Somewhat impatiently the Minister indicated the pile of papers. Carlile sorted through them, his expression of bewilderment growing.
“You see, they’re not there.”
The secretary stammered:
“But—but it’s incredible. I laid them there not three minutes ago.”
Lord Mayfield said good-humouredly:
“You must have made a mistake, they must be still in the safe.”
“I don’t see how—I know I put them there!”
Lord Mayfield brushed past him to the open safe. Sir George joined them. A very few minutes sufficed to show that the plans of the bomber were not there.
Dazed and unbelieving, the three men returned to the desk and once more turned over the papers.
“My God!” said Mayfield. “They’re gone!”
Mr. Carlile cried:
“But it’s impossible!”
“Who’s been in this room?” snapped out the Minister.
“No one. No one at all.”
“Look here, Carlile, those plans haven’t vanished into thin air. Someone has taken them. Has Mrs. Vanderlyn been in here?”
“Mrs. Vanderlyn? Oh, no, sir.”
“I’ll back that,” said Carrington. He sniffed the air! “You’d soon smell if she had. That scent of hers.”
“Nobody has been in here,” insisted Carlile. “I can’t understand it.”
“Look here, Carlile,” said Lord Mayfield. “Pull yourself together. We’ve got to get to the bottom of this. You’re absolutely sure the plans were in the safe?”
“Absolutely.”
“You actually saw them? You didn’t just assume they were among the others?”
“No, no, Lord Mayfield. I saw them. I put them on top of the others on the desk.”
“And since then, you say, nobody has been in the room. Have you been out of the room?”
“No—at least—yes.”
“Ah!” cried Sir George. “Now we’re getting at it!”
Lord Mayfield said sharply:
“What on earth—” when Carlile interrupted.
“In the normal course of events, Lord Mayfield, I should not, of course, have dreamt of leaving the room when important papers were lying about, but hearing a woman scream—”
“A woman scream?” ejaculated Lord Mayfield in a surprised voice.
“Yes, Lord Mayfield. It startled me more than I can say. I was just laying the papers on the desk when I heard it, and naturally I ran out into the hall.”
“Who screamed?”
“Mrs. Vanderlyn’s French maid. She was standing halfway up the stairs, looking very white and upset and shaking all over. She said she had seen a ghost.”
“Seen a ghost?”
“Yes, a tall woman dressed all in white who moved without a sound and floated in the air.”
“What a ridiculous story!”
“Yes, Lord Mayfield, that is what I told her. I must say she seemed rather ashamed of herself. She went off upstairs and I came back in here.”
“How long ago was this?”
“Just a minute or two before you and Sir George came in.”
“And you were out of the room—how long?”
The secretary considered.
“Two minutes—at the most three.”
“Long enough,” groaned Lord Mayfield. Suddenly he clutched his friend’s arm.
“George, that shadow I saw—slinking away from this window. That was it! As soon as Carlile left the room, he nipped in, seized the plans and made off.”
“Dirty work,” said Sir George.
Then he seized his friend by the arm.
“Look here, Charles, this is the devil of a business. What the hell are we going to do about it?”
III
“At any rate give it a trial, Charles.”
It was half an hour later. The two men were in Lord Mayfield’s study, and Sir George had been expending a considerable amount of persuasion to induce his friend to adopt a certain course.
Lord Mayfield, at first most unwilling, was gradually becoming less averse to the idea.
Sir George went on:
“Don’t be so damned pigheaded, Charles.”
Lord Mayfield said slowly:
“Why drag in a wretched foreigner we know nothing about?”
“But I happen to know a lot about him. The man’s a marvel.”
“Humph.”
“Look here, Charles. It’s a chance! Discretion is the essence of this business. If it leaks out—”
“When it leaks out is what you mean!”
“Not necessarily. This man, Hercule Poirot—”
“Will come down here and produce the plans like a conjurer taking rabbits out of his hat, I suppose?”
“He’ll get at the truth. And the truth is what we want. Look here, Charles, I take all responsibility on myself.”
Lord Mayfield said slowly:
“Oh, well, have it your own way, but I don’t see what the fellow can do. . . .”
Sir George picked up the phone.
“I’m going to get through to him—now.”
“He’ll be in bed.”
“He can get up. Dash it all, Charles, you can’t let that woman get away with it.”
“Mrs. Vanderlyn, you mean?”
“Yes. You don’t doubt, do you, that she’s at the bottom of this?”
“No, I don’t. She’s turned the tables on me with a vengeance. I don’t like admitting, George, that a woman’s been too clever for us. It goes against the grain. But it’s true. We shan’t be able to prove anything against her, and yet we both know that she’s been the prime mover in the affair.”
“Women are the devil,” said Carrington with feeling.
“Nothing to connect her with it, damn it all! We may believe that she put the girl up to that screaming trick, and that the man lurking outside was her accomplice, but the devil of it is we can’t prove it.”
“Perhaps Hercule Poirot can.”
Suddenly Lord Mayfield laughed.
“By the Lord, George, I thought you were too much of an old John Bull to put your trust in a Frenchman, however clever.”
“He’s not even a Frenchman, he’s a Belgian,” said Sir George in a rather shamefaced manner.
