“It’s all right, dearest,” he said. “Dearest, it’s quite all right.”
“We thought you’d been shot,” said Miss Bellever gruffly.
Lewis Serrocold frowned. He said with a trifle of asperity:
“Of course I haven’t been shot.”
They could see into the study by now. Edgar Lawson had collapsed by the desk. He was sobbing and gasping. The revolver lay on the floor where it had dropped from his hand.
“But we heard the shots,” said Mildred.
“Oh yes, he fired twice.”
“And he missed you?”
“Of course he missed me,” snapped Lewis.
Miss Marple did not consider that there was any of course about it. The shots must have been fired at fairly close range.
Lewis Serrocold said irritably:
“Where’s Maverick? It’s Maverick we need.”
Miss Bellever said:
“I’ll get him. Shall I ring up the police as well?”
“Police? Certainly not.”
“Of course, we must ring up the police,” said Mildred. “He’s dangerous.”
“Nonsense,” said Lewis Serrocold. “Poor lad. Does he look dangerous?”
At the moment he did not look dangerous. He looked young and pathetic and rather repulsive.
His voice had lost its carefully acquired accent.
“I didn’t mean to do it,” he groaned. “I dunno what came over me—talking all that stuff—I must have been mad.”
Mildred sniffed.
“I really must have been mad. I didn’t mean to. Please, Mr. Serrocold, I really didn’t mean to.”
Lewis Serrocold patted him on the shoulder.
“That’s all right, my boy. No damage done.”
“I might have killed you, Mr. Serrocold.”
Walter Hudd walked across the room and peered at the wall behind the desk.
“The bullets went in here,” he said. His eye dropped to the desk and the chair behind it. “Must have been a near miss,” he said grimly.
“I lost my head. I didn’t rightly know what I was doing. I thought he’d done me out of my rights. I thought—”
Miss Marple put in the question she had been wanting to ask for some time.
“Who told you,” she asked, “that Mr. Serrocold was your father?”
Just for a second, a sly expression peeped out of Edgar’s distracted face. It was there and gone in a flash.
“Nobody,” he said. “I just got it into my head.”
Walter Hudd was staring down at the revolver where it lay on the floor.
“Where the hell did you get that gun?” he demanded.
“Gun?” Edgar stared down at it.
“Looks mighty like my gun,” said Walter. He stooped down and picked it up. “By heck, it is! You took it out of my room, you creeping louse you.”
Lewis Serrocold interposed between the cringing Edgar and the menacing American.
“All this can be gone into later,” he said. “Ah, here’s Maverick. Take a look at him, will you, Maverick?”
Dr. Maverick advanced upon Edgar with a kind of professional zest. “This won’t do, Edgar,” he said. “This won’t do, you know.”
“He’s a dangerous lunatic,” said Mildred sharply. “He’s been shooting off a revolver and raving. He only just missed my stepfather.”
Edgar gave a little yelp and Dr. Maverick said reprovingly:
“Careful, please, Mrs. Strete.”
“I’m sick of all this. Sick of the way you all go on here! I tell you this man’s a lunatic.”
With a bound, Edgar wrenched himself away from Dr. Maverick and fell to the floor at Serrocold’s feet.
“Help me. Help me. Don’t let them take me away and shut me up. Don’t let them….”
An unpleasing scene, Miss Marple thought.
Mildred said angrily, “I tell you he’s—”
Her mother said soothingly,
“Please, Mildred. Not now. He’s suffering.”
Walter muttered,
“Suffering cripes! They’re all cuckoo round here.”
“I’ll take charge of him,” said Dr. Maverick. “You come with me, Edgar. Bed and a sedative—and we’ll talk everything over in the morning. Now you trust me, don’t you?”
Rising to his feet and trembling a little, Edgar looked doubtfully at the young doctor and then at Mildred Strete.
“She said—I was a lunatic.”
“No, no, you’re not a lunatic.”
Miss Bellever’s footsteps rang purposefully across the Hall. She came in with her lips pursed together and a flushed face.
“I’ve telephoned the police,” she said grimly. “They will be here in a few minutes.”
Carrie Louise cried, “Jolly!” in tones of dismay.
Edgar uttered a wail.
Lewis Serrocold frowned angrily.
“I told you, Jolly, I did not want the police summoned. This is a medical matter.”
“That’s as may be,” said Miss Bellever. “I’ve my own opinion. But I had to call the police. Mr. Gulbrandsen’s been shot dead.”
Eight
It was a moment or two before anyone took in what she was saying.
Carrie Louise said incredulously:
“Christian shot? Dead? Oh, surely, that’s impossible.”
“If you don’t believe me,” said Miss Bellever, pursing her lips, and addressing not so much Carrie Louise, as the assembled company, “go and look for yourselves.”
She was angry. And her anger sounded in the crisp sharpness of her voice.
Slowly, unbelievingly, Carrie Louise took a step towards the door. Lewis Serrocold put a hand on her shoulder.
“No, dearest, let me go.”
He went out through the doorway. Dr. Maverick, with a doubtful glance at Edgar, followed him. Miss Bellever went with them.
Miss Marple gently urged Carrie Louise into a chair. She sat down, her eyes looking hurt and stricken.
“Christian—shot?” she said again.
It was the bewildered, hurt tone of a child.
Walter Hudd remained close by Edgar Lawson, glowering down at him. In his hand he held the gun that he had picked up from the floor.
Mrs. Serrocold said in a wondering voice:
“But who could possibly want to shoot Christian?”
It was not a question that demanded an answer.
Walter muttered under his breath:
“Nuts! The whole lot of them.”
Stephen had moved protectively closer to Gina. Her young, startled face was the most vivid thing in the room.
Suddenly the front door opened and a rush of cold air, together with a man in a big overcoat, came in.
The heartiness of his greeting seemed incredibly shocking.
“Hullo, everybody, what’s going on tonight? A lot of fog on the road. I had to go dead slow.”
For a startled moment, Miss Marple thought that she was seeing double. Surely the same man could not be standing by Gina and coming in by the door. Then she realised that it was only a likeness and not, when you looked closely, such a very strong likeness. The two men were clearly brothers with a strong family resemblance, but no more.
Where Stephen Restarick was thin to the point of emaciation, the newcomer was sleek. The big coat with the astrakhan collar fitted the sleekness of body snugly. A handsome young man and one who bore upon him the authority and good humour of success.
But Miss Marple noted one thing about him. His eyes, as he entered the Hall, looked immediately at Gina.
He said, a little doubtfully:
“You did expect me? You got my wire?”
He was speaking now to Carrie Louise. He came towards her.
Almost mechanically, she put up her hand to him. He took it and kissed it gently. It was an affectionate act of homage, not a mere theatrical courtesy.