"I must make some concessions to modernity," said Emily Arundell. "Goodnight, Minnie."
As the other woman left the room, Emily Arundell wondered if this spiritualistic business was really good for Minnie. Her eyes had been popping out of her head, and she had looked so restless and excited.
Odd about the Boule cabinet, thought Emily Arundell as she got into bed. She smiled grimly as she remembered the scene of long ago. The key that had come to light after Papa's death, and the cascade of empty brandy bottles that had tumbled out when the cabinet had been unlocked! It was little things like that, things that surely neither Minnie Lawson nor Isabel and Julia Tripp could possibly know, which made one wonder whether, after all, there wasn't something in this spiritualistic business…
She felt wakeful lying on her big four-poster bed. Nowadays she found it increasingly difficult to sleep. But she scorned Dr Grainger's tentative suggestion of a sleeping draught. Sleeping draughts were for weaklings, for people who couldn't bear a finger ache, or a little toothache, or the tedium of a sleepless night.
Often she would get up and wander noiselessly round the house, picking up a book, fingering an ornament, rearranging a vase of flowers, writing a letter or two. In those midnight hours she had a feeling of the equal liveliness of the house through which she wandered. They were not disagreeable, those nocturnal wanderings. It was as though ghosts walked beside her, the ghosts of her sisters, Arabella, Matilda and Agnes, the ghost of her brother Thomas, the dear fellow, as he was before That Woman got a hold of him! Even the ghost of General John Laverton Arundell, that domestic tyrant with the charming manners who shouted and bullied his daughters but who nevertheless was an object of pride to them with his experiences in the Indian Mutiny and his knowledge of the world. What if there were days when he was "not quite so well" as his daughters put it evasively?
Her mind reverting to her niece's fiancée, Miss Arundell thought, "I don't suppose he'll ever take to drink! Calls himself a man and drank barley water this evening! Barley water! And I opened Papa's special port."
Charles had done justice to the port all right. Oh! if only Charles were to be trusted. If only one didn't know that with him – Her thoughts broke off… Her mind ranged over the events of the weekend… Everything seemed vaguely disquieting…
She tried to put worrying thoughts out of her mind.
It was no good.
She raised herself on her elbow, and by the light of the night-light that always burned in a little saucer she looked at the time.
One o'clock and she had never felt less like sleep.
She got out of bed and put on her slippers and her warm dressing-gown. She would go downstairs and just check over the weekly books ready for the paying of them the following morning.
Like a shadow she slipped from her room and along the corridor, where one small electric bulb was allowed to burn all night.
She came to the head of the stairs, stretched out one hand to the banister rail and then, unaccountably, she stumbled, tried to recover her balance, failed and went headlong down the stairs.
The sound of her fall, the cry she gave, stirred the sleeping house to wakefulness. Doors opened, lights flashed on.
Miss Lawson popped out of her room at the head of the staircase.
Uttering little cries of distress, she pattered down the stairs. One by one the others arrived – Charles, yawning, in a resplendent dressing gown. Theresa, wrapped in dark silk. Bella in a navy-blue kimono, her hair bristling with combs to "set the wave."
Dazed and confused, Emily Arundell lay in a crushed heap. Her shoulder hurt her and her ankle – her whole body was a confused mass of pain. She was conscious of people standing over her, of that fool Minnie Lawson crying and making ineffectual gestures with her hands, of Theresa with a startled look in her dark eyes, of Bella standing with her mouth open looking expectant, of the voice of Charles saying from somewhere – very far away so it seemed:
"It's that damned dog's ball! He must have left it here and she tripped over it. See? Here it is!"
And then she was conscious of authority, putting the others aside, kneeling beside her, touching her with hands that did not fumble but knew.
A feeling of relief swept over her. It would be all right now.
Dr Tanios was saying in firm, reassuring tones:
"No, it's all right. No bones broken… Just badly shaken and bruised – and of course she's had a bad shock. But she's been very lucky that it's no worse."
Then he had cleared the others off a little and picked her up quite easily and carried her up to her bedroom, where he had held her wrist for a minute, counting, then nodded his head, sent Minnie (who was still crying and being generally a nuisance) out of the room to fetch brandy and to heat water for a hot bottle.
Confused, shaken, and racked with pain, she felt acutely grateful to Jacob Tanios in that moment. The relief of feeling oneself in capable hands. He gave you just that feeling of assurance – of confidence – that a doctor ought to give.
There was something – something she couldn't quite get hold of – something vaguely disquieting – but she wouldn't think of it now. She would drink this and go to sleep as they told her.
But surely there was something missing – someone.
Oh, well, she wouldn't think… Her shoulder hurt her. She drank down what she was given.
She heard Dr Tanios say – and in what a comfortable assured voice: "She'll be all right, now."
She closed her eyes.
She awoke to a sound that she knew – a soft, muffled bark.
She was wide awake in a minute.
Bob – naughty Bob! He was barking outside the front door – his own particular 'out all night very ashamed of myself' bark, pitched in a subdued key but repeated hopefully.
