Japp said: "Will you explain, or shall I?"
Poirot said gravely: "Mademoiselle, this Dr Andersen had perfected a scheme of exploitation and murder - scientific murder. Most of his life has been spent in bacteriological research. Under a different name he has a chemical laboratory in Sheffield. There he makes cultures of various bacilli. It was his practice, at the Festivals, to inject into his followers a small but sufficient dose of Cannabis Indica - which is also known by the names of Hashish or Blang. This gives delusions of grandeur and pleasurable enjoyment. It bound his devotees to him.
These were the Spiritual Joys that he promised them."
"Most remarkable," said Miss Carnaby. "Really a most remarkable sensation."
Hercule Poirot nodded. "That was his general stock in trade - a dominating personality, the power of creating mass hysteria and the reactions produced by this drug. But he had a second aim in view.
"Lonely women, in their gratitude and fervour, made wills leaving their money to the Cult. One by one, these women died. They died in their own homes and apparently of natural causes. Without being too technical I will try to explain. It is possible to make intensified cultures of certain bacteria. The bacillus colicommunis, for instance, the cause of ulcerative colitis. Typhoid bacilli can be introduced into the system.
So can the Pneumococcus. There is also what is termed Old Tuberculin which is harmless to a healthy person but which stimulates any old tubercular lesion into activity. You perceive the cleverness of the man? These deaths would occur in different parts of the country, with different doctors attending them and without any risk of arousing suspicion. He had also, I gather, cultivated a substance which had the power of delaying but intensifying the action of the chosen bacillus."
"He's a devil, if there ever was one!" said Chief Inspector Japp.
Poirot went on: "By my orders, you told him that you were a tuberculous subject. There was Old Tuberculin in the syringe when Cole arrested him. Since you were a healthy person it would not have harmed you, which is why I made you lay stress on your tubercular trouble. I was terrified that even now he might choose some other germ, but I respected your courage and I had to let you take the risk."
"Oh, that's all right," said Miss Carnaby brightly. "I don't mind taking risks. I'm only frightened of bulls in fields and things like that. But have you enough evidence to convict this dreadful person?"
Japp grinned. "Plenty of evidence," he said. "We've got his laboratory and his cultures and the whole layout!"
Poirot said: "It is possible, I think, that he has committed a long line of murders. I may say that it was not because his mother was a Jewess that he was dismissed from that German University. That merely made a convenient tale to account for his arrival here and to gain sympathy for him. Actually, I fancy, he is of pure Aryan blood."
Miss Carnaby sighed.
"Qu'est ce qu'il y a?" asked Poirot.
"I was thinking," said Miss Carnaby, "of a marvellous dream I had at the First Festival - hashish, I suppose. I arranged the whole world so beautifully! No wars, no poverty, no ill health, no ugliness... no crime..."
"It must have been a fine dream," said Japp enviously.
Miss Carnaby jumped up. She said: "I must get home. Emily has been so anxious. And dear Augustus has been missing me terribly, I hear."
Hercule Poirot said with a smile: "He was afraid, perhaps, that like him, you were going to 'die for Hercule Poirot'!"
Chapter 11
THE APPLES OF THE HESPERIDES
II
Inspector Wagstaffe was interested.
"The Veratrino cup? Yes, I remember all about it. I was in charge of the business this end. I speak a bit of Italiano, you know, and I went over and had a powwow with the Macaronis. It's never turned up from that day to this. Funny thing, that."
"What is your explanation? A private sale?"
Wagstaffe shook his head.
"I doubt it. Of course it's remotely possible... No, my explanation is a good deal simpler. The stuff was cached - and the only man who knew where it was is dead."
"You mean Casey?"
"Yes. He may have cached it somewhere in Italy, or he may have succeeded in smuggling it out of the country. But he hid it and wherever he hid it, there it still is."
