The Moving Finger mm-3

by Agatha Christie

  She got up and came toward us. I thought I saw just a faint hunted look in her eye. If so, it went again. She was perfectly normal and hearty.

  "Want me? Not in trouble over my car lights again, I hope?"

  She led the way out of the drawing room and across the hall into a small study.

  As I closed the drawing-room door, I saw Symmington's head jerk up sharply. I supposed his legal training had brought him in contact with police cases, and he had recognized something in Nash's manner. He half rose.

  That is all I saw before I shut the door and followed the others.

  Nash was saying his piece. He was very quiet and correct. He cautioned her and then told her that he must ask her to accompany him. He had a warrant for her arrest and he read out the charge.

  I forget now the exact legal term. It was the letters, not murder yet.

  Aimée Griffith flung up her head and bayed with laughter. She boomed out:

  "What ridiculous nonsense! As though I'd write a packet of indecent stuff like that. You must be mad. I've never written a word of the kind."

  Nash had produced the letter to Elsie Holland. He said, "Do you deny having written this, Miss Griffith?"

  If she hesitated it was only for a split second.

  "Of course I do. I've never seen it before."

  Nash said quietly:

  "I must tell you, Miss Griffith, that you were observed to type that letter on the machine at the Women's Institute between eleven and eleven-thirty P.M. on the night before last. Yesterday you entered the post office with a bunch of letters in your hand."

  "I never posted this."

  "No, you did not. While waiting for stamps, you dropped it inconspicuously on the floor, so that somebody should come along unsuspectingly and pick it up and post it."

  "I never -"

  The door opened and Symmington came in. He said sharply,

  "What's going on? Aimée, if there is anything wrong, you ought to be legally represented. If you wish me -"

  She broke then. Covered her face with her hands and staggered to a chair. She said, "Go away, Dick, go away. Not you! Not you!"

  "You need a solicitor, my dear girl."

  "Not you. I – I – couldn't bear it. I don't want you to know – all this."

  He understood then, perhaps. He said quietly, "I'll get hold of Mildmay, of Exhampton. Will that do?"

  She nodded. She was sobbing now.

  Symmington went out of the room. In the doorway he collided with Owen Griffith.

  "What's this?" said Owen violently. "My sister -"

  "I'm sorry, Dr. Griffith. Very sorry. But we have no alternative."

  "You think she – was responsible for those letters?"

  "I'm afraid there is no doubt of it, sir," said Nash – he turned to Aimée: "You must come with us, now, please, Miss Griffith – you shall have every facility for seeing a solicitor, you know."

  Owen cried, "Aimée?"

  She brushed past him without looking at him.

  She said, "Don't talk to me. Don't say anything. And for heaven's sake don't look at me!"

  They went out. Owen stood like a man in a dream.

  I waited a bit, then I came up to him.

  "If there's anything I can do, Griffith, tell me."

  He said like a man in a dream, "Aimée? I don't believe it."

  "It may be a mistake," I suggested feebly.

  He said slowly, "She wouldn't take it like that if it were. But I would never have believed it. I can't believe it."

  He sank down on a chair. I made myself useful by finding a stiff drink and bringing it to him. He swallowed it down and it seemed to do him good.

  He said, "I couldn't take it in at first. I'm all right now. Thanks, Burton, but there's nothing you can do. Nothing anyone can do."

  The door opened and Joanna came in. She was very white.

  She came over to Owen and looked at me.

  She said, "Get out, Jerry. This is my business."

  As I went out of the door, I saw her kneel down by his chair.

  Chapter 8

  I can't tell you coherently the events of the next twenty-four hours. Various incidents stand out, unrelated to other incidents.

  I remember Joanna coming home, very white and drawn and of how I tried to cheer her up, saying:

  "Now who's being a ministering angel?"

  And of how she smiled in a pitiful twisted way and said, "He says he won't have me, Jerry. He's very very proud and stiff!"

