скачать книгу бесплатно
‘Look here, Poirot,’ I cried, ‘this really is a bit thick. You’re pulling my leg.’
He looked at me.
‘You lack the brains and the imagination of Mr Simpson, Hastings. See here: On Wednesday evening, Simpson decoys away the cook. A printed card and a printed sheet of notepaper are simple matters to obtain, and he is willing to pay £150 and a year’s house rent to assure the success of his plan. Miss Dunn does not recognize him—the beard and the hat and the slight colonial accent completely deceive her. That is the end of Wednesday—except for the trifling fact that Simpson has helped himself to fifty thousand pounds’ worth of negotiable securities.’
‘Simpson—but it was Davis—’
‘If you will kindly permit me to continue, Hastings! Simpson knows that the theft will be discovered on Thursday afternoon. He does not go to the bank on Thursday, but he lies in wait for Davis when he comes out to lunch. Perhaps he admits the theft and tells Davis he will return the securities to him—anyhow he succeeds in getting Davis to come to Clapham with him. It is the maid’s day out, and Mrs Todd was at the sales, so there is no one in the house. When the theft is discovered and Davis is missing, the implication will be overwhelming. Davis is the thief! Mr Simpson will be perfectly safe, and can return to work on the morrow like the honest clerk they think him.’
‘And Davis?’
Poirot made an expressive gesture, and slowly shook his head.
‘It seems too cold-blooded to be believed, and yet what other explanation can there be, mon ami. The one difficulty for a murderer is the disposal of the body—and Simpson had planned that out beforehand. I was struck at once by the fact that although Eliza Dunn obviously meant to return that night when she went out (witness her remark about the stewed peaches) yet her trunk was all ready packed when they came for it. It was Simpson who sent word to Carter Paterson to call on Friday and it was Simpson who corded up the box on Thursday afternoon. What suspicion could possibly arise? A maid leaves and sends for her box, it is labelled and addressed ready in her name, probably to a railway station within easy reach of London. On Saturday afternoon, Simpson, in his Australian disguise, claims it, he affixes a new label and address and redespatches it somewhere else, again “to be left till called for”. When the authorities get suspicious, for excellent reasons, and open it, all that can be elicited will be that a bearded colonial despatched it from some junction near London. There will be nothing to connect it with 88 Prince Albert Road. Ah! Here we are.’
Poirot’s prognostications had been correct. Simpson had left days previously. But he was not to escape the consequences of his crime. By the aid of wireless, he was discovered on the Olympia, en route to America.
A tin trunk, addressed to Mr Henry Wintergreen, attracted the attention of railway officials at Glasgow. It was opened and found to contain the body of the unfortunate Davis.
Mrs Todd’s cheque for a guinea was never cashed. Instead Poirot had it framed and hung on the all of our sitting-room.
‘It is to me a little reminder, Hastings. Never to despise the trivial—the undignified. A disappearing domestic at one end—a cold-blooded murder at the other. To me, one of the most interesting of my cases.’
The Cornish Mystery (#ulink_8151a9b6-e5b5-5ed2-8925-e493f6179eaa)
I
‘Mrs Pengelley,’ announced our landlady, and withdrew discreetly.
Many unlikely people came to consult Poirot, but to my mind, the woman who stood nervously just inside the door, fingering her feather neck-piece, was the most unlikely of all. She was so extraordinarily commonplace—a thin, faded woman of about fifty, dressed in a braided coat and skirt, some gold jewellery at her neck, and with her grey hair surmounted by a singularly unbecoming hat. In a country town you pass a hundred Mrs Pengelleys in the street every day.
Poirot came forward and greeted her pleasantly, perceiving her obvious embarrassment.
‘Madame! Take a chair, I beg of you. My colleague, Captain Hastings.’
The lady sat down, murmuring uncertainly: ‘You are M. Poirot, the detective?’
‘At your service, madame.’
But our guest was still tongue-tied. She sighed, twisted her fingers, and grew steadily redder and redder.
‘There is something I can do for you, eh, madame?’
‘Well, I thought—that is—you see—’
‘Proceed, madame, I beg of you—proceed.’
Mrs Pengelley, thus encouraged, took a grip on herself.
‘It’s this way, M. Poirot—I don’t want to have anything to do with the police. No, I wouldn’t go to the police for anything! But all the same, I’m sorely troubled about something. And yet I don’t know if I ought—’ She stopped abruptly.
