Lord Edgware Dies - Agatha Christie [40]
‘Yes, yes. Mademoiselle, say it.’
‘Well, I sometimes thought he revenged himself on the mother – his first wife – that way. She was a gentle creature, I believe, with a very sweet disposition. I’ve always been sorry for her. I shouldn’t have mentioned all this, M. Poirot, if it hadn’t been for that very foolish outburst of Geraldine’s just now. Things she said – about hating her father – they might sound peculiar to anyone who didn’t know.’
‘Thank you very much, Mademoiselle. Lord Edgware, I fancy, was a man who would have done much better not to marry.’
‘Much better.’
‘He never thought of marrying for a third time?’
‘How could he? His wife was alive.’
‘By giving her her freedom he would have been free himself.’
‘I should think he had had enough trouble with two wives as it was,’ said Miss Carroll grimly.
‘So you think there would have been no question of a third marriage. There was no one? Think, Made-moiselle. No one?’
Miss Carroll’s colour rose.
‘I cannot understand the way you keep harping on the point. Of course there was no one.’
Chapter 14
Five Questions
‘Why did you ask Miss Carroll about the possibility of Lord Edgware’s wanting to marry again?’ I asked with some curiosity as we were driving home.
‘It just occurred to me that there was a possibility of such a thing, mon ami.’
‘Why?’
‘I have been searching in my mind for something to explain Lord Edgware’s sudden volte face regarding the matter of divorce. There is something curious there, my friend.’
‘Yes,’ I said thoughtfully. ‘It is rather odd.’
‘You see, Hastings, Lord Edgware confirmed what Madame had told us. She had employed the lawyers of all kinds, but he refused to budge an inch. No, he would not agree to the divorce. And then, all of a sudden, he yields!’
‘Or so he says,’ I reminded him.
‘Very true, Hastings. It is very just, the observation you make there. So he says. We have no proof, whatever, that that letter was written. Eh bien, on one part, ce Monsieur is lying. For some reason he tells us the fabrication, the embroidery. Is it not so? Why, we do not know. But, on the hypothesis that he did write that letter, there must have been a reason for so doing. Now the reason that presents itself most naturally to the imagination is that he has suddenly met someone whom he desires to marry. That explains perfectly his sudden change of face. And so, naturally, I make the inquiries.’
‘Miss Carroll turned the idea down very decisively,’ I said.
‘Yes. Miss Carroll . . .’ said Poirot in a meditative voice.
‘Now what are you driving at?’ I asked in exasperation.
Poirot is an adept at suggesting doubts by the tone of his voice.
‘What reason should she have for lying about it?’ I asked.
‘Aucune – aucune.’
‘But, you see, Hastings, it is difficult to trust her evidence.’
‘You think she’s lying? But why? She looks a most upright person.’
‘That is just it. Between the deliberate falsehood and the disinterested inaccuracy it is very hard to distinguish sometimes.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘To deceive deliberately – that is one thing. But to be so sure of your facts, of your ideas and of their essential truth that the details do not matter – that, my friend, is a special characteristic of particularly honest persons. Already, mark you, she has told us one lie. She said she saw Jane Wilkinson’s face when she could not possibly have done so. Now how did that come about? Look at it this way. She looks down and sees Jane Wilkinson in the hall. No doubt enters her head that it is Jane Wilkinson. She knows it is. She says