ABC Murders - Agatha Christie [50]
Poirot was swaying to and fro, his hands clasped to his head. He was muttering to himself with such vehemence that nobody else said anything, but stared at him instead.
“Stockings,” he was murmuring. “Stockings…stockings…stockings…ça vient…stockings…stockings…it is the motif— yes…three months ago…and the other day…and now. Bon Dieu, I have it!”
He sat upright and fixed me with an imperious eye.
“You remember, Hastings? Andover. The shop. We go upstairs. The bedroom. On a chair. A pair of new silk stockings. And now I know what it was that roused my attention two days ago. It was you, mademoiselle—” He turned on Megan. “You spoke of your mother who wept because she had bought your sister some new stockings on the very day of the murder….”
He looked round on us all.
“You see? It is the same motif three times repeated. That cannot be coincidence. When mademoiselle spoke I had the feeling that what she said linked up with something. I know now with what. The words spoken by Mrs. Ascher’s next-door neighbour, Mrs. Fowler. About people who were always trying to sell you things—and she mentioned stockings. Tell me, mademoiselle, it is true, is it not, that your mother bought those stockings, not at a shop, but from someone who came to the door?”
“Yes—yes—she did…I remember now. She said something about being sorry for these wretched men who go round and try to get orders.”
“But what’s the connection?” cried Franklin. “That a man came selling stockings proves nothing!”
“I tell you, my friends, it cannot be coincidence. Three crimes—and every time a man selling stockings and spying out the land.”
He wheeled round on Thora.
“A vous la parole! Describe this man.”
She looked at him blankly.
“I can’t…I don’t know how…He had glasses, I think—and a shabby overcoat….”
“Mieux que ça, mademoiselle.”
“He stooped…I don’t know. I hardly looked at him. He wasn’t the sort of man you’d notice….”
Poirot said gravely:
“You are quite right, mademoiselle. The whole secret of the murders lies there in your description of the murderer—for without a doubt he was the murderer! ‘He wasn’t the sort of man you’d notice.’ Yes—there is no doubt about it…You have described the murderer!”
Twenty-two
NOT FROM CAPTAIN HASTINGS’ PERSONAL NARRATIVE
I
Mr. Alexander Bonaparte Cust sat very still. His breakfast lay cold and untasted on his plate. A newspaper was propped up against the teapot and it was this newspaper that Mr. Cust was reading with avid interest.
Suddenly he got up, paced to and fro for a minute, then sank back into a chair by the window. He buried his head in his hands with a stifled groan.
He did not hear the sound of the opening door. His landlady, Mrs. Marbury, stood in the doorway.
“I was wondering, Mr. Cust, if you’d fancy a nice—why, whatever is it? Aren’t you feeling well?”
Mr. Cust raised his head from his hands.
“Nothing. It’s nothing at all, Mrs. Marbury. I’m not—feeling very well this morning.”
Mrs. Marbury inspected the breakfast tray.
“So I see. You haven’t touched your breakfast. Is it your head troubling you again?”
“No. At least, yes…I—I just feel a bit out of sorts.”
“Well, I’m sorry, I’m sure. You’ll not be going away today, then?”
Mr. Cust sprang up abruptly.
“No, no. I have to go. It’s business. Important. Very important.”
His hands were shaking. Seeing him so agitated, Mrs. Marbury tried to soothe him.
“Well, if you must—you must. Going far this time?”
“No. I’m going to”—he hesitated for a minute or two—“Cheltenham.”
There was something so peculiar about the tentative way he said the word that Mrs. Marbury looked at him in surprise.
“Cheltenham’s a nice place,” she said conversationally. “I went there from Bristol one year. The shops are ever so nice.”
“I suppose so—yes.”
Mrs. Marbury stooped rather stiffly—for stooping did not suit her figure—to pick up the paper that was lying crumpled on the floor.