After the Funeral - Agatha Christie [92]
“You sound like a young lady in a Victorian melodrama. But it’s about time you came across with something. I can’t hold out on this setup much longer. That Banks fellow is still insisting that he poisoned Richard Abernethie and boasting that we can’t find out how. What beats me is why there’s always somebody who comes forward when there’s a murder and yells out that they did it! What do they think there is in it for them? I’ve never been able to fathom that.”
“In this case, probably shelter from the difficulties of being responsible for oneself—in other words— Forsdyke Sanatorium.”
“More likely to be Broadmoor.”
“That might be equally satisfactory.”
“Did he do it, Poirot? The Gilchrist woman came out with the story she’d already told you and it would fit with what Richard Abernethie said about his niece. If her husband did it, it would involve her. Somehow, you know, I can’t visualize that girl committing a lot of crimes. But there’s nothing she wouldn’t do to try and cover him.”
“I will tell you all—”
“Yes, yes, tell me all! And for the Lord’s sake hurry up and do it!”
II
This time it was in the big drawing room that Hercule Poirot assembled his audience.
There was amusement rather than tension in the faces that were turned towards him. Menace had materialized in the shape of Inspector Morton and Superintendent Parwell. With the police in charge, questioning, asking for statements, Hercule Poirot, private detective, had receded into something closely resembling a joke.
Timothy was not far from voicing the general feeling when he remarked in an audible sotto voce to his wife:
“Damned little mountebank! Entwhistle must be gaga!—that’s all I can say.”
It looked as though Hercule Poirot would have to work hard to make his proper effect.
He began in a slightly pompous manner.
“For the second time, I announce my departure! This morning I announced it for the twelve o’clock train. This evening I announce it for the nine thirty—immediately, that is, after dinner. I go because there is nothing more here for me to do.”
“Could have told him that all along.” Timothy’s commentary was still in evidence. “Never was anything for him to do. The cheek of these fellows!”
“I came here originally to solve a riddle. The riddle is solved. Let me, first, go over the various points which were brought to my attention by the excellent Mr. Entwhistle.
“First, Mr. Richard Abernethie dies suddenly. Secondly, after his funeral, his sister Cora Lansquenet says, ‘He was murdered, wasn’t he?’ Thirdly Mrs. Lansquenet is killed. The question is, are those three things part of a sequence? Let us observe what happens next? Miss Gilchrist, the dead woman’s companion, is taken ill after eating a piece of wedding cake which contains arsenic. That, then, is the next step in the sequence.
“Now, as I told you this morning, in the course of my inquiries I have come across nothing—nothing at all, to substantiate the belief that Mr. Abernethie was poisoned. Equally, I may say, I have found nothing to prove conclusively that he was not poisoned. But as we proceed, things become easier. Cora Lansquenet undoubtedly asked that sensational question at the funeral. Everyone agrees upon that. And undoubtedly, on the following day, Mrs. Lansquenet was murdered—a hatchet being the instrument employed. Now let us examine the fourth happening. The local post van driver is strongly of the belief—though he will not definitely swear to it—that he did not deliver that parcel of wedding cake in the usual way. And if that is so, then the parcel was left by hand and though we cannot exclude a ‘person unknown’—we must take particular notice of those people who were actually on the spot and in a position to put the parcel where it was subsequently found. Those were: Miss Gilchrist herself, of course; Susan Banks who came down that day for the inquest; Mr. Entwhistle (but yes, we must consider Mr. Entwhistle; he was present, remember, when Cora made her disquieting remark!) And there were two other people. An old gentleman who represented himself to be a Mr.