The Body in the Library (Miss Marple 3)

“As I say, with my eye on motive, the money angle seemed very suggestive. It was annoying, therefore, to find that both these people had alibis for the time when Ruby Keene, according to the medical evidence, had met her death.

“But soon afterwards there came the discovery of the burnt-out car with Pamela Reeves’s body in it, and then the whole thing leaped to the eye. The alibis, of course, were worthless.

“I now had two halves of the case, and both quite convincing, but they did not fit. There must be a connection, but I could not find it. The one person whom I knew to be concerned in the crime hadn’t got a motive.

“It was stupid of me,” said Miss Marple meditatively. “If it hadn’t been for Dinah Lee I shouldn’t have thought of it—the most obvious thing in the world. Somerset House! Marriage! It wasn’t a question of only Mr. Gaskell or Mrs. Jefferson—there were the further possibilities of marriage. If either of those two was married, or even was likely to marry, then the other party to the marriage contract was involved too. Raymond, for instance, might think he had a pretty good chance of marrying a rich wife. He had been very assiduous to Mrs. Jefferson, and it was his charm, I think, that awoke her from her long widowhood. She had been quite content just being a daughter to Mr. Jefferson—like Ruth and Naomi—only Naomi, if you remember, took a lot of trouble to arrange a suitable marriage for Ruth.

“Besides Raymond there was Mr. McLean. She liked him very much and it seemed highly possible that she would marry him in the end. He wasn’t well off—and he was not far from Danemouth on the night in question. So it seemed, didn’t it,” said Miss Marple, “as though anyone might have done it?”

“But, of course, really, in my mind, I knew. You couldn’t get away, could you, from those bitten nails?”

“Nails?” said Sir Henry. “But she tore her nail and cut the others.”

“Nonsense,” said Miss Marple. “Bitten nails and close cut nails are quite different! Nobody could mistake them who knew anything about girl’s nails—very ugly, bitten nails, as I always tell the girls in my class. Those nails, you see, were a fact. And they could only mean one thing. The body in Colonel Bantry’s library wasn’t Ruby Keene at all.

“And that brings you straight to the one person who must be concerned. Josie! Josie identified the body. She knew, she must have known, that it wasn’t Ruby Keene’s body. She said it was. She was puzzled, completely puzzled, at finding that body where it was. She practically betrayed that fact. Why? Because she knew, none better, where it ought to have been found! In Basil Blake’s cottage. Who directed our attention to Basil? Josie, by saying to Raymond that Ruby might have been with the film man. And before that, by slipping a snapshot of him into Ruby’s handbag. Who cherished such bitter anger against the dead girl that she couldn’t hide it even when she looked down at her dead? Josie! Josie, who was shrewd, practical, hard as nails, and all out for money.

“That is what I meant about believing too readily. Nobody thought of disbelieving Josie’s statement that the body was Ruby Keene’s. Simply because it didn’t seem at the time that she could have any motive for lying. Motive was always the difficulty—Josie was clearly involved, but Ruby’s death seemed, if anything, contrary to her interests. It was not till Dinah Lee mentioned Somerset House that I got the connection.

“Marriage! If Josie and Mark Gaskell were actually married—then the whole thing was clear. As we know now, Mark and Josie were married a year ago. They were keeping it dark until Mr. Jefferson died.

“It was really quite interesting, you know, tracing out the course of events—seeing exactly how the plan had worked out. Complicated and yet simple. First of all the selection of the poor child, Pamela, the approach to her from the film angle. A screen test—of course the poor child couldn’t resist it. Not when it was put up to her as plausibly as Mark Gaskell put it. She comes to the hotel, he is waiting for her, he takes her in by the side door and introduces her to Josie—one of their makeup experts! That poor child, it makes me quite sick to think of it! Sitting in Josie’s bathroom while Josie bleaches her hair and makes up her face and varnishes her fingernails and toenails. During all this, the drug was given. In an ice cream soda, very likely. She goes off into a coma. I imagine that they put her into one of the empty rooms opposite—they were only cleaned once a week, remember.

“After dinner Mark Gaskell went out in his car—to the seafront, he said. That is when he took Pamela’s body to the cottage dressed in one of Ruby’s old dresses and arranged it on the hearthrug. She was still unconscious, but not dead, when he strangled her with the belt of the frock … Not nice, no—but I hope and pray she knew nothing about it. Really, I feel quite pleased to think of him being hanged … That must have been just after ten o’clock. Then he drove back at top speed and found the others in the lounge where Ruby Keene, still alive, was dancing her exhibition dance with Raymond.

“I should imagine that Josie had given Ruby instructions beforehand. Ruby was accustomed to doing what Josie told her. She was to change, go into Josie’s room and wait. She, too, was drugged, probably in after-dinner coffee. She was yawning, remember, when she talked to young Bartlett.

