Dead Man's Folly - Agatha Christie [37]
‘I never knew my cousin at all well. She was a unit in a large family and not particularly interesting to me. But in answer to your question I would say to you that although mentally weak, she was not, as far as I know, ever possessed by any homicidal tendencies.’
‘Really, Mr De Sousa, I wasn’t suggesting that!’
‘Weren’t you? I wonder. I can see no other reason for your question. No, unless Hattie has changed very much, she is not homicidal!’ He rose. ‘I am sure that you cannot want to ask me anything further, Inspector. I can only wish you every possible success in tracking down the murderer.’
‘You are not thinking of leaving Helmmouth for a day or two, I hope, Mr De Sousa?’
‘You speak very politely, Inspector. Is that an order?’
‘Just a request, sir.’
‘Thank you. I propose to stay in Helmmouth for two days. Sir George has very kindly asked me to come and stay in the house, but I prefer to remain on the Espérance. If you should want to ask me any further questions, that is where you will find me.’
He bowed politely. P.C. Hoskins opened the door for him, and he went out.
‘Smarmy sort of fellow,’ muttered the inspector to himself.
‘Aah,’ said P.C. Hoskins in complete agreement.
‘Say she is homicidal if you like,’ went on the inspector, to himself. ‘Why should she attack a nondescript girl? There’d be no sense in it.’
‘You never know with the barmy ones,’ said Hoskins.
‘The question really is, how barmy is she?’
Hoskins shook his head sapiently.
‘Got a low I.Q., I reckon,’ he said.
The inspector looked at him with annoyance.
‘Don’t bring out these new-fangled terms like a parrot. I don’t care if she’s got a high I.Q. or a low I.Q. All I care about is, is she the sort of woman who’d think it funny, or desirable, or necessary, to put a cord round a girl’s neck and strangle her? And where the devil is the woman, anyway? Go out and see how Frank’s getting on.’
Hoskins left obediently, and returned a moment or two later with Sergeant Cottrell, a brisk young man with a good opinion of himself, who always managed to annoy his superior officer. Inspector Bland much preferred the rural wisdom of Hoskins to the smart know-all attitude of Frank Cottrell.
‘Still searching the grounds, sir,’ said Cottrell. ‘The lady hasn’t passed out through the gate, we’re quite sure of that. It’s the second gardener who’s there giving out the tickets and taking the admission money. He’ll swear she hasn’t left.’
‘There are other ways of leaving than by the main gate, I suppose?’
‘Oh, yes, sir. There’s the path down to the ferry, but the old boy down there – Merdell, his name is – is also quite positive that she hasn’t left that way. He’s about a hundred, but pretty reliable, I think. He described quite clearly how the foreign gentleman arrived in his launch and asked the way to Nasse House. The old man told him he must go up the road to the gate and pay for admission. But he said the gentleman seemed to know nothing about the fête and said he was a relation of the family. So the old man set him on the path up from the ferry through the woods. Merdell seems to have been hanging about the quay all the afternoon so he’d be pretty sure to have seen her ladyship if she’d come that way. Then there’s the top gate that leads over the fields to Hoodown Park, but that’s been wired up because of trespassers, so she didn’t go through there. Seems as though she must be still here, doesn’t it?’
‘That may be so,’ said the inspector, ‘but there’s nothing to prevent her, is there, from slipping under a fence and going off across country? Sir George is still complaining of trespassing here from the hostel next door, I understand. If you can get in the way the trespassers get in, you can get out the same way, I suppose.’
‘Oh, yes, sir, indubitably, sir. But I’ve talked to her maid, sir. She’s wearing’ – Cottrell consulted a paper in his hand – ‘a dress of cyclamen crêpe georgette (whatever that is), a large black hat, black court shoes with four-inch french heels. Not the sort of things you’d wear for