“I will fetch another cup.”
Poirot raised a faintly protesting hand, but she pushed the protest aside.
“Of course you must have some tea.”
She went out of the room. He looked round him once more. A piece of needlework, a petit point chair seat, lay on a table with a needle sticking in it. Against the wall was a bookcase with books. There was a little cluster of miniatures on the wall and a faded photograph in a silver frame of a man in uniform with a stiff moustache and a weak chin.
Mrs. Folliat came back into the room with a cup and saucer in her hand.
Poirot said, “Your husband, Madame?”
“Yes.”
Noticing that Poirot’s eyes swept along the top of the bookcase as though in search of further photographs, she said brusquely:
“I’m not fond of photographs. They make one live in the past too much. One must learn to forget. One must cut away the dead wood.”
Poirot remembered how the first time he had seen Mrs. Folliat she had been clipping with sécateurs at a shrub on the bank. She had said then, he remembered, something about dead wood. He looked at her thoughtfully, appraising her character. An enigmatical woman, he thought, and a woman who, in spite of the gentleness and fragility of her appearance, had a side to her that could be ruthless. A woman who could cut away dead wood not only from plants but from her own life…
She sat down and poured out a cup of tea, asking: “Milk? Sugar?”
“Three lumps if you will be so good, Madame?”
She handed him his cup and said conversationally:
“I was surprised to see you. Somehow I did not imagine you would be passing through this part of the world again.”
“I am not exactly passing through,” said Poirot.
“No?” She queried him with slightly uplifted eyebrows.
“My visit to this part of the world is intentional.”
She still looked at him in inquiry.
“I came here partly to see you, Madame.”
“Really?”
“First of all—there has been no news of the young Lady Stubbs?”
Mrs. Folliat shook her head.
“There was a body washed up the other day in Cornwall,” she said. “George went there to see if he could identify it. But it was not her.” She added: “I am very sorry for George. The strain has been very great.”
“Does he still believe that his wife may be alive?”
Slowly Mrs. Folliat shook her head.
“I think,” she said, “that he has given up hope. After all, if Hattie were alive, she couldn’t possibly conceal herself successfully with the whole of the Press and the police looking for her. Even if something like loss of memory had happened to her—well, surely the police would have found her by now?”
“It would seem so, yes,” said Poirot. “Do the police still search?”
“I suppose so. I do not really know.”
“But Sir George has given up hope.”
“He does not say so,” said Mrs. Folliat. “Of course I have not seen him lately. He has been mostly in London.”
“And the murdered girl? There have been no developments there?”
“Not that I know of.” She added. “It seems a senseless crime—absolutely pointless. Poor child—”
“It still upsets you, I see, to think of her, Madame.”
Mrs. Folliat did not reply for a moment or two. Then she said:
“I think when one is old, the death of anyone who is young upsets one out of due proportion. We old folks expect to die, but that child had her life before her.”
“It might not have been a very interesting life.”
“Not from our point of view, perhaps, but it might have been interesting to her.”
“And although, as you say, we old folk must expect to die,” said Poirot, “we do not really want to. At least I do not want to. I find life very interesting still.”
“I don’t think that I do.”
She spoke more to herself than him, her shoulders drooped still more.
“I am very tired, M. Poirot. I shall be not only ready, but thankful, when my time comes.”
He shot a quick glance at her. He wondered, as he had wondered before, whether it was a sick woman who sat talking to him, a woman who had perhaps the knowledge or even the certainty of approaching death. He could not otherwise account for the intense weariness and lassitude of her manner. That lassitude, he felt, was not really characteristic of the woman. Amy Folliat, he felt, was a woman of character, energy and determination. She had lived through many troubles, loss of her home, loss of wealth, the deaths of her sons. All these, he felt, she had survived. She had cut away the “dead wood,” as she herself had expressed it. But there was something now in her life that she could not cut away, that no one could cut away for her. If it was not physical illness he did not see what it could be. She gave a sudden little smile as though she were reading his thoughts.
