Hercule Poirot 100 Years (1916 - 2016)

by Mark Place

  "Yes," said Poirot, "it is not unnatural perhaps that you should both feel that.

  Celia, I should imagine, more than you. She is more disturbed by it than you are. But, if I may say so, does it really matter? What matters is the now, the present. The girl you want to marry, the girl who wants to marry you - what has the past to do with you? Does it matter whether her parents had a suicide pact or whether they died in an airplane accident or one of them was killed in an accident and the other one later committed suicide? Whether there were love affairs which came into their lives and made for unhappiness."

  "Yes," said Desmond Burton-Cox, "yes, I think what you say is sensible and quite right but - well, things have been built up in such a way that I've got to make sure that Celia is satisfied. She's - she's a person who minds about things although she doesn't talk about them much."

  "Has it not occurred to you," said Hercule Poirot, "that it may be very difficult, if not impossible, to find out what really happened?"

  "You mean which of them killed the other or why, or that one shot the other and then himself. Not unless - not unless there had been something."

  "Yes, but that something would have been in the past, so why does it matter now?"

  "It oughtn't to matter - it wouldn't matter but for my mother interfering, poking about in things. It wouldn't have mattered. I don't suppose that, well, Celia's ever thought much about it. I think probably that she was away at school in Switzerland at the time the tragedy happened and nobody told her much and, well, when you're a teen-ager or younger still you just accept things as something that happened, but that's not anything to do with you really."

  "Then don't you think that perhaps you're wanting the impossible?"

  "I want you to find out," said Desmond. "Perhaps it's not the kind of thing that you can find out, or that you like finding out -"

  "I have no objection to finding out," said Poirot. "In fact one has even a certain - curiosity, shall I say. Tragedies, things that arise as a matter of grief, surprise, shock, illness - they are human tragedies, human things, and it is only natural that if one's attention is drawn to them one should want to know. What I say is, is it wise or necessary to rake up things?"

  "Perhaps it isn't," said Desmond, "but you see..."

  "And also," said Poirot, interrupting him, "don't you agree with me that it is rather an impossible thing to do after all this time?"

  "No," said Desmond, "that's where I don't agree with you. I think it would be quite possible."

  "Very interesting," said Poirot. "Why do you think it would be quite possible?"

  "Because"

  "Of what? You have a reason."

  "I think there are people who would know. I think there are people who could tell you if they were willing to tell you. People, perhaps, who would not wish to tell me, who would not wish to tell Celia, but you might find out from them."

  "That is interesting," said Poirot.

  "Things happened," said Desmond. "Things happened in the past. I - I've sort of heard about them in a vague way. There was some mental trouble. There was someone - I don't know who exactly, I think it might have been Lady Ravenscroft - I think she was in a mental home for years. Quite a long time. Some tragedy had happened when she was quite young. Some child who died or an accident. Something that - well, she was concerned in it in some way."

  "It is not what you know of your own knowledge, I presume?"

  "No. It's something my mother said. Something she heard. She heard it in India, I think. Gossip there from other people. You know how they get together in the Services, people like that, and the women all gossip together - all the mem-sahibs. Saying things that mightn't be true at all."

  "And you want to know whether they were true or were not true?"

  "Yes, and I don't know how to find out myself. Not now, because it was a long time ago and I don't know who to ask. I don't know who to go to, but until we really find out what did happen and why -"

  "What you mean is," said Poirot, "at least I think I am right, only this is pure surmise on my part, Celia Ravenscroft does not want to marry you unless she is quite sure that there is no mental flaw passed to her presumably by her mother. Is that it?"

  "I think that is what she has got into her head somehow. And I think my mother put it there. I think it's what my mother wants to believe. I don't think she's any reason really for believing it except ill-mannered spite and gossip and all the rest of it."

  "It will not be a very easy thing to investigate," said Poirot.

  "No, but I've heard things about you. They say that you're very clever at finding out what did happen. Asking people questions and getting them to tell you things."

  "Whom do you suggest I should question or ask? When you say India, I presume you are not referring to people of Indian nationality. You are speaking of what you might call the mem-sahib days, the days when there were Service communities in India. You are speaking of English people and the gossip in some English station there."

  "I don't really mean that that would be any good now. I think whoever it was who gossiped, who talked - I mean, it's so long ago now that they'd have forgotten all about it, that they are probably dead themselves. I think that my mother's got a lot of things wrong, that she's heard things and made up more things about them in her mind."

  "And you still think that I would be capable"

  "Well, I don't mean that I want you to go out to India and ask people things. I mean, none of the people would be there now."

  "So you think you could not give me names?"

  "Not those sort of names," said Desmond.

  "But some names?"

  "Well, I'll come out with what I mean. I think there are two people who might know what happened and why. Because, you see, they'd have been there. They'd have known, really known, of their own knowledge."

  "You do not want to go to them yourself?"

  "Well, I could. I have in a way, but I don't think, you see, that they - I don't know. I wouldn't like to ask some of the things I want to ask. I don't think Celia would. They're very nice, and that's why they'd know. Not because they're nasty, not because they gossip, but because they might have helped. They might have done something to make things better, or have tried to do so, only they couldn't. Oh, I'm putting it all so badly."

