‘Amost unsuitable girl-as seems always to be the way. Oh, I don’t mean an actress or anything like that. The local doctor’s sister-more like his daughter, really, years younger-and the poor man with no idea how to bring her up. Men are so helpless, aren’t they? She ran quite wild, entangled herself first with a young man in the office-a mere clerk-and a very unsatisfactory character, too. They had to get rid of him. Repeated confidential information. Anyway, this girl, Helen Kennedy, was, I suppose, very pretty. I didn’t think so. I always thought her hair was touched up. But Walter, poor boy, fell very much in love with her. As I say, quite unsuitable, no money and no prospects, and not the kind of girl one wanted as a daughter-in-law. Still, what can a mother do? Walter proposed to her and she refused him, and then he got this silly idea into his head of going out to India and being a tea-planter. My husband said, “Let him go,” though of course he was very disappointed. He had been looking forward to having Walter with him in the firm and Walter had passed all his law exams and everything. Still, there it was. Really, the havoc these young women cause!’
‘Oh, I know. My nephew-’
Once again Mrs Fane swept over Miss Marple’s nephew.
‘So the dear boy went out to Assam or was it Bangalore-really I can’t remember after all these years. And I felt most upset because I knew his health wouldn’t stand it. And he hadn’t been out there a year (doing very well, too. Walter does everything well) than-would you believe it?-this impudent chit of a girl changes her mind and writes out that she’d like to marry him after all.’
‘Dear, dear.’ Miss Marple shook her head.
‘Gets together her trousseau, books her passage-and what do you think the next move is?’
‘I can’t imagine.’ Miss Marple leaned forward in rapt attention.
‘Has a love-affair with a married man, if you please. On the boat going out. A married man with three children, I believe. Anyway there is Walter on the quay to meet her and the first thing she does is to say she can’t marry him after all. Don’t you call that a wicked thing to do?’
‘Oh, I do indeed. It might have completely destroyed your son’s faith in human nature.’
‘It should have shown her to him in her true colours. But there, that type of woman gets away with anything.’
‘He didn’t-’ Miss Marple hesitated-‘resent her action? Some men would have been terribly angry.’
‘Walter has always had wonderful self-control. However upset and annoyed Walter may be over anything, he never shows it.’
Miss Marple peered at her speculatively. Hesitantly, she put out a feeler.
‘That is because it goes really deep, perhaps? One is really astonished sometimes, with children. A sudden outburst from some child that one has thought didn’t care at all. A sensitive nature that can’t express itself until it’s driven absolutely beyond endurance.’
‘Ah, it’s very curious you should say that, Miss Marple. I remember so well. Gerald and Robert, you know, both hot-tempered and always apt to fight. Quite natural, of course, for healthy boys-’
‘Oh, quite natural.’
‘And dear Walter, always so quiet and patient. And then, one day, Robert got hold of his model aeroplane-he’d built it up himself with days of work-so patient and clever with his fingers-and Robert, who was a dear high-spirited boy but careless, smashed it. And when I came into the schoolroom there was Robert down on the floor and Walter attacking him with the poker, he’d practically knocked him out-and I simply had all I could do to drag Walter off him. He kept repeating. “He did it on purpose-he did it on purpose. I’m going to kill him.” You know, I was quite frightened. Boys feel things so intensely, do they not?’
‘Yes, indeed,’ said Miss Marple. Her eyes were thoughtful.
She reverted to the former topic.
‘And so the engagement was finally broken off. What happened to the girl?’
‘She came home. Had another love-affair on the way back, and this time married the man. A widower with one child. A man who has just lost his wife is always a fair target-helpless, poor fellow. She married him and they settled down here in a house the other side of the town-St Catherine’s-next door to the hospital. It didn’t last, of course-she left him within the year. Went off with some man or other.’
‘Dear, dear!’ Miss Marple shook her head. ‘What a lucky escape your son had!’
‘That’s what I always tell him.’
‘And did he give up tea-planting because his health wouldn’t stand it?’
A slight frown appeared on Mrs Fane’s brow.
‘The life wasn’t really congenial to him,’ she said. ‘He came home about six months after the girl did.’
‘It must have been rather awkward,’ ventured Miss Marple. ‘If the young woman was actually living here. In the same town-’
‘Walter was wonderful,’ said Walter’s mother. ‘He behaved exactly as though nothing had happened. I should have thought myself (indeed I said so at the time) that it would be advisable to make a clean break-after all, meetings could only be awkward for both parties. But Walter insisted on going out of his way to be friendly. He used to call at the house in the most informal fashion, and play with the child-Rather curious, by the way, the child’s come back here. She’s grown up now, with a husband. Came into Walter’s office to make her will the other day. Reed, that’s her name now. Reed.’
‘Mr and Mrs Reed! I know them. Such a nice unaffected young couple. Fancy that now-and she is actually the child-’
‘The first wife’s child. The first wife died out in India. Poor Major-I’ve forgotten his name-Hallway-something like that-was completely broken up when that minx left him. Why the worst women should always attract the best men is something hard to fathom!’
‘And the young man who was originally entangled with her? A clerk, I think you said, in your son’s office. What happened to him?’
‘Did very well for himself. He runs a lot of those Coach Tours. Daffodil Coaches. Afflick’s Daffodil Coaches. Painted bright yellow. It’s a vulgar world nowadays.’
‘Afflick?’ said Miss Marple.
‘Jackie Afflick. A nasty pushing fellow. Always determined to get on, I imagine. Probably why he took up with Helen Kennedy in the first place. Doctor’s daughter and all that-thought it would better his social position.’
‘And this Helen has never come back again to Dillmouth?’
‘No. Good riddance. Probably gone completely to the bad by now. I was sorry for Dr Kennedy. Not his fault. His father’s second wife was a fluffy little thing, years younger than he was. Helen inherited her wild blood from her, I expect. I’ve always thought-’
Mrs Fane broke off.
‘Here is Walter.’ Her mother’s ear had distinguished certain well-known sounds in the hall. The door opened and Walter Fane came in.
‘This is Miss Marple, my son. Ring the bell, son, and we’ll have some fresh tea.’
‘Don’t bother, Mother. I had a cup.’
‘Of course we will have fresh tea-and some scones, Beatrice,’ she added to the parlourmaid who had appeared to take the teapot.
‘Yes, madam.’
With a slow, likeable smile Walter Fane said: ‘My mother spoils me, I’m afraid.’
Miss Marple studied him as she made a polite rejoinder.
A gentle quiet-looking person, slightly diffident and apologetic in manner- colourless. A very nondescript personality. The devoted type of young man whom women ignore and only marry because the man they love does not return their affection. Walter, who is Always There. Poor Walter, his mother’s darling…Little Walter Fane who had attacked his older brother with a poker and had tried to kill him…
Miss Marple wondered.
Chapter 17. Richard Erskine
