скачать книгу бесплатно
‘Do you mean—but, my dear fellow, that’s all a wash-out. The old lady is dead.’
‘Exactly.’
The tone of that one word made me stare at him harder than ever. It was evident that he had some bee in his bonnet over this incoherent letter.
‘But if she’s dead, Poirot,’ I said gently, ‘what’s the use? She can’t tell you anything now. Whatever the trouble was, it’s over and finished with.’
‘How lightly and easily you put the matter aside! Let me tell you that no matter is finished with until Hercule Poirot ceases to concern himself with it!’
I should have known from experience that to argue with Poirot is quite useless. Unwarily I proceeded.
‘But since she is dead—’
‘Exactly, Hastings. Exactly—exactly—exactly… You keep repeating the significant point with a magnificently obtuse disregard of its significance. Do you not see the importance of the point? Miss Arundell is dead.’
‘But my dear Poirot, her death was perfectly natural and ordinary! There wasn’t anything odd or unexplained about it. We have old Gabler’s word for that.’
‘We have his word that Littlegreen House is a bargain at £2,850. Do you accept that as gospel also?’
‘No, indeed. It struck me that Gabler was all out to get the place sold—it probably needs modernizing from top to toe. I’d swear he—or rather his client—will be willing to accept a very much lower figure than that. These large Georgian houses fronting right on the street must be the devil to get rid of.’
‘Eh bien, then,’ said Poirot. ‘Do not say, “But Gabler says so!” as though he were an inspired prophet who could not lie.’
I was about to protest further, but at this minute we passed the threshold of the George and with an emphatic ‘Chut!’ Poirot put a damper on further conversation.
We were directed to the coffee-room, a room of fine proportions, tightly-shut windows and an odour of stale food. An elderly waiter attended to us, a slow, heavy-breathing man. We appeared to be the only lunchers. We had some excellent mutton, large slabs of watery cabbage and some dispirited potatoes. Some rather tasteless stewed fruit and custard followed. After gorgonzola and biscuits the waiter brought us two cups of a doubtful fluid called coffee.
At this point Poirot produced his orders to view and invited the waiter’s aid.
‘Yes, sir. I know where most of these are. Hemel Down is three miles away—on the Much Benham road—quite a little place. Naylor’s Farm is about a mile away. There’s a kind of lane goes off to it not long after the King’s Head. Bisset Grange? No, I’ve never heard of that. Littlegreen House is just close by, not more than a few minutes’ walk.’
‘Ah, I think I have already seen it from the outside. That is the most possible one, I think. It is in good repair—yes?’
‘Oh, yes, sir. It’s in good condition—roof and drains and all that. Old-fashioned, of course. It’s never been modernized in any way. The gardens are a picture. Very fond of her garden Miss Arundell was.’
‘It belongs, I see, to a Miss Lawson.’
‘That’s right, sir. Miss Lawson, she was Miss Arundell’s companion and when the old lady died everything was left to her—house and all.’
‘Indeed? I suppose she had no relations to whom to leave it?’
‘Well, it was not quite like that, sir. She had nieces and nephews living. But, of course, Miss Lawson was with her all the time. And, of course, she was an old lady and—well—that’s how it was.’
‘In any case I suppose there was just the house and not much money?’
I have often had occasion to notice how, where a direct question would fail to elicit a response, a false assumption brings instant information in the form of a contradiction.
‘Very far from that, sir. Very far indeed. Everyone was surprised at the amount the old lady left. The will was in the paper and the amount and everything. It seems she hadn’t lived up to her income for many a long year. Something like three or four hundred thousand pounds she left.’
‘You astonish me,’ cried Poirot. ‘It is like a fairy tale—eh? The poor companion suddenly becomes unbelievably wealthy. Is she still young, this Miss Lawson? Can she enjoy her newfound wealth?’
‘Oh, no, sir, she’s a middle-aged person, sir.’
His enunciation of the word person was quite an artistic performance. It was clear that Miss Lawson, ex-companion, had cut no kind of a figure in Market Basing.
‘It must have been disappointing for the nephews and nieces,’ mused Poirot.
‘Yes, sir, I believe it came as somewhat of a shock to them. Very unexpected. There’s been feeling over it here in Market Basing. There are those who hold it isn’t right to leave things away from your own flesh and blood. But, of course, there’s others as hold that everyone’s got a right to do as they like with their own. There’s something to be said for both points of view, of course.’
‘Miss Arundell had lived for many years here, had she not?’
‘Yes, sir. She and her sisters and old General Arundell, their father, before them. Not that I remember him, naturally, but I believe he was quite a character. Was in the Indian Mutiny.’
‘There were several daughters?’
‘Three of them that I remember, and I believe there was one that married. Yes, Miss Matilda, Miss Agnes, and Miss Emily. Miss Matilda, she died first, and then Miss Agnes, and finally Miss Emily.’
‘That was quite recently?’
‘Beginning of May—or it may have been the end of April.’
‘Had she been ill some time?’
‘On and off—on and off. She was on the sickly side. Nearly went off a year ago with that there jaundice. Yellow as an orange she was for some time after. Yes, she’d had poor health for the last five years of her life.’