Miss Arundell strained her ears. Ah, yes, that was all right. She could hear Minnie going down to let him in. She heard the creak of the opening front door, a confused low murmur – Minnie's futile reproaches -
"Oh, you naughty little doggie – a very naughty little Bobsie -" She heard the pantry door open. Bob's bed was under the pantry table.
And at that moment Emily realized what it was she had subconsciously missed at the moment of her accident. It was Bob! All that commotion – her fall, people running – normally Bob would have responded by a crescendo of barking from inside the pantry.
So that was what had been worrying her at the back of her mind. But it was explained now – Bob, when he had been let out last night, had shamelessly and deliberately gone off on pleasure bent. From time to time he had these lapses from virtue – though his apologies afterwards were always all that could be desired.
So that was all right. But was it? What else was there worrying her, nagging at the back of her head. Her accident – something to do with her accident.
Ah, yes, somebody had said – Charles – that she had slipped on Bob's ball which he had left on the top of the stairs…
The ball had been there – he had held it up in his hand…
Emily Arundell's head ached. Her shoulder throbbed. Her bruised body suffered…
But in the midst of her suffering her mind was clear and lucid. She was no longer confused by shock. Her memory was perfectly clear.
She went over in her mind all the events from six o'clock yesterday evening… She retraced every step… till she came to the moment when she arrived at the stairhead and started to descend the stairs…
A thrill of incredulous horror shot through her…
Surely – surely, she must be mistaken… One often had queer fancies after an event had happened. She tried – earnestly she tried – to recall the slippery roundness of Bob's ball under her foot…
But she could recall nothing of the kind. Instead -
"Sheer nerves," said Emily Arundell. "Ridiculous fancies."
But her sensible, shrewd, Victorian mind would not admit that for a moment. There was no foolish optimism about the Victorians.
They cou
ld believe the worst with the utmost ease.
Emily Arundell believed the worst.
Chapter 4
MISS ARUNDELL WRITES A LETTER
It was Friday. The relations had left.
They left on the Wednesday as originally planned. One and all, they had offered to stay on. One and all they had been steadfastly refused. Miss Arundell explained that she preferred to be "quite quiet."
During the two days that had elapsed since their departure, Emily Arundell had been alarmingly meditative. Often she did not hear what Minnie Lawson said to her. She would stare at her and curtly order her to begin all over again.
"It's the shock, poor dear," said Miss Lawson. And she added with the kind of gloomy relish in disaster which brightens so many otherwise drab lives: "I dare say she'll never be quite herself again."
Dr Grainger, on the other hand, rallied her heartily.
He told her that she'd be downstairs again by the end of the week, that it was a positive disgrace she had no bones broken, and what kind of a patient was she for a struggling medical man. If all his patients were like her, he might as well take down his shingle straight away.
Emily Arundell replied with spirit – she and old Dr Grainger were allies of long standing. He bullied and she defied – they always got a good deal of pleasure out of each other's company!
But now, after the doctor had stumped away, the old lady lay with a frown on her face, thinking – thinking – responding absent-mindedly to Minnie Lawson's well-meant fussing – and then suddenly coming back to consciousness and rending her with a vitriolic tongue.
"Poor little Bobsie," twittered Miss Lawson, bending over Bob, who had a rug spread on the corner of his mistress's bed. "Wouldn't little Bobsie be unhappy if he knew what he'd done to his poor, poor Missus?"
Miss Arundell snapped:
"Don't be idiotic, Minnie. And where's your English sense of justice? Don't you know that every one in this country is accounted innocent until he or she is proved guilty?"
"Oh, but we do know -"
Emily snapped:
"We don't know anything at all. Do stop fidgeting, Minnie. Pulling this and pulling that. Haven't you any idea how to behave in a sick-room? Go away and send Ellen to me."
Meekly Miss Lawson crept away.
Emily Arundell looked after her with a slight feeling of self-reproach. Maddening as Minnie was, she did her best.
Then the frown settled down again on her face.
She was desperately unhappy. She had all a vigorous strong-minded old lady's dislike of inaction in any given situation. But in this particular situation she could not decide upon her line of action.
There were moments when she distrusted her own faculties, her own memory of events. And there was no one, absolutely no one, in whom she could confide.
Half an hour later, when Miss Lawson tiptoed creakingly into the room, carrying a cup of beef-tea, and then paused irresolute at the view of her employer lying with closed eyes, Emily Arundell suddenly spoke two words with such force and decision that Miss Lawson nearly dropped the cup.
"Mary Fox," said Miss Arundell.
"A box, dear?" said Miss Lawson. "Did you say you wanted a box?"
"You're getting deaf, Minnie. I didn't say anything about a box. I said Mary Fox. The woman I met at Cheltenham last year. She was the sister of one of the Canons of Exeter Cathedral. Give me that cup. You've spilt it into the saucer. And don't tiptoe when you come into a room. You don't know how irritating it is. Now go downstairs and get me the London telephone book."
"Can I find the number for you, dear? Or the address?"
"If I'd wanted you to do that I'd have told you so. Do what I tell you. Bring it here, and put my writing things by the bed."
Miss Lawson obeyed orders.
