"Ah, I see. You like night-clubs?"
"Oh, yes" said Lady Stubbs fervently.
"And why do you like night-clubs so much?"
"There is music and you dance. And I wear my nicest clothes and bracelets and rings. And all the other women have nice clothes and jewels, but not as nice as mine."
She smiled with enormous satisfaction. Poirot felt a slight pang of pity.
"And all that amuses you very much?"
"Yes. I like the casino, too. Why are there not any casinos in England?"
"I have often wondered," said Poirot, with a sigh. "I do not think it would accord with the English character."
She looked at him uncomprehendingly. Then she bent slightly towards him.
"I won sixty thousand francs at Monte Carlo once. I put it on number twenty-seven and it came up."
"That must have been very exciting, Madame."
"Oh, it was. George gives me money to play with – but usually I lose it."
She looked disconsolate.
"That is sad."
"Oh, it does not really matter. George is very rich. It is nice to be rich, don't you think so?"
"Very nice," said Poirot gently.
"Perhaps, if I was not rich, I should look like Amanda." Her gaze went to Miss Brewis at the tea table and studied her dispassionately. "She is very ugly, don't you think?"
Miss Brewis looked up at the moment and across to where they were sitting. Lady Stubbs had not spoken loudly, but Poirot wondered whether Amanda Brewis had heard.
As he withdrew his gaze, his eyes met those of Captain Warburton. The Captain's glance was ironic and amused.
Poirot endeavoured to change the subject.
"Have you been very busy preparing for the fête?" he asked.
Hattie Stubbs shook her head.
"Oh, no, I think it is all very boring – very stupid. There are servants and gardeners. Why should not they make the preparations?"
"Oh, my dear." It was Mrs Folliat who spoke. She had come to sit on the sofa nearby. "Those are the ideas you were brought up with on your island estates. But life isn't like that in England these days. I wish it were." She sighed. "Nowadays one has to do nearly everything oneself."
Lady Stubbs shrugged her shoulders.
"I think it is stupid. What is the good of being rich if one has to do everything oneself?"
"Some people find it fun," said Mrs Folliat, smiling at her. "I do really. Not all things, but some. I like gardening myself and I like preparing for a festivity like this one tomorrow."
"It will be like a party?" asked Lady Stubbs hopefully.
"Just like a party – with lots and lots of people."
"Will it be like Ascot? With big hats and everyone very chic?"
"Well, not quite like Ascot," said Mrs Folliat. She added gently, "But you must try and enjoy country things, Hattie. You should have helped us this morning, instead of staying in bed and not getting up until teatime."
"I had a headache," said Hattie sulkily. Then her mood changed and she smiled affectionately at Mrs Folliat.
"But I will be good tomorrow. I will do everything you tell me."
"That's very sweet of you, dear."
"I've got a new dress to wear. It came this morning. Come upstairs with me and look at it."
Mrs Folliat hesitated. Lady Stubbs rose to her feet and said insistently:
"You must come. Please. It is a lovely dress. Come now!"
"Oh, very well." Mrs Folliat gave a half-laugh and rose.
As she went out of the room, her small figure following Hattie's tall one, Poirot saw her face and was quite startled at the weariness on it which had replaced her smiling composure. It was as though, relaxed and off her guard for a moment, she no longer bothered to keep up the social mask. And yet – it seemed more than that. Perhaps she was suffering from some disease about which, like many women do, she never spoke. She was not a person, he thought, who would care to invite pity or sympathy.
Captain Warburton dropped down in the chair Hattie Stubbs had just vacated. He, too, looked at the door through which the two women had just passed, but it was not of the older woman that he spoke. Instead he drawled, with a slight grin:
"Beautiful creature, isn't she?" He observed with the tail of his eye Sir George's exit through a french window with Mrs Masterton and Mrs Oliver in tow. "Bowled over old George Stubbs all right. Nothing's too good for her! Jewels, mink, all the rest of it. Whether he realises she's a bit wanting in the top story, I've never discovered. Probably thinks it doesn't matter. After all, these financial johnnies don't ask for intellectual companionship."
