The Floating Admiral - Agatha Christie [127]
If more time is needed, the handkerchief and greengage stones can be found lying in the shade and would thus take longer to dry. The other importance of the greengage clue is Rudge’s deduction from it, before Walter’s recognition by a villager happens, that a woman who strolls cheerfully into a garden and eats greengages is not likely to commit suicide three minutes later. The funeral card is a false clue: it is really written by one of the servants or by the Vicar himself, and is a genuine message to any possible caller. Or it might be a fake message written in the Vicar’s handwriting by Walter in order to avoid the discovery of the murder for several hours. I don’t know how to explain Elma and Holland’s share or non-share in the business. It’s quite inexplicable to me. So I have gone on the ground that they are two perfectly innocent people, and that all the evidence that points to them is purely accidental. I am, frankly, in a complete muddle as to what has happened, and have tried to write a chapter that anybody can use to prove anything they like.
APPENDIX II
NOTES ON MOORING OF BOAT
(Extract from letter from John Rhode)
I, TOO, wanted it to be necessary to get into the boat in order to cast it off or make it fast again. Now, as it happens, in a river with a considerable rise and fall of tide (as this river must have had, to account for the swiftness of the ebb and flow of the tidal stream), this is nearly always necessary, if it is desired to keep the boat afloat at all states of the tide. One method of mooring a boat under these circumstances is as I visualised it.
The mooring-post is driven into the bed of the stream, beyond low-water mark, in water deep enough to float the boat at all times. A hard, made of a few loads of stone, is run from the bank to low-water mark, to save ploughing through the mud. A ring-bolt is fixed at the shore end of this hard.
Now, having been out in the boat, you want to come ashore. Right. Make fast the painter to the mooring-post. Pole the boat round till her stern touches the hard. Jump ashore, taking with you the end of a light line, made fast at the other end to the ring in the stern of the boat. Then push the boat off again, and make fast your end of the line to the ring-bolt on shore, adjusting the length of the line so that the boat lies parallel, during the ebb, with the bank.
Having had your drink, you want to put off again. Cast off the line, and haul the stern of the boat in till it touches the hard. Jump in with the line up in the stern. Go forward, haul in on painter till you are near enough to the post, then cast off.
I gather that you want someone to get into the boat and cast off the painter. As you will see, unless the boat is approached by water, this is necessary in any case. In describing the incident, remember how the boat swings. During the ebb the boat lies as described. But during the flood the stern will swing in of itself, and will remain touching the shore throughout the flood. This, of course, does not matter since the water is rising.
Remember, too, that any particular point in the tidal phase occurs (near enough for this purpose) about three-quarters of an hour later on successive days. Don’t make it high-water at 10 a.m. one day and low-water at 11 a.m. the next. Also, in a river like this, the tide ebbs longer than it flows. I laid down rules for this particular river, though I don’t remember them exactly now, for the guidance of those who followed.
As for the distance of the pole from high-water mark, you can, within limits, make this to suit yourself. If you allow twelve feet or more, measuring horizontally, between H.W.O.S.T. and L.W.O.S.T., and six feet or more between L.W.O.S.T. and the post, you won’t be far wrong. These distances can be increased almost