Hercule Poirot sighed. "It is a romantic theory. Pearls stuffed into plaster casts - what is the story - the Bust of Napoleon, is it not? But in this case it is not jewels - it is a large, solid gold cup. Not so easy to hide that, one would think."
Wagstaffe said vaguely: "Oh, I don't know. It could be done, I suppose.
Under the floor-boards - something of that kind."
"Had Casey a house of his own?"
"Yes - in Liverpool." He grinned. "It wasn't under the floor-boards there. We made sure of that."
"What about his family?"
"Wife was a decent sort of woman - tubercular. Worried to death by her husband's way of life. She was religious - a devout Catholic - but couldn't make up her mind to leave him. She died a couple of years ago. Daughter took after her - she became a nun. The son was different - a chip off the old block. Last I heard of him he was doing time in America."
Hercule Poirot wrote, in his little notebook, America.
He said: "It is possible that Casey's son may have known the hidingplace?"
"Don't believe he did. It would have come into the fences' hands by now."
"The cup might have been melted down."
"It might. Quite possible, I should say. But I don't know - its supreme value is to collectors - and there's a lot of funny business goes on with collectors - you'd be surprised! Sometimes," said Wagstaffe virtuously, "I think collectors haven't any morals at all."
"Ah! Would you be surprised if Sir Reuben Rosenthal, for instance, were engaged in what you describe as 'funny business'?"
Wagstaffe grinned. "I wouldn't put it past him. He's not supposed to be very scrupulous where works of art are concerned."
"What about the other members of the gang?"
"Ricovetti and Dublay both got stiff sentences. I should imagine they'll be coming out about now."
"Dublay is a Frenchman, is he not?"
"Yes, he was the brains of the gang."
"Were there other members of it?"
"There was a girl - Red Kate she used to be called. Took a job as lady's-maid and found out all about a crib - where stuff was kept and so on. She went to Australia, I believe, after the gang broke up."
"Anyone else?"
"Chap called Yougouian was suspected of being in with them. He's a dealer. Headquarters in Stamboul but he has a shop in Paris. Nothing proved against him - but he's a slippery customer."
Poirot sighed. He looked at his little notebook. In it was written:
America, Australia, Italy, France, Turkey...
He murmured: "I'll put a girdle round the earth -"
"Pardon?" said Inspector Wagstaffe.
"I was observing," said Hercule Poirot, "that a world tour seems indicated."
III
It was the habit of Hercule Poirot to discuss his cases with his capable valet, George. That is to say, Hercule Poirot would let drop certain observations to which George would reply with the worldly wisdom which he had acquired in the course of his career as a gentleman's gentleman.
"If you were faced, Georges," said Poirot, "with the necessity of conducting investigations in five different parts of the globe, how would you set about it?"
"Well, sir, air travel is very quick, though some say as it upsets the stomach. I couldn't say myself."
"One asks oneself," said Hercule Poirot, "what would Hercules have done?"
"You mean the bicycle chap, sir?"
"Or," pursued Hercule Poirot, "one simply asks, what did he do? And the answer, Georges, is that he travelled energetically. But he was forced in the end to obtain information - as some say - from Prometheus - others from Nereus."
"Indeed, sir?" said George. "I never heard of either of thos
e gentlemen. Are they travel agencies, sir?"
Hercule Poirot, enjoying the sound of his own voice, went on:
"My client, Emery Power, understands only one thing - action! But it is useless to dispense energy by unnecessary action. There is a golden rule in life, Georges, never do anything yourself that others can do for you.
"Especially," added Hercule Poirot, rising and going to the bookshelf, "when expense is no object!"
He took from the shelf a file labelled with the letter D and opened it at the words "Detective Agencies - Reliable".
"The modern Prometheus," he murmured. "Be so obliging, Georges, as to copy out for me certain names and addresses. Messrs.
Hankerton, New York. Messrs. Laden and Bosher, Sydney. Signor Giovanni Mezzi, Rome. M. Nahum, Stamboul. Messrs. Roget et Franconard, Paris."
