The Mirror Crack'd From Side to Side (Miss Marple 9)

“You seem to know a lot about her,” said Miss Marple.

“Well, naturally,” said Mrs. Bantry. “When she bought Gossington I was interested. She married the present man about two years ago, and they say she’s quite all right again now. He’s a producer—or do I mean a director? I always get mixed. He was in love with her when they were quite young, but he didn’t amount to very much in those days. But now, I believe, he’s got quite famous. What’s his name now? Jason—Jason something—Jason Hudd, no Rudd, that’s it. They’ve bought Gossington because it’s handy for”—she hesitated—“Elstree?” she hazarded.

Miss Marple shook her head.

“I don’t think so,” she said. “Elstree’s in North London.”

“It’s the fairly new studios. Hellingforth—that’s it. Sounds so Finnish, I always think. About six miles from Market Basing. She’s going to do a film on Elizabeth of Austria, I believe.”

“What a lot you know,” said Miss Marple. “About the private lives of film stars. Did you learn it all in California?”

“Not really,” said Mrs. Bantry. “Actually I get it from the extraordinary magazines I read at my hairdresser’s. Most of the stars I don’t even know by name, but as I said because Marina Gregg and her husband have bought Gossington, I was interested. Really the things those magazines say! I don’t suppose half of it is true—probably not a quarter. I don’t believe Marina Gregg is a nymphomaniac, I don’t think she drinks, pobably she doesn’t even take drugs, and quite likely she just went away to have a nice rest and didn’t have a nervous breakdown at all!—but it’s true that she is coming here to live.”

“Next week, I heard,” said Miss Marple.

“As soon as that? I know she’s lending Gossington for a big fête on the twenty-third in aid of the St. John Ambulance Corps. I suppose they’ve done a lot to the house?”

“Practically everything,” said Miss Marple. “Really it would have been much simpler, and probably cheaper, to have pulled it down and built a new house.”

“Bathrooms, I suppose?”

“Six new ones, I hear. And a palm court. And a pool. And what I believe they call picture windows, and they’ve knocked your husband’s study and the library into one to make a music room.”

“Arthur will turn in his grave. You know how he hated music. Tone deaf, poor dear. His face, when some kind friend took us to the opera! He’ll probably come back and haunt them.” She stopped and then said abruptly, “Does anyone ever hint that Gossington might be haunted?”

Miss Marple shook her head.

“It isn’t,” she said with certainty.

“That wouldn’t prevent people saying it was,” Mrs. Bantry pointed out.

“Nobody ever has said so.” Miss Marple paused and then said, “People aren’t really foolish, you know. Not in villages.”

Mrs. Bantry shot her a quick look. “You’ve always stuck to that, Jane. And I won’t say that you’re not right.”

She suddenly smiled.

“Marina Gregg asked me, very sweetly and delicately, if I wouldn’t find it very painful to see my old home occupied by strangers. I assured her that it wouldn’t hurt me at all. I don’t think she quite believed me. But after all, as you know, Jane, Gossington wasn’t our home. We weren’t brought up there as children—that’s what really counts. It was just a house with a nice bit of shooting and fishing attached, that we bought when Arthur retired. We thought of it, I remember, as a house that would be nice and easy to run! How we can ever have thought that, I can’t imagine! All those staircases and passages. Only four servants! Only! Those were the days, ha ha!” She added suddenly: “What’s all this about your falling down? That Knight woman ought not to let you go out by yourself.”

“It wasn’t poor Miss Knight’s fault. I gave her a lot of shopping to do and then I—”

“Deliberately gave her the slip? I see. Well, you shouldn’t do it, Jane. Not at your age.”

“How did you hear about it?”

Mrs. Bantry grinned.

“You can’t keep any secrets in St. Mary Mead. You’ve often told me so. Mrs. Meavy told me.”

“Mrs. Meavy?” Miss Marple looked at sea.

“She comes in daily. She’s from the Development.”

“Oh, the Development.” The usual pause happened.

“What were you doing in the Development?” asked Mrs. Bantry, curiously.

“I just wanted to see it. To see what the people were like.”

“And what did you think they were like?”

“Just the same as everyone else. I don’t quite know if that was disappointing or reassuring.”

“Disappointing, I should think.”

“No. I think it’s reassuring. It makes you—well—recognize certain types—so that when anything occurs—one will understand quite well why and for what reason.”

“Murder, do you mean?”

Miss Marple looked shocked.

“I don’t know why you should assume that I think of murder all the time.”

“Nonsense, Jane. Why don’t you come out boldly and call yourself a criminologist and have done with it?”

“Because I am nothing of the sort,” said Miss Marple with spirit. “It is simply that I have a certain knowledge of human nature—that is only natural after having lived in a small village all my life.”

“You probably have something there,” said Mrs. Bantry thoughtfully, “though most people wouldn’t agree, of course. Your nephew Raymond always used to say this place was a complete backwater.”

“Dear Raymond,” said Miss Marple indulgently. She added: “He’s always been so kind. He’s paying for Miss Knight, you know.”

The thought of Miss Knight induced a new train of thought and she arose and said: “I’d better be going back now, I suppose.”

“You didn’t walk all the way here, did you?”

“Of course not. I came in Inch.”

This somewhat enigmatic pronouncement was received with complete understanding. In days very long past, Mr. Inch had been the proprietor of two cabs, which met trains at the local station and which were also hired by the local ladies to take them “calling,” out to tea parties, and occasionally, with their daughters, to such frivolous entertainments as dances. In the fulness of time Inch, a cheery red-faced man of seventy odd, gave place to his son—known as “young Inch” (he was then aged forty-five) though old Inch still continued to drive such elderly ladies as considered his son too young and irresponsible. To keep up with the times, young Inch abandoned horse vehicles for motor cars. He was not very good with machinery and in due course a certain Mr. Bardwell took over from him. The name Inch persisted. Mr. Bardwell in due course sold out to Mr. Roberts, but in the telephone book Inch’s Taxi Service was still the official name, and the older ladies of the community continued to refer to their journeys as going somewhere “in Inch,” as though they were Jonah and Inch was a whale.

II

“Dr. Haydock called,” said Miss Knight reproachfully. “I told him you’d gone to tea with Mrs. Bantry. He said he’d call in again tomorrow.”

She helped Miss Marple off with her wraps.

“And now, I expect, we’re tired out,” she said accusingly.

“You may be,” said Miss Marple. “I am not.”

“You come and sit cosy by the fire,” said Miss Knight, as usual paying no attention. (“You don’t need to take much notice of what the old dears say. I just humour them.”) “And how would we fancy a nice cup of Ovaltine? Or Horlicks for a change?”

Miss Marple thanked her and said she would like a small glass of dry sherry. Miss Knight looked disapproving.

“I don’t know what the doctor would say to that, I’m sure,” she said, when she returned with the glass.

“We will make a point of asking him tomorrow morning,” said Miss Marple.

On the following morning Miss Knight met Dr. Haydock in the hall, and did some agitated whispering.

The elderl

y doctor came into the room rubbing his hands, for it was a chilly morning.

“Here’s our doctor to see us,” said Miss Knight gaily. “Can I take your gloves, Doctor?”

“They’ll be all right here,” said Haydock, casting them carelessly on a table. “Quite a nippy morning.”