Murder Is Easy - Agatha Christie [61]
“Dead! Struck down by divine wrath!”
Opening his eyes a little, Luke said:
“Rather an excessive punishment, perhaps, for a few hasty words uttered after a glass too much.”
Lord Whitfield shook his head.
“It’s always like that! Retribution comes swiftly and terribly. And there’s good authentic authority for it. Remember the children that mocked Elisha—how the bears came out and devoured them. That’s the way things happen, Fitzwilliam.”
“I always thought that was rather unnecessarily vindictive.”
“No, no. You’re looking at it the wrong way. Elisha was a great and holy man. No one could be suffered to mock at him and live! I understand that because of my own case!”
Luke looked puzzled.
Lord Whitfield lowered his voice.
“I could hardly believe it at first. But it happened every time! My enemies and detractors were cast down and exterminated.”
“Exterminated?”
Lord Whitfield nodded gently and sipped his port.
“Time after time. One case quite like Elisha—a little boy. I came upon him in the gardens here—he was employed by me then. Do you know what he was doing? He was giving an imitation of Me—of ME! Mocking me! Strutting up and down with an audience to watch him. Making fun of me on my own ground! D’you know what happened to him? Not ten days later he fell out of an upper window and was killed!
“Then there was that ruffian Carter—a drunkard and a man of evil tongue. He came here and abused me. What happened to him? A week later he was dead—drowned in the mud. There had been a servant girl, too. She lifted her voice and called me names. Her punishment soon came. She drank poison by mistake! I could tell you heaps more. Humbleby dared to oppose me over the Water scheme. He died of blood poisoning. Oh, it’s been going on for years—Mrs. Horton, for instance, was abominably rude to me and it wasn’t long before she passed away.”
He paused and leaning forward passed the port decanter round to Luke.
“Yes,” he said. “They all died. Amazing, isn’t it?”
Luke stared at him. A monstrous, an incredible suspicion leapt into his mind! With new eyes, he stared at the small fat man who sat at the head of the table, who was gently nodding his head and whose light protuberant eyes met Luke’s with a smiling insouciance.
A rush of disconnected memories flashed rapidly through Luke’s brain. Major Horton saying “Lord Whitfield was very kind. Sent down grapes and peaches from his hothouse.” It was Lord Whitfield who so graciously allowed Tommy Pierce to be employed on window cleaning at the library. Lord Whitfield holding forth on his visit to the Wellerman Kreutz Institute with its serums and germ cultures just a short time before Dr. Humbleby’s death. Everything pointing plainly in one direction and he, fool that he had been, never even suspecting….
Lord Whitfield was still smiling. A quiet happy smile. He nodded his head gently at Luke.
“They all die,” said Lord Whitfield.
Eighteen
CONFERENCE IN LONDON
Sir William Ossington, known to the cronies of earlier days as Billy Bones, stared incredulously at his friend.
“Didn’t you have enough crime out in Mayang?” he asked plaintively. “Have you got to come home and do our work for us here?”
“Crime in Mayang isn’t on a wholesale basis,” said Luke. “What I’m up against now is a man who’s done a round half-dozen murders at least—and got away with it without a breath of suspicion!”
Sir William sighed.
“It does happen. What’s his speciality—wives?”
“No, he’s not that kind. He doesn’t actually think he’s God yet—but he soon will.”
“Mad?”
“Oh, unquestionably, I should say.”
“Ah! but he probably isn’t legally mad. There’s a difference, you know.”
“I should say he knows the nature and consequence of his acts,” said Luke.
“Exactly,” said Billy Bones.
“Well, don’t let’s quibble about legal technicalities. We’re not nearly at that stage yet. Perhaps we never shall be. What I want from you, old boy, is a few facts. There was a street accident took place on Derby Day between five and six o’clock in the afternoon. Old lady run over