take action.”

“You’re talking about your children?”

She nodded her head rapidly.

“Yes. Donald and Ruby. They were nine and seven and left without a father. I told them. I told them every day. I made them swear it every night.”

Inspector Neele leant forward.

“What did you make them swear?”

“That they’d kill him, of course.”

“I see.”

Inspector Neele spoke as though it was the most reasonable remark in the world.

“Did they?”

“Donald went to Dunkirk. He never came back. They sent me a wire saying he was dead: ‘Deeply regret killed in action.’ Action, you see, the wrong kind of action.”

“I’m sorry to hear that, madam. What about your daughter?”

“I haven’t got a daughter,” said Mrs. MacKenzie.

“You spoke of her just now,” said Neele. “Your daughter, Ruby.”

“Ruby. Yes, Ruby.” She leaned forward. “Do you know what I’ve done to Ruby?”

“No, madam. What have you done to her?”

She whispered suddenly:

“Look here at the Book.”

He saw then that what she was holding in her lap was a Bible. It was a very old Bible and as she opened it, on the front page, Inspector Neele saw that various names had been written. It was obviously a family Bible in which the old-fashioned custom had been continued of entering each new birth. Mrs. MacKenzie’s thin forefinger pointed to the two last names. “Donald MacKenzie” with the date of his birth, and “Ruby MacKenzie” with the date of hers. But a thick line was drawn through Ruby MacKenzie’s name.

“You see?” said Mrs. MacKenzie. “I struck her out of the Book. I cut her off forever! The Recording Angel won’t find her name there.”

“You cut her name out of the book? Now, why, madam?”

Mrs. MacKenzie looked at him cunningly.

“You know why,” she said.

“But I don’t. Really, madam, I don’t.”

“She didn’t keep faith. You know she didn’t keep faith.”

“Where is your daughter now, madam?”

“I’ve told you. I have no daughter. There isn’t such a person as Ruby MacKenzie any longer.”

“You mean she’s dead?”

“Dead?” The woman laughed suddenly. “It would be better for her if she were dead. Much better. Much, much better.” She sighed and turned restlessly in her seat. Then her manner reverting to a kind of formal courtesy, she said: “I’m so sorry, but really I’m afraid I can’t talk to you any longer. You see, the time is getting very short, and I must read my book.”

To Inspector Neele’s further remarks Mrs. MacKenzie returned no reply. She merely made a faint gesture of annoyance and continued to read her Bible with her finger following the line of the verse she was reading.

Neele got up and left. He had another brief interview with the superintendent.

“Do any of her relations come to see her?” he asked. “A daughter, for instance?”

“I believe a daughter did come to see her in my predecessor’s time, but her visit agitated the patient so much that he advised her not to come again. Since then everything is arranged through solicitors.”

“And you’ve no idea where this Ruby MacKenzie is now?”

The superintendent shook his head.

“No idea whatsoever.”

“You’ve no idea whether she’s married, for instance?”

“I don’t know, all I can do is to give you the address of the solicitors who deal with us.”

Inspector Neele had already tracked down those solicitors. They were unable, or said they were unable, to tell him anything. A trust fund had been established for Mrs. MacKenzie which they managed. These arrangements had been made some years previously and they had not seen Miss MacKenzie since.

Inspector Neele tried to get a description of Ruby MacKenzie but the results were not encouraging. So many relations came to visit patients that after a lapse of years they were bound to be remembered dimly, with the appearance of one mixed-up with the appearance of another. The matron who had been there for many years seemed to remember that Miss MacKenzie was small and dark. The only other nurse who had been there for any length of time recalled that she was heavily built and fair.

“So there we are, sir,” said Inspector Neele as he reported to the assistant commissioner. “There’s a whole crazy setup and it fits together. It must mean something.”

The AC nodded thoughtfully.

“The blackbirds in the pie tying up with the Blackbird Mine, rye in the dead man’s pocket, bread and honey with Adele Fortescue’s tea—(not that that is conclusive. After all, anyone might have had bread and honey for tea!) The third murder, that girl strangled with a stocking and a clothes-peg nipped onto her nose. Yes, crazy as the setup is, it certainly can’t be ignored.”

“Half a minute, sir,” said Inspector Neele.

“What is it?”

Neele was frowning.

?

??You know, what you’ve just said. It didn’t ring true. It was wrong somewhere.” He shook his head and sighed. “No. I can’t place it.”

Chapter Twenty-One

I

Lance and Pat wandered round the well-kept grounds surrounding Yewtree Lodge.

“I hope I’m not hurting your feelings, Lance,” Pat murmured, “if I say this is quite the nastiest garden I’ve ever been in.”

“It won’t hurt my feelings,” said Lance. “Is it? Really I don’t know. It seems to have three gardeners working on it very industriously.”

Pat said:

“Probably that’s what’s wrong with it. No expense spared, no signs of an individual taste. All the right rhododendrons and all the right bedding out done in the proper season, I expect.”

“Well, what would you put in an English garden, Pat, if you had one?”

“My garden,” said Pat, “would have hollyhocks, larkspurs and Canterbury bells, no bedding out and none of these horrible yews.”

She glanced up at the dark yew hedges, disparagingly.

“Association of ideas,” said Lance easily.

“There’s something awfully frightening about a poisoner,” said Pat. “I mean it must be a horrid, brooding revengeful mind.”

“So that’s how you see it? Funny! I just think of it as businesslike and cold-blooded.”

“I suppose one could look at it that way.” She resumed, with a slight shiver, “All the same, to do three murders . . . Whoever did it must be mad.”

“Yes,” said Lance, in a low voice. “I’m afraid so.” Then breaking out sharply, he said: “For God’s sake, Pat, do go away from here. Go back to London. Go down to Devonshire or up to the Lakes. Go to Stratford-on-Avon or go and look at the Norfolk Broads. The police wouldn’t mind your going—you had nothing to do with all this. You were in Paris when the old man was killed and in London when the other two died. I tell you it worries me to death to have you here.”

Pat paused a moment before saying quietly:

“You know who it is, don’t you?”

“No, I don’t.”

“But you think you know . . . That’s why you’re frightened for me . . . I wish you’d tell me.”