HICKORY DICKORY DEATH [065-di]
BY AGATHA CHRISTIE
Synopsis:
A SIMPLE CASE OF THEFT TURNS
INTO TRIPLE MURDER!
Copyright 9 1955 by Max Edgar Lucien
Mallowan and William Edund Cork
Published BY ARRANGEMENT with Dodd, Mead and
Company
ISBN: 0-671-41594-8
First Pocket Books printing September-,

20 19 18 17 16 15 14 13
POCKET and colophon are trademarks of
Simon and Sclster.
Printed in the U.S.A.
HERCULE POIROT FROWNED.
"Miss Lemon," he said.
"Yes, Mr. Poirot?"
"There are three mistakes in this letter."
His voice held incredulity. For Miss
Lemon, that hideous and efficient woman, never
made mistakes. She was never ill, never tired,
never upset, never inaccurate. For all
practical purposes, that is to say, she was not a
woman at all. She was a machine-the perfect
secretary. She knew everything, she coped with
everything. She ran Hercule Poirot's life for
him, so that it, too, functioned like a machine. Order
and method had been Hercule Poirot's watchwords
from many years ago. With George, his perfect
manservant, and Miss Lemon, his perfect
secretary, order and method ruled supreme in his
life. Now that crumpers were baked square as well
as round, he had nothing about which to complain.
And yet, this morning Miss Lemon had made
three mistakes in typing a perfectly simple
letter, and moreover, had not even noticed those
mistakes. The stars stood still in their courses!
Hercule Poirot held out the offending document.
He was not annoyed, he was merely bewildered.
This was one of the things that could not happen-but it had
happened!
Miss Lemon took the letter. She looked at
it. For the first time in his life, Poirot saw her
blush; a deep ugly unbecoming flush that dyed her
face right up to the roots of her strong grizzled
hair.
"Oh, dear," she said. "I can't think how-at
least, I can. It's because of my sister."
"Your sister?"
Another shock. Poirot had never conceived of
Miss Lemon's having a sister. Or, for that
matter, having a father, mother or even grandparents.
Miss Lemon, somehow, was so completely machine
made-a precision instrument, so to speak-that to think of
her having affections, or anxieties, or family
worries, seemed quite ludicrous. It was well known
that the whole of Miss Lemon's heart and mind was
given, when she was not on duty, to the perfection of a
new filing system which was to be patented and bear her
name.
"Your sister?" Hercule Poirot repeated,
therefore, with an incredulous note in his voice.
Miss Lemon nodded a vigorous assent.
"Yes," she said. "I don't think
I've ever mentioned her to you. Practically all her
life has been spent in Singapore. Her husband
was in the rubber business there."
Hercule Poirot nodded understandingly. It seemed
to him appropriate that Miss Lemon's sister should
have spent most of her life in Singapore. That was
what places like Singapore were for. The sisters of
women like Miss Lemon married men in business in
Singapore, so that the Miss Lemons of this world could
devote themselves with machine-like efficiency to their
employers" affairs (and of course to the invention of
filing systems in their moments of relaxation).
"I comprehend," he said. "Proceed."
Miss Lemon proceeded.
"She was left a widow four years ago. No
children.
I managed to get her fixed up in a very nice
little flat at quite a reasonable rent-was
(of course Miss Lemon would manage to do just
that almost impossible thing.)
"She is reasonably off-Sough money doesn't
go as far as it did, but her tastes aren't expensive
and she has enough to be quite comfortable if she is careful."
Miss Lemon paused and then continued:
"But the truth is, of course, she was
lonely. She had never lived in England and she'd
got no old friends or cronies and of course she had
a lot of time on her hands. Anyway, she told
me about six months ago that she was thinking of taking
up this job."
"Job? ,
"Warden, I think they call it-or Matron of a
Hostel for Students. It was owned by a woman who was
partly Greek and she wanted someone to run it for her.
Manage the catering and see that things went smoothly.
It's an old fashioned roomy house-in
Hickory Road, if you know where that is" Poirot
did not. "It used to be quite a superior
neighbourhood once, and the houses are well
built. My sister was to have very nice accommodation,
bedroom and sitting room and a tiny bath kitchenette
of her own"
Miss Lemon paused. Poirot made an
encouraging noise. So far this did not seem at all
like a tale of disaster.
"I wasn't any too sure about it myself, but I
saw the force of my sister's arguments. She's never
been one to sit with her hands crossed all day long and
she's a very practical woman and good at running
things-and of course it wasn't as though she were
thinking of putting money into it or anything like that. It was
formerly a salaried position
with a high salary, but she didn't need that, and there
was no hard physical work. She's always been fond
of young people and good with comthem, and having lived in the East
so long she understands racial differences and people's
susceptibilities. Because these students at the
Hostel were of all nationalities; mostly English,
but some of them actually are black, I believe."
"Naturally," said Hercule Poirot.
"Half the nurses in our hospitals seem
to be black nowadays," said Miss Lemon,
doubtfully, "and I understand much pleasanter and more
attentive than the English ones. But that's neither here
nor there. We talked the scheme over and finally my
sister moved in. Neither she nor I cared very much for the
proprietress, Mrs. Nicoletis, a woman
of very uncertain temper, sometimes charming and sometimes,
I'm sorry to say, quite the reverse-and both
cheese-paring and impractical. Still, naturally, if
she'd been a thoroughly competent woman, she
wouldn't have needed any assistance. My sister is not
one to let people's tantrums and vagaries worry her.
She can hold her own with anyone and she never stands
any nonsense."
Poirot nodded. He felt a vague
resemblance to Miss Lemon showing in this account of
Miss Lemon's sister coma Miss Lemon
softened as it were, by marriage and the climate of
Singapore, but a woman with the same hard core of
sense.
"So your sister took the job?" he asked.
"Yes, she moved into 26 Hickory Road about
six months ago. On the whole, she liked her work
there and found it interesting."
Hercule Poirot listened. So far the
adventures of Miss Lemon's sister had been
disappointingly tame.
"But for some time now she's been badly worried.
Very badly worried."
"Why?"
"Well, you see, Mr. Poirot, she
doesn't like the things that are going on."
"There are students there of both sexes?"
Poirot inquired delicately.
"Oh no, Mr. Poirot, I don't mean that!
One is always prepared for difficulties of that kind,
one expects them! No, you see, things have been
disappearing."
"Disappearing?"
"Yes. And such odd things . . . And all in rather
an unnatural way."
"When you say things have been disappearing, you mean
things have been stolen?"
"Yes."
"Have the police been called in?"
"No. Not yet. My sister hopes that it may not
be necessary. She is fond of these young people-of some of them,
that is-and she would very much prefer to straighten things out
by herself."
"Yes," said Poirot thoughtfully. "I can quite
see that. But that does not explain, if I may say
so, your own anxiety which I take to be a reflex
of your sister's anxiety."
"I don't like the situation, Mr. Poirot. I
don't like it at all. I cannot help feeling that
something is going on which I do not understand. No ordinary
explanation seems quite to cover the facts-and I really
cannot imagine what other explanation there can be."
Poirot nodded thoughtfully.
Miss Lemon's Heel of Achilles had always
been her imagination. She had none. On questions of
fact she was invincible. On questions of surmise, she
was lost. Not for her the state of mind of Cortes'
men upon
the peak of Darien.
"Not ordinary petty thieving.? A
kleptomaniac, perhaps?"
"I do not think so. I read up the subject,"
said the conscientious Miss Lemon, "in the
Encyclopedia Britannica and in a medical work.
But I was not convinced."
Hercule Poirot was silent for a minute and a
half.
Did he wish to embroil himself in the troubles of
Miss Lemon's sister and the passions and grievances
of a polyglot Hostel? But it was very annoying and
inconvenient to have Miss Lemon making mistakes
in typing his letters. He told himself that if he were
to embroil himself in the matter, that would be the reason.
He did not admit to himself that he had been rather bored
of late and that the very triviality of the business
attracted him.
""The parsley sinking into the butter on a hot
day," he murmured to himself.
"Parsley? Butter?" Miss Lemon looked
startled.
"A quotation from one of your classics," he said.
"You are acquainted, Do doubt, with the Adventures,
to say nothing of the Exploits, of Sherlock
Holmes."
"You mean these Baker Street societies and
all that," said Miss Lemon. "Grown men being so
silly! But there, that's men all over. Like the model
railways they go on playing with. I can't say
I've ever had time to read any of the stories. When
I do get time for reading, which isn't often, I
prefer an improving book."
Hercule Poirot bowed his head gracefully.
"How would it be, Miss Lemon, if you were
to invite your sister here for some suitable
refreshment-afternoon tea, perhaps? I might be able to be
of some slight assistance to her."
"That's very kind of you, Mr. Poirot. Really very
kind indeed. My sister is always free in the
afternoons."
"Then shall we say tomorrow, if you can arrange it?"
And in due course, the faithful George was
instructed to provide a meal of square crumpets
richly buttered, symmetrical sandwiches, and other
suitable components of a lavish English afternoon tea.
Miss LEMON'S SISTER whose name was Mrs.
Hubbard had a definite resemblance to her sister.
She was a good deal yellower of skin, she was
plumper, her hair was more frivolously
done, and she was less brisk in manner, but the eyes
that looked out of a round and amiable countenance were the same
shrewd eyes that gleamed through Miss Lemon's.
"This is very kind of you, I'm sure, Mr.
Poirot," she said. "Very kind. And such a
delicious tea, too. I'm sure I've eaten
far more than I should-well perhaps just one more
sandwich-tea? Well, just half a cup."
"First," said Poirot, "we make the repast-and
afterwards we get down to business."
He smiled at her amiably and twirled his
moustaches,
and Mrs. Hubbard said,
"You know, you're exactly like I pictured you from
Felicity's description."
After a moment's startled realization that Felicity
was the severe Miss Lemon's Christian name,
Poirot replied that he should have expected no
less, given Miss Lemon's efficiency.
"Of course," said Mrs. Hubbard absently
taking a second sandwich, "Felicity has never
cared for people. I do. That's why I'm so worried."
"Can you explain to me exactly what does
worry you?"
"Yes I can. It would be natural enough for
money to be taken-small sums here and there. And if
it were jewelry that's quite straightforward too-at least,
I don't mean straightforward, quite the opposite-but
it would fit in-with kleptomania or dishonesty. But
I'll just read you a list of the things that have been taken,
that I've put down on paper."
Mrs. Hubbard opened her bag and took out a
small notebook.
Evening shoe (one of a new pair)
Bracelet (costume jewelry)
Diamond ring (found in plate of soup)
Powder compact
Lipstick
Stethoscope
Ear-rings
Cigarette lighter
Old flannel trousers
Electric light bulbs
Box of chocolates
Silk scarf (found cut to pieces)
Rucksack (ditto)
Boracie powder
Bath salts
Cookery book
Hercule Poirot drew in a long
deep breath.
"Remarkable," he said, "and quite-quite fascinating."
He was entranced. He looked from the severe
disapproving face of Miss Lemon to the kindly,
distressed face of Mrs. Hubbard.
"I congratulate you," he said, warmly, to the
latter.
She looked startled.
"But why, Mr. Poirot?"
"I congratulate you on having such a unique and
beautiful problem."
"Well, perhaps it makes sense to you, Mr.
Poirot, but-,"
"It does not make sense at all. It reminds
me of nothing so much as a round game I was recently
persuaded to play by some young friends during the Christmas
season. It was called, I understand, the Three
Horned Lady. Each person in turn uttered the
following phrase, 'I went to Paris and bought adding
some article. The next person repeated that and added
a further article and the object of the game was
to memorize in their proper order the articles thus
enumerated, some of them I may say, of a most
monstrous and ridiculous nature. A piece of
soap, a white elephant, a gate-legged
table and a Muscovy duck were, I remember, some
of the items. The difficulty of the memorization lay,
of course, in the totally unrelated nature of the
objects-the lack of sequence, so to speak. As in the
list you have just shown me. By the time that, say, twelve
objects had been mentioned, to enumerate them in their
proper order became almost impossible. A
failure to do so resulted in a paper horn being
handed to the competitor and he or she had to continue the
recitation next time in the terms, 'l, a one homed
lady, went to Paris," etc. After three horns,
had been acquired, retirement was compulsory, the
last left in was the winner."
"I'm sure you were the winner, Mr. Poirot,"
said Miss Lemon with the faith of a loyal
employee.
Poirot beamed.
"That was, in fact, so," he said. "To even the
most haphazard assembly of objects one can bring
order, andwitha little ingenuity, sequence, so to speak. That
is: one says to oneself mentally 'With a piece of
soap I wash the dirt from a large white marble
elephant which stands on a gate-legged table!-and so
on.
Mrs. Hubbard said respectfully,
"Perhaps you could do the same thing with comthe list of things
I've given you."
"Undoubtedly I could. A lady with her right shoe
on, puts a bracelet on her left arm. She
then puts on powder and lipstick and goes down
to dinner and drops her ring in the soup, and so on-I
could thus commit your list to memory-but it is not that that
we are seeking. Why was such a haphazard
collection of things stolen? Is there any system behind
it? Some fixed idea of any kind? We have here
primarily a process of analysis. The first thing
to do is to study the list of objects very carefully."
There was a silence whilst Poirot applied himself
to study. Mrs. Hubbard watched him with the wrapped
attention of a small boy watching a conjuror,
waiting hopefully for a rabbit or at least streams
of coloured ribbons to appear. Miss Lemon,
unimpressed, withdrew inffconsideration of the finer points
of her filing system.
When Poirot finally spoke, Mrs. Hubbard
jumped.
"The first thing that strikes me is this," said
Poirot. "Of all these things that disappeared, most of
them were of small value (some quite negligible) with the
exception of two-a stethoscope and a
diamond ring. Leaving the stethoscope aside for a
moment, I should like to concentrate on the ring. You say
a valuable ring-how valuable?"
"Well, I couldn't say exactly, Mr.
Poirot. It was a solitaire diamond, was a
cluster of small diamonds top
and bottom. It had been Miss Lane's mother's
engagement ring, I understand. She was most upset when
it was missing, and we were all relieved when it turned
up the same evening in Miss Hobhouse's plate
of soup. Just a nasty practical joke, we
thought."
"And so it may have been. But I myself consider that
its theft and return are significant. If a
lipstick, or a powder compact or a book are
missing-it is not sufficient to make you call in the
police. But a valuable diamond ring is
different. There is every chance that the police will be
called in. So the ring is returned."
"But why take it if you're going to return it?"
said Miss Lemon, frowning.
"Why indeed," said Poirot. "But for the moment we
will leave the questions. I am engaged now on
classifying these thefts, and I am taking the ring first.
Who is this Miss Lane from whom it was
stolen?"
"Patricia Lane? She's a very nice girl.
Going in for a what-do-you-call-it, a diploma in
history or archeology or something."
"Well off?"
"Oh, no. She's got a little money of her own,
but she's very careful always. The ring, as I say,
belonged to her mother. She has one or two bits of
jewelry but she doesn't have many new clothes, and
she's given up smoking lately."
"What is she like? Describe her to me in your
own words."
"Well, she's sort of betwixt and between in
colouring. Rather washed out looking. Quiet and
ladylike, but not much spirits or life to her. What
you'd call rather awell, an earnest type of girl."
"And the ring turned up again in Miss Hobhouse's
plate of soup. Who is Miss Hobhouse?"
"Valerie Hobhouse? She's a clever dark
girl with rather a sarcastic way of talking. She works
in a beauty parlour. Sabrina Fair-I
suppose you have heard of it."
"Are these two girls friendly?"
Mrs. Hubbard considered.
"I should say so-yes. They don't have much
to do with each other. Patricia gets on well with
everybody, I should say, without being particularly
popular or anything like that. Valerie Hobhouse
has her enemies, her tongue being what it is-but
she's got quite a following too, If you know what I
mean."
"I think I know," said Poirot.
So Patricia Lane was nice but dull, and
Valerie Hobhouse had personality. He
resumed his study of the list of thefts.
"What is so intriguing is all the different
categories represented here. There are the small
trifles that would tempt a girl who was both vain and
hard up, the lipstick, the costume jewelry, a
powder compact-bath salts-the box of chocolates,
perhaps. Then we have the stethoscope, a more likely
theft for a man who would know just where to sell it or pawn
it. Who did it belong to?"
"It belonged to Mr. Batesonhe's a big
friendly young man."
"A medical student?"
"Yes."
"Was he very angry?"
"He was absolutely livid, Mr. Poirot.
He's got one of those flaring up
tempers-say anything at the time, but it's soon
over. He's not the sort who'd take kindly
to having his things pinched."
"Does anyone?"
"Well, there's Mr. Gopal Ram, one of our
Indian students. He smiles at everything. He
waves his hand and says material possessions do not
matter."
"Has anything been stolen from him?"
"No."
"Ah! Who did the flannel trousers belong
to?"
"Mr. Mcationabb. Very old they were, and anyone
else would say they were done for, but Mr. Mcationabb
is very attached to his old clothes and he never throws
anything away."
"So we have come to the things that it would seem were not
worth stealing-old flannel trousers, electric
light bulbs, boracic powder, bath salts-a
cookery book. They may be important, more
likely they are not. The boracie was probably
removed by error, someone may have removed a dead
bulb and intended to replace it, but forgot-the cookery
book may have been borrowed and not returned. Some
charwoman may have taken away the trousers."
"We employ two very reliable cleaning women.
I'm sure they would neither of them have done such a thing
without asking first."
"You may be right. Then there is the evening shoe, one
of a new pair, I understand? Who do they belong to?"
"Sally Finch. She's an American girl
studying over here on a Fulbright scholarship."
"Are you sure that the shoe has not simply been
mislaid? I cannot conceive what use one shoe could be
to anyone."
"It wasn't mislaid, Mr. Poirot. We
all had a terrific hunt. You see Miss Finch
was going out to a party in what she calls 'formal
dressHis-evening dress to usand the shoes were really
vital-they were her only good ones."
"It caused her inconvenience-and annoyanceyes .
. . yes, I wonder. Perhaps there is something there .
. ."
He was silent for a moment or two and then went
on.
"And there are two more items-a rucksack cut
to
pieces and a silk scarf in the same state. Here
we have something that is neither vanity, nor profit-instead
we have something that is deliberately
vindictive. Who did the rucksack belong to?"
"Nearly all the students have rucksacks-they
all hitchhike a lot, you know. And a great many of the
rucksacks are the same-bought at the same place,
so it's hard to identify one from the other. But it
seems fairly certain that this one belonged to Leonard
Bateson or Colin Mcationabb."
"And the silk scarf that was also cut about. To whom
did that belong?"
"To Valerie Hobhouse. She had it as a
Christmas present-it was emerald green and really
good quality."
"Miss Hobhouse ... I see."
Poirot closed his eyes. What he perceived
mentally was a kaleidoscope, no more, no less.
Pieces of cut up scarves and rucksacks,
cookery books, lipsticks, bath salts; names and
thumb nail sketches of odd students. Nowhere was
there cohesion or form. Unrelated incidents and people
whirled round in space. But Poirot knew quite
well that somehow and somewhere there must be a pattern.
Possibly several patterns. Possibly each
time one shook the kaleidoscope one got a
different pattern. . . . But one of the patterns would
be the right pattern. The question was where to Start. .
. .
He opened his eyes.
"This is a matter that needs some reflection. A
good deal of reflection."
"Oh, I'm sure it does, Mr. Poirot,"
assented Mrs. Hubbard eagerly. "And I'm
sure I didn't want to trouble you-was
"You are not troubling me. I am intrigued. But
whilst I am reflecting, we might make a start
on the
practical side. A start ... The shoe, the
evening shoe ... yes, we might make a start there,
Miss Lemon."
"Yes, Mr. Poirot?" Miss Lemon
banished filing from her thoughts, sat even more upright, and
reached automatically for pad and pencil.
"Mrs. Hubbard will obtain for you, perhaps, the
remaining shoe. Then go to Baker Street station, to the
lost property department. The loss occurred-whenough?"
Mrs. Hubbard considered.
"Well, I can't remember exactly now,
Mr. Poirot. Perhaps two months ago. I can't
get nearer than that. But I could find out from Sally
Finch the date of the party."
"Yes. Well-was He turned once more
to Miss Lemon. "You can be a little vague. You will
say you left a shoe in an Inner Circle
train-that is the most likelyor you may have left it
in some other train. Or possibly a bus. How
many buses serve the neighbourhood of Hickory
Road?"
"Two only, Mr. Poirot."
"Good. If you get no results from Baker
Street, try Scotland Yard and say it was left
in a taxi."
"Lambeth," corrected Miss Lemon
efficiently.
Poirot waved a hand.
"You always know these things."
"But why do you think-was began Mrs. Hubbard.
Poirot interrupted her.
"Let us see first what results we get.
Then, if they are negative or positive, you and
I, Miss Hubbard, must consult again. You will tell
me then those things which it is necessary that I should know."
"I really think I've told you everything I can."
"No, no. I disagree. Here we have young people
herded together, of varying texmperaments, of different
sexes. A loves B, but B loves C, and
D and E are at daggers drawn because of
A perhaps. It is all that that I
need to know. The interplay of human emotions. The
quarrels, the jealousies, the friendships, the malice
and all uncharitableness."
"I'm sure," said Mrs. Hubbard,
uncomfortably, "I don't know anything about that
sort of thing. I don't mix at all. I just run
the place and see to the catering and all that."
"But you are interested in people. You have told me so.
You like young people. You took this post, not because it was of much
interest financially, but because it would bring you in contact
with human problems. There will be those of the students that you
like and some that you do not like so well, or indeed at all,
perhaps. You will tell me-yes, you will tell me! Because
you are worried-not about what has been happening-you could
go to the police about that-was
"Mrs. Nicoletis wouldn't like to have the police
in, I assure you."
Poirot swept on, disregarding the interruption.
"No, you are worried about someone-someone who you
think may have been responsible or at least mixed
up in this. Someone, therefore, that you like."
"Really, Mr. Poirot."
"Yes, really. And I think you are right to be
worried. For that silk scarf cut
to pieces, it is not nice. And the slashed
rucksack, that also is not nice. For the rest it
seems childishness-and yet-I am not sure. No,
I am not sure at all!"
HuRRYTNG A LITTLE as she went up the
steps, Mrs. Hubbard inserted her latch key into the
door of 26 Hickory Road. Just as the door
opened, a big young man with fiery red hair ran up
the steps behind her.
"Hullo, Ma," he said, for in such fashion
did Len Bateson usually address her. He was
a friendly soul, with a cockney accent and mercifully
free from any kind of inferiority complex. "Been out
gallivanting?"
"I've been out to tea, Mr. Bateson.
Don't delay me now, I'm late."
"I cut up a lovely corpse today," said
Len. "Smashing! his
"Don't be so horrid, you nasty boy. A
lovely corpse, indeed! The idea. You make me
feel quite squeamish."
Len Bateson laughed, and the hall echoed the sound
in a great Ha ha.
"Nothing to Celia," he said. "I went along
to the Dispensary. "Come to tell you about a
corpse," I said. She went as white as a sheet
and I thought she was going to pass out. What do you think
of that, Mother Hubhard?"
"I don't wonder at it," said Mrs.
Hubbard. "The idea! Celia probably thought you
meant a real one."
"What do you mean-a real one? what do you think our
corpses are? Synthetic?"
A thin young man with long untidy hair strolled
out of a room on the right, said in a waspish way:
"Oh, it's only you. I thought it was at least a
posse of strong men. The voice is but the voice of
one man, but the volume is as the volume of ten."
"Hope it doesn't get on your nerves, I'm
sure."
"Not more than usual," said Nigel Chapman and
went back again.
"Our delicate flower," said Len.
"Now don't you two scrap," said Mrs.
Hubbard. "Good temper, that's what I like, and a bit
of give and take."
The big young man grinned down at her
affectionately.
"I don't mind our Nigel, Ma," he said.
A girl coming down the stairs at that moment
said:
"Oh, Mrs. Hubbard, Mrs. Nicoletis
is in her room and said she would like to see you as soon
as you got back."
Mrs. Hubbard sighed and started up the stairs.
The tall dark girl who had given the message
stood against the wall to let her pass.
Len Bateson, divesting himself of his mackintosh,
said,
"What's up, Valerie? Complaints of our
behavior to be passed on by Mother Hubbard in due
course?"
The girl shrugged her thin elegant shoulders.
She came down the stairs and across the hall.
"This place gets more like a madhouse every day," she
said over her shoulder.
She went through the door at the right as she spoke.
She moved with that insolent effortless grace that is
common to those who have been professional mannequins.
26 Hickory Road was in reality two
houses, 24 and 26 semidetached. They had been
thrown into one on the ground floor, so that there was both
a communal sitting room and a large dining room on
the
ground floor, as well as two
cloakrooms and a small office towards the back
of the house. Two separate staircases led to the
floors above which remained detached. The girls
occupied bedrooms in the right hand side of the house,
and the men on the other, the original No. 24.
Mrs. Hubbard went upstairs loosening the
collar of her coat. She sighed as she turned in the
direction of Mrs. Nicoletis's room.
"In one of her states again, I suppose," she
muttered.
She tapped on the door and entered.
Mrs. Nicoletis's sitting room was kept very
hot. The big electric fire had all its bars
turned on and the window was tightly shut. Mrs.
Nicoletis was sitting smoking on a sofa
surrounded by a lot of rather dirty silk and velvet
sofa cushions. She was a big dark woman still good
looking, with a bad tempered mouth and enormous brown
eyes.
"Ah! So there you are," Mrs. Nicoletis
made it sound like an accusation.
Mrs. Hubbard, true to her Lemon blood, was
unperturbed.
"Yes," she said tartly, "I'm here. I was
told you wanted to see me specially."
"Yes, indeed I do. It is monstrous, no
less, monstrous!"
"What's monstrous?"
"These bills! Your accounts!" Mrs.
Nicoletis produced a sheaf of papers from beneath a
cushion in the manner of a successful conjurer.
"What are we feeding these miserable students on?
Foie gras and quails? Is this the Ritz? Who
do they think they are, these students?"
"Young people with a healthy appetite," said Mrs.
Hubbard. "They get a good breakfast and a decent
evening meal-plain food but nourishing. It all
works
out very economically."
"Economically? Economically? You dare to say
comt to me? When I am being ruined?"
"You make a very substantial profit, Mrs.
Nicoletis, out of this place. For students, the
rates are on the
high side."
"But am I not always full? Do I ever have a
vacancy that is not applied for three times over?
Am I not sent students by the British Council,
by London University Lodging Board-by the
Embassies-by the French Lyc6e?
Are not there always three applications for every
vacancy?"
"That's very largely because the meals here are
appetizing and sufficient. Young people must be properly
fed."
"Bah! These totals are scandalous. It is that
Italian cook and her husband. They swindle you
over the food."
"Oh no, they don't, Mrs. Nicoletis.
I can assure you that no foreigner is going to put
anything over on me."
"Then it is you yourself-you who are robbing me."
Mrs. Hubbard remained unperturbed.
"I can't allow you to say things like that," she said in
the voice an old fashioned Nanny might have used
to a particularly truculent charge. "It isn't a
-- nice thing to do, and one of these days it will land you in
trouble."
"A hid!" Mrs. Nicoletis threw the sheaf
of bills dramatically up in the air whence they
fluttered to the ground in aBut directions. Mrs.
Hubbard bent and picked them up, pursing her lips.
"You enrage me," shouted
her employer.
"I daresay," said Mrs. Hubbard, "but
it's bad for you, you know, getting all worked up.
Tempers are bad for the blood pressure."
"You admit that these totals are higher than those
of last week?"
"Of course they are. There's been some very good cut
price stuff going at Lampson's Stores.
I've taken advantage of it. Next week's
total will be below average."
Mrs. Nicoletis looked sulky.
"You explain everything so plausibly."
"There," Mrs Hubbard put the bills in a neat
pile on the table. "Anything else?"
"The American girl, Sally Finch, she talks
of le'aying-I do no t want her to go. She is a
Fulbright scholar. She will bring here other Fulbright
scholars. She must not leave."
"What's her reason for leaving?"
Mrs. Nicoletis humped monumental
shoulders.
"How can I remember? It was not genuine. I could
tell that. I always know."
Mrs. Hubbard nodded thoughtfully. She was inclined
to believe Mrs. Nicoletis on that point.
"Sally hasn't said anything to me," she said.
"But you will talk to her?"
"Yes, of course."
"And if it is thesd coloured students, these
Indians, these Negresses-then they can all go, you
understand?
The colour bar, it means everything to these
Americans comandfor me it is the Americans that
matter-as for these coloured ones-Scram!"
She made a dramatic gesture.
"Not while I'm in charge," said Mrs. Hubbard
coldly. "And anyway, you're wrong. There's no
feeling of that sort here amongst the students, and Sally
certainly isn't like that. She and Mr. Akibombo
have lunch together quite often, and nobody could be blacker
than he is."
"Then it is Communists-you know what the
Americans are about Communists. Nigel Chapman
now-he is a Communist."
"I doubt it."
"Yes, Yes. You should have heard what he was
saying the other evening."
"Nigel will say anything to annoy people. He is very
tiresome that way."
"You know them all so well. Dear Mrs.
Hubbard, you are wonderful! I say to myself again and
agwhat should I do without Mrs. Hubbard? I
rely on you utterly. You are a wonderful
wonderful woman."
coneaAfter the powder, the jam," said Mrs. Hubbard.
"What is that?"
"Don't worry. I'll do what I can."
She left the room cutting short a gushing
speech of thanks.
Muttering to herself "Wasting my time-what a maddening
woman she is!" she hurried along the passage and
into her own sitting room.
But there was to be no peace for Mrs. Hubbard as
yet. A tall figure rose to her feet as
Mrs. Hubbard entered and said,
"I should be glad to speak to you for a few minutes,
,gglease."
"Of course, Elizabeth."
Mrs. Hubbard was rather surprised. Elizabeth
Johnston was a girl from the West Indies who was
studying law. She was a hard worker, ambitious, who
kept very much to herself. She had always seemed
particularly well balanced and competent, and Mrs.
Hubbard had always regarded her as one of the most
satisfactory students in the Hostel.
She was perfectly controlled now, but Mrs.
Hubbard caught the slight tremor in her
voice although the dark features were quite impassive.
"Is something the matter?"
"Yes. Will you come with me to my room, please?"
"Just a moment." Mrs. Hubbard threw off her
coat and gloves and then followed the girl out of the
room and up the next flight of stairs. The girl
had a room on the top floor. She opened the
door and went across to a table near the window.
"Here are the notes of my work," she said. "This
represents several months of hard study. You see
what has been done?"
Mrs. Hubbard caught her breath with a slight
gasp.
Ink had been spilled on the table. It had run
all over the papers, soaking them through. Mrs.
Hubbard touched it with her finger tip. It was still wet.
She said, knowing the question to be foolish as she asked
it,
"You didn't spill the ink yourself?"
"No. It was done whilst I was out."
"Mrs. Biggs, do you think"
Mrs. Biggs was the cleaning woman who looked
after the top floor bedrooms.
"It was not Mrs. Biggs. It was not even my own
ink. That is here on the shelf by my bed. It
has not been touched. It was done by someone who brought
ink here and did it deliberately."
Mrs. Hubbard was shocked.
"What a very wicked-and cruel thing to do."
"Yes, it is a bad thing."
The girl spoke quite quietly, but Mrs.
Hubbard did not make the mistake of underrating her
feelings.
"Well, Elizabeth, I hardly know what
to say. I am shocked, badly shocked, and I shall do
my utmost to find out who did this wicked malicious
thing. You've no ideas yourself as to that?"
The girl replied at once.
"This is green ink, you saw that."
"Yes, I noticed that."
"It is not very common, this green ink. I know one
person here who uses it. Nigel Chapman."
"Nigel? Do you think Nigel would do a thing like
that?"
"I should not have thought so-no. But he writes his
letters and his notes with green ink."
"I shall have to ask a lot of questions. I'm very
sorry, Elizabeth, that such a thing should happen in this
house and I can only tell you that I shall do my best
to get to the bottom of it."
"Thank you, Mrs. Hubbard. There have been-other
things, have there not?"
"Yes-er-yes."
Mrs. Hubbard left the room and started towards
the stairs. But she stopped suddenly before proceeding
down and instead went along the passage to a door at
the end of the corridor. She knocked and the voice of
Miss Sally Finch bid her enter.
The room was a pleasant one and Sally Finch
herself, a cheerful redhead, was a pleasant person.
She was writing on a pad and looked up with a
bulging cheek. She held out an open box of
sweets and said indistinctly,
"Candy from home. Have some."
"Thank you, Sally. Not just now. I'm rather
upset."
She paused. "Have you heard what's happened
to Elizabeth Johnston?"
"What's happened to Black Bess?"
The nickname was an affectionate one and had been
accepted as such by the girl herself.
Mrs. Hubbard described what had happened.-
Sally showed every sign of sympathetic anger.
"I'll say that's a mean thing to do. I wouldn't
believe anyone would do a thing like that to our
Bess. Everybody likes her. She's quiet and
doesn't get around
much, or join in, but I'm sure there's no one
who dislikes her."
"That's what I should have said."
"Well-it's all of a piece, isn't it, with the
other thineaeaS. That's why-was
"That's why what?" Mrs. Hubbard asked as the
girl stopped abruptly.
Sally said slowly,
"That's why I'm getting out of here. Did Mrs.
Nick tell you?"
"Yes. She was very upset about it. Seemed to think
you hadn't given her the real reason."
"Well, I didn't. No point in making her
go up in smoke. You know what she's like. But that's the
reason, ri-lit enoueaeahid. I just don't like
what's going on here. Tt was odd losing my shoe,
and then Valerie's scarf being all cut to bits-and
Len's rucksack . . . it wasn't so much things
being pinched-after all, that may happen any time-it's not
nice but it's roughly normal-but this other isn't."
She paused for a moment, smiling, and then suddenly
grinned. "Akibombo's scared," she said. "He's
always very superior and civilised-but there's a
good old West African belief in Magic very
close to the surface."
"Tehah!" said Mrs. Hubbard crossly.
"I've no patience with superstitious nonsense.
Just some ordinary human beings making a nuisance of
themselves. That's all there is to it."
Sally's mouth curved up in a wide cat-like
grin.
"The emphasis," she said, "is on ordinary.
I've a sort of feeling that there's a person in this
house who isn't ordinary!"
Mrs. Hubbard went on down the stairs. She
turned into the students" common room on the ground
floor. There were four people in the room. Valerie
Hobhouse, prone on a sofa with her narrow,
elegant feet stuck up
over the arm of it; Nigel Chapman sitting at
a table with a heavy book open in front of him;
Patricia Lane leaning against the mantelpiece
and a girl in a mackintosh who had just come in and who was
pulling off a woolly cap as Mrs. Hubbard
entered. She was a stocky, fair girl with brown
eyes set wide apart and a mouth that was usually just a
little open so that she seemed perpetually startled.
Valerie, removing a cigarette from her
mouth, said in a lazy drawling voice:
"Hullo, Ma, have you administered soothing syrup
to the old devil, our revered proprietress?"
Patricia Lane said:
"Has she been on the war path?"
"And how!" said Valerie and chuckled.
"Something very unpleasant has happened," said
Mrs. Hubbard. "Nigel, I want you to help
me."
"Me, Ma'am?" Nigel looked up a-t her
and shut his book. His thin, malicious face was
suddenly illumined by a mischievous but surprisingly
sweet smile. "What have I done?"
"Nothing, I hope," said Mrs. Hubbard. "But
ink has been deliberately and maliciously
spilt all over Elizabeth Johnston's notes
and it's green ink. You write with green ink,
Nigel."
He stared at her, his smile disappearing.
"Yes, I use green ink."
"Horrid stuff," said Patricia. "I wish
you wouldn't, Nigel. I've always told you I think
it's horribly affected of you."
"I like being affected," said Nigel. "Lilac
ink would be even better, I think. I must
try and get some. But are you serious, Mum? About the
sabotage, I mean?"
"Yes, I am serious. Was it your doing,
Nigel?"
"No, of course not. I like annoying people, as you
kno ,, but I'd never do a filthy trick like that-and
certainly not to Black Bess who minds her own
business in a way that's an example to some people I
could mention. Where is that ink of mine? I filled my
pen yesterday evening, I remember. I usually
keep it on the shelf over there." He sprang up
and went across the room. "Here it is." He picked
the bottle up, then whistled. "You're right. The
bottle's nearly empty. It should be practically
full."
The girl in a mackintosh gave a little gasp.
