‘Talk and tea is his speciality,’ said Giles. ‘He has about five cups of tea a day. But he works splendidly when we are looking.’
‘Come out and see the garden,’ said Gwenda.
They showed her the house and the garden, and Miss Marple made the proper comments. If Gwenda had feared her shrewd observation of something amiss, then Gwenda was wrong. For Miss Marple showed no cognizance of anything unusual.
Yet, strangely enough, it was Gwenda who acted in an unpredictable manner. She interrupted Miss Marple in the midst of a little anecdote about a child and a seashell to say breathlessly to Giles:
‘I don’t care-I’m going to tell her…’
Miss Marple turned her head attentively. Giles started to speak, then stopped. Finally he said, ‘Well, it’s your funeral, Gwenda.’
And so Gwenda poured it all out. Their call on Dr Kennedy and his subsequent call on them and what he had told them.
‘That was what you meant in London, wasn’t it?’ Gwenda asked breathlessly. ‘You thought, then, that-that my father might be involved?’
Miss Marple said gently, ‘It occurred to me as a possibility-yes. “Helen” might very well be a young stepmother-and in a case of-er-strangling, it is so often a husband who is involved.’
Miss Marple spoke as one who observes natural phenomena without surprise or emotion.
‘I do see why you urged us to leave it alone,’ said Gwenda. ‘Oh, and I wish now we had. But one can’t go back.’
‘No,’ said Miss Marple, ‘one can’t go back.’
‘And now you’d better listen to Giles. He’s been making objections and suggestions.’
‘All I say is,’ said Giles, ‘that it doesn’t fit.’
And lucidly, clearly, he went over the points as he had previously outlined them to Gwenda.
Then he particularized his final theory.
‘If you’ll only convince Gwenda that that’s the only way it could have been.’
Miss Marple’s eyes went from him to Gwenda and back again.
‘It is a perfectly reasonable hypothesis,’ she said. ‘But there is always, as you yourself pointed out, Mr Reed, the possibility of X.’
‘X!’ said Gwenda.
‘The unknown factor,’ said Miss Marple. ‘Someone, shall we say, who hasn’t appeared yet-but whose presence, behind the obvious facts, can be deduced.’
‘We’re going to the Sanatorium in Norfolk where my father died,’ said Gwenda. ‘Perhaps we’ll find out something there.’
Chapter 10. A Case History
Saltmarsh House was set pleasantly about six miles inland from the coast. It had a good train service to London from the five-miles-distant town of South Benham.
Giles and Gwenda were shown into a large airy sitting-room with cretonne covers patterned with flowers. A very charming-looking old lady with white hair came into the room holding a glass of milk. She nodded to them and sat down near the fireplace. Her eyes rested thoughtfully on Gwenda and presently she leaned forward towards her and spoke in what was almost a whisper.
‘Is it your poor child, my dear?’
Gwenda looked slightly taken aback. She said doubtfully: ‘No-no. It isn’t.’
He paused, and then, looking up sharply, said: ‘You know, I presume, that Major Halliday committed suicide.’
‘Ohno!’ cried Gwenda.
‘I’m sorry, Mrs Reed. I thought you knew that. You are entitled, perhaps, to attach some blame to us on that account. I admit that proper vigilance would have prevented it. But frankly I saw no sign of Major Halliday’s being a suicidal type. He showed no tendency to melancholia-no brooding or despondency. He complained of sleeplessness and my colleague allowed him a certain amount of sleeping tablets. Whilst pretending to take them, he actually kept them until he had accumulated a sufficient amount and-’
He spread out his hands.
‘Was he so dreadfully unhappy?’
***
In the train on the way back to London, Gwenda took out the shabby little black book and began to read.
She opened it at random.
Kelvin Halliday had written:
I suppose these doctor wallahs know their business…It all sounds such poppycock. Was I in love with my mother? Did I hate my father? I don’t believe a word of it…I can’t help feeling this is a simple police case-criminal court-not a crazy loony-bin matter. And yet-some of these people here-so natural, so reasonable-just like everyone else-except when you suddenly come across the kink. Very well, then, it seems that I, too, have a kink…
I’ve written to James…urged him to communicate with Helen…Let her come and see me in the flesh if she’s alive…He says he doesn’t know where she is…that’s because he knows that she’s dead and that I killed her…he’s a good fellow, but I’m not deceived…Helen is dead…
When did I begin to suspect her? A long time ago…Soon after we came to Dillmouth…Her manner changed…She was concealing something…I used to watch her…Yes, and she used to watch me…
Did she give me drugs in my food? Those queer awful nightmares. Not ordinary dreams…living nightmares…I know it was drugs…Only she could have done that…Why?…There’s some man…Some man she was afraid of…
Let me be honest. I suspected, didn’t I, that she had a lover? There was someone-I know there was someone-She said as much to me on the boat…Someone she loved and couldn’t marry…It was the same for both of us…I couldn’t forget Megan…How like Megan little Gwennie looks sometimes. Helen played with Gwennie so sweetly on the boat…Helen…You are so lovely, Helen…
Is Helen alive? Or did I put my hands round her throat and choke the life out of her? I went through the dining-room door and I saw the note-propped up on the desk, and then-and then-all black-just blackness. But there’s no doubt about it…I killed her…Thank God Gwennie’s all right in New Zealand. They’re good people. They’ll love her for Megan’s sake. Megan-Megan, how I wish you were here…
It’s the best way…No scandal…The best way for the child. I can’t go on. Not year after year. I must take the short way out. Gwennie will never know anything about all this. She’ll never know her father was a murderer…
Tears blinded Gwenda’s eyes. She looked across at Giles, sitting opposite her. But Giles’s eyes were riveted on the opposite corner.
Aware of Gwenda’s scrutiny, he motioned faintly with his head.
Their fellow passenger was reading an evening paper. On the outside of it, clearly presented to their view was a melodramatic caption:Who were the men in her life?
Slowly, Gwenda nodded her head. She looked down at the diary.
There was someone-I know there was someone…