"What nationality is she?" Poirot asked curiously.
"Looks South American, I always think. But I believe she comes from the West Indies. One of those islands with sugar and rum and all that. One of the old families there – a creole, I don't mean a half-caste. All very intermarried, I believe, on these islands. Accounts for the mental deficiency."
Young Mrs Legge came over to join them.
"Look here, Jim," she said, "you've got to be on my side. That tent's got to be where we all decided – on the far side of the lawn backing on the rhododendrons. It's the only possible place."
"Ma Masterton doesn't think so."
"Well, you've got to talk her out of it."
He gave her his foxy smile.
"Mrs Masterton's my boss."
"Wilfred Masterton's your boss. He's the M.P."
"I dare say, but she should be. She's the one who wears the pants – and don't I know it."
Sir George re-entered the window.
"Oh, there you are, Sally," he said. "We need you. You wouldn't think everyone could get het up over who butters the buns and who raffles a cake, and why the garden produce stall is where the fancy woollens was promised it should be. Where's Amy Folliat? She can deal with these people – about the only person who can."
"She went upstairs with Hattie."
"Oh, did she -?"
Sir George looked round in a vaguely helpless manner and Miss Brewis jumped up from where she was writing tickets, and said, "I'll fetch her for you, Sir George."
"Thank you, Amanda."
Miss Brewis went out of the room.
"Must get hold of some more wire fencing," murmured Sir George.
"For the fête?"
"No, no. To put up where we adjoin Hoodown Park in the woods. The old stuff's rotted away, and that's where they get through."
"Who get through?"
"Trespassers!" ejaculated Sir George.
Sally Legge said amusedly:
"You sound like Betsy Trotwood campaigning against donkeys."
"Betsy Trotwood? Who's she?" asked Sir George simply.
"Dickens."
"Oh, Dickens. I read the Pickwick Papers once. Not bad. Not bad at all – surprised me. But, seriously, trespassers are a menace since they've started this Youth Hostel tomfoolery. They come out at you from everywhere wearing the most incredible shirts – boy this morning had one all covered with crawling turtles and things – made me think I'd been hitting the bottle or something. Half of them can't speak English – just gibber at you…" He mimicked: "'Oh, plees – yes, haf you – tell me – iss way to ferry?' I say no, it isn't, roar at them, and send them back where they've come from, but half the time they just blink and stare and don't understand. And the girls giggle. All kinds of nationalities, Italian, Yugoslavian, Dutch, Finnish – Eskimos I shouldn't be surprised! Half of them communists, I shouldn't wonder," he ended darkly.
"Come now, George, don't get started on communists," said Mrs Legge. "I'll come and help you deal with the rabid women."
She led him out of the window and called over her shoulder: "Come on, Jim. Come and be torn to pieces in a good cause."
"All right, but I want to put M. Poirot in the picture about the Murder Hunt since he's going to present the prizes."
"You can do that presently."
"I will await you here," said Poirot agreeably.<
br />
In the ensuing silence, Alec Legge stretched himself out in his chair and sighed.
"Women!" he said. "Like a swarm of bees."
He turned his head to look out of he window.
"And what's it all about? Some silly garden fête that doesn't matter to anyone."
"But obviously," Poirot pointed out, "there are those to whom it does matter."
"Why can't people have some sense? Why can't they think? Think of the mess the whole world has got itself into. Don't they realise that the inhabitants of the globe are busy committing suicide?"
Poirot judged rightly that he was not intended to reply to this question. He merely shook his head doubtfully.
"Unless we can do something before it's too late…" Alec Legge broke off. An angry look swept over his face. "Oh, yes," he said, "I know what you're thinking. That I'm nervy, neurotic – all the rest of it. Like those damned doctors. Advising rest and change and sea air. All right. Sally and I came down here and took the Mill Cottage for three months, and I've followed their prescription. I've fished and bathed and taken long walks and sunbathed -"
"I noticed that you had sunbathed, yes," said Poirot politely.
