her. 'And you see where that leaves us. MrsClapperton unlocked
t& door and let the murderer in. Now would she be likely to do
that for a bead seller?'
Ellie objected: 'She might not have known who it was. He
may have knocked - she got up and opened the door - and he
forced his way in and killed her.'
Poirot shook his head. 'Au contraire. She was 'lying peace-fully
in bed when she was stabbed.'
Miss Henderson stared at him. 'What's your idea?' she asked
abruptly.
Poirot smiled. 'Well, it looks, does it not, as though she knew
the person she admitted...'
'You mean,' said Miss Henderson and her voice sounded a
little harsh, 'that the murderer is a passenger on the sh)?'
Poirot nodded. 'It seems indicated.'
'And the string of beads left on the floor was a blind?'
'Precisely.'
'The theft of the money also?'
'Exactly.'
There was a pause, then Miss Henderson said slowly: 'I
thought Mrs Clapperton a very unpleasant woman and I don't
think anyone on board really liked her - but there wasn't
anyone who had any reason to kill her.'
'Except her husband, perhaps,' said Poirot.
'You don't really think -' She stopped.
'It is the opinion of every person on this ship that Colonel
Clapperton would have been quite justified in "taking a
hatchet to her". That was, I think, the expression used.'
Ellie Henderson looked at him - waiting.
'But I am bound to say,' went on Poirot, 'that I myself have
not noted any signs of exasperation on the good Colonel's part.
Also what is more important, he had an alibi. He was with those
199
two girls all day and did not return to the ship till four o'clock By then, Mrs Clapperton had been dead many hours.'
There was another minute of silence. Ellie Henderson said
softly: 'But you still think - a passenger on the ship?'
Poirot bowed his head.
Ellie Henderson laughed suddenly - a reckless defmnt laugh.
'Your theory may be difficult to prove, M. Poirot. There area
good many passengers on this ship.'
Poirot bowed to her. 'I will use a phrase from one o;
detective stories. "I have my methods, Watson." '
The following evening, at dinner, every passenger fed a
typewritten slip by his plate requesting him to be h the ,nain
lounge at 8.30. When the company were assembled, the
Captain stepped on to the raised platform where the orccstra
usually played and addressed them.
'Ladies and gentlemen, you all know of the tragedy ".:,¥ich
took place yesterday. I am sure you all wish to co-oper:e in
bringing the perpetrator of that foul crime to justice ' He
paused and cleared his throat. 'We have on board with '¢,, M.
Hercule Poirot who is probably known to you all as a man who
has had wide experience in - er - such matters. I hope you will
listen carefully to what he has to say.'
It was at this moment that Colonel Clappenon, who had not
been at dinner, came in and sat down next to General Forbes.
He looked like a man bewildered by sorrow - not at all like a
man conscious of great relief. Either he was a very good
actor or else he had been genuinely fond of his disagreeable
wife.
'M. Hercule Poirot,' said the Captain and stepped down.
Poirot took his place. He looked comically self-important as he
beamed on his audience.
'Messieurs, mesdames,' he began. 'It is most kind of you. be
so indulgent as to listen to me. M. le Gapitaine has told you ;at
I have had a certain experience in these matters. I have, t is
true, a little idea of my own about how to get to the botto ': of
this particular case.' He made a sign and a steward pu.ed
200
forward and passed on to him a bulky, shapeless object
vrapped in a sheet.
'What I am about to do may surprise you a little,' Poirot
vamed them. 'It may occur to you that I am eccentric, perhaps
mad. Nevertheless I assure you that behind my madness there
is - as you English say - a method.'
His eyes met those of Miss Henderson for just a minute. He
began unwrapping the bulky object.
'I have here, messieurs and mesdames, an important witness to
the truth of who killed Mrs Clapperton.' With a deft hand he
whisked away the last enveloping cloth, and the object it
concealed was revealed - an almost life-sized wooden doll,
dressed in a velvet suit and lace collar.
'Now, Arthur,' said Poirot and his voice changed subtly - it
was no longer foreign - it had instead a confident English, a
slightly Cockney inflection. 'Can you tell me - I repeat - can
you tell me - anything at all about the death of Mrs
Clapperton?'
The doll's neck oscillated a little, its wooden lower jaw
dropped and wavered and a shrill high-pitched woman's voice.
spoke:
'What is it, John? The door's locked. I don't want to be
disturbed by the stewards...'
There was a cry - an overturned chair - a man stood
swaying, his hand to his throat - trying to speak - trying...
Then suddenly, his figure seemed to crumple up. He pitched
headlong.
It was Colonel Clapperton.
