Murder Is Easy (Agatha Christie Collection) by Agatha Christie

Author:Agatha Christie [Christie, Agatha]
Language: eng
Format: azw3
Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers
Published: 2010-10-13T16:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 13

Miss Waynflete Talks

On the following morning Luke came to a decision. He had, he felt, proceeded as far as he could with indirect inquiries. It was inevitable that sooner or later he would be forced into the open. He felt that the time had come to drop the book-writing camouflage and reveal that he had come to Wychwood with a definite aim in view.

In pursuance of this plan of campaign he decided to call upon Honoria Waynflete. Not only had he been favourably impressed by that middle-aged spinster’s air of discretion and a certain shrewdness of outlook—but he fancied that she might have information that would help him. He believed that she had told him what she knew. He wanted to induce her to tell him what she might have guessed. He had a shrewd idea that Miss Waynflete’s guesses might be fairly near the truth.

He called immediately after church.

Miss Waynflete received him in a matter-of-fact manner, showing no surprise at his call. As she sat down near him, her prim hands folded and her intelligent eyes—so like an amiable goat’s—fixed on his face, he found little difficulty in coming to the object of his visit.

He said: ‘I dare say you have guessed, Miss Waynflete, that the reason of my coming here is not merely to write a book on local customs?’

Miss Waynflete inclined her head and continued to listen.

Luke was not minded as yet to go into the full story. Miss Waynflete might be discreet—she certainly gave him the impression of being so—but where an elderly spinster was concerned Luke felt he could hardly rely on her resisting the temptation to confide an exciting story to one or two trusted cronies. He thereupon proposed to adopt a middle course.

‘I am down here to inquire into the circumstances of the death of that poor girl, Amy Gibbs.’

Miss Waynflete said:

‘You mean you have been sent down by the police?’

‘Oh, no—I’m not a plain-clothes dick.’ He added with a slightly humorous inflection, ‘I’m afraid I’m that well-known character in fiction, the private investigator.’

‘I see. Then it was Bridget Conway who brought you down here?’

Luke hesitated a moment. Then he decided to let it go at that. Without going into the whole Pinkerton story, it was difficult to account for his presence. Miss Waynflete was continuing, a note of gentle admiration in her voice.

‘Bridget is so practical—so efficient! I’m afraid, if it had been left to me, I should have distrusted my own judgement—I mean, that if you are not absolutely sure of a thing, it is so difficult to commit yourself to a definite course of action.’

‘But you are sure, aren’t you?’

Miss Waynflete said gravely:

‘No, indeed, Mr Fitzwilliam. It is not a thing one can be sure about! I mean, it might all be imagination. Living alone, with no one to consult or to talk to, one might easily become melodramatic and imagine things which had no foundation in fact.’

Luke assented readily to this statement, recognizing its inherent truth, but he

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