Murder on the Orient Express - Agatha Christie [66]
‘But the accident to the train changes everything. Doubtless we have here the reason why the man remained in the compartment with his victim so long. He was waiting for the train to go on. But at last he realized that the train was not going on. Different plans would have to be made. The murderer would now be known to be still on the train.’
‘Yes, yes,’ said M. Bouc impatiently. ‘I see all that. But where does the handkerchief come in?’
‘I am returning to it by a somewhat circuitous route. To begin with, you must realize that the threatening letters were in the nature of a blind. They might have been lifted bodily out of an indifferently written American crime novel. They are not real. They are, in fact, simply intended for the police. What we have to ask ourselves is, “Did they deceive Ratchett?” On the face of it, the answer seems to be, “No.” His instructions to Hardman seem to point to a definite “private” enemy of the identity of whom he was well aware. That is if we accept Hardman’s story as true. But Ratchett certainly received one letter of a very different character—the one containing a reference to the Armstrong baby, a fragment of which we found in his compartment. In case Ratchett had not realized it sooner, this was to make sure that he understood the reason of the threats against his life. That letter, as I have said all along, was not intended to be found. The murderer’s first care was to destroy it. This, then, was the second hitch in his plans. The first was the snow, the second was our reconstruction of that fragment.
‘That note being destroyed so carefully can only mean one thing. There must be on the train someone so intimately connected with the Armstrong family that the finding of that note would immediately direct suspicion upon that person.
‘Now we come to the other two clues that we found. I pass over the pipe-cleaner. We have already said a good deal about that. Let us pass on to the handkerchief. Taken at its simplest, it is a clue which directly incriminates someone whose initial is H, and it was dropped there unwittingly by that person.’
‘Exactly,’ said Dr Constantine. ‘She finds out that she has dropped the handkerchief and immediately takes steps to conceal her Christian name.’
‘How fast you go. You arrive at a conclusion much sooner than I would permit myself to do.’
‘Is there any other alternative?’
‘Certainly there is. Suppose, for instance, that you have committed a crime and wish to cast suspicion for it on someone else. Well, there is on the train a certain person connected intimately with the Armstrong family—a woman. Suppose, then, that you leave there a handkerchief belonging to that woman. She will be questioned, her connection with the Armstrong family will be brought out—et voilà. Motive—and an incriminating article of evidence.’
‘But in such a case,’ objected the doctor, ‘the person indicated being innocent, would not take steps to conceal her identity.’
‘Ah, really? That is what you think? That is truly the opinion of the police court. But I know human nature, my friend, and I tell you that, suddenly confronted with the possibility of being tried for murder, the most innocent person will lose their head and do the most absurd things. No, no, the grease spot and the changed label do not prove guilt—they only prove that the Countess Andrenyi is anxious for some reason to conceal her identity.’
‘What do you think her connection with the Armstrong family can be? She has never been in America, she says.’
‘Exactly, and she speaks broken English, and she has a very foreign appearance which she exaggerates. But it should not be difficult to guess who she is. I mentioned just now the name of Mrs Armstrong’s mother. It was Linda Arden, and she was a very celebrated actress—among other things a Shakespearean actress. Think of As You Like It—the Forest of Arden and