‘Me, I have nothing to do with the police. My investigations are strictly private.’
Mrs Pengelley caught at the word.
‘Private—that’s what I want. I don’t want any talk or fuss, or things in the papers. Wicked it is, the way they write things, until the family could never hold up their heads again. And it isn’t as though I was even sure—it’s just a dreadful idea that’s come to me, and put it out of my head I can’t.’ She paused for breath. ‘And all the time I may be wickedly wronging poor Edward. It’s a terrible thought for any wife to have. But you do read of such dreadful things nowadays.’
‘Permit me—it is of your husband you speak?’
‘Yes.’
‘And you suspect him of—what?’
‘I don’t like even to say it, M. Poirot. But you do read of such things happening—and the poor souls suspecting nothing.’
I was beginning to despair of the lady’s ever coming to the point, but Poirot’s patience was equal to the demand made upon it.
‘Speak without fear, madame. Think what joy will be yours if we are able to prove your suspicions unfounded.’
‘That’s true—anything’s better than this wearing uncertainty. Oh, M. Poirot, I’m dreadfully afraid I’m being poisoned.’
‘What makes you think so?’
Mrs Pengelley, her reticence leaving her, plunged into a full recital more suited to the ears of her medical attendant.
‘Pain and sickness after food, eh?’ said Poirot thoughtfully. ‘You have a doctor attending you, madame? What does he say?’
‘He says it’s acute gastritis, M. Poirot. But I can see that he’s puzzled and uneasy, and he’s always altering the medicine, but nothing does any good.’
‘You have spoken of your—fears, to him?’
‘No, indeed, M. Poirot. It might get about in the town. And perhaps it is gastritis. All the same, it’s very odd that whenever Edward is away for the week-end, I’m quite all right again. Even Freda notices that—my niece, M. Poirot. And then there’s that bottle of weed-killer, never used, the gardener says, and yet it’s half-empty.’
She looked appealingly at Poirot. He smiled reassuringly at her, and reached for a pencil and notebook.
‘Let us be businesslike, madame. Now, then, you and your husband reside—where?’
‘Polgarwith, a small market town in Cornwall.’
‘You have lived there long?’
‘Fourteen years.’
‘And your household consists of you and your husband. Any children?’
‘No.’
‘But a niece, I think you said?’
‘Yes, Freda Stanton, the child of my husband’s only sister. She has lived with us for the last eight years—that is, until a week ago.’
‘Oh, and what happened a week ago?’
‘Things hadn’t been very pleasant for some time; I don’t know what had come over Freda. She was so rude and impertinent, and her temper something shocking, and in the end she flared up one day, and out she walked and took rooms of her own in the town. I’ve not seen her since. Better leave her to come to her senses, so Mr Radnor says.’
‘Who is Mr Radnor?’
Some of Mrs Pengelley’s initial embarrassment returned.
‘Oh, he’s—he’s just a friend. Very pleasant young fellow.’
‘Anything between him and your niece?’
‘Nothing whatever,’ said Mrs Pengelley emphatically.
Poirot shifted his ground.
‘You and your husband are, I presume, in comfortable circumstances?’
‘Yes, we’re very nicely off.’
‘The money, is it yours or your husband’s?’
‘Oh, it’s all Edward’s. I’ve nothing of my own.’
‘You see, madame, to be businesslike, we must be brutal. We must seek for a motive. Your husband, he would not poison you just pour passer le temps! Do you know of any reason why he should wish you out of the way?’
‘There’s the yellow-haired hussy who works for him,’ said Mrs Pengelley, with a flash of temper. ‘My husband’s a dentist, M. Poirot, and nothing would do but he must have a smart girl, as he said, with bobbed hair and a white overall, to make his appointments and mix his fillings for him. It’s come to my ears that there have been fine goings-on, though of course he swears it’s all right.’
‘This bottle of weed-killer, madame, who ordered it?’
‘My husband—about a year ago.’
‘Your niece, now, has she any money of her own?’
‘About fifty pounds a year, I should say. She’d be glad enough to come back and keep house for Edward if I left him.’
‘You have contemplated leaving him, then?’
‘I don’t intend to let him have it all his own way. Women aren’t the downtrodden slaves they were in the old days, M. Poirot.’
