After the Funeral - Agatha Christie [11]
“I’m not thinking of her being ‘fey’ or having a premonition. No, I’m just hunting around for something—well, something out of the ordinary.”
“I don’t think I quite understand you, Inspector,” said Mr. Entwhistle.
“It’s not a very easy case to understand, Mr. Entwhistle. Say someone watched the Gilchrist woman come out of the house at about two o’clock and go along to the village and the bus stop. This someone then deliberately takes the hatchet that was lying by the woodshed, smashes the kitchen window with it, gets into the house, goes upstairs, attacks Mrs. Lansquenet with the hatchet—and attacks her savagely. Six or eight blows were struck.” Mr. Entwhistle flinched—“Oh, yes, quite a brutal crime. Then the intruder pulls out a few drawers, scoops up a few trinkets—worth perhaps a tenner in all, and clears off.”
“She was in bed?”
“Yes. It seems she returned late from the North the night before, exhausted and very excited. She’d come into some legacy as I understand?”
“Yes.”
“She slept very badly and woke with a terrible headache. She had several cups of tea and took some dope for her head and then told Miss Gilchrist not to disturb her till lunchtime. She felt no better and decided to take two sleeping pills. She then sent Miss Gilchrist into Reading by the bus to change some library books. She’d have been drowsy, if not already asleep, when this man broke in. He could have taken what he wanted by means of threats, or he could easily have gagged her. A hatchet, deliberately taken up with him from outside, seems excessive.”
“He may just have meant to threaten her with it,” Mr. Entwhistle suggested. “If she showed fight then—”
“According to the medical evidence there is no sign that she did. Everything seems to show that she was lying on her side sleeping peacefully when she was attacked.”
Mr. Entwhistle shifted uneasily in his chair.
“One does hear of these brutal and rather senseless murders,” he pointed out.
“Oh yes, yes, that’s probably what it will turn out to be. There’s an alert out, of course, for any suspicious character. Nobody local is concerned, we’re pretty sure of that. The locals are all accounted for satisfactorily. Most people are at work at that time of day. Of course her cottage is up a lane outside the village proper. Anyone could get there easily without being seen. There’s a maze of lanes all round the village. It was a fine morning and there has been no rain for some days, so there aren’t any distinctive car tracks to go by—in case anyone came by car.”
“You think someone came by car?” Mr. Entwhistle asked sharply.
The Inspector shrugged his shoulders. “I don’t know. All I’m saying is there are curious features about the case. These, for instance—” He shoved across his desk a handful of things—a trefoil-shaped brooch with small pearls, a brooch set with amethysts, a small string of pearls, and a garnet bracelet.
“Those are the things that were taken from her jewel box. They were found just outside the house shoved into a bush.”
“Yes—yes, that is rather curious. Perhaps if her assailant was frightened at what he had done—”
“Quite. But he would probably then have left them upstairs in her room… Of course a panic may have come over him between the bedroom and the front gate.”
Mr. Entwhistle said quietly:
“Or they may, as you are suggesting, have only been taken as a blind.”
“Yes, several possibilities…Of course this Gilchrist woman may have done it. Two women living alone together—you never know what quarrels or resentments or passions may have been aroused. Oh yes, we’re taking that possibility into consideration as well. But it doesn’t seem very likely. From all accounts they were on quite amicable terms.” He paused before going on. “According to you, nobody stands to gain by Mrs. Lansquenet’s death?”
The lawyer shifted uneasily.
“I didn’t quite say that.”
Inspector Morton looked up sharply.
“I thought you said that Mrs. Lansquenet’s source of income was an allowance made to her by her brother and that as far as you knew she had no property or means of her own.”
“That