  And I said, "My girl won't have me either… "

  We sat there for a while, Joanna saying at last, "The Burton family isn't exactly in demand at the moment!"

  I said, "Never mind, my sweet, we still have each other," and Joanna said, "Somehow or other, Jerry, that doesn't comfort me much just now… "

  Owen came the next day and rhapsodized in the most fulsome way about Joanna. She was wonderful, marvelous!

  The way she'd come to him, the way she was willing to marry him – at once if he liked. But he wasn't going to let her do that. No – she was too good, too fine to be associated with the kind of muck that would start as soon as the papers got hold of the news.

  I was fond of Joanna, and knew she was the kind who's all right when standing by in trouble, but I got rather bored with all this highfalutin' stuff. I told Owen rather irritably not to be so damned noble.

  I went down to the High Street and found everybody's tongue wagging nineteen to the dozen. Emily Barton was saying that she had never really trusted Aimée Griffith. The grocer's wife was saying with gusto that she'd always thought Miss Griffith had a queer look in her eye.

  They had completed the case against Aimée, so I learned from Nash. A search of the house had brought to light the cut pages of Emily Barton's book – in the cupboard under the stairs, of all places, wrapped up in an old roll of wallpaper.

  "And a jolly good place too," said Nash appreciatively. "You never know when a prying servant won't tamper with a desk or a locked drawer – but those junk cupboards full of last year's tennis balls and old wallpaper are never opened except to shove something more in."

  "The lady would seem to have had a penchant for that particular hiding place," I said.

  "Yes. The criminal mind seldom has much variety. By the way, talking of the dead girl, we've got one fact to go upon: There's a large heavy pestle missing from the doctor's dispensary. I'll bet anything you like that's what she was stunned with."

  "Rather an awkward thing to carry about," I objected.

  "Not for Miss Griffith. She was going to the Guides that afternoon, but she was going to leave flowers and vegetables at the Red Cross stall on the way, so she'd got a whopping great basket with her."

  "You haven't found the skewer?"

  "No, and I shan't. The poor devil may be mad, but she wasn't mad enough to keep a bloodstained skewer just to make it easy for us, when all she'd got to do was to wash it and return it to a kitchen drawer."

  "I suppose," I conceded, "that you can't have everything."

  The vicarage had been one of the last places to hear the news. Old Miss Marple was very much distressed by it. She spoke to me very earnestly on the subject:

  "It isn't true, Mr. Burton. I'm sure it isn't true."

  "It's true enough, I'm afraid. They were lying in wait, you know. They actually saw her type that letter."

  "Yes, yes – perhaps they did. Yes, I can understand that."

  "And the printed pages from which the letters were cut were found where she'd hidden them in her house."

  Miss Marple stared at me. Then she said, in a very low voice, "But that is horrible – really wicked."

  Mrs. Dane Calthrop came up with a rush and joined us and said, "What's the matter, Jane?"

  Miss Marple was murmuring helplessly, "Oh, dear, oh, dear, what can one do?"

  "What's upset you, Jane?"

  Miss Marple said, "There must be something. But I am so old and so ignorant and, I am afraid, so foolish."

&nb
sp; I felt rather embarrassed and was glad when Mrs. Dane Calthrop took her friend away.

  I was to see Miss Marple again that afternoon, however. Much later when I was on my way home.

  She was standing near the little bridge at the end of the village, near Mrs. Cleat's cottage, and talking to Megan, of all people.

  I wanted to see Megan. I had been wanting to see her all day. I quickened my pace. But as I came up to them, Megan turned on her heel and went off in the other direction.

  It made me angry and I would have followed her, but Miss Marple blocked my way.

  "I wanted to speak to you," she said. "No, don't go after Megan now. It wouldn't be wise."

  I was just going to make a sharp rejoinder when she disarmed me by saying, "That girl has great courage – a very high order of courage."

  I still wanted to go after Megan, but Miss Marple said, "Don't try and see her now. I do know what I am talking about. She must keep her courage intact."

