Sant left the office before Kenward had a chance to reply. His immediate response was to open his desk drawer and take out the near-empty bottle of whisky. He hesitated for a moment, but then took a couple of swigs, draining the bottle. The peaty amber liquid began to soothe his nerves a little, but a question gnawed within him like some terrible parasite eating into his brain. What would happen if he had been wrong all along?
Chapter Thirty-two
I was sure that my real identity would be discovered at any moment. I had caught Rosie and another of the chambermaids whispering in the corridor and, as they lifted their heads to look at me, they blushed and hid their faces. As I passed through the hotel I felt, or at least imagined that I felt, a hundred pairs of eyes turn in my direction. Although I was hungry, I did not care to sit in the dining room for lunch – that would only mean a greater risk of exposure – and I needed to return to Flora’s hotel to check on her. The few hours’ extra rest, I was sure, would have done her good, but I was still concerned about Flora’s increased pulse rate; that would need to be monitored and brought down if necessary.
As I was about to leave the hotel I heard someone call out my name, or rather my assumed name; each time I heard it I felt a dull ache in my heart, a conjoined pain brought about by Archie’s betrayal and Kurs’s cruelty.
‘Mrs Neele? Mrs Neele?’
I turned to see one of the hotel guests – a small, birdlike woman I knew I had been introduced to but whose name eluded me – gesturing at a well-thumbed newspaper.
‘Have you seen the latest? What do you think has happened? Do you have any idea?’
I shook my head.
‘I was just saying to Mrs Robson at breakfast this morning that the disappearance of Mrs Christie is most peculiar. There’s something very strange about it all.’ I did not know quite what to say.
‘I wonder if she has been kidnapped and sold into the white slave trade. You may laugh, Mrs Neele, but it does happen more than one likes to think. Oh, to think of the things that the brutes could be doing to her now.’
As the woman continued to prattle on, I smiled politely, but then the lady stopped and stared at me, open-mouthed. As I turned to go, I felt the sharp peck of the woman’s fingers on my arm. ‘I say,’ said the woman, glancing at the newspaper. ‘Don’t you look like her? Well, I never. You could be sisters, you could. Has anyone said that to you before? Have they?’
I did my best to react with indifference. ‘A couple of people have mentioned it, yes, but I can’t see it myself.’
‘Have you been following the story in the papers?’ the woman trilled. ‘Aren’t you gripped? Oh, the horror of it all. I mean, it’s like something from one of her books, don’t you think?’
‘I’m sure this Mrs Christie is a very elusive woman, but I don’t want to bother with her. I think the newspapers should let her get on with her life, don’t you?’
‘Ah, so you think she is alive then, do you? That is most interesting, as many of those consulted believe she is—’
I could endure it no longer. I turned on my heels and left the hotel. Really the woman was most insufferable; I would try to avoid her in future. As I made my way to the Cairn Hotel my pace quickened. I felt something was not quite right. Before I got to the room I had the key Flora had given me in my hand. I knocked gently, feeling the sweat prick the back of my neck and the sense of panic in my chest, before pushing the key into the door and turning the lock. The curtains were closed, the room was darkened, and Flora was nowhere to be seen. I pulled off the sheets, blankets and silk eiderdown, even checked underneath the bed and in the wardrobe, but there was no trace of her.
The dash across town, combined with the shock at not finding Flora in her room, had left me breathless. Perhaps a little water would help. I took a glass from the tray on the dressing table, walked over to the basin and reached out to turn on the cold tap. How could I be so stupid? Flora had told me, only a few hours before, that there was a problem with the water supply. As I recalled the scene from that morning, I turned the tap and cold water came gushing forth. A wave of nausea hit me. I had been out of the room for only a minute or so, but of course that would have given Flora enough time.
