Murder on the Orient Express - Agatha Christie [29]
‘Why, I told the man what had happened, and he didn’t seem to believe me. Seemed to imagine I’d dreamt the whole thing. I made him look under the seat, though he said there wasn’t room for a man to squeeze himself in there. It was plain enough the man had got away, but there had been a man there and it just made me mad the way the conductor tried to soothe me down! I’m not one to imagine things, Mr—I don’t think I know your name?’
‘Poirot, Madame, and this is M. Bouc, a director of the company, and Dr Constantine.’
Mrs Hubbard murmured:
‘Pleased to meet you, I’m sure,’ to all three of them in an abstracted manner, and then plunged once more into her recital.
‘Now I’m just not going to pretend I was as bright as I might have been. I got it into my head that it was the man from next door—the poor fellow who’s been killed. I told the conductor to look at the door between the compartments, and sure enough it wasn’t bolted. Well, I soon saw to that, I told him to bolt it then and there, and after he’d gone out I got up and put a suitcase against it to make sure.’
‘What time was this, Mrs Hubbard?’
‘Well, I’m sure I can’t tell you. I never looked to see. Iwas so upset.’
‘And what is your theory now?’
‘Why, I should say it was just as plain as plain could be. The man in my compartment was the murderer. Who else could he be?’
‘And you think he went back into the adjoining compartment?’
‘How do I know where he went? I had my eyes tight shut.’
‘He must have slipped out through the door into the corridor.’
‘Well, I couldn’t say. You see, I had my eyes tight shut.’
Mrs Hubbard sighed convulsively.
‘Mercy, I was scared! If my daughter only knew—’
‘You do not think, Madame, that what you heard was the noise of someone moving about next door—in the murdered man’s compartment?’
‘No, I do not, Mr—what is it?—Poirot. The man was right there in the same compartment with me. And, what’s more, I’ve got proof of it.’
Triumphantly she hauled a large handbag into view and proceeded to burrow in its interior.
She took out in turn two large clean handkerchiefs, a pair of horn-rimmed glasses, a bottle of aspirin, a packet of Glauber’s salts, a celluloid tube of bright green peppermints, a bunch of keys, a pair of scissors, a book of American Express cheques, a snapshot of an extraordinarily plain-looking child, some letters, five strings of pseudo Oriental beads and a small metal object—a button.
‘You see this button? Well, it’s not one of my buttons. It’s not off anything I’ve got. I found it this morning when I got up.’
As she placed it on the table, M. Bouc leaned forward and gave an exclamation.
‘But this is a button from the tunic of a Wagon Lit attendant!’
‘There may be a natural explanation for that,’ said Poirot.
He turned gently to the lady.
‘This button, Madame, may have dropped from the conductor’s uniform, either when he searched your cabin, or when he was making the bed up last night.’
‘I just don’t know what’s the matter with all you people. Seems as though you don’t do anything but make objections. Now listen here. I was reading a magazine last night before I went to sleep. Before I turned the light out I placed that magazine on a little case that was standing on the floor near the window. Have you got that?’
They assured her that they had.
‘Very well, then. The conductor looked under the seat from near the door and then he came in and bolted the door between me and the next compartment, but he never went up near the window. Well, this morning that button was lying right on top of the magazine. What do you call that, I should like to know?’
‘That, Madame, I call evidence,’ said Poirot.
The answer seemed to appease the lady.
‘It makes me madder than a hornet to be disbelieved,’ she explained.
‘You have given us most interesting and valuable evidence,’ said Poirot soothingly. ‘Now, may I ask you a few questions?’
‘Why, willingly.’
‘How was it, since you were nervous of this man Ratchett, that you hadn’t already bolted the