  There was something about the old lady's assertion that chilled me. It was as though she knew something that I didn't.

  I was afraid and didn't know why I was afraid.

  I didn't go home. I went back into the High Street and walked up and down aimlessly. I don't know what I was waiting for, nor what I was thinking about…

  I got caught by that awful old bore Colonel Appleby. He asked after my pretty sister as usual and then went on:

  "What's all this about Griffith 's sister being mad as a hatter? They say she's been at the bottom of this anonymous letter business that's been such a confounded nuisance to everybody? Couldn't believe it at first, but they say it's quite true."

  I said it was true enough.

  "Well, well – I must say our police force is pretty good on the whole. Give 'em time, that's all, give ' em time. Funny business this anonymous letter stunt – these desiccated old women are always the ones who go in for it – though the Griffith woman wasn't bad-looking even if she was a bit long in the tooth. But there aren't any decent-looking girls in this part of the world – except that governess girl of the Symmingtons. She's worth looking at. Pleasant girl, too. Grateful if one does any little thing for her.

  "Came across her having a picnic or something with those kids not long ago. They were romping about in the heather and she was knitting – ever so vexed she'd run out of wool. 'Well,' I said, 'like me to run you into Lymstock? I've got to call for a rod of mine there. I shan't be more than ten minutes getting it, then I'll run you back again.' She was a bit doubtful about leaving the boys. 'They'll be all right,' I said. 'Who's to harm them?' Wasn't going to have the boys along, no fear! So I ran her in, dropped her at the wool shop, picked her up again later and that was that. Thanked me very prettily. Grateful and all that. Nice girl."

  I managed to get away from him.

  It was after that, that I caught sight of Miss Marple for the third time. She was coming out of the police station.

  Where do one's fears come from? Where do they shape themselves? Where do they hide before coming out into the open?

  Just one short phrase. Heard and noted and never quite put aside:

  "Take me away – It's so awful being here – feeling so wicked…"

  Why had Megan said that? What had she to feel wicked about?

  There could be nothing in Mrs. Symmington's death to make Megan feel wicked.

  Why had the child felt wicked? Why? Why?

  Could it be because she felt responsible in any way? Megan? Impossible! Megan couldn't have had anything to do with those letters – those foul obscene letters. Owen Griffith had known a case up north – a schoolgirl…

  What had Inspector Graves said?

  Something about an adolescent mind…

  Innocent middle-aged ladies on operating tables babbled words they hardly knew. Little boys chalking up things on walls.

  No, no, not Megan.

  Heredity? Bad blood? An unconscious inheritance of something abnormal? Her misfortune, not her fault, a curse laid upon her by a past generation?

  "I'm not the wife for you. I'm better at hating than loving."

  Oh, my Megan, my little child. Not that! Anything but that. And that old Tabby is after you, she suspects. She says you have courage. Courage to do what?

  It was only a brainstorm. It passed. But I wanted to see Megan – I wanted to see her badly.

  At half past nine that night I left the house and went down to the town and along to the Symmingtons'.

  It was then that an entirely new idea came into my mind. The idea of a woman whom nobody had considered for a moment.

  (Or had Nash considered her?)

  Wildly unlikely, wildly improbable, and I would have said up to today impossible, too. But that was not so. No, not impossible.

  I redoubled my pace. Because it was now even more imperative that I should see Megan straightaway.

  I passed through the Symmingtons' gate and up to the house. It was a dark overcast night. A little rain was beginning to fall. The visibility was bad.

  I saw a line of light from one of the windows. The little morning room?

  I hesitated a moment or two, then instead of going up to the front door, I swerved and crept very quietly up to the window, skirting a big bush and keeping low.

  The light came from a chink in the curtains, which were not quite drawn. It was easy to look through and see.

  It was a strangely peaceful and domestic scene. Symmington in a big armchair, and Elsie Holland, her head bent, busily patching a boy's torn shirt.

  I could hear as well as see, for the window was open at the top.