With my hands still dripping with water I ran across the room and grabbed my handbag. I started to search through its contents – here was my notebook, a compact, a handkerchief, a battered old address book – but I could not see the vial of poison. I lost patience and tipped the handbag upside down, spilling its innards onto the bed. My hands searched through the detritus, but it was obvious. Flora had taken the tetrodotoxin. I leant forwards, my head in my hands, and as I did so I noticed an envelope on the floor with my name written on it. It must have fallen onto the carpet as I stripped back the covers on the bed. I ripped it open and read:
My dear Agatha
I address you as a friend, if I may, even though we have known each other for only a few days. I do not have much time to spare, so please forgive the brevity of this letter.
When I saw you this morning, I realised that you had made up your mind to kill Patrick. I could not let you do this as I knew that such an action would result in your destruction. I knew that if you went through with this plan you would never be able to live with yourself, never free yourself from the dark spectre of murder.
You will know by now that I have decided to take my fate, and the fate of my husband, into my own hands. I should have done this at the beginning, when you first came to me, as it was the only possible solution to the heinous situation he involved you in. I ask that you forgive me. I know what I am about to do is a sin, but is there not such a thing as the lesser of two evils?
I am going to take a train down south today. I will make my way to Patrick’s house in Rickmansworth, where I intend to bring an end to all of this. Please do not try to stop me. I realise this may put you in a difficult position, but you know in your heart of hearts that this is for the best.
Please say a prayer for me.
Yours truly
Flora Kurs
After reading the letter I let it drop into my lap. The better part of me wanted to try to stop Flora, to telephone her and try to persuade her not to go through with this. I could contact the police and alert them to what was going to happen. Perhaps it was a rather quaint idea, but I was worried about what would happen to Flora’s soul. But then I realised the contradictions in my position; after all, I had been prepared to carry out the very same act myself.
I stood up, walked across the room and studied myself in the glass. Had my face always looked like this or had I acquired the lines around my mouth and the dark shadows underneath my eyes over the course of the last week or so? If Flora had not taken the lead would I really have gone on and murdered Kurs? Yes, I most probably would have done so. Since meeting the doctor my moral compass had been distorted and tested to its limits. First Kurs had asked me to kill Flora, which I had successfully resisted doing, but I had been forced into a position where I had had no choice but to consider murdering the doctor. I felt distinctly uncomfortable, like something had changed within me, as if a part of my innocence had been taken from me. I had to remind myself that neither I nor Flora had initiated any of this; the fault lay with Kurs and, as such, he would have to bear the consequences. I did not care one jot if Kurs died; my only sadness was for Flora. I thought of the last sentence in her letter. I bowed my head, and with tears rolling down my cheeks, said a silent prayer.
Chapter Thirty-three
She heard a key in the door and then the sound of footsteps in the hall. She felt ready for the encounter, perfectly composed. For years she had feared her husband and what he might do, not just to her but to those close to her. He may not have carried out the physical act of murder himself – he had his lackeys, his pack of degenerates to do that for him – but her conversations with Mrs Christie had shown her the true extent and depth of his evil. It was time to end that once and for all.
After taking the poison from Agath
a’s handbag, Flora had managed to dress herself and make her way down to the reception desk of the hotel. There, she had paid her bill and, under the guise of Dr Maxwell, had sent a telegram to Kurs, asking him to come and formally identify the body of his wife which would be waiting for him at the house in Leeds. She was sure that he would interpret this telegram as being a coded message sent from Mrs Christie, who could not risk associating herself with the crime. On receiving the telegram, Kurs would need to make sure that any loose ends were tied up. Her husband would want the dead body to be cremated so as to destroy any evidence of the poison within the system: even if Mrs Christie had committed the crime, and not he, there was a risk that she might have a breakdown and confess. Kurs must have left the house in Surrey at dawn and caught an early morning train to the north.
Of course, she had already sent messages to the servants to tell them to take the whole of the week off. She had kept the details vague, but had assured them that she was well and that she was going away for a few days. The break would give them, she hoped, time to do a spot of Christmas shopping, and serve as the perfect opportunity to see any relatives in distant parts of the countryside before the preparations for the festivities began. She said she was planning on having quite a few friends to stay over the period, which would entail a great deal of extra work. The least she could do, she said, was give them a little time off in advance.
