Hercule Poirot 100 Years (1916 - 2016)

by Mark Place

  Through Poirot’s mind there ran quickly: ‘Rinse. Open a little wider, please. Now close gently.’

  Japp had proceeded to his next step. It would possibly be necessary for Miss Sainsbury Seale to give evidence at the inquest. After a first scream of dismay, Miss Sainsbury Seale seemed to take kindly to the idea. A tentative inquiry from Japp produced Miss Sainsbury Seale’s whole life history. She had, it seemed, come from India to England six months ago. She had lived in various hotels and boarding-houses and had finally come to the Glengowrie Court which she liked very much because of its homely atmosphere; in India she had lived mostly in Calcutta where she had done Mission work and had also taught elocution.

  ‘Pure, well-enunciated English—most important, Chief Inspector. You see,’ Miss Sainsbury Seale simpered and bridled, ‘as a girl I was on the stage. Oh! only in small parts, you know. The provinces! But I had great ambitions. Repertory. Then I went on a world tour—Shakespeare, Bernard Shaw.’ She sighed. ‘The trouble with us poor women is heart —at the mercy of our hearts . A rash impulsive marriage. Alas! we parted almost immediately. I—I had been sadly deceived. I resumed my maiden name. A friend kindly provided me with a little capital and I started my elocution school. I helped to found a very good amateur dramatic society. I must show you some of our notices.’

  Chief Inspector Japp knew the dangers of that! He escaped, Miss Sainsbury Seale’s last words being: ‘and if, by any chance, my name should be in the papers—as a witness at the inquest, I mean—you will be sure that it is spelt right. Mabelle Sainsbury Seale—Mabelle spelt M.A.B.E.L.L.E, and Seale S.E.A.L.E. And, of course, if they did care to mention that I appeared in As You Like It at the Oxford Repertory Theatre—’

  ‘Of course, of course.’ Chief Inspector Japp fairly fled.

  In the taxi, he sighed and wiped his forehead.

  ‘If it’s ever necessary, we ought to be able to check up on her all right,’ he observed, ‘unless it was all lies—but that I don’t believe!’

  Poirot shook his head. ‘Liars,’ he said, ‘are neither so circumstantial nor so inconsequential.’

  Japp went on: ‘I was afraid she’d jib at the inquest—most middle-aged spinsters do—but her having been an actress accounts for her being eager. Bit of limelight for her!’

  Poirot said: ‘Do you really want her at the inquest?’

  ‘Probably not. It depends.’ He paused and then said: ‘I’m more than ever convinced, Poirot. This wasn’t suicide.’

  ‘And the motive?’

  ‘Has us beat for the moment. Suppose Morley once seduced Amberiotis’ daughter?’ Poirot was silent. He tried to visualize Mr Morley in the role of seducer to a luscious-eyed Greek maiden, but failed lamentably. He reminded Japp that Mr Reilly had said his partner had had no joy of living. Japp said vaguely: ‘Oh well, you never know what may happen on a cruise!’ and he added with satisfaction, ‘We shall know better where we stand when we’ve talked to this fellow.’ They paid off the taxi and entered the Savoy. Japp asked for Mr Amberiotis. The clerk looked at them rather oddly. He said: ‘Mr Amberiotis? I’m sorry, sir, I’m afraid you can’t see him.’

  ‘Oh, yes, I can, my lad,’ Japp said grimly. He drew the other a little aside and showed him his credentials. The clerk said: ‘You don’t understand, sir. Mr Amberiotis died half an hour ago .’

  To Hercule Poirot it was as though a door had gently but firmly shut.

  Five, Six, Picking up Sticks

  I

  Twenty-four hours later Japp rang Poirot up. His tone was bitter. ‘Wash-out! The whole thing!’

  ‘What do you mean, my friend?’

  ‘Morley committed suicide all right. We’ve got the motive.’

  ‘What was it?’

  ‘I’ve just had the doctor’s report on Amberiotis’ death. I won’t give you the official jargon but in plain English he died as a result of an overdose of adrenaline and novocaine. It acted on his heart, I understand, and he collapsed. When the wretched devil said he was feeling bad yesterday afternoon, he was just speaking the truth. Well, there you are! Adrenaline and procaine is the stuff dentists inject into your gum—local anæsthetic. Morley made an error, injected an overdose, and then after Amberiotis left, he realized what he had done, couldn’t face the music and shot himself.’