"Oh dear," she said. "Oh dear. I don't like
it-was Nigel wheeled at her accusingly.
"Have you got an alibi, Celia?" he said
menacingly. The girl gave a gasp.
"I didn't do it. I really didn't do it.
Anyway, I've been at the Hospital all
day. I couldn't-was
"Now, Nigel," said Mrs. Hubbard.
"Don't tease Celia." ,
Patricia Lane said angrily,
"I don't see why Nigel should be suspected.
Just because his ink was taken-was Valerie said cattishly,
"That's right, darling, defend your young."
"But it's so unfair-was
"But really I didn't have anything to do with it,"
Celia protested earnestly.
"Nobody thinks you did, infant," said
Valerie impatiently. "All the same, you know,"
her eyes met Mrs. Hubbard's and exchanged a
glance, "all this is getting beyond a joke. Something will
have to be done about it."
Something is going to be done," said Mrs. Hubbard
grimly.
"'HERE YOU ARE, Mr. Poirot."
Miss Lemon laid a small brown paper
parcel before Poirot. He removed the paper and
looked appraisingly at a well cut silver
evening shoe.
"It was at Baker Street, just as you said."
"That has saved us trouble," said Poirot. "Also
it confirms my ideas."
"Quite," said Miss Lemon who was sublimely
incurious by nature.
She was, however, susceptible to the
claims of family affection. She said,
"If it is not troubling you too much, Mr.
Poirot, I received a letter from my sister. There- have
been some new developments."
"You permit that I read it?"
She handed it to him and after reading it, he directed
Miss Lemon to get her sister on the telephone.
Presently Miss Lemon indicated that the
connection had been obtained. Poirot took the
receiver.
"Mrs. Hubbard?"
"Oh yes, Mr. Poirot. So kind of you to ring
me up so promptly. I was really very-i"
Poirot interrupted her.
"Where are you speaking from?"
"Why-from 26 Hickory Road, of course.
Oh I see what you mean. I am in my own
sitting room."
"There is an extension?"
"This is the extension. The main phone is
downstairs in the hall."
"Who is in the house who might listen in?"
"All the students are out at this time of day. The
cook is out marketing. Geronimo, her husbadd,
understands very little English. There is a cleaning
woman, but she is deaf and I'm quite sure wouldn't
bother to listen in."
"Very good, then. I can speak freely. Do you
occasionally have lectures in the evening, or films?
Entertainments of some kind?"
"We do have lectures occasionally. Miss
Battrout, the explorer, came not long ago, with
her coloured transparencies. And we had an
appeal for Far Eastern Missions, though I am
afraid quite a lot of the students went out that night."
"Ah. Then this evening you will have prevailed on M.
Hercule Poirot, the employer of your sister,
to come and discourse to your students on the more interesting of
my cases."
"That will be very nice, I'm sure, but do you think-was
"It is not a question of thinking. I am sure!"
That evening, students entering the Common Room found
a notice tacked up on the Board which stood just
inside the door.
M. Hercule Poirot, the celebrated
private detective, has kindly consented to give
a talk this evening on the theory and practice of
successful detection, with an account of certain
celebrated criminal cases.
Returning students made varied comments
on this.
"Who's this private Eye?"
"Never heard of him."
"Oh, I have. There was a man who was condemned
to death for the murder of a charwoman and this detective
got him off at the last moment by finding the real
person."
"Sounds crumby to me."
"I think it might be
rather fun."
"Colin ought to enjoy it. He's mad on
criminal psychology."
"I would not put it precisely like that, but I'll
not deny that a man who has been closely
acquainted with criminals might be interesting
to interrogate."
Dinner was at seven thirty and most of the students
were already seated when Mrs. Hubbard came down from her
sitting room (where sherry had been served to the
distinguished guest) followed by a small elderly man
with suspiciously black hair and a mustache of
ferocious proportions which he twirled contentedly.
"These are some of our students, Mr. Poirot.
This is M. Hercule Poirot who is kindly
going to talk to us after dinner."
Salutations were exchanged and Poirot sat down
by Mrs. Hubbard and busied himself with keeping his
moustaches out of the excellent minestrone which was served
by a small active Italian manservant from a
big tureen.
This was followed by a piping hot dish of spaghetti
and meat balls and it was then that a girl sitting on
Poirot's right spoke shyly to him.
"Does Mrs. Hubbard's sister really work for
you?"
Poirot turned to her.
"But yes indeed. Miss Lemon has been my
secretary for many years. She is the most efficient
woman that ever lived. I am sometimes afraid of
her."
"Oh. I see. I wondered-was
"Now what did you wonder, Mademoiselle?"
He smiled upon her in paternal fashion, making
a mental note as he did so.
"Pretty, worried, not too quick mentally,
frightened . . ." He said,
"May I know your name and what it is you are
studying?"
"Celia Austin. I don't study. I'm a
dispenser at St.
Catherine's Hospital."
"Ah, that is interesting work?"
"Well, I don't know comperh it is." She
sounded rather uncertain.
"And these others? Can you tell me something about them,
perhaps? I understood this was a Home for Foreign
Students, but these seem mostly to be English."
"Some of the foreign ones are out. Mr. Chandra
Lal and Mr. Gopal Ram-they're Indians-and
Miss Reinleer who's Dutch-and Mr. comAhmed
Ali who's Egyptian and frightfully
political!"
"And those who are here? Tell me about these."
"Well, sitting on Mrs. Hubbard's left
is Nigel Chapman. He's studying Mediaeval
History and Italian at London University.
Then there's Patricia Lane, next to him, with the
spectacles. She's taking a diploma in
Archaeology. The big red-headed boy is Len
Bateson, he's a medical and the dark girl is
Valerie Hobhouse, she's in a Beauty Shop.
Next to her is Colin Mcationabb comhe's doing a
post graduate course in psychiatry."
There was a faint change in her voice as she
described Colin. Poirggyt glanced
keenly a-t her and saw that the colour had come up in
her face.
He said to himself,
"So-she is in love and she cannot easily conceal the
f act.
He noticed that young Mcationabb never seemed
to look at her across the table, being far too much taken
up with his conversation with a laughing red-headed girl beside-
him.
"That's Sally Finch. She's American-over here
on a Fulbright. Then there's Genevieve
Maricaud. She's doing English, and so is Rene
Halle who sits next to her. The small fair
girl is Jean Tomlinson-she's at St.
Catherine's too. She's a physiotherapist. The
black
man is Akibombo-he comes from West Africa
and he's frightfully nice. Then there's Elizabeth
Johnston, she's from Jamaica and she's studying
law. Next to us on wy right are two Turkish
st14dents who came about a week ago. They know
hardly any English."
"Thank you. And do you all get on well together?
Or do you have quarrels?"
The lightness of his tone robbed the words of
seriousness.
Celia said,
"Oh, we're all too busy really to have
fights, although-was
"Although what, Miss Austin?"
"Well-nigel-next to Mrs. Hubbard. He
likes stirring people up and making them angry. And Len
Bateson gets angry. He gets wild with
rage sometimes. But he's very sweet really."
"And Colin Mcationabb-does he too get
annoyed?"
"Oh no. Colin just raises his eyebrows and
looks amused."
"I see. And the young ladies, do you have your
quarrels?"
"Oh no, we all get on very well.
Genevieve has feelings sometimes. I think French
people are inclined to be touchy-oh I mean-I'm
sorry"
Celia was the picture of confusion.
"Me, I am Belgian," said Poirot
solemnly. He went on quickly, before Celia could
recover control of herself.
"What did you mean just now, Miss Austin, when
you said you wondered. You wondered-what?"
She crumbled her bread nervously.
"Oh that-nothing-notlng really-just, there have been some
silly practical jokes lately-I thought
Mrs. Hubbard-But really, it was silly of me. I
didn't mean anything."
Poirot did not press her. He turned away
to Mrs. Hubbard and was presently engaged in a
three cornered conversation with her and with Nigel
Chapman who introduced the controversial challenge
that crime was a form of creative art-and that the
misfits of society were really the police who
only entered that profession because of their secret
sadism. Poirot was amused to note that the anxious
looking young woman in spectacles of about
thirty-five who sat beside him tried desperately
to explain away his remarks as fast as he made
them. Nigel, however, took absolutely no
notice of her.
Mrs. Hubbard looked benignantly amused.
"All you young people nowadays think of nothing but
polities and psychology," she said. "When I was
a girl we were much more lighthearted. We danced.
If you rolled back the carpet in the Common Room
there's quite a good floor, and you could dance to the wireless,
but you never do."
Celia laughed and said with a tinge of malice,
"But you used to dance, Nigel. I've danced with you
myself once, though I don't expect you
to remember."
"You've danced with me," said Nigel
incredulously.
"Where?"
"At Cambridge-in May Week."
"Oh, May Week!" Nigel waved away the
follies of youth. "One goes through that adolescent
phase. Mercifully it soon passes." his
Nigel was clearly not much more than twenty-five
now. Poirot concealed a smile in his mustache.
Patricia Lane said earnestly, "You see,
Mrs. Hubbard, there is so much study to be done.
With lectures to attend and one's notes to write
up, there's really no time for anything but what is
really worth while."
"Well, my dear, one's only young once," said
Mrs. Hubbard.
A chocolate pudding succeeded the spaghetti and
afterwards they all went into the Common Room, and helped
themselves to coffee from an urnthat stood on a table.
Poirot was then invited to begin his discourse. The two
Turks politely excused themselves. The
rest seated themselves and looked expectant.
Poirot rose to his feet and spoke with his
usual aplomb. The sound of his own voice was always
pleasant to him, and he spoke for three quarters of
an hour in a light and amusing fashion, recallin,
those of his experiences that lent themselves to an agreeable
exaggeration. If he managed to suggest, in a
subtle fashion, that he was, perhaps, something of a
mountebank, it was not too obviously contrived.
"And so, you see," he finished, "I say to this
City gentleman that I am reminded of a soap
manufacturer I knew in L16ge who
poisoned his wife in order to marry a beautiful
blond secretary. I say it very lightly, but at
once I get a reaction. He presses upon me
the stolen money I had just recovered for him. He
goes pale and there is fear in his eyes. 'I will
give this money," I say, "to a deserving
charity." 'Do anything you like with it," he says. And
I say to him then, and I say it very
significantly, "It will be advisable,
Monsieur, to be very careful." He nods,
speechless, and as I go out, I see that he wipes his
forehead. He has had the big fright, and H have
saved his life. For though he is infatuated
with his blond secretary he will not now try and
poison his stupid and disagreeable wife.
Prevention, always, is betaer than cure. We
want to prevent murders-not wait until they have
been committed."
He bowed and spread out his hands.
"There, I have wearied you long enough."
The students clapped him vigorously. Poirot
bowed.
And then, as he was about to sit down, Colin
Mcationabb took his pipe from between his teeth and
observed,
"And now, perhaps, you'll talk about what you're
really here for!"
There was a momentary silence and then Patricia said
reproachfully, "Colin."
"Well, we can all guess, can't we?" He
looked round scornfully. "M. Poirot's given
us a very amusing little talk, but that's not what he came
for. He's on the job. You don't really think,
Mr. Poirot, that we're not wise to that?"
"You speak for yourself, Colin," said Sally.
"It's true, isn't it?" said Colin.
Again Poirot spread out his hands in a graceful
acknowledging gesture.
"I will admit," he said, "that my kind hostess
has confided to me that certain events have caused
herworry."
Len Bateson got up, his face heavy and
truculent.
"Look here," he said, "what's all this? Has
this been planted on us?"
"Have you really only just tumbled to that, Bateson?"
asked Nigel sweetly.
Celia gave a frightened gasp and said, "Then I
was right!"
Mrs. Hubbard spoke with decisive authority.
"I asked Mr. Poirot to give us a talk,
but I also wanted to ask him his advice about various
things that have happened lately. Something's got to be
done and it seems to me that the only other
alternative is-the police."
At once a violent altercation broke out.
Genevieve burst into heated French. "It was a
disgrace, shameful, to go to the police!" Other
voices chimed in, for or against. In a final lull
Leonard Bateson's voice was raised with
decision.
"Let's hear what Mr. Poirot has to say
about our trouble."
Mrs. Hubbard said,
"I've given Mr. Poirot all the facts.
If he wants to ask any questions, I'm sure none
of you will object."
Poirot bowed to her.
"Thank you." With the air of a conjurer he brought out
a pair of evening shoes and handed them to Sally Finch.
"Your shoes, Mademoiselle?"
"Why-yes-both of them? Where did the missing one
come from?"
"From the Lost Property Office at Baker
Street
Station."
"But what made you think it might be there, M.
Poirot?"
"A very simple process of deduction. Someone
takes a shoe from your room. Why? Not to wear and not
to sell. And since the house will be searched by everyone
to try and find it, then the shoe must be got out of the
house, or destroyed. But it is not so easy
to destroy a shoe. The easiest way is to take it
in a bus or train in a parcel in the rush hour and
leave it thrust down under a seat. That was my first
guess and it proved right-so I knew that I was on
safe groundthe shoe was taken, as your poet
says, 'ffannoy, because he knows it teases."
his
Valerie gave a short laugh.
"That points to you, Nigel, my love, with an
unerring
finger."
Nigel said, smirking a little, "If the shoe
fits, wear it."
"Nonsense," said Sally. "Nigel didn't
take my shoe."
"Of course he didn't," said Patricia
angrily. "It's the
most absurd idea."
"I don't know about absurd," said Nigel.
"Actually
I didn't do anything of the kind-ag no doubt
we shall all say."
It was as thou hid Poirot had been waiting for just
those words as an actor waits for his cue. His eyes
rested thoughtfully on Len Bateson's flushed
face, then they swept inquiringly over the rest of the
students.
He said, using his hands in a deliberately
foreign gesture,
,'my position is delicate. I am a
guest here. I have come at the invitation of Mrs.
Hubbard-to spend a pleasant evening, that is all.
And also, of course, to return a very charming pair of
evening shoes to Mademoiselle. For anything
further-was he paused. "Monsieur-Bateson?
yes, Bateson-has asked me to say what I
myself think of this-trouble. But it would be an impertinence
for me to speak unless I were invited so to do not by one
person alone, but by you all."
Mr. Akibombo was seen to nod his black
curled head in vigorous asseveration.
"That is very correct procedure, yes," he
said. "True democratic proceeding is to put
matter to the voting of all present."
The voice of Sally Finch rose impatiently.
"Oh, shucks," she said. "This is a kind of
party, all friends together. Let's hear what Mr.
Poirot advises without any more fuss."
"I couldn't agree with you more, Sally," said
Nigel.
Poirot bowed his head.
c" Very well," he said. "Since you all ask
me this question, I reply that my advice is quite
simple. Mrs. Hubbard-or Mrs. Nicoletis
rather-should call in the police at once. No
time should be lost."
THERE WAS NO DOUBT that Poirot's
statement was unexpected. It caused not a ripple
of protest or comment, but a sudden and uncomfortable
silence.
Under cover of that momentary paralysis, Poirot
was taken by Mrs. Hubbard up to her own sitting,
room, with only a quick polite "Good night to you
all," to herald his departure.
Mrs. Hubbard switched on the light, closed the
door, and begged M, Poirot to take the arm
chair by the fireplace. Her nice good humored
face was puckered with doubt and anxiety. She offered
her guest a cigarette, but Poirot refused
politely, explaining that he preferred his own. He
offered her one, but she refused, saying in an
abstracted tone: "I don't smoke, M.
Poirot."
Then, as she sat down opposite him, she said,
after a momentary hesitation:
"I daresay you're right, Mr. Poirot. Perhaps
we should get the police in on this-especially after this
malicious ink business. But I rather wish you hadn't
said so-right out like that."
"Ah," said Poirot, as he lit one of
his tiny cigarettes and watched the smoke ascend.
"You think I should have dissembled?"
"Well, I suppose it's nice to be fair and
above board about things-but it seems to me it might have
been better to keep quiet, and just ask an officer
to come
round and explain things privately to him. What
I mean is, whoever's been doing these stupid things
well, that person's warned now."
"Perhaps, yes."
"I should say quite certainly," said Mrs. Hubbard
rather sharply. "No perhaps about it! Even if it's one
of the servants or a student who wasn't here this
evening, the word will get around. It always does."
"So true. It always does."
"And there's Mrs. Nicoletis, too. I
really don't know what attitude she'll take
up. One never does know with her."
"It will be interesting to find out."
"Naturally we can't call in the police unless
she agrees-Oh, who's that now?"
There had been a sharp authoritative tap on the
door. It was repeated and almost before Mrs. Hubbard
had called an irritable "Come in" the door opened
and Colin Mcationabb, his pipe clenched
firmly between his teeth and a scowl on his forehead,
entered the room.
Removing the pipe, and closing the door behind him,
he said:
"You'll excuse me, but I was anxious to just have a
word with Mr. Poirot here."
"With me?" Poirot turned his head in innocent
surprise.
"Ay, with you." Colin spoke grimly.
He drew up a rather uncomfortable chair and sat
squarely on it facing Hercule Poirot.
"You've given us an amusing talk tonight," he said
indulgently. "And I'll not deny that you're a man
who's had a varied and lengthy experience, but if
you'll excuse me for saying so, your methods and your
ideas are both equally antiquated."
"Really, Colin," said Mrs. Hubbard,
colouring. "You're extremely rude."
"I'm not meaning to give offence, but I've got
to make thins clear. Crime and Punishment, Mr.
Poiro-t comt's as far as your horizon
stretches."
"They seem to me a natural sequence," said
Poirot.
"You take the narrow view of the Law-and
what's more of the Law at its most old fashioned.
Nowadays, even the Law has to keep itself co
nizant of the newest and most up to date theories of
what causes crime. It is the causes that are
important, Mr. Poirot."
"But there," cried Poirot, "to speak in your new
fashioned phrase, I could not agree with you more!"
"Then you've got to consider the cause of what has
been happening in this house-you've got to find out why
these things have been done."
"But I am still agreeing with you-yes, that is most
important."
"Because there always is a reason, and it may be, to the
person concerned, a very good reason."
At this point, Mrs. Hubbard, unable to contain
herself, interjected sharply, "Rubbish."
"That's where you're wrong," said Colin, turning
slightly toward her. "You've got to take into account
the psychological background."
"Psychological balderdash," said Mrs.
Hubbard. "I've no patience with all that sort of
talk!"
"That's because you know precisely nothing about it,"
comsd Colin in a gravely rebuking fashion. He
returned his gaze to Poirot.
"I'm interested in these subjects. I am at
present taking a post graduate course in
psychiatry and psychology. We come across the most
involved and astounding cases, and what I'm pointing out
to you, M.
Poirot, is that you can't just dismiss the criminal
with a doctrine of original sin, or wilful disregard
of the laws of the land. You've got to have an understanding of the
root of the trouble if you're ever to effect a cure
of the young delinquent. These ideas were not known or
thought of in your day and I've no doubt you find them
hard to accept-was
can' Stealing's stealing," put in Mrs. Hubbard
stubbornly.
Colin frowned impatiently.
Poirot said meekly,
"My ideas are doubtless old fashioned, but I
am perfectly prepared to listen to you, Mr.
Mcationabb."
Colin looked areeably surprised.
C,
"That's very fairly said, Mr. Poirot. Now
I'll try to make this matter clear to you, usin, very
simple terms."
I
coneaThank you," said Poirot meekly.
"For convenience's sake, I'll start with the pair
of shoes you brought with you tonight and returned to Sally
Finch. If you remember, one shoe was stolen.
Only one."
"I remember being struck by the fact," said
Poirot.
Colin Mcationabb leaned forward, his dour but handsome
features were lit up by eagerness.
"Ah, but you didn't see the significance of it.
It's one of the prettiest and most satisfying
examples anyone could wish to come across. We have here,
very definitcly, a Cinderella complex. You are
maybe acquainted with the Cinderella fairy story."
"Of French origin-mais oui.
"Cinderella, the unpd drudge, sits by the
fire, her sisters dressed in their fitiery, go to the
Prince's ball. A Fairy Godiuother sends
Cinderella too, to that ball. At the stroke of
midnight, her finery turns back to rags-she
escapes hurriedly, leaving behind her one slipper.
So here we have a mind that compares itself to Cinderella
(unconsciously, of course). Here we have
frustration, envy, the sense of inferiority. The girl
steals a slipper. Why?"
"A girl?"
was But naturally, a girl. That," said Colin
reprovingly, should be clear to the meanest
intelligence."
coneaReally, Colin!was said Mrs. Hubbard.
'Pray continue," said Poirot, courteously.
"Probably she herself does not know why she does
it-but the inner wish is clear. She wants to be the
Princess, to be identified by the Prince and
claimed by him. Another significant fact, the
slipper is stolen from an attractive girl who
is going to a Ball."
Colin's pipe had long since gone out. He
waved it now with mounting enthusiasm.
"And now we'll take a few of the other
happenings. A magpie acquiring of pretty
things-all things associated with attractive
feminity. A powder compact, lipsticks, earrings,
a bracelet, a ring-there is a twofold
significance here. The girl wants to be noticed.
She wants, even, to be punished-as is
frequently the case with very young juvenile
delinquents. These things are none of them what you would
call ordinary criminal thefts. It is not the
value of these things that is wanted. In just such
a way do well-to-do women go into department stores
and steal things they could perfectly well afford to pay
for."
"Nonsense," said Mrs. Hubbard
belligerently. "Some people are just plain dishonest, that's
all there is to it."
"Yet a diamond ring of some value was
amoneaeast the things stolen," said Poirot, ignoring
Mrs. Hubbard's interpolation.
"That was returned."
"And surely, Mr. Mcationabb, you would not say
that a stethoscope is a feminine pretty
pretty?"
"That had a deeper significance. Women who
feel they are, deficient in feminine attraction can
find sublimation in the pursuit of a career."
"And the cookery book?"
"A symbol of home life, husband and
family."
"And boracic powder?"
Colin said irritably,
"My dear Mr. Poirot. Nobody would steal
boracic powder! Why should they?"
"That is what I have asked myself. I must admit,
Mr. Mcationabb, that you seem to have an
answer for everythin,. Explain to me, then, the
significance of the disappearance of an old pair of
flannel trousers your flannel trousers, I
understand."
For the first time, Colin appeared ill at ease.
He blushed and cleared his throat.
"I could explain that-but it would be somewhat involved,
and perhapser well, rather embarrassing."
"Ah, you spare my blushes."
Suddenly Poirot leaned forward and tapped the young
man on the knee.
was And the ink that is spilt over another student's
papers, the silk scarf that is cut and slashed. Do
these things cause you no disquietude?"
The complacence and superiority of Colin's manner
underwent a sudden and not unlikeable change.
"They do," he said. "Believe me, they do.
It's serious. She ought to have treatment-at once. But
medical treatment, that's the point. It's not a case
for the police. The poor little devil doesn't even
know what it's all about. She's all tied up in
knots. If I Poirot interrupted him.
"You know then who she is?"
"Well, I have a very strong suspicion."
Poirot murmured with the air of one who
is recapitulating.
"A girl who is not outstandingly successful with the
other sex. A shy girl. An affectionate girl.
A girl whose brain is inclined to be slow in its
reactions. A girl who feels frustrated and
lonely. A girl . .
There was a tap on the door. Poirot broke
off. The tap was repeated.
"Come in," said Mrs. Hubbard.
The door opened and Celia Austin came in.
"Ah," said Poirot, nodding his head.
"Exactly. Miss Celia Austin."
Celia looked at Colin with agonised eyes.
"I didn't know you were here," she said breathlessly.
"I camel came..."
She took a deep breath and rushed to Mrs.
Hubbard.
"Please, please don't send for the police.
It's me. I've been taking those things. I don't
know why. I can't imagine. I didn't want to.
It just-it just came over me." She whirled round on
Colin. "So now you know what I'm like ... and I
suppose you'll never speak to me a am. I know
I'm awful..."
,eaOch! not a bit of it," said Colin.
His rich voice was warm and friendly. "You're just a
bit mixed up, that's all. It's just a kind of
illness you've had, from not looking at things clearly.
If you'll trust me, Celia, I'll soon be
able to put you right."
"Oh, Colin-really?"
Celia looked at him with unconcealed adoration.
"I've been so dreadfully worried."
He took her hand in a slightly avuncular
manner.
"Well, there's no need to worry any more."
Rising to his feet he drew Celia's hand through his
arm and looked sternly at Mrs. Hubbard.
"I hope now," he said, "that there'll be no more
foolish talk of calling in the police. Nothing's
been stolen of any real worth and what has been
taken, Celia
will return."
"I can't return the bracelet and the powder
compact," said Celia anxiously. "I pushed them
down a gutter. But I'll buy new ones."
"And the stethoscope?" said Pggjirot. "Where
did you put that?"
Celia flushed.
"I never took any stethoscope. What
should I want with a silly old stethoscope?" Her
flush deepened. "And it wasn't me who spilt ink
all over Elizabeth's papers. I'd never do
a-a malicious thing like that."
"Yet you cut and slashed Miss Hobhouse's
scarf, Mademoiselle."
Celia looked uncomfortable. She said rather
uncertainly, "That was dill erent. I
mean-Valerie didn't mind."
"And the rucksack?"
"Oh, I didn't cut that up. That was just
temper."
Poirot took out the list he had copied from
Mrs. Hubbard's little book.
"Tell me," he said, "and this time it must be the
truth. What are you or are you not responsible forof
these happenings?"
Celia glanced down the list and her answer came
at once.
was I don't know anything about the racksack, or
the electric light bulbs, or boracic or bath
salts, and the ring was just a mistake. When I
realesed it was valuable I returned it."
"I see."
"Because really I didn't mean to be
dishonest. It was only-was
"Only what?"
A faintly wary look came into Celia's
eyes.
"I don't know comreally I don't. I'm all
mixed up."
Colin cut in in a peremptory manner.
"I'll be thankful if you'll not catechise her.
I can promise you that there will be no recurrence of this
business. From now on I'll definitely make
myself responsible for her."
"Oh Colin, you are good to me."
"I'd like you to tell me a great deal about yourself,
Celia. Your early home life, for instance. Did
your father and mother get on well together?"
"Oh no, it was awful-at home-was
"Precisely. And-was
Mrs. Hubbard cut in. She spoke with the
voice of authority.
"That will do now, both of you. I'm glad,
Celia, that you've come and owned up. You've caused
a great deal of worry and anxiety, though, and you ought
to be ashamed of yourself. But I'll say this. I
accept your word that you didn't spill ink
deliberately on Elizabeth's notes.
I don't believe you'd do a thing like that. Now take
yourselves off, you and Colin. I've had enough of you both for
this evening."
As the door closed behind them, Mrs. Hubbard
drew a deep breath.
"Well," she said. "What do you think of that?"
There was a twinkle in Hercule Poirot's
eye. He said, "I think-that we have assisted at a
love scene commodern style."
Mrs. Hubbard made an ejaculation of
disapproval.
"Autres temps, autres moeurs,"
murmured Poirot. "In my young day the young men
lent the girls books on Theosophy or discussed
Maeterlinck's Bluebird. All was sentiment and
high ideals. Nowadays it is the maladjusted
lives and the complexes which bring a boy and girl
together."
"All such nonsense," said Mrs. Hubbard.
Poirot dissented.
"No, it is not all nonsense. The underlying
principles are sound enough-but when one is an earnest
young researcher like Colin one sees nothing but
complexes and the victim's unhappy home life."
"Celia's father died when she was four
years old,"
said Mrs. Hubbard. "And she's had a very
agreeable childhood with a nice but stupid mother."
"Ah, but she is wise enough not to say so to the young
Mcationabb! She will say what he wants to hear.
She is very much in love."
"Do you believe all this hooey, Mr.
Poirot?"
"I do not believe that Celia had a Cinderella
complex or that she stole things without knowing what she was
doing. I think she took the risk of stealing
unimportant trifles with the object of attracting
the attention of the earnest Colin Mcationabb-in which
object she has been successful. Had she
remained a pretty shy ordinary irl be might never
have looked at her.
In my opinion," said Poiro t, "a girl
is entitled to attempt desperate measures to get
her man."
"I shouldn't have thought she had the brains to think it
up," said Mrs. Hubbard.
Poirot did not reply. He frowned. Mrs.
Hubbard went on.
"So the whole thing's been a mare's nest! I
really do apologise, M. Poirot, for
taking p your time over such a trivial business.
Anyway, all's well that ends well."
"No, no." Poirot shook his head. "I do not
think we are at the end yet. We have cleared out of the
way somethin, rather trivial that was at the front of the
Z, picture. But there are things still that are not
explained and me, I have the impression that we have here
something serious-really serious."
Mrs. Hubbard's face clouded over again.
"Oh, Mr. Poirot, do you really think so?"
"It is my impression. . . . I wonder,
Madame, if I could speak to Miss Patricia
Lane. I would like to examine the ring that was stolen."
"Why, of course, Mr. Poirot. I'll go
down and send
her up to you. I want to speak to Len Bateson
about something."
Patricia Lane came in shortly afterward with an
inquiring look on her face.
"T am so sorry to disturb you, Miss
Lane."
"Oh, that's all right. I wasn't busy.
Mrs. Hubbard said you wanted to see my ring."
She slipped it off her finger and held it out to him.
"It's quite a large diamond really, but of
course it's an old fashioned setting. It was
mymother's engagement ring."
Poirot, who was examining the ring, nodded his head.
"She is alive still, your mother?"
"No. Both my parents are dead."
"That is sad."
"Yes. They were both very nice people but somehow I was
never quiet so close to them as I ought to have been.
One regrets that afterwards. My mother wanted a
frivolous pretty daughter, a daughter who was
fond of clothes and social things. She was very
disappointed when I took up archeology."
"You have always been of a serious turn of mind?"
"I think so, really. One feels life is so
short one ought really to be doing something worth while."
Poirot looked at her thoughtfully.
Patricia Lane was, he guessed, in her
early thirties. Apart from a smear of lipstick,
carelessly applied, she wore no make-up. Her
mouse coloured hair was combed back from her face and
arranged without artifice. Her quite pleasant blue
eyes looked at you seriously through glasses.
"No allure, bon Dieu," said Poirot
to himself with feeling. "And her clothes! What is it they
say? Dragged through a hedge backwards?
Ma for, that expresses it exactly!"
He was disapproving. He found Patricia's
well bred unaccented tones wearisome to the ear. "She
is intelligent and cultured, this girl," he said
to himself, "and, alas, every year she will grow more boring!
In old age-was His mind darted for a fleeting moment
to the memory of the Countess Vera Rossakoff.
What exotic splendour there, even in decay! These
girls of nowadays "But that is because I grow old,"
said Poirot to himself. "Even this excellent girl
may appear a veritable Venus to some man." But he
doubted that.
Patricia was saying,
"I'm really very shocked about what happened
to Bess-to Miss Johnston. Using that green ink
seems to me to be a deliberate attempt to make
it look as though it was Nigel's doing. But I do
assure you, M.
Poirot, Nigel would never do a thing like that."
"Ah." Poirot looked at her with more interest.
She had become flushed and quite eager.
"Nigel's not easy to understand," she said
earnestly. "You see, he had a very difficult
home life as a child."
"Mon Dieu, another of them!"
"I beg your pardon?"
"Nothing. You were saying"
"About Nigel. His being difficult. He's always
had the tendency to go against authority of any kind.
He's very clever-brilliant really, but I must
admit that he sometimes has a very unfortunate
manner. Sneering-you know. And he's much too
scornful ever to explain or defend himself. Even if
everybody in this place thinks he did that trick with the
ink, he won't go out of his way to say he didn't.
He'll just say, 'Let them think it if they want
to." And that attitude is really so utterly
foolish."
"It can be misunderstood, certainly."
"It's a kind of pride, I think. Because he's
been so much misunderstood always."
"You have known him many years?"
"No, only for about a year. We met on a
tour of the Chateaux of the Loire. He went down with
flu which turned to pneumonia and I nursed him through
it. He's plus very delicate and he takes
absolutely no care of his own health. In some
ways, in spite of his being so independent, he needs
looking after like a child. He really needs someone to look
after him."
Poirot sinhed. He felt, suddenly, very tired
of love.... First there had been Celia, with the
adoring eyes of a spaniel. And now here was
Patricia looking like an earnest Madonna.
Admittedly there must be love, young people must meet and
pair off, but he, Poirot, was mercifully past
all that. He rose to his feet.
"Will you permit me, Mademoiselle, to retain
your ring? It shall be returned to you tomorrow without fail."
"Certainly, if you like," said Patricia, rather
surprised.
"You are very kind. And please, Mademoiselle,
be caref u I.
"Careful? Careful of what?"
"I wish I knew," said Hercule Poirot,
still worried.
THE FOLLOWING DAY Mrs. Hubbard found
exasperating in every particular. She had wakened with a
considerable sense of relief. The nagging doubt about
recent occurrences was at last relieved. A
silly girl, behaving in that silly modern fashion
(with which Mrs. Hubbard had no patience), had been
responsible. And from now on, order would reign.
Descending to breakfast in this comfortable assurance,
Mrs. Hubbard found her newly attained
ease menaced. The students chose this particular
morning to be particularly trying, each in his or her
way.
Mr. Chandra Lal who had heard of the sabotage
to Elizabeth's papers became excited and voluble.
"Oppression," he spluttered, "deliberate
oppression of native races. Contempt and
prejudice, colour prejudice. It is here
well authenticated example."
"Now, Mr. Chandra Lal," said Mrs.
Hubbard sharply. "You've no call to say anything
of that kind. Nobody knows who did it or why it was
done."
"Oh but, Mrs. Hubbard, I thought Celia had
come to you herself and really faced up," said Jean
Tomlinson. "I thought it splendid of her. We
must all be very kind to her."
"Must you be so revoltingly pi, Jean?" demanded
Valerie Hobhouse angrily.
"I think that's a very unkind thing to say."
"Faced up," said Nigel with a shudder. "Such an
utterly revolting term."
I don't see why. The Oxford Group use it
and" conea"Oh, for Heaven's sake, have we gggyt
to have the Oxford Group for breakfast?"
"What's all this, Ma? Is it Celia who's
been pinchmg those things, do you say? Is that why she's
not down to breakfast?"
"I do not understand, please," said Mr.
Akibombo.
Nobody enlightened him. They were all too
anxious to say their own piece.
"Poor kid," Len Bateson went on.
"Was she hard up or something?"
"I'm not really surprised, you know," said Sally
slowly-"I always had a sort of idea. . ."
"You are saying that it was Celia who spilt ink
on my notes?" Elizabeth Johnston looked
incredulous. "That seems to me surprising and hardly
credible."
"Celia did not throw ink on your work," said
Mrs. Hubbard. "And I wish you would all stop
discussing this. I meant to tell you all quietly
later but-was
"But Jean was listening outside the door last
nifht," said Valerie.
"I was not listening. I just happened to go-was
"Come now, Bess," said Nigel. "You know quite
well who spilt the ink. I, said bad Nigel, with
my little green phial. I spilt the ink."
"He didn't. He's only pretending! Oh
Nigel, how can you be so stupid?"
"I'm being noble and shielding you, Pat. Who
borrowed my ink yesterday morning? You did."
"I do no t understand, please," said Mr.
Akibombo.
"You don't want to," Sally told him.
"I'd keep right out of it if I were you."
Mr. Chandra Lal rose to his feet.
"You ask why is the Mau Mau? You ask why
does Egypt resent the Suez Canal?"
"Oh, hell!" said Nigel violently, and
crashed his cup down on his saucer. "First the Oxford
Group and now politics! At breakfast! I'm
going."
He pushed back his chair violently and left the
room.
"There's a cold wind. Do take your coat."
Patricia rushed after him.
"Cluck, cluck, cluck," said Valerie
unkindly. "She'll grow feathers and flap her wings
soon."
The French girl, Genevieve, whose English was
as yet not equal to following rapid exchanges had
been listening to explanations hissed into her ear
by Ren6. She now burst into rapid French, her
voice rising to a scream.
"Comment dong? Ciest cette petite qui m'a
vole mon compact? Ah, par example!
J'irais a la police. fe time
supporterais pas une pareille. . ."
Colin Mcationabb had been attempting to make
himself heard for some time, but his deep superior drawl
had been drowned by the higher pitched voices.
Abandoning his superior attitude he now brought
down his fist with a heavy crash on the table and startled
everyone into silence. The marmalade pot skidded off
the table and broke.