  "No," said Poirot, "you are doing it very well, and I am interested and I think you have something definite in your mind. Tell me, does Celia Ravenscroft agree with you?"

  "I haven't said too much to her. You see, she was very fond of Maddy and of Zélie."

  "Maddy and Zélie?"

  "Oh, well, that's their names. Oh, I must explain. I haven't done it very well. You see, when Celia was quite a child - at the time when I first knew her, as I say, when we were living next door in the country - she had a French sort of - well, I suppose nowadays we call it an au pair girl, but it was called a governess then. You know, a French governess. A mademoiselle. And you see, she was very nice. She played with all of us children and Celia always called her Maddy for short - and all the family called her Maddy."

  "Ah, yes. The mademoiselle."

  "Yes, you see being French, I thought - I thought perhaps she would tell you things that she knew and wouldn't wish to speak about to other people."

  "Ah. And the other name you mentioned?"

  "Zélie. The same sort of thing, you see. A mademoiselle. Maddy was there, I think, for about two or three years and then, later, she went back to France, or Switzerland I think it was, and this other one came. Younger than Maddy was and we didn't call her Maddy. Celia called her Zélie. All the family called her Zélie. She was very young, pretty and great fun. We were all frightfully fond of her. She played games with us and we all loved her. The family did. And General Ravenscroft was very taken with her. They used to play games together, picquet, you know, and lots of things."

  "And Lady Ravenscroft?"

  "Oh, she was devoted to Zélie too, and Zélie was devoted to her. That's why she came
back again after she'd left."

  "Came back?"

  "Yes, when Lady Ravenscroft was ill, and had been in hospital, Zélie came back and was sort of companion to her and looked after her. I don't know, but I believe, I think, I'm almost sure that she was there when it - the tragedy - happened. And so, you see she'd know - what really happened."

  "And you know her address? You know where she is now?"

  "Yes. I know where she is. I've got her address. I've got both their addresses. I thought perhaps you could go and see her, or both of them. I know it's a lot to ask -" He broke off.

  Poirot looked at him for some minutes. Then he said: "Yes, it is a possibility - certainly - a possibility."

  Book II - LONG SHADOWS

  Chapter 11

  SUPERINTENDENT GARROWAY AND POIROT COMPARE NOTES

  Superintendent Garroway looked across the table at Poirot. His eyes twinkled. At his side George delivered a whisky and soda. Passing on to Poirot, he put down a glass filled with a dark purple liquid.

  "What's your tipple?" said Superintendent Garroway with some interest.

  "A syrup of black currant," said Poirot.

  "Well, well," said Superintendent Garroway, "everyone to their own taste. What was it Spence told me? He told me you used to drink something called a tisane, wasn't it? What's that, a variant of French piano or something?"

  "No," said Poirot, "it's useful for reducing fevers."

  "Ah. Invalid dope of some kind." He drank from his glass.

  "Well," he said, "here's to suicide!"

  "It was suicide?" Poirot asked.

  "What else can it be?" said Superintendent Garroway. "The things you wanted to know!" He shook his head. His smile grew more pronounced. "I am sorry," said Poirot, "to have troubled you so much. I am like the animal or the child in one of your stories by Mr. Kipling. I suffer from insatiable curiosity."

  "Insatiable curiosity," said Superintendent Garroway. "Nice stories he wrote, Kipling. Knew his stuff, too. They told me once that that man could go for one short tour round a destroyer and know more about it than one of the top engineers in the Royal Navy."

  "Alas," said Hercule Poirot, "I do not know everything. Therefore, you see, I have to ask questions. I am afraid that I sent you rather a long list of questions."

  "What intrigued me," said Superintendent Garroway, "is the way you jumped from one thing to another. Psychiatrists, doctors' reports, how money was left, who had money, who got money. Who expected money and didn't get money, particulars of ladies' hairdressing, wigs, name of the supplier of wigs, charming rose-colored cardboard boxes they came in, by the way."

  "You knew all these things," said Poirot. "That has amazed me, I can assure you."

  "Ah, well, it was a puzzling case and of course we made full notes on the subject. None of this was any good to us, but we kept the files and it was all there if one wanted to look for it."

  He pushed a piece of paper across the table.

  "Here you are. Hairdressers. Bond Street, Expensive firm. Eugene and Rosentelle was the name of it. They moved later. Same firm but went into business in Sloane Street. Here's the address, but it's a pet shop now. Two of their assistants retired some years ago now, but they were the top assistants serving people then, and Lady Ravenscroft was on their list. Rosentelle lives in Cheltenham now. Still in the same line of business. Calls herself a hair stylist - that's the up-to-date term - and you add beautician. Same man, different hat, as one used to say in my young days."

  "Ah-ha!" said Poirot.

  "Why ah-ha?" asked Garroway.

  "I am immensely obliged to you," said Hercule Poirot. "You have presented me with an idea. How strange it is the way ideas arrive into one's head."

