Hercule Poirot 100 Years (1916 - 2016)

by Mark Place

  This was Graves, valet butler to the late Count Foscatini. The story he had to tell was a sensational one. On the previous morning, two gentlemen had called to see his master. They were Italians, and the elder of the two, a man of about forty, gave his name as Signor Ascanio. The younger was a well-dressed lad of about twenty-four. Count Foscatini was evidently prepared for their visit and immediately sent Graves out upon some trivial errand. Here the man paused and hesitated in his story. In the end, however, he admitted that, curious as to the purport of the interview, he had not obeyed immediately, but had lingered about endeavouring to hear something of what was going on.

  The conversation was carried on in so low a tone that he was not as successful as he had hoped; but he gathered enough to make it clear that some kind of monetary proposition was being discussed, and that the basis of it was a threat. The discussion was anything but amicable. In the end, Count Foscatini raised his voice slightly, and the listener heard these words clearly: "I have no time to argue further now, gentlemen. If you will dine with me tomorrow night at eight o'clock, we will resume the discussion."

  Afraid of being discovered listening, Graves had then hurried out to do his master's errand. This evening the two men had arrived punctually at eight. During dinner they had talked of indifferent matters politics, the weather, and the theatrical world. When Graves had placed the port upon the table and brought in the coffee his master told him that he might have the evening off.

  "Was that a usual proceeding of his when he had guests?" asked the inspector.

  "No, sir; it wasn't. That's what made me think it must be some business of a very unusual kind that he was going to discuss with these gentlemen."

  That finished Graves's story. He had gone out about 8:30, and, meeting a friend, had accompanied him to the Metropolitan Music Hall in Edgware Road. Nobody had seen the two men leave, but the time of the murder was fixed clearly enough at 8:47.

  A small clock on the writing-table had been swept off by Foscatini's arm, and had stopped at that hour, which agreed with Miss Rider's telephone summons. The police surgeon had made his examination of the body, and it was now lying on the couch. I saw the face for the first time-the olive complexion, the long nose, the luxuriant black moustache, and the full red lips drawn back from the dazzlingly white teeth. Not altogether a pleasant face.

  "Well," said the inspector, refastening his notebook. "The case seems clear enough. The only difficulty will be to lay our hands on this Signor Ascanio. I suppose his address is not in the dead man's pocket-book by any chance?"

  As Poirot had said, the late Foscatini was an orderly man. Neatly written in small, precise handwriting was the inscription, "Signor Paolo Ascanio, Grosvenor Hotel."

  The inspector busied himself with the telephone, then turned to us with a grin. "Just in time. Our fine gentleman was off to catch the boat train to the Continent. Well, gentlemen, that's about all we can do here. It's a bad business, but straightforward enough. One of these Italian vendetta things, as likely as not."

  Thus airily dismissed, we found our way downstairs. Dr Hawker was full of excitement. "Like the beginning of a novel, eh? Real exciting stuff. Wouldn't believe it if you read about it."

  Poirot did not speak. He was very thoughtful. All the evening he had hardly opened his lips.

  "What says the master detective, eh?" asked Hawker, clapping him on the back. "Nothing to work your grey cells over this time."

  "You think not?"

  "What could there be?"

  "Well, for example, there is the window."

  "The window? But it was fastened. Nobody could have got out or in that way. I noticed it specially."

  "And why were you able to notice it?"

  The doctor looked puzzled. Poirot hastened to explain.

  "It is to the curtains I refer. They were not drawn. A little odd, that. And then there was the coffee. It was very black coffee."

  "Well, what of it?"

  "Very black," repeated Poirot. "In conjunction with that let us remember that very little of the rice soufflé was eaten, and we get what?"

  "Moonshine," laughed the doctor. "You're pulling my leg."

  "Never do I pull the leg. Hastings here knows that I am perfectly serious."

  "I don't know what you are getting at, all the same," I confessed. "You don't suspect the manservant, do you? He might have been in with the gang, and put some dope in the coffee. I suppose they'll test his alibi?"

