They don't expect, for the first visit, to first receive a letter from a friend, saying that so-and-so is a charming person, a childhood friend, etc…'
And that, thought Craddock, was exactly the source of his trouble. He didn't know. They were all just faces and personalities vouched for by rationing and I.D. cards… well-printed but without photographies or fingerprints. You could get an I.D. for the asking – and partly due to this the subtle ties that hold the structure of the rural society together were loosening. In a city nobody knows their neighbours; neither in the country, but sometimes you have the illusion that you do.
Thanks to the tampered door, Craddock knew that one of the occupants of the living-room of Little Paddocks wasn't the good neighbour he or she pretended to be…
And so he was afraid of what could happen to Miss Marple, who was so frail and old, even if she was so clever…
'Up to a point,' he said, 'we can check the past lives of these people…' But he knew that this what harder than it seemed. India, China, Hong-Kong, South of France… much harder than it would have been fifteen years ago. He knew well that many people went around with borrowed identities… mostly borrowed from people who died in tragic circumstances in the big cities. There were organizations who bought or faked I.D. cards – there were hundreds of kinds of small illegal activities around. It was possible to check – but it would take a lot of time, time he didn't have since the widow of Randall Goedler was dying soon.
It was then, tired and worried, bathed in sunlight, that he told Miss Marple the story of Randall Goedler and Pip and Emma.
'Two names, nothing more,' he said. 'Nicknames, after all! They may not exist. They may be respectable citizens living somewhere in Europe. Or one of them or both could be here in Chipping Cleghorn.'
About twenty-five years old… who could they be? He went on:
'The nephew and niece… or cousins, or whatever… for how long didn't she see them, I would like to know…'
'I'll try to find out,' said Miss Marple quietly.
'For God's sake, don't, Miss Marple…'
'It's going to be easy, Inspector, don't you worry. And nobody will pay attention, since it won't be official. If there's something wrong it's better not to alarm them, isn't it?'
Pip and Emma, thought Craddock. Pip and Emma? It had become an obsession to him. The good-looking smart boy, the beautiful girl with cold eyes…
'I may discover something about them in the next forty-eight hours,' he said. 'I'm going to Scotland. If she is able to talk, Mrs. Goedler may tell me something about Pip and Emma.'
Chapter 11
MISS MARPLE COMES TO TEA
If Letitia Blacklog seemed slightly absentminded when Mrs. Harmon came to tea and brought a guest who was staying with her, Miss Marple, the guest in question, was hardly likely to notice the fact since it was the first time she had met her.
The old lady was very charming in her gentle gossipy fashion. She revealed herself almost at once to be one of those old ladies who have a constant preoccupation with burglars.
'They can get in anywhere, my dear,' she assured her hostess, 'absolutely anywhere nowadays. So many new American methods. I myself pin my faith to a very old-fashioned device. A cabin hook and eye. They can pick locks and draw back bolts but a brass hook and eye defeats them. Have you ever tried that?'
'I'm afraid we're not very good at bolts and bars,' said Miss Blacklog cheerfully. 'There's really nothing much to burgle.'
'A chain on the front door,' Miss Marple advised. 'Then the maid need only open it a crack and see who is there and they can't force their way in.'
'I expect Mitzi, our Mittel European, would love that.'
'The hold-up you had must have been very, very frightening,' said Miss Marple. 'Bunch has been telling me all about it.'
'I was scared stiff,' said Bunch.
'It was an alarming experience,' admitted Miss Blacklog.
'It really seems like Providence that the man tripped himself up and shot himself. These burglars are so violent nowadays. How did he get in?'
'Well, I'm afraid we don't lock our doors much.'
'Oh, Letty,' exclaimed Miss Bunner. 'I forgot to tell you the Inspector was most peculiar this morning. He insisted on opening the second door – you know – the one that's never been opened – the one over there. He hunted for the key and everything and said the door had been oiled. But I can't see why because-'
Too late she got Miss Blacklog's signal to be quiet, and paused open-mouthed.
'Oh, Lotty, I'm so sorry – I mean, oh, I do beg your pardon, Letty – oh, dear, how stupid I am.'
'It doesn't matter,' said Miss Blacklog, but she was annoyed. 'Only I don't think Inspector Craddock wants that talked about. I didn't know you had been there when he was experimenting, Dora. You do understand, don't you, Mrs. Harmon?'
'Oh, yes,' said Bunch. 'We won't breathe a word, will we, Aunt Jane. But I wonder why he-'
She relapsed into thought. Miss Bunner fidgeted and looked miserable, bursting out at last: 'I always say the wrong thing – Oh, dear, I'm nothing but a trial to you, Letty.'
Miss Blacklog said quickly, 'You're my great comfort, Dora. And anyway in a small place like Chipping Cleghorn, there aren't really any secrets.'
'Now that is very true,' said Miss Marple. 'I'm afraid, you know, that things do get round in the most extraordinary way. Servants, of course, and yet it can't only be that, because one has so few servants nowadays. Still, there are the daily women and perhaps they are worse, because they go to everybody in turn and pass the news round.'
'Oh!' said Bunch Harmon suddenly. 'I've got it! Of course, if that door could open too, someone might have gone out of here in the dark and done the holdup – only of course they didn't – because it was the man from the Royal Spa Hotel. Or wasn't it?… No, I don't see after all…' she frowned.
'Did it all happen in this room then?' asked Miss Marple, adding apologetically: 'I'm afraid you must think me sadly curious, Miss Blacklog – but it really is so very exciting – just like something one reads about in the paper – and actually to have happened to someone one knows… I'm just longing to hear all about it and to picture it all, if you know what I mean-'
Immediately Miss Marple received a confused and voluble account from Bunch and Miss Bunner – with occasional emendations and corrections from Miss Blacklog.
In the middle of it Patrick came in and good-naturedly entered into the spirit of the recital – going so far as to enact himself the part of Rudi Scherz.
'And Aunt Letty was there – in the corner by the archway… Go and stand there, Aunt Letty.'
Miss Blacklog obeyed, and then Miss Marple was shown the actual bullet holes.
'What a marvellous – what a providential escape,' she gasped.
'I was just going to offer my guests cigarettes-' Miss Blacklog indicated the big silver box on the table.
'People are so careless when they smoke,' said Miss Bunner disapprovingly. 'Nobody really respects good furniture as they used to do. Look at the horrid burn somebody made on this beautiful table by putting a cigarette down on it. Disgraceful.'
Miss Blacklog sighed.
'Sometimes, I'm afraid, one thinks too much of one's possessions.'
'But it's such a lovely table, Letty.'
Miss Bunner loved her friend's possessions with as much fervour as though they had been her own. Bunch
