‘Don’t bother, Mother. I had a cup.’

‘Of course we will have fresh tea-and some scones, Beatrice,’ she added to the parlourmaid who had appeared to take the teapot.

‘Yes, madam.’

With a slow, likeable smile Walter Fane said: ‘My mother spoils me, I’m afraid.’

Miss Marple studied him as she made a polite rejoinder.

A gentle quiet-looking person, slightly diffident and apologetic in manner-colourless. A very nondescript personality. The devoted type of young man whom women ignore and only marry because the man they love does not return their affection. Walter, who is Always There. Poor Walter, his mother’s darling…Little Walter Fane who had attacked his older brother with a poker and had tried to kill him…

Miss Marple wondered.