Dumb Witness - Agatha Christie [58]
“You think so?”
“Sure of it, my dear fellow. I’ve seen a lot of that sort of thing. It gets hold of people. You’d be amazed! Especially anyone of Miss Arundell’s age. I’d be prepared to bet that that’s how the suggestion came. Some spirit—possibly her dead father—ordered her to alter her will and leave her money to the Lawson woman. She was in bad health—credulous—”
There was a very faint movement from Mrs. Tanios. Poirot turned to her.
“You think it possible—yes?”
“Speak up, Bella,” said Dr. Tanios. “Tell us your views?”
He looked at her encouragingly. Her quick look back at him was an odd one. She hesitated, then said:
“I know so little about these things. I daresay you’re right, Jacob.”
“Depend upon it I’m right, eh, M. Poirot?”
Poirot nodded his head.
“It may be—yes.” Then he said, “You were down at Market Basing, I think, the weekend before Miss Arundell’s death?”
“We were down at Easter and again the weekend after—that is right.”
“No, no, I meant the weekend after that—on the 26th. You were there on the Sunday, I think?”
“Oh, Jacob, were you?” Mrs. Tanios looked at him wide-eyed.
He turned quickly.
“Yes, you remember? I just ran down in the afternoon. I told you about it.”
Both Poirot and I were looking at her. Nervously she pushed her hat a little farther back on her head.
“Surely you remember, Bella,” her husband continued. “What a terrible memory you’ve got.”
“Of course!” she apologized, a thin smile on her face. “It’s quite true, I have a shocking memory. And it’s nearly two months ago now.”
“Miss Theresa Arundell and Mr. Charles Arundell were there then, I believe?” said Poirot.
“They may have been,” said Tanios easily. “I didn’t see them.”
“You were not there very long then?”
“Oh, no—just half an hour or so.”
Poirot’s inquiring gaze seemed to make him a little uneasy.
“Might as well confess,” he said with a twinkle. “I hoped to get a loan—but I didn’t get it. I’m afraid my wife’s aunt didn’t take to me as much as she might. Pity, because I liked her. She was a sporting old lady.”
“May I ask you a frank question, Dr. Tanios?”
Was there or was there not a momentary apprehension in Tanios’ eye?
“Certainly, M. Poirot.”
“What is your opinion of Charles and Theresa Arundell?”
The doctor looked slightly relieved.
“Charles and Theresa?” he looked at his wife with an affectionate smile. “Bella, my dear, I don’t suppose you mind my being frank about your family?”
She shook her head, smiling faintly.
“Then it’s my opinion they’re rotten to the core, both of them! Funnily enough I like Charles the best. He’s a rogue but he’s a likeable rogue. He’s no moral sense but he can’t help that. People are born that way.”
“And Theresa?”
He hesitated.
“I don’t know. She’s an amazingly attractive young woman. But she’s quite ruthless, I should say. She’d murder anyone in cold blood if it suited her book. At least that’s my fancy. You may have heard, perhaps, that her mother was tried for murder?”
“And acquitted,” said Poirot.
“As you say, and acquitted,” said Tanios quickly. “But all the same, it makes one—wonder sometimes.”
“You met the young man to whom she is engaged?”
“Donaldson? Yes, he came to supper one night.”
“What do you think of him?”
“A clever fellow. I fancy he’ll go far—if he gets the chance. It takes money to specialize.”
“You mean that he is clever in his profession.”
“That is what I mean, yes. A first-class brain.” He smiled. “Not quite a shining light in society yet. A little precise and prim in manner. He and Theresa make a comic pair. The attraction of opposites. She’s a social butterfly and he’s a recluse.”
The two children were bombarding their mother.
“Mother, can’t we go in to lunch? I’m hungry. We’ll be late.”
Poirot looked at his watch and gave an exclamation.
“A thousand pardons! I delay your lunch hour.”
Glancing at her husband Mrs. Tanios said, uncertainly:
“Perhaps we can offer you—”
Poirot said quickly:
“You are most amiable, madame, but I have a luncheon engagement for which I am already late.”
He shook hands with both the Tanioses and with the children.