“Well, have your Belgian down. Let him try his wits on this business. I’ll bet he can’t make more of it than we can.”
Without replying, Sir George stretched a hand to the telephone.
IV
Blinking a little, Hercule Poirot turned his head from one man to the other. Very delicately he smothered a yawn.
It was half past two in the morning. He had been roused from sleep and rushed down through the darkness in a big Rolls-Royce. Now he had just finished hearing what the two men had to tell him.
“Those are the facts, M. Poirot,” said Lord Mayfield.
He leaned back in his chair, and slowly fixed his monocle in one eye. Through it a shrewd, pale-blue eye watched Poirot attentively. Besides being shrewd the eye was definitely sceptical. Poirot cast a swift glance at Sir George Carrington.
That gentleman was leaning forward with an expression of almost childlike hopefulness on his face.
Poirot said slowly:
“I have the facts, yes. The maid screams, the secretary goes out, the nameless watcher comes in, the plans are there on top of the desk, he snatches them up and goes. The facts—they are all very convenient.”
Something in the way he uttered the last phrase seemed to attract Lord Mayfield’s attention. He sat up a little straighter, his monocle dropped. It was as though a new alertness came to him.
“I beg your pardon, M. Poirot?”
“I said, Lord Mayfield, that the facts were all very convenient—for the thief. By the way, you are sure it was a man you saw?”
Lord Mayfield shook his head.
“That I couldn’t say. It was just a—shadow. In fact, I was almost doubtful if I had seen anyone.”
Poirot transfer
red his gaze to the Air Marshal.
“And you, Sir George? Could you say if it was a man or a woman?”
“I didn’t see anyone myself.”
Poirot nodded thoughtfully. Then he skipped suddenly to his feet and went over to the writing table.
“I can assure you that the plans are not there,” said Lord Mayfield. “We have all three been through those papers half a dozen times.”
“All three? You mean, your secretary also?”
“Yes, Carlile.”
Poirot turned suddenly.
“Tell me, Lord Mayfield, which paper was on top when you went over to the desk?”
Mayfield frowned a little in the effort of remembrance.
“Let me see—yes, it was a rough memorandum of some sort of our air defence positions.”
Deftly, Poirot nipped out a paper and brought it over.
“Is this the one, Lord Mayfield?”
Lord Mayfield took it and glanced over it.
“Yes, that’s the one.”
Poirot took it over to Carrington.
“Did you notice this paper on the desk?”
Sir George took it, held it away from him, then slipped on his pince-nez.
“Yes, that’s right. I looked through them too, with Carlile and Mayfield. This was on top.”
Poirot nodded thoughtfully. He replaced the paper on the desk. Mayfield looked at him in a slightly puzzled manner.
“If there are any other questions—” he began.
“But yes, certainly there is a question. Carlile. Carlile is the question!”
Lord Mayfield’s colour rose a little.
“Carlile, M. Poirot, is quite above suspicion! He has been my confidential secretary for nine years. He has access to all my private papers, and I may point out to you that he could have made a copy of the plans and a tracing of the specifications quite easily without anyone being the wiser.”
“I appreciate your point,” said Poirot. “If he had been guilty there would be no need for him to stage a clumsy robbery.”
“In any case,” said Lord Mayfield, “I am sure of Carlile. I will guarantee him.”
“Carlile,” said Carrington gruffly, “is all right.”
Poirot spread out his hands gracefully.
“And this Mrs. Vanderlyn—she is all wrong?”
“She’s a wrong ’un all right,” said Sir George.
Lord Mayfield said in more measured tones:
“I think, M. Poirot, that there can be no doubt of Mrs. Vanderlyn’s—well—activities. The Foreign Office can give you more precious data as to that.”
“And the maid, you take it, is in with her mistress?”
“Not a doubt of it,” said Sir George.
“It seems to me a plausible assumption,” said Lord Mayfield more cautiously.
There was a pause. Poirot sighed, and absentmindedly rearranged one or two articles on a table at his right hand. Then he said:
“I take it that these papers represented money? That is, the stolen papers would be definitely worth a large sum in cash.”
“If presented in a certain quarter—yes.”
“Such as?”
Sir George mentioned the names of two European powers.
Poirot nodded.
“That fact would be known to anyone, I take it?”
“Mrs. Vanderlyn would know it all right.”
“I said to anyone?”
“I suppose so, yes.”
“Anyone with a minimum of intelligence would appreciate the cash value of the plans?”
“Yes, but M. Poirot—” Lord Mayfield was looking rather uncomfortable.
Poirot held up a hand.
“I do what you call explore all the avenues.”
Suddenly he rose again, stepped nimbly out of the window and with a flashlight examined the edge of the grass at the farther side of the terrace.
The two men watched him.
He came in again, sat down and said:
“Tell me, Lord Mayfield, this malefactor, this skulker in the shadows, you do not have him pursued?”
Lord Mayfield shrugged his shoulders.
“At the bottom of the garden he could make his way out to a main road. If he had a car waiting there, he would soon be out of reach—”
“But there are the police—the A.A. scouts—”
Sir George interrupted.
