黑麦奇案45

时间：2025-10-10 08:36:31

（单词翻译:单击）

Chapter Twenty-Six
Inspector1 Neele stared at Miss Marple and slowly shook his head.
“Are you saying,” he said incredulously, “that Gladys Martin deliberately3
murdered Rex Fortescue? I’m sorry, Miss Marple, but I simply don’t be-
lieve it.”
“No, of course she didn’t mean to murder him,” said Miss Marple, “but
she did it all the same! You said yourself that she was nervous and upset
when you questioned her. And that she looked guilty.”
“Yes, but not guilty of murder.”
“Oh, no, I agree. As I say, she didn’t mean to murder anybody, but she
put the taxine in the marmalade. She didn’t think it was poison, of
course.”
“What did she think it was?” Inspector Neele’s voice still sounded in-
credulous2.
“I rather imagine she thought it was a truth drug,” said Miss Marple.
“It’s very interesting, you know, and very instructive—the things these
girls cut out of papers and keep. It’s always been the same, you know, all
through the ages. Recipes for beauty, for attracting the man you love. And
witchcraft4 and charms and marvellous happenings. Nowadays they’re
mostly lumped together under the heading of Science. Nobody believes in
magicians anymore, nobody believes that anyone can come along and
wave a wand and turn you into a frog. But if you read in the paper that by
injecting certain glands5 scientists can alter your vital tissues and you’ll de-
velop froglike characteristics, well, everybody would believe that. And
having read in the papers about truth drugs, of course Gladys would be-
lieve it absolutely when he told her that that’s what it was.”
“When who told her?” said Inspector Neele.
“Albert Evans,” said Miss Marple. “Not of course that that is really his
name. But anyway he met her last summer at a holiday camp, and he
flattered her up and made love to her, and I should imagine told her some
story of injustice6 or persecution7, or something like that. Anyway, the point
was that Rex Fortescue had to be made to confess what he had done and
make restitution8. I don’t know this, of course, Inspector Neele, but I’m
pretty sure about it. He got her to take a post here, and it’s really very easy
nowadays with the shortage of domestic staff, to obtain a post where you
want one. Staffs are changing the whole time. They then arranged a date
together. You remember on that last postcard he said: ‘Remember our
date.’ That was to be the great day they were working for. Gladys would
put the drug that he gave her into the top of the marmalade, so that Mr.
Fortescue would eat it at breakfast and she would also put the rye in his
pocket. I don’t know what story he told her to account for the rye, but as I
told you from the beginning, Inspector Neele, Gladys Martin was a very
credulous girl. In fact, there’s hardly anything she wouldn’t believe if a
personable young man put it to her the right way.”
“Go on,” said Inspector Neele in a dazed voice.
“The idea probably was,” continued Miss Marple, “that Albert was going
to call upon him at the office that day, and that by that time the truth drug
would have worked, and that Mr. Fortescue would have confessed
everything and so on and so on. You can imagine the poor girl’s feelings
when she heard that Mr. Fortescue was dead.”
“But, surely,” Inspector Neele objected, “she would have told?”
Miss Marple asked sharply:
“What was the first thing she said to you when you questioned her?”
“She said: ‘I didn’t do it,’ ” Inspector Neele said.
“Exactly,” said Miss Marple, triumphantly9. “Don’t you see that’s exactly
what she would say? If she broke an ornament10, you know, Gladys would
always say: ‘I didn’t do it, Miss Marple. I can’t think how it happened.’ They
can’t help it, poor dears. They’re very upset at what they’ve done and their
great idea is to avoid blame. You don’t think that a nervous young woman
who had murdered someone when she didn’t mean to murder him is go-
ing to admit it, do you? That would have been quite out of character.”
“Yes,” Neele said, “I suppose it would.”
He ran his mind back over his interview with Gladys. Nervous, upset,
guilty, shifty-eyed, all those things. They might have had a small signific-
ance, or a big one. He could not really blame himself for having failed to
come to the right conclusion.
“Her first idea, as I say,” went on Miss Marple, “would be to deny it all.