  ‘With a pistol he was not known to possess?’ queried Poirot.

  ‘He may have possessed it all the same. Relations don’t know everything. You’d be surprised sometimes, the things they don’t know!’

  ‘That is true, yes.’

  Japp said: ‘Well, there you are. It’s a perfectly logical explanation of the whole thing.’

  Poirot said: ‘You know, my friend, it does not quite satisfy me. It is true that patients have been known to react unfavourably to these local anæsthetics. Adrenaline idiosyncrasy is well known. In combination with procaine toxic effects have followed quite small doses. But the doctor or dentist who employed the drug does not usually carry his concern as far as killing himself!’

  ‘Yes, but you’re talking of cases where the employment of the anæsthetic was normal. In that case no particular blame attaches to the surgeon concerned. It is the idiosyncrasy of the patient that has caused death. But in this case it’s pretty clear that there was a definite overdose. They haven’t got the exact amount yet—these quantitive analyses seem to take a month of Sundays—but it was definitely more than the normal dose. That means that Morley must have made a mistake.’

  ‘Even then,’ said Poirot, ‘it was a mistake. It would not be a criminal matter.’

  ‘No, but it wouldn’t do him any good in his profession. In fact, it would pretty well ruin him. Nobody’s going to go to a dentist who’s likely to shoot lethal doses of poison into you just because he happens to be a bit absent-minded.’

  ‘It was a curious thing to do, I admit.’

  ‘These things happen—they happen to doctors—they happen to chemists…Careful and reliable for years, and then—one moment’s inattention—and the mischief’s done and the poor devils are for it. Morley was a sensitive man. In the case of a doctor, there’s usually a chemist or a dispenser to share the blame—or to shoulder it altogether. In this case Morley was solely responsible.’

  Poirot demurred. ‘Would he not have left some message behind him? Saying what he had done? And that he could not face the consequences? Something of that kind? Just a word for his sister?’

  ‘No, as I see it, he suddenly realized what had happened—and just lost his nerve and took the quickest way out.’

  Poirot did not answer.

  Japp said: ‘I know you, old boy. Once you’ve got your teeth into a case of murder, you like it to be a case of murder! I admit I’m responsible for setting you on the track this time. Well, I made a mistake. I admit it freely.’

  Poirot said: ‘I still think, you know, that there might be another explanation.’

  ‘Plenty of other explanations, I dare say. I’ve thought of them—but they’re all too fantastic. Let’s say that Amberiotis shot Morley, went home, was filled with remorse and committed suicide, using some stuff he’d pinched from Morley’s surgery. If you think that’s likely, I think it’s damned unlikely. We’ve got a record of Amberiotis at the Yard. Quite interesting. Started as a little hotel-keeper in Greece, then he mixed himself up in politics. He’s done espionage work in Germany and in France—and made very pretty little sums of money. But he wasn’t getting rich quick enough that way, and he’s believed to have done a spot or two of blackmail. Not a nice man, our Mr Amberiotis. He was out in India last year and is believed to have bled one of the native princes rather freely. The difficult thing has been ever to prove anything against him. Slippery as an eel! There is another possibility. He might have been blackmailing Morley over something or other. Morley, having a golden opportunity, plugs an overdose of adrenaline and novocaine into him, hoping that the verdict will be an unfortunate accident—adrenaline idiosyncrasy—something of that sort. Then, after the man�
�s gone away Morley gets a fit of remorse and does himself in. That’s possible, of course, but I can’t somehow see Morley as a deliberate murderer.

  No, I’m pretty sure it was what I first said—a genuine mistake, made on a morning when he was overworked. We’ll have to leave it at that, Poirot. I’ve talked to the A.C. and he’s quite clear on it.’

  ‘I see,’ said Poirot, with a sigh. ‘I see…’

  Japp said kindly: ‘I know what you feel, old boy. But you can’t have a nice juicy murder every time! So long. All I can say by way of apology is the old phrase: “Sorry you have been troubled!”

  He rang off.