  "Without doubt, my friend; but it is the alibi of Signor Ascanio that interests me."

  "You think he has an alibi?"

  "That is just what worries me. I have no doubt that we shall soon be enlightened on that point."

  The Daily Newsmonger enabled us to become conversant with succeeding events. Signor Ascanio was arrested and charged with the murder of Count Foscatini. When arrested, he denied knowing the Count, and declared he had never been near Regent's Court either on the evening of the crime or on the previous morning. The younger man had disappeared entirely. Signor Ascanio had arrived alone at the Grosvenor Hotel from the Continent two days before the murder. All efforts to trace the second man failed. Ascanio, however, was not sent for trial. No less a personage than the Italian Ambassador himself came forward and testified at the police-court proceedings that Ascanio had been with him at the Embassy from eight till nine that evening. The prisoner was discharged. Naturally, a lot of people thought that the crime was a political one, and was being deliberately hushed up. Poirot had taken a keen interest in all these points. Nevertheless, I was somewhat surprised when he suddenly informed me one morning that he was expecting a visitor at eleven o'clock, and that that visitor was none other than Ascanio himself.

  "He wishes to consult you?"

  "Du tout, Hastings. I wish to consult him."

  "What about?"

  "The Regent's Court murder."

  "You are going to prove that he did it?"

  "A man cannot be tried twice for murder, Hastings. Endeavour to have the common sense. Ah, that is our friend's ring."

  A few minutes later Signor Ascanio was ushered in -a small, thin man with a secretive and furtive glance in his eyes. He remained standing, darting suspicious glances from one to the other of us.

  "Monsieur Poirot?"

  My little friend tapped himself gently on the chest.

  "Be seated, signor. You received my note. I am determined to get to the bottom of this mystery. In some small measure you can aid me. Let us commence. You in company with a friend visited the late Count Foscatini on the morning of Tuesday the 9th"

  The Italian made an angry gesture. "I did nothing of the sort. I have sworn in court"

  "Précisément -and I have a little idea that you have sworn falsely."

  "You threaten me? Bah! I have nothing to fear from you. I have been acquitted."

  "Exactly; and as I am not an imbecile, it is not with the gallows I threaten you -but with publicity. Publicity! I see that you do not like the word. I had an idea that you would not. My little ideas, you know, they are very valuable to me. Come, signor, your only chance is to be frank with me. I do not ask to know whose indiscretions brought you to England. I know this much, you came for the especial purpose of seeing Count Foscatini."

  "He was not a count," growled the Italian.

  "I have already noted the fact that his name does not appear in the Almanach de Gotha. Never mind, the title of count is often useful in the profession of blackmailing."

  "I suppose I might as well be frank. You seem to know a good deal."

  "I have employed my grey cells to some advantage. Come, Signor Ascanio, you visited the dead man on the Tuesday morning -that is so, is it not?"

  "Yes, but I never went there on the following evening. There was no need. I will tell you all. Certain information concerning a man of great position in Italy had come into this scoundrel's possession. He demanded a big sum of money in return for the papers. I came over to England to arrange the matter. I called upon him by
appointment that morning. One of the young secretaries of the Embassy was with me. The Count was more reasonable than I had hoped, although even then the sum of money I paid him was a huge one."

  "Pardon, how was it paid?" "In Italian notes of comparatively small denomination. I paid over the money then and there. He handed me the incriminating papers. I never saw him again."

  "Why did you not say all this when you were arrested?"

  "In my delicate position I was forced to deny any association with the man."

  "And how do you account for the events of the evening, then?"

  "I can only think that someone must have deliberately impersonated me. I understand that no money was found in the flat."

  Poirot looked at him and shook his head. "Strange," he murmured. "We all have the little grey cells. And so few of us know how to use them. Good morning, Signor Ascanio. I believe your story. It is very much as I had imagined. But I had to make sure."

  After bowing his guest out, Poirot returned to his armchair and smiled at me. "Let us hear M. le Capitaine Hastings on the case?"

  "Well, I suppose Ascanio is right somebody impersonated him."

