The Man in the Brown Suit

by Agatha Christie

  And I told him about the searching cross-examination I had been put through. Immediately I was sorry, I saw a glint in his eye that I know only too well. I changed the conversation hurriedly. But it was too late. Pagett was on the warpath.

  He next proceeded to bore me with a long pointless story about the Kilmorden. It was about a roll of films and a wager. The roll of films being thrown through a porthole in the middle of the night by some steward who ought to have known better. I hate horseplay. I told Pagett so, and he began to tell me the story all over again. He tells a story extremely badly, anyway. It was a long time before I could make head or tail of this one.

  I did not see him again until lunchtime. Then he came in brimming over with excitement, like a bloodhound on the scent. I never have cared for bloodhounds. The upshot of it all was that he had seen Rayburn.

  “What?” I cried, startled.

  Yes, he had caught sight of someone whom he was sure was Rayburn crossing the street. Pagett had followed him.

  “And who do you think I saw him stop and speak to? Miss Pettigrew!”

  “What?”

  “Yes, Sir Eustace. And that’s not all. I’ve been making inquiries about her—”

  “Wait a bit. What happened to Rayburn?”

  “He and Miss Pettigrew went into that corner curioshop—”

  I uttered an involuntary exclamation. Pagett stopped inquiringly.

  “Nothing,” I said. “Go on.”

  “I waited outside for ages—but they didn’t come out. At last I went in. Sir Eustace, there was no one in the shop! There must be another way out.”

  I stared at him.

  “As I was saying, I came back to the hotel and made some inquiries about Miss Pettigrew.” Pagett lowered his voice and breathed hard as he always does when he wants to be confidential. “Sir Eustace, a man was seen coming out of her room last night.”

  I raised my eyebrows.

  “And I always regarded her as a lady of such eminent respectability,” I murmured.

  Pagett went on without heeding.

  “I went straight up and searched her room. What do you think I found?”

  I shook my head.

  “This!”

  Pagett held up a safety razor and a stick of shaving soap.

  “What should a woman want with these?”

  I don’t suppose Pagett ever reads the advertisements in the high-class ladies’ papers. I do. Whilst not proposing to argue with him on the subject, I refused to accept the presence of the razor as proof positive of Miss Pettigrew’s sex. Pagett is so hopelessly behind the times. I should not have been at all surprised if he had produced a cigarette case to support his theory. However, even Pagett has his limits.

  “You’re not convinced, Sir Eustace. What do you say to this?”

  I inspected the article which he dangled aloft triumphantly.

  “It looks like hair,” I remarked distastefully.

  “It is hair. I think it’s what they call a toupee.”

  “Indeed,” I commented.

  “Now are you convinced that that Pettigrew woman is a man in disguise?”

  “Really, my dear Pagett, I think I am. I might have known it by her feet.”

  “Then that’s that. And now, Sir Eustace, I want to speak to you about my private affairs. I cannot doubt, from your hints and your continual allusions to the time I was in Florence, that you have found me out.”

  At last the mystery of what Pagett did in Florence is going to be revealed!

  “Make a clean breast of it, my dear fellow,” I said kindly. “Much the best way.”

  “Thank you, Sir Eustace.”

  “Is it her husband? Annoying fellows, husbands. Always turning up when they’re least expected.”

  “I fail to follow you, Sir Eustace. Whose husband?”

  “The lady’s husband.”

  “What lady?”

  “God bless my soul, Pagett, the lady you met in Florence. There must have been a lady. Don’t tell me that you merely robbed a church or stabbed an Italian in the back because you didn’t like his face.”

  “I am quite at a loss to understand you, Sir Eustace. I suppose you are joking.”

  “I am an amusing fellow sometimes, when I take the trouble, but I can assure you that I am not trying to be funny this minute.”

  “I hoped that as I was a good way off you had not recognized me, Sir Eustace.”

  “Recognized you where?”

  “At Marlow, Sir Eustace?”

  “At Marlow? What the devil were you doing at Marlow?”