  "You've too many ideas in your head already," said the Superintendent. "That's one of your troubles - you don't need any more. Now then, I've checked up as well as I could on the family history - nothing much there. Alistair Ravenscroft was of Scottish extraction. Father was a clergyman - two uncles in the Army - both quite distinguished. Married Margaret Preston-Grey - well-born girl - presented at Court and all the rest of it. No family scandals. You were quite right about her being one of twin sisters. Don't know where you picked that up - Dorothea and Margaret Preston-Grey - known colloquially as Dolly and Molly. Preston-Grays lived at Hatters Green in Sussex. Identical twins - usual kind of history of that kind of twin. Cut their first tooth the same day - both got scarlet fever the same month - wore the same kind of clothes - fell in love with the same kind of man - got married about the same time - both husbands in the Army. Family doctor who attended the family when they were young died some years ago, so there's nothing of interest to be got out of him. There was an early tragedy, though, connected with one of them."

  "Lady Ravenscroft?"

  "No, the other one - she married a Captain Jarrow - had two children; the younger one, a boy of four, was knocked down by a wheelbarrow or some kind of a child's garden toy - or a spade or a child's hoe. Hit him on his head and he fell into an artificial pond or something and drowned. Apparently it was the older child, a girl of nine, who did it. They were playing together and quarrelled, as children do. Doesn't seem much doubt, but there was another story. Someone said the mother did it - got angry and hit him - and someone else said it was a woman who lived next door who hit him. Don't suppose it's of any interest to you - no bearing on a suicide pact entered into by the mother's sister and her husband years after."

  "No," said Poirot, "it does not seem to. But one likes to know background."

  "Yes," said Garroway, "as I told you, one has to look into the past. I can't say we'd thought of looking into the past as long ago as this. I mean, as I've said, all this was twenty years before the suicide."

  "Were there any proceedings at the time?"

  "Yes. I managed to look up the case. Accounts of it. Newspaper accounts. Various things. There were some doubts about it, you know. The mother was badly affected. She broke down completely and had to go into hospital. They do say she was never the same woman again afterwards."

  "But they thought she had done it?"

  "Well, that's what the doctor thought. There was no direct evidence, you understand. She said that she had seen this happen from a window, that she'd seen the older child, the girl, hit the boy and push him in. But her account - well, I don't think they believed it at the time. She talked so wildly."

  "There was, I suppose, some psychiatric evidence?"

  "Yes. She went to a nursing home or hospital of some kind, she was definitely a mental case. She was a good long time in one or two different establishments having treatment, I believe under the care of one of the specialists from St. Andrew's Hospital in London. In the end she was pronounced cured, and released after about three years, and sent home to lead a normal life with her family."

  "And she was then quite normal?"

  "She was always neurotic, I believe -"

  "Where was she at the time of the suicide? Was she staying with the Ravenscrofts?"

  "No - she had died nearly three weeks before that. She was staying with them at Overcliffe when it happened. It seemed again to be an illustration of the identical twin destiny. She walked in her sleep - had suffered from that over a period of years, it seems. She had had one or two minor accidents that way. She sometimes took too many tranquilizers and that resulted in her walking round the house and sometimes out of it during the night. She was following a path along the cliff edge, lost her footing and fell over the cliff, killed immediately. They didn't find her until the next day. Her sister, Lady Ravenscroft, was terribly upset. They were very devoted to each other and she had to be taken to hospital suffering from shock."

  "Could this tragic accident have led to the Ravenscrofts' suicide some months later?"

  "There was never a suggestion of such a thing."

  "Odd things happen with twins, as you say. Lady Ravenscroft might have killed herself because of the link between her and her twin sister. Then the husband may have sh
ot himself because possibly he felt guilty in some way -"

  Superintendent Garroway said: "You have too many ideas, Poirot. Alistair Ravenscroft couldn't have had an affair with his sister-in-law without everyone knowing about it. There was nothing of that kind - if that's what you've been imagining."

  The telephone rang. Poirot rose and answered it. It was Mrs. Oliver. "Monsieur Poirot, can you come to tea or sherry tomorrow? I have got Celia coming - and later on the bossy woman. That's what you wanted, isn't it?"

  Poirot said it was just what he wanted.

  "I've got to dash now," said Mrs. Oliver, "going to meet an old war horse - provided by my elephant Number One, Julia Carstairs. I think she's got his name wrong - she always does - but I hope she's got his address right."

  Chapter 12

  CELIA MEETS HERCULE POIROT

  "Well, madame," said Poirot, "and how did you fare with Sir Hugo Foster?"

  "To begin with, his name wasn't Foster - it was Fothergill. Trust Julia to get a name wrong. She's always doing it."

  "So elephants are not always reliable in the names they remember?"

  "Don't talk of elephants - I've finished with elephants."

  "And your war horse?"

  "Quite an old pet - but useless as a source of information. Obsessed by some people called Marchant who did have a child killed in an accident in India. But nothing to do with the Ravenscrofts. I tell you, I've finished with elephants"