  Elsie Holland was speaking:

  "But I do think, really, Mr. Symmington, that the boys are quite old enough to go to boarding school. Not that I shan't hate leaving them because I shall. I'm ever so fond of them both."

  Symmington said, "I think perhaps you're right about Brian, Miss Holland. I've decided that he shall start next term at Winhays – my old prep school. But Colin is a little young yet. I'd prefer him to wait another year."

  "Well, of course I see what you mean. And Colin is perhaps a little young for his age -"

  Quiet domestic talk – quiet domestic scene – and a golden head bent over needlework.

  Then the door opened and Megan came in.

  She stood very straight in the doorway, and I was aware at once of something tense and strung up about her. The skin of her face was tight and drawn and her eyes bright and resolute. There was no diffidence about her tonight and no childishness.

  She said, addressing Symmington, but giving him no title (and I suddenly reflected that I never had heard her call him anything. Did she address him as father or as Dick or what?):

  "I would like to speak to you, please. Alone."

  Symmington looked surprised and, I fancied, not best pleased. He frowned, but Megan carried her point with a determination unusual in her.

  She turned to Elsie Holland and said, "Do you mind, Elsie?"

  "Oh, of course." Elsie Holland jumped up. She looked startled and a little flurried.

  She went to the door and Megan came farther in so that Elsie passed her.

  Just for a minute Elsie stood motionless in the doorway looking over her shoulder.

  Her lips were closed, she stood quite still, one hand stretched out, the other clasping her needlework to her.

  I caught my breath, overwhelmed suddenly by her beauty. When I think of her now, I always think of her like that – in arrested motion, with that matchless deathless perfection that belonged to ancient Greece.

  Then she went out shutting the door.

  Symmington said rather fretfully, "Well, Megan, what is it? What do you want?"

  Megan had come right up to the table. She stood there looking down at Symmington. I was struck anew by the resolute determination of her face and by something else – a hardness new to me.

  Then she opened her lips and said something that startled me to the core.

  "I want some money," she said.r />
  The request didn't improve Symmington's temper. He said sharply, "Couldn't you have waited until tomorrow morning? What's the matter, do you think your allowance is inadequate?"

  A fair man, I thought even then, open to reason, though not to emotional appeal.

  Megan said, "I want a good deal of money."

  Symmington sat up straight in his chair. He said coldly:

  "You will come of age in a few months' time. Then the money left you by your grandmother will be turned over to you by the Public Trustee."

  Megan said:

  "You don't understand. I want money from you." She went on, speaking faster: "Nobody's ever talked much to me about my father. They've not wanted me to know about him. But I do know that he went to prison and I know why. It was for blackmail!"

  She paused.

  "Well, I'm his daughter. And perhaps I take after him. Anyway, I'm asking you to give me money because – if you don't -" She stopped and then went on very slowly and evenly – "if you don't – shall say what I saw you doing to the cachet that day in my mother's room."

  There was a pause. Then Symmington said in a completely emotionless voice, "I don't know what you mean."

  Megan said, "I think you do."

  And she smiled. It was not a nice smile.

  Symmington got up. He went over to the writing desk. He took a checkbook from his pocket and wrote out a check. He blotted it carefully and then came back. He held it out to Megan.

  "You're grown up now," he said. "I can understand that you may feel you want to buy something rather special in the way of clothes and all that. I don't know what you're talking about. I didn't pay attention. But here's a check."

  Megan looked at it, then she said, "Thank you. That will do to go on with."

  She turned and went out of the room. Symmington stared after her and at the closed door, then he turned around and as I saw his face I made a quick uncontrolled movement forward. It was checked in the most extraordinary fashion. The big bush that I had noticed by the wall stopped being a bush.

  Superintendent Nash's arms went around me and Superintendent Nash's voice just breathed in my ear:

  "Quiet, Burton. For God's sake."

  Then, with infinite caution he beat a retreat, his arm impelling me to accompany him.