  "Never, never will you use the brains the good God has given you. Recall to yourself some words I uttered after leaving the flat that night. I referred to the window-curtains not being drawn. We are in the month of June. It is still light at eight o'clock. The light is failing by half-past. Ça vous dit quelque chose? I perceive a struggling impression that you will arrive someday. Now let us continue. The coffee was, as I said, very black. Count Foscatini's teeth were magnificently white. Coffee stains the teeth. We reason from that that Count Foscatini did not drink any coffee. Yet there was coffee in all three cups. Why should anyone pretend Count Foscatini had drunk coffee when he had not done so?" I shook my head, utterly bewildered.

  "Come, I will help you. What evidence have we that Ascanio and his friend, or two men posing as them, ever came to the flat that night? Nobody saw them go in; nobody saw them go out. We have the evidence of one man and of a host of inanimate objects."

  "You mean?"

  "I mean knives and forks and plates and empty dishes.

  Ah, but it was a clever idea! Graves is a thief and a scoundrel, but what a man of method! He overhears a portion of the conversation in the morning, enough to realize that Ascanio will be in an awkward position to defend himself. The following evening, about eight o'clock, he tells his master he is wanted at the telephone. Foscatini sits down, stretches out his hand to the telephone, and from behind Graves strikes him down with the marble figure. Then quickly to the service telephone dinner for three! It comes, he lays the table, dirties the plates, knives, and forks, etc. But he has to get rid of the food too. Not only is he a man of brain; he has a resolute and capacious stomach! But after eating three tournedos, the rice soufflé is too much for him! He even smokes a cigar and two cigarettes to carry out the illusion.

  Ah, but it was magnificently thorough! Then, having moved on the hands of the clock to 8:47, he smashes it and stops it. The one thing he does not do is to draw the curtains. But if there had been a real dinner party the curtains would have been drawn as soon as the light began to fail. Then he hurries out, mentioning the guests to the lift man in passing. He hurries to a telephone box, and as near as possible to 8:47 rings up the doctor with his master's dying cry. So successful is his idea that no one ever inquires if a call was put through from Flat 11 at that time."

  "Except Hercule Poirot, I suppose?" I said sarcastically.

  "Not even Hercule Poirot," said my friend, with a smile.

  "I am about to inquire now. I had to prove my point to you first. But you will see, I shall be right; and then Japp, to whom I have already given a hint, will be able to arrest the respectable Graves. I wonder how much of the money he has spent."

  Poirot was right. He always is, confound him!

  The Adventure Of

  The Clapham Cook

  BY

  AGATHA CHRISTIE

  The Adventure of the Clapham Cook

  At the time that I was sharing rooms with my friend Hercule Poirot, it was my custom to read aloud to him the headlines in the morning newspaper, the Daily Blare. The Daily Blare was a paper that made the most of any opportunity for sensationalism. Robberies and murders did not lurk obscurely in its back pages. Instead they hit you in the eye in large type on the front page. I read.

  ABSCONDING BANK CLERK DISAPPEARS WITH FIFTY THOUSAND POUNDS” WORTH OF NEGOTIABLE SECURITIES,

  HUSBAND PUTS HIS HEAD IN GAS-OVEN. UNHAPPY HOME. MISSING TYPIST. PRETTY GIRL TWENTY-ONE. WHERE IS EDNA DUNN?

  “There you are, Poirot, plenty to choose from, an absconding bank clerk, a mysterious suicide, a missing typist - which will you have?”

  My friend was in a placid mood. He quietly shook his head. “I am not greatly attracted to any of them, mon ami. Today I feel inclined for the life of ease. It would have to be a very interesting problem to tempt me from my chair. See you I have affairs of importance of my own to attend to.”

  “Such as?”

  “My wardrobe, Hastings.”

  “If I mistake not, there is on my new grey suit the spot of grease- only the unique spot, but it is sufficient to trouble me. Then there is my winter overcoat - I must lay him aside in the powder of Keatings. And I think - yes, I think - the moment is ripe for the trimmings of my moustaches - and afterwards I must apply the pomade.”