"Will you hold your tongues, all of you, and hear
me speak. I've never heard more crass ignorance
and unkindness! Don't any of you have even a nodding
acquaintance with psychology? The girl's not to be
blamed, I tell you. She's been going through a
severe emotional crisis and she needs treating with the
utmost sympathy and care-or she may remain
unstable for life. I'm warning you. The utmost
care-that's what she needs."
"But after all," said Jean, in a clear, priggish
voice,
"although I quite agree about being kind-we
oughtn't to condone that sort of thing, ought we? Stealing,
I mean."
"Stealing," said Colin. "This wasn't stealing.
Och!
You make me sick-all of you."
"Interesting case, is she, Colin?" said
Valerie and grinned at him.
"If you're interested in the workings of the mind,
yes."
"Of course, she didn't take anything of
mine-was began Jean, "but I do think-was
"No, she didn't take anything of yours," said
Colin, turning to scowl at her. "And if you knew
in the least what that meant you'd maybe not be too
pleased about it.eaong
"Really, I don't see-was
"Oh, come on, Jean," said Len Bateson.
"Let's stop nagging and nattering. I'm going to be
late and so are you.
They went out together. "Tell Celia to buck
up," he said over his shoulder.
"I should like to make formal protest," said Mr.
Chandra Lal. "Boracic powder very necessary for my
eyes which much inflamed by study, was removed.."
"And you'll be late too, Mr. Chandra
Lal," said Mrs. Hubbard firmly.
"My Professor is often unpunctual," said
Mr. Chandra Lal gloomily, but moving towards the
door. "Also, he is irritable and unreasonable when
I ask many questions of searching nature-was
"Mais il faut qu'elle me le rende, ce
compact," said Genevieve.
"You must speak English, Genevieve-you'll never
learn English if you go back into French whenever
you're excited. And you had Sunday dinner in this
week and you haven't paid me for it."
"Ah, I have not my purse just now. Tonight-Viens,
Rend, nous serons en retard."
"Please," said Mr. Akibombo, looking round
him beseechingly. "I do not understand."
"Come along, Akibombo," said Sally. "I'll
tell you all about it on the way to the Institute."
She nodded reassuringly to Mrs. Hubbard and
steered the bewildered Akibombo out of the room.
"Oh dear," said Mrs. Hubbard, drawing a
deep breath. "Why in the world I ever took this job
on!"
Valerie, who was the only person left, grinned
in a friendly fashion.
"Don't worry, Ma," she said.
"It's a good thing it's all come out! Everyone was
getting on the jumpy side."
"I must say I was very surprised."
"That it turned out to be Celia?"
"Yes. Weren't you?"
Valerie said in a rather absent voice,
"Rather obvious, really, I should have thought."
"Have you been thinking so all along?"
"Well, one or two things made me wonder.
At any rate she's got Colin where she wants
him."
"Yes, I can't help feeling that it's wrong."
"You can't get a man with a gun," Valerie
laughed. "But a spot of kleptomania does the
trick? Don't worry, Mum. And for God's
sake make Celia give Genevieve back her
compact, otherwise we shall never have any peace at
meals."
Mrs. Hubbard said with a sigh,
"Nigel has cracked his saucer and the marmalade
pot is broken."
histo 'ell of a morning, isn't it?" said Valerie.
She went out. Mrs. Hubbard heard her voice in
the hall saying cheerfully,
"Good morning, Celia. The coast's
clear. All is known and all is going to be
forgiven-by order of Pious
Jean. As for Colin, he's been roaring like a
lion on your behalf."
Celia came into the dining room. Her eyes were
reddened with crying.
"Oh, Mrs. Hubbard."
"You're very late, Celia. The coffee's cold
and there's not much left to cat."
"I didn't want to meet the others."
"So I gather. But you've got to meet them
sooner or later."
"Oh, yes, I know. But I thought-by this evening
comx would be easier. And of course I shall't stop
on here. I'll go at the end of the week."
Mrs. Hubbard frowned.
"I don't think there's any need for that. You must
expect a little unpleasantness-that's only fair-but
they're generous minded young people on the whole. Of
course you'll have to make reparation as far as
possible-was
Celia interrupted her eagerly.
"Oh yes. I've got my cheque book here.
That's one of the things I wanted to say to you." She
looked down. She was holding a cheque
book and an envelope in her hand. "I'd written
to you in case you weren't about when I got down, to say
how sorry I was and I meant to put in a cheque,
so that you could square up with people-but my pen ran out of
ink."
"We'll have to make a list."
"I have-as far as possible. But I don't know
whether to try and buy new things or just to give the
money."
"I'll think it over. It's difficult to say
offhand."
"Oh, but do let me we you a cheque now. I'd
feel so much better."
About to say uncompromisingly "Really? And why
should you be allowed to make yourself feel better?"
Mrs. Hubbard reflected that since the students
were always short of ready cash, the whole affair would be
more easily settled that way. It would also placate
Genevieve who otherwise might make trouble with
Mrs. Nicoletis. (there would be trouble enough there
anyway.)
"All right," she said. She ran her eye down the
list of objects. "It's difficult to say how much
offhand" Celia said eagerly, "Let me give you
a cheque for what you think roughly and then you
find out from people and I can take some back or give you
more."
"Very well." Mrs. Hubbard tentatively
mentioned a sum which gave, she considered, ample
margin, and Celia agreed at once. She opened the
cheque book.
"Oh bother my pen." She went over to the
shelves where odds and ends were kept belonging to various
students. "There doesn't seem to be any ink here
except Nigel's awful green. Oh, I'll
use that. Nigel won't mind, I must remember
to get a new bottle of Ouink when I go out."
She filled the pen and came back and wrote out the
cheque.
Giving it to Mrs. Hubbard, she glanced at her
watch.
"I shall be late. I'd better not stop for
breakfast."
"Now you'd better have something, Celia-even if
it's only a bit of bread and butter-no good going
out on an emlyly stomach. Yes, what is it?"
Geronimo, the Italian manservant, had come
into the room and was making emphatic gestures with his
hands, his wizened monkey-like face screwed up in a
comical grimace.
"The Padrona, she just come in. She want
to see you." He added, with a final gesture, "She
plenty mad."
"I'm coming."
Mrs. Hubbard left the room while Celia
hurriedly began hacking a piece off the loaf.
Mrs. Nicoletis was walking up and down her
room in a fairly good imitation of a tiger at the
Zoo near feeding time.
"What is this I hear?" she burst out. "You send
for the police? Without a word to me? Who do you think you
are? My God, who does the woman think she
is?"
"I did not send for the police."
"You are a liar."
"Now then, Mrs. Nicoletis, you can't talk
to me like that."
"Oh no. Certainly not! It is I who am
wrong, not you. Always me. Everything you do is
perfect. Police in my respectable Hostel."
"It wouldn't be the first time," said "Jrs.
Hubbard, recalling various unpleasant incidents.
"There was that West Indian student who was wanted for
living on immoral earnings and the notorious young
communist agitator who came here under a
false name-and-was
"Ah! You throw that in my teeth? Is it my
fault that people come here and He to me and have forged papers
and are wanted to assist the police in murder
cases? And you reproach me for what I have
suffereeaggI!"
"I'm doing nothing of the kind. I only point out
that it wouldn't be exactly a novelty to have the
police here comI daresay it's inevitable with a mixed
lot of students. But the fact is that no one has
"called in the police." A private
detective with a big reputation happened to dine here
as my guest last night. He gave a very interesting
talk on criminology to the students."
"As if there were any need to talk about
criminology to our students! They know quite enough already.
Enough to steal and destroy and sabotage as they like! And
nothing is done about it-nothing!"
"T have done something about it."
"Yes, you have told this friend of yours all about our
most intimate affairs. That is a gross breach of
confidence."
"Not at all. I'm responsible for running this
place. I'm glad to tell you the matter is now
cleared up. One of the students has confessed
that she has been responsible for most of these
happenings."
"Dirty little cat," said Mrs. Nicoletis.
"Throw her into the street."
"She is ready to leave of her own accord and she
is making full reparation."
"What is the good of that? My beautiful
Students" Home will now have a bad name. No one
will come."
Mrs. Nicoletis sat down on the sofa and
burst into tears. "Nobody thinks of my feelings,"
she sobbed. "It is abominable, the way I am
treated. Ignored! Thrust aside! If I wete
to die tomorrow, who would care?"
Wisely leaving this question unanswered, Mrs.
Hubhard left the room.
"May the Almighty give me patience," said
Mrs. Hubbard to herself and went down to the kitchen
to interview Maria.
Maria was sullen and uncooperative. The word
"police" hovered unspoken in the air.
"It is I who WiRather be accused. I and
Geronimo-the povero. What justice can you expect
in a foreign land?
No, I cannot cook the risotto as you
suggesthey send the wrong rice. I make you instead
the spaghetti."
"We had spaghetti last night."
"It does not matter. In my country we eat the
spaghetti every day-every single day. The pasta, it is
good all the time."
"Yes, but you're in England now."
"Very well then, I make the stew. The English
stew. You will not like it but I make it-pale-palewith
the onions boiled in much water instead of cooked in
the oil-and pale meat on cracked bones."
Maria spoke so menacingly that Mrs. Hubbard
felt she was listening to an account of a murder.
"Oh, cook what you like," she said angrily and
left the kitchen.
By six o'clock that evening, Mrs. Hubbard was once
more her efficient self again. She had put notes in
all the students' rooms asking them to come and see her
before dinner, and when the various summonses were obeyed,
she explained that Celia had asked her to arrange
matters. They were all, she comthought, very nice about it.
Even Genevieve, softened by a generous estimate
of the value of her compact, said cheerfully that all would
be sans rancune and added with a wise air, "One
knows that these crises of the nerves occur. She
is rich, this Celia, she does not need to steal.
No, it is a storm in her head. M. Mcationabb
is right there."
Len Bateson drew Mrs. Hubbard aside as
she came down when the dinner bell rang.
"I'll wait for Celia out in the hall," he
said, "and bring her in. So that she sees it's all
right."
"That's very nice of you, Len."
"That's O.K., Ma."
In due course, as soup was being passed round,
Len's voice was heard booming from the hall.
"Come along in, Celia. All friends here."
Nigel remarked waspishly to his soup plate,
"Done his good deed for the day!" but otherwise
controlled his tongue and waved a hand of greeting
to Celia as she came in with Len's large arm
passed round her shoulders.
There was a general outburst of cheerful conversation on
various topics and Celia was appealed to by one and the
other.
Almost inevitably this manifestation of goodwill
died away into a doubtful silence. It was then that
MT. Akibombo turned a beaming face towards
Celia and leaning across the table said:
"They have explained me good now all that I did not
understand. You very clever at steal things. Long time
nobody know. Very clever."
At this point Sally Finch, gasping out,
"Akibombo, you'll be the death of me," had such a
severe choke that she had to go out in the hall
to recover. And the laughter broke out in a thoroughly
natural fashion.
Colin Mcationabb came in late. He seemed
reserved and even more uncommunicative than
usual. At the close of the meal and before the others had
finished he got up and said in an embarrassed
mumble,
"Got to go out and see someone. Like to tell you all
first Celia and I-hope to get married next year
when I've done my course."
The picture of blushing misery, he received the
congratulations and jeering cat-calls of his friends and
finally escaped, looking terribly sheepish.
Celia, on the other side, was pink and composed.
"Another good man gone West," sighed Len
Bateson.
"I'm so glad, Celia," said Patricia.
"I hope you'll be very happy." "Everything in the
garden is now perfect," said Nigel.
"Tomorrow we'll bring some chianti in and drink your
health. Why is our dear Jean looking so grave?
Do you disapprove of marria e, Jean?"
"Of course not, Nigel."
"I always think it's so much better than Free
Love, don't you? Nicer for the children. Looks
better on their passports."
"But the mother should not be too young," said Genevieve.
"They tell one that in comthe Physiology
classes."
"Really, dear," said Nigel, "you're not
suggesting that Celia's below the age of consent or
anything like that, are you? She's free, white, and
twenty-one."
"That," said Mr. Chandra Lal, "is a most
offensive remark."
"No, no, Mr. Chandra Lal," said
Patricia. "It's just a-a kind of idiom. It
doesn't mean anything."
"I do not understand," said Mr. Akibombo. "If
a thing does not mean anything, why should it be said?"
Elizabeth Johnston said suddenly, raising her
voice a little,
"Things are sometimes said comt do not seem to mean
anything but they mean a good deal. No, it is
not your American quotation I mean. I am talking
of something else." She looked round the table. "I
am talking of what happened yesterday."
Valerie said sharply,
"What's up, Bess?"
"Oh, please," said Celia. "T think-I
really do-that by tomorrow everything will be cleared up. I really
mean it. The ink on your papers, and that silly
business of the rucksack. And if-if the person owns
up, like I've done, then everything will be cleared up."
She spoke earnestly, with a flushed face, and one
or two people looked at her curiously.
Valerie said with a short laugh,
"And we'll all live happy ever afterwards."
Then they got up and went into the Common Room.
There was quite a little competition to give Celia her
coffee. Then the wireless was turned on, some
students left to keep appointments or to work and
finally the inhabitants of 24 and 26 Hickory
Road got to bed.
It had been, Mrs. Hubbard reffected, as she
climbed gratefully betweenthe sheets, a long wearying
day.
"But thank goodness," she said to herself. "It's all
over now."
Miss LEMON WAS SELDOM, if ever,
unpunctual. Fog, storm, epidemics of flu,
transport breakdowns-none of these things seemed
to affect that remarkable woman. But this morning Miss
Lemon arrived, breathless, at five minutes past
ten instead of on the stroke of ten o'clock. She was
profusely apologetic and for her, quite ruffled.
"I'm extremely sorry, Mr.
Poirot-really extremely sorry. I was just about
to leave the flat when my sister rang up."
"Ah, she is in good health and spirits, I trust?"
"Well, frankly no." Poirot looked
inquiring. "In fact, she's very distressed. One
of the students has committed suicide."
Poirot stared at her. He muttered something
softly under his breath.
"I beg your pardon, Mr. Poirot?"
:, What is the name of the student?"
"A girl called Celia Austin."
"How?"
"They think she took morphia."
"Could it have been an accident?"
"Oh no. She left a note, it seems."
Poirot said softly, "It was not this I
expected, no, it was not this ... and yet it
is true, I expected something."
He looked up to find Miss Lemon at
attention, waiting with pencil poised above her pad.
He sighed and shook his head.
"No, I will hand you here this morning's mail.
File them, please, and answer what you can. Me,
I shall go round to Hickory Road."
Geronimo let Poirot in and recognizing him
as the honoured guest of two nights before became at
once voluble in a sibilant conspirational whisper.
"Ah, Signor, it is you. We have here the trouble
the big trouble. The little Signorina, she is dead in
her bed this morning. First the doctor come. He shake
his head. Now comes an Inspector of the Police.
He is upstairs with the Signora and the Padrona.
Why should she wish to kill herself, the poverina? When
last night all is so gay and the betrothment is
made?"
"Betrothment?"
"Si, si. To Mr. Colin-you know combig, dark,
always smoke the pipe."
"I know."
Geronimo opened the door of the Common Room and
introduced Poirot into it with a redoublement of the
conspiratorial manner.
"You stay here, yes? Presently, when the
police go, I tell the Signora you are here. That
is good, yes?"
Poirot said that it was good and Geronimo withdrew.
Left to himself, Poirot who had no scruples of
delicacy, made as minute an examination as
possible of everything in the room with special attention
to everything belonging to the students. His rewards were
mediocre. The students kept most of their belongings
and personal papers in their bedrooms.
Upstairs, Mrs. Hubbard was sitting facing
Inspector Sharpe who was asking questions in a soft
apologetic voice. He was a big, confidential
looking man with a deceptively mild manner.
"It's very awkward and distressing for you, I know,"
he said soothingly. "But you see, as Dr. Coles
has already told you, there will have to be an inquest, and
we have just to get the picture right, so to speak. Now this
girl had been distressed and unhappy lately, you
say?"
"Yes."
"Love affair?"
"Not exactly." Mrs. Hubbard hesitated.
"You'd better tell me, you know," said
Inspector Sharpe, persuasively. "As
I say, we've got to get the picture. There was
a reason, or she thought there was, for taking her own
life? Any possibility that she might have been
pregnant?"
"It wasn't that kind of thing at all. I
hesitated, Inspector Sharpe, simply because the child
had done some very foolish things and I hoped it
needn't be necessary to bring them out in the open."
Inspector Sharpe coughed.
"We have a good deal of discretion, and the Coroner
is a man of wide experience. But we have to know."
"Yes, of course. I was being foolish. The
truth is that for some time past, three months or more,
things have been disappeariny-smah things, I mearmothing
very important."
"Trinkets, you mean, finery, nylon stockings and
all that? Money, too?"
"No money as far as I know."
"Ah. And this girl was responsible?"
"Yes.
"You'd caught her at it?"
"Not exactly. The night before last a-er-a friend
of mine came to dine. A M. Hercule
Poirot-I don't know if you know the name."
Inspector Sharpe had looked up from his
notebook. His eyes had opened rather wide. It
happened that he did know the name.
"M. Hercule Poirot?" he said. "Indeed?
Now that's very interesting."
"He gave us a little talk after dinner and the
subject of these thefts came up. He advised
me, in front of them all, to go to the police."
"He did, did he?"
"Afterwards, Celia came along to my room and
owned up. She was very distressed."
"Any question of prosecution?"
"No. She was going to make good the losses, and
everyone was very nice to her about it."
"Had she been hardup?"
"No. She had an adequately paid job as
dispenser at St. Catherine's Hospital and has a
little money of her own, I believe. She was rather
better off than most of our students."
"So she'd no need to steal-but did," said the
Inspector, writing it down.
"It's kleptomania, I suppose," said
Mrs. Hubbard.
"That's the label that's used. I just mean one of the
people that don't need to take things, but nevertheless do take
them."
"I wonder if you're being a little unfair to her.
You see, there was a young man."
"And he ratted on her?"
"Oh no. Quite the reverse. He spoke very
strongly in her defence and as a matter of fact last
night, after supper, he announced that they'd become
engaged."
Inspector Sharpe's eyebrows mounted his forehead
in a surprised fashion.
"And then she goes up to bed and takes morphia?
That's rather surprising, isn't it?"
G It is. I can't understand it."
Mrs. Hubbard's face was creased with perplexity
and distress.
"And yet the facts are clear enough." Sharpe
nodded to the small torn piece of paper that lay on
the
table between them.
Dear Mrs. Hubbard, (it ran) I really am
sorry- and
this is the best thing I can do.
"It's not signed, but you've no doubt it's her
handwriting?"
'ationo.
Mrs. Hubbard spoke rather uncertainly
and frowned as she looked at the torn scrap of
paper. Why did she feel so strongly that there was
something wrong about it-his
"There's one clear fingerprint on it which is
definitely hers," said the Inspector. "The
morphia was in a small bottle with the label of
St. Catherine's Hospital on it and you tell me
that she works as a dispenser in St. Catherine's.
She'd have access to the poison cupboard and that's where
she probably got it. Presumably she brought it
home with her yesterday with suicide in nful."
"I really can't believe it. It doesn't seem
right some
how. She was so happy last night."
"Then we must suppose that a reaction set in when
she went up to bed. Perhaps there's more in her past than
you know about. Perhaps she was afraid of that coming out. You
think she was very much in love with this young man-what's his
name, by the way?"
"Colin Mcationabb. He's doing a post
graduate course
at St. Catherine's."
"A doctor? Hm. And at St.
Catherine's?"
"Celia was very much in love with him, more
I
should say, than he with her. He's a rather
self-centered young man."
"Then that's probably the explanation. She
didn't feel worthy of him, or hadn't told him
all she ought to tell him. She was quite young, wasn't
she?"
"Twenty-three."
"They're idealistic at that age and they take
love affairs hard. Yes, that's it, I'm
afraid. Pity."
He rose to his feet. "I'm afraid the
actual facts will have to come out, but we'll do all we
can to gloss things over. Thank you, Mrs. Hubbard.
I've got all the information I need now. Her mother
died two years ago and the only relative you know of
is this elderly aunt in Yorkshire-we'll
communicate with her."
He picked up the small torn fragment with
Celia's agitated writing oDit .
"There's something wrong about that," said Mrs.
Hubbard suddenly.
"Wrong? In what way?"
"I don't know comb I feel I ought to know. Oh
dear."
"You're quite sure it's her handwriting?"
"Oh yes. It's not that." Mrs. Hubbard
pressed her hands to her eyeballs.
"I feel so dreadfully stupid this morning," she
said apologetically.
"It's all been very trying for you, I know," said the
Inspector with gentle sympathy. "I don't think
we need to trouble you further at the moment, Mrs.
Hubhard."
Inspector Sharpe opened the door and immediately
fell over Gerortimo who was pressed against the
door outside.
"Hullo," said Inspector Sharpe
pleasantly. "Listening at doors, eh?"
"No, no," Geronimo answered with an air of
virtuous
indignation. "I do not listermever, never! I am just
coming in with message."
"I see. What message?"
Geronimo said sulkily,
"Only that there is gentleman downstairs to see
la Signora Hubbard."
"All right. Go along in, sonny, and tell
her."
He walked past Geronimo down the
passage and then, taking a leaf out of the Italian's
book, turned sharply, and tiptoed Doiselessly
back. Might as well know if little monkey face
had been telling the truth.
He arrived in time to hear Geronimo say,
"The gentleman who came to supper the other
night, the gentleman with the moustaches, he is
downstairs waiting to see you."
"Eh? What?" Mrs. Hubbard sounded
abstracted. "Oh, thank you, Geronimo. I'll
be down in a minute or two.
"Gentleman with the moustaches, eh," said Sharpe
to himself, grinning. "I bet I know who that is."
He went downstairs and into the Common Room.
"Hullo, Mr. Poirot," he said. "It's a
long time since we met."
Poircyt rose without visible discomposure from a
kneeling position by the bottom shelf near the
fireplace.
"Aha," he said. "But surely-yes, it is
Inspector Sharpe, is it not? But you were not formerly
in this division?"
"Transferred two years ago. Remember that
business down at Crays Hill?"
"Ah yes. That is a long time ago
now. You are still a young man, Inspector"
"Getting on, getting on."
hiscomand I am an old one. Alas!" Poirot
si,eaeahe'd.
"But still active, eh, Mr. Poirot.
Active in certain ways, shall we say?"
"Now what do you mean by that?"
"I mean that I'd like to know why you came along here
the other night to give a andM on criminology
to students."
Poirot smiled.
"But there is such a simple explanation. Mrs.
Hubhard here is the sister of my much valued
secretary, Miss Lemon. So when she asked
me-was
"When she asked you to look into what had been going
on here, you came along. That's it really, isn't
it?"
"You are quite correct."
"But why? That's what I want to know. What was
there in it for you?"
"To interest me, you mean?"
"That's what I mean. Here's a silly kid
who's been pinching a few things here and there. Happens
all the time. Rather small beer for you, Mr.
Poirot, isn't it?"
Poirot shook his head.
"Why not? What isn't simple about it?"
"It is not so simple as that."
Poirot sat down on a chair. With a slight
frown he dusted the knees of his trousers.
"I wish I knew," he said simply.
Sharpe frowned.
"I don't understand," he said.
"No, and I do not understand. The things that were taken"
he shook his head. "They did not make a
pattern-they did not make sense. It is like seeing
a trail of footprints and they are not all made
by the same feet. There is, quite clearly, the print of
what you have called "a silly kid"-but there is more
than that. Other things happened that were meant to fit in
with the pattern of Celia Austin-but they did not fit
in. They were meaningless, apparently purposeless.
There
was evidence, too, of malice. And Celia was not
malicious."
"She was a kleptomaniac?"
"I should very much doubt it."
coneaJust an ordinary petty thief, then?"
"Not in the way you mean. I give it
to you as my opinion that all this pilfering of petty
objects was done to attract the attention of a certain
young man."
'Colin Mcationabb?"
disccallyes. She was desperately in love with
Colin Meationabb. Colin never noticed her.
Instead of a nice, pretty, well behaved young
girl, she displayed herself as an interesting young
criminal. The result was successful. Colin
Mcationabb immediately fell for her, as they say, in a
big way."
was He must be a complete fool, then."
"Not at all. He is a keen psychologist."
"Oh," Inspector Sharpe groaned. "One of
those! I understand now." A faint grin showed on his
face. "Pretty smart of the girl."
"SLFFRPRISINGLY so."
Poirot repeated, musingly, "Yes,
surprisingly so."
Inspector Sharpe looked alert.
coneaMeaning by that, Mr. Poirot?"
'That I wondered-I still wonder-if the idea
had been suggested to her by someone else?"
"For what reason?"
"How do I know? Altruism? Some
ulterior motive?
One is in the dark."
"Any ideas as to who it might have been who gave
he r the tip?"
coneaationo-unless-but n"
'All the same," said Sharpe, pondering, "I
don't quite get it. If she's been simply trying
this kleptomania business on, and it's succeeded,
why the hell go and commit suicide?"
"The answer is that she should not have committed
suicide."
The two men looked at each other.
Poirot murmured:
coneaally are quite sure that she did?"
'It's clear as day, Mr. Poirot There's
no reason to believe otherwise and-was
The door opened and Mrs. Hubbard came in.
She looked flushed and triumphant. Her chin
stuck out aggressively.
"I've got it," she said triumphantly.
"Good morning, Mr. Poirot. I've got it,
Inspector Sharpe. It came to me quite suddenly.
Whythat suicide note looked wrong, I mean.
Celia couldn't possibly have written it."
"Why not, Mrs. Hubbard?"
"Because it's written in ordinary blue black
ink. And Celia filled her pen with green ink-that ink
over there," Mrs. Hubbard nodded towards the shelf,
"at breakfast'time yesterday morning."
Inspector Sharpe, a somewhat different
Inspector Sharpe, came back into the room which he
had left abruptly after Mrs. Hubbard's
statement.
"Quite right," he said. "I've checked up. The
only pen in the girl's room, the one that was by her
bed, has green ink in it. Now that green ink"
Mrs. Hubbard held up the nearly empty
bottle.
Then she explained, clearly and concisely, the
scene at the breakfast table.
"I feel sure," she ended, "that the scrap of
paper was torn out of the letter she had written to me
yesterday-and which I never opened."
"What did she do with it? Can you remember?"
Mrs. Hubbard shook her head.
"I left her alone in here and went to do my
housekeeping. She must, I think, have left it lying
somewhere in here, and forgotten about it."
"And somebody found it ... and opened it somebody-was
He broke off.
"You realize," he said, "what this means? I
haven't been very happy about this torn bit of paper
all along. There was quite a pile of lecture
notepaper in her room commuch more natural to write
a suicide note on one of them. This means that
somebody saw the possibility of using the opening
phrase of her letter to you-to suggest something very
different. To suggest suicide-was
He paused and then said slowly, "This means-was
"Murder," said Hercule Poirot.
THOUGH PERSONALLY DEPRECATING le five
o'clock as inhibiting the proper appreciation of the
supreme meal of the day, dinner, Poirot was now
getting quite accustomed to serving it.
The resourceful George had on this occasion
produced large cups, a pot of really strong-
Indian tea and, in addition to the hot and buttery
square crumpets, bread and jam and a large square
of rich plum cake.
All this for the delectation of Inspector Sharpe
who was leaning back contentedly sipping his third cup
of tea.
"You don't mind my coming along like this, M.
Poirot? I've got an hour to spare until
the time when
the students will be getting back. I shall want to question
them all and, frankly, it's not a business I'm
lookin, forward to. You met some of them the other
night and I wondered If you could give me any
useful dope comon the foreigners, anyway."
"You think I am a good judge of foreigners?
But, mon cher, there were no Belgians amongst them."
"No Belg- Oh, I see what you mean! You
mean that as you're a Belgian, all the other
nationalities are as foreign to you as they are to me.
Butthat's not quite true, is it? I mean you
probably know more about the Continental types than I
do-though not the Indians and the West Africans and that
lot."
"Your best assistance will probably be from Mrs.
Hubbard. She has been there for some months in
intimate association with these young people and she is quite a
good judge of human nature."
"Yes, thoroughly competent woman. I'm
relying on her. I shall have to see the proprietress
of the place, too. She wasn't there this morning.
Owns several of these places, I understand, as well
as some of the student clubs. Doesn't seem to be
much liked."
Poirot said nothing for a moment or two,
then he asked,
"You have been to St. Catherine's?"
"Yes. The Chief Pharmacist was most
helpful. He was much shocked and distressed by the
news."
"What did he say of the girl?"
"She'd worked there for just over a year and was well
liked. He described her as rather slow, but very
conscientious." He paused and then added, "The
morphia came from there all right."
"It did? That is interesting-and rather puzzling."
"It was morphine tartrate. Kept in the
poison cupboard in the Dispensary. Uppei
shelf-among drugs that were not often used. The
hypodermic tablets, of
course, are what are in general use, and it
appears that morphine hydrochloride is more often
used than the tartrate. There seems to be a kind of
fashion in drugs like everything else. Doctors
seem to follow one
another in prescribing like a lot of sheep. He
didn't say that. It was my own thought. There are some
drugs in the upper shelf of that cupboard that were once
popular, but haven't been prescribed for years."
"So the absence of one small dusty
phial would not immediately be noticed?"
"That's right. Stock-taking is only done at
regular intervals. Nobody remembers any
prescription with morphine tartrate in it for a long
time. The absence of the bottle wouldn't be noticed
until it was wanted-or until they went over
stock. The three dispensers all had keys of the
poison cupboard and the Dangerous Drug
cupboard. The cupboards are opened as needed, and as
on a busy day (which is practically every day) someone
is going to the cupboard every few minutes, the
cupboard is unlocked and remains unlocked till
the end of work."
"Who had access to it, other than Celia herself?"
"The two other women Dispensers, but they have no
connection of any kind with Hickory Road. One
has been there for four years, the other only came a
few weeks ago, was formerly at a Hospital in
Devon. Good record. Then there are the three
senior pharmacists who have all been at St.
Catherine's for years. Those are the people who have what you
might call rightful and normal access to the
cupboard. Then there's an old woman who scrubs
the floors. She's there between nine and ten in the morning
and she could have grabbed a bottle out of the
cupboard if the girls were busy at the
outpatients' hatches, or attending to the ward
baskets, but she's been working for the Hospital for
years and it seems very unlikely. The lab
attendant comes through with stock bottles and he,
too, could help himself to a bottle if he watched his
opportunity-but none of these suggestions seem at
all probable."
"What outsiders come into the Dispensary?"
ets' Quite a lot, one way or another. They'd
pass through the Dispensary to go to the Chief
Pharmacist's office, for instance-or travellers from
the big wholesale drug houses would go through it to the
manufacturing departments, Then, of course, friends
come in occasionally to see one of the dispensers-not a usual
thing, but it happens."
"That is better. Who came in recently to see
Celia Austin?"
Sharpe consulted his notebook.
"A girl called Patricia Lane came in
on Tuesday of last week. She wanted Celia
to come to meet her at the pictures after the Dispensary
closed."
"Patricia Lane," said Poirot thoughtfully.
"She was only there about five minutes and
she did not go near the poison cupboard but remained
near the Outpatients windows talking to Celia and
another girl. They also remember a coloured girl
comingab two weeks ago-a very superior girl, they
said. She was interested in the work and asked questions about it
and made notes. Spoke perfect English."
"That would be Elizabeth Johnston. She was
interested, was she?"
"It was a Welfare Clinic afternoon. She was
interested in the organisation of such things and also in what
was prescribed for such ailments as infant diarrhoea
and skin infections."
Poirot nodded.
"Anyone else?"
"Not that can be remembered."
"Do doctors come to the Dispensary?"
Sharpe grinned.
"All the time. Officially and unofficially.
Sometimes to ask about a particular formula, or to see
what is kept in stock."
"To see what is kept in stock?"
"Yes, I thought of that. Sometimes they ask
advice comab a substitute for some preparation that
seems to irritate a patient's skin or interfere
with digestion unduly. Sometimes a
physician just strolls in for a chat comslack moment.
A good many of the young chaps come in for veganin or
aspirin when they've got a hangover-and occasionally,
I'd say, for a flirtatious word or two with one
of the girls if the opportunity arises. Human
nature is always human nature. You see how it
is. Pretty hopeless."
Poirot said, "And if I recollect rightly,
one or more of the students at Hickory Road is
attached to St. Catherine's-a big red-haired
boy-BatesBateman-was
"Leonard Bateson. That's right. And Colin
Mcationabb is doing a post graduate course there.
Then there's a girl, Jean Tomlinson, who works
in the physiotherapy department."
"And all of these have probably been quite often in the
Dispensary?"
"Yes, and what's more, nobody remembers when
because they're used to seeing them and know them by sight.
Jean Tomlinson was by way of being a friend of the senior
Dispenser-was
"It is not easy," said Poircvt.
"I'll say it's not! You see, anyone who was
on the staff could take a look in the poison
cupboard, say, "Why on earth do you have
so much Liquor Arsenicalis" or something like that.
"Didn't know anybody used it nowadays." And
nobody would think twice about it or remember it."
Sharpe pause (i and then said:
"What we are postulating is that someone gave
Celia Austin morphia and afterwards put the
morphia bottle and the torn out fragment of letter in
her room to make it look like suicide. But why,
Mr. Poirot, why?"
Poirot shook his head. Sharpe went on:
"You hinted this morning that someone might have suggested
the kleptomania idea to CeHa Austin."
Poirot moved uneasily.
"That was only a vague idea of mine. It was just
that it seemed doubtful if she would have had the wits
to think of it herself."
"Then who?"
"As far as I know, onlythree of the students would
have been capable of thinking out such an idea.
Leonard Bateson would have had the requisite knowledge.
He is aware of Colin's enthusiasm for
'maladjusted personalities." He might have
suggested something of the kind to Celia more or less as a
joke and coached her in her part. But I cannot really
see him conniving at such a thing for month after
monthunless, that is, he had an ulterior motive,
or is a very different person from what he appears
to be. (that is always a thing one must take into account.)
Nigel Chapman has a mischievous and slightly
malicious turn of mind. He'd think it good fun,
and I should imagine, would have no scruples whatever.
He is a kind of grown up 'enfant terrible." The
third person I have in mind is a young woman
called Valerie Hobhouse. She has brains,
is modern in outlook and education, and has
probably read enough psychology to judge Colin's
probable reartion. If she were fond of Celia, she
might think it legitimate fun to make a fool of
Colin."
"Leonard Bateson, Nigel Chapman,
Valerie Hobhouse," said Sharpe writing down the
names. "Thanks for the tip. I'll remember when
I'm questioning them.
What about the Indians? One of them is a
medical student, too."
"His mind is entirely occupied with politics
and persecution mania," said Poirot. "I don't
think he would be interested enough to suggest kleptomania
to Celia Austin and I don't think she would have
accepted such advice from him."
"And that's all the help you can give me, Mr.
Poirot?"
said Sharpe, rising to his feet and buttoning
away his notebook.
"I fear so. But I consider myself personally
interested-that is if you, do not object, my friend?"
"Not in the least. Why should I?"
"In my own amateurish way I shall do what I
can. For me, there is, I think, only one line of
action."
"And that is?"
Poiro-t sighed.
"Conversation, my friend. Conversation and again conversation!
All the murderers I have ever come across enjoyed
talking. In my opinion the strong silent man
seldom commits a crime-and if he does it is
simple, violent and perfectly obvious. But our
clever subtle murderer-he is so pleased with himself that
sooner or later he says something unfortunate and
trips himself up. Talk to these people, mon cher, do not
confine yourself to simple interrogation. Encourage their
views, demand their help, inquire about their
hunches-but, bon Dieu! I do not need to teach you
your business. I remember your abilities well
enouch."
Sharpe smiled gently.
"Yes," he said, "I've always
found-well-amiability-a great help."
The two men smiled at each other in mutual
accord.
Sharpe rose to depart.
"I suppose every single one of them is a possible
murderer," he said slowly.
"I should think so," said Poirot nonchalantly.
"Leonard Bateson, for instance, has a temper.
He could lose control. Valerie Hobhouse has
brains and could plan cleverly. Nigel Chapman
is the childish type that lacks proportion. There
is a French girl there who might kill if enough
money were involved. Patricia Lane is a
maternal type and maternal types are always
ruthless. The American girl, Sally Finch, is
cheerful and gay, but she could play an assumed part
better than most. Jean Tomlinson is very full
of sweetness and righteousness, but we have all known
killers who attended Sunday school with sincere
devotion. The West Indian girl Elizabeth
Johnston has probably the best brains of
anyone in the Hostel. She has subordinated her
emotional life to her brain-Ahat is
dangerous. There is a charming young African who
might have motives for killing about which we could never
guess. We have Colin Mcationabb, the
psychologist. How many psychologists does one
know to whom it might be said, Physician, heal
thyself?"