‘I suppose you have some good doctors down here?’
‘Well, there’s Dr Grainger. Been here close on forty years, he has, and folks mostly go to him. He’s a bit crotchety and he has his fancies but he’s a good doctor, none better. He’s got a young partner, Dr Donaldson. He’s more the new-fangled kind. Some folk prefer him. Then, of course, there’s Dr Harding, but he doesn’t do much.’
‘Dr Grainger was Miss Arundell’s doctor, I suppose?’
‘Oh, yes. He’s pulled her through many a bad turn. He’s the kind that fair bullies you into living whether you want to or not.’
Poirot nodded.
‘One should learn a little about a place before one comes to settle in it,’ he remarked. ‘A good doctor is one of the most important people.’
‘That’s very true, sir.’
Poirot then asked for his bill to which he added a substantial tip.
‘Thank you, sir. Thank you very much, sir. I’m sure I hope you’ll settle here, sir.’
‘I hope so, too,’ said Poirot mendaciously.
We set forth from the George.
‘Satisfied yet, Poirot?’ I asked as we emerged into the street.
‘Not in the least, my friend.’
He turned in an unexpected direction.
‘Where are you off to now, Poirot?’
‘The church, my friend. It may be interesting. Some brasses—an old monument.’
I shook my head doubtfully.
Poirot’s scrutiny of the interior of the church was brief. Though an attractive specimen of what the guidebook calls Early Perp., it had been so conscientiously restored in Victorian vandal days that little of interest remained.
Poirot next wandered seemingly aimlessly about the churchyard reading some of the epitaphs, commenting on the number of deaths in certain families, occasionally exclaiming over the quaintness of a name.
I was not surprised, however, when he finally halted before what I was pretty sure had been his objective from the beginning.
An imposing marble slab bore a partly-effaced inscription:
SACRED
TO THE MEMORY OF
JOHN LAVERTON ARUNDELL
GENERAL 24TH SIKHS
WHO FELL ASLEEP IN CHRIST MAY 19TH 1888
AGED 69
‘FIGHT THE GOOD FIGHT WITH ALL THY MIGHT’
ALSO OF
MATILDA ANN ARUNDELL
DIED MARCH 10TH 1912
‘I WILL ARISE AND GO TO MY FATHER’
ALSO OF
AGNES GEORGINA MARY ARUNDELL
DIED NOVEMBER 20TH 1921
‘ASK AND YE SHALL RECEIVE’
Then came a brand new piece of lettering, evidently just done:
ALSO OF
EMILY HARRIET LAVERTON ARUNDELL
DIED MAY 1ST 1936
‘THY WILL BE DONE’
Poirot stood looking for some time.
He murmured softly:
‘May 1st… May 1st… And today, June 28th, I receive her letter. You see, do you not, Hastings, that that fact has got to be explained?’
I saw that it had.
That is to say, I saw that Poirot was determined that it should be explained.
CHAPTER 8 (#ulink_e82b0e95-93e9-5791-9d36-3c6b02cbdd21)
Interior of Littlegreen House (#ulink_e82b0e95-93e9-5791-9d36-3c6b02cbdd21)
On leaving the churchyard, Poirot led the way briskly in the direction of Littlegreen House. I gathered that his role was still that of the prospective purchaser. Carefully holding the various orders to view in his hand, with the Littlegreen House one uppermost, he pushed open the gate and walked up the path to the front door.
On this occasion our friend the terrier was not to be seen, but the sound of barking could be heard inside the house, though at some distance—I guessed in the kitchen quarters.
Presently we heard footsteps crossing the hall and the door was opened by a pleasant-faced woman of between fifty and sixty, clearly the old-fashioned type of servant seldom seen nowadays.
Poirot presented his credentials.
‘Yes, sir, the house-agent telephoned. Will you step this way, sir?’
The shutters which I had noticed were closed on our first visit to spy out the land, were now all thrown open in preparation for our visit. Everything, I observed, was spotlessly clean and well kept. Clearly our guide was a thoroughly conscientious woman.
‘This is the morning-room, sir.’
I glanced round approvingly. A pleasant room with its long windows giving on the street. It was furnished with good, solid, old-fashioned furniture, mostly Victorian, but there was a Chippendale bookcase and a set of attractive Hepplewhite chairs.
Poirot and I behaved in the customary fashion of people being shown over houses. We stood stock still, looking a little ill at ease, murmuring remarks such as ‘very nice.’ ‘A very pleasant room.’ ‘The morning-room, you say?’
The maid conducted us across the hall and into the corresponding room on the other side. This was much larger.
‘The dining-room, sir.’
This room was definitely Victorian. A heavy mahogany dining-table, a massive sideboard of almost purplish mahogany with great clusters of carved fruit, solid leather-covered dining-room chairs. On the wall hung what were obviously family portraits.
The terrier had continued to bark in some sequestered spot. Now the sound suddenly increased in volume. With a crescendo of barking he could be heard galloping across the hall.
‘Who’s come into the house? I’ll tear him limb from limb,’ was clearly the ‘burden of his song’.