"Oh, this?" Alec's hand went to his sore face. "That's the result of a fine English summer for once in a way. But what's the good of it all? You can't get away from facing truth just by running away from it."
"No, it is never any good running away."
"And being in a rural atmosphere like this just makes you realise things more keenly – that and the incredible apathy of the people of this country. Even Sally who's intelligent enough, is just the same. Why bother? That's what she says. It makes me mad! Why bother?"
"As a matter of interest, why do you?"
"Good God, you too?"
"No, it is not advice. It is just that I would like to know your answer."
"Don't you see, somebody's got to do something?"
"And that somebody is you?"
"No, no, not me personally. One can't be personal in times like these."
"I do not see why not. Even in 'these times' as you call it, one is still a person."
"But one shouldn't be! In times of stress, when it's a matter of life or death, one can't think of one's own insignificant ills or preoccupations."
"I assure you, you are quite wrong. In the late war, during a severe air-raid, I was much less preoccupied by the thought of death than of the pain from a corn on my little toe. It surprised me at the time that it should be so. 'Think,' I said to myself, 'at any moment now, death may come.' But I was still conscious of my corn – indeed, I felt injured that I should have that to suffer as well as the fear of death. It was because I might die that every small personal matter in my life acquired increased importance. I have seen a woman knocked down in a street accident, with a broken leg, and she has burst out crying because she sees that there is a ladder in her stocking."
"Which just shows you what fools women are!"
"It shows you what people are. It is, perhaps, that absorption in one's personal life that has led the human race to survive."
Alec Legge gave a scornful laugh.
"Sometimes," he said, "I think it's a pity they ever did."
"It is, you know," Poirot persisted, "a form of humility. And humility is valuable. There was a slogan that was written up in your underground railways here, I remember, during the war. 'It all depends on you.' It was composed, I think, by some eminent divine – but in my opinion it was a dangerous and undesirable doctrine. For it is not true. Everything does not depend on, say, Mrs Blank of Little-Blank-in-the-Marsh. And if she is led to think it does, it will not be good for her character. While she thinks of the part she can play in world affairs, the baby pulls over the kettle."
"You are rather old-fashioned in your views, I think. Let's hear what your slogan would be."
"I do not need to formulate one of my own. There is an older one in this country which contents me very well."
"What is that?"
"'Put your trust in God, and keep your powder dry.'"
"Well, well…" Alec Legge seemed amused. "Most unexpected coming from you. Do you know what I should like to see done in this country?"
"Something, no doubt, forceful and unpleasant," said Poirot, smiling.
Alec Legge remained serious.
"I should like to see every feeble-minded person put out – right out! Don't let them breed. If, for one generation, only the intelligent were allowed to breed, think what the result would be."
"A very large increase of patients in the psychiatric wards, perhaps," said Poirot dryly. "One needs roots as well as flowers on a plant, M. Legge. However large and beautiful the flowers, if the earthy roots are destroyed there will be no more flowers." He added in a conversational tone: "Would you consider Lady Stubbs a candidate for the lethal chamber?"
"Yes, indeed. What's the good of a woman like that? What contribution has she ever made to society? Has she ever had an idea in her head that wasn't of clothes or furs or jewels? As I say, what good is she?"
"You and I," said Poirot blandly, "are certainly much more intelligent than Lady Stubbs. But -" he shook his head sadly – "it is true, I fear, that we are not nearly so ornamental."
"Ornamental…" Alec was beginning with a fierce snort, but he was interrupted by the re-entry of Mrs Oliver and Captain Warburton through the window.
Chapter 4
"You must come and see the clues and things for the Murder Hunt, M. Poirot," said Mrs Oliver breathlessly.
Poirot rose and followed them obediently.