  “Well,” I said, strolling to the window, “I doubt if you’ll be able to carry out this delirious programme.”

  There was a ring at the bell.

  “You have a client.”

  “Unless the affair is one of national importance, I touch it not,” declared Poirot with dignity. A moment later our privacy was invaded by a stout red-faced lady who panted audibly as a result of her rapid ascent of the stairs. “You’re M. Poirot?” she demanded, as she sank into a chair.

  “I am Hercule Poirot, yes, Madame.”

  “You’re not a bit like what I thought you’d be,” said the lady, eyeing him with some disfavour.

  “Did you pay for the bit in the paper saying what a clever detective you were, or did they put it in themselves?”

  “Madame!” said Poirot, drawing himself up.

  “I’m sorry I’m sure, but you know what these papers are nowadays. You begin reading a nice article "What a bride said to her plain unmarried friend", and it’s all about a simple thing you buy at the chemists and shampoo your hair with. Nothing but puff, but no offence taken, I hope? I’ll tell you what I want you to do for me. I want you to find my cook.”

  Poirot stared at her; for once his ready tongue failed him. I turned aside to hide the broadening smile I could not control.

  “It’s all this wicked dole,” continued the lady. “Putting ideas into servants” heads, wanting to be typists and what nots. Stop the dole, that’s what I say. I’d like to know what my servants have to complain of - afternoon and evening off a week, alternate Sundays, washing put out, same food as we have - and never a bit of margarine in the house, nothing but the very best butter.”

  She paused for want of breath and Poirot seized his opportunity. He spoke in his haughtiest manner rising to his feet as he did so. “I fear you are making a mistake, Madame. I am not holding an inquiry into the conditions of domestic service. I am a private detective.”

  “I know that,” said our visitor. “Didn’t I tell you I wanted you to find my cook for me? Walked out of the house on Wednesday, without so much as a word to me, and never came back.”

  “I am sorry, Madame, but I do not touch “this particular kind of business”. I wish you good morning.” Our visitor snorted with indignation.

  “That’s it, is it, my fine fellow? Too proud, eh? Only deal with Government secrets and countesses’ jewels? Let me tell you a servant’s every bit as important as a tiara to a woman in my position. We can’t all be fine ladies going out in our motors with our diamonds and our pearls. A good cook’s a good co
ok - and when you lose her, it’s as much to you as her pearls are to some fine lady.”

  For a moment or two it appeared to be a toss-up between Poirot’s dignity and his sense of humour. Finally he laughed and sat down again.

  “Madame, you are in the right, and I am in the wrong. Your remarks are just and intelligent. This case will be a novelty. Never yet have I hunted a missing domestic. Truly here is the problem of national importance that I was demanding of fate just before your arrival. En avant! You say this jewel of a cook went out on Wednesday and did not return. That is the day before yesterday.”

  “Yes, it was her day out.”

  “But probably, Madame, she has met with some accident. Have you inquired at any of the hospitals?”

  “That’s exactly what I thought yesterday, but this morning, if you please, she sent for her box. And not so much as a line to me! If I’d been at home, I’d not have let it go - treating me like that! But I’d just stepped out to the butcher.”

  “Will you describe her to me?”

  “She was middle-aged, stout, black hair turning grey - most respectable. She’d been ten years in her last place. Eliza Dunn, her name was.”

  “And you had had - no disagreement with her on the Wednesday?”

  “None whatever. That’s what makes it all so queer.”

  “How many servants do you keep, Madame?”

  “Two. The house-parlour maid, Annie, is a very nice girl. A bit forgetful and her head full of young men, but a good servant if you keep her up to her work.”

  “Did she and the cook get on well together?”

  “They had their ups and downs, of course - but on the whole, very well.”

  “And the girl can throw no light on the mystery?”

  “She says not - but you know what servants are - they all hang together.”

  “Well, well, we must look into this. Where did you say you resided, Madame?”

  “At Clapham; 88 Prince Albert Road.”