  II

  Hercule Poirot sat at his handsome modern desk. He liked modern furniture. Its squareness and solidity were more agreeable to him than the soft contours of antique models. In front of him was a square sheet of paper with neat headings and comments. Against some of them were query marks. First came: Amberiotis. Espionage. In England for that purpose? Was in India last year. During period of riots and unrest. Could be a Communist agent. There was a space, and then the next heading: Frank Carter? Morley thought him unsatisfactory. Was discharged from his employment recently. Why? After that came a name with merely a question mark: Howard Raikes?

  Next came a sentence in inverted commas.

  ‘But that’s absurd!’???

  Hercule Poirot’s head was poised interrogatively. Outside the window a bird was carrying a twig to build its nest. Hercule Poirot looked rather like a bird as he sat there with his egg-shaped head cocked to one side. He made another entry a little farther down: Mr Barnes? He paused and then wrote: Morley’s office? Mark on carpet. Possibilities. He considered that last entry for some time. Then he got up, called for his hat and stick and went out.

  III

  Three-quarters of an hour later Hercule Poirot came out of the underground station at Ealing Broadway and five minutes after that he had reached his destination—No. 88, Castlegardens Road.

  It was a small semi-detached house, and the neatness of the front garden drew an admiring nod from Hercule Poirot. ‘Admirably symmetrical,’ he murmured to himself. Mr Barnes was at home and Poirot was shown into a small, precise dining-room and here presently Mr Barnes came to him. Mr Barnes was a small man with twinkling eyes and a nearly bald head. He peeped over the top of his glasses at his visitor while in his left hand he twirled the card that Poirot had given the maid. He said in a small, prim, almost falsetto voice: ‘Well, well, M. Poirot? I am honoured, I am sure.’

  ‘You must excuse my calling upon you in this informal manner,’ said Poirot punctiliously.

  ‘Much the best way,’ said Mr Barnes. ‘And the time is admirable, too. A quarter to seven—very sound time at this period of the year for catching anyone at home.’ He waved his hand. ‘Sit down, M. Poirot. I’ve no doubt we’ve got a good deal to talk about. 58, Queen Charlotte Street, I suppose?’

  Poirot said: ‘You suppose rightly—but why should you suppose anything of the kind?’

  ‘My dear sir,’ said Mr Barnes, ‘I’ve been retired from the Home Office for some time now—but I’ve not gone quite rusty yet. If there’s any hush-hush business, it’s far better not to use the police. Draws attention to it all!’

  Poirot said: ‘I will ask yet another question. Why should you suppose this is a hush-hush business?’

  ‘Isn’t it?’ asked the other. ‘Well, if it isn’t, in my opinion it ought to be.’ He leant forward and tapped with his pince-nez on the arm of the chair. ‘In Secret Service work it’s never the little fry you want—it’s the big bugs at the top—but to get them you’ve got to be careful not to alarm the little fry.’

  ‘It seems to me, Mr Barnes, that you know more than I do,’ said Hercule Poirot.

  ‘Don’t know anything at all,’ replied the other, ‘just put two and two together.’

  ‘One of those two being?’

  ‘Amberiotis,’ said Mr Barnes promptly. ‘You forget I sat opposite him in the waiting-room for a minute or two. He didn’t know me . I was always an insignificant chap. Not a bad thing sometimes. But I knew him all right—and I could guess what he was up to over here.’

  ‘Which was?’

  Mr Barnes twinkled more than ever.

  ‘We’re very tiresome people in this country. We’re conservative, you know, conservative to the backbone. We grumble a lot, but we don’t really want to smash our democratic government and try new-fangled experiments. That’s what’s so heart-breaking to the wretched foreign agitator who’s working full time and over! The whole trouble is—from their point of view—that we really are , as a country, comparatively solvent. Hardly any other country in Europe is at the moment! To upset England—really upset it—you’ve got to play hell with its finance—that’s what it comes to! And you can’t play hell with its finance when you’ve got men like Alistair Blunt at the helm.’

  Mr Barnes paused and then went on: ‘Blunt is the kind of man who in private life would always pay his bills and live within his income—whether he’d got two pence a year or several million makes no difference. He is that type of fellow. And he just simply thinks that there’s no reason why a country shouldn’t be the same! No costly experiments. No frenzied expenditure on possible Utopias. That’s why’—he paused—‘that’s why certain people have made up their minds that Blunt must go.’