A floorboard outside the room creaked and the handle of the door began to turn. Flora checked the tea things on the tray before her were just so and waited for Kurs to enter. In that moment she realised that this was one of the few occasions in recent years when she was actually looking forward to seeing his face. How would he react, she wondered, when he learnt that she had risen from the dead?
His entry into the room was slow and careful, like a cat ready to spring at the slightest threat of danger. Flora watched as the colour disappeared from his face and his black eyes burnt with a dark intensity that she had once found attractive but now only repelled her. He did not move, but stayed paralysed by the door. Then, in an instant, he recovered his senses and stepped towards her. As he came closer Flora noticed that he had a scratch on his face.
‘I’m not surprised to find you here at all,’ he said coldly.
‘You’re not?’ said Flora, as lightly as if she were referring to his decision not to take marmalade with his breakfast toast.
‘I suppose this is all Mrs Christie’s work,’ he said. ‘I thought better of her, I really did.’
‘You honestly thought she would go ahead and kill me?’
Kurs did not answer the question.
‘I had to lie to her, to tell her that I was dying, in order for her to even consider taking the risk. She is a good woman, Patrick.’
‘She’s not as good as you think,’ he hissed. ‘Anyway, she will just have to take the blame for it.’
Flora knew what he was referring to, but she forced herself to ask the question. ‘The blame for what?’
‘For your death, of course. I can’t let her get away with this. But as far as I am aware, and please correct me if I am wrong, you have already been pronounced dead by a doctor, and your corpse has been seen by policemen. That’s what I was told when the police came to my house.’
‘Yes, that’s right. But—’
‘Well, so you see. All I need to do is to kill you, place you back in bed, and then when I am ready call the undertaker to cart you away. I would have thought whatever poison Mrs Christie gave you – I wonder what it was, you don’t happen to know, do you?’
‘No, no, I don’t.’
‘Never mind,’ said Kurs, taking a seat opposite her. ‘Well, whatever toxic substance she administered is likely to still be in your system. The pathologist will do a post-mortem, find the traces of the poison, and Mrs Christie will be arrested for your murder. I did tell her that this could be avoided, but she wouldn’t listen. The public will be thrilled to learn the lurid details of how a detective novelist turned to murder. Now that will make for interesting reading.’
Flora looked at Kurs now not with hatred, but with a kind of deep sympathy. Tears formed in her eyes as she remembered their wedding day and the smell of the honeysuckle that lingered in the night air outside their window on their honeymoon at that sweet little hotel in Cornwall.
‘And how do you expect to do it? To kill me, I mean?’
‘I’m not sure yet. Do you have a preference?’
The coldness of the question leached the pity from her heart. She couldn’t bear to look at him for one minute longer.
‘Would you like some tea? You must have had a long journey.’
‘To share one last cup of warming tea with my long-suffering wife. Yes, that would be nice.’
Flora glanced at the tray. ‘Would you mind bringing some milk? I believe there is some in the pantry. As you can see I gave the servants some time off.’
Kurs’s eyes narrowed with suspicion. He looked at the tea tray, with its fine china cups and saucers decorated with small pink flowers, set out on the table before him. He picked up a teacup carefully, examined it and rolled it about in his hands with a certain tenderness, before replacing it on the saucer and doing the same with the other.
‘I think I will take my tea black, if you don’t mind.’
Flora tried to swallow but her mouth felt parched and dry. ‘Very well,’ she said, failing to disguise the terror in her voice. As she poured the tea her hands shook and she spilled a little of the liquid onto the tray.
‘I know what you are trying to do, Flora. I can see that you are nervous, and quite right, you should be. To think that you could fool me by asking me to go and get some milk from the pantry. As if I would fall for that, silly girl.’ He made a series of slow tutting noises. ‘Out of interest, you must tell me how she did it. She gave you some sleeping draught that made you look like you were dead? Extraordinary that she fooled the doctor, though. I wonder what she used. Are you sure you can’t remember?’
