“You remember my speaking to you about a snapshot of my nephew, one that I showed to Major Palgrave, and that he didn’t give back to me?”
“Yes, yes, of course I remember. Sorry we couldn’t find it for you.”
“There wasn’t any such thing,” said Miss Marple, in a small, frightened voice.
“I beg your pardon?”
“There wasn’t any such thing. I made up that story, I’m afraid.”
“You made it up?” Dr. Graham looked slightly annoyed. “Why?”
Miss Marple told him. She told him quite clearly, without twittering. She told him about Major Palgrave’s murder story and how he’d been about to show her this particular snapshot and his sudden confusion and then she went on to her own anxiety and to her final decision to try somehow to obtain a view of it.
“And really, I couldn’t see any way of doing so without telling you something that was quite untrue,” she said, “I do hope you will forgive me.”
“You thought that what he had been about to show you was a picture of a murderer?”
“That’s what he said it was,” said Miss Marple. “At least he said it was given him by this acquaintance who had told him the story about a man who was a murderer.”
“Yes, yes. And—excuse me—you believed him?”
“I don’t know if I really believed him or not at the time,” said Miss Marple. “But then, you see, the next day he died.”
“Yes,” said Dr. Graham, struck suddenly by the clarity of that one sentence. The next day he died . . .
“And the snapshot had disappeared.”
Dr. Graham looked at her. He didn’t quite know what to say.
“Excuse, Miss Marple,” he said at last, “but is what you’re telling me now—is it really true this time?”
“I don’t wonder your doubting me,” said Miss Marple. “I should, in your place. Yes, it is true what I am telling you now, but I quite realise that you have only my word for it. Still, even if you don’t believe me, I thought I ought to tell you.”
“Why?”
“I realised that you ought to have the fullest information possible. In case—”
“In case what?”
“In case you decided to take any steps about it.”
10
A DECISION IN JAMESTOWN
DR. GRAHAM was in Jamestown, in the Administrator’s office; sitting at a table opposite his friend Daventry, a grave young man of thirty-five.
“You sounded rather mysterious on the phone, Graham,” said Daventry. “Anything special the matter?”
“I don’t know,” said Dr. Graham, “but I’m worried.”
Daventry looked at the other’s face, then he nodded as drinks were brought in. He spoke lightly of a fishing expedition he had made lately. Then when the servant had gone away, he sat back in his chair and looked at the other man.
“Now then” he said, “let’s have it.”
Dr. Graham recounted the facts that had worried him. Daventry gave a slow long whistle.
“I see. You think maybe there’s something funny about old Palgrave’s death? You’re no longer sure that it was just natural causes? Who certified the death? Robertson, I suppose. He didn’t have any doubts, did he?”
“No, but I think he may have been influenced in giving the certificate by the fact of the Serenite tablets in the bathroom. He asked me if Palgrave had mentioned that he suffered from hypertension, and I said no, I’d never had any medical conversation with him myself, but apparently he had talked about it to other people in the hotel. The whole thing—the bottle of tablets, and what Palgrave had said to people—it all fitted in—no earthly reason to suspect anything else. It was a perfectly natural inference to make—but I think now it may not have been correct. If it had been my business to give the certificate, I’d have given it without a second thought. The appearances are quite consistent with his having died from that cause. I’d never have thought about it since if it hadn’t been for the odd disappearance of that snapshot . . .”
“But look here, Graham,” said Daventry, “if you will allow me to say so, aren’t you relying a little too much on a rather fanciful story told by an elderly lady. You know what these elderly ladies are like. They magnify some detail and work the whole thing up.”