"For heaven's sake, Poirot. You are making
my head spin! Is nobody incapable of murder?"
"I have often wondered," said Hercule Poirot.
INSPECTOR SHARPE SIGHED, leaned back in
his chair and rubbed his forehead with a handkerchief. He
had interviewed an indignant and tearful French
girl, a
supercilious and uncooperative young Frenchman,
a stolid and suspicious Dutchman, a voluble and
aggressive Egyptian. He had exchanged a
few brief remarks with two nervous young Turkish
students who did not really understand what he was saying
and the same went for a charming young Iraqi. None of
these, he was pretty certain, had had anything to do,
or could help him in any way, with the death of Celia
Austin. He had dismissed them one by one with a few
reassuring words and was now preparing to do the same
to Mr. Akibombo.
The young West African looked at him
with smiling white teeth and childlike rather plaintive
eyes.
"I should like to help-yes-please," he said. "She
is very nice to me, this Miss Celia. She give
me once a box of Edinburgh rock-very nice
confection which I do not know before. It seems very sad she
should be killed. Is it blood feud, perhaps? Or
is it perhaps fathers or uncles who come and kill her
because they have heard false stories that she do wrong
things?"
Inspector Sharpe assured him that none of these
things were remotely possible. The young man shook his
head sadly.
"Then I do not know why it happened," he said.
"I do not see why anybody here should want to do harm
to her. But you give me piece of her hair and nail
clippings," he continued, "and I see if I find
out by old method. Not scientific, not modern, but very
much in use where I come from."
"Well, thank you, Mr. Akibombo, but I
don't think that will be necessary. We-er-don't do things that
way over here."
"No, sir, I quite understand. Not modern. Not
Atomic Age. Not done at home now by new
policemennly old men from bush. I am
sure all new methods very superior and sure
to achieve complete success." Mr. Akibombo
bowed politely and removed himself. Inspector
Sharpe murmured to himself,
"I sincerely hope we do meet with success-if
only to maintain prestige."
His next interview was with Nigel Chapman, who
was inclined to take the conduct of the conversation into his own
hands.
"This is an absolutely extraordinary
business, isn't it?" he said. "Mind you, I had
an idea that you were barking up the wrong tree when you
insisted on suicide. I must say, it's rather
gratifying to me to think that the whole thing hinges,
really, on her having filled her fountain pen with my
green ink. Just the one thing the murderer couldn't
possibly foresee. I suppose you've given due
consideration as to what can possibly be the motive for this
crime?"
"I'm asking the questions, Mr. Chapman," said
Inspector Sharpe drily.
"Oh, of course, of course," said Nigel,
airily waving a kand. "I was trying to make a bit
of a short cut of it, that was all. But I suppose
we've got to go through with all the red tape as
usual. Name, Nigel Chapman. Age,
twenty-five. Born, I believe, in
Nagasaki-it really seems a most ridiculous
place. What my father and mother were doing there at the time
I can't imagine. On a world tour, I suppose.
However, it doesn't make me necessarily a
Japanese, I understand. I'm talking a diploma
at London University in Bronze Age and
Mediaeval History. Anything else you want
to know?"
"What is your home address, Mr.
Chapman?"
"No home address, my dear sir. I have a
papa, but he and I have quarrelled, and his address
is therefore no longer mine. So 26 Hickory
Road and Coutts Bank, Leadenhall Street
Branch, will always find me as one says to travelling
acquaintances whom you hope you will never meet again."
Inspector Sharpe displayed no reaction towards
Nigel's airy impertinence. He had met
'ationigels" before and shrewdly suspected that
Nigel's impertinence masked a natural
nervousness of being questioned in connection with murder.
"How well did you know Celia Austin?" he
asked.
"That's really quite a diffivlt question. I knew her
very well in the sense of seeing her practically every
day, and being on quite cheerful terms with her, but actually
I didn't know her at all. Of course, I
wasn't in the least bit interested in her and I comthink
she probably disapproved of me, if anything."
"Did she disapprove of you for any particular
reason?"
"Well, she didn't like my sense of humour very
much. Then, of course, I wasn't one of those
brooding, rude young men like Colin Mcationabb. That
kind of rudeness is really the perfect technique for
attracting women."
"When was the last time you saw Celia Austin?"
"At dinner yesterday evening. We'd all given
her the big hand, you know. Colin bad got up and
hemmed and hahed and finally admitted, in a coy and
bashful way, that they were engaged. Then we all ragged
him a bit, and that was that."
"Was that at dinner or in the Common Room?"
"Oh, at dinner. Afterwards, when we went into the
Common Room, Colin went off somewhere."
"And the rest of you had coffee in the Common
Room."
"If you call the fluid they serve
coffee-yes," said Nigel.
"Did Celia Austin have coffee?"
"Well, I suppose so. I mean, I
didn't actually notice her having coffee, but she
must have had it."
"You did not personally hand her her coffee, for
instance?"
"How horribly suggestive all this isl When you
said that and looked at me in that searching way, d'you
know I felt quite certain that I had handed Celia her
coffee and had filled it up with strychnine, or
whatever it was. Hypnotic suggestion, I
suppose, but actually, Mr. Sharpe, I didn't
go near her-and to be frank, I didn't even
notice her drinking coffee, and I can assure you,
whether you believe me or not, that I have never had any
passion for Celia myself and that the announcement of her
engagement to Colin Mcationabb aroused no feelings of
murderous revenge in me."
"I'm not really suggesting anything of the kind, Mr.
Chapman," said Sharpe mildly. "Unless I'm very
much mistaken, there's no particular love angle
to this, but somebody wanted Celia Austin out of the
way. Why?"
"I simply can't imagine why,
Inspector. It's really most intriguing because
Celia was really a most harmless kind of girl, if
you know what I mean. Slow on the uptake, a bit
of a bore; thoroughly nice; and absolutely, I
should say, not the kind of girl to get herself murdered."
"Were you surprised When you found that it was
Celia Austin who had been responsible for the
various disappearances, thefts, et cetera, in this
place?"
"My dear man, you could have knocked me over with a
feather! Most uncharacteristic, that's what I thought."
"You didn't, perhaps, put her up to doing these
things?"
Nigel's stare of surprise seemed quite genuine.
"I? Put her up to it? Why should I?"
"Well, that would be rather the question, wouldn't it? Some people
have a funny sense of humour."
"Wegg'J, really, I may be dense, but I
can't see anything amusing about all this silly
pilfering that's been going on."
"Not your idea of a joke?"
"It never occurred to me it was meant to be funny.
Surely, Inspector, the thefts were purely
psychological?"
"You definitely consider that Celia
Austin was a kleptomaniac?"
"But surely there can't be any other explanation,
Inspector?"
"Perhaps you don't know as much about kleptomaniacs
as I do, Mr. Chapman."
"Well, I really can't think of any other
explanation."
"You don't think it's possible that someone might have
put Miss Austin up to all this as a means
ofsay-arousing Mr. Mcationibb's interest in her?"
Nieaeael's eyes glistened with appreciative
malice.
"Now that really is a most diverting explanation,
Inspector," he said. "You know, when I think of
it, it's perfectly possible and of course old
Colin would swallow it, line, hook and sinker."
Nigel savoured this with much glee for a second or
two. Then he shook his head sadly.
. "But Celia wouldn't have played," he said.
"She was a serious girl. She'd never have made
fun of Colin. She was soppy about him."
"You've no theory of your own, Mr. Chapman,
about the things that have been going on in this house?
About, for instance, the spilling of ink over Miss
Johnston's papers?"
"If you're thinking I did it, Inspector
Sharpe, that's quite untrue. Of course, it looks like
me because of the green ink, but if you ask me, that was just
spite."
"What was spite?"
"XJ-SING my ink. Somebody deliberately
used my ink to make it look like me. There's a lot
of spite about here, Inspector."
The Inspector looked at him sharply.
"Now what exactly do you mean by a lot of
spite about?"
But Nigel immediately drew back into his shell and
became noncommittal.
"I didn't mean anything really-just that when a lot
of people are cooped up together, they get rather petty."
The next person on Inspector Sharpe's list
was Leonard Bateson. Len Bateson was even
less at ease than Niel, though it showed in a
different way. He was suspicious and truculent.
"All right!" he burst out, after the first routine
enquiries were concluded. "I poured out Celia's
coffee and gave it to her. So what?"
"You gave her her after-dinner coffee-is that what
you're saying, Mr. Bateson?"
"Yes. At least, I filled the cup
up from the urn and put it down beside her and you can
believe it or not, but there was no morphia in it."
"You saw her drink it?"
"No, I didn't actually see her drink it.
We were all moving around and I got into an argument with
someone just after that. I didn't notice when she
drank it. There were other people around her."
"I see. In fact, what you are saying is that
anybody could have dropped morphia into her coffee
cup?"
"You try and put anything in anyone's cup!
Everybody would see you."
"Not necessarily," said Sharpe.
Len burst out aggressively,
"What the hell do you think I wanted to poison
the kid for? I'd nothing against her."
"I've not suggested that you did want to poison
her."
"She took the stuff herself. She must have taken it
herself. There's no other explanation."
"We might think so, If it weren't for that faked
suicide note."
"Faked my hat! She wrote it, didn't
she?"
"She wrote it as part of a letter, early that
morning."
"Well-she could have torn a bit out and used it as
a suicide note."
"Come now, Mr. Bateson. If you wanted
to write a suicide note, you'd write one. You
wouldn't take a letter you'd written to somebody else
and carefully tear out one particular phrase."
"I might do. People do all sorts of funny
things."
Z, "Tn that case, where is the rest of the letter?"
"How should I know? That's your business, not mine."
"I'm making it my business. You'd be well
advised, Mr. Bateson, to answer my questions
civilly."
"Well, what do you want to know? I didn't
kill the girl, and I'd no motive for killing
her."
"You liked her?"
Len said less aggressively:
"I liked her very much. She was a nice kid. A
bit dumb, but nice."
"You believed her when she owned up to having
committed the thefts which had been worrying everyone for some
time past?"
"Well, I believed her, of course,
since she said so. But I must say it seemed odd."
"You didn't think it was a likely thing for her
to do?"
"Well, no. Not really."
Leonard's truculence had subsided now that he
was no longer on the defensive and was giving his mind
to a problem which obviously intrigued him.
"She didn't seem to be the type of a
kleptomaniac, if you know what I mean," he
said. "Nor a thief either."
"And you can't think of any other reason for her
having done what she did?"
"Other reason? What other reason could there be?"
"Well, she might have wanted to arouse the interest
of Mr. Colin Mcationabb."
"That's a bit far-fetched, isn't it?"
"But it did arouse his interest."
"Yes, of course it did. Old Colin's
absolutely dead keen on any kind of
psychological abnormality."
"Well, then. If Celia Austin knew that..
Len shook his head.
"You're wrong there. She wouldn't have been capable
of thinking a thing like that out. Of planning it, I mean.
She hadn't got the knowledge."
"You've got the knowledge, though, haven't you?"
"What do you mean?"
"T mean that, out of a purely kindly intention, you
might have suggested something of the kind to her."
Len gave a short laugh.
"Think I'd do some damfool thing like that? You're
crazy."
The Inspector shifted his round.
"Do you think that Celia Austin spilled the ink
over Elizabeth Johnston's papers or do you
think someone else did it?"
"Someone else. Celia said she didn't do that and
I believe her. Celia never got Tiled
by Bess; not like some other people did."
"Who got riled by her-and why?"
"She ticked people off, you know." Len thought about it
for a moment or two. "Anyone who made a rash
statement. She'd look across the table and she'd say,
in that precise way of hers, "I'm afraid that
is not borne out by the facts. Tt has been well
established by statistics that Somethin, of that kind.
Well, it was
riting, you know comespecially to people who like making rash
statements, like Nigel Chapman for instance."
"Ah yes. Nigel Chapman."
"And it was green ink, too."
"So you think it was Niel who did it?"
"Well, it's possible, at least. He's a
spiteful sort of cove, you know, and I think he
might have a bit of racial feeling. About the only
one of us who has."
"Can you think of anybody else who Miss
Johnston annoyed with her exactitude and her
habit of correction?"
"Well, Colin Mcationabb wasn't too
pleased, now and again, and she got Jean
Tomlinson's goat once or twice."
Sharpe asked a few more desultory questions but Len
Bateson had nothing useful to add. Next Sharpe
saw Valerie Hobhouse.
Valerie was cool, elegant and wary. She
displayed much less nervousness than either of the men had
done. She had been fond of Celia, she said.
Celia was not particularly bright and it was rather pathetic
the way she had set her heart on Colin
Mcationabb.
"Do you think she was a kleptomaniac, Miss
Hobhouse?"
"Well, I suppose so. I don't really know
much about the subject."
"Do you think anyone had put her up to doing what
she did?"
Valerie shrugged her shoulders.
"You mean in order to attract that pompous ass
Colin?"
"You're very quick on the point, Miss Hobhouse.
Yes, that's what I mean. You didn't suggest
it to her yourself, I suppose?"
Valerie looked amused.
"Well, hardly, my dear man, considerin-, that
a
particular favourite scarf of mine was cut
to ribbons. I'm not so altruistic as that."
"Do you think anybody else suggested it to her?"
"I should hardly think so. I should say it was just
natural on her part."
"What do you mean by natural?"
"Well, I first had a suspicion that it was
Celia when all the fuss happened about Sally's
shoe. Celia was jealous of Sally. Sally Finch,
I'm talking about. She's far and away the most
attractive girl here and Colin paid her a fair
amount of attention. So on the ni lit of this party
Sally's shoe disappears and she has to go in an old
black dress and black shoes. There was
Celia lookin, as smug as a cat that's swallowed
cream about it. Mind you, I didn't suspect her
of all these petty thievings of bracelets and
compacts."
"Who did you think was responsible for those?"
Valerie shrugged her shoulders.
"Oh, I don't know. One of the cleaning women,
I thought."
coneaAnd the slashed rucksack?"
'Was there a slashed rucksack? I'd
forgotten. That seems very pointless."
"You've been here a good long time, haven't you,
Miss Hobhouse?"
"Well, yes. I should say I'm probably the
oldest inhabitant. That is to say, I've been
here about two years and a half, now."
was So you probably know more about this hostel than
anybody else?"
"I should say so, yes."
"Have you any ideas of your own about Celia
Austin's death? Any idea of the motive that underlay
it?"
Valerie shook her bead. Her face was serious
now.
"No," she said. "It was a horrible thing
to happen.
I can't see anybody who could possibly have
wanted Celia to die. She was a nice, harmless
child, and she'd just got engaged to be married, and . .
."
"Yes. And?" the Inspector prompted.
"I wondered if that was why," said Valerie
slowly. "Because she'd jot engaged. Because she was going
to be happy. But that means, doesn't it, somebody
well-mad."
She said the word with a little shiver, and Inspector
Sharpe looked at her thou litfully.
"Yes," he said. "We can't quite rule out
madness."
He went on, "Have you any theory about the damage
done to Elizabeth Johnston's notes and
papers?"
"No. That was a spiteful thing, too. I don't
believe for a moment that Celia would do a thing like that."
"Any idea who it could have been?"
"Well ... Not a reasonable idea."
"But an unreasonable one?"
"You don't want to hear something that's just a hunch,
do you, Inspector?"
"I'd like to hear a hunch very much. I'll
accept it as such, and it'll only be between ourselves."
"Well, I may probably be quite wrong, but
I've got a sort of idea that it was Patricia
Lane's work."
"Indeed! Now you do surprise me, Miss
Hobhouse.
I shouldn't have thought of Patricia Lane. She
seems @u very well balanced, amiable young lady."
"I don't say she did do it. I just had a
sort of idea she might have done."
"For what reason in particular?"
"Well, Patricia disliked Black Bess.
Black Bess was always ticking off Patricia's
beloved Nigel, putting him ri-L lit, you know,
when he made silly statements in the way he does
sometimes."
"You think it was more likely to have been Patricia
Lane than Nigel himself?"
"Oh, yes. I don't think Nigel would
bother, and he'd certainly not go using his own pet
brand of ink. He's got plenty of brains. But
it's just the sort of stupid thing that Patricia would do
without thinking that it might involve her precious
Nigel as a suspect."
"Or again, it might be somebody who had
a down on Nigel Chapman and wanted to suggest that
it was his doing?"
"Yes, that's another possibility."
con'Who dislikes Nigel Chapman?"
'Oh, well, Jean Tomlinson for one. And be
and Len Bateson are always scrapping a good deal."
"Have you any ideas, Miss Hobhouse, how
morphia could have been administered to Celia
Austin?"
"I've been thinking and thinking. Of course, I
suppose the cot ee is the most obvious way.
We were all milling around in the Common Room.
Celia's coffee was on a small table near her and
she always waited until her coffee was nearly cold
before she drank it. I suppose anybody who had
sufficient nerve could have ,dropped a tablet or
something into her cup without being seen, but it would be rather a
risk to take. I mean, it's the sort of thing that
might be noticed quite easily."
was The morphia," said Inspector Sharpe,
"was not in tablet form."
What was it? Powder?"
:ea'allyes."
Valerie frowned.
That would be rather more difficult, wouldn't it?"
:ea'Anything else-besides cotee you can think of?"
"She sometimes had a glass of hot milk before she
went to bed. I don't tldnk she did that night,
though."
"Can you describe to me exactly what happened
that evening in the Common Room?"
"Well, as I say, we all sat about,
talked, somebody
turned the wireless on. Most of the boys, I
think, went out. Celia went up to bed fairly
early and so did Jean Tomlinson. Sally and I
sat on there fairly late. I was writing letters and
Sally was mugging over some notes. I rather think I was
the last to go up to bed."
"It was just a casual evening, in fact?"
"Absolutely, Inspector."
"Thank you, Miss Hobbouse. Will you send
Miss Lane to me now?"
Patricia Lane looked worried, but not
apprehensive. Questions and answers elicited nothing
very new. Asked about the damage to Elizabeth
Johnston's papers Patricia said that she had no
doubt that Celia had been responsible.
"But she denied it, Miss Lane, very
vehemently."
"Well, of course," said Patricia. "She
would. I think she was ashamed of having done it. But it
fits in, doesn't it, with all the other thins?"
"Do you know what I find about this case, Miss
Lane? That nothing fits in very well."
"I suppose," said Patricia, flushing, "that
you think it was Nigel who messed up Bess's
papers. Because of the ink. That's such absolute
nonsense. I mean, Nigel wouldn't have used his own
ink if he'd done a thing like that. He wouldn't be such
a fool. But anyway, he wouldn't do it."
"He didn't always get on very well with Miss
Johnston, did he?"
"Oh, she had an annoying manner sometimes, but
he didn't really mind." Patricia Lane
leaned forward earnestly. "I would like to try. and make
you understand one or two things, Inspector. About
Nigel Chapman, I mean. You see, Nigel
is really very much his own worst enemy. I'm the first
to admit that he's got a very difficult manner. It
prejudices people against him. He's rude and
sarcastic and makes fun of people,
and so he puts people's backs up and they think the
worst of him. But really he's quite different from what
he seems. He's one of those shy, rather
unhappy people who really want to be liked but who, from
a kind of spirit of contradiction, find themselves saying and
doing the opposite to what they mean to say and do."
"Ah," said Inspector Sharpe. "Rather
unfortunate for them, that."
"Yes, but they really can't help it, you know. It
comes from having had an unfortunate childhood.
Nigel had a very unhapy home life. His father was
very harsh and severe and never understood him. And his father
treated his mother very badly. After she died they bad the
most terrific quarrel and Nigel flung out of the
house and his father said that he'd never give him a penny
and he must get on as well as be could without any
help from him. Nigel said he didn't want any
help from his father; and wouldn't take it if it was offered.
A small amount of money came to him under his mother's
will, and he never wrote to his father or went near him
again. Of course, I think that was a pity in a way,
but there's no doubt that his father is a very unpleasant
man. I don't wonder that that's made Nigel
bitter and difficult to get on with. Since his mother
died, he's never had anyone to care for him ,allynd
look after him. His health's not been good though his mind
is brilliant. He is handicapped in life and
he just can't show himself as he really is."
Patricia Lane stopped. She was flushed and a
little breathless as the result of her long earnest
speech. Inspector Sharpe looked at her
thoughtfully. He had come across many Patricia
Lanes before. 'In love with the chap," he thought
to himself. "Don't suppose he cares twopence for
her, but probably accepts being mothered. Father
certainly sounds a cantankerous old cuss, but I
daresay the mother was a foolish woman
who spoilt her son and by doting on him, widened
the breach between him and his father. I've seen enough of that kind
of thing." He wondered if Nigel Chapman had
been attracted at all to Celia Austin. It
seemed unlikely, but it might be so. 'And if
so," he thought, "Patricia Lane might have
bitterly resented the fact." Resented it enough to wish
to do Celia an injury?
Resented it enough to do murder? Surely not-and in
any case, the fact that Celia had got engaged
to Colin Mcationabb would surely wash that out as a
possible motive for murder. He dismissed
Patricia Lane and asked for Jean Tomlinson.
Miss ToMLIN-SON WAS a severe-looking
young woman of twenty-seven with fair hair,
regular features and a rather pursed-up mouth.
She sat down and said primly,
"Yes, Inspector? What can I do for you?"
"I wonder if you can help us at all, Miss
Tomlinson, about this very tragic matter."
"It's shocking. Really quite shocking," said Jean.
"It was bad enough when we thought Celia had committed
suicide, but now that it's supposed to be murder .
. ." She stopped and shook her head, sadly.
"We are fairly sure that she did not poison
herself," said Sharpe. "You know where the poison came
from?"
Jean nodded.
"I gather it came from St. Catherine's
Hospital,
where she works. But surely that makes it seem more
like suicide?"
"It was intended to, no doubt," said the
Inspector.
"But who else could possibly have got that poison
except Celia?"
"Quite a lot of people," said Inspector Sharpe,
"if they were determined to do so. Even you, yourself,
Miss Tomlinson," he said, "might have managed
to help yourself to it if you had wished to do so."
"Really, Inspector Sharpe!"
Jean's tones were sharp with indi nation.
"Well, you visited the Dispensary fairly often,
didn't you, Miss Tomlinson?"
"I went in there to see Mildred Carey, yes.
But naturally I would never have dreamed of tampering with the
poison cupboard."
"But you could have done so?"
"I certainly couldn't have done anything of the kind!"
"Oh, come now, Miss Tomlinson. Say that
your friend was busy packing up the ward baske
greater-than ts and the other girl was at the
Outpatients window. There are frequent times when
there are only two dispensers in the front room. You
could have wandered casually round the back of the shelves of
bottles that run across the middle of the floor. You
could have nipped a hottle out of the cupboard and into your
pocket, and neither of the two dispensers would have dreamed of
what you had done."
"I resent what you say very much, Inspector
Sharpe. It's-it's a-disgraceful accusation."
"But it's not an accusation, Miss Tomlinson.
It's nothing of the kind. You mustn't misunderstand me.
You said to me that it wasn't possible for you to do such a
thing, and I'm trying to show you that it was
possible. I'm not suggesting for a moment that
you did do so. After all," he added, "why should you?"
"Quite so. You don't seem to rearise,
Inspector Sharpe, that I was a friend of
Celia's."
"Quite a lot of people get poisoned by their friends.
There's a certain question we have to ask ourselves sometimes.
'When is a friend not a friend?"
"There was no disagreement between me and Celia,
nothing of the kind. I liked her very much."
"Had you any reason to suspect it was she who had
been responsible for these thefts in the house?"
"No, indeed. I was never so surprised in my
life. I always thought Celia had high
principles. I wouldn't have dreamed of her doing such
a thin,."
"Of course," said Sharpe, watching her
carefully, "kleptomaniacs can't really help
themselves, can they?"
Jean Tomlinson's lips pursed themselves together
even more closely. Then she opened them and spoke.
"I can't say I can quite subscribe to that idea,
Inspector Sharpe. I'm old-fashioned in my
views and believe that stealing is stealin,."
"You think that Celia stole things because, frankly,
she wanted to take them?"
"Certainly I db."
"Plain dishonest, in fact?"
"I'm afraid so."
"Ah!" said Inspector Sharpe, shaking his head.
"That's bad."
"Yes, it's always upsetting when you feel you're
disappointed in anyone."
"There was a question, I understand, of our being called
in-the police, I, mean."
"Yes. That would have been the right thing to do, in my
opinion."
"Perliandps you think it ought to have been done
anyway?"
"I think it would have been the right thing. Yes, I
don't think, you know, people ought to be allowed to get
away with these things."
"With calling oneself a kleptomaniac when one is
really a thief, do you mean?"
"Well, more or less, yes-that is what I
mean."
"Instead of which everything was ending happily and Miss
Austin had wedding bells ahead."
"Of course, one isn't surprised at anything
Colin Mcationabb does," said Jean Tomlinson
viciously. "I'm sure he's an atheist
and a most disbelieving, mocking, unpleasant young
man. He's rude to everybody. It's my opinion
that he's a Communist!"
"Ah!" said Inspeetor Sharpe. "Bad!" He
shook his head.
"He backed up Celia, I think, because he
hasn't got any proper feeling about property.
He probably thinks everyone should help themselves
to everything they want."
"Still, at any rate," said Inspector Sharpe,
"Miss Austin did own up."
"After she was found out. Yes," said Jean,
sharply.
"Who found her out?"
"That Mr.-what-was-his-name Poirot, who
came."
"But why do you think he found her out, Miss
Tomlinson? He didn't say so. He just
advised calling in the police."
"He must have shown her that he knew. She
obviously knew the game was up and rushed off
to confess."
"What about the ink on Elizabeth Johnston's
papers?
Did she confess to that?"
"I really don't know. I suppose so."
"You suppose wrong," said Sharpe. "She denied
most vehemently that she had anythin, to do with that."
"Well, perhaps that may be so. I must say it
doesn't seem very likely."
"You think it is more likely that it was Nigel
Chapman?"
"No, I don't think Nigel would do that either.
I think it's much more likely to be Mr.
Akibombo."
"Really? Why should he do it?"
"Jealousy. All these coloured people are very jealous
of each other and very hysterical."
"That's interesting, Miss Tomlinson. When was the
last time you saw Celia Austin?"
"After dinner on Friday night.""
"Who went up to bed first? Did she or did you?"
"I did's
"You did not go to her room or see her after you'd
left the Common Room?"
"No."
"And you've no idea who could have introduced
morphia into her coffee?-if it was given that way?"
"No idea at all."
"You never saw this morphia lying about the
house or in anyone's room?"
"No. No, I don't think so."
"You don't think so? What do you mean by that,
Miss Tomlinson?"
"Well, I just wondered. There was that silly
bet, you know."
"What bet?"
"One-oh, two or three of the boys were arguing-was
"What were they arguing about?"
"Murder, and ways of doing it. Poisoning in
particular."
"Who was concerned in the discussion?"
"Well, I think Colin and Nigel started it,
and then Len Bateson chipped in and Patricia was
there too-was
"Can you remember, as closely as possible, what
was said on that occasion-how the argument went?"
Jean Tomlinson reflected a few moments.
"Well, it started, I think, with a discussion on
murdering by poison, sayin, that the difficulty was
to get bold of the poison, that the murderer was usually
traced by either the sale of the poison or having an
opportunity to get it, and Niel said that wasn't
at all necessary. He said that he could think of three
distinct ways by which anyone could get hold of
poison, and nobody would ever know they bad it. Len
Bateson said then that he was talking through his hat.
Niel said no he wasn't, and he was quite prepared
to prove it. Pat said that of course Nigel was quite
ri lit. She said that either Len or Colin could
probably help themselves to poison any time they
liked from a hospital, and so could Celia, he said.
And Niel said that wasn't what he meant at all.
He said it would be noticed if Celia took
anything from the Dispensary. Sooner or later they'd
look for it and find it gone. And Pat said no, not
if she took the bottle and emptied some stuff out and
filled it up with somethin, else. Colin laughed then
and said there'd be very serious complaints from the patients
one of these days, in that case. But Nigel said of
course he didn't mean special
opportunities. He said that he himself, who hadn't
got any particular access, either as a doctor or
dispenser, could jolly well get three different
kinds of poison by three different methods. Len
Bateson said, 'All right, then, but what are your
methods?" and Nigel said, 'I shall't tell you,
now, but I'm prepared to bet you that within three weeks
I can produce. samples of three deadly
poisons here," and Len Bateson said
he'd bet him a fiver he couldn't do it."
"Well?" said Inspector Sharpe, when Jean
stopped. "Well, nothing more came of it, I think,
for some
time and then, one evening, in the Common Room,
Nigel said, "Now then, chaps, look here-I'm
as good as my word," and he threw down three things on
the table. He had a tube of hyoscine tablets, and a
bottle of tincture digitalin and a tiny bottle
of morphine tartrate."
The Inspector said sharply,
"Morphine tartrate. Any label on it?"
"Yes, it had St. Catherine's Hospital on
it. I do remember that because, naturally, it caught
my eye."
"And the others?"
"I didn't notice. They were nott hospital
stores, I should say."
"What happened next?"
"Well, of course, there was a lot of talk and
jawing, and Len Bateson said, 'Come now, if
you'd done a murder this would be traced to you soon
enough," and Nigel said, "Not a bit of it. I'm
a layman, I've no connection with any clinic or
hospital and nobody will connect me for one
moment with these. I didn't buy them over the
counter," and Colin Mcationabb took his pipe out of
his teeth and said, "No, you'd certainly not be able
to do that. There's no chemist would sell you those three
things without a doctor's prescription." Anyway,
they argued a bit but in the end Len said heea'd pay
up. He said, 'I can't do it now, because I'm a
bit short of cash, but there's no doubt about it;
Nigel's proved his point," and then he said,
"Vast are we going to do with the guilty spoils?"
Nigel grinned and said we'd better get rid of
them before any accidents occurred, so they emptied out
the tube and threw the tablets on the fire and emptied
out the powder from the morphine tartrate and threw that on
the fire too. The tincture of digitalis they
poured down the lavatory."
"And the bottles?"
"I don't know what happened to the bottles
should think they probably were just thrown into the waste
paper basket."
"But the poison itself was destroyed?"
"Yes, I'm sure of that. I saw it."
"And that was-whenough?"
"About, oh just over a fortnight ago I think."
"I see. Thank you, Miss
Tomlinson."
Jean lingered, clearly wanting to be told more.
"D'you think it might be important?"
"It might be. One can't tell."
Inspector Sharpe remained brooding for a few
moments. Then he had Nigel Chapman in again.
"I've just had a rather interesting statement from Miss
Jean Tomlinson," he said.
"Ah! Who's dear Jean been poisoning your
mind against? Me?"
"She's been talking about poison, and in
connec-don with you, Mr. Chapman."
"Poison and me? What on earth?"
"Do you deny that some weeks ago you had a wager with
Mr. Ba-teson about methods of obtaining poison
in some way that could not be traced to you?"
"Oh, that!" Nigel was suddenly enlightened.
"Yes, of course! Funny I never thought of that.
I don't even remember Jean being there. But you
don't think it could have any possible significance,
do you?"
"Well, one doesn't know. You admit the
fact, then?"
"Oh, yes, we were arguing on the subject.
Colin and Len were being very superior and
high-handed about it so I told them that with a little ingenuity
anyone could get hold of a suitable supply of
poison-in fact I said I could think of three
distinct ways of doing it, and I'd prove my
point, I said, by putting them into practice."
"Which you then proceeded to do?"
"Which I then proceeded to do, Inspector."
"And what were those three methods, Mr.
Chapman?"
Nigel put his head a Ettle on one side.
"Aren't you asking me to incriminate myself?" he
said. "Surely you ought to warn me?"
"It hasn't come to warning you yet, Mr.
Chapman, but, of course, there's no need for you
to incriminate yourself, as you put it. In fact you're
perfectly entitled to refuse my questions if you like to
do so."
"I don't know that I want to refuse."
Nigel considered for a moment or two, a slight
smile playing round his lips.
"Of course," he said, "what I did was, no
doubt, against the law. You could haul me in for it if
you Eked. On the other hand, this is a murder case
and if it's got any bearing on poor little
Celia's death I suppose I ought
to tell you."
"That would certainly be the sensible point of view
to take."
"All right then. I'll talk."
"What were these three methods?"
"Well." Nigel leant back in his chair.
"One's always reading in the papers, isn't one, about
doctors losing dangerous drugs from a car? People are
being warned
about it?"
"Yes."
"Well, it occurred to me that one very simple
method would be to go down to the country, follow a
G.P.
about on his rounds, when occasion offered-just open the
car, look in the doctor's case, and extract
what you wanted. You see, in these country districts,
the doctor doesn't always take his case into the
house. It depends what sort of patient he's
going to see."
"Well?"
"Well, that's all. That's to say that's all for
method
number one. I had to sleuth three doctors
until I had found a suitably careless
one. When I did, it was simplicity itself. The car
was left outside a farmhouse in a rather lonely
spot. I opened the door, looked at the case,
took out a tube of hyoscine hydrobromide, and
that was that."
"Ah! And method number two?"
"That entailed just a little pumping of dear Celia,
as a matter of fact. She was quite unsuspicious.
I told you she was a stupid girl, she had no
idea what I was doing. I simply talked a bit
about the mumbo jumbo Latin of doctors"
prescriptions, and asked her to write me out a
prescription in the way a doctor writes it, for
tincture digitalin. She obliged quite
unsuspecting. All I had to do' after that was to find
a doctor in the classified directory, living in
a far off district of Lo.ndon, add his initials
or sli litly illegible signature. I then
took it to a chemist in a busy part of London,
who would not be likely to be familiar with that particular
doctor's signature, and I received the
prescription made up without any difficulty at
all. Digitatin is prescribed in quite large
quantities for heart cases and I had written out
the prescription on hotel notepaper."
"Very ingenious," said Inspector Sharpe,
drily.
"I am incriminating myself! I can hear it in your
voice."
"And the third method?"
Niel did not reply at once. Then he said,
"Look here. What exactly am I letting
myself in for?"
"The theft of drugs from an unlocked car is
larceny," said Inspector Sharpe. "Forging a
prescription Nigel interrupted him.
"Not exactly forging, is it? I mean, I
didn't obtain any money by it, and it wasn't
actually an imitation of any doctor's
signature. I mean, if I write a
prescription
and write H. R. Jarlies on it, you can't
say I'm forging any particular Dr. James's
name, can you?" He went on with rather a wry smile.
"You see what I mean. I'm sticking my neck
out. If you like to turn nasty over this-well-I'm
obviously for it. On the other hand, if. . ."
"Yes, Mr. Chapman, on the other hand?"
Nigel said with a sudden passion,
"I don't like murder. It's a
beastly, horrible thing. Celia, poor little devil,
didn't deserve to be murdered. I want to help.
But does it help? I can't see that it does.
Telling you my peccadilloes, I mean."
"The police have a good deal of latitude, Mr.
Chapman. It's up to them to look upon certain
happenings as a light-hearted prank of an
irresponsible nature. I accept your assurance
that you want to help in the solving of this girl's
murder. Now please go on, and tell me about your
third method."
"Well," said Nigel, "we're comino, fairly
near the bone now. It was a bit more risky than the
other two, but at the same time it was a great deal more
fun. You see, I'd been to visit Celia once
or twice in her Dispensary. I knew the lay of the
land there . . ."
"So you were able to pinch the bottle out of the
cupboard?"
"No, no, nothing as simple as that. That wouldn't
have been fair from my point of view. And,
incidentally, if it had been a real murder-that is,
if I had been stealing the poison for the purpose of
murder-it would probably be remembered that I had
been there. Actually, I hadn't been in
Celia's Dispensary for about six months. No, I
knew that Celia always went into the back room at
eleven fifteen for what you might call
lelevenses," that is, a cup of coffee and a
biscuit. The girls went in turn, two at a
time. There was a new girl there who had only just come
and she certainly
wouldn't know me by sight. So what I did was this.
I strolled into the Dispensary with a white coat on and a
stethoscope round my neck. There was only the new
girl there and she was busy at the Outpatients"
hatch. I strolled in, went along to the poison
cupboard, took out a bottle, strolled round the
end of the partition, said to the girl, "What strength
adrenalin do you keep?" She told me and I
nodded, then I asked her if she had a couple of
veganin as I had a terrific hangover. I
swallowed them down and strolled out again. She never had
the least suspicion that I wasn't somebody's
houseman or a medical student. It was child's
play. Celia never even knew I'd been there."
