A Murder Is Announced

‘And then I got her to agree to do her part. I rehearsed her till she was word perfect. Then I told her to go upstairs to her room and not come down until Inspector Craddock came. The worst of these excitable people is that they’re apt to go off half-cocked and start the whole thing before the time.’

‘She did it very well,’ said Julia.

‘I don’t quite see the point,’ said Bunch. ‘Of course, I wasn’t there-’ she added apologetically.

‘The point was a little complicated-and rather touch and go. The idea was that Mitzi whilst admitting, as though casually, that blackmailhad been in her mind, was now so worked up and terrified that she was willing to come out with the truth. She’d seen, through the keyhole of the dining-room, Miss Blacklock in the hall with a revolver behind Rudi Scherz. She’d seen, that is,what had actually taken place. Now the only danger was that Charlotte Blacklock might have realized that, as the key was in the keyhole, Mitzi couldn’t possibly have seen anything at all. But I banked on the fact that you don’t think of things like that when you’ve just had a bad shock. All she could take in was that Mitzi had seen her.’

Craddock took over the story.

‘But-and this was essential-I pretended to receive this with scepticism, and I made an immediate attack as though unmasking my batteries at last, upon someone who had not been previously suspected. I accused Edmund-’

‘And very nicelyI playedmy part,’ said Edmund. ‘Hot denial. All according to plan. What wasn’t according to plan, Phillipa, my love, was you throwing in your little chirp and coming out into the open as “Pip”. Neither the Inspector nor I had any idea you were Pip.I was going to be Pip! It threw us off our stride for the moment, but the Inspector made a masterly comeback and made some perfectly filthy insinuations about my wanting a rich wife which will probably stick in your subconscious and make irreparable trouble between us one day.’

‘I don’t see why that was necessary?’

‘Don’t you? It meant that,from Charlotte Blacklock’s point of view, the only person who suspected or knew the truth, wasMitzi. The suspicious of the police were elsewhere. They had treated Mitzi for the moment as a liar. But if Mitzi were to persist, they might listen to her and take her seriously. So Mitzi had got to be silenced.’

‘Mitzi went straight out of the room and back to the kitchen-just like I had told her,’ said Miss Marple. ‘Miss Blacklock came out after her almost immediately. Mitzi was apparently alone in the kitchen. Sergeant Fletcher was behind the scullery door. And I was in the broom cupboard in the kitchen. Luckily I’m very thin.’

Bunch looked at Miss Marple.

‘What did you expect to happen, Aunt Jane?’

‘One of two things. Either Charlotte would offer Mitzi money to hold her tongue-and Sergeant Fletcher would be a witness to that offer, or else-or else I thought she’d try to kill Mitzi.’

‘But she couldn’t hope to get away withthat? She’d have been suspected at once.’

‘Oh, my dear, she was past reasoning. She was just a snapping terrified cornered rat. Think what had happened that day. The scene between Miss Hinchcliffe and Miss Murgatroyd. Miss Hinchcliffe driving off to the station. As soon as she comes back Miss Murgatroyd will explain that Letitia Blacklock wasn’t in the room that night. There’s just a few minutes in which to make sure Miss Murgatroyd can’t tell anything. No time to make a plan or set a stage. Just crude murder. She greets the poor woman and strangles her. Then a quick rush home, to change, to be sitting by the fire when the others come in, as though she’d never been out.

‘And then came the revelation of Julia’s identity. She breaks her pearls and is terrified they may notice her scar. Later, the Inspector telephones that he’s bringing everyone there. No time to think, to rest. Up to her neck in murder now, no mercy killing-or undesirable young man to be put out of the way. Crude plain murder. Is she safe? Yes, so far. And then comes Mitzi-yetanother danger. Kill Mitzi, stop her tongue! She’s beside herself with fear. Not human any longer. Just a dangerous animal.’

‘But why were you in the broom cupboard, Aunt Jane?’ asked Bunch. ‘Couldn’t you have left it to Sergeant Fletcher?’

‘It was safer with two of us, my dear. And besides, I knew I could mimic Dora Bunner’s voice. If anything could break Charlotte Blacklock down-that would.’

‘And it did…!’

‘Yes…She went to pieces.’

There was a long silence as memory laid hold of them and then, speaking with determined lightness, to ease the strain, Julia said:

‘It’s made a wonderful difference to Mitzi. She told me yesterday that she was taking a post near Southampton. And she said (Julia produced a very good imitation of Mitzi’s accent):