  “I thought you understood that—”

  “I’m beginning to understand less and less. Go back to the beginning of the story and start again. You went to Florence—”

  “Then you don’t know after all—and you didn’t recognize me!”

  “As far as I can judge, you seem to have given yourself away needlessly—made a coward of by your conscience. But I shall be able to tell better when I’ve heard the whole story. Now, then, take a deep breath and start again. You went to Florence—”

  “But I didn’t go to Florence. That is just it.”

  “Well, where did you go, then?”

  “I went home—to Marlow.”

  “What the devil did you want to go to Marlow for?”

  “I wanted to see my wife. She was in delicate health and expecting—”

  “Your wife? But I didn’t know you were married!”

  “No, Sir Eustace, that is just what I am telling you. I deceived you in this matter.”

  “How long have you been married?”

  “Just over eight years. I had been married just six months when I became your secretary. I did not want to lose the post. A resident secretary is not supposed to have a wife, so I suppressed the fact.”

  “You take my breath away,” I remarked. “Where has she been all these years?”

  “We have had a small bungalow on the river at Marlow, quite close to the Mill House, for over five years.”

  “God bless my soul,” I muttered. “Any children?”

  “Four children, Sir Eustace.”

  I gazed at him in a kind of stupor. I might have known, all along, that a man like Pagett couldn’t have a guilty secret. The respectability of Pagett has always been my bane. That’s just the kind of secret he would have—a wife and four children.

  “Have you told this to anyone else?” I demanded at last, when I had gazed at him in fascinated interest for quite a long while.

  “Only Miss Beddingfeld. She came to the station at Kimberley.”

  I continued to stare at him. He fidgeted under my glance.

  “I hope, Sir Eustace, that you are not seriously annoyed?”

  “My dear fellow,” I said, “I don’t mind telling you here and now that you’ve blinking well torn it!”

  I went out seriously ruffled. As I passed the corner curioshop, I was assailed by a sudden irresistible temptation and went in. The proprietor came forward obsequiously, rubbing his hands.

  “Can I show you something? Furs, curios?”

  “I want something quite out of the ordinary,” I said. “It’s for a special occasion. Will you show me what you’ve got?”

  “Perhaps you will come into my back room? We have many specialities there.”

  That is where I made a mistake. And I thought I was going to be so clever. I followed him through the swinging portières.

  Thirty-two

  (Anne’s Narrative Resumed)

  I had great trouble with Suzanne. She argued, she pleaded, she even wept before she would let me carry out my plan. But in the end I got my own way. She promised to carry out my instructions to the letter and came down to the station to bid me a tearful farewell.

  I arrived at my destination the following morning early. I was met by a short black-bearded Dutchman whom I had never seen before. He had a car waiting and we drove off. There was a queer booming in the distance, and I asked him what it was. “Guns,” he answered la
conically. So there was fighting going on in Jo’burg!

  I gathered that our objective was a spot somewhere in the suburbs of the city. We turned and twisted and made several detours to get there, and every minute the guns were nearer. It was an exciting time. At last we stopped before a somewhat ramshackle building. The door was opened by a Kafir boy. My guide signed to me to enter. I stood irresolute in the dingy square hall. The man passed me and threw open a door.

  “The young lady to see Mr. Harry Rayburn,” he said, and laughed.

  Thus announced, I passed in. The room was sparsely furnished and smelt of cheap tobacco smoke. Behind a desk a man sat writing. He looked up and raised his eyebrows.

  “Dear me,” he said, “if it isn’t Miss Beddingfeld!”

  “I must be seeing double,” I apologized. “Is it Mr. Chichester, or is it Miss Pettigrew? There is an extraordinary resemblance to both of them.”

  “Both characters are in abeyance for the moment. I have doffed my petticoats—and my cloth likewise. Won’t you sit down?”

  I accepted a seat composedly.

  “It would seem,” I remarked, “that I have come to the wrong address.”

  “From your point of view, I am afraid you have. Really, Miss Beddingfeld, to fall into the trap a second time!”