Poirot and the ship's doctor rose from their knees by the
prostrate figure.
'All over, I'm afraid. Heart,' said the doctor' briefly.
Poirot nodded. 'The shock of having his trick seen through,'
he said.
He turned to General Forbes. 'It was you, General, who
gave me a valuable hint with your mention of the music hall
stage. I puzzle - I think - and then it comes to me. Supposing
that before the war Clapperton was a ventriloquist. In that case,
201
it would be perfectly possible for three people to hear
Clapperton speak from inside her cabin when she was alread
dead...'
Ellie Henderson was beside him. Her eyes were dark and full
of pain. 'Did you know his heart was weak?' she asked.
'I guessed it... Mrs Clapperton talked of her own he. an
being affected, but she struck me as the type of woman who
likes to be thought ill. Then I picked up a torn prescription
with a very strong dose of digitalin in it. Digitalin is a
medicine but it couldn't be Mrs Clapperton's because digitalin '
dilates the pupils of the eyes. I have never noticed such
phenomenon with her - but when I looked at his eyes I saw the
signs at once.'
ERie murmured: 'So you thought - it might end - this way?'
'The best way, don't you think, ndemoiselle?' he said
gently.
He saw the tears rise in her eyes. She said: 'You've known.
You've known all along... That I cared... But he didn't do it
for me ... It was those girls - youth - it made him feel his
'slavery. He wanted to be free before it was too late... Yes, I'm
sure that's how it was... When did you guess - that it was he?'
'His self-control was too perfect,' said Poirot simply. 'No
matter how galling his wife's conduct, it never seemed to touch
<
br /> him. That meant either that he was so used to it that it no longer
stung him, or else - eh b/eh - I decided on the latter
alternative... And I was right...
'And then there was his insistence on his conjuring ability-the
evening before the crime he pretended to give himself
away. But a man like Clapperton doesn't give himself away,
There must be a reason. So long as people thought he had beea
a conjuror they weren't likely to think of his having been a vemriloquist.'
'And the voice we heard - Mrs Clapperton's voice?'
'One of the stewardesses had a voice not unlike hers. I
induced her to hide behind the stage and taught her the wrds to say.'
'It was a trick - a cruel trick,' cried out Ellie.
'I do not approve of murder,' said Hercule Poirot.
202
THE THIRD-FLOOR FLAT
'Bother? said Pat.
With a deepening frown she rummaged Wildly in the silken
trifle she called an evening bag. Two young men and another
girl watched her anxiously. They were all standing outside the
closed door of Patrica Gamett s fla.
'It's no good,' said Pat. 'It's not there. And now what shall
we do?'
'What is life without a latchley?' murmured Jimmy
Faulkener.
He was a shorh broad-shouldered young roan, with good-tempered
blue eyes.
Pat turned on him angrily. 'Don't make jokes, Jimmy. This
is serious.'
'Look again, Pat,' said Donovan Bailey. 'It must be there
somewhere.'
He had a lazy, pleasant voice that matched his lean, dark
figure.
'If you ever brought it out,' said the other girl, Mildred
Hope.
'Of course I brought it out,' said Pat. 'I believe I gave it to
one of you two.' She turned on the men aceusinly. 'I told
Donovan to take it for me.'
But she was not to find a scapegoat so easily. Donovan put in
a firm disclaimer, and liramy backed him up.
'I saw you put it in your bag, myself,' said Jimmy.
'Well, then, one of you dropped it out when you picked up
my bag. I've dropped it once or twice.'
'Once or twice? said Donovan. 'You've dropped it a dozen
times at least, besides leaving it behind on every possible
OCiOll?
'I can't see why everything on earth doesn't drop out of it the
whole time,' said Jimmy.
2O3
0
o o mo m. od uu 1;)! qgd .9uno,( 'ums ql qnq 'lqol sn
o snp I, 'M P ,'Pal s,l ,uop I,
,' si, '.ou p ,'oN,
and we shall smash endless crockery before I can get to the light
switch. Don't move about, Jimmy, till I get the light on.'
He felt his way cautiously over the floor, uttering one fervent
'Damn!' as a corner of the kitchen table took him unawares in
the ribs. He reached the switch, and in another moment
another 'Damn!' floated out of the darkness.
'What's the matter?' asked Jimmy.
'Light won't come on. Dud bulb, I suppose. Wait a minute.
I'll turn the sitting-room light on.'
The sitting-room was the door immediately across the
passage. Jimmy heard Donovan go out of the door, and
presently fresh muffled curses reached him. He himseffedged
his way cautiously across the kitchen.
'What's the matter?'
