Murder Is Easy - Agatha Christie [24]
Tommy Pierce? Latter snooped among Abbot’s papers. Did he find out something he shouldn’t have known?
Harry Carter? No definite connection.
Amy Gibbs? No connection known. Hat paint quite suitable to Abbot’s mentality—an old-fashioned mind. Was Abbot away from the village the day Miss Pinkerton was killed?
Major Horton: Possible case against him.
No connection known with Amy Gibbs, Tommy Pierce or Carter.
What about Mrs. Horton? Death sounds as though it might be arsenical poisoning. If so other murders might be result of that—blackmail? NB—Thomas was doctor in attendance. (Suspicious for Thomas again.)
Mr. Ellsworthy: Possible case against him.
Nasty bit of goods—dabbles in black magic. Might be temperament of a bloodlust killer. Connection with Amy Gibbs. Any connection with Tommy Pierce? Carter? Nothing known. Humbleby? Might have tumbled to Ellsworthy’s mental condition.
Miss Pinkerton? Was Ellsworthy away from Wychwood when Miss Pinkerton was killed?
Mr. Wake: Possible case against him.
Very unlikely. Possible religious mania? A mission to kill?
Saintly old clergymen likely starters in books, but (as before) this is real life.
Note. Carter, Tommy, Amy all definitely unpleasant characters. Better removed by divine decree?
Mr. Jones.
Data—none.
Amy’s young man.
Probably every reason to kill Amy—but seems unlikely on general grounds.
The etceteras?
Don’t fancy them.
He read through what he had written.
Then he shook his head.
He murmured softly:
“—which is absurd! How nicely Euclid put things.”
He tore up the lists and burnt them.
He said to himself:
“This job isn’t going to be exactly easy.”
Eight
DR. THOMAS
Dr. Thomas leant back in his chair, and passed a long delicate hand over his thick fair hair. He was a young man whose appearance was deceptive. Though he was over thirty, a casual glance would have put him down in the early twenties if not in his teens. His shock of rather unruly fair hair, his slightly startled expression and his pink and white complexion gave him an irresistibly schoolboyish appearance. Immature as he might look, though, the diagnosis he had just pronounced on Luke’s rheumatic knee agreed almost precisely with that delivered by an eminent Harley Street specialist only a week earlier.
“Thanks,” said Luke. “Well, I’m relieved you think that electrical treatment will do the trick. I don’t want to turn a cripple at my age.”
Dr. Thomas smiled boyishly.
“Oh, I don’t think there’s any danger of that, Mr. Fitzwilliam.”
“Well, you’ve relieved my mind,” said Luke. “I was thinking of going to some specialist chap—but I’m sure there’s no need now.”
Dr. Thomas smiled again.
“Go if it makes your mind easier. After all, it’s always a good thing to have an expert’s opinion.”
“No, no, I’ve got full confidence in you.”
“Frankly, there is no complexity about the matter. If you take my advice, I am quite sure you will have no further trouble.”
“You’ve relieved my mind no end, doctor. Fancied I might be getting arthritis and would soon be all tied up in knots and unable to move.”
Dr. Thomas shook his head with a slightly indulgent smile.
Luke said quickly:
“Men get the wind up pretty badly in these ways. I expect you find that? I often think a doctor must feel himself a ‘medicine man’—a kind of magician to most of his patients.”
“The element of faith enters in very largely.”
“I know. ‘The doctor says so’ is a remark always uttered with something like reverence.”
Dr. Thomas raised his shoulders.
“If one’s patients only knew!” he murmured humorously.
Then he said:
“You’re writing a book on magic, aren’t you, Mr. Fitzwilliam?”
“Now how did you know that?” exclaimed Luke, perhaps with somewhat overdone surprise.
Dr. Thomas looked amused.
“Oh, my dear sir, news gets about very rapidly in a place like this. We have so little to talk about.”
“It probably gets exaggerated too. You’ll be hearing I’m raising the local spirits and emulating the Witch of Endor.”
“Rather