He paused while George finished this. Then he said:
"And now be so kind as to look up the trains for Liverpool."
"Yes, sir, you are going to Liverpool, sir?"
"I am afraid so. It is possible, Georges, that I may have to go even further. But not just yet."
IV
It was three months later that Hercule Poirot stood on a rocky point and surveyed the Atlantic Ocean. Gulls rose and swooped down again with long melancholy cries. The air was soft and damp.
Hercule Poirot had the feeling, not uncommon in those who come to Inishgowlan for the first time, that he had reached the end of the world.
He had never in his life imagined anything so remote, so desolate, so abandoned. It had beauty, a melancholy, haunted beauty, the beauty of a remote and incredible past. Here, in the west of Ireland, the Romans had never marched, tramp, tramp, tramp; had never fortified a camp; had never built a well-ordered, sensible, useful road. It was a land where common sense and an orderly way of life were unknown.
Hercule Poirot looked down at the tips of his patent-leather shoes and sighed. He felt forlorn and very much alone. The standards by which he lived were here not appreciated.
His eyes swept slowly up and down the desolate coast line, then once more out to sea. Somewhere out there, so tradition had it, were the Isles of the Blest, the Land of Youth...
He murmured to himself: "The Apple Tree, the Singing and the Gold..."
And suddenly, Hercule Poirot was himself again - the spell was broken, he was once more in harmony with his patent-leather shoes and natty, dark grey gent's suiting.
Not very far away he had heard the toll of a bell. He understood that bell. It was a sound he had been familiar with from early youth.
He set off briskly along the cliff. In about ten minutes he came in sight of the building on the cliff. A high wall surrounded it and a great wooden door studded with nails was set in the wall. Hercule Poirot came to this door and knocked. There was a vast iron knocker. Then he cautiously pulled at a rusty chain and a shrill little bell tinkled briskly inside the door.
A small panel in the door was pushed aside and showed a face. It was a suspicious face, framed in starched white. There was a distinct moustache on the upper lip, but the voice was the voice of a woman, it was the voice of what Hercule Poirot called a femme formidable.
It demanded his business.
"Is this the Convent of St Mary and All Angels?"
The formidable woman said with asperity: "And what else would it be?"
Hercule Poirot did not attempt to answer that. He said to the dragon:
"I would like to see the Mother Superior."
The dragon was unwilling, but in the end she yielded. Bars were drawn back, the door opened and Hercule Poirot was conducted to a small bare room where visitors to the Convent were received.
Presently a nun glided in, her rosary swinging at her waist.
Hercule Poirot was a Catholic by birth. He understood the atmosphere in which he found himself.
"I apologise for troubling you, ma mère," he said, "but you have here, I think, a religieuse who was, in the world, Kate Casey."
The Mother Superior bowed her head.
She said: "That is so. Sister Mary Ursula in religion."
Hercule Poirot said: "There is a certain wrong that needs righting. I believe that Sister Mary Ursula could help me. She has information that might be invaluable."
The Mother Superior shook her head. Her face was placid, her voice calm and remote. She said:
"Sister Mary Ursula cannot help you."
"But I assure you -"
He broke off. The Mother Superior said:
"Sister Mary Ursula died two months ago."
V
In the saloon bar of Jimmy Donovan's Hotel, Hercule Poirot sat uncomfortably against the wall. The hotel did not come up to his ideas of what a hotel should be. His bed was broken - so were two of the window panes in his room - thereby admitting that night air which
Hercule Poirot distrusted so much. The hot water brought him had been tepid and the meal he had eaten was producing curious and painful sensations in his inside.
There were five men in the bar and they were all talking politics. For the most part Hercule Poirot could not understand what they said. In any case, he did not much care.
Presently he found one of the men sitting beside him. This was a man of slightly different class to the others. He had the stamp of the seedy townsman upon him.
