Diana Glass
The Help
‘What is it, Jane?’ asks Mrs Bantry. Miss Marple has suddenly stopped talking – has lifted her nose to the air like a cat scenting danger – or perhaps prey.
‘Something’s happened,’ Miss Marple says.
‘What do you mean?’ Mrs Bantry says, setting down her tea cup.
‘The staff,’ Mrs Marple says, looking about the breakfast room.
‘They’re all a-fluster. They’re excited about something.
’ One of the receptionists has just entered and is conversing urgently with three of the waiters.
One covers his mouth with a hand, the other lets out a whispered exclamation.
I am sure that I make out the word: mort.
‘Someone’s dead?’ Mrs Bantry exclaims; apparently her hearing is just as keen.
Miss Marple, meanwhile, is already on her feet. She walks over to the small group of waitresses whispering in one corner, moving surprisingly quickly for a woman of her age.
Mrs Bantry raises her eyebrows at me above her coffee cup. ‘Whatever is going on,’ she says, ‘Jane will be sure to find it all out. People tell her things, you see. Sometimes I think it is as if they can’t help themselves! But I think it is also because she seems – as she is – so very good.’
A few moments later, Miss Marple returns to us. She shakes her head. ‘A dreadful thing,’ she says. ‘Such a dreadful thing …’
‘What is it, Jane?’ Mrs Bantry bursts out, after a moment. ‘Don’t keep us in suspense, please.’
‘A guest,’ Miss Marple says. ‘Has been found, dead.’
‘Where?’ Mrs Bantry asks, and then: ‘How?’
‘The top of the gondola,’ Miss Marple says. ‘He got in alive. Then, at the top, the doors opened … and there he lay – dead.’
‘He?’
‘I am sure they should not have told me this,’ Miss Marple says. ‘But then, I think they should not have told me any of this. The dead man is Anthony Narracott.’
‘No!’ Mrs Bantry is aghast. ‘But … what could it have been? He seemed so vital. A heart attack, something like that?’
‘Possibly.’ Then Miss Marple gives a little sigh.
‘What is it, Jane?’ Mrs Bantry asks. ‘You’ve got that look about you … I can see it now.’
‘Wickedness,’ says Miss Marple, ominously.
‘If one has lived long enough with enough experience of the world, then that is what one thinks of, at a time like this. A man in the peak of health and vigour, suddenly struck down? Of course, there are sudden deaths from natural causes. But it just feels … wrong.’ Now she stops talking; her attention caught by something through the window.
I see one of the horses that brought us from the station moving slowly through the falling snow with a low-slung sled attached; to the sled is fastened a long dark shape; something wrapped in black cloth.
The snow, the bowed head of both black horse and rider against the snowstorm – all combine to create the impression of a funeral cortège.
‘The body,’ says Mrs Bantry.