Then in a confused way she would try to sort it all out in her mind. Per-
haps11 Albert hadn’t known how strong the stuff was, or he’d made a mis-
take and given her too much of it. She’d think of excuses for him and ex-
planations. She’d hope he’d get in touch with her, which, of course, he did.
By telephone.”
“Do you know that?” asked Neele sharply.
Miss Marple shook her head.
“No. I admit I’m assuming it. But there were unexplained calls that day.
That is to say, people rang up and, when Crump or Mrs. Crump answered,
the phone was hung up. That’s what he’d do, you know. Ring up and wait
until Gladys answered the phone, and then he’d make an appointment
with her to meet him.”
“I see,” said Neele. “You mean she had an appointment to meet him on
the day she died.”
Miss Marple nodded vigorously.
“Yes, that was indicated. Mrs. Crump was right about one thing. The girl
had on her best nylon stockings and her good shoes. She was going to
meet someone. Only she wasn’t going out to meet him. He was coming to
Yewtree Lodge12. That’s why she was on the look out that day and flustered13
and late with tea. Then, as she brought the second tray into the hall, I
think she looked along the passage to the side door, and saw him there,
beckoning14 to her. She put the tray down and went out to meet him.”
“And then he strangled her,” said Neele.
Miss Marple pursed her lips together. “It would only take a minute,” she
said, “but he couldn’t risk her talking. She had to die, poor, silly, credulous
girl. And then—he put a clothes-peg on her nose!” Stern anger vibrated the
old lady’s voice. ‘To make it fit in with the rhyme. The rye, the blackbirds,
the countinghouse, the bread and honey, and the clothes-peg—the nearest
he could get to a little dickey bird that nipped off her nose—”
“And I suppose at the end of it all he’ll go to Broadmoor and we shan’t
be able to hang him because he’s crazy!” said Neele slowly.
“I think you’ll hang him all right,” said Miss Marple. “And he’s not crazy,
Inspector, not for a moment!”
Inspector Neele looked hard at her.
“Now see here, Miss Marple, you’ve outlined a theory to me. Yes—yes—
although you say you know, it’s only a theory. You’re saying that a man is
responsible for these crimes, who called himself Albert Evans, who picked
up the girl Gladys at a holiday camp and used her for his own purposes.
This Albert Evans was someone who wanted revenge for the old Blackbird
Mine business. You’re suggesting, aren’t you, that Mrs. MacKenzie’s son,
Don MacKenzie, didn’t die at Dunkirk. That he’s still alive, that he’s behind
all this?”
But to Inspector Neele’s surprise, Miss Marple was shaking her head vi-
olently.
“Oh no!” she said, “oh no! I’m not suggesting that at all. Don’t you see, In-
spector Neele, all this blackbird business is really a complete fake. It was
used, that was all, used by somebody who heard about the blackbirds—the
ones in the library and in the pie. The blackbirds were genuine enough.
They were put there by someone who knew about the old business, who
wanted revenge for it. But only the revenge of trying to frighten Mr. For-
tescue or to make him uncomfortable. I don’t believe, you know, Inspector
Neele, that children can really be brought up and taught to wait and brood
and carry out revenge. Children, after all, have got a lot of sense. But any-
one whose father had been swindled and perhaps left to die might be will-
ing to play a malicious15 trick on the person who was supposed to have
done it. That’s what happened, I think. And the killer16 used it.”
“The killer,” said Inspector Neele. “Come now, Miss Marple, let’s have
your ideas about the killer. Who was he?”
“You won’t be surprised,” said Miss Marple. “Not really. Because you’ll
see, as soon as I tell you who he is, or rather who I think he is, for one
must be accurate must one not?—you’ll see that he’s just the type of per-
son who would commit these murders. He’s sane17, brilliant and quite un-
scrupulous18. And he did it, of course, for money, probably for a good deal
of money.”
“Percival Fortescue?” Inspector Neele spoke19 almost imploringly20, but he
knew as he spoke that he was wrong. The picture of the man that Miss
Marple had built up for him had no resemblance to Percival Fortescue.
“Oh, no,” said Miss Marple. “Not Percival. Lance.”

