There's no reason -"
"Aunt Jane!"
Miss Marple sighed and then smiled brightly.
"It's nothing, dear," she said.
"Did you think you knew who did the murder?" asked Bunch.
"Who was it?"
"I don't know at all," said Miss Marple.
"I got an idea for a moment - but it's gone.
I wish I did know.
Time's so short.
So terribly short."
"What do you mean short?"
"That old lady up in Scotland may die any moment."
Bunch said, staring:
"Then you really do believe in Pip and Emma.
You think it was them - and that they'll try again?"
"Of course they'll try again," said Miss Marple, almost absentmindedly.
"If they tried once, they'll try again.
If you've made up your mind to murder someone, you don't stop because the first time it didn't come off.
Especially if you're fairly sure you're not suspected."
"But if it's Pip and Emma," said Bunch, "there are only two people it could be. It must be Patrick and Julia.
They're brother and sister and they're the only ones who are the right age."
"My dear, it isn't nearly as simple as that.
There are all sort of ramifications and combinations.
There's Pip's wife if he's married, or Emma's husband.
There's their mother - she's an interested party even if she doesn't inherit direct.
If Letty Blacklog hasn't seen her for thirty years, she'd probably not recognise her now.
One elderly woman is very like another.
You remember Mrs. Wotherspoon drew her own and Mrs. Bartlett's Old Age Pension although Mrs. Bartlett had been dead for years.
Anyway, Miss Blacklog's shortsighted.
Haven't you noticed how she peers at people?
And then there's the father.
Apparently he was a real bad lot."
"Yes, but he's a foreigner."
"By birth.
But there's no reason to believe he speaks broken English and gesticulates with his hands.
I dare say he could play the part of - of an Anglo-Indian Colonel as well as anybody else."
"Is that what you think?"
"No, I don't. I don't indeed, dear.
I just think that there's a great deal of money at stake, a great deal of money.
And I'm afraid I know only too well the really terrible things that people will do to lay their hands on a lot of money."
"I suppose they will," said Bunch.
"It doesn't really do them any good, does it?
Not in the end?"
"No - but they don't usually know that."
"I can understand it."
Bunch smiled suddenly, her sweet rather crooked smile.
"One feels it would be different for oneself... Even I feel that." She considered:
"You pretend to yourself that you'd do a lot of good with all that money. Schemes... Homes for Unwanted Children... Tired Mothers... A lovely rest abroad somewhere for elderly women who have worked too hard..."
Her face grew sombre. Her eyes were suddenly dark and tragic.