  “It was not very bright of me,” I admitted meekly.

  Something about my manner seemed to puzzle him.

  “You hardly seem upset by the occurrence,” he remarked dryly.

  “Would my going into heroics have any effect upon you?” I asked.

  “It certainly would not.”

  “My Great-aunt Jane always used to say that a true lady was neither shocked nor surprised at anything that might happen,” I murmured dreamily. “I endeavour to live up to her precepts.”

  I read Mr. Chichester-Pettigrew’s opinion so plainly written on his face that I hastened into speech once more.

  “You really are positively marvellous at makeup,” I said generously. “All the time you were Miss Pettigrew I never recognized you—even when you broke your pencil in the shock of seeing me climb upon the train at Cape Town.”

  He tapped upon the desk with the pencil he was holding in his hand at the minute.

  “All this is very well in its way, but we must get to business. Perhaps, Miss Beddingfeld, you can guess why we required your presence here?”

  “You will excuse me,” I said, “but I never do business with anyone but principals.”

  I had read the phrase or something like it in a moneylender’s circular, and I was rather pleased with it. It certainly had a devastating effect upon Mr. Chichester-Pettigrew. He opened his mouth and then shut it again. I beamed upon him.

  “My Great-uncle George’s maxim,” I added, as an afterthought. “Great-aunt Jane’s husband, you know. He made knobs for brass beds.”

  I doubt if Chichester-Pettigrew had ever been ragged before. He didn’t like it at all.

  “I think you would be wise to alter your tone, young lady.”

  I did not reply, but yawned—a delicate little yawn that hinted at intense boredom.

  “What the devil—” he began forcibly.

  I interrupted him.

  “I can assure you it’s no good shouting at me. We are only wasting time here. I have no intention of talking with underlings. You will save a lot of time and annoyance by taking me straight to Sir Eustace Pedler.”

  “To—”

  He looked dumbfounded.

  “Yes,” I said. “Sir Eustace Pedler.”

  “I—I—excuse me—”

  He bolted from the room like a rabbit. I took advantage of the respite to open my bag and powder my nose thoroughly. Also I settled my hat at a more becoming angle. Then I settled myself to wait with patience for my enemy’s return.

  He reappeared in a subtly chastened mood.

  “Will you come this way, Miss Beddingfeld?”

  I followed him up the stairs. He knocked at the door of a room, a brisk “Come in” sounded from inside, and he opened the door and motioned to me to pass inside.

  Sir Eustace Pedler sprang up to greet me, genial and smiling.

  “Well, well, Miss Anne.” He shook me warmly by the hand. “I’m delighted to see you. Come and sit down. Not tired after your journey? That’s good.”

  He sat down facing me, still beaming. It left me rather at a loss. His manner was so completely natural.

  “Quite right to insist on being brought straight to me,” he went on. “Minks is a fool. A clever actor—but a fool. That was Minks you saw downstairs.”

  “Oh, really,” I said feebly.

  “And now,” said Sir Eustace cheerfully, “let’s get down to facts. How long have you known that I was the ‘Colonel?’ ”

  “Ever since Mr. Pagett told me that he had seen you in Marlow when you were supposed to be in Cannes.”

  Sir Eustace nodded ruefully.

  “Yes, I told the fool he’d blinking well torn it. He didn’t understand, of course. His whole mind was set on whether I’d recognized him. It never occurred to him to wonder what I was doing down there. A piece of sheer bad luck that was. I arranged it all so carefully too, sending him off to Florence, telling the hotel I was going over to Nice for one night or possibly two. Then, by the time the murder was discovered, I was back again in Cannes, with nobody dreaming that I’d ever left the Riviera.”

  He still spoke quite naturally and unaffectedly. I had to pinch myself to understand that this was all real—that the man in front of me was really that deep-dyed criminal, the “Colonel.” I followed things out in my mind.

  “Then it was you who tried to throw me overboard on the Kilmorden,” I said slowly. “It was you that Pagett followed up on deck that night?”

