Peril at End House - Agatha Christie [68]
But he only shook his head, and repeated at intervals:
‘Iam afraid, Hastings, I am afraid…’
And the strange way he said it made me, too, feel afraid.
Once he caught me by the arm.
‘Listen, my friend. Iam all wrong. I have been all wrong from the beginning.’
‘You mean it isn’t the money—’
‘No, no, I am right about that. Oh, yes. But those two—it is too simple—too easy, that. There is another twist still. Yes, there is something!’
And then in an outburst of indignation:
‘Ah! cette petite! Did I not forbid her? Did I not say, “Do not touch anything from outside?” And she disobeys me—me, Hercule Poirot. Are not four escapes from death enough for her? Must she take a fifth chance? Ah, c’est inoui!’
At last we made our way back. After a brief wait we were conducted upstairs.
Nick was sitting up in bed. The pupils of her eyes were widely dilated. She looked feverish and her hands kept twitching violently.
‘At it again,’ she murmured.
Poirot experienced real emotion at the sight of her. He cleared his throat and took her hand in his.
‘Ah! Mademoiselle—Mademoiselle.’
‘I shouldn’t care,’ she said, defiantly, ‘if they had got me this time. I’m sick of it all—sick of it!’
‘Pauvre petite!’
‘Something in me doesn’t like to give them best!’
‘That is the spirit—le sport—you must be the good sport, Mademoiselle.’
‘Your old nursing home hasn’t been so safe after all,’ said Nick.
‘If you had obeyed orders, Mademoiselle—’
She looked faintly astonished.
‘But I have.’
‘Did I not impress upon you that you were to eat nothing that came from outside?’
‘No more I did.’
‘But these chocolates—’
‘Well, they were all right. You sent them.’
‘What is that you say, Mademoiselle?’
‘You sent them!’
‘Me? Never. Never anything of the kind.’
‘But you did. Your card was in the box.’
‘What?’
Nick made a spasmodic gesture towards the table by the bed. The nurse came forward.
‘You want the card that was in the box?’
‘Yes, please, nurse.’
There was a moment’s pause. The nurse returned to the room with it in her hand.
‘Here it is.’
I gasped. So did Poirot. For on the card, in flourishing handwriting, were written the same words that I had seen Poirot inscribe on the card that accompanied the basket of flowers.
‘With the Compliments of Hercule Poirot.’
‘Sacré tonnerre!’
‘You see,’ said Nick, accusingly.
‘I did not write this!’ cried Poirot.
‘What?’
‘And yet,’ murmured Poirot, ‘and yet it is my handwriting.’
‘I know. It’s exactly the same as the card that came with the orange carnations. I never doubted that the chocolates came from you.’
Poirot shook his head.
‘How should you doubt? Oh! the devil! The clever, cruel devil! To think of that! Ah! but he has genius, this man, genius! “With the Compliments of Hercule Poirot.” So simple. Yes, but one had to think of it. And I—I did not think. I omitted to foresee this move.’
Nick moved restlessly.
‘Do not agitate yourself, Mademoiselle. You are blameless—blameless. It is I that am to blame, miserable imbecile that I am! I should have foreseen this move. Yes, I should have foreseen it.’
His chin dropped on his breast. He looked the picture of misery.
‘I really think—’ said the nurse.
She had been hovering nearby, a disapproving expression on her face.
‘Eh? Yes, yes, I will go. Courage, Mademoiselle. This is the last mistake I will make. I am ashamed, desolated—I have been tricked, outwitted—as though I were a little schoolboy. But it shall not happen again. No. I promise you. Come, Hastings.’
Poirot’s first proceeding was to interview the matron. She was, naturally, terribly upset over the whole business.
‘It seems incredible to me, M. Poirot, absolutely incredible. That a thing like that should happen in my nursing home.’
Poirot was sympathetic and tactful. Having soothed her sufficiently, he began to inquire into the circumstance of the arrival of the fatal packet. Here, the matron declared, he would do best to interview the orderly who had been on duty at the time of its arrival.
The man in question, whose