“Really, you know, I have not very much to live for, M. Poirot,” she said. “I have many friends but no near relations, no family.”
“You have your home,” said Poirot on an impulse.
“You mean Nasse? Yes—”
“It is your home, isn’t it, although technically it is the property of Sir George Stubbs? Now Sir George Stubbs has gone to London you rule in his stead.”
Again he saw the sharp look of fear in her eyes. When she spoke her voice held an icy edge to it.
“I don’t quite know what you mean, M. Poirot. I am grateful to Sir George for renting me this lodge, but I do rent it. I pay him a yearly sum for it with the right to walk in the grounds.”
Poirot spread out his hands.
“I apologize, Madame. I did not mean to offend you.”
“No doubt I misunderstood you,” said Mrs. Folliat coldly.
“It is a beautiful place,” said Poirot. “A beautiful house, beautiful grounds. It has about it a great peace, great serenity.”
“Yes.” Her face lightened. “We have always felt that. I felt it as a child when I first came here.”
“But is there the same peace and serenity now, Madame?”
“Why not?”
“Murder unavenged,” said Poirot. “The spilling of innocent blood. Until that shadow lifts, there will not be peace.” He added, “I think you know that, Madame, as well as I do.”
Mrs. Folliat did not answer. She neither moved nor spoke. She sat quite still and Poirot had no idea what she was thinking. He leaned forward a little and spoke again.
“Madame, you know a good deal—perhaps everything—about this murder. You know who killed that girl, you know why. You know who killed Hattie Stubbs, you know, perhaps, where her body lies now.”
Mrs. Folliat spoke then. Her voice was loud, almost harsh.
“I know nothing,” she said. “Nothing.”
“Perhaps I have used the wrong word. You do not know, but I think you guess, Madame. I’m quite sure that you guess.”
“Now you are being—excuse me—absurd!”
“It is not absurd—it is something quite different—it is dangerous.”
“Dangerous? To whom?”
“To you, Madame. So long as you keep your knowledge to yourself you are in danger. I know murderers better than you do, Madame.”
“I have told you already, I have no knowledge.”
“Suspicions, then—”
“I have no suspicions.”
“That, excuse me, is not true, Madame.”
“To speak out of mere suspicion would be wrong—indeed, wicked.”
Poirot leaned forward. “As wicked as what was done here just over a month ago?”
She shrank back into her chair, huddled into herself. She half whispered:
“Don’t talk to me of it.” And then added, with a long shuddering sigh, “Anyway, it’s over now. Done—finished with.”
“How can you tell that, Madame? I tell you of my own knowledge that it is never finished with a
murderer.”
She shook her head.
“No. No, it’s the end. And, anyway, there is nothing I can do. Nothing.”
He got up and stood looking down at her. She said almost fretfully:
“Why, even the police have given up.”
Poirot shook his head.
“Oh, no, Madame, you are wrong there. The police do not give up. And I,” he added, “do not give up either. Remember that, Madame, I, Hercule Poirot, do not give up.”
It was a very typical exit line.
Seventeen
After leaving Nasse, Poirot went to the village where, by inquiry, he found the cottage occupied by the Tuckers. His knock at the door went unanswered for some moments as it was drowned by the high-pitched tone of Mrs. Tucker’s voice from inside.
“—And what be yu thinking of, Jim Tucker, bringing them boots of yours on to my nice linoleum? If I’ve tell ee once I’ve tell ee a thousand times. Been polishing it all the morning, I have, and now look at it.”
A faint rumbling denoted Mr. Tucker’s reaction to these remarks. It was on the whole a placatory rumble.
“Yu’ve no cause to go forgetting. ’Tis all this eagerness to get the sports news on the wireless. Why, ’twouldn’t have took ee tu minutes to be off with them boots. And yu, Gary, do ee mind what yu’m doing with that lollipop. Sticky fingers I will not have on my best silver teapot. Marilyn, that be someone at the door, that be. Du ee go and see who ’tis.”