  He shrugged his shoulders.

  “I apologize, my dear child, I really do. I always liked you—but you were so confoundedly interfering. I couldn’t have all my plans brought to naught by a chit of a girl.”

  “I think your plan at the Falls was really the cleverest,” I said, endeavouring to look at the thing in a detached fashion. “I would have been ready to swear anywhere that you were in the hotel when I went out. Seeing is believing in future.”

  “Yes, Minks had one of his greatest successes, as Miss Pettigrew, and he can imitate my voice quite creditably.”

  “There is one thing I should like to know.”

  “Yes?”

  “How did you induce Pagett to engage her?”

  “Oh, that was quite simple. She met Pagett in the doorway of the Trade Commissioner’s office or the Chamber of Mines, or wherever it was he went—told him I had phoned down in a hurry, and that she had been selected by the Government department in question. Pagett swallowed it like a lamb.”

  “You’re very frank,” I said, studying him.

  “There’s no earthly reason why I shouldn’t be.”

  I didn’t like the sound of that. I hastened to put my own interpretation on it.

  “You believe in the success of this Revolution? You’ve burnt your boats.”

  “For an otherwise intelligent young woman, that’s a singularly unintelligent remark. No, my dear child, I do not believe in this Revolution. I give it a couple of days longer and it will fizzle out ignominiously.”

  “Not one of your successes, in fact?” I said nastily.

  “Like all women, you’ve no idea of business. The job I took on was to supply certain explosives and arms—heavily paid for—to foment feeling generally, and to incriminate certain people up to the hilt. I’ve carried out my contract with complete success, and I was careful to be paid in advance. I took special care over the whole thing, as I intended it be my last contract before retiring from business. As for burning my boats, as you call it, I simply don’t know what you mean. I’m not the rebel chief, or anything of that kind—I’m a distinguished English visitor, who had the misfortune to go nosing into a certain curioshop—and saw a little more than he was meant to, and so the poor fellow wa
s kidnapped. Tomorrow, or the day after, when circumstances permit, I shall be found tied up somewhere, in a pitiable state of terror and starvation.”

  “Ah!” I said slowly. “But what about me?”

  “That’s just it,” said Sir Eustace softly. “What about you? I’ve got you here—I don’t want to rub it in in any way—but I’ve got you here very neatly. The question is, what am I going to do with you? The simplest way of disposing of you—and, I may add, the pleasantest to myself—is the way of marriage. Wives can’t accuse their husbands, you know, and I’d rather like a pretty young wife to hold my hand and glance at me out of liquid eyes—don’t flash them at me so! You quite frighten me. I see that the plan does not commend itself to you?”

  “It does not.”

  Sir Eustace sighed.

  “A pity! But I am no Adelphi villain. The usual trouble, I suppose. You love another, as the books say.”

  “I love another.”

  “I thought as much—first I thought it was that long-legged, pompous ass, Race, but I suppose it’s the young hero who fished you out of the Falls that night. Women have no taste. Neither of those two have half the brains that I have. I’m such an easy person to underestimate.”

  I think he was right about that. Although I knew well enough the kind of man he was and must be, I could not bring myself to realize it. He had tried to kill me on more than one occasion, he had actually killed another woman, and he was responsible for endless other deeds of which I knew nothing, and yet I was quite unable to bring myself into the frame of mind for appreciating his deeds as they deserved. I could not think of him as other than our amusing, genial, travelling companion. I could not even feel frightened of him—and yet I knew he was capable of having me murdered in cold blood if it struck him as necessary. The only parallel I can think of is the case of Stevenson’s Long John Silver. He must have been much the same kind of man.

  “Well, well,” said this extraordinary person, leaning back in his chair. “It’s a pity that the idea of being Lady Pedler doesn’t appeal to you. The other alternatives are rather crude.”

  I felt a nasty feeling going up and down my spine. Of course I had known all along that I was taking a big risk, but the prize had seemed worth it. Would things turn out as I had calculated, or would they not?