Parker Pyne Investigates - Agatha Christie [70]
Mrs Peters was a woman of a single idea. ‘Where’s my boy?’ she demanded, with the eyes of an angry tigress.
‘As a matter of fact,’ said Mr Thompson, ‘he’s just outside the door.’
‘Willard!’
The door was flung open. Willard, sallow and spectacled and distinctly unshaven, was clasped to his mother’s heart. Mr Thompson stood looking benignly on.
‘All the same,’ said Mrs Peters, suddenly recovering herself and turning on him, ‘I’ll have the law on you for this. Yes, I will.’
‘You’ve got it all wrong, Mother,’ said Willard. ‘This gentleman rescued me.’
‘Where were you?’
‘In a house on the cliff point. Just a mile from here.’
‘And allow me, Mrs Peters,’ said Mr Thompson, ‘to restore your property.’
He handed her a small packet loosely wrapped in tissue paper. The paper fell away and revealed the diamond necklace.
‘You need not treasure that other little bag of stones, Mrs Peters,’ said Mr Thompson, smiling. ‘The real stones are still in the necklace. The chamois bag contains some excellent imitation stones. As your friend said, Aristopoulous is quite a genius.’
‘I just don’t understand a word of all this,’ said Mrs Peters faintly.
‘You must look at the case from my point of view,’ said Mr Thompson. ‘My attention was caught by the use of a certain name. I took the liberty of following you and your fat friend out of doors and I listened–I admit it frankly–to your exceedingly interesting conversation. I found it remarkably suggestive, so much so that I took the manager into my confidence. He took a note of the number to which your plausible friend telephoned and he also arranged that a waiter should listen to your conversation in the dining-room this morning.
‘The whole scheme worked very clearly. You were being made the victim of a couple of clever jewel thieves. They know all about your diamond necklace; they follow you here; they kidnap your son, and write the rather comic “bandit” letter, and they arrange that you shall confide in the chief instigator of the plot.
‘After that, all is simple. The good gentleman hands you a bag of imitation diamonds and–clears out with his pal. This morning, when your son did not appear, you would be frantic. The absence of your friend would lead you to believe that he had been kidnapped too. I gather that they had arranged for someone to go to the villa tomorrow. That person would have discovered your son, and by the time you and he had put your heads together you might have got an inkling of the plot. But by that time the villains would have got an excellent start.’
‘And now?’
‘Oh, now they are safely under lock and key. I arranged for that.’
‘The villain,’ said Mrs Peters, wrathfully remembering her own trustful confidences. ‘The oily, plausible villain.’
‘Not at all a nice fellow,’ agreed Mr Thompson.
‘It beats me how you got on to it,’ said Willard admiringly. ‘Pretty smart of you.’
The other shook his head deprecatingly. ‘No, no,’ he said. ‘When you are travelling incognito and hear your own name being taken in vain–’
Mrs Peters stared at him. ‘Who are you?’ she demanded abruptly.
‘I am Mr Parker Pyne,’ explained that gentleman.
Problem at Pollensa Bay
I
The steamer from Barcelona to Majorca landed Mr Parker Pyne at Palma in the early hours of the morning–and straightaway he met with disillusionment. The hotels were full! The best that could be done for him was an airless cupboard overlooking an inner court in a hotel in the centre of the town–and with that Mr Parker Pyne was not prepared to put up. The proprietor of the hotel was indifferent to his disappointment.
‘What will you?’ he observed with a shrug.
Palma was popular now! The exchange was favourable! Everyone–the English, the Americans–they all came to Majorca in the winter. The whole place was crowded. It was doubtful if the English gentleman would be able to get in anywhere–except perhaps at Formentor where the prices were so ruinous that even foreigners blenched at them.
Mr Parker Pyne partook of some coffee and a roll and went out to view the cathedral, but found