stopped. 'Let's have it in your own words.'
'I meant,' said Miss Marple, 'that it would be quite possible, audacious but possible, for someone to pick up that glass which as soon as it was in his or her hand, of course, would be assumed to be his or her own drink and to add whatever was added quite openly. In that case, you see, people wouldn't think twice of it.'
'He – or she – couldn't be sure of that, though,' Haydock pointed out.
'No,' agreed Miss Marple, 'it would be a gamble, a risk – but it could happen. And then,' she went on, 'there's the third possibility.'
'Possibility One, a moron,' said the doctor. 'Possibility Two, a gambler – what's Possibility Three?'
'Somebody saw what happened, and has held their tongue deliberately.'
Haydock frowned. 'For what reason?' he asked. 'Are you suggesting blackmail? If so -'
'If so,' said Miss Marple, 'it's a very dangerous thing to do.'
'Yes, indeed.' He looked sharply at the placid old lady with the white fleecy garment on her lap. 'Is the third possibility the one you consider the most probable one?'
'No,' said Miss Marple, 'I wouldn't go so far as that. I have, at the moment, insufficient grounds. Unless,' she added carefully, 'someone else gets killed.'
'Do you think someone else is going to get killed?'
'I hope not,' said Miss Marple, 'I trust and pray not. But it so often happens, Doctor Haydock. That's the sad and frightening thing. It so often happens.'
Chapter 17
Ella put down the telephone receiver, smiled m herself and came out of the public telephone box. She was pleased with herself.
'Chief-Inspector God Almighty Craddock!' she said to herself. 'I'm twice as good as he is at the job. Variations on the theme off 'Fly, all is discovered!''
She pictured to herself with a good deal of pleasure the reactions recently suffered by the person at the other end of the line. That faint menacing whisper coming through the receiver. 'I saw you…'
She laughed silently, the corners of her mouth curving up in a feline cruel line. A student of psychology might have watched her with some interest. Never until the last few days had she had this feeling of power. She was hardly aware herself of how much the heady intoxication of it affected her…
She passed the East Lodge and Mrs Bantry, busy as usual in the garden, waved a hand to her.
'Damn that old woman,' thought Ella. She could feel Mrs Bantry's eyes following her as she walked up the drive.
A phrase came into her head for no particular reason. The pitcher goes to the well once too often…
Nonsense. Nobody could suspect that it was she who had whispered those menacing words…
She sneezed.
'Damn this hay-fever,' said Ella Zielinsky.
When she came into her office, Jason Rudd was standing by the window.
He wheeled round.
'I couldn't think where you were.'
'I had to go and speak to the gardener. There were -' she broke off as she caught sight of his face.
She asked sharply: 'What is it?'
His eyes seemed set deeper in his face than ever. All the gaiety of the clown was gone. This was a man under strain. She had seen him under strain before but never looking like this.
She said again: 'What is it?'
He held a sheet of paper out to her. 'It's the analysis of that coffee. The coffee that Marina complained about and wouldn't drink.'
'You sent it to be analysed?' She was startled. 'But you poured it away down the sink. I saw you.'
His wide mouth curled up in a smile. 'I'm pretty good at sleight of hand, Ella,' he said. 'You didn't know that, did you? Yes, I poured most of it away but I kept a little and I took it along to be analysed.'
She looked down at the paper in her hand.
'Arsenic.' She sounded incredulous.
'Yes, arsenic.'
'So Marina was right about it tasting bitter?'
'She wasn't right about that. Arsenic has no taste. But her instinct was quite right.'
'And we thought she was just being hysterical!'
'She is hysterical! Who wouldn't be? She has a woman drop dead at her feet practically. She gets threatening notes – one after another – there's not been anything today, has there?'
Ella shook her head.
'Who plants the damned things? Oh well, I suppose it's easy enough – all these open windows. Anyone could slip in.'
'You mean we ought to keep the house barred and locked? But it's such hot weather. There's a man posted in the grounds, after all.'
'Yes, and I don't want to frighten her more than she's frightened already. Threatening notes don't matter two hoots. But arsenic, Ella, arsenic's different…'
'Nobody could tamper with food here in the house.'
'Couldn't they, Ella? Couldn't they?'
'Not without being seen. No unauthorized person -'
He interrupted.
'People will do things for money, Ella.'
'Hardly murder!'
'Even that. And they mightn't realize it was murder… The servants…'
'I'm sure the servants are all right.'
'Giuseppe now. I doubt if I'd trust Giuseppe very far if it came to the question of money… He's been with us some time, of course, but -'
'Must you torture yourself like this, Jason?'
He flung himself down in the chair. He leaned forward, his long arms hanging down between his knees.
'What to do?' he said slowly and softly. 'My God, what to do?'
Ella did not speak. She sat there watching him.
'She was happy here,' said Jason. He was speaking more to himself than to Ella. He stared down between his knees at the carpet. If he had looked up, the expression on her face might perhaps have surprised him.
'She was happy,' he said again. 'She hoped to be happy and she was happy. She was saying so that day, the day Mrs What's-her-name-'
'Bantry?'
'Yes. The day Mrs Bantry came to tea. She said it was 'so peaceful.' She said that at last she'd found a place where she could settle down and be happy and feel secure. My goodness, secure!'
'Happy ever after?' Ella's voice held a slight tone of irony. Yes, put like that, it sounds just like a fairy story.'
'At any rate she believed it.'
'But you didn't,' said Ella. 'You never thought it would be like that?'
Jason Rudd smiled. 'No. I didn't go the whole hog. But I did think that for a while, a year – two years – there might be a period of calm and content. It might have made a new woman of her. It might have given her confidence in herself. She can be happy, you know. When she is happy she's like a child. Just like a child. And now – this had to happen to her.'
Ella moved restlessly. 'Things have to happen to all of us,' she said brusquely. 'That's the way life is. You just have to take it. Some of us can, some of us can't. She's the kind that can't.'