“Josie came up later to ‘look for her’—but nobody but Josie went into Josie’s room. She probably finished the girl off then—with an injection, perhaps, or a blow on the back of the head. She went down, danced with Raymond, debated with the Jeffersons where Ruby could be, and finally went to bed. In the early hours of the morning she dressed the girl in Pamela’s clothes, carried the body down the side stairs—she was a strong muscular young woman—fetched George Bartlett’s car, drove two miles to the quarry, poured petrol over the car and set it alight. Then she walked back to the hotel, probably timing her arrival there for eight or nine o’clock—up early in her anxiety about Ruby!”

“An intricate plot,” said Colonel Melchett.

“Not more intricate than the steps of a dance,” said Miss Marple.

“I suppose not.”

“She was very thorough,” said Miss Marple. “She even foresaw the discrepancy of the nails. That’s why she managed to break one of Ruby’s nails on her shawl. It made an excuse for pretending that Ruby had clipped her nails close.”

Harper said: “Yes, she thought of everything. And the only real proof you had, Miss Marple, was a schoolgirl’s bitten nails.”

“More than that,” said Miss Marple. “People will talk too much. Mark Gaskell talked too much. He was speaking of Ruby and he said ‘her teeth ran down her throat.’ But the dead girl in Colonel Bantry’s library had teeth that stuck out.”

Conway Jefferson said rather grimly:

“And was the last dramatic finale your idea, Miss Marple?”

Miss Marple confessed. “Well, it was, as a matter of fact. It’s so nice to be sure, isn’t it?”

“Sure is the word,” said Conway Jefferson grimly.

“You see,” said Miss Marple, “once Mark and Josie knew that you were going to make a new will, they’d have to do something. They’d already committed two murders on account of the money. So they might as well commit a third. Mark, of course, must be absolutely clear, so he went off to London and established an alibi by dining at a restaurant with friends and going on to a night club. Josie was to do the work. They still wanted Ruby’s death to be put down to Basil’s account, so Mr. Jefferson’s death must be thought due to his heart failing. There was digitalin, so the Superintendent tells me, in the syringe. Any doctor would think death from heart trouble quite natural in the circumstances. Josie had loosened one of the stone balls on the balcony and she was going to let it crash down afterwards. His death would be put down to the shock of the noise.”

Melchett said: “Ingenious devil.”

Sir Henry said: “So the third death you spoke of was to be Conway Jefferson?”

Miss Marple shook her head.

“Oh no—I meant Basil Blake. They’d have got him hanged if they could.”

“Or shut up in Broadmoor,?

? said Sir Henry.

Conway Jefferson grunted. He said:

“Always knew Rosamund had married a rotter. Tried not to admit it to myself. She was damned fond of him. Fond of a murderer! Well, he’ll hang as well as the woman. I’m glad he went to pieces and gave the show away.”

Miss Marple said:

“She was always the strong character. It was her plan throughout. The irony of it is that she got the girl down here herself, never dreaming that she would take Mr. Jefferson’s fancy and ruin all her own prospects.”

Jefferson said:

“Poor lass. Poor little Ruby….”

Adelaide Jefferson and Hugo McLean came in. Adelaide looked almost beautiful tonight. She came up to Conway Jefferson and laid a hand on his shoulder. She said, with a little catch in her breath:

“I want to tell you something, Jeff. At once. I’m going to marry Hugo.”

Conway Jefferson looked up at her for a moment. He said gruffly:

“About time you married again. Congratulations to you both. By the way, Addie, I’m making a new will tomorrow.”

She nodded. “Oh yes, I know.”

Jefferson said:

“No, you don’t. I’m settling ten thousand pounds on you. Everything else I have goes to Peter when I die. How does that suit you, my girl?”

“Oh, Jeff!” Her voice broke. “You’re wonderful!”

“He’s a nice lad. I’d like to see a good deal of him—in the time I’ve got left.”

“Oh, you shall!”

“Got a great feeling for crime, Peter has,” said Conway Jefferson meditatively. “Not only has he got the fingernail of the murdered girl—one of the murdered girls, anyway—but he was lucky enough to have a bit of Josie’s shawl caught in with the nail. So he’s got a souvenir of the murderess too! That makes him very happy!”

II

Hugo and Adelaide passed by the ballroom. Raymond came up to them.

Adelaide said, rather quickly:

“I must tell you my news. We’re going to be married.”

The smile on Raymond’s face was perfect—a brave, pensive smile.

“I hope,” he said, ignoring Hugo and gazing into her eyes, “that you will be very, very happy….”

They passed on and Raymond stood looking after them.

“A nice woman,” he said to himself. “A very nice woman. And she would have had money too. The trouble I took to mug up that bit about the Devonshire Starrs … Oh well, my luck’s out. Dance, dance, little gentleman!”

And Raymond returned to the ballroom.

* * *