Mrs McGinty's Dead - Agatha Christie [90]
‘No, Mrs Summerhayes, you do not understand. There can be only two reasons for keeping this photograph after the second murder. The first of them is an innocent sentimentality. You had no feeling of guilt and so you could keep the photograph. You told us yourself, at Mrs Carpenter’s house one day, that you were an adopted child. I doubt whether you have ever known what your real mother’s name was. But somebody else knew. Somebody who has all the pride of family—a pride that makes him cling to his ancestral home, a pride in his ancestors and his lineage. That man would rather die than have the world—and his children—know that Maureen Summerhayes is the daughter of the murderer Craig and of Eva Kane. That man, I have said, would rather die. But that would not help, would it? So instead let us say that we have here a man who is prepared to kill.’
Johnnie Summerhayes got up from his seat. His voice, when he spoke, was quiet, almost friendly.
‘Rather a lot of nonsense you’re talkin’, aren’t you? Enjoying yourself spouting out a lot of theories? Theories, that’s all they are! Saying things about my wife—’
His anger broke suddenly in a furious tide.
‘You damned filthy swine—’
The swiftness of his rush across the floor took the room unawares. Poirot skipped back nimbly and Superintendent Spence was suddenly between Poirot and Summerhayes.
‘Now, now, Major Summerhayes, take it easy—take it easy—’
Summerhayes recovered himself, shrugged, said:
‘Sorry. Ridiculous really! After all—anyone can stick a photograph in a drawer.’
‘Precisely,’ said Poirot. ‘And the interesting thing about this photograph is that it has no fingerprints on it.’
He paused, then nodded his head gently.
‘But it should have had,’ he said. ‘If Mrs Summerhayes kept it, she would have kept it innocently, and so her fingerprints should have been on it.’
Maureen exclaimed:
‘I think you’re mad. I’ve never seen that photograph in my life—except at Mrs Upward’s that day.’
‘It is fortunate for you,’ said Poirot, ‘that I know that you are speaking the truth. The photograph was put into that drawer only a few minutes before I found it there. Twice that morning the contents of that drawer were tumbled on to the ground, twice I replaced them; the first time the photograph was not in the drawer, the second time it was. It had been placed there during that interval—and I know by whom.’
A new note crept into his voice. He was no longer a ridiculous little man with an absurd moustache and dyed hair, he was a hunter very close to his quarry.
‘The crimes were committed by a man—they were committed for the simplest of all reasons—for money. In Mrs Upward’s house there was a book found and on the flyleaf of that book is written Evelyn Hope. Hope was the name Eva Kane took when she left England. If her real name was Evelyn then in all probability she gave the name of Evelyn to her child when it was born. But Evelyn is a man’s name as well as a woman’s. Why had we assumed that Eva Kane’s child was a girl? Roughly because the Sunday Comet said so! But actually the Sunday Comet had not said so in so many words, it had assumed it because of a romantic interview with Eva Kane. But Eva Kane left England before her child was born—so nobody could say what the sex of the child would be.
‘That is where I let myself be misled. By the romantic inaccuracy of the Press.
‘Evelyn Hope, Eva Kane’s son, comes to England. He is talented and he attracts the attention of a very rich woman who knows nothing about his origin—only the romantic story he chooses to tell her. (A very pretty little story it was—all about a tragic young ballerina dying of tuberculosis in Paris!)
‘She is a lonely woman who has recently lost her own son. The talented young playwright takes her name by deed poll.
‘But your real name is Evelyn Hope, isn’t it, Mr Upward?’
Robin Upward cried out shrilly:
‘Of course it isn’t! I don’t know what you’re talking about.’
‘You really cannot hope to deny it. There are people who know you under that name. The name Evelyn Hope, written in the book, is in your