Ordeal by Innocence - Agatha Christie [89]
“Perhaps,” said Kirsten Lindstrom. “Perhaps—yes, perhaps I said that. It was true.”
“Yes, it was true. He was wicked. If he had not been wicked none of this would have happened. Yet you know quite well,” said Calgary, “that my evidence cleared him of the actual crime.”
Kirsten said:
“One cannot always believe evidence. You had concussion. I know very well what concussion does to people. They remember things not clearly but in a kind of blur.”
“So that is still your solution?” said Calgary. “You think that Jacko actually committed that crime and that in some way he managed to fake an alibi? Is that right?”
“I do not know the details. Yes, something of that sort. I still say he did it. All the suffering that has gone on here and the deaths—yes, these terrible deaths—they are all his doing. All Jacko’s doing!”
Hester cried:
“But Kirsten, you were always devoted to Jacko.”
“Perhaps,” said Kirsten, “yes, perhaps. But I still say he was wicked.”
“There I think you are right,” said Calgary, “but in another way you are wrong. Concussion or no concussion, my memory is perfectly clear. On the night of Mrs. Argyle’s death I gave Jacko a lift at the stated time. There is no possibility—and I repeat those words strongly—there is no possibility that Jacko Argyle killed his adopted mother that night. His alibi holds.”
Leo moved with a trace of restlessness. Calgary went on:
“You think that I’m repeating the same thing over and over again? Not quite. There are other points to be considered. One of them is the statement that I got from Superintendent Huish that Jacko was very glib and assured when giving his alibi. He had it all pat and ready, the times, the place, almost as though he knew he might need it. That ties up with the conversation I had about him with Dr. MacMaster, who has had a very wide experience of borderline delinquent cases. He said he was not so surprised at Jacko having the seeds of murder in his heart, but he was surprised that he had actually carried one out. He said the type of murder he would have expected was one where Jacko egged on someone else to commit the crime. So I came to the point where I asked myself this: Did Jacko know that a crime was to be committed that night? Did he know that he would need an alibi and did he deliberately go about giving himself one? If so, someone else killed Mrs. Argyle, but—Jacko knew she was going to be killed and one may fairly say that he was the instigator of the crime.”
He said to Kirsten Lindstrom:
“You feel that, don’t you? You still feel it, or you want to feel it? You feel that it was Jacko who killed her, not you… You feel it was under his orders and under his influence you did it. Therefore you want all the blame to be his!”
“I?” said Kirsten Lindstrom. “I? What are you saying?”
“I’m saying,” said Calgary, “that there was only one person in this house who could in any way fit into the role of Jacko Argyle’s accomplice. And that is you, Miss Lindstrom. Jacko has a record behind him, a record of being able to inspire passion in middle-aged women. He employed that power deliberately. He had the gift of making himself believed.” He leaned forward. “He made love to you, didn’t he?” he said gently. “He made you believe that he cared for you, that he wanted to marry you, that after this was over and he’d got more control of his mother’s money, you would be married and go away somewhere. That is right, isn’t it?”
Kirsten stared at him. She did not speak. It was as though she were paralysed.
“It was done cruelly and heartlessly and deliberately,” said Arthur Calgary. “He came here that night desperate for some money, with the shadow over him of arrest and a jail sentence. Mrs. Argyle