"A stethoscope," said Inspector Sharpe
curiously.
"Where did you get a stethoscope?"
Nigel grinned suddenly.
"It was Len Bateson's," he said. "I pinched
it."
"From this house?"
"Yes.
"So that explains the theft of the stethoscope. That
was not Celia's doing."
"Good Lord, no! Can't see a kleptomaniac
stealing a stethoscope, can you?"
"What did you do with it afterwards?"
"Well, I had to pawn it," said Nigel
apologetically.
"Wasn't that a little hard on Bateson?"
"Very hard on him. But without explaining my
methods, which I didn't mean to do, I couldn't ten
him about it. However," added Nigel cheerfully, "I
took him out not long after and gave him a hell of a
party one evening."
"You're a very irresponsible young man," said
Inspector Sharpe.
"You should have seen their faces," said Nigel, his
grin widening, "when I threw down those three lethal
preparations on the table and told them I had managed
to pinch them without anybody being wise as to who took
them."
"What you're telling me is"" said the
Inspector, "that you had three means of poisoning
someone by three dim erent poisons and that in each
case the poison could not have been traced to you."
Nigel nodded.
"That's fair enough," he said. "And given the
circumstances it's not a very pleasant thin, to admit.
But the
c, point is, that the poisons were all disposed of
at least a fortni lit a,eaeao or loner."
"That is what you think, Mr. Chapman, but it
may not really be so."
Nigel stared at him.
"What do you mean?"
"You had these things in your possession, how long?"
Niel considered.
C,
"Well, the tube of hyoscine about ten days, I
suppose. The morphine tartrate, about four days.
The tincture digitalin I'd only got that very
afternoon."
"And where did you keep these things-the hyoscine
hydrobromide and the morphine tartrate, that is
to say?"
"In the drawer of my chest-of-drawers,
pushed-to the back under my socks."
"Did anyone know you had it there?"
"No. No, I'm sure they didn't."
There had been, however, a faint hesitation in his
voice which Inspector Sharpe noticed, but for the
moment he did not press the point.
"Did you tell anyone what you were doing? Your
methods? The way you were going about these things?"
"No. At least-no, I didn't."
"You said, "at least," Mr. Chapman."
"Well, I didn't actually. As a matter of
fact, I was
going to tell Pat, then I thought she wouldn't
approve. She's very strict, Pat is, so I
fobbed her off."
"You didn't tell her about stealing the stuff from the
doctor's car, or the prescriptions, or the
morphia from the hospital?"
"Actually, I betold her afterwards about the
digitalin, that I'd written a. prescription and
got a bottle from the chemist, and about masquerading as
a doctor at the hospital. I'm sorry to say
Pat wasn't amused. I didn't tell her about
pinching things from a car. I thought she'd go up in
smoke."
"Did you tell her you were going to destroy
this stuff after you'd won the bet?"
"Yes. She was all worried and het up about it.
Started to insist I take the things back or something like
that."
"That course of action never occurred to you yourself?"
"Good Lord no! That would have been fatal; it would have
landed me in no end of a row. No, we three just
chucked the stuff on the fire and poured it down the
Lou and that was that. No harm done."
"You say that, Mr. Chapman, but it's quite
possible that harm was done."
"How can it have been, If the stuff was chucked
away as I tell you?"
"Has it ever occurred to you, Mr. Chapman, that
someone might have seen where you put those things, or found
them perhaps, and that someone might have emptied morphia out
of the bottle and replaced it with something else?"
"Good Lord no!" Nigel stared at him. "I
never thought of anything of that kind. I don't believe
it."
"But it's a possibility, Mr. Chapman."
"But nobody could possibly have known."
"I should say," said the Inspector, drily, "that
in a
place of this kind a great deal more is
known than you yourself might believe possible."
"Snooping, you mean?"
"Yes."
"Perhaps you're right there."
"Which of the students might normally, at any time,
be in your room?"
"Well, I share it with Len Bateson. Most
of the men here have been in it now and again. Not the girls,
of course. The girls aren't supposed to come to the
bedroom floors on our side of the house.
Propriety. Pure living."
"They're not supposed to, but they might do so,
I suppose?"
"Anyone might," said Niel. "In the daytime.
The afternoon, for instance, there's nobody about."
"Does Miss Lane ever come to your room?"
"I hope you don't mean that the way it sounds,
Inspector. Pat comes to my room sometimes
to replace some socks she's been daming. Nothing more
than that."
"You do realise, Mr. Chapman, that the person
who could most easily have taken some of that poison out
of the bottle and substituted something else for it, was
yourself?"
Nigel looked at hird, his face
suddenly hard and ha gard.
"Yes," he said. "I've seen that just a minute
and a half ago. I could have done just exactly that. But
I'd no reason on earth for putting that girl out of the
way, Inspector, and I didn't do it. Still, there
it is-I quite realise that you've only got my word for
it."
THE STORY of the bet and the disposal of the poison
was confirmed by Len Bateson and by Colin
Mcationabb. Sharpe retained Colin Mcationabb after
the others had gone.
"I don't want to cause you more pain than I can
help, Mr. Mcationabb," he said. "I can
realize what it means to you for your fianc6e to have
been poisoned on the very night of your engagement."
"There'll be no need to go into that aspect of it,"
said Colin Mcationabb, his face immovable.
"You'll not need to concern yourself with my feelings. Just
ask me any questions you like which you think may be useful
to you."
"It was your considered opinion that Celia
Austin's behaviour had a psychological
origin?"
"There's no doubt about it at all,- said Colin
Meationabb. "If you'd like me to go into the
theory of the thing . . ."
"No, no," said Inspector Sharpe, hastily.
"I'm taking your word for it as a student of
psychology."
"Her childhood had been particularly
unfortunate. It had set-up an emotional
block. . . ."
"Quite so, quite so." Inspector Sharpe was
desperately anxious to avoid hearing the story of
yet another unhappy childhood. Nigel's had
been quite enough.
"You had been attracted to her for some time?"
"I would not say precisely that," said Colin,
considering the matter conscientiously. "These things
sometimes surprise you by the way they dawn upon you
suddenly, like. Subconsciously no doubt, I had
been attracted, but I was not aware of the fact.
Since it was not my intention to marry young I had no
doubt set up a considerable resistance to the idea in
my conscious mind."
"Yes. Just so. Celia Austin was happy in her
engagement to you? I mean, she expressed no
doubts? Uncertainties? There was nothing she felt
she ought to tell you?"
"She made a very full confession of all
she'd been doing. There was nothing more in her mind
to worry her."
"And you were planning to get married-whenough?"
"Not for a considerable time. I'm not in a position,
at comthe moment, to support a wife."
"Had Celia any enemy here? Anyone who did
not like her?"
"I can hardly believe so. I've given that
point of view a great deal of thought, Inspector.
Celia was well liked here. I'd say, myself, it
was not a personal matter at all which brought about her
end."
"What do you mean by'not a personal
matter'?"
"I do no-t wish to be very precise at the
moment. It's only a vague kind of idea I have
and I'm not clear about it myself."
From that position the Inspector could not budge him.
The last two students to be interviewed were Sally
Finch and Elizabeth Johnston. The Inspector
took Sally Finch first.
Sally was an attractive girl with a mop of red
hair and eyes that were bright and intelligent. After
routine enquiries Sally Finch suddenly took the
initiative.
"D'you know what I'd like to do, Inspector?
I'd like
to tell you just what I think. I personally.
There's something all wrong about this house, something very
wrong indeed. I'm sure of that."
"You mean because Celia Austin was poisoned?"
"No, I mean before that. I've been feeling it for
some time. I didn't like the things that were going on here.
I didn't like that rucksack which was slashed about and I
didn't like Valerie's scarf being cut to pieces.
I didn't like Black Bess's notes being
covered with ink. I was going to get out of here and get out
quick. That's what I still mean to do, as soon, that is,
as you let us go."
Sally nodded her head.
"You mean you're afraid of something, Miss
Finch?"
"Yes, I'm afraid. There's something or someone
here who's pretty ruthless. The whole place
isn't-well, how shall I put it?-it isn't what it
seems. No, no, Inspector, I don't mean
Communists. I can see that just trembling on your
lips. It's not Communists I mean. Perhaps it
isn't even criminal. I don't know. But I'll
bet you anything you like that awful old woman
knows about it all."
"What old woman? You mean Mrs. Hubbard?"
"No. Not Ma Hubbard. She's a dear. I
mean old Nicoletis. That old she-wolf."
"That's interesting, Miss Finch. Can you be more
definite? About Mrs. Nicoletis, I mean."
Sally shook her head.
"No. That's just what I can't be. All I can
tell you is she gives me the creeps every time I
pass her. Something queer is going on here,
Inspector."
"I wish you could be a little more definite."
"So do I. You'll be thinking I'm fanciful.
Well, perhaps I am, but other people feel it comtoo.
Akibombo does. He's scared. I believe
Black Bess does, too, but she
wouldn't let on. And I think, Inspector, that
Celia knew something about it."
"Knew something about what?"
"That's just it. What? But there were things she said.
Said that last day. About clearing everything up. She had
owned up to her part in what was going on, but she sort
of hinted that there were other thin,eaeaness she knew about and
she wanted to get them cleared up too. I think she
knew something, Inspector, about someone.
That's the reason I think she was killed."
"But if it was something as serious as that . . .
Sally interrupted him.
"I'd say that she had no idea how serious it
was. She wasn't bright, you know. She was pretty
dumb. She got hold of something but she'd no idea
that the something she'd got hold of was dangerous.
Anyway, that's my hunch for what it's worth."
"I see. Thank you. . . . Now the last time you
saw Celia Austin was in the Common Room after
dinner last night, is that right?"
"That's right. At least, actually, I saw her
after that."
"You saw her after that? Where? In her room?"
"No. When I went up to bed she was going out of the
front door just as I came out of the Common
Room."
"Going out of the front door? Out of the house, do you
mean?"
"Yes."
"That's rather surprising. Nobody else has
suggested that."
"I daresay they didn't know. She certainly
said good night and that she was going up to bed, and if I
hadn't seen her I would have assumed that she
had gone up to bed."
"Whereas, actually, she went upstairs, put on
some outdoor thin s and then left the house. is that
right?"
Sally nodded.
"And I think she was going outto meet someone."
"I see. Someone from outside. Or could it have
been one of the students?"
"Well it's my hunch that it would be one of the
students. You see, if she wanted to speak
to somebody privately, there was nowhere very well she
could do it in the house. Someone might have suggested that
she come out and meet them somewhere outside."
"Have you any idea when she got in again?"
"No idea whatever."
"Would Geronimo know, the man servant?"
"He'd know if she came in after eleven o'clock because
that's the time he bolts and chains the door. Up to that
time anyone can get in with their own key."
"Do you know exactly what time it was when you saw
her going out of the house?"
"I'd say it was about-ten. Perhaps a little past ten,
but not much."
"I see. Thank you, Miss Finch, for what
you've told me."
Last of all the Inspector talked
to Elizabeth Johnston. He was at once
impressed with the quiet capability of the girl. She
answered his questions with intelligent decision and then
waited for him to proceed.
"Celia Austin," he said, "pretested
vehemently that it was not she who damaged your papers,
Miss Johnston. Do you believe her?"
"I do not think Celia did that. No."
"You don't know who did?"
"The obvious answer is Nigel Chapman. But
it seems to me a little too obvious. Nigel is
intelligent. He would not use his own ink."
"And if not Nigel, who then?"
"That is more difficult. But I think Celia
knew who it was-or at least guessed."
"Did she tell you so?"
"Not in so many words, but she came to my room on
the evening of the day she died, before going down to dinner.
She came to tell me that though she was responsible
for the thefts she had not sabota ed my work. I told
her that I accepted that assurance. I asked her if
she knew who had done so?"
"And what did she say?"
"She said," Elizabeth paused a
moment, as though to be sure of the accuracy of what she
was about to say, "She said, "I can't really be
sure, because I don't see why....... It might
have been a mistake or an accident....... I'm
sure whoever did it is very unhappy about it, and would
really like to own up." Celia went on, "There are
some things I don't understand, like the electric lighl
bulbs the day the police came." Sharpe
interrupted.
"What's tills about the police and electric
light bulbs?"
"I don't know. All Celia said was: 'I
didn't take them out." And then she said: 'I
wondered if it had anything to do with the passport?" I
said, 'What passport are you talking about?" And she
said, 'I think someone might have a forged passport."
was The Inspector was silent for a moment or two.
Here at last some vague pattern seemed to be
taking shape. A passport.
He asked, "What more did she say?"
"Nothing more. She just said: 'Anyway I shall know more
about it tomorrow."
his
"She said that, did she? 'I shall know more about it
tomorrow." That's a very significant remark,
Miss Johnston."
"Yes."
The Inspector was silent again as he reflected.
Something about a passport-and a visit from the
police.... Before coming to Hickory Road, he
had carefully looked up the files. A fairly
close eye was kept on hostels which housed foreign
students. 26 Hickory Road had a good
record. Such details as there were, were meagre and
unsuggestive. A West African student wanted
by the Sheffield police for living on a woman's
earnings; the student in question had been at Hickory
Road for a few days and had then gone elsewhere,
Eind had in due course been gathered in and since
deported. There had been a routine check of all
hostels and boarding houses for a Eurasian "wanted
to assist the police" in the murder of a publican's
wife near Cambridge. That had been cleared up
when the young man in question had walked into the police station
at Hull and had given himself up for the crime. There
had been an inquiry into a student's distribution of
subversive pamphlets. All these occurrences had
taken place some time ago and could not possibly have
had any connection with the death of Celia Austin.
He sighed and looked up to find
Elizabeth Johnston's davit intelligent
eyes watching him.
On an impulse, he said, "Tell me,
Miss Johnston, have you ever had a feeling-an
impression-of something wrong about this place?"
She looked surprised.
"In what way-wrong?"
"I couldn't really say. I'm thinking of something
Miss Sally Finch said to me."
"Oh-Sally Finch!"
There was an intonation in her voice which he found
hard to place. He felt interested and went on:
"Miss Finch seemed to me a good observer, both
shrewd and practical. She was very insistent on there
being somethin,-odd about this place-though she found it
difficult to define just what it was."
Elizabeth said sharply,
"That is her American way of thought. They are
all the same, these Americans, nervous,
apprehensive, suspecting every kind of foolish thing!
Look at the fools they make of themselves with their
witch hunts, their hysterical spy mania, their
obsession over communism. Sally Finch is
typical."
The Inspector's interest grew. So
Elizabeth disliked Sally Finch. Why? Because Sally
was an American?
Or did Elizabeth dislike Americans
merely because Sally Finch was an American, and hhd
she some reason of her own for disliking the attractive
red-head? Perhaps it was just simple female jealousy.
He resolved to try a line of approach that he
had sometimes found useful. He said smoothly,
"As you may appreciate, Miss Johnston,
in an establishment like this, the level of intelligence
varies a great deal. Some people-most people, we just ask for
facts. But when we come across someone with a high level
of intelligence-was
He paused. The inference was flattering. Would she
respond?
After a brief pause, she did.
"I think I understand what you mean, Inspector.
The intellectual level here is not, as you say, very
high. Nigel Chapman has a certain quickness of
intellect, but his mind is shallow. Leonard
Batesen is a plodderno more. Valerie Hobhouse
has a good quality of mind, but her outlook is
commercial, and she's too lazy to use her brains
on anything worth while. What you want is the
detachment of a trained mind."
"Such as yours, Miss Johnston."
She accepted the tribute without a protest. He
realised, with some interest, that behind her modest
pleasant manner, here was a young woman who was
positively arrogant in her appraisement of her
own qualities.
"I'm inclined to agree with your estimate of your
fellow students, Miss Johnston. Chapman is
clever but childish. Valerie Hobhouse has
brains but a blasd attitude to life. You, as you
say, have a trained mind. That's why I'd value
your views-the views of a powerful detached
intellect."
For a moment he was afraid he had overdone it, but
he need have had no fears.
"There is nothing wrong about this place,
Inspector. Pay no attention to Sally Finch. This
is a decent well run hostel. I am certain that
you will find no trace of any subversive
activities."
Inspector Sharpe felt a little surprised.
"It wasn't really subversive activities
I was thinking about."
"Oh-I se" She was a little taken aback.
"I was linking up what Celia said about a
passport. But looking at it impartially and weighing
up all the evidence, it seems quite certain to me that the
reason for Celia's death was what I should express
as a private onesome sex complication, perhaps. I'm
sure it had nothing to do with what I might call the
hostel as a hostel, or anything "going on" here.
Nothing, I am sure, is going on. I should be
aware of the fact If it were so, my perceptions are very
keen."
"I see. Well, thank you, Miss
Johnston. You've been very kind and helpful."
Elizabeth Johnston went out. Inspector
Sharpe sat staring at the closed door and Sergeant
Cobb had to speak to him twice before he roused himself.
"Eh?")
"I said that's the Iggallyt, sir."
"Yes, and what have we got? Precious little. But
I'll tell you one thing, Cobb. I'm coming back
here tomorrow with a search warrant. We'll go away
talking pretty now and they'll think it's all over.
But there's some thing going on in this place. Tomorrow
I'll turn it upside dowrmot so easy when you
don't know what you're looking for, but there's a chance
that I'll find something to give me a clue. That's a
very interesting girl who just went out. She's
got the ego of a neaeaIpoleon, and I strongly
suspect that she knows something."
HERCULE POIROT, at work upon his
correspondence, paused in the middle of a sentence that
he was dictating. Mbss Lemon looked up
questioningly.
"Yes, Mr. Poirot?"
"My mind wanders!" Poirot waved a hand.
"After all, this letter is not important. Be so kind,
Miss Lemon, as to get me your sister upon the
telephone."
"Yes, Mr. Poirot."
A few moments later Poirot crossed the
room and took the receiver from his secretary's hand.
was "Allo!" he said.
"Yes, Mr. Poirot?"
Mrs. Hubbard sounded rather breathless.
"I trust, Mrs. Hubbard, that I am not
disturbing
you?"
"I'm past being disturbed," said Mrs. Hubbard.
"There have been agitations, yes?" Poirot asked
delicately.
... That's a very nice way of putting it, Mr.
Poirot.
That's exactly what they have been. Inspector
Sharpe
finished questioning all the students yesterday, and then he
came back with a search warrant today and I've got
Mrs. Nicoletis on my-hands with raving
hysterics."
Poirot clucked his tongue sympathetically.
Then he said, "I-t is just a little question I have
to ask. You sent me a list of those things that had
disappeared-and other queer happenings-what I have to ask
is this, did you write that list in chronological
order?"
"You mean?"
"I mean, were thetbings written down exactly in
the order of their disappearance?"
"No, they weren't. I'm sorry-I just put them
down as I thought of them. I'm sorry if I've
misled you."
"I should have asked you before," said Poirot. "But it
did not strike me then as important. I have your
list here. It begins, one evening shoe, bracelet,
powder compact, diamond ring, cigarette lighter,
stethoscope, and so on. But you say that that was not comthe
order of disappearance?"
"No."
"Can you remember now, or would it be too
difficult for you, what was the proper order?"
"Well, I'm not sure if I could now, Mr.
Poirot. You see it's all some time ago. I should
have to think it out. Actually, after I had talked with my
sister and knew I was coming to see you, I made a
list, and I should say that I put it down in the order
of the things as I remembered them. I mean, the evening
shoe because it was so peculiar, and then the bracelet and the
powder compact and the cigarette lighter and the diamond
ring because comthey were all rather important things and looked
as though we had a genuine thief at work, and then I
remembered the other more unimportant things later and
added them. I niean the
boracic and the electric light bulbs and the
rucksack. They weren't really important and I
only really thought of them as a kind of afterthought."
"I see," said Poirot. "Yes, I see .
. . Now what I would ask of you, Madame, is
to sit down now, when you have the leisure, that is . .
."
"I daresay when I've got Mrs.
Nicoletis to bed with a sedative and calmed down
Geronimo and Maria, I shall have a little time. What
is it you want me to do?"
"Sit down and try to put down, as nearly as you
can, the chronological order in which the various
incidents occurred."
"Certainly, Mr. Poirot. The rucksack,
I believe, was the first and the electric light
bulbs-wh I really didn't think had any connection
with the other things comand then the bracelet and the compact,
no-the evening shoe. But there, you don't want to hear
me speculate about it. I'll put them down as
best I can."
"Thank you, Madame. I shall be much obliged
to you."
Poirot hung up the phone.
"I am vexed with myself," he said to Miss
Lemon. "I have departed from the principles of order
and method. I should have made quite sure from the start, the
exact order in which these thefts occurred."
"Dear, dear," said Miss Lemon,
mechanically. "Are you going to finish these letters now,
Mr. Poirot?"
But once again Poirot waved her impatiently
away.
On arrival back at Hickory Road with a
search warrant on Saturday morning, Inspector
Sharpe had demanded an interview with Mrs.
Nicoletis who always
came on Saturday to do accounts with Mrs.
Hubbard. He had explained what he was about to do.
Mrs. Nicoletis prggytested with vigour.
"But it is an insult, that!- My students they will
leave-they will all leave. I shall be ruined . . ."
"No, no, Madam. I'm sure they wt be
sensible. After all, this is a case of murder."
"It is not murder-it is suicide."
"And I'm sure once I've explained, no
one will object . . ."
Mrs. Hubbard put in a soothing word.
"I'm sure," she said, "everyone will be sensible
except," she added thoughtfully, "perhaps Mr. Ahmed
Ali and Mr. Chandra Lal."
"Pah!" said Mrs. Nicoletis. "Who cares
about them?"
"Thank you, Madam," said the Inspector.
"Then I'll make a start here, in your sitting
room."
An immediate and violent protest came from Mrs.
Nicoletis at the suggestion.
"You search where you please," she said, "but here,
no! I refuse."
"I'm sorry, Mrs. Nicoletis,
but I have to go through the house from top to bottom."
"That is right, but not in my room. I am above the
law."
"No one's above the law. I'm afraid I shall
have to ask you to stand aside."
"It is an outrage," Mrs. Nicoletis
screamed with fury. "You are officious
busybodies. I will write to everyone. I will
write to my Member of Parliament. I will write
to the papers."
"Write to anyone you please, Madam," said
Inspector Sharpe, "I'm going to search this
room."
He started straight away upon the bureau. A
large carton of confectionery, a mass of papers,
and a large
variety of assorted junk rewarded his search.
He moved from there to a cupboard in the corner of the
room.
"This is locked. Can I have the key, please?"
"Never!" screamed Mrs. Nicoletis.
"Never, never, never shall,; you have the key! Beast and
pig of a policeman, I spit at you. I spit!
I spit! I spit!"
"You might just as well give me the
key," said Inspector Sharpe. "If not, I shall
simply prise the door open."
"I will not give you the key! You will have to tear my
clothes off me before you get the key! And that that will be a
scandal."
"Get a chisel, Cobb," said Inspector
Sharpe resignedly.
Mrs. Nicoletis uttered a scream of fury.
Inspector Sharpe paid no attention. The chisel was
brought. Two sharp cracks and the door of the cupboard
came open. As it swung forward, a large
consignment of empty brandy bottles poured out of the
cupboard.
"Beast! Pig! Devil!" screamed Mrs.
Nicoletis.
"Thank you, Madam," said the Inspector
politely. "We've finished in here."
Mrs. Hubbard tactfully replaced the
bottles while Mrs. Nicoletis had
hysterics.
One mystery, the mystery of Mrs.
Nicoletis's tempers, was now cleared up.
Poirot's telephone call came through just as
Mrs. Hubbard was pouring out an appropriate
dose of sedative from the private medicine
cupboard in her sitting room. After replacing the
receiver she went back to Mrs. Nicoletis whom
she had left screaming and kicking her heels on the
sofa in her sitting room.
"Now you drink this," said Mrs. Hubbard. "And
you'll feel better."
,eaGestapo!" said Mrs. Nicoletis who was
now quiet but sullen.
disI shouldn't think any more about it If I were you,"
saiggf Mrs. Hubbard soothingly.
"Gestapo!" said Mrs. Nicoletis again.
"Gestapol That is what they are!"
"They have to do their duty, you know," said Mrs.
Hubbard.
"Is it their duty to pry into my private
cupboards?
say to them, 'That is not for you." I lock it.
I put the key down my bosom. If you had not
been there as a witness they would have torn my clothes
off me without shame."
"Oh no, I don't think they would have done that,"
said Mrs. Hubbard.
"That is what you say! Instead they get a chisel
and they force my door. That is structural damage
to the house for which I shall be responsible."
"Well, you see, if you wouldn't give them the
key ..."
"Why should I give them the key? It was my key.
My private key. And this is my private
room. My private room and I say to the
police, 'Keep out" and they do not keep out."
"Well, after all, Mrs. Nicoletis, there
has been a murder, remember. And after a murder
one has to put up with certain things which might not be very
pldasant at ordinary times."
"I spit upon the murder!" said Mrs.
Nicoletis. "That little Celia she commits
suicide. She has a silly love affair and she
takes poison. It is the sort of thing that is always
happening. They are so stupid about love, these
girls-as though love mattered! One year, two
years and it is all fccLnished, the grand passion!
The man
is the same as any other man! But com^the silly
girls they do not know that. They take the sleeping
draught and the disinfectant and they turn on gas
taps and then it is too late."
"Well," said Mrs. Hubbard, returning fun
circle, as it were, to where the conversation had started,
"I shouldn't worry any more about it all
now."
"That is all very well for you. Me, I have
to worry. It is not safe for me any longer."
"Safe?" Mrs. Hubbard looked at her,
startled.
"It was my private cupboard," Mrs.
Nicoletis insisted. "Nobody knows what was in
my private cupboard. I did not want them
to know. And now they do know. I am very uneasy. They
may think-what will they think?"
"Who do you mean by they?"
Mrs. Nicoletis shrugged her large, handsome
shoulders and looked sulky.
"You do not understand," she said, "but it makes me
uneasy. Very uneasy."
"You'd better tell me," said Mrs. Hubbard.
"Then perhaps I can help you."
"Thank goodness I do not sleep here," said Mrs.
Nicoletis. "These locks on the doors here they
are all alike; one key fits any other. No,
thanks to heaven, I do not sleep here."
Mrs. Hubbard said,
"Mrs. Nicoletis, if you are afraid of
something, hadn't you better tell me just what it is?"
Mrs. Nicoletis gave her a
flickering look from her dark eyes and then looked
away again.
"You have said it yourself," she said evasively. "You
have said there has been murder in this house, so
naturally one is uneasy. Who may be next?
One does not even know who the murderer is. That is
because the police are so stupid, or perhaps they have been
bribed."
"That's all nonsense and you know it," said Mrs.
Hubbard. "But tell me, have you got any cause for
real anxiety . . ."
Mrs. Nicoletis flew into one of her
tempers.
"Ah, you do not think I have any cause for
anxiety?
You know best as usual. You know everything! You are
so wonderful, you cater, you manage, you spend money
like water on food so that the students are fond of you,
and now you want to manage my affairs! But that, no!
I keep my all airs to myself and nobody shall pry
into them, do you hear? No, Mrs. What-do
you-call-it Paul Pry."
"Please yourself," said Mrs. Hubbard,
exasperated.
"You are a spy-I always knew it."
"A spy on what?"
"Nothing," said Mrs. Nicoletis. "There is
nothing here to spy upop. If you think there is it is
because you made it up. If lies are told about me
I shall know who told them."
"If you wish me to leave," said Mrs. Hubbard,
"you've only got to say so."
"No, you are not to leave. I forbid it. Not at this
moment. Not when I have all the cares of the police, of
murder, of everything else on my hands. I shall not
allow you to abandon me."
"Oh, all right," said Mrs. Hubbard
helplessly. "But really, it's very difficult to know
what you do want. Sometimes I don't think you know
yourself. You'd better lie down on my bed and have a
sleep-was
HERCULE POIROT ALIGHTED from a taxi at
26 Hickory
Road.
The door was opened to him by Geronimo who
welcomed him as an old friend. There was a constable standing
in the hall and Geronimo drew Poirot into the dining
room and closed the door.
"It is terrible," he whispered, as he assisted
Poirot off with his overcoat. "We have
police here all time! Ask questions, go here, go there,
look in cupboards, look in drawers, come
into Maria's kitchen even. Maria very angry. She
say she like to hit policeman with rolling pin but I
say better not. I say policeman not like being hit
by rolling pins and they make us more embarrassment if
Maria do that."
"You have the good sense," said Poirot,
approvingly. "Is Mrs. Hubbard at liberty?"
"I take you upstairs to her."
"A Ettle moment," Poirot stopped him.
"Do you remember the day when certain electric
light bulbs disappeared?"
"Oh yes, I remember. But that long time ago
now.
One-twhree month ago."
"Exactly what electric light bulbs were
taken?"
"The one in the hall and I think in the Common
Room. Someone make joke. Take all the
bulbs out."
"You don't remember the exact date?"
Geronimo struck an attitude as he thought.
"I do not remember," he said. "But I think it
was on day when policeman come, some time in
February-was
"A policeman? What did a policeman come
here for?"
"He come here to see Mrs. Nicoletis about a
student. Very bad student. come from Africa. Not do
work. Go to labour exchan e, get National
Assistance, then have woman and she go out with men for him.
Very bad that. Police not like comt. All this in
Manchester, I think, or Sheffield so he ran
away from there and he come here, but police come after him
and they talk to Mrs. Hubbard about him. Yes. And
she say he not stop here because she no like him and she
send him away."
"I see. They were trying to trace I".gg@.
"Scusi?"
"They were trying to find him?"
"Yes, yes, that is right. They find him and then
they put him in prison because he live on woman and
live on woman must not do. This is nice house
here. Nothing like that here."
"And that was the day the bulbs were missing?"
"Yes. Because I turn switch and nothing happen.
And I go into Common Room and no bulb there, and I
look in drawer here for spares and I see bulbs have
been taken away. So I go down to kitchen
and ask Maria if she know where spare bulbs-but she
angry because she not like police come and she say spare
bulbs not her business, so I bring just candles."
Poirot digested this story as he followed
Geronimo up the stairs to Mrs. Hubbard's
room.
Poirot was welcomed warmly by Mrs. Hubbard,
who was looking tired and harassed. She held out, at
once, a piece of paper to him.
"I've done my best, Mr. Poirot,
to write down these
things in the proper order but I wouldn't like to say that
it's a hundred percent accurate now. You see,
it's very difficult when you look back over a
period of months to remember just when this, that or the
other happened."
"I am deeply grateful to you, Madame. And
how is Mrs. Nicoletis?"
"I've given her a sedative and I hope
she's asleep now. She made a terrible fuss
over the search warrant. She refused to open the
cupboard in her room and the Inspector broke it
open and quantities of empty bottles tumbled
out."
"Ah," said Poirot, making a
tactful sound.
"Which really explains quite a lot of things," said
Mrs. Hubbard. "I really can't imagine why I
didn't think of that before, having seen as much of drink
as I have out in Singapore. But all that, I'm
sure, isn't what interests you."
"Everything interests me," said Poirot.
He sat down and studied the piece of paper that
Mrs. Hubbard had handed to him.
"Ah!" he said, after a moment or two. "I
see that now the rucksack heads the list."
"Yes. It wasn't a very important thing, but
I do remember now, definitely, that it happened
before the jewelry and those sort of things began
to disappear. It was all rather mixed up with some trouble we
had about one of the coloured students. He'd left a
day or two before this happened and I remembered thinking
that it might have been a revengeful act on his part before
he went. There'd been-well-a little trouble."
"Ah! Geronimo has recounted to me something like
that. You had, I believe, the police here? Is that
right?"
"Yes. It seems they had an enquiry from
Sheffield or Birmingham or somewhere. It had all
been rather a scandal. L equals oral
earnings and all that sort of thing.
He was had up about it in court later. Actually,
he'd only stayed here about three or four days.
Then I didn't like his behaviour, the way he was
carrying on, so I told him that his room was engaged
and that he'd have to go. I wasn't really at all
surprised when the police called. Of course, I
couldn't tell them where he'd gone to, but they got
on his track all right."
"And it was after that that you found the rucksack?"
"Yes, I think so-it's hard to remember. You
see, Len Bateson was going off on a
hitch-hike and he couldn't find his rucksack
anywhere and he created a terrible fuss about it -- and
everyone did a lot of searching and at last
Geronimo found it shoved behind the boiler all cut
to ribbons. Such an odd thing to happen. So curious
and pointless, M. Poirot."
"Yes," Poirot agreed. "Curious and
pointless."
He remained thoughtful for a moment.
"And it was on that same day, the day that the police
came to enquire about this African student, that some
electric bulbs disappeared-or so Geronimo
tells me. Was it that day?"
"WeII, I really can't remember. Yes,
yes, I think you're right, because I remember coming
downstairs with the police inspector and going into the
Common Room with him and there were candles there. We
wanted to ask Akibombo' whether this other young man
had spoken to him at an or told him where he was
going to stay."
"Who else was in the Common Room?"
"Oh, I think most of the students had come back
by that time. It was in the evening, you know, just about six
o'clock. I asked Geronimo about the bulbs and he said
they'd been taken out. I asked him why he hadn't
replaced them and he said we were right out of electric
bulbs. I was rather annoyed as it seemed such a
silly pointless joke. I thought of it as a joke,
not as stealing,
but I was surp'n'sed that we had no more electric
bulbs because we usually keep quite a good supply in
stock. Still, I didn't take it seriously, Mr.
Poirot, not at that time."
"The bulbs and the rucksack," said Poirot
thoughtfully.
"But it still seems to me possible," said Mrs.
Hubhard, "that those two things have no connection with
poor little Celia's peccadilloes. You
remember she denied very earnestly that she'd even
touched the racksack at all."
"Yes, yes, that is true. How soon after this
did the thefts begin?"
"Oh dear, Mr. Poirot, you've no idea
how difficult all this is to remember. Let me
see-that was March, no, February-the end of
February. Yes, yes, I think Genevieve said
she'd missed her bracelet about a week after that.
Yes, between the 20th and 25th of February."
"And after that the thefts went on fairly
continuously?"
"Yes."
"And this rucksack was Len Bateson's?"
"Yes."
"And he was very annoyed about it?"
"Well, you mustn't go by that, Mr. Poirot,"
said Mrs. Hubbard, smiling a little. "Len
Bateson is that kind of boy, you know.
Warmhearted, generous, kind to a fault, but one of
those fiery, outspoken tempers."
"What was it, this rucksack-something special?"
"Oh no, it was just the ordinary kind."
"Could you show me one like it?"
"WeEvery, yes, of course. Colin's
got one, I think, just like it. So has Nigel-in
fact Len's got one again now because he had to go and
buy another. The students usually buy them at the
shop at the end of the road.
It's a very good place for all kinds of camping
equipment and hikers" outfits. Shorts, sleeping
bags, all that sort of thing. And very cheap-much cheaper
than any of the big stores."
"If I could just see one of these rucksacks,
Madame?"
Mrs. Hubbard obligingly led him to Colin
Mcationabb's room. Colin himself was not there, but
Mrs. Hubbard opened the wardrobe, stooped, and
picked up a rucksack which she held out
to Poirot.
was There you are, Mr. Poirot. That's exactly
like the one that was missing and that we found all cut up."
"It would take some cutting," murmured
Poirot, as he fingered the rucksack
appreciatively. "One could not snip at this with a
little pair of embroidery scissors."
"Oh no, it wasn't what you'd expect
a-well, a girl to do, for instance. There must have been
a certain amount of strength involved, I should say.
Strength and-well-malice, you know."
was I know, yes, I know. It is not pleasant.
Not pleasant to think about."
"Then, when later that scarf of Valerie's was
found, also slashed to pieces, well, it did
look-what shall I
say-unbalanced."
"Ah," said Poirot. "But I think there you are
wrong, Madame. I do not think there is anything
unbalanced about this business. I think it has aim and
purpose and shall we say, method."
"Well, I daresay you know more about these things,
Mr. Poirot, than I do," said Mrs.
Hubbard. "All I can say is, I don't like it.
As far as I can judge we've got a very nice
lot of students here and it would distress me very much
to think that one of them is-well, not what I'd like
to think he or she is."
Poirot had wandered over to the window. He opened
it and stepped out on to the old-fashioned balcony.
The room looked out over the back of the house.