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点击收听单词发音收听单词发音  

1 inspector q6kxH     
n.检查员，监察员，视察员
参考例句：
  • The inspector was interested in everything pertaining to the school.视察员对有关学校的一切都感兴趣。
  • The inspector was shining a flashlight onto the tickets.查票员打着手电筒查看车票。
2 credulous Oacy2     
adj.轻信的，易信的
参考例句：
  • You must be credulous if she fooled you with that story.连她那种话都能把你骗倒，你一定是太容易相信别人了。
  • Credulous attitude will only make you take anything for granted.轻信的态度只会使你想当然。
3 deliberately Gulzvq     
adv.审慎地；蓄意地；故意地
参考例句：
  • The girl gave the show away deliberately.女孩故意泄露秘密。
  • They deliberately shifted off the argument.他们故意回避这个论点。
4 witchcraft pe7zD7     
n.魔法，巫术
参考例句：
  • The woman practising witchcraft claimed that she could conjure up the spirits of the dead.那个女巫说她能用魔法召唤亡灵。
  • All these things that you call witchcraft are capable of a natural explanation.被你们统统叫做巫术的那些东西都可以得到合情合理的解释。
5 glands 82573e247a54d4ca7619fbc1a5141d80     
n.腺( gland的名词复数 )
参考例句：
  • a snake's poison glands 蛇的毒腺
  • the sebaceous glands in the skin 皮脂腺
6 injustice O45yL     
n.非正义，不公正，不公平，侵犯（别人的）权利
参考例句：
  • They complained of injustice in the way they had been treated.他们抱怨受到不公平的对待。
  • All his life he has been struggling against injustice.他一生都在与不公正现象作斗争。
7 persecution PAnyA     
n. 迫害,烦扰
参考例句：
  • He had fled from France at the time of the persecution. 他在大迫害时期逃离了法国。
  • Their persecution only serves to arouse the opposition of the people. 他们的迫害只激起人民对他们的反抗。
8 restitution cDHyz     
n.赔偿；恢复原状
参考例句：
  • It's only fair that those who do the damage should make restitution.损坏东西的人应负责赔偿，这是再公平不过的了。
  • The victims are demanding full restitution.受害人要求全额赔偿。
9 triumphantly 9fhzuv     
ad.得意洋洋地；得胜地；成功地
参考例句：
  • The lion was roaring triumphantly. 狮子正在发出胜利的吼叫。
  • Robert was looking at me triumphantly. 罗伯特正得意扬扬地看着我。
10 ornament u4czn     
v.装饰，美化；n.装饰，装饰物
参考例句：
  • The flowers were put on the table for ornament.花放在桌子上做装饰用。
  • She wears a crystal ornament on her chest.她的前胸戴了一个水晶饰品。
11 haps 7226286636a9a1dc4226df0e47f52e59     
n.粗厚毛披巾；偶然，机会，运气( hap的名词复数 )
参考例句：
  • He recorded all the little haps and mishaps of his life. 他记录了下他生命中的所有小祸小福。 来自互联网
  • Per haps he's never run up against any walls. 这家伙大概没有碰过钉子吧？ 来自互联网
12 lodge q8nzj     
v.临时住宿，寄宿，寄存，容纳；n.传达室，小旅馆
参考例句：
  • Is there anywhere that I can lodge in the village tonight?村里有我今晚过夜的地方吗？
  • I shall lodge at the inn for two nights.我要在这家小店住两个晚上。
13 flustered b7071533c424b7fbe8eb745856b8c537     
adj.慌张的；激动不安的v.使慌乱，使不安( fluster的过去式和过去分词)
参考例句：
  • The honking of horns flustered the boy. 汽车喇叭的叫声使男孩感到慌乱。 来自《现代英汉综合大词典》
  • She was so flustered that she forgot her reply. 她太紧张了，都忘记了该如何作答。 来自辞典例句
14 beckoning fcbc3f0e8d09c5f29e4c5759847d03d6     
adj.引诱人的，令人心动的v.（用头或手的动作）示意，召唤( beckon的现在分词 )
参考例句：
  • An even more beautiful future is beckoning us on. 一个更加美好的未来在召唤我们继续前进。 来自辞典例句
  • He saw a youth of great radiance beckoning to him. 他看见一个丰神飘逸的少年向他招手。 来自辞典例句
15 malicious e8UzX     
adj.有恶意的，心怀恶意的
参考例句：
  • You ought to kick back at such malicious slander. 你应当反击这种恶毒的污蔑。
  • Their talk was slightly malicious.他们的谈话有点儿心怀不轨。
16 killer rpLziK     
n.杀人者，杀人犯，杀手，屠杀者
参考例句：
  • Heart attacks have become Britain's No.1 killer disease.心脏病已成为英国的头号致命疾病。
  • The bulk of the evidence points to him as her killer.大量证据证明是他杀死她的。
17 sane 9YZxB     
adj.心智健全的，神志清醒的，明智的，稳健的
参考例句：
  • He was sane at the time of the murder.在凶杀案发生时他的神志是清醒的。
  • He is a very sane person.他是一个很有头脑的人。
18 scrupulous 6sayH     
adj.审慎的，小心翼翼的，完全的，纯粹的
参考例句：
  • She is scrupulous to a degree.她非常谨慎。
  • Poets are not so scrupulous as you are.诗人并不像你那样顾虑多。
19 spoke XryyC     
n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说
参考例句：
  • They sourced the spoke nuts from our company.他们的轮辐螺帽是从我们公司获得的。
  • The spokes of a wheel are the bars that connect the outer ring to the centre.辐条是轮子上连接外圈与中心的条棒。
20 imploringly imploringly     
adv. 恳求地, 哀求地
参考例句：
  • He moved his lips and looked at her imploringly. 他嘴唇动着，哀求地看着她。
  • He broke in imploringly. 他用恳求的口吻插了话。

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