Tape Measure Murder by Agatha Christie

Author:Agatha Christie [Christie, Agatha]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction, Mystery & Detective, Traditional British, Short Stories (Single Author)
ISBN: 9780062129697
Google: Aaau4cmRaAYC
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2011-01-01T05:00:00+00:00

Mr Spenlow was sitting in a deck chair. He looked bewildered. He said, in his thin, precise voice, ‘I may, of course, be imagining what occurred. My hearing is not as good as it was. But I distinctly think I heard a small boy call after me, “Yah, who’s a Crippen?” It – it conveyed the impression to me that he was of the opinion that I had – had killed my dear wife.’

Miss Marple, gently snipping off a dead rose head, said, ‘That was the impression he meant to convey, no doubt.’

‘But what could possibly have put such an idea into a child’s head?’ Miss Marple coughed. ‘Listening, no doubt, to the opinions of his elders.’

‘You – you really mean that other people think that, also?’

‘Quite half the people in St Mary Mead.’

‘But – my dear lady – what can possibly have given rise to such an idea? I was sincerely attached to my wife. She did not, alas, take to living in the country as much as I had hoped she would do, but perfect agreement on every subject is an impossible idea. I assure you I feel her loss very keenly.’

‘Probably. But if you will excuse my saying so, you don’t sound as though you do.’

Mr Spenlow drew his meagre frame up to its full height. ‘My dear lady, many years ago I read of a certain Chinese philosopher who, when his dearly loved wife was taken from him, continued calmly to beat a gong in the street – a customary Chinese pastime, I presume – exactly as usual. The people of the city were much impressed by his fortitude.’

‘But,’ said Miss Marple, ‘the people of St Mary Mead react rather differently. Chinese philosophy does not appeal to them.’

‘But you understand?’

Miss Marple nodded. ‘My Uncle Henry,’ she explained, ‘was a man of unusual self-control. His motto was “Never display emotion”. He, too, was very fond of flowers.’

‘I was thinking,’ said Mr Spenlow with something like eagerness, ‘that I might, perhaps, have a pergola on the west side of the cottage. Pink roses and, perhaps, wisteria. And there is a white starry flower, whose name for the moment escapes me –’

In the tone in which she spoke to her grandnephew, aged three, Miss Marple said, ‘I have a very nice catalogue here, with pictures. Perhaps you would like to look through it – I have to go up to the village.’

Leaving Mr Spenlow sitting happily in the garden with his catalogue, Miss Marple went up to her room, hastily rolled up a dress in a piece of brown paper, and, leaving the house, walked briskly up to the post office. Miss Politt, the dressmaker, lived in the rooms over the post office.

But Miss Marple did not at once go through the door and up the stairs. It was just two-thirty, and, a minute late, the Much Benham bus drew up outside the post office door. It was one of the events of the day in St Mary Mead.

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