Flora shook her head and passed a teacup to Kurs.
‘It can’t have been an ordinary opiate, I don’t suppose. No, more likely to be something exotic. How intriguing. When I get back I must consult my dictionary of poisons. Or I suppose I could always visit Mrs Christie in jail before she is hanged.’
‘Can I ask you something before, well before . . . ?’
‘Of course,’ said Kurs, taking a sip of black tea. ‘I don’t believe there should be secrets between man and wife, especially at a moment such as this.’
‘Am I right in thinking it was you who was behind the death of my parents in that car accident?’
‘Yes, you are correct. It was easy enough to organise if you know the right kind of people. You must admit that they were getting on and I spared them a great deal of suffering and the indignities that inevitably come with serious illness.’
Flora stopped herself from lashing out at him, but she could not control the words that spat out of her mouth. ‘But you’ve never actually carried out a murder yourself, you coward.’
‘You are quite wrong, my dear. You see, only yesterday I disposed of a young lady who turned out to be quite troublesome, an aspiring journalist who was asking too many questions. She was sweet and rather bright, from a terribly grand family, and put up quite a fight at the end as you can see.’ He pointed at the scratch on his cheek, but as he did so his hand stopped. It was, Flora thought, almost as if a sculptor had turned him into marble. ‘What have you done?’ His voice was quiet but full of fury. ‘Flora?’
‘Well, you wanted to know what Mrs Christie had given me. I thought I’d give you a taste of it so you could experience it for yourself. The poison in question is called tetrodotoxin – am I pronouncing that correctly? – and I believe it originates in tropical puffer fish. Quite an unusual poison in many respects. Mrs Christie told me about a very interesting case described in the log of Captain James Cook, but I don’t believe you will live to be able to read about it.
�
��I can see that you are worried about the lack of feeling in your lips. That’s the least troubling symptom, let me tell you. Soon you will begin to experience an excess of salivation, followed by – and listen carefully, as a medical man you will fully understand the implications of what I am going to tell you – perspiration, weakness, nausea, diarrhoea, paralysis, tremor, aphonia, dyspnoea, dysphagia, convulsions, bronchorrhoea, bronchospasm, respiratory failure, coma and, finally . . . death.’
A silence settled over the room as the couple stared at one another. Kurs did not move – Flora wondered whether the paralysis had already begun to affect his body – but then suddenly he stood up, dashing his cup to the floor. A shard of shattered china whizzed across the room, slashing into her ankle. The liquid splashed onto the bottom of her dress and a dark bloom, a mix of blood and tea, began to spread across the white fabric. He came towards her with outstretched hands, knocking the contents of the tray and the teapot that contained the poison onto the floor. He grabbed her neck and started to squeeze.
‘It – it doesn’t matter,’ she managed to whisper. ‘I’ve taken it too. I know what to expect. I’m – I’m ready to die.’
Her words did not stop him from pressing harder around her neck. As she felt his hands dig deeper into her skin and tighten around her throat so as to constrict the flow of air to her brain she did not fight or struggle. After all, death by strangulation would be preferable to the terrible fate she would have to otherwise endure.
She had one last thing she wanted to tell him before it was all over, but she could not get the words out. She felt her eyes bulging in her face, and thought she might be swallowing her tongue. Surely it would be over any moment now. But then she felt Patrick’s hands loosen and he collapsed backwards onto the floor. Through a haze of tears she saw her husband’s body shake with a terrible force. She fell back onto the sofa with a mixture of relief and disappointment. The drug would kill him, she was certain of that, as the teapot had contained in excess of the fatal quantities of the poison. Yet she was sad that Patrick had not had the strength to finish her off quickly. She would have to die the same terrible death as him: long, painful, and conscious to the very, very end.
A Talent For Murder Page 23