Miss Marple – Miss Marple and Mystery: The Complete Short Stories. Агата Кристи

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СКАЧАТЬ jar,’ he managed to ejaculate at last. ‘THE BLUE JAR! What’s become of that?’

      Jack stared at him in non-comprehension, but submerged in the torrent of words that followed he began to understand.

      It came with a rush: ‘Ming – unique – gem of my collection – worth ten thousand pounds at least – offer from Hoggenheimer, the American millionaire – only one of its kind in the world – Confound it, sir, what have you done with my BLUE JAR?’

      Jack rushed from the room. He must find Lavington. The young lady at the office eyed him coldly.

      ‘Dr Lavington left late last night – by motor. He left a note for you.’ Jack tore it open. It was short and to the point.

      MY DEAR YOUNG FRIEND,

      Is the day of the supernatural over? Not quite – especially when tricked out in new scientific language. Kindest regards from Felise, invalid father, and myself. We have twelve hours start, which ought to be ample. Yours ever,

      AMBROSE LAVINGTON, Doctor of the Soul.

       6 Jane in Search of a Job

      ‘Jane in Search of a Job’ was first published in Grand Magazine, August 1924.

      Jane Cleveland rustled the pages of the Daily Leader and sighed. A deep sigh that came from the innermost recesses of her being. She looked with distaste at the marble-topped table, the poached egg on toast which reposed on it, and the small pot of tea. Not because she was not hungry. That was far from being the case. Jane was extremely hungry. At that moment she felt like consuming a pound and a half of well-cooked beefsteak, with chip potatoes, and possibly French beans. The whole washed down with some more exciting vintage than tea.

      But young women whose exchequers are in a parlous condition cannot be choosers. Jane was lucky to be able to order a poached egg and a pot of tea. It seemed unlikely that she would be able to do so tomorrow. That is unless –

      She turned once more to the advertisement columns of the Daily Leader. To put it plainly, Jane was out of a job, and the position was becoming acute. Already the genteel lady who presided over the shabby boarding-house was looking askance at this particular young woman.

      ‘And yet,’ said Jane to herself, throwing up her chin indignantly, which was a habit of hers, ‘and yet I’m intelligent and good-looking and well educated. What more does anyone want?’

      According to the Daily Leader, they seemed to want shorthand typists of vast experience, managers for business houses with a little capital to invest, ladies to share in the profits of poultry farming (here again a little capital was required), and innumerable cooks, housemaids and parlourmaids – particularly parlourmaids.

      ‘I wouldn’t mind being a parlourmaid,’ said Jane to herself. ‘But there again, no one would take me without experience. I could go somewhere, I dare say, as a Willing Young Girl – but they don’t pay willing young girls anything to speak of.’

      She sighed again, propped the paper up in front of her, and attacked the poached egg with all the vigour of healthy youth.

      When the last mouthful had been despatched, she turned the paper, and studied the Agony and Personal column whilst she drank her tea. The Agony column was always the last hope.

      Had she but possessed a couple of thousand pounds, the thing would have been easy enough. There were at least seven unique opportunities – all yielding not less than three thousand a year. Jane’s lip curled a little.

      ‘If I had two thousand pounds,’ she murmured, ‘it wouldn’t be easy to separate me from it.’

      She cast her eyes rapidly down to the bottom of the column and ascended with the ease born of long practice.

      There was the lady who gave such wonderful prices for cast-off clothing. ‘Ladies’ wardrobes inspected at their own dwellings.’ There were gentlemen who bought anything – but principally teeth. There were ladies of title going abroad who would dispose of their furs at a ridiculous figure. There was the distressed clergyman and the hard-working widow, and the disabled officer, all needing sums varying from fifty pounds to two thousand. And then suddenly Jane came to an abrupt halt. She put down her teacup and read the advertisement through again.

      ‘There’s a catch in it, of course,’ she murmured. ‘There always is a catch in these sort of things. I shall have to be careful. But still –’

      The advertisement which so intrigued Jane Cleveland ran as follows:

      If a young lady of twenty-five to thirty years of age, eyes dark blue, very fair hair, black lashes and brows, straight nose, slim figure, height five feet seven inches, good mimic and able to speak French, will call at 7 Endersleigh Street, between 5 and 6 p.m., she will hear of something to her advantage.

      ‘Guileless Gwendolen, or why girls go wrong,’ murmured Jane. ‘I shall certainly have to be careful. But there are too many specifications, really, for that sort of thing. I wonder now … Let us overhaul the catalogue.’

      She proceeded to do so.

      ‘Twenty-five to thirty – I’m twenty-six. Eyes dark blue, that’s right. Hair very fair – black lashes and brows – all OK. Straight nose? Ye-es – straight enough, anyway. It doesn’t hook or turn up. And I’ve got a slim figure – slim even for nowadays. I’m only five feet six inches – but I could wear high heels. I am a good mimic – nothing wonderful, but I can copy people’s voices, and I speak French like an angel or a Frenchwoman. In fact, I’m absolutely the goods. They ought to tumble over themselves with delight when I turn up. Jane Cleveland, go in and win.’

      Resolutely Jane tore out the advertisement and placed it in her handbag. Then she demanded her bill, with a new briskness in her voice.

      At ten minutes to five Jane was reconnoitring in the neighbourhood of Endersleigh Street. Endersleigh Street itself is a small street sandwiched between two larger streets in the neighbourhood of Oxford Circus. It is drab, but respectable.

      No. 7 seemed in no way different from the neighbouring houses. It was composed like they were of offices. But looking up at it, it dawned upon Jane for the first time that she was not the only blue-eyed, fair-haired, straight-nosed, slim-figured girl of between twenty-five and thirty years of age. London was evidently full of such girls, and forty or fifty of them at least were grouped outside No. 7 Endersleigh Street.

      ‘Competition,’ said Jane. ‘I’d better join the queue quickly.’

      She did so, just as three more girls turned the corner of the street. Others followed them. Jane amused herself by taking stock of her immediate neighbours. In each case she managed to find something wrong – fair eyelashes instead of dark, eyes more grey than blue, fair hair that owed its fairness to art and not to Nature, interesting variations in noses, and figures that only an all-embracing charity could have described as slim. Jane’s spirits rose.

      ‘I believe I’ve got as good an all-round chance as anyone,’ she murmured to herself. ‘I wonder what it’s all about? A beauty chorus, I hope.’

      The queue was moving slowly but steadily forward. Presently a second stream of girls began, issuing from inside СКАЧАТЬ