III

He found Bunch and her husband waiting for him, their faces anxious anddrawn.

“She hasn’t come back,” said Bunch.

“Did she say she was coming back here when she left Boulders?” askedJulian.

“She didn’t actually say so,” said Craddock slowly, throwing his mindback to the last time he had seen Jane Marple.

He remembered the grimness of her lips and the severe frosty light inthose usually gentle blue eyes.

Grimness, an inexorable determination … to do what? To go where?

“She was talking to Sergeant Fletcher when I last saw her,” he said. “Justby the gate. And then she went through it and out. I took it she was goingstraight home to the Vicarage. I would have sent her in the car—but therewas so much to attend to, and she slipped away very quietly. Fletcher mayknow something! Where’s Fletcher?”

But Sergeant Fletcher, it seemed, as Craddock learned when he rang upBoulders, was neither to be found there nor had he left any messagewhere he had gone. There was some idea that he had returned toMilchester for some reason.

The Inspector rang up headquarters in Milchester, but no news ofFletcher was to be found there.

Then Craddock turned to Bunch as he remembered what she had toldhim over the telephone.

“Where’s that paper? You said she’d been writing something on a bit ofpaper.”

Bunch brought it to him. He spread it out on the table and looked downon it. Bunch leant over his shoulder and spelled it out as he read. The writ-ing was shaky and not easy to read:

Lamp.

Then came the word “Violets.”

Then after a space:

Where is bottle of aspirin?

The next item in this curious list was more difficult to make out. “Deli-cious death,” Bunch read. “That’s Mitzi’s cake.”

“Making enquiries,” read Craddock.

“Inquiries? What about, I wonder? What’s this? Severe affliction bravelyborne … What on earth—!”

“Iodine,” read the Inspector. “Pearls. Ah, pearls.”

“And then Lotty—no, Letty. Her e’s look like o’s. And then Berne. Andwhat’s this? Old Age Pension. …”

They looked at each other in bewilderment.

Craddock recapitulated swiftly:

“Lamp. Violets. Where is bottle of aspirin? Delicious Death. Making en-quiries. Severe affliction bravely borne. Iodine. Pearls. Letty. Berne. OldAge Pension.”

Bunch asked: “Does it mean anything? Anything at all? I can’t see anyconnection.”

Craddock said slowly: “I’ve just a glimmer—but I don’t see. It’s odd thatshe should have put down that about pearls.”

“What about pearls? What does it mean?”

“Does Miss Blacklock always wear that three-tier choker of pearls?”

“Yes, she does. We laugh about it sometimes. They’re so dreadfully false-looking, aren’t they? But I suppose she thinks it’s fashionable.”

“There might be another reason,” said Craddock slowly.

“You don’t mean that they’re real. Oh! they couldn’t be!”

“How often have you had an opportunity of seeing real pearls of thatsize, Mrs. Harmon?”

“But they’re so glassy.”

Craddock shrugged his shoulders.

“Anyway, they don’t matter now. It’s Miss Marple that matters. We’vegot to find her.”

They’d got to find her before it was too late—but perhaps it was alreadytoo late? Those pencilled words showed that she was on the track … Butthat was dangerous — horribly dangerous. And where the hell wasFletcher?

Craddock strode out of the Vicarage to where he’d left his car. Search—that was all he could do—search.

A voice spoke to him out of the dripping laurels.

“Sir!” said Sergeant Fletcher urgently. “Sir. …”