As she was going out of the room after having done everything required of her, Emily Arundell said unexpectedly:
"You're a good, faithful creature, Minnie. Don't mind my bark. It's a good deal worse than my bite. You're very patient and good to me."
Miss Lawson went out of the room with her face pink and incoherent words burbling from her lips.
Sitting up in bed. Miss Arundell wrote a letter. She wrote it slowly and carefully, with numerous pauses for thought and copious underlining. She crossed and recrossed the page – for she had been brought up in a school that was taught never to waste notepaper.
Finally, with a sigh of satisfaction, she signed her name and put it into an envelope. She wrote a name upon the envelope. Then she took a fresh sheet of paper. This time she made a rough draft and after having reread it and made certain alterations and erasures, she wrote out a fair copy. She read the whole thing through very carefully, then satisfied that she had expressed her meaning she enclosed it in an envelope and addressed it to William Purvis, Esq., Messrs. Purvis, Purvis, Charlesworth and Purvis, Solicitors, Harchester.
She took up the first envelope again, which was addressed to M. Hercule Poirot, and opened the telephone directory. Having found the address, she added it.
A tap sounded at the door.
Miss Arundell hastily thrust the letter she lad just finished addressing – the letter to Hercule Poirot – inside the flap of her writing-case.
She had no intention of rousing Minnie's curiosity. Minnie was a great deal too inquisitive.
She called "Come in" and lay back on her pillows with a sigh of relief.
She had taken steps to deal with the situation.
Chapter 5
HERCULE POIROT RECEIVES A LETTER
The events which I have just narrated were not, of course, known to me until a long time afterwards. But by questioning various members of the family in detail, I have, I think, set them down accurately enough.
Poirot and I were only drawn into the affair when we received Miss Arundell's letter.
I remember the day well. It was a hot, airless morning towards the end of June.
Poirot had a particular routine when opening his morning correspondence. He picked up each letter, scrutinized it carefully and neatly slit the envelope open with his paper-cutter. Its contents were perused and then placed in one of four piles beyond the chocolate-pot. (Poirot always drank chocolate for breakfast – a revolting habit.) All this with a machine-like regularity! So much was this the case that the least interruption of the rhythm attracted one's attention.
I was sitting by the window, looking out at the passing traffic. I had recently returned from the Argentine and there was something particularly exciting to me in being once more in the roar of London.
Turning my head, I said with a smile:
"Poirot, I – the humble Watson – am going to hazard a deduction."
"Enchanted, my friend. What is it?"
I struck an attitude and said pompously:
"You have received this morning one letter of particular interest!"
"You are indeed the Sherlock Holmes! Yes, you are perfectly right."
I laughed.
"You see, I know your methods, Poirot. If you read a letter through twice it must mean that it is of special interest."
"You shall judge for yourself, Hastings."
With a smile my friend tendered me the letter in question.
I took it with no little interest, but immediately made a slight grimace. It was written in one of those old-fashioned spidery handwritings, and it was, moreover, crossed on two pages.
"Must I read this, Poirot?" I complained.
"Ah, no, there is no compulsion. Assuredly not."
"Can't you tell me what it says?"
"I would prefer you to form your own judgment. But do not trouble if it bores you."
"No, no, I want to know what it's all about," I protested.
My friend remarked drily:
"You can hardly do that. In effect, the letter says nothing at all."
Taking this as an exaggeration, I plunged without more ado into the letter.
M. Hercule Poirot.
Dear Sir,
After much doubt and indecision, I am writing (the last word was crossed out and the letter went on) I am emboldened to write to you in the hope that you may be able to assist me in a matter of a strictly private nature. (The words strictly private were underlined three times.) I may say that your name is not unknown to me. It was mentioned to me by a Miss Fox of Exeter, and although Miss Fox was not herself acquainted with you, she mentioned that her brother-in-law's sister (whose name I cannot, I am sorry to say, recall) had spoken of your kindness and discretion in the highest terms (highest terms underlined once). I did not inquire, of course, as to the nature (nature underlined) of the inquiry you had conducted on her behalf, but I understood from Miss Fox that it was of a painful and confidential nature (last four words underlined heavily).
I broke off my difficult task of spelling out the spidery words.
"Poirot," I said. "Must I go on? Does she ever get to the point?"
"Continue, my friend. Patience."
"Patience!" I grumbled. "It's exactly as though a spider had got into an ink-pot and were walking over a sheet of notepaper! I remember my great-aunt Mary's writing used to be much the same!"
Once more I plunged into the epistle.
In my present dilemma, it occurs to me that you might undertake the necessary investigations on my behalf. The matter is such, as you will readily understand, as calls for the utmost discretion and I may, in fact – and I need hardly say how sincerely I hope and pray (pray underlined twice) that this may be the case – I may, in fact, be completely mistaken. One is apt sometimes to attribute too much significance to facts capable of a natural explanation.
"I haven't left out a sheet?" I murmured in some perplexity.
Poirot chuckled.
"No, no."
"Because this doesn't seem to make sense. What is it she is talking about?"
"Continuez toujours."
"The matter is such, as you will readily understand – No, I'd got past that. Oh! here we are.
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