The door was opened gingerly and a child of about eleven or twelve years old peered out suspiciously at Poirot. One cheek was bulged with a sweet. She was a fat child with small blue eyes and a rather piggy kind of prettiness.
“’Tis a gentleman, Mum,” she shouted.
Mrs. Tucker, wisps of hair hanging over her somewhat hot face, came to the door.
“What is it?” she demanded sharply. “We don’t need…” She paused, a faint look of recognition came across her face. “Why let me see, now, didn’t I see you with the police that day?”
“Alas, Madame, that I have brought back painful memories,” said Poirot, stepping firmly inside the door.
Mrs. Tucker cast a swift agonized glance at his feet, but Poirot’s pointed patent leather shoes had only trodden the high road. No mud was being deposited on Mrs. Tucker’s brightly polished linoleum.
“Come in, won’t you, sir,” she said, backing before him, and throwing open the door of a room on her right hand.
Poirot was ushered into a devastatingly neat little parlour. It smelt of furniture polish and Brasso and contained a large Jacobean suite, a round table, two potted geraniums, an elaborate brass fender, and a large variety of china ornaments.
“Sit down, sir, do. I can’t remember the name. Indeed, I don’t think as I ever heard it.”
“My name is Hercule Poirot,” said Poirot rapidly. “I found myself once more in this part of the world and I called here to offer you my condolences and to ask you if there had been any developments. I trust the murderer of your daughter has been discovered.”
“Not sight or sound of him,” said Mrs. Tucker, speaking with some bitterness. “And ’tis a downright wicked shame if you ask me. ’Tis my opinion the police don’t disturb themselves when it’s only the likes of us. What’s the police anyway? If they’m all like Bob Hoskins I wonder the whole country isn’t a mass of crime. All that Bob Hoskins does is spend his time looking into parked cars on the Common.”
At this point, Mr. Tucker, his boots removed, appeared through the doorway, walking on his stockinged feet. He was a large, red-faced man with a pacific expression.
“Police be all right,” he said in a husky voice. “Got their troubles like anyone else. These here maniacs ar’n’t so easy to find. Look the same as you or me, if you take my meaning,” he added, speaking directly to Poirot.
The little girl who had opened the door to Poirot appeared behind her father, and a boy of about eight poked his head round her shoulder. They all stared at Poirot with intense interest.
“This is your younger daughter, I suppose,” said Poirot.
“That’s Marilyn, that is,” said Mrs. Tucker. “And that’s Gary. Come and say how do you do, Gary, and mind your manners.”
Gary backed away.
“Shy-like, he is,” said his mother.
“Very civil of you, I’m sure, sir,” said Mr. Tucker, “to come and ask about Marlene. Ah, that was a terrible business, to be sure.”
“I have just called upon Mrs. Folliat,” said M. Poirot. “She, too, seems to feel this very deeply.”
“She’s been poorly-like ever since,” said Mrs. Tucker. “She’s an old lady an’t was a shock to her, happening as it did at her own place.”
Poirot noted once more everybody’s unconscious assumption that Nasse House still belonged to Mrs. Folliat.
“Makes her feel responsible-like in a way,” said Mr. Tucker, “not that ’twere anything to do with her.”
“Who was it that actually suggested that Marlene should play the victim?” asked Poirot.
“The lady from London that writes the books,” said Mrs. Tucker promptly.
Poirot said mildly:
“But she was a stranger down here. She did not even know Marlene.”
“’Twas Mrs. Masterton what rounded the girls up,” said Mrs. Tucker, “and I suppose ’twas Mrs. Masterton said Marlene was to do it. And Marlene, I must say, was pleased enough at the idea.”
Once again, Poirot felt, he came up against a blank wall. But he knew now what Mrs. Oliver had felt when she first sent for him. Someone had been working in the dark, someone who had pushed forward their own desires through other recognized personalities. Mrs. Oliver, Mrs. Masterton. Those were the figureheads. He said:
“I have been wondering, Mrs. Tucker, whether Marlene was already acquainted with this—er—homicidal maniac.”