He said with immense dignity: "I tell you, sir. I tell you - Pegeen's Pride hasn't got a chance, not a chance... bound to finish right down the course - right down the course. You take my tip... everybody ought to take my tip. Know who I am, sir, do you know, I shay? Atlas, thatsh who I am - Atlas of the Dublin Sun... been tipping winnersh all the season...
Didn't I give Larry's Girl? Twenty-five to one - twenty-five to one. Follow Atlas and you can't go wrong."
Hercule Poirot regarded him with a strange reverence. He said, and his voice trembled:
"Mon Dieu, it is an omen!"
VI
It was some hours later. The moon showed from time to time, peeping out coquettishly from behind the clouds. Poirot and his new friend had walked some miles. The former was limping. The idea crossed his mind that there were, after all, other shoes - more suitable to country walking than patent-leather. Actually George had respectfully conveyed as much. "A nice pair of brogues," was what George had said.
Hercule Poirot had not cared for the idea. He liked his feet to look neat and well-shod. But now, tramping along this stony path, he realised that there were other shoes...
His companion said suddenly: "Is it the way the Priest would be after me for this? I'll not have a mortal sin upon my conscience."
Hercule Poirot said: "You are only restoring to Caesar the things which are Caesar's."
They had come to the wall of the Convent. Atlas prepared to do his part.
A groan burst from him and he exclaimed in low, poignant tones that he was destroyed entirely!
Hercule Poirot spoke with authority.
"Be quiet. It is not the weight of the world that you have to support only the weight of Hercule Poirot."
VII
Atlas was turning over two new five pound notes.
He said hopefully: "Maybe I'll not remember in the morning the way I earned this. I'm after worrying that Father O'Reilly will be after me."
"Forget everything, my friend. Tomorrow the world is yours."
Atlas murmured: "And what'll I put it on? There's Working Lad, he's a grand horse, a lovely horse he is! And there's Sheila Boyne. 7 to 1 I'd get on her."
He paused.
"Was it my fancy now or did I hear you mention the name of a heathen god? Hercules, you said, and glory be to God, there's a Hercules running in the three-thirty tomorrow."
"My friend," said Hercule Poirot, "put your money on that horse. I tell you this, Hercules cannot fail."
And it is certainly true that on the following day Mr Rosslyn's Hercules very unexpectedly won the Boynan Stakes, starting price 60 to 1.
VIII
Deftly Hercule Poirot unwrapped
the neatly done-up parcel. First the brown paper, then the wadding, lastly the tissue paper.
On the desk in front of Emery Power he placed a gleaming golden cup.
Chased on it was a tree bearing apples of green emeralds.
The financier drew a deep breath. He said: "I congratulate you, M.
Poirot."
Hercule Poirot bowed.
Emery Power stretched out a hand. He touched the rim of the goblet, drawing his finger round it.
He said in a deep voice: "Mine!"
Hercule Poirot agreed. "Yours!"
The other gave a sigh. He leaned back in his chair.
He said in a businesslike voice: "Where did you find it?"
Hercule Poirot said: "I found it on an altar."
Emery Power stared.
Poirot went on: "Casey's daughter was a nun. She was about to take her final vows at the time of her father's death. She was an ignorant but a devout girl. The cup was hidden in her father's house in Liverpool. She took it to the Convent wanting, I think, to atone for her father's sins. She gave it to be used to the glory of God. I do not think that the nuns themselves ever realised its value. They took it, probably, for a family heirloom. In their eyes it was a chalice and they used it as such."
Emery Power said: "An extraordinary story!" He added: "What made you think of going there?"
Poirot shrugged his shoulders.
"Perhaps - a process of elimination. And then there was the extraordinary fact that no one had ever tried to dispose of the cup.
That looked, you see, as though it were in a place where ordinary material values did not apply. I remembered that Patrick Casey's daughter was a nun."
Power said heartily: "Well, as I said before, I congratulate you. Let me know your fee and I'll write you a cheque."
Hercule Poirot said: "There is no fee."
The other stared at him. "What do you mean?"
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