The Moving Finger (Miss Marple 4)

“You mean I ought to be more like your sister? All dolled up?”

I rather resented this description of Joanna.

“She looks clean and tidy and pleasing to the eye,” I said.

“She’s awfully pretty,” said Megan. “She isn’t a bit like you, is she? Why not?”

“Brothers and sisters aren’t always alike.”

“No. Of course. I’m not very like Brian or Colin. And Brian and Colin aren’t like each other.” She paused and said, “It’s very rum, isn’t it?”

“What is?”

Megan replied briefly: “Families.”

I said thoughtfully, “I suppose they are.”

I wondered just what was passing in her mind. We walked on in silence for a moment or two, then Megan said in a rather shy voice:

“You fly, don’t you?”

“Yes.”

“That’s how you got hurt?”

“Yes, I crashed.”

Megan said:

“Nobody down here flies.”

“No,” I said. “I suppose not. Would you like to fly, Megan?”

“Me?” Megan seemed surprised. “Goodness, no. I should be sick. I’m sick in a train even.”

She paused, and then asked with that directness which only a child usually displays:

“Will you get all right and be able to fly again, or will you always be a bit of a crock?”

“My doctor says I shall be quite all right.”

“Yes, but is he the kind of man who tells lies?”

“I don’t think so,” I replied. “In fact, I’m quite sure of it. I trust him.”

“That’s all right then. But a lot of people do tell lies.”

I accepted this undeniable statement of fact in silence.

Megan said in a detached judicial kind of way:

“I’m glad. I was afraid you looked bad tempered because you were crocked up for life—but if it’s just natural, it’s different.”

“I’m not bad tempered,” I said coldly.

“Well, irritable, then.”

“I’m irritable because I’m in a hurry to get fit again—and these things can’t be hurried.”

“Then why fuss?”

I began to laugh.

“My dear girl, aren’t you ever in a hurry for things to happen?”

Megan considered the question. She said:

“No. Why should I be? There’s nothing to be in a hurry about. Nothing ever happens.”

I was struck by something forlorn in the words. I said gently: “What do you do with yourself down here?”

She shrugged her shoulders.

“What is there to do?”

“Haven’t you got any hobbies? Do you play games? Have you got friends round about?”

“I’m stupid at games. And I don’t like them much. There aren’t many girls round here, and the ones there are I don’t like. They think I’m awful.”

“Nonsense. Why should they?”

Megan shook her head.

“Didn’t you go to school at all?”

“Yes, I came back a year ago.”

“Did you enjoy school?”

“It wasn’t bad. They taught you things in an awfully silly way, though.”

“How do you mean?”

“Well—just bits and pieces. Chopping and changing from one thing to the other. It was a cheap school, you know, and the teachers weren’t very good. They could never answer questions properly.”

“Very few teachers can,” I said.

“Why not? They ought to.”

I agreed.

“Of course I’m pretty stupid,” said Megan. “And such a lot of things seem to me such rot. History, for instance. Why, it’s quite different out of different books!”

“That is its real interest,” I said.

“And grammar,” went on Megan. “And silly compositions. And all the blathering stuff Shelley wrote, twittering on about skylarks, and Wordsworth going all potty over

some silly daffodils. And Shakespeare.”

“What’s wrong with Shakespeare?” I inquired with interest.

“Twisting himself up to say things in such a difficult way that you can’t get at what he means. Still, I like some Shakespeare.”

“He would be gratified to know that, I’m sure,” I said.

Megan suspected no sarcasm. She said, her face lighting up:

“I like Goneril and Regan, for instance.”

“Why these two?”

“Oh, I don’t know. They’re satisfactory, somehow. Why do you think they were like that?”

“Like what?”

“Like they were. I mean something must have made them like that?”

For the first time I wondered. I had always accepted Lear’s elder daughters as two nasty bits of goods and had let it go at that. But Megan’s demand for a first cause interested me.

“I’ll think about it,” I said.

“Oh, it doesn’t really matter. I just wondered. Anyway, it’s only English Literature, isn’t it?”

“Quite, quite. Wasn’t there any subject you enjoyed?”

“Only Maths.”

“Maths?” I said, rather surprised.

Megan’s face had lit up.

“I loved Maths. But it wasn’t awfully well taught. I’d like to be taught Maths really well. It’s heavenly. I think there’s something heavenly about numbers, anyway, don’t you?”

“I’ve never felt it,” I said truthfully.

We were now entering the High Street. Megan said sharply:

“Here’s Miss Griffith. Hateful woman.”

“Don’t you like her?”

“I loathe her. She’s always at me to join her foul Guides. I hate Guides. Why dress yourself up and go about in clumps, and put badges on yourself for something you haven’t really learnt to do properly? I think it’s all rot.”

On the whole, I rather agreed with Megan. But Miss Griffith had descended on us before I could voice my assent.

The doctor’s sister, who rejoiced in the singularly inappropriate name of Aimée, had all the positive assurance that her brother lacked. She was a handsome woman in a masculine weather-beaten way, with a deep hearty voice.

“Hallo, you two,” she bayed at us. “Gorgeous morning, isn’t it? Megan, you’re just the person I wanted to see. I want some help addressing envelopes for the Conservative Association.”