Below was a small, sooty garden.
can' It is more quiet here than at the front, I
expect?" he said.
"In a way. But Hickory Road isn't
really a noisy road. And facing this way
you get all the cats at night. Yowling, you know, and
knocking the lids off the dust bins."
Poirot looked down at four large battered
ash cans and other assorted back yard junk.
"Where is the boiler house?"
"That's the door to it, down there next to the coal
house."
"see."
He gazed down speculatively.
"Who else has rooms facing this way?"
so' Nigel Chapman and Len Bateson have the
next room to this."
"And beyond them?"
"Then it's the next house-and the girls' rooms.
First the room Celia had and beyond it Elizabeth
Johnston's and then Patricia Lane's.
Valerie and Jean Tomlinson look out to the
front."
Poirot nodded and came back into the room.
"He is neat, this young man," he murmured,
looking round him appreciatively.
"Yes, Colin's room is always very tidy. Some
of the boys live in a terrible mess," said Mrs.
Hubbard. "You should see Len Bateson's room."
She added indulgently, "But he is a
nice boy, Mr. Poirot."
"You say that these rucksacks are bought at the shop
at the end of the road?"
"Yes."
"What is the name of that shop?"
"Now really, Mr. Poirot, when you ask me like
that I can't remember. Mabberley, I tlnk. Or
else Kelso.
No, I know they don't sound the same kind of
name but they're the same sort of name in my mind.
Really, of course, because I knew some people once
called Kelso and some other ones called
Mabberley, and they were very alike."
"Ah," said Poirot. "That is one of the reasons
for things that always fascinate me. The unseen link."
He looked once more out of the window and down into the
garden, then took his leave of Mrs. Hubbard and
left the house.
He walked down Hickory Road until he
came to the corner and turned into the main road. He
had no difficulty in recognizing the shop of
Mrs. Hubbard's description. It displayed in
great profusion picnic baskets, rucksacks,
thermos flasks, sports equipment of all kinds,
shorts, bush shirts, topees, tents,
swimming suits, bicycle lamps and torches; in
fact all possible needs of young and athletic youth.
The name above the shop, he noted, was neither Mabberley
nor Kelso but Hicks. After a careful study of the
goods displayed in the window, Poirot entered and
represented himself as desirous of purchasing a
rucksack for a hypothetical nephew.
"He makes "re camping," you understand," said
Poirot at his most foreign. "He goes with other
students upon the feet and all he needs he takes
with him on his back, and the cars and the lorries that
pass, they give him a lift."
The proprietor, who was a small, obliging
man with sandy hair, replied promptly.
"Ah, hitch-hiking," he said. "They all do it
nowadays. Must lose the buses and the railways a
lot of money, though. Hitch-hike themselves all over
Europe some of these young people do. Now it's a
rucksack you're wanting, sir. Just an ordinary
rucksack?"
"I understand so. Yes. You have a variety then?"
"Well, we have one or two extra light ones
for ladies, but this is the general article we sell.
Good, stout, stand a lot of wear, and really very cheap
though I say it myself."
He produced a stout canvas affair which was,
as far as Poirot could judge, an exact
replica of the one he had been shown in Colin's
room. Poirot examined it, asked a few more
exotic and unnecessary questions and ended by paying for it then and
there.
"Ah yes, we sell a lot of these," said the
man as he made it up into a parcel.
"A good many students lodge round here, do they
not?"
"Yes. This is a neighbourhood with a lot of
students."
"There is one hostel, I believe, in
Hickory Road?"
"Oh yes. I've sold several to the young
gentlemen there. And the young ladies. They usually come
here for any equipment they want before they go off. My
prices are cheaper than the big stores, and so I
tell them. There you are, sir, and I'm sure your
nephew will be delighted with the service he gets out of
this."
Poirot thanked him and went out with his parcel.
He had only gone a step or two when a hand
fell on his shoulder.
It was Inspector Sharpe.
"Just the man I want to see," said Sharpe.
"You have accomplished your search of the house?"
"I've searched the house, but I don't know that
I've accomplished very much. There's a place along
here where you can get a very decent sandwich and a cup of
coffee. Come along with me if you're not too busy.
I'd like to talk to you."
The sandwich bar was almost empty. The two men
carried their plates and cups to a small table in a
corner.
Here Sharpe recounted the results of his questioning of the
students.
"The only person we've got any evidence
against is young Chapman," he said. "And there we've
got too much. Three lots of poison through his
hands. But there's no reason to believe he'd any
animus against Celia Austin, and I doubt if
he'd have been as frank about his activities if he
was really guilty."
"It opens out other possibilities, though."
"Yes-all that stuff knocking about in a drawer.
Silly young, ass!"
He went on to Elizabeth Johnston and her
account of what Celia had said to her.
"If what she said is true, it's
significant."
"Very significant," Poirot agreed.
The Inspector quoted,
was "T shall know more about it tomorrow.""
"And so-tomorrow never came for that poor girl!
Your search of the house-did it accomplish
anything?"
"There were one or two things that were-what shall I
say? Unexpected, perhaps."
"Such as?"
"Elizabeth Johnston is a member of the
Communist party. We found her Party card."
"Yes," said Poirot, thoughtfully. "That is
interesting."
"You wouldn't have expected it," said Inspector
Sharpe. "I didn't until I questioned her
yesterday. She's got a lot of personality, that
girl."
"I should think she was a valuable recruit to the
Party," said Hercule Poirot. "She is a young
woman of quite unusual intelligence, I should say."
"It was interesting to me," said Inspector Sharpe,
"because she has never paraded those sympathies,
apparently. She's kept very quiet about it at
Hickory
Road. I don't see that it has any
significance in connection with the case of Celia
Austin, I mean-but it's a thing to bear in mind."
"What else did you find?"
Inspector Sharpe shrugged his shoulders.
1Miss Patricia Lane, in her drawer,
had a handkerchief rather extensively stained with green
ink."
Poirot's eyebrows rose.
"Green ink? Patricia Lane! So it may have
been she who took the ink and spilled it over
Elizabeth Johnston's papers and comthen wiped her
hands afterwards. But surely . . ."
"Surely she wouldn't want her dear Nigel
to be suspected," Sharpe finished for him.
"One would not have thought so. Of course, someone else
might have put the handkerchief in her drawer."
"Likely enough."
"Anything else?"
"Well," Sharpe reflected for a moment. "It
seems Leonard Bateson's father is in Longwith
Vale Mental Hospital, a certified
patient. I don't suppose it's of any
particular interest, but . . ."
"But Len Bateson's father is insane.
Probably without significance, as you say, but it
is a fact to be stored away in the memory. It
would even be interesting to know what particular form his
mania takes."
"Bateson's a nice young fellow," said
Sharpe, "but of course his temper is a bit,
well, uncontrolled."
Poirot nodded. Suddenly, vividly, he
remembered Celia Austin saying 'Of course, I
wouldn't cut up a rucksack. That's just silly.
Anyway, that was only temper." How did she know
it was temper? Had she seen Len Bateson hacking
at that rucksack? He came back to the present
to hear Sharpe say, with a grin,
and Mr. Ahmed Ali has some extremely
pornographic literature and postcards which
explains why he went up in the air over the
search."
"There were many protests, no doubt?"
"I should say there were. A French girl
practically had hysterics and an Indian, Mr.
Chandra Lal, threatened to make an international
incident of it. There were a few subversive
pamphlets amongst his belongings-the usual half
baked stuff-and one of the West Africans
had some rather fearsome souvenirs and fetishes. Yes, a
search warrant certainly shows you the peculiar side
of human nature. You heard about Mrs.
Nicoletis and her private cupboard?"
"Yes, I heard about that."
Inspector Sharpe grinned.
"Never seen so many empty brandy bottles in my
life! And was she mad at us!"
He laughed, and then, abruptly, became
serious.
"But we didn't find what we were after," he said.
"No passports except strictly
legitimate ones."
"You can hardly expect such a thing as a false
passport to be left about for you to find, mon ami.
You never had occasion, did you, to make an official
visit to 26 Hickory Road in connection with a
passport?
Say, in the last six months?"
"No. I'll tell you the only occasions on which
we did call round-within the times you mention."
He detailed them carefully.
Poirot listened with a frown.
"All that, it does not make sense," he said.
He shook his head.
"Things will only make sense If we begin at the
beginning."
"What do you call the beginning, Poirot?"
"The rucksack, my friend," said Poirot
softly. "The rucksack. All this began with a
cucksack."
MRS. NICOLETIS CAME Up the stairs
from the basement where she had just succeeded in thoroughly
infuriating both Geronimo and the temperamental
Maria.
"Liars and thieves," said Mrs. Nicoletis
in a loud triumphant voice. "All
Italians are liars and thieves!"
Mrs. Hubbard who was just descending the stairs
gave a short vexed sigh.
"It's a pity," she said, "to upset them just while
they're cooking the supper."
"What do I care?" said Mrs. Nicoletis.
"I shall not be here for supper."
Mrs. Hubbard suppressed the retort that rose
to her lips.
"I shall come in as usual on Monday," said
Mrs. Nicoletis.
"Yes, Mrs. Nicoletis."
"And please get someone to repair my
cupboard door first thing Monday morning. The bill
for repairing it will go to the police, do you understand? To the
police."
Mrs. Hubbard looked dubious.
"And I want fresh electric light bulbs
put in the dark passages-stronger ones. The
passages are too dark."
"You said especially that you wanted low power bulbs
in the passages-for economy."
"Thia was last week," snapped Mrs.
Nicoletis. "Now
comx is different. Now I look over my
shoulder-and I wonder, 'Who is following me?""
Was her employer dramatising herself, Mrs.
Hubhard wondered, or was she really afraid of
something or someone? Mrs. Nicoletis had such a
habit of exaggerating everything that it was always hard to know
how much relance to place on her statements.
Mrs. Hubbard said doubtfully,
"Are you sure you ought to go home by yourself?
Would you tike me to come with you?"
"I shall be safer there than here, I can teer you!"
"But what is it you are afraid of? If I
knew, perhaps I could-was
"It is not your business. I tell you
nothing. I find it insupportable the way you continually
ask me questions."
"I'm sorry, I'm sure-was
"Now you are offended." Mrs. Nicoletis
gave her a beaming smile. "I am bad tempered
and rude-yes. But I have much to worry me. And
remember I trust you and rely on you. What I
should do without you, dear Mrs. Hubbard, I really do
not know. See, I kiss my hand to you. Have a
pleasant weekend. Good night."
Mrs. Hubbard watched her as she went out through the
front door and pulled it to behind her. Relieving her
feelings with a rather inadequate "Well, really!"
Mrs. Hubbard turned toward the kitchen stairs.
Mrs. Nicoletis went down the front steps,
out through the gate and turned to the left. Hickory
Road was a fairly broad road. The houses in
it were set back a little in their gardens. At the end
of the road, a few minutes" walk from number
26, was one of London's main thoroughfares, down
which buses were roaring. There were traffic-lights at the
end of the road and a public house. The Queen's
Necklace, at the corner. Mrs. Nicoletis
walked in the middle of the pavement and
from time to time sent a nervous glance over
her shoulder, but there was no one in sight. Hickory
Road appeared to be unusually deserted this evening.
She quickened her steps a little as she drew near The
Queen's Necklace. Taking another hasty glance
round she slipped rather guiltily into the Saloon
Bar.
Sipping the double brandy that she had asked for, her
spirits revived. She no longer looked the frightened and
uneasy woman that she had a short time
previously. Her animosity against the police,
however, was not lessened. She murmured under her
breath, "Gestapol I shall make them pay. Yes,
they shall pay!" and finished off her drink. She ordered
another and brooded over recent happenings.
Unfortunate, extremely unfortunate, that the
police should have been so tactless as to discover her
secret hoard, and too much to hope that word would not
get around amongst the students and the rest of them.
Mrs. Hubbard would be discreet, perhaps, or again perhaps
not, because really, could one trust anyone? These things
always did get around. Geronimo knew. He had
probably already told his wife, and she would tell the
cleaning women and so it would go on until-she started
violently as a voice behind her said,
"Why, Mrs. Nick, I didn't know
this was a haunt of yours?"
She wheeled round sharply and then gave a sigh of
relief.
"Oh, it's you," she said. "I thought. .
"Who did you think it was? The big bad woer?
What are you drinking? Have another on me."
"It is all the worry," Mrs. Nicoletis
explained with dignity. "These policemen searching my
house, upsetting everyone. My poor heart. I have
to be very careful with my heart. I do not care for
drink, but
really I felt quite faint outside. I thought a
little
brandy . . ."
"Nothing like brandy. Here you are."
Mrs. Nicoletis left The Queen's
Necklace a short while later feeling revived
and positively happy. She would not take a bus,
she decided. It was such a fine night and the air would
be good for her. Yes, deand nitely the air would be
good for her. She felt not exactly unsteady on her
feet but just a little bit uncertain. One brandy
less, perhaps, would have been wise, but the air would
soon clear her head. After all, why shouldn't a
lady have a quiet drink in her own room
from time to time? What was there wrong with it? It was not as
though she had ever allowed herself to be seen
intoxicated. Intoxicated? Of course, she was
never intoxicated. And anyway, if they didn't like
it, if they ticked her off, she'd soon tell them
where they got off I She knew a thing or two,
didn't she? If she liked to shoot off her mouth!
Mrs. Nicoletis tossed her head in a
bellicose manner and swerved abruptly to avoid
a pillar-box which had advanced upon her in a menacing
manner. No doubt, her head was swimming a little.
Perhaps if she just leant against the wall here for a little?
If she closed her eyes for a moment or two ...
Police Constable Bott, swinging magnificently
down
on his beat, was accosted by antimid-looking clerk.
(l There's a woman here, officer. I
really-she seems
to have been taken ill or something. She's lying in
a heap."
Police Constable Bott bent his energetic steps
that way, and stooped over the recumbent form. A
strong aroma of brandy confirmed his suspicions.
"Passed out," he said. "Drunk. Ah well,
don't worry, sir, we'll see to it."
Hercule Poirot, having finished his Sunday
breakfast, wiped his moustaches carefully free from
all traces of his breakfast cup of chocolate and
passed into his sitting room.
Neatly arranged on the table were four
rucksacks, each with its bill attached-the result
of instructions given to Georgethe day before. Poirot
took the rucksack he had purchased the day before from
its wrapping, and added it to the others. The result was
interesting. The rucksack he had bought from Mr.
Hicks did not seem inferior in any way that he
could see, to the articles purchased by George from
various other establishments. But it was very decidedly
cheaper.
"Interesting," said Hercule Poirot.
He stared at the rucksacks.
Then he examined them in detail. Inside and
outside, turning them upside down, feeling the
seams, the pockets, the handles. Then he rose,
went into the bathroom and came back with a small sharp
com-knife. Turning the rucksack he had bought
at Mr. Hicks' store inside out, he attacked
the bottom of it with the knife. Between the inner lining and the
bottom there was a heavy piece of corrugated
stiffening, rather resembling in appearance
corrugated paper. Poirot looked at the
dismembered rucksack with a great deal of interest.
Then he proceeded to attack the other
rucksacks.
He sat back finally and surveyed the amount of
destruction he had just accomplished.
Then he drew the telephone towards him and after a
short delay managed to get through to Inspector
Sharpe.
"Encoutez, mon cher," he said. "I want to know
just two things."
Something in the nature of a guffaw from Inspector
Sharpe.
"know two things about the horse, And one of them is
rather coarse,," he observed.
"I beg your pardon," said Hercule Poirot,
surprised.
"Nothing. Nothing. Just a rhyme I used to know.
What are the two things you want to know?"
"You mentioned yesterday certain police inquiries
at Hickory Road made during the last three
months. Can you tell me the dates of them and also the
time of day they were made?"
"Yes-well-that should be easy. Itn be in the
files. Just wait and I'll look it
up."
It was not long before the Inspector returned to the
phone. "First inquiry as to Indian student
disseminating subversive propaganda, 18th
December last-3cccj P M."
"That is too long ago."
"Inquiry re Montage Jones, Eurasian,
wanted in connection with murder of Mrs. Ahce
Combe of Cambridge-February 24th-5cccj
P more. Inquiry re William
Robinsormative West Africa, wanted
by Sheffield police-March 6th, I I A M."
"Ah! I thank you."
"But if you think that either of those cases could have any
connection with-was
Poirot interrapted him.
"No, they have no connection. I am interested
only in the time of day they were made."
"What are you up to, Poirot?"
""I dissect rucksacks, my friend. It is very
interesting."
Gently he replaced the receiver.
He took from his pocket book the amended list that
Mrs. Hubbard had handed him the day before. It ran as
follows:
Rucksack (len Bateson's)
Electric fight bulbs
Bracelet (miss Rysdorff's)
Diamond Ring (patricia's)
Powder Compact (genevieve's)
Evening shoe (sally's)
Lipstick (elizabeth Johnston's)
Earrings (valerie's)
Stethoscope (len Bateson's)
Bathsalts werehiswere
Scarf cut in pieces (valerie's)
Trousers (colin's)
Cookery Book werehiswere
Borarcie (chandra Lal's)
Costume broach (sally's)
Ink spilled on Elizabeth's notes.
(this is the best I can do. It's not absolutely
accurate. L. Hubbard.)
Poirot looked at it a long time.
He sighed and murmured to himself, "Yes . . .
decidedly . . . we have to eliminate the things that do
not matter. . . ."
He had an idea as to who could help him to do that.
It was Sunday. Most of the students would probably
be at home.
He dialled the number of 26 Hickory
Road and asked to speak to Miss Valerie
Hobhouse. A thick rather guttural voice seemed
rather doubtful as to whether she was up yet, but said it would
go and see.
Presently he heard a low husky voice,
"Valerie Hobhouse speaking."
"It is Hercule Poirot. You remember
me?"
"Of course, Mr. Poirot. What can I do for
you?"
"I would like, if I may, to have a short conversation
with you?"
"Certainly."
"I may come roundeaeathen, to Hickory Road?"
"Yes. I'll be expecting you. I'll ten
Geronimo to bring you up to my room. There's not much
privacy here on a Sunday."
"Thank you, Miss Hobhouse. I am most
grateful."
Geronimo opened the door to Poirot with a
flourish, then bending forward he spoke with his usual
conspiratorial air.
c" I take you up to Miss Valerie very
quietly. Hush sh sh."
Placing his finger on his lips, he led the way
upstairs and into a good sized room overlooking
Hickory Road. It was furnished with taste and a
reasonable amount of luxury as a bed sitting room.
The divan bed was covered with a worn but beautiful
Persian rug, and there was an attractive Queen
Anne walnut bureau which Poirot judged hardly
likely to be one of the original furnishings of 26
Hickory Road.
Valerie Hobhouse was standing ready to greet him.
She looked tired, he thought, and there were dark
circles round her eyes.
Mais vous ites tris bien ici," said
Poirot as he greeted her. "It is chic. It
has an air."
Valerie smiled.
"I've been here a good time," she said. "Two
and a half years. Nearly three. I've dug myself
in more or less and I've got some of my own things."
"You are not a student, are you,
Mademoiselle?"
"Oh no. Purely commercial. I've got a
job."
"In a-cosmetic firm, was it?"
"Yes. I'm one of the buyers for
Sabrina Fair-it's a Beauty Salon.
Actually I have a small share in the business. We
run a certain amount of side-fines besides beauty
treatment. Accessories, that type of thing. Small
Parisian novelties. And that's my department."
"You go over then fairly often to Paris and to the
Continent7"
"Oh yes, about once a month, sometimes oftener."
"You must forgive me," said Poirot, "If I
seem to be displaying curiosity. . . ."
"Why not?" She cut him short. "In the
circumstances in which we find ourselves we must all put
up with curiosity. I've answered a good many questions
yesterday from Inspector Sharpe. You look as though
you would like an upright chair, Monsieur Poirot,
rather than a low armchair."
"You display the perspicacity,
Mademoiselle." Poirot sat down carefully
and squarely in a high-backed chair with arms to it.
Valerie sat down on the divan. She offered
him a cigarette and took one herself and lighted it.
He studied her with some attention. She had a
nervous, rather haggard elegance that appealed to him more than
mere conventional good looks would have done. An
intelligent and attractive young woman,
he thought. He wondered if her nervousness was the
result of the recent inquiry or whether it was a
natural component of her manner. He remembered
that he had thought much the same about her on the evening when
he had come to supper.
"Inspector Sharpe has been making inquiries
of you?" he asked.
"Yes, indeed."
"And you have told him all that you know?"
"Of course."
"I wonder," said Poirot, "if that is
true."
She looked at him with an ironic expression.
"Since you did not hear my answers
to Inspector Sharpe you can hardly be a judge,"
she said.
"Ah no. It is merely one of my Jittle
ideas. I have
them, you know comthe little ideas. They are here." He
tapped his head.
It could be noticedthat Poirot, as he sometimes
did, was deliberately playing the mountebank.
Valerie, however, did not smile. She looked at
him in a straightforward manner. When she spoke it
was with a certain abruptness.
"Shall we come to the point, Mr. Poirot?" she
asked. "I really don't know what you're driving
at."
"But certainly, Miss Hobhouse."
He took from his pocket a little package.
"You can guess, perhaps, what I have here?"
"I'm not clairvoyant, Mr. Poirot. I
can't see through paper and wrappings."
"I have here," said Poirot, "the ring that was stolen
from Miss Patricia Lane."
"Patricia's engagement ring? I mean, her
mother's engagement ring? But why should you have it?"
"I asked her to lend it to me for a day or two."
Again Valerie's rather surprised eyebrows mounted
her forehead.
"Indeed," she observed.
"I was interested in the ring," said Poirot.
"Interested in its disappearance, in its return and in
something else about it. So I asked Miss Lane
to lend it to me. She agreed readily. I took it
straight away to a jeweller friend of mine."
"Yes?"
"I asked him to report on the diamond in it.
A fairly large stone, if you remember, flanked
at either side by a little cluster of small
stones. You remember-Mademoiselle?"
"I think so. I don't really remember it very
well."
"But you handled it, didn't you? It was in your soup
plate."
"That was how it was returned! Oh yes, I
remember that. I nearly swallowed it." Valerie
gave a short laugh.
"As I say, I took the ring to my jeweller
friend and I asked him his opinion on the diamond.
Do you know what his answer was?"
"How could I?"
"His answer was that the stone was not a diamond.
It was merely a zircon. A white zircon."
"Oh!" She stared at him. Then she went on,
her tone a little uncertain, "D'you mean
that-Patricia thought it was a diamond but it was only
a zircon or ..."
Poirot was shaking his head.
"No, I do not mean that. It was the engagement ring,
so I understand, of this Patricia Lane's mother.
Miss Patricia Lane is a young lady of good
family and her people, I should say, certainly before
recent taxation, were in comfortable circumstances. In those
circles, Mademoiselle, money is
spent upon an engagement ring. An engagement ring must
be a handsome ringa diamond ring or a ring containing some
other precious stone. I am quite certain that the papa
of Miss Lane would not have given her mamma anything
but a valuable engagement ring."
"As to that," said Valerie, "I couldnt agree with
you more. Patricia's father was a small country
squire, I believe."
"Therefore," said Poirot, "it would seem that the
stone in the ring must have been replaced with another stone
later."
"I suppose," said Valerie slowly, "that
Pat might have lost the stone out of it, couldn't afford
to replace it with a diamond, and had a zircon put
in instead."
"That is possible," said Hercule Poirot, "but
I do not think it is what happened."
"Well, Monsieur Poirot, if we're
guessing, what do you think happened?"
"I think," said Poirot, "that the ring was taken
by Mademoiselle Celia and that the diamond was
deliberately removed and the zircon substituted
before the ring was returned."
Valerie sat up very straight.
"You think Celia stole that diamond
deliberately?"
Poirot shook his head.
"No," he said. "I think you stole it,
Mademoiselle."
Valerie Hobhouse caught her breath sharply.
"Well, really!" she exclaimed. "That seems
to me pretty thick. You've no earthly evidence of
any kind."
"But yes," Poirot interrupted her. "I have
evidence. The ring was returned in a plate of soup.
Now me, I dined here one evening. I noticed the
way the soup was served. It was served from a tureen on
the side table. Therefore, if anyone found a ring in
their soup plate it could only have been placed there either
by the person who was serving the soup (in this case
Geronimo) or by the person whose soup plate it
was. You! I do not think it was Geronimo. I think
that you staged the return of the ring in the soup that way because
it amused you. You have, if I may make the
criticism, rather too humorous a sense of the
dramatic. To hold up the ring! To exclaim! I
think you indulged your sense of humour there,
Mademoiselle, and did not realise that you betrayed
yourself in so doing."
"Is that all?" Valerie spoke
scornfully.
"Oh, no, it is by no means all. You see,
when Celia confessed that evening to having been
responsible for the thefts here, I noticed several
small points. For instance, in speaking of this ring she
said, "I didn't realise how valuable it was.
As soon as I knew, I managed to return it."
How did she know, Miss Valerie?
Who told her how valuable the ring was? And then
again in speaking of the cut scarf, little Miss
Celia said something like, 'That didn't matter.
Valerie didn't mind. . . ." Why did you not
mind if a good quality silk scarf belonging to you was
cut to shreds? I formed the impression then and there that the
whole campaign of stealing things, of making herself out
to be a kleptomaniac, and so attracting the
attention of Colin Meationabb had been thought out for
Celia by someone else. Someone with far more
intelligence than Celia Austin had andwitha good working
knowledge of psychology. You told her the ring was valuable;
you took it from her and arranged for its return. Inthe
same way it was at your suggestion that she slashed a
scarf of yours to pieces."
"These are all theories," said Valerie, "and rather
far-fetched theories at that. The
Inspector has already suggested to me that I put
Celia up to doing these tricks."
"And what did you say to him?"
"I said it was nonsense," said Valerie.
"And what do you say to me?"
Valerie looked at him searchingly for a moment or
two. Then she gave a short laugh, stubbed out her
cigarette, leaned back thrusting a cushion behind her
back and said:
"You're quite right. I put her up to it."
"May I ask you why?"
Valerie said impatiently,
"Oh, sheer foolish good nature. Benevolent
interfering. There Celia was, mooning about like a little
ghost, yearning over Colin who never looked at her.
It all seemed so silly. Colin's one of those
conceited, opinionated young men wrapped up in
psychology and complexes and emotional blocks and
all the rest of it, and I thought really it would be rather
fun to egg him on and make a fool of him.
Anyway I hated to
see Celia look so miserable, so I got
hold of her, gave her a talking-to, explained in
outline the whole scheme, and urged her on to it. She
was a bit nervous, I think, about it all,
but rather thrilled at the same time. Then, of course,
one of the first things the little idiot does is to find
Pat's ring left in the bathroom and pinch that coma
really valuable piece of jewelry about which there'd be
a lot of hoo-ha and the police would be called in and the
whole thing might take a serious turn. So I
grabbed the ring off her, told her I'd return it
somehow, and urged her in the future to stick to costume
jewelry and cosmetics and a little wilful damage
to something of mine which wouldn't land her in trouble."
Poirot drew a deep breath.
"That was exactly what I thought," he said.
"I wish that I hadn't done it now," said
Valerie sombrely. "But I really did mean
well. That's an atrocious thing to say and just like
Jean Tomlinson, but there it is."
"And now," said Poirot, "we come to this business
of Patricia's ring. Celia gave it to you. You were
to find it somewhere and return it to Patricia. But before
returning it to Patricia," he paused. "What
happened?"
He watched her fingers nervously plaitidg and
unplaiting the end of a fringed scarf that she was wearing
round her neck. He went on, in an even more
persuasive voide,
"You were hard up, eh, was that it?"
Without looking up at him she gave a short nod
of the head.
"I said I'd come clean," she said and there was
bitterness in her voice. "The trouble with me is,
MoDsieur Poirot, I'm a gambler. That's
one of the things that's born in you and you can't do anything
much about it. I belong to a little club in
Mayfair-oh, I shall't tell
you just where-I don't want to be responsible for
getting it raided by the police or anything of that
kind. We'll just let it go at the fact that I
belong to it. There's roulette there, baccarat, all the
rest of it. I've taken a nasty series of
losses one after the other. I had this ring of Pat's.
I happened to be passing a shop where there was a
zircon ring. I thought to myself, 'If this diamond was
replaced with a white zircon Pat would never know the
difference!" You never do look at a ring you know really
well. If the diamond seems a bit duller
than usual you just think it needs cleaning or something like
that. All right, I had an impulse. I fell.
I prised out the diamond and sold it. Replaced
it with a zircon and that night I pretended to find it in
my soup. That was a damn silly thing to do,
too, I agree. There! Now you know it all. But
honestly, I never meant Celia to be blamed for
that."
"No, no, I understand." Poirot nodded his
head. "It was just an opportunity that came your
way. It seemed easy and you took it. But you made
there a great mistake, Mademoiselle."
"I real-'Ise that," said Valerie drily.
Then she broke out unhappily,
"But what the hell! Does that matter now? Oh,
turn me in if you like. Tell Pat. Tell the
Inspector. Tell the world! But what good is it
going to do? How's it going to help us with finding out who
killed Celia?"
Poirot rose to his feet.
"One never knows," he said, "what may help and
what may not. One has to clear out of the way so many
things that do not matter and that confuse the issue. It was
important for me to know who had inspired the little
Celia to play the part she did. I know that now. As
to the ring, I suggest that you go yourself to Miss
Patricia Lane and that you tell her what you did
and express the customary sentiments."
Valerie made a grimace.
"I daresay that's pretty good advice
on the whole," she said. "All right, I'll go
to Pat and I'll eat humble pie. Pat's a very
decent sort. I'll tell her that when I can afford
it again I'll replace the diamond. Is that what
you want, Mr. Poirot?"
"It is not -- what I want, it is what is
advisable."
The door opened suddenly and Mrs. Hubbard
came
in.
She was breathing hard and the expression on her face
made Valerie exclaim,
"What's the matter, Mum? What's happened?"
Mrs. Hubbard dropped into a chair.
"It's Mrs. Nicoletis."
"Mrs. Nick? What about her?"
"Oh, my dear. She's dead."
"Dead?" Valerie's voice came harshly.
"How?
When?"
"It seems she was picked up in the street last
night comthey took her to the police station. Theythought
she
was-was-was
"Drunk? I suppose..
"Yes-she had been drinking. But anyway-she
died-was
"Poor old Mrs. Nick," said Valerie.
There was a tremor in her husky voice.
Poirot said gently,
"You were fond of her, Mademoiselle?"
"It's odd in a way-she could be a proper old
devil comb yes-I was. . . . When I first
came herethree years ago, she wasn't nearly
as-as temperamental as she became later-She was good
company-amusing comwarm-hearted- She's changed a
lot in the last
year-was
Valerie looked at Mrs. Hubbard.
"I suppose that's because she'd taken to drinking
on the quiet-they found a lot of bottles and
things in her room, didn't they?"
:, Yes," Mrs. Hubbard hesitated, then
burst out,
'I do blame myself-letting her go off home
alone last ni lit-she was afraid of something, you
know."
"Afraid?"
Poirot and Valerie said it in unison.
Mrs. Hubbard nodded unhappily.
Her mild round face was troubled.
"Yes. She kept saying she wasn't safe.
I asked her to tell me what she was afraid of-and
she snubbed me. And one never knew with her, of
course, how much was exaggeration-But now-I wonder-was
Valerie said,
"You don't think that she-that she, too-that she
was-was She broke off with a look of horror in her
eyes.
Poirot asked, "What did they say was the
cause of death?"
Mrs. Hubbard said unhappily, "They-they
didn't say- There's to be an inquest comon
Tuesday-was
IN A QUIET ROOM at New Scotland
Yard, four men
were sitting round a table.
Presiding over the conference was Superintendent
Wilding of the Narcotics squad. Next to him was
Sergeant Bell, a young man of great energy and
optimiswho looked rather like an eager greyhound.
Leaning back in his chair, quiet and alert, was
Inspector Sharpe. The fourth man was Hercule
Poirot. On the table was
a rucksack.
Superintendent Wilding stroked his chin thoughtfully.
"It's an interesting idea, Mr. Poirot,"
he said cautiously. "Yes, it's an interesting
idea."
"It is, as I say, simply an idea," said
Poirot.
Wilding nodded.
"We've outlined the general position," he said.
"Smuggling goes on all the time, of course, in one
form or another. We clear up one lot of
operators and after a due interval things start again
somewhere else. Speaking for my own branch, there's
been a good lot of the stuff coming into this country in the
last year and a half. Heroin mostly-a fair amount
of coke. There are various depots dotted here and
there on the continent. The French police have got a
lead or two as to how it comes into France-they're
less certain how it goes
out again."
"Would I be right in saying," Poirot asked, "that
your problem could be divided roughly under three heads.
There is the problem of distribution, there is the problem
of how the consi innents enter the country, and there is the
problem of who really runs the business and takes the
main profits?"
"Roughly I'd say that's quite right. We know a
fair amount about the small distributors and how the
stuff is distributed. Some of the distributors we
pull in, some we leave alone hoping that they may
lead us to the big fish. It's distributed in a lot
of different ways, night clubs, pubs,
drugstores, an odd doctor or so, fashionable
women's dressmakers and hairdressers. It's
handed over on race courses, and in antique
dealers", sometimes in a crowded multiple store.
But I needn't
tell you all this. It's not that side of it that's
important. We can keep pace with all that
fairly well. And we've got certain very shrewd
suspicions as to what I've called the big fish.
One or two very respectable wealthy gentlemen against
whom there's never a breath of suspicion. Very
careful they are; they never handle the stuff themselves, and the
little fry don't even know who they are. But every now and
again, one of them makes a slip-and then-we get
him."
"That is all very much as I supposed. The line in
which I am interested is the second line-how do the
consignments come into the country?"
"Ah. We're an island. The most
usual way is the good old fashioned way of the
sea. Running a cargo. Quiet landing somewhere on the
East coast, or a little cove down South, by a
motor boat that's slipped quietly across the
Channel. That succeeds for a bit but sooner or
later we get a line on the particular fellow who
owns the boat and once he's under suspicion his
opportunity's gone. Once or twice lately
the stuff's come in on one of the air liners. There's
big money offered, and occasionally one of the stewards or
one of the crew proves to be only too human. And
then there are the commercial importers. Respectable
firms that import grand pianos or what have you!
They have quite a good run for a bit, but we usually get
wise to them in the end."
"You would agree that it is one of the chief
difficulties when you are running an illicit
trade-the entry from abroad into this country?"
"Decidedly. And I'll say more. For some time
now, we've been worried. More stuff is coming in
than we can keep pace with."
"And what about other things, such as gems?"
Sergeant Bell spoke.
"There's a good deal of it going on, sir.
Illicit
diamonds and other stones are coming out of South
Africa and Australia, some from the Far East.
They're coming into this country in a steady stream, and we
don't know how. The other day a young woman, an
ordinary tourist, in France, was asked by a casual
acquaintance If she'd take a pair of shoes
across the Channel. Not new ones, nothing dutiable,
just some shoes someone had left behind. She agreed quite
unsuspiciously. We happened to be on to that. The
heels of the shoes turned out to be hollow and packed
with uncut diamonds."
SuperinterWent Wilding said,
"But look here, Mr. Poirot, what is it
you're on the track of, dope or smuggled gems?"
"Either. Anything, in fact, of high value and
small bulk. There is an opening, it seems to me,
for what you might call a freight service, conveying
goods such as I have described to and from across the
Channel. Stolen jewelry, the stones removed from
their settings, could be taken out of England, illicit
stones and drugs brought in. It could be a small
independent agency, unconnected with distribution, that
carried stuff on a commission basis. And the profits
might be high."
"I'll say you're right there! You can
pack ten or twenty thousand pounds' worth of heroin
in a very small space and the same goes for uncut
stones of high quality."
"You see," said Poirot, "the weakness of the
smuggler is always the human element. Sooner or
later you suspect a person, an air liner
steward, a yachting enthusiast with a small cabin
cruiser, the woman who travels to and fro to France
too often, the importer who seems to be making more
money than is reasonable, the man who lives well
without visible means of support. But if the stuff
is brought into this country by an innocent person, and
what is more, by a different
person each time, then the difficulties of
spotting the cargoes are enormously increased."
Wilding pushed a finger towards the rucksack.
"And that's your suggestion?"
"Yes. Who is the person who is least
vulnerable to suspicion these days? The student. The
earnest, hardworking student. Badly off, travelling
about with no more luggage than he can carry on his
back. Hitchhiking his way across Europe. If
one particular student were to bring the stuff in all the
time, no doubt you'd get wise to him or her, but the
whole essence of the arrangement is that the
carriers are innocent and that there are a lot of them."
