Sad cypress - Agatha Christie [52]
‘That is the question,’ said Poirot.
Nurse O’Brien went on dramatically:
‘Wasn’t I there that night when the old lady was trying to speak, and Miss Elinor promising her that everything should be done decently and according to her wishes? And didn’t I see her face looking after Mary as she went down the stairs one day, and the black hate that was on it? ’Twas murder she had in her heart that minute.’
Poirot said:
‘If Elinor Carlisle killed Mrs Welman, why did she do it?’
‘Why? For the money, of course. Two hundred thousand pounds, no less. That’s what she got by it, and that’s why she did it – if she did it. She’s a bold, clever young lady, with no fear in her, and plenty of brains.’
Hercule Poirot said:
‘If Mrs Welman had lived to make a will, how do you think she’d have left her money?’
‘Ah, it’s not for me to be saying that,’ said Nurse O’Brien, betraying, however, every symptom of being about to do so. ‘But it’s my opinion that every penny the old lady had would have gone to Mary Gerrard.’
‘Why?’ said Hercule Poirot.
The simple monosyllable seemed to upset Nurse O’Brien.
‘Why? Is it why you’re asking? Well – I’d say that that would be the way of it.’
Poirot murmured:
‘Some people might say that Mary Gerrard had played her cards very cleverly, that she had managed so to ingratiate herself with the old woman, as to make her forget the ties of blood and affection.’
‘They might that,’ said Nurse O’Brien slowly.
Poirot asked:
‘Was Mary Gerrard a clever, scheming girl?’
Nurse O’Brien said, still rather slowly:
‘I’ll not think that of her…All she did was natural enough, with no thought of scheming. She wasn’t that kind. And there’s reasons often for these things that never get made public…’
Hercule Poirot said softly:
‘You are, I think, a very discreet woman, Nurse O’Brien.’
‘I’m not one to be talking of what doesn’t concern me.’
Watching her very closely, Poirot went on:
‘You and Nurse Hopkins, you have agreed together, have you not, that there are some things which are best not brought out into the light of day.’
Nurse O’Brien said:
‘What would you be meaning by that?’
Poirot said quickly:
‘Nothing to do with the crime – or crimes. I mean – the other matter.’
Nurse O’Brien said, nodding her head:
‘What would be the use of raking up mud and an old story, and she a decent elderly woman with never a breath of scandal about her, and dying respected and looked up to by everybody.’
Hercule Poirot nodded in assent. He said cautiously:
‘As you say, Mrs Welman was much respected in Maidensford.’
The conversation had taken an unexpected turn, but his face expressed no surprise or puzzlement.
Nurse O’Brien went on:
‘It’s so long ago, too. All dead and forgotten. I’ve a soft heart for a romance myself, and I do say and I always have said that it’s hard for a man who’s got a wife in an asylum to be tied all his life with nothing but death that can free him.’
Poirot murmured, still in bewilderment:
‘Yes, it is hard…’
Nurse O’Brien said:
‘Did Nurse Hopkins tell you how her letter crossed mine?’
Poirot said truthfully:
‘She did not tell me that.’
‘’Twas an odd coincidence. But there, that’s always the way of it! Once you hear a name, maybe, and a day or two later you’ll come across it again, and so on and so on. That I should be seeing the self-same photograph on the piano and at the same minute Nurse Hopkins was hearing all about it from the doctor’s housekeeper.’
‘That,’ said Poirot, ‘is very interesting.’
He murmured tentatively:
‘Did Mary Gerrard know – about this?’
‘Who’d be telling her?’ said Nurse O’Brien. ‘Not I – and not Hopkins. After all, what good would it be to her?’
She flung up her red head and gazed at him steadily.
Poirot said with a sigh:
‘What, indeed?’
Chapter 11
Elinor Carlisle…
Across the width of the table that separated them Poirot looked at her searchingly.
They were alone together. Through a glass wall a warder watched them.
Poirot noted the sensitive intelligent face with the square, white forehead, and the