“She wouldn’t know nobody like that,” said Mrs. Tucker virtuously.
“Ah,” said Poirot, “but as your husband has just observed, these maniacs are very difficult to spot. They look the same as—er—you and me. Someone may have spoken to Marlene at the fête, or even before it. Made friends with her in a perfectly harmless manner. Given her presents, perhaps.”
“Oh, no, sir, nothing of that kind. Marlene wouldn’t take presents from a stranger. I brought her up better than that.”
“But she might see no harm in it,” said Poirot, persisting. “Supposing it had been some nice lady who had offered her things.”
“Someone, you mean, like young Mrs. Legge down at the Mill Cottage.”
“Yes,” said Poirot. “Someone like that.”
“Give Marlene a lipstick once, she did,” said Mrs. Tucker. “Ever so mad, I was. I won’t have you putting that muck on your face, Marlene, I said. Think what your father would say. Well, she says, perky as may be, ’tis the lady down at Lawder’s Cottage as give it me. Said as how it would suit me, she did. Well, I said, don’t you listen to what no London ladies say. ’Tis all very well for them, painting their faces and blacking their eyelashes and everything else. But you’re a decent girl, I said, and you wash your face with soap and water until you’re a good deal older than what you are now.”
“But she did not agree with you, I expect,” said Poirot, smiling.
“When I say a thing I mean it,” said Mrs. Tucker.
The fat Marilyn suddenly gave an amused giggle. Poirot shot her a keen glance.
“Did Mrs. Legge give Marlene anything else?” he asked.
“Believe she gave her a scarf or summat—one she hadn’t no more use for. A showy sort of thing, but not much quality. I know quality when I see it,” said Mrs. Tucker, nodding her head. “Used to work at Nasse House as a girl, I did. Proper stuff the ladies wore in those days. No gaudy colours and all this nylon and rayon; real good silk. Why, some of their taffeta dresses would have stood up by themselves.”
“Girls like a bit of finery,” said Mr. Tucker indulgently. “I don’t mind a few bright colours
myself, but I won’t have this ’ere mucky lipstick.”
“A bit sharp I was with her,” said Mrs. Tucker, her eyes suddenly misty, “and her gorn in that terrible way. Wished afterwards I hadn’t spoken so sharp. Ah, nought but trouble and funerals lately, it seems. Troubles never come singly, so they say, and ’tis true enough.”
“You have had other losses?” inquired Poirot politely.
“The wife’s father,” explained Mr. Tucker. “Come across the ferry in his boat from the Three Dogs late at night, and must have missed his footing getting on to the quay and fallen in the river. Of course he ought to have stayed quiet at home at his age. But there, yu can’t do anything with the old ’uns. Always pottering about on the quay, he was.”
“Father was a great one for the boats always,” said Mrs. Tucker. “Used to look after them in the old days for Mr. Folliat, years and years ago that was. Not,” she added brightly, “as Father’s much loss, as you might say. Well over ninety, he was, and trying in many of his ways. Always babbling some nonsense or other. ’Twas time he went. But, of course, us had to bury him nice—and two funerals running costs a lot of money.”
These economic reflections passed Poirot by—a faint remembrance was stirring.
“An old man—on the quay? I remember talking to him. Was his name—?”
“Merdell, sir. That was my name before I married.”
“Your father, if I remember rightly, was head gardener at Nasse?”
“No, that was my eldest brother. I was the youngest of the family—eleven of us, there were.” She added with some pride, “There’s been Merdells at Nasse for years, but they’re all scattered now. Father was the last of us.”
Poirot said softly:
“There’ll always be Folliats at Nasse House.”
“I beg your pardon, sir?”
“I am repeating what your old father said to me on the quay.”
“Ah, talked a lot of nonsense, Father did. I had to shut him up pretty sharp now and then.”
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