Wilding rubbed his jaw.
"Just how exactly do you think it's managed, M.
Poirot?" he asked.
Hercule Poirot shrugged his shoulders.
"As to that it is my guess only. No doubt I
am wrong in many details, but I should say that it
worked roughly like this: First, a line of rucksacks are
placed on the market. They are of the ordinary,
conventional type, just like any other rucksack, well
and strongly made and suitable for their purpose. When
I say "just like any other rucksack" that is not
so. The lining at the base is slightly different.
As you see, it is quite easily removable and is of a
thickness and composition to allow of rouleaux of gems
or powder concealed in the corrugations. You would never
suspect it unless you were looking for it. Pure heroin
or pure cocaine would take up very little room."
"Too true," said Wilding. "Why," he
measured with rapid fingers, "you could bring in stuff
worth five or six thousand pounds each time without
anyone being the wiser."
"Exactly," said Hercule Poirot.
"Alors! The rucksacks are made, put on the
market, are on saleprobably in more
comthan one shop. The proprietor of the shop may be
in the racket or he may not. It may be that he
has just been sold a cheap line which he finds
profitable, since his prices will compare favourably
with those charged by other camping-outfit sellers. There
is, of course, a definite organisation in the
background; a carefully kept list of students at
the medical schools, at London University and
at other places. Someone who is himself a student,
or posing as a student is probably at the head
of the racket. Students go abroad. At some point
in the return journey a duplicate rucksack
is exchanged. The student returns to England;
customs investigations will be perfunctory. The
student arrives back at his or her hostel,
unpacks, and the empty rucksack is tossed into a
cupboard or into a corner of the room. At this point
there will be again an exchange of rucksacks or
possibly the false bottom will be neatly
extracted and an innocent one
replace it."
"And you think that's what happened at Hickory
Road?"
Poirot nodded.
"That is my suspicion. Yes."
"But what put you on to it, Mr.
Poirot-assuming you're right, that is?"
"A rucksack was cut to pieces," said
Poirot. "Why?
Since the reason is not plain, one has
to imagine a reason. There is something queer about the
rucksacks that come to Hickory Road. They are
too cheap. There has been a series of peculiar
happenings at Hickory Road, but the girl
responsible for them swore that the destruction of the
rucksack was not her doing. Since she has confessed
to the other things why should she deny that unless she was
speaking the truth? So there must be another reason for the
destruction of the rucksack and to destroy a
rucksack, I may say, is not an easy
thing. It was hard work and someone must have been pretty
desperate to undertake it. I got my clue when I
found that roughly-(only roughly, alas, because people's
memories after a period of some months are not too
certain) but roughly-that that rucksack was destroyed at
about the date when a police officer called to see the
person in charge of the Hostel. The actual reason
that the police officer called had to do with another
matter, but I will put it to you like this: You are someone
concerned in this smuggling racket. You go
home to the house that evening and you are informed that the
police have called and are at the moment upstairs with
Mrs. Hubbard. Immediately you assume that the police
are on to the smuggling racket, that they have come to make
an investigation; and let us say that at the moment there
is in the house a rucksack just brought back from
abroad containingor which has recently
contained-contraband. Now, if the police have a line
on what has been going on, they will have come
to Hickory Road for the express purpose of
examining the rucksacks of the students. You dare not
walk out of the house with the rucksack in question because, for
all you know, somebody may have been left outside
by the police to watch the house with just that object in
view, and a rucksack is not an easy thing to conceal
or disguise. The only thing you can think of is to rip
up the rucksack, and cram the pieces away among
the junk in the boiler-house. If there is dope-or
gems on the premises, they can be concealed in bath
salts as a temporary measure. But even an
empty rucksack, if it had held dope, might
yield traces of heroin or cocaine on closer
examination or analysis. So the rucksack must be
destroyed. You agree that that is possible?"
"It's an idea, as I said before," said
Superintendent Wilding.
"It also seems Possible comt a small incident
not hitherto regarded as important may be connected
with the rucksack. According to the Italian servant,
Geronimo, on the day, or one of the days, when the
police called the light in the hall had gone. He
went to look for a bulb to replace it; found the spare
bulbs, too, were missing. He was quite sure that a day
or two previously there had been spare bulbs in
the drawer. It seems to me a possibility-this is
far-fetched and I would not say that I am sure of it,
you understand, it is a mere possibility-that there was
someone with a guilty conscience who had been mixed up
with a smuggling racket before and who feared that his face
might be known to the police if they saw him in a
bright light. So he quietly removed the bulb from
the hall light and took away the new ones so that it
should not be replaced. As a result the hall was
illuminated by a candle only. This, as I say, is
merely a supposition."
"It's an ingenious idea," said Wilding.
"It's possible, sir," said Sergeant Bell
eagerly. "The more I think of it the more possible I
think it is."
"But if so," went on Wilding, "there's
more to it than just Hickory Road?"
Poirot nodded.
"Oh yes. The organisation must cover a wide
range of students' clubs and so on."
"You have to find a connecting link between them," said
Wilding.
Inspector Sharpe spoke for the first time.
"There is such a link, sir," he said, "or there
was. A woman who ran several student clubs and
organisations. A woman who was right on the spot
at Hickory Road. Mrs. Nicoletis."
Wilding flicked a quick glance at Poirot.
"Yes," said Poirot. "Mrs. Nicoletis
fits the bill. She had a financial interest in
all these places though she
didn't run them herself. Her method was to get
someone of unimpeachable integrity and antecedents
to run the place. My friend Mrs. Hubbard is such
a person. The financial backing was supplied
by Mrs. Nicoletisbut there again I suspect her
of being only a figurehead."
"Hm," said Wilding. "I think it would be
interesting to know a little more about Mrs. Nicoletis."
Sharpe nodded.
"We're investigating her," he said.
"Her background and where she came from. It has to be
done carefully. We don't want to alarm our
birds too soon. We're looking into her
financial background, too. My word, that woman
was a tartar if there ever was one."
He described his experiences with Mrs.
Nicoletis when confronted with a search warrant.
"Brandy bottles, eh?" said Wilding. "So she
drank?
Well, that ought to make it easier. What's
hzffppened to her? Hooked it-his"
"No, sir. She's dead."
"Dead?" Wilding raised his eyebrows.
"Monkey business, do you mean?"
"We think so-yes. We'll know for certain after the
autopsy. I think myself she'd begun to crack.
Maybe she didn't bargain for murder."
"You're talking about the Celia Austin case.
Did the girl know something?"
"She knew something," said Poirot, "but if I
may so put it, I do not think she knew what it was
she knew!"
"You mean she knew something but didn't
appreciate the implications of it?"
"Yes. Just that. She was not a clever
girl. She would be quite likely to fail to grasp an
inference. But having seen something, or heard something,
she may have mentioned the fact quite unsuspiciously."
"You've no idea what she saw or heard,
Mr. Poirot?"
"I make guesses," said Poirot. "I cannot
do more. There has been mention of a passport. Did
someone in the house have a false passport allowing
them to go to and fro to the Continent under another name?
Would the revelation of that fact be a serious danger
to that person? Did she see the rucksack being
tampered with or did she, perhaps, one day see someone
removin,,,, the false bottom from the rucksack
without reafisin, what it was that that person was doing?
Did she perhaps see the person who removed the light
bulbs?
And mention the fact to him or her, not realising that it
was of any importance? Ah, mon Dieu!" said
Hercule Poirot with irritation. "Guesses!
guesses!
guesses! One must know more. Always one must know
more!"
"Well," said Sharpe, "we can make a start on
Mrs. Nicoletis" antecedents. Something may
come, up."
"She was put out of the way because they thought she might
talk? Would she have talked?"
"She'd been drinking secretly for some time ...
and that means her nerves were shot to pieces," said
Sharpe. "She might have broken down and spilled the
whole thing. Turned Queen's Evidence."
"She didn't really run the racket, I
suppose?"
Poirot shook his head.
"I should not think so, no. She was out in the open, you
see. She knew what was going on, of course, but
I should not say she was the brains behind it. No."
"Any idea who is the brains behind it?"
"I could make a guess-I migtit be wrong.
Yes-I might be wrong!"
"HJCKORY, DICKORY, DOCK," said
Nigel, "the mouse ran up the clock. The
police said "Boo," I wonder who, Win
eventually stand in the Dock?"
He added, "To tell or not to tell? That is the
question!"
He poured himself out a fresh cup of coffee and
brought it back to the breakfast table.
"Tell what?" asked Len Bateson.
"Anything one knows," said Nigel, with
an airy wave of the hand.
Jean Tomlinson said disapprovingly,
"But of course! If we have any information that may
be of use,, of course we must tell the police.
That would be only right."
"And there speaks our bonny Jean," said
Nigel.
"Moi, je n'aime pas It's tics," said
Ren6, offering his contribution to the discussion.
"Tell what?" Leonard Bateson asked again.
"The things we know," said Nigel. "About each
other, I mean," he added helpfully. His glance
swept round the breakfast room table with a malicious
Team.
"After all," he said, cheerfully, "we all do
know lots of things about each other, don't we? I
mean, one's bound to, living in the same house."
"But who is to decide what is important or
not?
There are many thinos no business of the police it
all," said Mr. Ahmed Ali. He spoke
hotly, with a injured
remembrance of the Inspector's sharp remarks about
his collection of postcards.
"T hear," said Nigel, turning
towards Mr. Akibombo, "that they found some very
interesting things in your room."
Owing to his colour, Mr. Akibombo was not able
to blush, but his eyelids blinked in a discomfited
manner.
"Very much superstition in my country," he said.
"My grandfather give me things to bring here. I keep
out of feeling of piety and respect. I, myself, am
modern and scientific; not believe in voodoo, but
owing to imperfect command of language I find very
difficult to explain to policeman."
"Even dear little Jean has her secrets, I
expect," said Niel, turning his gaze back
to Miss Tomlinson.
Jean said hotly that she wasn't going to be
insulted.
"I shall leave this place and go to the ally W C
A.," she said.
"Come now, Jean," said Nigel. "Give us
another chance."
"Oh, cut it out, Nigel!" said Valerie
wearily. "The police have to snoop, I suppose,
under the circumstances."
Colin Mcationabb cleared his throat,
preparatory to making a remark.
"In my opinion," he said judicially, "the
present position ought to be made clear to us. What
exactly was the cause of Mrs. Nick's death?"
"We'll hear at the inquest, I suppose,"
said Valerie, impatiently.
"I very much doubt it," said Colin. "In my
opinion they'll adjourn the inquest."
"I suppose it was her heart, wasn't it?" said
Patricia. "She fell down in the street."
"Drunk and incapable," said Len Bateson.
"That's how she got taken to the police station."
"So she did drink," said Jean. "You know, I
always thought so.
"When the police searched the house they found
cupboards full of empty brandy bottles in her
room, I believe," she added.
"Trust our Jean to know all the dirt," said
Nigel, approvingly.
"Well, that does explain why she was sometimes so
odd in her manner," said Patricia.
Colin cleared his throat again.
"Ah! hem," he said. "Ihappened to observe
her going into The Queen's Necklace on
Saturday evening, when I was on my way home."
"That's where she got tanked up, I
suppose," said Nigel.
"I suppose she just died of drink, then?" said
Jean.
Len Bateson shook his head.
"Cerebral haemorrhage? I rather doubt it."
"For goodness' sake, you don't think she was
murdered, too, do you?" said Jean.
"I bet she was," said Sally Finch. "Nothing
would surprise me less."
"Please," said Mr. Akibombo. "It is
thought someone killed her? Is that right?"
He looked from face to face.
"We've no reason to suppose anything of the
sort yet," said Colin.
"But who would want to kill her?" demanded
Genevieve. "Had she much money to leave? If she
was rich it is possible, I suppose."
"She was a maddening woman, my dear," said
Nigel. "I'm sure everybody wccinted to kill
her. I often did," he added, helping himself
happily to marmalade.
"Please, Miss Sally, may I ask you a
question? It is after what was said at breakfast. I have
been thinking very much."
"Well, I shouldn't think too much if
I were you, Akibombo," said Sally. "It isn't
healthy."
Sally and Akibombo were partaking of an open air
lunch in Regent's Park. Summer was officially
supposed to have come and the restaurant was open.
"All this morning," said Akibombo mournfully,
his
have been much disturbed. I cannot answer my
professor's questions good at all. He is not
pleased at me. He says to me that I copy large
bits out of books and do not think for myself. But I am
here to acquire wisdom from much books and it seems
to me that they say better in the books than the way
I put it, because I have not good command of the English. And
besides, this morning I find it very hard to think at all
except for what goes on at Hickory Road and
difficulties there."
"I'll say you're right about that," said Sally. "I
just couldn't concentrate myself, this morning."
"So that is why I ask you please to tell me
certain things, because as I say, I have been thinking very
much."
"Well, let's hear what you've been thinking
about, then."
"Well, it is this bor-ass-sic."
"Bor-ass-sic? Oh, boracic! Yes.
What about it?"
"Well, I do not understand very well. It is an
acid, they say? An acid like sulphuric
acid?"
"Not like sulphuric acid, no," said Sally.
"It is not something for laboratory experiment
only?"
"I shouldn't imagine they ever did any
experiments
in laboratories with it. It's something quite mild and
harmless."
"You mean, even, you could put it in your eyes?"
"That's right. That's just what one uses it for."
"Ah, that explains that then. Mr. Chandra Lal,
he have little white bottle with white powder, and he
puts powder in hot water and bathes his eyes with it.
He keeps it in bathroom and then it is not there one
day and he is very angry. That would be the
bor-ac-ic, yes?"
"What is all this about boracic?"
"I tell you by and by. Please not now. I think
some more."
"Well, don't go sticking your neck out," said
Sally.
"I don't want yours to be the next corpse,
Akibombo."
"Valerie, do you think you could give me some
advice?"
"Of course I could give you advice, Jean,
though I don't know why anyone ever wants
advice. They never take it."
"It's really a matter of conscience," said Jean.
"Then I'm the last person you ought to ask. I
haven't got any conscience to speak of."
"Oh, Valerie, don't say things like that!"
"Well, it's quite true," said Valerie. She
stubbed out a cigarette as she spoke. "I smuggle
clothes in from Paris aDd tell the most
frightfullies about their faces to the hideous women who
come to the salon. I even travel on buses without
paying my fare when I'm hard up. But come on,
tell me. What's it all about?"
"It's what Nigel said at breakfast. If one
knows something about someone else, do you think one ought
to tell?"
"What an idiotic question! You can't put a thing like
that in general terms. What is it you want to tell,
or don't want to tell?"
"It's about a passport."
"A passport?" Valerie sat up,
surprised. "Whose passport?"
"Nigel's. He's got a false
passport."
"Nigel?" Valerie sounded disbelieving. "I
don't believe it. It seems most improbable."
"But he has. And you know, Valerie, I
believe there's some question-I think I beard the
police saying that Celia had said something about a
passport. Supposing she'd found out about it and he
killed her?"
"Sounds very melodramatic," said Valerie.
"But frankly, I don't believe a word of it.
What is this story about a passport?"
"I saw it."
"How did you see it?"
"Well, it was absolutely an accident," said
Jean. "I was looking for something in my despatch
case a week or two ago, and by mistake I must
have looked in Nigel's attache case instead. They
were both on the shelf in the Common Room."
Valerie laughed rather disagreeably.
"Tell that to the marines!" she said. "What were you
really doing? Snooping?"
"No, of course not!" Jean sounded
justly indignant. "The one thing I'd never do is
to look among anybody's private papers. I'm
not that sort of person. It was just that I was feeling rather
absent-minded, so I opened the case and I was just
sorting through it . . ."
"Look here, Jean, you can't get away with that.
Nigel's attache case is a good deal larger
than yours and it's an entirely different colour.
While you're admitting things you might just as well
admit that you
are that sort of person. All right. You found a
chance to go through some of Nigel's things and you took it."
Jean rose.
"Of course, Valerie, if you're going to be so
unpleasant and so very unfair and unkind, I shall . .
."
"Oh, come back, child!" said Valerie. "Get
on with it. I'm getting interested now. I want
to know."
"Well, there was this passport," said Jean. "It
was down at the bottom and it had a name on it.
Stanford or Stanley or some name like that, and I
thought, "How odd that Nigel should have somebody
else's passport here." I opened it and the
photograph inside was Nigel!
So don't you see, he must be leading a double
life?
What I wonder is, ought I tell the police?
Do you think it's my duty?"
Valerie laughed.
"Bad luck, Jean," she said. "As a matter
of fact, T believe there's a quite simple
explanation. Pat told me. Nigel came into some
money, or something, on condition that he changed his name.
He did it perfectly properly by deed poll or
whatever it is, but that's all it is. I believe his
original name was Stanfield or Stanley or
something like that."
"Oh?" Jean looked thoroughly chagrined.
"Ask Pat about it if you don't believe me,"
said Valerie.
"Oh-no-well, if it's as you say, I must have
made a mistake."
"Better luck next time," said Valerie.
"I don't know what you mean, Valerie."
"You like to get your knife into Nigel, wouldn't you?
And get him in wrong with the police?"
Jean drew herself up.
"You may not believe me, Valerie," she said,
"but all I wanted to do was my duty."
"Oh, hell!" said Valerie.
She left the room.
There was a tap at the door and Sally entered.
"What's the matter, Valerie? You're looking
a bit down in the mouth."
"It's that disgusting Jean. She really is too
awful!
You don't think, do you, that there's the remotest
chance it was Jean that bumped off poor Celia? I
should rejoice madly if I ever saw Jean in the
dock."
"I'm with you there," said Sally. "But I don't
think it's particularly likely. I don't think
Jean would ever stick her neck out enough to murder
anybody."
"What do you think about Mrs. flick?"
"I just don't know what to think. I suppose we
shall hear soon."
"I'd say ten to one she was bumped off, too,"
said Valerie.
"But why? What's going on here?" said Sally.
"I wish I knew. Sally, do you ever find yourself
looking at people?"
"What do you mean, Val, looking at people?"
"Well, looking and wondering, 'is it
you?" I've got a feeling, Sally, that there's someone
here who's mad. Really mad. Bad mad, I
mearmot just thinking they're a cucumber."
"That may well be," said Sally. She shivered.
"Ouch!" she said. "Somebody's walking over my
grave."
"Nigel, I've got something I must tell you."
"Well, what is it, Pat?" Nigel was
burrowing frantically in his chest of drawers. "What
the hell I did with those notes of mine I can't
imagine. I shoved them in here, I thought."
"Oh, Nigel, don't scrabble like that! You
leave
everything in such a frightful mess and I've just
tidied it.,)
"Well, what comthe hell, I've got to find my
notes, haven't I?"
"Nigel, you must listen!"
"O K., Pat, don't look so desperate.
What is it?"
"It's something I've got to confess."
"Not murder, I hope?" said Nigel with his
usual flippancy.
"No, of course not!"
"Good. Well, what lesser sin?"
"It was one day when I mended your socks and I
brought them along here to your room and was putting them
away in your drawer. .
"Yes?"
"And the bottle of morphia was there. The one you
told me about, that you got from the hospital."
"Yes, and you made such a fuss about it!"
"But Nigel, it was there in your drawer among your
socks, where anybody could have found it."
"Why should they? Nobody else goes routing about
among my socks except you."
"Well, it seemed to me dreadful to leave it about
like that, and I know you'd said you were going to get rid of it
after you'd won your bet, but in the meantime there it was,
still there."
"Of course. I hadn't got the third thing
yet."
"Well, I thought it was very wrong, and so I took
the bottle out of the drawer and I emptied the poison
out of it, and I replaced it with some ordinary
bicarbonate of soda. It looked almost exactly
the same."
Nigel paused in his scramble for his lost notes.
"Good Lord!" he said. "Did you really? You mean
that when I was swearing to Len and old Colin
that
the stuff was morphine sulphate or tartrate
or whatever it was, it was merely bicarbonate of
soda all the time?"
"Yes. You see. . ."
Nigel interrupted her. He was frowning.
"I'm not sure, you know, comt that doesn't
invalidate the bet. Of course, I'd no
idea-was
"But Nigel, it was really dangerous keeping it
there."
"Oh, Lord, Pat, must you always fuss so? What
did you do with the actual stuff?"
"I put it in the Sodi Bic bottle and hid
it at the back of my handkerchief drawer."
Nigel looked at her in mild surprise.
"Really, Pat, your logical thought processes
beggar description! What was all the point?"
"I felt it was safer there."
"My dear girl, either the morphia should have been
under lock and key, or If it wasn't, it couldn't
really matter whether it was among my socks or your
handkerchiefs."
"Well, it did marter. For one thing, I have a
room to myself and you share yours."
"Why, you don't think poor old Len was going
to pinch the morphia off me, do you?"
"I wasn't going to tell you about it, ever, but I
must now. Because, you see, it's gone."
"'allyou mean the police have swiped it?"
"No. It disappeared before that."
"Do you mean ... hiswas Nigel gazed at her in
consternation. "Let's get this straight. There's a
bottle labelled 'Sodi Bic," containing
morphine sulphate, which is knocking about the place
somewhere, and at any time someone may take a heaping
teaspoonful of it If they've got a pain in their
middle? Good God, Pat! You have done it! Why the
hell didn't you throw the stuff away If you were so
upset about it?"
"Because I thought it was valuable and ought to go back to the
hospital instead of being just thrown away. As soon
as you'd won your bet, I meant to give it
to Celia and ask her to put it back."
"You're sure you didn't give it to her, and she
took it and it was suicide, and it was all my
fault?"
"Calm down. When did it disappear?"
"I don't know exactly. I looked for it the
day before Celia died. I couldn't find it,
but I just thought I'd perhaps put it somewhere else."
"It was gone the day before she died?"
"I suppose," said Patricia, her face
white, "that I've been very stupid."
"That's putting it mildly," said Nigel.
"To what
lengths can a muddled mind and an active conscience
go! Is
"Nigel. D'you think I ought to tell the
police?"
"Oh, hell!" said Nigel. "I suppose so,
yes. And it's going to be all my fault."
"Oh, no, Nigel darling, it's me. l"
"I pinched the damned stuff in the first place,"
said Nigel. "It all seemed to be a very amusing
stunt at the time. But now-I can already hear the
vitriolic remarks from the bench."
"I am sorry. When I took it I really
meant it for"
"You meant it for the best. I know. I know! Look
here, Pat, I simply can't believe the stuff
has disappeared. You've forgotten just where you put it.
You do mislay things sometimes, you know."
"Yes, but-was
She hesitated, a shade of doubt
appearing on her frowning face.
Nigel rose briskly.
"Let's go along to your room and have a thorough
search."
"Nigel, those are my underclothes."
"Really, Pat, you can't go all prudish on me
at this stage. Down among the panties is just where you
would hide a bottle, now, isn't it?"
"Yes, but I'm sure I-was
"We cant be sure of anything until we've
looked everywhere. And I'm jolly well going to do
it."
There was a perfunctory tap on the door and
Sally Finch entered. Her eyes widened with
surprise. Pat, clasping a handful of Nigel's
socks, was sitting on the bed, and Nigel, the
bureau drawers all pulled out, was burrowing like an
excited terrier into a heap of pullovers whilst about
him were strewn panties, brassiandres, stockings and
other component parts of female attire.
"For land's sake," said Sally, "what goes
on?"
"Looking for bicarbonate," said Nigel
briefly.
"Bicarbonate? Why?"
"I've got a pain," said Nigel grinning.
"A pain in my turn-turn-turn-and nothing but
bicarbonate will assuage it."
"I've got some somewhere, I believe."
"No good, Sally, it's got to be Pat's.
Hers is the only brand that will ease my particular
ailment."
"You're crazy," said Sally. "What's he up
to, Pat?"
Patricia shook her head miserably.
"You haven't seen my Sodi Bic, have you,
Sally?" she asked. "Just a little in the bottom of the
bottle."
"No." Sally looked at her curiously. Then
she frowned. "Let me see. Somebody around
here-no, I can't remember- Have you got a stamp,
Pat? I have to mail a letter and I've run out."
"In the drawer there."
Sally opened the shallow drawer of the writing table,
took out a book of stamps, extracted one,
affixed it to the letter she held in her hand, dropped the
stamp book back in the drawer, and put two pence
halfpenny on the desk.
"Thanks. Shall I mail this letter of yours at the
same time?"
"Yes-no- No, I think I'll wait."
Sally nodded and left the room.
Pat dropped the socks she had been holding, and
twisted her fingers nervously together.
"Nigel?"
"Yes?" Nigel had transferred his attention
to the wardrobe and was looking in the pockets of a
coat.
"There's something else I've got to confess."
"Good Lord, Pat, what else have you been doing?"
"I'm afraid you'll be angry."
"I'm past being angry. I'm just plain scared.
If Celia was poisoned with the stuff that I pinched,
I shall probably go to prison for years and years,
even if they don't hang me."
"It's nothing to do with that. It's about your father."
"What?" Nigel spun around, an expression of
incredulous astonishment on his face.
"You do know he's very ill, don't you?"
"I don't care how ill he is."
"It said so on the wireless last night. "Sir
Arthur Stanley, the famous research chemist, is
lying in a very critical condition."
his
"So nice to be a V I P. All
the world gets the news when you're ill."
"Nigel, if he's dying, you ought to be
reconciled to him."
"Like hell, I will!"
"But if he's dying."
"He's the same swine dying as he was when he was
in the pink of condition."
"You mustn't be like that, Nigel. So bitter and
unforgiving."
"Listen, Pat-I told you once: he killed
my mother."
"I know you said so, and I know you adored her. But
I do think, Nigel, that you sometimes exaggerate.
Lots of husbands are unkind and unfeeling and their
wives resent it and it makes them very unhappy. But
to say your father killed your mother is an extravagant
statement and isn't really true."
"You know so much about it, don't you?"
"I know that some day you'll regret not having made
it up with your father before he died. That's why-was Pat
paused and braced herself. "That's why H've written
to your father-telling him-was
"You've written to him? is that the letter Sally
wanted to post?" He strode ovet to the writing
table. "I see."
He picked up the letter lying addressed and stamped,
and with quick nervous fingers, he tore it into small
pieces and threw it into the waste paper basket.
"That's that! And don't you dare do anything of that
kind again."
"Really, Nigel, you are absolutely
childish. You can tear the letter up, but you can't stop me
writing another, and I shall."
"You're so incurably sentimental. Did it never
occur to you that when I said my father killed my mother, I
was stating just a plain unvarnished fact? My mother
died of an overdose of veronal. Took it
by mistake, they said at the inquest. But she didn't
take it by mistake. It was given to her,
deliberately, by my father. He wanted to marry
another woman, you see, and my mother wouldn't give
him a divorce. It's a plain sordid murder
story. What would you have done in my place?
Denounced him to the police? My mother wouldn't have
wanted that.... So I did the only thing I could do
told the swine I knew-and cleared out-for ever. I
even changed my name."
"Nigel-I'm sorry ... I never dreamed. .
"Well, you know now. . . . The respected and
famous Arthur Stanley with Is
researches and his antibiotics. Flourishing like the
green bay tree? But his fancy piece didnt
marty him after an. She sheered off. I think she
guessed what he'd done-was
"Nigel, dear, how awful-I am sorry..."
"All right. We won't talk of it again.
Let's get back to this blasted bicarbonate
business. Now think back carefully to exactly
what you did with the stuff- Put your head in your hands
and think, Pat."
Genevieve entered the Common Room in a state
of great excitement. She spoke to the assembled
students in a low thrilled voice.
"I am sure now, but absolutely sure I
know who killed the little Celia."
"Who was it, Genevieve?" demanded Ren6.
"What has arrived to make you so positive?"
Genevieve looked cautiously round to make
sure the door of the Common Room was closed. She
lowered her voice.
"It is Nigel Chapman."
"Nigel Chapman, but why?"
"Listen. I pass along the corridor to go down
the stairs just now and I hear voices in
Patricia's room. It is Nigel who
speaks."
"Nigel? In Patricia's room?" Jean
spoke in a disapproving voice. But Genevieve
swept on.
"And he is saying to her that his father killed his mother,
and that, pour Va, he has changed his name.
So it is clear, is it not? His father was a convicted
murderer, and Nigel he has the hereditary taint .
. ."
"It is possible," said Mr. Chandra Lal,
dwelling pleasurably on the possibility. "It
is certainly possible. He is so violent,
Nigel, so unbalanced. No self control. You
agree?" He turned condescendingly to Akibombo
who nodded an enthusiastic black woolly head and
showed his white teeth in a pleased smile.
"I've always felt very strongly," said Jean, "that
Nigel has no moral sense.... A thoroughly
degenerate character."
"It is sex murder, yes," said Mr. Ahmed
Ali. "He sleeps with this girl, then he kills
her. Because she is nice girl, respectable, she will
expect marriage.
"Rot," said Leonard Bateson
explosively. "What did you say?"
"I said ROT!" roared Len.
SEATED rNA ROOM at the police station,
Nigel looked nervously into the stern eyes of
Inspector Sharpe. Stammering slightly, he had
just brought his narrative to a close.
"You realize, Mr. Chapman, that what you have just
told us is very serious? Very serious indeed."
"Of course I realise it. I wouldn't have come
here to tell you about it unless I'd felt that it was
urgent."
"A nd you say Miss Lane can't remember
exactly
when she last saw this bicarbonate bottle
containing morphine?"
"She's got herself all muddled up. The more she
tries to think the more uncertain she gets. She said
I flustered her. She's trying to think it out
quietly while I came round to you."
"We'd beller go round to Hickory Road right
away."
As the Inspector spoke the telephone on the
table rang and the constable who had been taking notes of
Nigel's story, stretched out his hand and lifted the
receiver.
"It's Miss Lane now," he said as
he listened. "Wanting to speak to Mr. Chapman."
Nigel leaned across the table and took the receiver from
him.
"Pat? Nigel here."
The girl's voice came, breathless, eager, the
words tumbling over each other.
"Nigel. I think I've got itl I mean,
I think I know now who must have taken-you know comtaken
it from my handkerchief drawer, I mean-you see,
there's only one person who-was
The voice broke off.
"Pat. Hullo? Are youthere? Who was it?"
"I can't tell you now. Later. You'll be coming
round?"
The receiver was near enough for the constable and the Inspector
to have heard the conversation clearly, and the latter nodded in
answer to Nigel's questioning look.
"TeEvery her 'at once,"
was he said.
"We're coming round at once," said Nigel.
"On our way this minute."
"Oh! Good. I'll be in my room."
"So long, Pat."
Hardly a word was spoken during the brief ride
to
Hickory Road. Sharpe wondered to himself whether
this was a break a-t last. Would Patricia Lane
have any definite evidence to offer, or would it be
pure surmise on her part? Clearly she had
remembered something that had seemed to her important.
He supposed that she had been telephoning from the
hall, and that therefore she had had to be guarded in her
language. At this timein the evening so many people would have
been passing through.
Nigel opened the front door of 26
Hickory Road with his key and they passed inside.
Through the open door of the Common Room, Sharpe could
see the rumpled red head of Leonard Bateson
bent over some books.
Nigel led the way upstairs and along the
passage to Pat's room. He gave a short
tap on the door and entered.
"Hullo, Pat. Here w"
His voice stopped, dying away in a long choking
gasp. He stood motionless. Over his shoulder,
Sharpe saw also what there was to see.
Patricia Lane lay slumped on the floor.
The Inspector pushed Nigel gently aside.
He went forward and knelt down by the girl's huddled
body. He raised her head, felt for the
pulse, then delicately let the head resume its
former position. He rose to his feet, his face
grim and set.
"No?" said Nigel, his voice high and
unnatural. "No. No. No."
"Yes, Mr. Chapman. She's dead."
"No, no. Not Pat! Dear stupid Pat.
How"
"With this."
It was a simple, quickly improvised weapon.
A marble paperweight slipped into a woolen sock.
"Struck on the back of the head. A very
efficacious
weapon. If it's any consolation to you, Mr.
Chapman, I don't think she even knew what
happened to her."
Nigel sat down shakily on the bed. He said:
"That's one of my socks.... She was going to mend
it.... Oh, God, she was going to mend it. . ."
Suddenly he began to cry. He cried like a
childwith abandon and without self-consciousness.
Sharpe was continuing his reconstruction. "It was
someone she knew quite well. Someone who picked up a
sock and just slipped the paperweight into it. Do you
recognize the paperweight, Mr.
Chapman?"
He rolled the sock back so as to display it.
Nigel, still weeping, looked.
"Pat always had it on her desk. A Lion of
Luceme."
He buried his face in his hands.
"Pat-oh, Pat! What shall I do without you!"
Suddenly he sat upright, flinging back his
untidy fair hair.
"I'll kill whoever did this! I'll kill him!
Murdering swine!"
"Gently, Mr. Chapman. Yes, yes, I
know how you feel. A brutal piece of work."
"Pat never harmed anybody. .
Speaking soothingly, Inspector Sharpe got him
out of the room. Then he went back himself into the
bedroom. He stooped over the dead girl. Very
gently he detached something from between her fingers.
Geronimo, perspiration running down his forehead,
turned frightened dark eyes from once face to the other.
"I see nothing. I hear nothing, I tell you.
I do not
know anything at all. I am with Maria in
kitchen. I put the minestrone on, I grate the
chees" Sharpe interrupted the
catalogue.
"Nobody's accusing you. We just want to get some
times quite clear. Who was in and out of the house the last
hour?"
"I do not know. How should I know?"
"But you can see very clearly from the kitchen window who
goes in and out, can't you?"
"Perhaps, yes."
"Then just tell us."
"They come in and out all the time at this hour of the
day."
"Who was in the house from six o'clock until six
thirty-five when we arrived?"
"Everybody except Mr. Niget and Mrs.
Hubbard and Miss Hobhouse."
"When did they go out?"
"Mrs. Hubbard she go out before teatime, she has not
come back yet."
I "Go on."
"Mr. Nigel goes out about half an hour
ago, just before six-look very upset. He come back
with you just now-was
"That's right, yes."
"Miss Valerie, she goes out just at six
o'clock. Time signal, pip, pip, pip.
Dressed for cocktails, very smart. She still out."
"And everybody else is here?"
"Yes, sir. All here."
Sharpe looked down at his notebook. The time of
Patricia's call was noted there. Ei lit
minutes past six, exactly.
"Everybody else was here, in the house? Nobody
came back during that time?"
"Only Miss Sally. She been down to pillar
box with letter and come back in-was
"Do you know what time she came in?"
Geronimo frowned.
"She came back while the news was going on."
"After six, then?"
"Yes, sir."
"What part of the news was it?"
"I don't remember, sir. But before the sport.
Because when sport come we switch off."
Sharpe smiled grimly. It was a wide field.
Only Nigel Chapman, Valerie Hobhouse and
Mrs. Hubbard could be excluded. It would mean long
and exhaustive questioning. Who had been in the Common
Room, who had left it? And when? Who could vouch for
whom? Add to that, that many of the students, especially the
Asiatic and African ones, were
constitutionally vague about times, and the task was no
enviable one.
But it would have to be done.
In Mrs. Hubbard's room the atmosphere was
unhappy. Mrs. Hubbard herself, still in her outdoor
things, her nice round face strained and anxious,
sat on the sofa. Sharpe and Sergeant Cobb at a
small table.
"I think she telephoned from in here," said
Sharpe. "Around about 6ccjh several people left or
entered the Common Room, or so they say-and nobody
saw or noticed or heard the hall telephone being
used. Of course, their times aren't reliable, half
these people never seem to look at a clock. But I
think that anyway she'd come in here if she wanted
to telephone the police
station. You were out, Mrs. Hubbard, but I don't
suppose you lock your door?"
Mrs. Hubbard shook her head.
"Mrs. Nicoletis always did, but I never do"
"Well then, Patricia Lane comes in here
to telephone, all agog with what she's remembered.
Then, whilst she was talking, the door opened and
somebody looked in or came in. Patricia
stalled and hung up. Was that because she
recognised the intruder as the person whose name she was
just about to say? Or was it just a general precaution?
Might be either. I incline myself to the first
supposition."
Mrs. Hubbard nodded emphatically.
"Whoever it was may have followed her here, perhaps
listened outside the door. Then came in to stop
Pat from going on."
"And then-was
Sharpe's face darkened. "That person went back
to Patricia's room with her, talking quite normally and
easily. Perhaps Patricia taxed her with removing
the bicarbonate, and perhaps the other gave a plausible
explanation."
