Concerning+a+Door

A Murder is Announced Chapter 9 Summary

 * Detective Craddock visits Miss Blacklock again and apologizes for "bother[ing] you again" (81).
 * Detective Craddock reveals that Rudi Scherz worked as "an orderly", and "a waiter", as well as getting a job in "a department store". He was also a thief, and "many of the patients missed small pieces of jewelry" (81).
 * In addition, about the department store, Craddock says "the shoplifting wasn't entirely due to the customers", referring to Rudi.
 * Craddock explains that Rudi came to England because "The Swiss police had begun to make his own country rather too hot" (81).
 * Letitia assures Craddock that there is nothing of significant value in her house, and emphatically states that "I've got no enemies" when asked why someone would want to murder her (83).
 * Craddock asks whether Miss Bunner may have faked being afraid of the ad as a "clever move on her part" (83).
 * Letitia becomes annoyed by Craddock and claims he has "an anti-foreigner complex" (83).
 * Craddock "asked Mitzi questions that he had asked her before and recieved the same answers" (84).
 * Mitzi claims that Mrs. Haynes is careful not to lock the door and that "that young man" "does not work alone", referring, probably to Rudi, and implying that Mrs. Haynes was a collaborator. (84).
 * Mitzi complains that the police will not listen because she is a "poor refugee girl" (84).
 * Although Craddock replies that "We note everything we are told", he is skeptical of Mitzi's statements, unsure if whether they are a "statement of spite" and guessing that she is "probably making it up" (84-85).
 * Mitzi says that while "out to get nettles", she overheads Philippa showing him where to hide and stay (85).
 * Craddock questions the validity of Mitzi's statements by asking whether there would "be any nice young green nettles in October" and wondering why "[Mitzi] didn't tell" him about this the "other day" (85).
 * Mitzi does not react wildly Craddock presents the situation that "someone was to say that you had been talking to Rudi Scherz" (86). Instead, she tells him to leave the kitchen so she can cook without distractions.
 * Craddock decides that there is "some substratum of truth" to Mitzi's story, even though she is "a liar" (86).
 * Craddock tries the wrong door. After being corrected by Miss Bunner, he notices "almost mechanically, a thin line horizontally across the panels of the door he had been trying to open" (87).
 * Dora Bunner, who is "delighted in the giving on information", informs Craddock that the door was moved "ten days or a fortnight ago" (87).
 * The table was moved because "Phillipa did a big vase" which "caught" "hair" as people "went past" (87).
 * Dora says that "it's a real door", but the door "was fastened up", "locked, and bolted, too" (87).
 * Craddock opens the door successfully with the key, noting that the bolt slid back "too easily" (87).
 * Craddock uses "X" to denote the perpetrator of the crime, and thinks to himself that "X was in the drawing-room that night" (88).