Any similarities might make a useful pointer. It had done so on other occasions.
The other two elderly ladies were apparently separate travellers. Both of them were about sixty. One was a well preserved, well-dressed woman of obvious social importance in her own mind, but probably in other people’s minds as well. Her voice was loud and dictatorial. She appeared to have in tow a niece, a girl of about eighteen or nineteen who addressed her as Aunt Geraldine. The niece, Miss Marple noted, was obviously well accustomed to coping with Aunt Geraldine’s bossiness. She was a competent girl as well as being an attractive one.
Across the aisle from Miss Marple was a big man with square shoulders and a clumsy-looking body, looking as though he had been carelessly assembled by an ambitious child out of chunky bricks. His face looked as though nature had planned it to be round but the face had rebelled at this and decided to achieve a square effect by developing a powerful jaw. He had a thick head of greyish hair and enormous bushy eyebrows which moved up and down to give point to what he was saying. His remarks seemed mainly to come out in a series of barks as though he was a talkative sheepdog. He shared his seat with a tall dark foreigner who moved restlessly in his seat and gesticulated freely. He spoke a most peculiar English, making occasional remarks in French and German. The bulky man seemed quite capable of meeting these onslaughts of foreign language, and shifted obligingly to either French or German. Taking a quick glance at them again, Miss Marple decided that the bushy eyebrows must be Professor Wanstead and the excitable foreigner was Mr Caspar.
She wondered what it was they were discussing with such animation, but was baffled by the rapidity and force of Mr Caspar’s delivery.
The seat in front of them was occupied by the other woman of about sixty, a tall woman, possibly over sixty, but a woman who would have stood out in a crowd anywhere. She was still a very handsome woman with dark grey hair coiled high on her head, drawn back from a fine forehead. She had a low, clear, incisive voice. A personality, Miss Marple thought. Someone! Yes, she was decidedly someone. ‘Reminds me,’ she thought to herself, ‘of Dame Emily Waldron.’ Dame Emily Waldron had been the Principal of an Oxford College and a notable scientist, and Miss Marple, having once met her in her nephew’s company, had never quite forgotten her.
Miss Marple resumed her survey of the passengers. There were two married couples, one American, middle-aged, amiable, a talkative wife and a placidly agreeing husband. They were obviously dedicated travellers and sightseers. There was also an English middle-aged couple whom Miss Marple noted down without hesitation as a retired military man and wife. She ticked them off from the list as Colonel and Mrs Walker.
In the seat behind her was a tall, thin man of about thirty with a highly technical vocabulary, clearly an architect. There were also two middle-aged ladies travelling together rather further up the coach. They were discussing the brochure and deciding what the tour was going to hold for them in the way of attractions. One was dark and thin and the other was fair and sturdily built and the latter’s face seemed faintly familiar to Miss Marple. She wondered where she had seen or met her before. However, she could not recall the occasion to mind. Possibly someone she had met at a cocktail party or sat opposite to in a train. There was nothing very special about her to remember.
Only one more passenger remained for her to appraise, and this was a young man, possibly of about nineteen or twenty. He wore the appropriate clothes for his age and sex; tight black jeans, a polo necked purple sweater and his head was an outsize rich mop of non-disciplined black hair. He was looking with an air of interest at the bossy woman’s niece, and the bossy woman’s niece also, Miss Marple thought, was looking with some interest at him. In spite of the preponderance of elderly pussies and middle-aged females there were, at any rate, two young people among the passengers.
They stopped for lunch at a pleasant riverside hotel, and the afternoon sight-seeing was given over to Blenheim. Miss Marple had already visited Blenheim twice before, so she saved her feet by limiting the amount of sight-seeing indoors and coming fairly soon to the enjoyment of the gardens and the beautiful view.
By the time they arrived at the hotel where they were to stay the night, the passengers were getting to know each other. The efficient Mrs Sandbourne, still brisk and unwearied by her duties in directing the sight-seeing, did her part very well; creating little groups by adding anyone who looked as if they were left out to one or other of them, murmuring, ‘You must make Colonel Walker describe his garden to you. Such a wonderful collection of fuchsias he has.’ With such little sentences she drew people together.
Miss Marple was now able to attach names to all the passengers. Bushy eyebrows turned out to be Professor Wanstead, as she had thought, and the foreigner was Mr Caspar. The bossy woman was Mrs Riseley-Porter and her niece was called Joanna Crawford. The young man with the hair was Emlyn Price and he and Joanna Crawford appeared to be finding out that certain things in life, such as decided opinions, they had in common, on economics, art, general dislikes, politics and such topics.
The two eldest pussies graduated naturally to Miss Marple as a kindred elderly pussy. They discussed happily arthritis, rheumatism, diets, new doctors, remedies both professional, patent, and reminiscences of old wives’ treatments which had had success where all else failed. They discussed the many tours they had been on to foreign places in Europe; hotels, travel agencies and finally the County of Somerset where Miss Lumley and Miss Bentham lived, and where the difficulties of getting suitable gardeners could hardly be believed.
The two middle-aged ladies travelling together turned out to be Miss Cooke and Miss Barrow. Miss Marple still felt that one of these two, the fair one, Miss Cooke, was faintly familiar to her, but she still could not remember where she had seen her before. Probably it was only her fancy. It might also be just fancy but she could not help feeling that Miss Barrow and Miss Cooke appeared to be avoiding her. They seemed rather anxious to move away if she approached. That, of course, might be entirely her imagination.
Fifteen people, one of whom at least must matter in some way. In casual conversation that evening she introduced the name of Mr Rafiel, so as to note if anyone reacted in any way. Nobody did.
The handsome woman was identified as Miss Elizabeth Temple, who was the retired Headmistress of a famous girls’ school. Nobody appeared to Miss Marple likely to be a murderer except possibly Mr Caspar, and that was probably foreign prejudice. The thin young man was Richard Jameson, an architect.
‘Perhaps I shall do better tomorrow,’ said Miss Marple to herself.
Miss Marple went to bed definitely tired out. Sight-seeing was pleasant but exhausting, and trying to study fifteen or sixteen people at once and wondering as you did so which of them could possibly be connected with a murder, was even more exhausting. It had a touch of such unreality about it that one could not, Miss Marple felt, take it seriously. These seemed to be all perfectly nice people, the sort of people who go on cruises and on tours and all the rest of it. However, she took another quick and cursory glance at the passenger list, making a few little entries in her notebook.
Mrs Riseley-Porter? Not connected with crime. Too social and self-centred.
Niece, Joanna Crawford? The same? But very efficient.
Mrs Riseley-Porter, however, might have information of some kind which Miss Marple might find had a bearing on matters. She must keep on agreeable terms with Mrs Riseley-Porter.
Miss Elizabeth Temple? A personality. Interesting. She did not remind Miss Marple of any murderer she’d ever known. ‘In fact,’ said Miss Marple to herself, ‘she really radiates integrity. If she had committed a murder, it would be a very popular murder. Perhaps for some noble reason or for some reason that she thought noble?’ But that wasn’t satisfactory either. Miss Temple, she thought, would always know what she was doing and why she was doing it and would not have any silly
