Hallowe'en Party - Agatha Christie [71]
‘Yes. Yes, I can see that they are—well, candidates for inclusion for another best seller by Ariadne Oliver.’
‘You really are a beast sometimes,’ said Mrs Oliver.
‘You make it all sound so vulgar.’ She paused thoughtfully. ‘Perhaps it is.’
‘No, no, it is not vulgar. It is just human.’
‘And you want me to invite Judith and Miranda to my flat or house in London?’
‘Not yet,’ said Poirot. ‘Not yet until I am sure that one of my little ideas might be right.’
‘You and your litle ideas! Now I’ve got a piece of news for you.’
‘Madame, you delight me.’
‘Don’t be too sure. It will probably upset your ideas. Supposing I tell you that the forgery you have been so busy talking about wasn’t a forgery at all.’
‘What is that you say?’
‘Mrs Ap Jones Smythe, or whatever her name is, did make a codicil to her Will leaving all her money to the au pair girl and two witnesses saw her sign it, and signed it also in the presence of each other. Put that in your moustache and smoke it.’
Chapter 19
‘Mrs—Leaman–’ said Poirot, writing down the name.
‘That’s right. Harriet Leaman. And the other witness seems to have been a James Jenkins. Last heard of going to Australia. And Miss Olga Seminoff seems to have been last heard of returning to Czechoslovakia, or wherever she came from. Everybody seems to have gone somewhere else.’
‘How reliable do you think this Mrs Leaman is?’
‘I don’t think she made it all up, if that’s what you mean. I think she signed something, that she was curious about it, and that she took the first opportunity she had of finding out what she’d signed.’
‘She can read and write?’
‘I suppose so. But I agree that people aren’t very good sometimes, at reading old ladies’ handwriting, which is very spiky and very hard to read. If there were any rumours flying about later, about this Will or codicil, she might have thought that that was what she’d read in this rather undecipherable handwriting.’
‘A genuine document,’ said Poirot. ‘But there was also a forged codicil.’
‘Who says so?’
‘Lawyers.’
‘Perhaps it wasn’t forged at all.’
‘Lawyers are very particular about these matters. They were prepared to come into court with expert witnesses.’
‘Oh well,’ said Mrs Oliver, ‘then it’s easy to see what must have happened, isn’t it?’
‘What is easy? What happened?’
‘Well, of course, the next day or a few days later, or even as much as a week later, Mrs Llewellyn-Smythe either had a bit of a tiff with her devoted au pair attendant, or she had a delicious reconciliation with her nephew, Hugo, or her niece Rowena, and she tore up the Will or scratched out the codicil or something like that, or burnt the whole thing.’
‘And after that?’
‘Well, after that, I suppose, Mrs Llewellyn-Smythe dies, and the girl seizes her chance and writes a new codicil in roughly the same terms in as near to Mrs Llewellyn-Smythe’s handwriting as she can, and the two witnessing signatures as near as she can. She probably knows Mrs Leaman’s writing quite well. It would be on national health cards or something like that, and she produces it, thinking that someone will agree to having witnessed the Will and that all would be well. But her forgery isn’t good enough and so trouble starts.’
‘Will you permit me, chère Madame, to use your telephone?’
‘I will permit you to use Judith Butler’s telephone, yes.’
‘Where is your friend?’
‘Oh, she’s gone to get her hair done. And Miranda has gone for a walk. Go on, it’s in the room through the window there.’
Poirot went in and returned about ten minutes later.
‘Well? What have you been doing?’
‘I rang up Mr Fullerton, the solicitor. I will now tell you something. The codicil, the forged codicil that was produced for probate was not witnessed by Harriet Leaman. It was witnessed by a Mary Doherty, deceased,