Mrs McGinty's Dead - Agatha Christie [23]
Hercule Poirot sprang to his feet and shut the door.
A moment or two later it opened again and Mrs Summerhayes reappeared. This time she was carrying a large enamel basin and a knife.
A man’s voice from some way away called out:
‘Maureen, that cat’s been sick again. What shall I do?’
Mrs Summerhayes called: ‘I’m coming, darling. Hold everything.’
She dropped the basin and the knife and went out again.
Poirot got up again and shut the door. He said:
‘Decidedly, I suffer.’
A car drove up, the large dog leaped from the chair and raised its voice in a crescendo of barking. He jumped on a small table by the window and the table collapsed with a crash.
‘Enfin,’ said Hercule Poirot. ‘C’est insupportable!’
The door burst open, the wind surged round the room, the dog rushed out, still barking. Maureen’s voice came, upraised loud and clear.
‘Johnnie, why the hell did you leave the back door open! Those bloody hens are in the larder.’
‘And for this,’ said Hercule Poirot with feeling, ‘I pay seven guineas a week!’
The door banged to with a crash. Through the window came the loud squawking of irate hens.
Then the door opened again and Maureen Summerhayes came in and fell upon the basin with a cry of joy.
‘Couldn’t think where I’d left it. Would you mind frightfully, Mr Er—hum—I mean, would it bother you if I sliced the beans in here? The smell in the kitchen is too frightful.’
‘Madame, I should be enchanted.’
It was not, perhaps, the exact phrase, but it was near enough. It was the first time in twenty-four hours that Poirot had seen any chance of a conversation of more than six seconds’ duration.
Mrs Summerhayes flung herself down in a chair and began slicing beans with frenzied energy and considerable awkwardness.
‘I do hope,’ she said, ‘that you’re not too frightfully uncomfortable? If there’s anything you want altered, do say so.’
Poirot had already come to the opinion that the only thing in Long Meadows he could even tolerate was his hostess.
‘You are too kind, madame,’ he replied politely. ‘I only wish it were within my powers to provide you with suitable domestics.’
‘Domestics!’ Mrs Summerhayes gave a squeal. ‘What a hope! Can’t even get hold of a daily. Our really good one was murdered. Just my luck.’
‘That would be Mrs McGinty,’ said Poirot quickly.
‘Mrs McGinty it was. God, how I miss that woman! Of course it was all a big thrill at the time. First murder we’ve ever had right in the family, so to speak, but as I told Johnnie, it was a downright bit of bad luck for us. Without McGinty I just can’t cope.’
‘You were attached to her?’
‘My dear man, she was reliable. She came. Monday afternoons and Thursday mornings—just like a clock. Now I have that Burp woman from up by the station. Five children and a husband. Naturally she’s never here. Either the husband’s taken queer, or the old mother, or the children have some foul disease or other. With old McGinty, at least it was only she herself who came over queer, and I must say she hardly ever did.’
‘And you found her always reliable and honest? You had trust in her?’
‘Oh, she’d never pinch anything—not even food. Of course she snooped a bit. Had a look at one’s letters and all that. But one expects that sort of thing. I mean they must live such awfully drab lives, mustn’t they?’
‘Had Mrs McGinty had a drab life?’
‘Ghastly, I expect,’ said Mrs Summerhayes vaguely. ‘Always on your knees scrubbing. And then piles of other people’s washing-up waiting for you on the sink when you arrive in the morning. If I had to face that every day, I’d be positively relieved to be murdered. I really would.’
The face of Major Summerhayes appeared at the window. Mrs Summerhayes sprang up, upsetting the beans, and rushed across to the window, which she opened to the fullest extent.
‘That damned dog’s eaten the hens’ food again, Maureen.’
‘Oh damn, now he’ll be sick!’
‘Look here,’ John Summerhayes displayed a colander full of greenery, ‘is this enough spinach?’
‘Of course not.’
‘Seems a colossal amount to me.’
‘It’ll be