The three of them went across the hall and into a small room furnished plainly as a business office.
"Lethal weapons to your left," observed Captain Warburton waving his hand towards a small baize-covered card table. On it were laid out a small pistol, a piece of lead piping with a rusty sinister stain on it, a blue bottle labelled Poison, a length of clothes line and a hypodermic syringe.
"Those are the Weapons," explained Mrs Oliver, "and these are the Suspects."
She handed him a printed card which he read with interest.
SUSPECTS
Estelle Glynne – a beautiful and mysterious young woman, the guest of
Colonel Blunt – the local Squire, whose daughter
Joan – is married to
Peter Gaye – a young Atom Scientist.
Miss Willing – a housekeeper.
Quiett – a butler.
Maya Stavisky – a girl hiker.
Esteban Loyola – an uninvited guest.
Poirot blinked and looked towards Mrs Oliver in mute incomprehension.
"A magnificent Cast of Characters," he said politely. "But permit me to ask, Madame, what does the Competitor do?"
"Turn the card over," said Captain Warburton.
Poirot did so.
On the other side was printed:
Name and address: ____________________
Solution:
Name of Murderer: ____________________
Weapon: ____________________
Motive: ____________________
Time and Place: ____________________
Reasons for arriving at your conclusions: ____________________
"Everyone who enters gets one of these," explained Captain Warburton rapidly. "Also a notebook and pencil for copying clues. There will be six clues. You go on from one to the other like a Treasure Hunt, and the weapons are concealed in suspicious places. Here's the first clue. A snapshot. Everyone starts with one of these."
Poirot took the small print from him and studied it with a frown. Then he turned it upside down. He still looked puzzled. Warburton laughed.
"Ingenious bit of trick photography, isn't it?" he said complacently. "Quite simple once you know what it is."
Poirot, who did not know what it was, felt a mounting annoyance.
"Some kind of barred window?" he suggested.
"Looks a bit like it, I admit. No, it's a section of a tennis net."
"Ah." Poirot looked again at the snapshot. "Yes, it is as you say – quite obvious when you have been told what it is!"
"So much depends on how you look at a thing," laughed Warburton.
"That is a very profound truth."
"The second clue will be found in a box under the centre of the tennis net. In the box are this empty poison bottle – here, and a loose cork."
"Only, you see," said Mrs Oliver rapidly, "it's a screw-topped bottle, so the cork is really the clue."
"I know, Madame, that you are always full of ingenuity, but I do not quite see -"
Mrs Oliver interrupted him.
"Oh, but of course," she said, "there's a story. Like in a magazine serial – a synopsis." She turned to Captain Warburton. "Have you got the leaflets?"
"They've not come from the printers yet."
"But they promised!"
"I know. I know. Everyone always promises. They'll be ready this evening at six. I'm going to fetch them in the car."
"Oh, good."
Mrs Oliver gave a deep sigh and turned to Poirot.
"Well, I'll have to tell it you, then. Only I'm not very good at telling things. I mean if I write things, I get them perfectly clear, but if I talk, it always sounds the most frightful muddle; and that's why I never discuss my plots with anyone. I've learnt not to, because if I do, they just look at me blankly and say – er – yes, but – I don't see what happened – and surely that can't possibly make a book.' So damping. And not true, because when I write it, it does!"
Mrs Oliver paused for breath, and then went on:
"Well, it's like this. There's Peter Gaye who's a young Atom Scientist and he's suspect of being in the pay of the Communists, and he's married to this girl, Joan Blunt, and his first wife's dead, but she isn't, and she turns up because she's a secret agent, or perhaps not, I mean she may really be a hiker – and the wife's having an affair, and this man Loyola turns up either to meet Maya, or to spy upon her, and there's a blackmailing letter which might be from the housekeeper, or again it might be the butler, and the revolver's missing, and as you don't know who the blackmailing letter's to, and the hypodermic syringe fell out at dinner, and after that it disappeared…"
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