'I don't know. Rooms get bewitched at night, I believe.
Everything seems to be in a different place. Chairs and tbles
where you least expected them. Oh, hell! Here's nother!'
But at this moment Jimmy fortunately connected with ¢
electric-light switch and pressed it down. In another mix, ute
two young men were looking at each other in silent horror
This room was not Pat's sitting-room. They were in the
wrOng flat.
To begin with, the room was about ten times more crowded
than Pat's, which explained Donovan's pathetic bewilderment
at repeatedly cannoning into chairs and tables. There was a
large round table in the centre of the room covered with a b$ze
cloth, and there was an aspidistra in the window. It was, in fact,
the kind of room whose owner, the young men felt sure, would
be difficult to explain to. With silent horror they gazed down at
the tablet on which lay a little pile of letters.
'Mrs Emestine Grant,' breathed Donovan, picking them up
and reading the name. 'Oh, helpI Do you think she's heard us?'
'It's a miracle she hasn't heard you,' said Jimmy. 'What with
your language and the way you've been crashing into me
furniture. Come- on, for the Lord's sake, let's get out of ilere
quickly.'
They hastily switched off the light and retraced their steps
206
ti toe to the lift. ]imray breathed a sigh of relief as they
on P - . -s of its depths without further incident...
regained the a...--:--.. a ,,ood, sound sleeper,' he smd
'I do like a wormul
'
. ' 1 'Mrs Emestine Grant has her point.
!0rovmg Y'
·
,hv e made the mistake in
-I see it flow,' salcl l.
thc floor, I mean. Out in that well we started up from the
basement.'
lie heaved on the rope, and the lift shot up. 'We're right this
time.' ,
'I devoutly trust we are, said Jimmy as he stepped out into
,
't
shocks
another inky void. My nerves won stand many more
of this kind.'
But no further nerve strain was imposed. The first click of
the light showed them Pat's kitchen, and in another minute
they were opening the front door and admitting the two girls
wfio were waiting outside.
'You have been a long time,' grumbled Pat. 'Mildred and I
have been waiting here ages.'
'We've had an adventure,' said Donovan. 'We might have
been hauled off to the police-station as dangerous malefactors.'
Pat had passed on into the sitting-room, where she switched
on the light and dropped her wrap on the sofa. She listened
lively interest to Donovan's account of his adventures.
wi''m glad she didn't catch you,' she commented. 'I'm sure
she's an old curmudgeon. I got a note from her this morning wanted
to see me some time - something she had to complain
about - my piano, I suppose, people who don't like pianos over
their heads shouldn't come and live in flats. I say, Donovan,
you've hurt your hand. It's all over blood. Go and wash it
under the tap.'
Donovan looked down at his hand in surprise. He went out
of the room obediently and presently his voice called to Jimmy.
'Hullo,' said the other, 'what's up? You haven't hurt
yourself badly, have you?'
'I haven't hurt myself at all.'
There was something so queer in Donovan's voice that
Jimmy stared at him in surprise. Donovan held out his washed
207
hand and Jimmy saw that there was no mark or cut of any kind
on it.
'That's odd,' he said, frowning. 'There was quite a lot of
blood. There did it come from?' And then suddenly he
realized what his quicker
-witted friend had already seen. 'By
Jove,' he said. 'It must have come from that flat.' He stopped,
thinking over the possibilities his word implied. 'You' re sure it
was - er - blood?' he said. 'Not paint?'
Donovan shook his head. 'It was blood, all right,' he said,
and shivered.
They looked at each other. The same thought was clearly in
each of their minds. It was Jimmy who voiced it first.
'I say,' he said awkwardly. 'Do you think we ought to - well
' go down again - and have - a - look around? See it's all right,
you know?'
'What about the girls?'
'We won't say anything to them. Pat's going to put on an
apron and make us an omelette. We'll be back by the time they
wonder where we are.'
'Oh, well, come on,' said Donovan. 'I suppose we've got to
go through with it. I dare say there isn't anything really wrong.'
But his tone lacked conviction. They got into the lift and
descended to the floor below. They found their way across the
kitchen without much difficulty and once more switched on
the sitting-room light.
'It must have been in here,' said Donovan, 'that - that I got
the stuff on me. I never touched anything in the kitchen.'
He looked round him. Jimmy did the same, and they both
frowned. Everything looked neat and commonplace and miles
removed from any suggestion of violence or gore.
Suddenly Jimmy started violently and caught his compan-ion's
arm.
'Look!'
' Donovan followed the pointing finger, and in his turn
AgathaChristie-HerculePoirotsCasebook Page 24