4.50 From Paddington (25 page)

“So you see,” said Miss Marple, “it really turned out to be, as I began to suspect, very, very simple. The simplest kind of crime. So many men seem to murder their wives.”

Mrs. McGillicuddy looked at Miss Marple and Inspector Craddock. “I'd be obliged,” she said, “if you'd put me a little more up to date.”

“He saw a chance, you see,” said Miss Marple, "of marrying a rich wife, Emma Crackenthorpe. Only he couldn't marry her because he had a wife already. They'd been separated for years but she wouldn't divorce him. That fitted in very well with what Inspector Craddock told me of this girl who called herself Anna Stravinska. She had an English husband, so she told one of her friends, and it was also said she was a very devout Catholic. Dr. Quimper couldn't risk marrying Emma bigamously, so he decided, being a very ruthless and cold-blooded man, that he would get rid of his wife. The idea of murdering her in the train and later putting her body in the sarcophagus in the barn was really rather a clever one. He meant it to tie up, you see, with the Crackenthorpe family. Before that he'd written a letter to Emma which purported to be from the girl Martine whom Edmund Crackenthorpe had talked of marrying. Emma had told Dr. Quimper all about her brother, you see. Then, when the moment arose he encouraged her to go to the police with the story. He wanted the dead woman identified as Martine. I think he may have heard that inquiries were being made by the Paris police about Anna Stravinska, and so he arranged to have a postcard come from her from Jamaica.

“It was easy for him to arrange to meet his wife in London, to tell her that he hoped to be reconciled with her and that he would like her to come down and 'meet his family'. We won't talk about the next part of it, which is very unpleasant to think about. Of course he was a greedy man. When he thought about taxation, and how much it cuts into income, he began thinking that it would be nice to have a good deal more capital. Perhaps he'd already thought of that before he decided to murder his wife. Anyway, he started spreading rumours that someone was trying to poison old Mr. Crackenthorpe so as to get the ground prepared, and then he ended by administering arsenic to the family. Not too much, of course, for he didn't want old Mr. Crackenthorpe to die.”

“But I still don't see how he managed,” said Craddock. “He wasn't in the house when the curry was being prepared.”

“Oh, but there wasn't any arsenic in the curry then,” said Miss Marple. “He introduced it to the curry afterwards when he took it away to be tested. He probably put the arsenic in the cocktail jug earlier. Then, of course, it was quite easy for him, in his role of medical attendant, to poison off Alfred Crackenthorpe and also to send the tablets to Harold in London, having safe-guarded himself by telling Harold that he wouldn't need any more tablets. Everything he did was bold and audacious and cruel and greedy, and I am really very, very sorry,” finished Miss Marple, looking as fierce as a fluffy old lady can look, “that they have abolished capital punishment because I do feel that if there is anyone who ought to hang, it's Dr. Quimper.”

“Hear, hear,” said Inspector Craddock.

“It occurred to me, you know,” continued Miss Marple, “that even if you only see anybody from the back view, so to speak, nevertheless a back view is characteristic. I thought that if Elspeth were to see Dr. Quimper in exactly the same position as she'd seen the man in the train in, that is, with his back to her, bent over a woman whom he was holding by the throat, then I was almost sure she would recognise him, or would make some kind of startled exclamation. That is why I had to lay my little plan with Lucy's kind assistance.”

“I must say,” said Mrs. McGillicuddy, “it gave me quite a turn. I said, 'That's him' before I could stop myself. And yet, you know, I hadn't actually seen the man's face and -”

“I was terribly afraid that you were going to say so, Elspeth,” said Miss Marple.

“I was,” said Mrs. McGillicuddy. “I was going to say that of course I hadn't seen his face.”

“That,” said Miss Marple, “would have been quite fatal! You see, dear, he thought you really did recognise him. I mean, he couldn't know that you hadn't seen his face.”

“A good thing I held my tongue then,” said Mrs. McGillicuddy.

“I wasn't going to let you say another word,” said Miss Marple.

Craddock laughed suddenly. “You two!” he said. “You're a marvellous pair. What next, Miss Marple? What's the happy ending? What happens to poor Emma Crackenthorpe, for instance?”

“She'll get over the doctor, of course,” said Miss Marple, “and I dare say if her father were to die - and I don't think he's quite so robust as he thinks he is - that she'd go on a cruise or perhaps to stay abroad like Geraldine Webb, and I dare say something might come of it. A nicer man than Dr. Quimper, I hope.”

“What about Lucy Eyelesbarrow? Weding bells there too?”

“Perhaps,” said Miss Marple, “I shouldn't wonder.”

“Which of 'em is she going to choose?” said Dermot Craddock.

“Don't you know?” said Miss Marple.

“No, I don't,” said Craddock. “Do you?”

“Oh, yes, I think so,” said Miss Marple.

And she twinkled at him.