Murder Is Easy - Agatha Christie [73]
She said, and her voice had exactly the right invitation in it:
“You meant at first to kill him—”
“Yes, but that didn’t satisfy me—much too ordinary—it had to be something better than just killing. And then I got this idea. It just came to me. He should suffer for committing a lot of crimes of which he was quite innocent. He should be a murderer! He should be hanged for my crimes. Or else they’d say he was mad and he would be shut up all his life…That might be even better.”
She giggled now. A horrible little giggle…Her eyes were light and staring with queer elongated pupils.
“As I told you, I read a lot of books on crime. I chose my victims carefully—there was not to be too much suspicion at first. You see,” her voice deepened, “I enjoyed the killing…That disagreeable woman, Lydia Horton—she’d patronized me—once she referred to me as an old maid. I was glad when Gordon quarrelled with her. Two birds with one stone, I thought! Such fun, sitting by her bedside and slipping the arsenic in her tea, and then going out and telling the nurse how Mrs. Horton had complained of the bitter taste of Lord Whitfield’s grapes! The stupid woman never repeated that, which was such a pity.
“And then the others! As soon as I heard that Gordon had a grievance against anyone, it was so easy to arrange for an accident! And he was such a fool—such an incredible fool! I made him believe that there was something very special about him! That anyone who went against him suffered. He believed it quite easily. Poor dear Gordon, he’d believe anything. So gullible!”
Bridget thought of herself saying to Luke scornfully:
“Gordon! He could believe anything!”
Easy? How easy! Poor pompous credulous little Gordon.
But she must learn more! Easy? This was easy too! She’d done it as a secretary for years. Quietly encouraged her employers to talk about themselves. And this woman wanted badly to talk, to boast about her own cleverness.
Bridget murmured:
“But how did you manage it all? I don’t see how you could.”
“Oh, it was quite easy! It just needed organisation! When Amy was discharged from the Manor I engaged her at once. I think the hat paint idea was quite clever—and the door being locked on the inside made me quite safe. But of course I was always safe because I never had any motive, and you can’t suspect anyone of murder if there isn’t a motive. Carter was quite easy too—he was lurching about in the fog and I caught up with him on the footbridge and gave him a quick push. I’m really very strong, you know.”
She paused and the soft horrible little giggle came again.
“The whole thing was such fun! I shall never forget Tommy’s face when I pushed him off the windowsill that day. He hadn’t the least idea….”
She leaned towards Bridget confidentially.
“People are really very stupid, you know. I’d never realized that before.”
Bridget said very softly:
“But then—you’re unusually clever.”
“Yes—yes—perhaps you’re right.”
Bridget said:
“Dr. Humbleby—that must have been more difficult?”
“Yes, it was really amazing how that succeeded. It might not have worked, of course. But Gordon had been talking to everybody of his visit to the Wellerman Kreutz Institute, and I thought if I could manage it so that people remembered that visit and connected it afterwards. And Wonky Pooh’s ear was really very nasty, a lot of discharge. I managed to run the point of my scissors into the doctor’s hand, and then I was so distressed and insisted on putting on a dressing and bandaging it up. He didn’t know the dressing had been infected first from Wonky Pooh’s ear. Of course, it mightn’t have worked—it was just a long shot. I was delighted when it did—especially as Wonky Pooh had been Lavinia’s cat.”
Her face darkened.
“Lavinia Pinkerton! She guessed…It was she who found Tommy that day. And then when Gordon and old Dr. Humbleby had that row, she caught me looking at Humbleby. I was off my guard.