  ‘Ah,’ said Poirot.

  Mr Barnes nodded.

  ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘I know what I’m talking about. Quite nice people some of ’em. Long-haired, earnest-eyed, and full of ideals of a better world. Others not so nice, rather nasty in fact. Furtive little rats with beards and foreign accents. And another lot again of the Big Bully type. But they’ve all got the same idea: Blunt Must Go!’

  He tilted his chair gently back and forward again.

  ‘Sweep away the old order! The Tories, the Conservatives, the Diehards, the hard-headed suspicious Business Men, that’s the idea. Perhaps these people are right—I don’t know—but I know one thing—you’ve got to have something to put in place of the old order—something that will work—not just something that sounds all right. Well, we needn’t go into that. We are dealing with concrete facts, not abstract theories. Take away the props and the building will come down. Blunt is one of the props of Things as They Are.’

  He leaned forward. ‘They’re out after Blunt all right. That I know. And it’s my opinion that yesterday morning they nearly got him. I may be wrong—but it’s been tried before. The method, I mean.’ He paused and then quietly, circumspectly, he mentioned three names. An unusually able Chancellor of the Exchequer, a progressive and far-sighted manufacturer, and a hopeful young politician who had captured the public fancy. The first had died on the operating table, the second had succumbed to an obscure disease which had been recognized too late, the third had been run down by a car and killed.

  ‘It’s very easy,’ said Mr Barnes. ‘The anæsthetist muffed the giving of the anæsthetic—well, that does happen. In the second case the symptoms were puzzling. The doctor was just a well-meaning G.P., couldn’t be expected to recognize them. In the third case, anxious mother was driving car in a hurry to get to her sick child. Sob stuff—the jury acquitted her of blame!’

  He paused: ‘All quite natural. And soon forgotten. But I’ll just tell you where those three people are now . The anæsthetist is set up on his own with a first-class research laboratory—no expense spared. That G.P. has retired from practice. He’s got a yacht, and a nice little place on the Broads. The mother is giving all her children a first-class education, ponies to ride in the holidays, nice house in the country with a big garden and paddocks.’

  He nodded his head slowly. ‘In every profession and walk of life there is someone who is vulnerable to temptation. The trouble in our case is that Morley wasn’t!’

  ‘You think it was like that?’ said Hercule Poirot.

  Mr Barnes said: ‘I do. It’s not easy to get at one of these big men, you know. They’re fairly well prote
cted. The car stunt is risky and doesn’t always succeed. But a man is defenceless enough in a dentist’s chair.’

  He took off his pince-nez, polished them and put them on again. He said: ‘That’s my theory! Morley wouldn’t do the job. He knew too much, though, so they had to put him out.’

  ‘They?’ asked Poirot.

  ‘When I say they —I mean the organization that’s behind all this. Only one person actually did the job, of course.’

  ‘Which person?’

  ‘Well, I could make a guess,’ said Mr Barnes, ‘but it’s only a guess and I might be wrong.’

  Poirot said quietly: ‘Reilly?’

  ‘Of course! He’s the obvious person. I think that probably they never asked Morley to do the job himself . What he was to do, was to turn Blunt over to his partner at the last minute. Sudden illness, something of that sort. Reilly would have done the actual business—and there would have been another regrettable accident—death of a famous banker—unhappy young dentist in court in such a state of dither and misery that he would have been let down light. He’d have given up dentistry afterwards—and settled down somewhere on a nice income of several thousands a year.’

  Mr Barnes looked across at Poirot.

  ‘Don’t think I’m romancing,’ he said. ‘These things happen.’

  ‘Yes, yes, I know they happen.’

  Mr Barnes went on, tapping a book with a lurid jacket that lay on a table close at hand: ‘I read a lot of these spy yarns. Fantastic, some of them. But curiously enough they’re not any more fantastic than the real thing . There are beautiful adventuresses, and dark sinister men with foreign accents, and gangs and international associations and super crooks! I’d blush to see some of the things I know set down in print—nobody would believe them for a minute!’

  Poirot said: ‘In your theory, where does Amberiotis come in?’

  ‘I’m not quite sure. I think he was meant to take the rap. He’s played a double game more than once and I dare say he was framed. That’s only an idea, mind.’