Mrs. Hubbard said sharply,
"Why do you say'her"?"
"Funny thing-a pronoun! When we found the
body, Nigel Chapman said, "I'll kill
whoever did this. I'll kill him." 'Him," you
notice. Nigel Chapman clearly believed the
murder was done by a man. It may be because he
associated the idea of violence with a man. It may
be that he's got some particular suspicion pointing
to a man, to some particular man. If the latter, we
must find out his reasons for thinking so. But
speaking for myself, I plump for a woman."
"Why?"
"Just tills. Somebody went into Patricia's
room with
her-someone with whom she felt quite at home. That
points to another girl. The men don't go to the
girls' bedroom floors unless it's for some
special reason. That's right, isn't it, Mrs.
Hubbard?"
"Yes. It's not exactly a hard and fast
rule, but it's fairly generally observed."
"The other side of the house is cut off from this
side, except on the ground floor. Taking it that
the conversation earlier between Nigel and Pat was
overheard, it would in all probability be a woman
who overheard it."
"Yes, I see what you mean. And some of the
girls seem to spend half their time here listening at
keyholes."
She flushed and added apologetically,
"That's rather too harsh. Actually, although these houses
are solidly built, they've been cut up and
partitioned, and all the new work is flimsy as
anything, like paper. You can't help hearing through it.
Jean, I must admit, does do a good
deal of snooping. She's the type. And of course,
when Genevieve heard Nigel tell Pat his father
had murdered his mother, she stopped and listened for all
she was worth."
The Inspector nodded. He had listened to the
evidence of Sally Finch and Jean Tomlinson and
Genevieve. He said:
"Who occupies the rooms on either side of
Patricia's?"
"Genevieve's is beyond it-but that's a good
original wall. Elizabeth Johnston's is on
the other side, nearer the stairs. That's only a
partition wall."
"The narrows it down a bit," said the
Inspector.
"The French girl heard the end of the conversation,
Sally Finch was present earlier on, before she went out
to post her letter. But the fact that those two girls were
there automatically excludes anybody else
having been
able to snoop, except for a very short period.
Always with the exception of Elizabeth Johnston who
could have heard everything through the partition wall if she'd
been in her bedroom, but it seems to be fairly
clear that she was already in the Common Room
when Sally Finch went out to the post."
She did not remain in the Common Room all the
time?"
"No, she went upstairs again at some period
to fetch a book she had forgotten. As usual,
nobody can say when."
"It might have been any of them," said Mrs.
Hub Z, hard helplessly.
"As far as their statements go, yes-but we've got
a little extra evidence."
He took a small folded paper pacist out of
his pocket.
Sharpe smiled.
coneaWhat's that?" demanded Mrs. Hubbard.
"A couple of hairs-I took them from between
Patricia Lane's fingers."
"You mean that-was
There was a tap on the door.
"Come in," said the Inspector.
The door opened to admit Mr. Akibombo.
He was smiling broadly, all over his black
face.
"Please," he said.
Inspector Sharpe said impatiently,
"Yes, Mr.-er-urn, what is it?"
"I think, please, I have statement to make. Of
first class importance to elucidation of sad and
tragic occurrence."
"Now, MR. AKIBOMBO," said Inspector
Sharpe, resignedly, "let's hear, please, what
all this is about."
Mr. Akibombo had been provided with a chair.
He sat facing the others who were all looking at him
with keen attention.
"Thank you. I begin now?"
"Yes, please."
"Well, it is, you see, that sometimes I have the
disquieting sensations in my stomach."
"Sick to my stomach. That is what Miss Sally
calls it. But I am not, you see, actually sick.
I do not, that is, vomit."
Inspector Sharpe restrained himself with
difficulty while these medical details were
elaborated.
"Yes, yes," he said. "Very sorry, I'm
sure. But you want to tell us-was
"It is, perhaps, unaccustomed food. I feel very
full here." Mr. Akibombo indicated exactly
where. "I think myself, not enough meat, and too much what you
call cardohydrates."
"Carbohydrates," the Inspector corrected
him mechanically. "But I don't see-was
"Sometimes I take small pill, soda mint;
and sometimes stomach powder. It does not matter very much
what it is-so that a great pouf comes and much air coml
this." Mr. Akibombo gave a most realistic and
gigantic belch. "After that," he smiled
seraphically, "I feel much better, much better."
The Inspector's face was becoming a congested
purple. Mrs. Hubbard said authoritatively,
"We understand all about that. Now get on to the
next part."
"Yes. Certainly. Well, as I say, this
happens to me early last week-I do not remember
exactly which day. Very good macaroni and I eat a
lot, and afterwards feel very bad. I try to do work for
my Professor but difficult to think with fullness
here." (again Akibombo indicated the spot.) "It
is after supper in the Common Room and only
Elizabeth there and I say to her, 'Have you
bicarbonate or stomach powder? I have finished
mine." And she says, 'ationo. But," she says,
"I saw some in Pat's drawer when I was putting
back a handkerchief I borrowed from her. I will get
it for you," she says. "Pat will not
mind." So she goes upstairs and comes back with
sodi bicarbonate bottle. Very little left, at
bottom of bottle, almost empty. I thank her and
go with it to the bathroom, and I put nearly all of
it, about a teaspoonful in water and stir it up and
drink it."
"A teaspoonful? A teaspoonful! My
God!"
The Inspector gazed at him fascinated.
Sergeant Cobb leaned forward with an astonished
face. Mrs. Hubbard said obscurely,
"Rasputin!was
"You swallowed a teaspoonful of morphia?"
"Naturally, I think it is bicarbonate."
"Yes, yes, what I can't understand is why you're
sitting here now!"
"And then, afterwards, I was ill, but really ill. Not
just the fulness. Pain, bad pain in my stomach."
"I can't make out why you're not dead!"
"Rasputin," said Mrs. Hubbard. "They used
to give
him poison again and again, lots of it, and it
didn't kill him!"
Mr. Akibombo was continuing.
"So then, next day, when I am
better, I take the bottle and the tiny bit of
powder that is left in it to a chemist and I say
please tell me, what is this I have taken, that has
made me feel so bad?"
"Yes?"
"And he says come back later, and when I do,
he says, 'ationo wonder! This is not the
bicarbonate. It is the Borass-eek. The
Acid Borasseek. You can put it in the eyes,
yes, but if you swallow a teaspoonful it makes you
ill."
"Boracic?" The Inspector stared at him
stupefied. "But how did Boracic get into that
bottle? What happened to the morphia?" He
groaned, "Of all the havwire cases!"
"And I have been thinking, please," went on
Akibombo.
The Inspector groaned again.
"You have been thinking," he said. "And what have you
been thinking?"
"I have been thinking of Miss Celia and how she
died, and that someone, after she was dead, must have come into her
room and left there the empty morphia bottle and the
little piece of paper that say she killed herself-was
Akibombo paused and the Inspector
nodded.
"And so I say-who could have done that? And I think
if it is one of the girls it will be easy, but if a
man not so easy, because he would have to go downstairs in
our house and up the other stairs and someone mi,eaealit
wake up and hear him or see him. So I think
again, and I say, suppose it is someone in our
house, but in the next room to Miss
Celia's-only she is in this house, you understand?
Outside his window is a
balcony and outside hers is a balcony,
too, and she will sleep with her window open because that is
hygienic practice. So if he is big and strong
and athletic he could jump across."
"The room next to Celia's in the other house,"
said Mrs. Hubbard. "Let me see, that's
Nigel's and and. . ."
"Len Bateson's," said the Inspector. His
finger touched the folded paper in his hand. "Len
Bateson."
"He is very nice, yes," said Mr.
Akibombo sadly. "And to me most pleasant, but
psychologically one does not know what goes on below
top surface. That is so, is it not? That is
modern theory. Mr. Chandra Lal very
angry when his boracic for the eyes disappears and
later, when I ask, he says he has been told
that it was taken by Len Bateson. . . ."
"The morphia was taken from Nigel's drawer and
boracic was substituted for it, and then Patricia
Lane came along and substituted sodi
bicarbonate for what she thought was morphia bat which
was really boracic powder.... Yes.... I see.
. ."
"I have helped you, yes?" Mr. Akibombo
asked politely.
"Yes, indeed, we're most grateful to you.
Don'ter comrepeat any of this."
"No, sir. I will be most careful."
Mr. A-kibombo bowed politely to all and
left the room.
"Len Bateson," said Mrs. Hubbard in a
distressed voice.
"Oh! No."
Sharpe looked at her.
"You don't want it to be Len Bateson?"
"I've got fond of that boy. He's got a
temper, I know, but he's always seemed so nice."
"That's been said about a lot of criminals," said
Sharpe. Gently he unfolded his little
paper packet. Mrs. Hubbard obeyed his gesture
and leaned forward to look.
On the wte paper were two red short curly
hairs....
"Oh! dear," said Mrs. Hubbard.
"Yes," said Sharpe reflectively. "In my
experience a murderer usually makes at least one
mistake."
"BUT IT IS BEAUTIFUL, my friend," said
Hercule Poirot with admiration. "So clear-so
beautifully clear."
"You sound as if you were talking about soup," grumbled
the Inspector. "It may be consommd to you
comb to me there's a good deal of thick mock
turtle
about it, still."
"Not now. Everything fits in in its appointed
place."
"Even these?"
As he had done to Mrs. Hubbard, Inspector
Sharpe produced his exhibit of two red hairs.
Poirot's answer was almost in the same words as
Sharpe had used.
"Ah-yeg," he said. "What do you call it on
the radio? The one deliberate
mistake."
The eyes of the two men met.
"No one," said Hercule Poirot, "is as
clever as they think they are."
Inspector Sharpe was greatly tempted to say:
"Not even Hercule Poirot?" but he restrained
himself.
coneaFor the other, my friend, it is all fixed?"
'allyes, the balloon goes up tomorrow."
:, You go yourself?"
'ationo, I'm scheduled to appear at 26
Hickory Road.
Cobb will be in charge."
"We will wish him good luck."
Gravely, Hercule Poirot raised his
glass. It contained crbme de menthe.
Inspector Sharpe raised his whisky glass.
"Here's hoping," he said.
"They do think up things, these places," said
Sergeant Cobb.
He was looking with grudging admiration at the
display window of SABRINA FAIR. Framed and
enclosed in an expensive illustration of the
glassmaker's art-the "glassy green translucent
wave"-Sabrina was displayed recumbent,
clad in brief and exquisite panties and
happily surrounded with every variety of deliciously
packaged cosmetics. Besides the panties she
wore various examples of barbaric costume
jewelry.
Detective Constable McCrae gave a snort
of deep disapproval.
"Blasphemy, I call it. Sabrina Fair,
that's Milton, that is."
"Well, Milton isn't the Bible, my lad."
"You'll not deny that Paradise Lost is about
Adam and Eve and the Garden of Eden and all the
devils of Hell and if that's not religion, what
is?"
Sergeant Cobb did not enter on these
controversial matters. He marched ishment,
the dour constable at his heels. In the shell pink
interior of Sabrina Fair the Sergeant and his
satellite looked as out of place asthe
traditional bull in a china shop.
An exquisite creature in delicate
salmon pink swam up to them, her feet hardly
seeming to touch the floor.
Sergeant Cobb said, "Good morning, Madam,"
and produced his credentials. The lovely
creature withdrew in a flutter. An equally
lovely but slightly older creature appeared.
She intum gave way to a superb and resplendent
Duchess whose blue-grey hair and smooth cheeks
set age and wrinkles at nought. Appraising steel
grey eyes met the steady gaze of Sergeant
Cobb.
"This is most unusual," said the Duchess
severely. "Please come this way."
She led him bethrough a square salon with a centre
table where magazines and periodicals were heaped
carelessly. AH round the walls were curtained
recesses where glimpses could be obtained of
recumbent women supine under the ministrant hands of
pink robed priestesses.
The Duchess led the police officers into a
small business-like apartment with a big roll top
desk, severe chairs, and no softening of the harsh
Northern light.
"I am Mrs. Lucas, the proprietress of
this establishment," she said. "My partner, Miss
Hobhouse, is not here today."
"No, Madam," said Sergeant Cobb, to whom
this was no news.
dis?This search warrant of yours seems
to be most highhanded," said Mrs. Lucas. "This is
Miss Hobhouse's private office. I
sincerely hope that it will not be necessary for you t cupset
our clients in any way."
"I don't think you need to worry unduly on that
score," said Cobb. "What we're after isn't
likely to be in the public rooms."
He waited politely until she unwillingly
withdrew. Then he looked round Valerie
Hobhouse's office. The narrow window gave a
view of the back premises of other Mayfair
firms. The walls were panelled in pale grey and
there were two good Persian rugs on the floor. His
eyes went from the small wall safe to the big
desk.
"Won't be in the safe," said Cobb. "Too
obvious."
A quarter of an hour later, the safe and the
drawers of the desk had yielded up their secrets.
"Looks like it's maybe a mare's nest," said
McCrae who was by nature both gloomy and
disapproving.
"We're only beginning," said Cobb.
Having emptied the drawers of their contents and
arranged the latter neatly in piles, he
now proceeded to take the drawers out and turn them
upside down.
He uttered an ejaculation of pleasure.
"Here we are, my lad," he said.
Fastened to the underneath side of the bottom drawer with
adhesive tape were a half dozen small dark
blue books with gilt lettering.
"Passports," said SereaeaIeant Cobb.
"Issued by Her Majesty's Secretary of State
for Foreign Aff airs, God bless his trusting
heart."
McCrae bent over with interest as Cobb opened
the passports and compared the affixed photographs.
"Hardly think it was the same woman, would you?"
said MacRae.
The passports were those of Mrs. da Silva,
Miss Irene French, Mrs. Olga Kohn,
Miss Nina Le Mesurier, Mrs. Gladwys
Thomas, and Miss Moira O'ationeele. They
represented a dark young woman whose age varied between
twenty-five and forty.
"It's the different hair-do every time that does it,"
said Cobb. "Pompadour, curls, straight out,
page boy
bob, etc. She's done something to her
nose for Olga Kohn, plumpers in her cheeks for
Mrs. Thomas. Here are two more-foreign
passports-Madame Mahmoudi, Algerian.
Sheila Donovan, Eire. I'll say she's
got bank accounts in all these dill erent names."
"Bit complicated, isn't that?"
"It has to be complicated, my lad. Inland
Revenue. Always snooping around asking embarrassing
questions."
It's not so difficult to make money by smuggling
goods comb it's hell and all to account for money when
you've got it! I bet this little gambling club in
Mayfair was started by the lady for just that reason.
Winning money by gambling is about the only thing an
Income Tax Inspector can't cheek up on. A
good part of the loot, I should say, is eached around in
Algerian and French banks and in Eire. The
whole thing's a thoroughly well thought out business-like
set-up. And then, one day, she must have had one of
i^the fake passports lying about at Hickory
Road and that poor little devil CeJia saw it."
"IT WAS A CLEVER IDEA of Miss
Hobhouse's," said Inspector Sharpe. His
voice was indulgent, almost f atherly.
He shuffled the passports from one hand
to the other like a man dealing cards.
"Complicated thing, finance," he said. "We've
had a
busy time haring round from one Bank to the other. She
covered her tracks well-her financial tracks,
I mean. I'd say that in a couple of years" time
she could have cleared out, gone abroad and lived
happily ever after, as they say, on ill-gotten
gains. It wasn't a big show-illicit
diamonds, sapphires, etc., coming instolen stuff
going out-and narcotics on the side, as you might
say. Thoroughly well organised. She went
abroad under her own and under different names, but never
too often, and the actual smuggling was always done,
unknowingly, by someone else. She had agents abroad
who saw to the exchange of rucksacks at the right
moment. Yes, it was a clever idea. And we've
got Mr. Poirot here to thank for putting us on
to it. It was smart of her, too, to suoeaeagest that
psychological stealing stunt to poor little Miss
Austin. You were wise to that almost at once, weren't
you, M. Poirot?"
Poirot smiled in a deprecating manner and
Mrs. Hubbard looked admiringly at him. The
conversation was strictly off the record in
Mrs. Hubbard's sitting room.
"Greed was her undoing," said Mr. Poirot.
"She was tempted by that fine diamond in Patricia
Lane's ring. It was foolish of her because it suggested
at once that she was used to handling precious stones-that
business of prising the diamond out and replacing it
with a zircon. Yes, that certainly gave me ideas
about Valerie Hobhouse. She was clever, though, when
I taxed her with inspiring Celia, she admitted it
and explained it in a thoroughly sympathetic way."
"But murder!" said Mrs. Hubbard.
"Cold-blooded murder. I can't really believe
it even now."
Inspector Sharpe looked gloomy.
"We aren't in a position to charge her with the murder
of Celia Austin yet," he said. "We've got
her cold on the smuggling, of course. No
difficulties about
that. But the murder charge is more tricky. The
public prosecutor doesn't see his way.
There's motive, of course, and opportunity. She
probably knew all about the bet and Nigel's
possession of morphia, but there's no real
evidence, and there are the two other deaths to take
into account. She could have poisoned Mrs.
Nicoletis all right-but on the other hand, she
definitely did not kill Patricia Lane.
Actually she's about the only person who's
completely in the clear. Geronimo says
positively that she left the house at six o'clock.
He sticks to that. I don't know whether she bribed
him"
"No," said Poirot, shaking his head. "She
did not bribe him."
"And we've the evidence of the chemist at the corner
of the road. He knows her quite well and he sticks to it
that she came in at five minutes past six and bought
face powder and aspirin and used the telephone. She
left his shop at quarter past six and took a
taxi from the rank outside."
Poirot sat up in his chair.
"But that," he said, "is magnificentl It is just
what we want!"
"What on earth do you mean?"
"I mean that she actually telephoned from the box
at the chemist's shop."
Inspector Sharpe looked at him in an
exasperated fashion.
"Now, see here, Mr. Poirot. Let's
take the known facts. At eight minutes
past six, Patricia Lane is alive and
telephoning to the police station from this room. You
agree to that?"
"I do not think she was telephoning from this room."
"Well then, from the hall downstairs."
"Not from the hall either."
Inspector Sharpe sighed.
"I suppose you don't deny that a call was put
through to the police station? You don't think that I and my
Sergeant and Police Constable Nye, and Nigel
Chapman were the victims of mass hallucination?"
"Assuredly not. A call was put through to you. I
should say at a guess that it was put through from the
public call box at the chemist's on the
corner."
Inspector Sharpe's jaw dropped for a moment.
"You mean that Valerie Hobhouse put through that
call? That she pretended to speak as Patricia
Lane, and that Patricia Lane was already dead?"
"That is what I mean, yes."
The Inspector was silent for a moment, then he
brou,eaealit down his fist with a crash on the table.
"I don't believe it. The voice-I heard it
myself"
"You heard it, yes. A girl's
voice-breathless, agitated. But you didn't know
Patricia Lane's voice well enough to say
definitely that it was her voice."
"I didn't, perhaps. But it was Nigel Chapman
who actually took the call. You can't ten me that
Nigel Chapman could be deceived. It isn't so
easy to disguile a voice over the telephone, or
to counterfeit somebody else's voice. Nigel
Chapman would have known if it wasn't Pat's
voice speaking."
"Yes," said Poirot. -- "Nigel Chapman
would have known. Nigel Chapman knew quite well that it
wasn't Patricia. Who should know better than
he, since he had killed her with a blow on the back
of the head only a short while before."
It was a moment or two before the Inspector
recovered his voice.
"Ni el Chapman? Nigel Chapman? But when
we found her dead-he cried-cried like a child."
"I daresay," said Poirot. "I think he was
as fond of that irl as he could be of anybody-but that
wouldn't save her-not if she represented a menace
to his
interests. All along, Nigel Chapman has
stood out as the obvious probability. Who
had morphia in his possession? Nigel Chapman.
Who has the shallow brilliant intellect
to plan, and the audacity to carry out fraud and murder?
Nigel Chapman. Who do we know to be both
ruthless and vain? Nigel Chapman. He has all
the hallraarks of the killer; the overweening vanity, the
spitefulness, the growing recklessness that led him to draw
attention to himself in every conceivable way comusing the green
ink in a stupendous double bluff, and finally overreaching
himself by the silly deliberate mistake of putting
Len Bateson's hairs in Patricia's fingers,
oblivious of the fact that as Patricia was struck
down from behind, she could not possibly have grasped her
assailant by the hair. They are like that, these
murderers-carried away by their own egoism, by their
admiration of their own cleverness, relying on their
charm-for he has charm, this Nigel-he has all the
charm of a spoiled child who has never grown up, who
never will grow up-who sees only one thing, Himself, and
what he wants!"
"But why, Mr. Poirot? Why murder?
Celia Austin, perhaps, but why Patricia
Lane?"
"That," said Poirot, "we have got to find out."
"I HAVEN'T SEEN YOU for a long
time," said old Mr. Endicott to Hercule
Poirot. He peered at the other keenly. "It's
very nice of you to drop in."
"Not really," said Hercule Poirot. "I
want something."
"Well, as you know, I'm deeply in your debt.
You cleared up that nasty Abemethy business for
me."
"I am surprised really to find you here. I thought
you had retired."
The old lawyer smiled grimly. His firm was a
most respectable and old established one.
"I came in specially today to see a very old
client. I still attend to the affairs of one or two
old friends."
"Sir Arthur Stanley was an old friend and
client, was he not?"
"Yes. We've undertaken all his legal work
since he was quite a young man. A very brilliant
man, Poirotquite an exceptional brain."
"His death was announced on the six o'clock news
yesterday, I believe."
"Yes. The funeral's on Friday. He's
been ailing some time. A malignant growth, I
understand."
"Lady Stanley died some years ago?"
"Two and a hall years ago, roughly."
The keen eyes below the bushy brows looked sharply
at Poirot.
"How did she die?"
The lawyer repried promptly.
"Overdose of sleeping stuff. Medinal as far
as'remember."
"There was an inquest?"
"Yes. The verdict was that she took it
accidentally."
"Did she?"
Mr. Endicott was silent for a moment.
"I won't insult you," he said. "I've no
doubt you've got a good reason for asking.
Medinal's a rather dangerous drug, I understand, because
there's not a big margin between an effective dose and a
lethal one. If the patient gets drowsy and
forgets she's taken a dose and takes
another-well, it can have a fatal result."
Poirot nodded.
"Is that what she did?"
"Presumably. There was no suggestion of
suicide, or suicidal tendencies."
"And no suggestion of-anything else?"
Again that keen glance was shot at him.
"Her husband gave evidence."
"And what did he say?"
"He made it clear that she did sometimes got
confused after comtaking her nightly dose and ask for
another."
"Was he lying?"
"Really, Poirot, what an outrageous question.
Why should you suppose for a minute that I should know?"
Poirot smiled. The attempt at bluster did
not deceive him.
"I suggest, my friend, that you know very well. But for the
moment I will not embarrass you by asking you what you know.
Instead I will ask you for an opinion. The opinion
of one man about another. Was Arthur Stanley the
kind of man who would do away with his wife if he
wanted to marry another woman?"
Mr. Endicott jumped as though he had been
stung by a wasp.
"Preposterous," he said angrily. "Quite
preposterous. And there was no other woman. Stanley
was devoted to his wife."
"Yes," said Poirot. "I thought so. And
now-I will come to the purpose of my call upon you. You
arethe solicitors who drew up Arthur
Stanley's will. You are, perhaps, his executor."
"That is so."
"Arthur Stanley had a son. The son
quaffelled with his father at the time of his mother's death.
Quarrelled with him and left home. He even went
so far as to change his name."
"That I did not know. What's he calling himself?"
"We shall come to that. Before we do I am going'
to make an assumption. If I am right, perhaps you will
admit the fact. I think that Arthur Stanley
left a sealed letter with you, a letter to be opened under
certain circumstances or after his death."
"Really, Poirot! In the Middle Ages you
would certainly have been burnt at the stake. How you
can possibly know the things you do!"
"I am right then? I think there was an
alternative in the letter. Its contents were either to be
destroyed comor you were to take a certain course of
action."
He paused. The other did not speak.
"Bon Dieu!" said Poirot, with alarm. "You
have not ajready destroyed-was
He broke off in relief as Mr. Endicott
slowly shook his head in negation.
"We never act in haste," he said
reprovingly. "I have to make full enquiries-to
satisfy myself absolutely' He paused. "This
matter," he said severely, "is highly
confidential. Even to you, Poirot' He shook his
head.
"And if I show you good cause why you should speak?"
"That- is- up to you. I cannot conceive how you can
possibly know anything at all that is relevant
to the matter we are discussing."
"I do not know coms I have to guess. If I
guess correctly-was
"HigWy unlikely," said Mr. Endicott
with a wave of his hand.
Poirot drew a deep breath.
"Very well then. It is in my mind that your
instructions are as follows. In the event of Sir
Arthur's death, you are to trace his son, Nigel,
to ascertain where he is living and how he is living and
particularly whether he is or has been engaged in
any criminal activity whatsoever."
This time Mr. Endicott's impregnable legal
calm was really shattered. He uttered an
exclamation such as few had ever heard from his Eps.
"Since you appear to be in full possession of the
facts," he said, "I'll tell you
anything you want to know. I gather you've come across young
Nigel in the course of your professional
activities. What's the young devil been up
to?"
"I think the story goes as follows. After he
left home he changed his name, telling anyone who
was interested that he had to do so as a condition of a
legacy. He then fell in with some people who were ranning
a smuggling racketrugs and jewels. I think it was
due to him that the racket assumed its final form-an
exceedingly clever one involving the using of innocent
bona fide students. The whole thing was operated
by two people, Nigel Chapman, as he now called
himself, and a young woman called Valerie Hobhouse
who, I think, originally introduced him to the
smuggling trade. It was a small private concern
and they worked it on a
commission basis-but it was immensely profitable.
The goods had to be of small bulk, but thousands of
pounds' worth of gems and narcotics occupy a very
small space. Everything went well until one of
those unforeseen chances occurred. A police officer
came one day to a students' hostel to make
inquiries in connection with a murder near
Cambridge. I think you know the reason
why that particular piece of information should cause
Nigel to panic. He thought the police were after him.
He removed certain electric light bulbs so that
the light should be dim and he also, in a panic, took
a certain racksack out into the back yard, hacked it
to pieces and threw it behind the boiler since he feared
traces of narcotic might be found in its false
bottom.
"His panic was quite unfounded-the police had
merely come to ask questions about a certain Eurasian
student-but one of the girls living in the Hostel had
happened to look out of her window and had seen.
him destroying the rucksack. That did not immediately
sign her death warrant. Instead, a clever scheme
was ,thought up by which she herself was induced to commit certain
foolish actions which would place her in a very invidious
position. But they carried that scheme too far. I was
called in. I advised going to the police. The
girl lost her head and confessed. She confessed, that
is, to the things that she had done. But she went, I
think, to Nigel, and urged him to confess also to the
rucksack business and to spilling ink over a fellow
student's work. Neither Nigel nor his accomplice
could consider attention being called to the rucksack-their
whole plan of campaign would be ruined.
Moreover Celia, the girl in question, had another
dangerous piece of knowledge which she revealed, as it
happened, the night I dined there. She knew who
Nigel really was."
"But surely-was Mr. Endicott frowned.
"Nigel had moved from one world to another. Any
former friends he met might know that he now called himself
Chapman, but they knew nothing of what he was doing.
In the Hostel nobody knew that his real name was
Stanley-but Celia suddenly revealed that she knew
him in both capacities. She also knew that
Valerie Hobhouse, on one occasion at least, had
travelled abroad on a false passport. She
knew too much. The next evening she went out to meet
him by appointment somewhere. He gave her a drink of
coffee and in it was morphia. She died in her
sleep with everything arranged to look like suicide."
Mr. Endicott stirred. An expression of
deep distress crossed his face. He murmured
something under his breath.
"But that was not the end," said Poirot. "The woman
who owned the chain of hosters and students' clubs died
soon after in suspicious circumstances and then,
finally, there came the last most cruel and heartless
crime. Patricia Lane, a girl who
was devoted to Nigel and of whom he himself was really
fond, meddled unwittingly in his all airs, and
moreover insisted that he should be reconciled to his
father before the latter died. He told her a string of
lies, but rearised that her obstinacy might urge her
actually to write a second letter after the first was
destroyed. I think, my friend, that you can tell me
why, from his point of view, that would have been such a
fatal thing to happen."
Mr. Endicott rose. He went across the room
to a safe, unlocked it, and came back with a long
envelope in his hand. It had a broken red seal on
the back of it. He drew out two enclosures and
laid them before Poirot.
Dear Endicott. You will open this after I am
dead. I wish you to trace my son Nigel and find
out If he has been guilty of any criminal
actions whatsoever.
"The facts I am about to tell you are known to me
only. Nigel has always been profoundly
unsatisfactory in his character. He has twice been
guilty of forging my name to a cheque. On each
occasion I acknowledged the signature as mine, but
warned him that I would not do so again. On the third
occasion it was his mother's name he forged. She
charged him with it. He begged her to keep silence.
She refused. She and I had discussed him, and she
made it clear she was going to tell me. It was then
that, in handing her her evening sleeping mixture, he
administered an overdose. Before it took effect,
however, she had come to my room and told me all about
matters. When, the next morning, she was found dead,
I knew who had done it.
"I accused Nigel and told him that I intended
to make a clean breast of all the facts to the
police. He pleaded desperately with me. What
would you have done, Endicott? I have no illusions about
my son, I know him for what he is, one of those
dangerous misfits who have neither conscience nor pity.
I had no cause to save him. But it was the thought of
my beloved wife that swayed me. Would she wish me
to execute justice? I thought that I knew the
answer-she would have wanted her son saved from the
scaffold. She would have shrunk, as I shrank, from
dragging down our name. But there was another consideration.
I firmly believe that once a killer, always a
killer. There might be, in the future, other
victims. I made a bargain with my son, and
whether I did right or wrong, I do not know. He was
to write out a confession of his crime which I
should
keep. He was comto leave my house and never
return,
but make a new are for hijnself. I would give
him
a second chance. Money belonging to his mother
would come to him automatically. He had had a
good education. He had every chance of making
good.
"But-if he were convicted of any criminal
activity whatsoever the confession he had left with
me should go to the police. I safeguarded myself
by explaining that my own death would not solve
the problem.
"You are my oldest friend. I am placing a bur
den on your shoulders, but I ask it in the name of
a dead woman who was also your friend. Find
Nigel. If his record is clean destroy this
letter
and the enclosed confession. If not-then justice
must be done.
Your affectionate friend,
Arthur Stanley
"Ah!" Poirot breathed a long sigh. He
unfolded the enclosure.
I hereby confess that I murdered my mother
by giving her an overdose of medinal on Novem
her 18, 195-.
Nigel Stanley.
"YOU QUITE UNDERSTAND your position, Miss
Hobhouse. I have already warned you' Valerie
Hobhouse cut him short.
"I know what I'm doing. You've warned me that
what I say will be used in evidence. I'm prepared
for that. You've got me on the smuggling charge. I
haven't got a hope. That means a long term of
imprisonment. This other means that I'll be charged as
an accessory to murder."
"Your being willing to make a statement may help
you, but I can't make any promise or hold out
any inducement."
"I don't know that I care. Just as well end it
all as languish in prison for years. I want
to make a statement. I may be what you call an
accessory, but I'm not a killer. I never intended
murder or wanted it. I'm not such a fool. What
I do want is that there should be a clear case against
Nigel ...
"Celia knew far too much, but I could have dealt
with that somehow. Nigel didn't give me
time. He got her to come out and meet him, told her
that he was going to own up to the rucksack and the ink
business and then slipped her the morphia in a cup
of coffee. He'd got hold of her letter to Mrs.
Hubbard earlier on and had torn out a useful
"suicide" phrase. He put that and the empty
morphia phial (which he had retrieved after
pretending to throw it away) by her bed. I see
now that he'd been contemplating murder for quite a little
time. Then he came and told me what he'd done.
For my own sake I had to stand in with him.
"The same thing must have happened with Mrs. Nick.
He'd found out that she drank, that she was getting
unreliable-he managed to meet her somewhere on her
way home, and poisoned her drink. He denied it
to mbut I know that that's what he did. Then came
Pat. He came up to my room and told me what
had happened. He told me what I'd got to do-so
that both he and I would have an unbreakable alibi. I
was in the net by then, there was no way out.... I
suppose, if you hadn't caught me, I'd have gone
abroad somewhere, and made a new life for myself. But
you did catch me. . . . And now I only care
about one thing-to make sure that that cruel smiling
devil gets hanged."
Inspector Sharpe drew a deep breath. All
this was eminently satisfactory, it was an
unbelievable piece of luck; but he was puzzled.
The Constable licked his pencil.
"I'm not sure that I quite understand," began Sharpe.
She cut him short.
"You don't need to understand. I've got my
reasons."
Hercule Poirot spoke very gently.
"Mrs. Nicoletis?" he asked.
He heard the sharp intake of her breath.
"She was-your mother, was she not?"
"Yes," said Valerie Hobhouse. "She was my
mother. . .
"I DO NOT UNDERSTAND," said Mr. Akibombo
plaintively.
He looked anxiously from one red head to the
(yourher.
Sally Finch and Len Bateson were conducting a
conversation which Mr. A-kibombo found it hard
to follow.
"Do you think," asked Sally, "that Nigel meant
me to be suspected, or you?"
"Either, I should say," replied Len. "I
believe he actually took the hairs from
my brusIL"
"I do not understand, please," said Mr.
Akibombo. "Was it then Mr. Nigel who
jumped the balcony?"
"Nigel can jump like a *Cat. I couldn't have
jumped across that space. I'm far too heavy."
. "t want to apologise very deeply and
humbly for wholly unjustifiable suspicions."
"That's all right," said Len.
"Actually, you helped a lot," said Sally.
"All your thinking-about the boracie."
Mr. Akibombo brightened up.
"One ought to have realised all along," said Len,
"that Nigel was a thoroughly maladjusted type and-was
"Oh, for heaven's sake-you sound just like Colin.
Frankly, Nigel always gave me the creeps-and
at last I see why. Do you realise, Len, that if
poor Sir Arthur Stanley hadn't been
sentimental and had turned Nigel
straight over to the police, three other people would be
alive today? It's a solemn thought."
"Still, one can understand what he felt about it"
"Please, Miss Sally."
"Yes, Akibombo?"
"If you meet my Professor at
University party tonight will you tell him, please, that
I have done some good thinking? My Professor he
says often that I have a muddled thought process."
"I'll tell him," said Sally.
Len Bateson was looking the picture of
gloom.
"In a week's time you'll be back in
America," he said.
There was a momentary silence.
"I shall come back," said Sally. "Or you might
come and do a course over there."
"What's the use?"
"Akibombo," said Sally, "would you like, one day,
to be Best Man at a wedding?"
"What is Best Man, please?"
"The bridegroom, Len here for instance, gives you
a ring to keep for him, and he and you go to church very
smartly dressed and at the right moment he asks you
for the ring and you give it to him, and he puts it on my
finger, and the organ plays the wedding march and everybody
cries. And there we are."
"You mean that you and Mr. Len are to be married?"
"That's the idea."
"Sallyl"
"Unless, of course, Len doesn't
care for the idea."
"Sally! But you don't know comab my father-was
"So what? Of course I know. So your father's
nuts.
All right, so are lots of people's fathers."
"It isn3t a hereditary type of mania. I
can assure
you of that, Sally, if you only knew how
desperately unhappy I've been about you."
"I did just have a tiny suspicion."
"In Africa," said Mr. Akibombo, "in
old days, before Atomic Age and scientific thought
had come, marriage customs were very curious and
interesting. I tell you-was
"You'd better not," said Sally. "I have an idea
they might make both Len and me blush, and when
you've got red hair it's very noticeable when you
blush."
Hercule Poirot signed the last of the letters that
Miss Lenion had laid before him.
"Tr?ness bien," he said gravely. "Not a
single mistake."
Miss Lemon looked slightly affronted.
"I don't often make mistakes, I hope,"
she said.
"Not often. But it has happened. How is your
sister, by the way?"
"She is thinking of going on a cruise, Mr.
Poirot.
To the Northern capitals."
"Ah," said Hercule Poirot.
He wondered if-possibly-on a cruise-his
Not that he himself would undertake a sea voyage comn
for any inducement....
The clock behind him struck one.
The clock struck one,
The mouse ran down,
Hickory dickory dock,
declared Hercule Poirot.
"I beg your pardon, Mr. Poirot?"
"Nothing," said Hercule Poirot.