‘I congratulate you on your independent spirit, madame; but let us be practical. You return to Polgarwith today?’
‘Yes, I came up by an excursion. Six this morning the train started, and the train goes back at five this afternoon.’
‘Bien! I have nothing of great moment on hand. I can devote myself to your little affair. Tomorrow I shall be in Polgarwith. Shall we say that Hastings, here, is a distant relative of yours, the son of your second cousin? Me, I am his eccentric foreign friend. In the meantime, eat only what is prepared by your own hands, or under your eye. You have a maid whom you trust?’
‘Jessie is a very good girl, I am sure.’
‘Till tomorrow then, madame, and be of good courage.’
II
Poirot bowed the lady out, and returned thoughtfully to his chair. His absorption was not so great, however, that he failed to see two minute strands of feather scarf wrenched off by the lady’s agitated fingers. He collected them carefully and consigned them to the wastepaper basket.
‘What do you make of the case, Hastings?’
‘A nasty business, I should say.’
‘Yes, if what the lady suspects be true. But is it? Woe betide any husband who orders a bottle of weed-killer nowadays. If his wife suffers from gastritis, and is inclined to be of a hysterical temperament, the fat is in the fire.’
‘You think that is all there is to it?’
‘Ah—voilà—I do not know, Hastings. But the case interests me—it interests me enormously. For, you see, it has positively no new features. Hence the hysterical theory, and yet Mrs Pengelley did not strike me as being a hysterical woman. Yes, if I mistake not, we have here a very poignant human drama. Tell me, Hastings, what do you consider Mrs Pengelley’s feelings towards her husband to be?’
‘Loyalty struggling with fear,’ I suggested.
‘Yet, ordinarily, a woman will accuse anyone in the world—but not her husband. She will stick to her belief in him through thick and thin.’
‘The “other woman” complicates the matter.’
‘Yes, affection may turn to hate, under the stimulus of jealousy. But hate would take her to the police—not to me. She would want an outcry—a scandal. No, no, let us exercise our little grey cells. Why did she come to me? To have her suspicions proved wrong? Or—to have them proved right? Ah, we have here something I do not understand—an unknown factor. Is she a superb actress, our Mrs Pengelley? No, she was genuine, I would swear that she was genuine, and therefore I am interested. Look up the trains to Polgarwith, I pray you.’
III
The best train of the day was the one-fifty from Paddington which reached Polgarwith just after seven o’clock. The journey was uneventful, and I had to rouse myself from a pleasant nap to alight upon the platform of the bleak little station. We took our bags to the Duchy Hotel, and after a light meal, Poirot suggested our stepping round to pay an after-dinner call on my so-called cousin.
The Pengelleys’ house stood a little way back from the road with an old-fashioned cottage garden in front. The smell of stocks and mignonette came sweetly wafted on the evening breeze. It seemed impossible to associate thoughts of violence with this Old World charm. Poirot rang and knocked. As the summons was not answered, he rang again. This time, after a little pause, the door was opened by a dishevelled-looking servant. Her eyes were red, and she was sniffing violently.
‘We wish to see Mrs Pengelley,’ explained Poirot. ‘May we enter?’
The maid stared. Then, with unusual directness, she answered: ‘Haven’t you heard, then? She’s dead. Died this evening—about half an hour ago.’
We stood staring at her, stunned.
‘What did she die of?’ I asked at last.
‘There’s some as could tell.’ She gave a quick glance over her shoulder. ‘If it wasn’t that somebody ought to be in the house with the missus, I’d pack my box and go tonight. But I’ll not leave her dead with no one to watch by her. It’s not my place to say anything, and I’m not going to say anything—but everybody knows. It’s all over the town. And if Mr Radnor don’t write to the ’Ome Secretary, someone else will. The doctor may say what he likes. Didn’t I see the master with my own eyes a-lifting down of the weed-killer from the shelf this very evening? And didn’t he jump when he turned round and saw me watching of him? And the missus’ gruel there on the table, all ready to take to her? Not another bit of food passes my lips while I am in this house! Not if I dies for it.’
‘Where does the doctor live who attended your mistress?’
‘Dr Adams. Round the corner in High Street. The second house.’
Poirot turned away abruptly. He was very pale.
‘For a girl who was not going to say anything, that girl said a lot,’ I remarked dryly.
Poirot struck his clenched hand into his palm.