“You forget, M. Poirot. We cannot risk publicity. If it were to get out that these plans had been stolen, the result would be extremely unfavourable to the Party.”
“Ah, yes,” said Poirot. “One must remember La Politique. The great discretion must be observed. You send instead for me. Ah well, perhaps it is simpler.”
“You are hopeful of success, M. Poirot?” Lord Mayfield sounded a trifle incredulous.
The little man shrugged his shoulders.
“Why not? One has only to reason—to reflect.”
He paused a moment and then said:
“I would like now to speak to Mr. Carlile.”
“Certainly.” Lord Mayfield rose. “I asked him to wait up. He will be somewhere at hand.”
He went out of the room.
Poirot looked at Sir George.
“Eh bien,” he said. “What about this man on the terrace?”
“My dear M. Poirot. Don’t ask me! I didn’t see him, and I can’t describe him.”
Poirot leaned forward.
“So you have already said. But it is a little different from that is it not?”
“What d’you mean?” asked Sir George abruptly.
“How shall I say it? Your disbelief, it is more profound.”
Sir George started to speak, then stopped.
“But yes,” said Poirot encouragingly. “Tell me. You are both at the end of the terrace. Lord Mayfield sees a shadow slip from the window and across the grass. Why do you not see that shadow?”
Carrington stared at him.
“You’ve hit it, M. Poirot. I’ve been worrying about that ever since. You see, I’d swear that no one did leave this window. I thought Mayfield had imagined it—branch of a tree waving—something of that kind. And then when we came in here and found there had been a robbery, it seemed as though Mayfield must have been right and I’d been wrong. And yet—”
Poirot smiled.
“And yet you still in your heart of hearts believe in the evidence (the negative evidence) of your own eyes?”
“You’re right, M. Poirot, I do.”
Poirot gave a sudden smile.
“How wise you are.”
Sir George said sharply:
“There were no footprints on the grass edge?”
Poirot nodded.
“Exactly. Lord Mayfield, he fancies he sees a shadow. Then there comes the robbery and he is sure—but sure! It is no longer a fancy—he actually saw the man. But that is not so. Me, I do not concern myself much with footprints and such things but for what it is worth we have that negative evidence. There were no footprints on the grass. It had rained heavily this evening. If a man had crossed the terrace to the grass this evening his footprints would have shown.”
Sir George said, staring: “But then—but then—”
“It brings us back to the house. To the people in the house.”
He broke off as the door opened and Lord Mayfield entered with Mr. Carlile.
Though still looking very pale and worried, the secretary had regained a certain composure of manner. Adjusting his pince-nez he sat down and looked at Poirot inquiringly.
“How long had you been in this room when you heard the scream, monsieur?”
Carlile considered.
“Between five and ten minutes, I should say.”
“And before that there had been no disturbance of any kind?”
“No.”
“I understand that the house party had been in one room for the greater part of the evening.”
“Yes, the drawing room.”
Poirot consulted his notebook.
“Sir George Carrington and his wife. Mrs. Macatta. Mrs. Vanderlyn. Mr. Reggie Carrington. Lord Mayfield and yourself. Is that right?”
“I myself was not in the drawing room. I was working here the greater part of the evening.”
Poirot turned to Lord Mayfield.
“Who went up to bed first?”
“Lady Julia Carrington, I think. As a matter of fact, the three ladies went out together.”
“And then?”
“Mr. Carlile came in and I told him to get out the papers as Sir George and I would be along in a minute.”
“It was then that you decided to take a turn on the terrace?”
“It was.”
“Was anything said in Mrs. Vanderlyn’s hearing as to your working in the study?”
“The matter was mentioned, yes.”
“But she was not in the room when you instructed Mr. Carlile to get out the papers?”
“No.”
“Excuse me, Lord Mayfield,” said Carlile. “Just after you had said that, I collided with her in the doorway. She had come back for a book.”
“So you think she might have overheard?”
“I think it quite possible, yes.”
“She came back for a book,” mused Poirot. “Did you find her her book, Lord Mayfield?”
“Yes, Reggie gave it to her.”
“Ah, yes, it is what you call the old gasp—no, pardon, the old wheeze—that—to come back for a book. It is often useful!”
“You think it was deliberate?”
Poirot shrugged his shoulders.
“And after that, you two gentlemen go out on the terrace. And Mrs. Vanderlyn?”
“She went off with her book.”
“And the young M. Reggie. He went to bed also?”
“Yes.”
“And Mr. Carlile he comes here and sometime between five and ten minutes later he heard a scream. Continue, M. Carlile. You heard a scream and you went out into the hall. Ah, perhaps it would be simplest if you reproduced exactly your actions.”
Mr. Carlile got up a little awkwardly.
“Here I scream,” said Poirot helpfully. He opened his mouth and emitted a shrill bleat. Lord Mayfield turned his head away to hide a smile and Mr. Carlile looked extremely uncomfortable.
“Allez! Forward! March!” cried Poirot. “It is your cue that I give you there.”
Mr. Carlile walked stiffly to the door, opened it and went out. Poirot followed him. The other two came behind.
Hercule Poirot: The Complete Short Stories Page 29