Geraldine McEwan credited as playing...
Miss Marple
- Miss Jane Marple: What is this, Mary?
- Mary Hill: Soup.
- Miss Jane Marple: Does it have a name?
- Mary Hill: Bits-and-bobs-and-odds-and-sods-and-the-meat-ration's-been-cut-again soup.
- DI Slack: [to a constable as Miss Marple is some distance walking away] I don't know whether to buy her a box of chocs or kick away her stick.
- Miss Jane Marple: [still walking away] I prefer the chocolates.
- DI Slack: Look, it's easy to imagine all kinds of things after the event, but the simple fact is...
- Miss Jane Marple: Murder is never simple. We would be foolish, stupid, to ignore any possibility.
- DI Slack: 'We?'
- Miss Jane Marple: [smiling] Did I say that? Hm. So sorry.
- Miss Jane Marple: [realizing who committed the murder and how it was done, smiling] How clever!
- [then frowning]
- Miss Jane Marple: How wicked!
- Miss Jane Marple: We're all very ordinary in St. Mary Mead, but ordinary people can sometimes do the most astonishing things.
- Miss Jane Marple: You don't like Mr. Clement, do you?
- DI Slack: Nothing personal. Vicars in general remind me of marriage.
- Miss Jane Marple: [understanding] Ah, of course.
- DI Slack: Of course what?
- Miss Jane Marple: Miss Hartnell's cousin's maid is walking out with a butcher's boy from Melchester who delivers to your mother-in-law. Mrs. Slack has been staying with her for a... little holiday, I gather?
- DI Slack: [frowning] A little, two-month, six-day, holiday so far.
- Miss Jane Marple: [wincing] Oh, dear.
- DI Slack: Hmmm.
- Lawrence Redding: I'll have to leave, you know, for Anne's sake.
- Miss Jane Marple: That's very brave.
- Lawrence Redding: Yes, well, I'll soon be over it.
- Miss Jane Marple: You won't, not for a long while.
- Lawrence Redding: Nothing gets past you, Miss Marple, does it?
- Miss Jane Marple: [smiling] Hardly ever, young man.
- DI Slack: The chief constable sends his regards.
- Miss Jane Marple: How lovely. I have been of some assistance to him from time to time.
- DI Slack: He said.
- Miss Jane Marple: Why does Inspector Slack think the Colonel was shot at twenty past six?
- Dr. Haydock: He'd started writing a note to the vicar saying he couldn't wait. He put the time on it.
- Miss Jane Marple: Had he?
- Dr. Haydock: And the clock stopped at just gone 6:20. He knocked it off the desk when he took the bullet.
- Miss Jane Marple: Oh, dear. I'm afraid I must put a cat amongst the Inspector's pigeons.
- DI Slack: [Miss Marple reveals that the note Colonel Protheroe left behind may have been altered] Thank you, Miss Marple. That means that he could have been shot after 6:20, and the murderer just put that onto the note, and then altered the clock...
- Miss Jane Marple: To the time when Mrs. Protheroe came here in answer to her anonymous telephone call, and Mr. Redding's gun is the murder weapon.
- [snaps her fingers]
- Miss Jane Marple: I think they were being, um... set up as pasties.
- DI Slack: [correcting] "Patsies," it is.
- Miss Jane Marple: Thank you, Inspector.
- Lawrence Redding: And how would you do it, Miss Marple?
- Miss Jane Marple: I never speak lightly of murder, Mr. Redding. I hate to tempt fate.
- Miss Hartnell: Where's Lettice this morning?
- Miss Jane Marple: Mr. Redding's painting her.
- Miss Hartnell: On a Sunday? You don't think...?
- Miss Jane Marple: Oh, he does have a way with him, but she's just a girl. I'd plumb for an older candidate if there is someone.
- DI Slack: [believing Lawrence Redding killed Colonel Protheroe] I've got a confession. And if the bullet that killed the Colonel doesn't match Redding's gun, I'll eat my handcuffs. Sometimes, the simple explanation is the right one.
- Miss Jane Marple: Last night's wasn't.
- Miss Jane Marple: [referring to Colonel Protheroe] If he was shot at a quarter to seven, why would he have stopped in the middle of a sentence at twenty past six?
- Miss Jane Marple: You are quite sure?
- Mrs. Price-Ridley: I always put a pound note into the box on the anniversary of poor Bruce's passing.
- Miss Jane Marple: I know, but perhaps this time...
- Colonel Protheroe: Oh, come on, Miss Marple! If Marjorie said she put a pound in, then she did! So where's it gone? Well, I thought you'd be straining at the leash to sniff out the culprit. You do have a reputation to maintain.
- Miss Jane Marple: My reputation, Colonel Protheroe, if I have one, and how very kind of you to suggest I do, is neither here nor there. I merely wonder if it's a little early to talk of culprits.
- Colonel Protheroe: Nonsense!
- Anne Protheroe: [touches his shoulder in an effort to calm him] Lucius...
- Colonel Protheroe: Anne, don't paw me! Now, look, I'm a churchwarden, and I was in intelligence. I know when something smells fishy! This could be just the tip of the iceberg! Eh... Vicar!
- [marches off to confront the vicar]
- [In Miss Marple's home, Mrs. Protheroe is attempting unsuccessfully to convince Inspector Slack that she killed her husband, when the phone rings, and Slack answers it]
- DI Slack: St. Mary Mead, two - yes, speaking. Is that definite? Right.
- [hangs up]
- DI Slack: I don't like my time wasted, Mrs. Protheroe. The bullet that killed your husband was fired from Mr. Redding's gun.
- Anne Protheroe: But... he did it for me!
- DI Slack: He didn't do it for anyone! I released him half an hour ago. Just happened to be carrying his gun, which I don't believe. And more important,
- [to Miss Marple]
- DI Slack: and something you didn't think of: if the Colonel was shot at a quarter to seven, why did he stop the note like that at 6:20?
- Miss Jane Marple: [feigning surprise] Oh, yes.