The Pale Horse - Agatha Christie [31]
Dear Inspector Lejeune,
You may remember that you asked me to get in touch with you if I should happen to see the man who was following Father Gorman on the night that he was killed. I kept a good lookout in the neighbourhood of my establishment, but never caught a glimpse of him again.
Yesterday, however, I attended a church fête in a village about twenty miles from here. I was attracted by the fact that Mrs. Oliver, the well-known detective writer, was going to be there autographing her own books. I am a great reader of detective stories and I was quite curious to see the lady.
What I did see, to my great surprise, was the man I described to you as having passed my shop the night Father Gorman was killed. Since then, it would seem, he must have met with an accident, as on this occasion he was propelling himself in a wheeled chair. I made some discreet inquiries as to who he might be, and it seems he is a local resident of the name of Venables. His place of residence is Priors Court, Much Deeping. He is said to be a man of considerable means.
Hoping these details may be of some service to you,
Yours truly,
Zachariah Osborne
“Well?” said Lejeune.
“Sounds most unlikely,” said Corrigan dampingly.
“On the face of it, perhaps. But I’m not so sure—”
“This Osborne fellow—he couldn’t really have seen anyone’s face very clearly on a foggy night like that. I expect this is just a chance resemblance. You know what people are. Ring up all over the country to say they’ve seen a missing person—and nine times out of ten there’s no resemblance even to the printed description!”
“Osborne’s not like that,” said Lejeune.
“What is he like?”
“He’s a respectable dapper little chemist, old-fashioned, quite a character, and a great observer of persons. One of the dreams of his life is to be able to come forward and identify a wife poisoner who has purchased arsenic at his shop.”
Corrigan laughed.
“In that case, this is clearly an example of wishful thinking.”
“Perhaps.”
Corrigan looked at him curiously.
“So you think there may be something in it? What are you going to do about it?”
“There will be no harm, in any case, in making a few discreet inquiries about this Mr. Venables of—” he referred to the letter— “of Priors Court, Much Deeping.”
Nine
Mark Easterbrook’s Narrative
I
“What exciting things happen in the country!” said Hermia lightly.
We had just finished dinner. A pot of black coffee was in front of us—
I looked at her. The words were not quite what I had expected. I had spent the last quarter of an hour telling her my story. She had listened intelligently and with interest. But her response was not at all what I had expected. The tone of her voice was indulgent—she seemed neither shocked nor stirred.
“People who say that the country is dull and the towns full of excitement don’t know what they are talking about,” she went on. “The last of the witches have gone to cover in the tumbledown cottage, black masses are celebrated in remote manor houses by decadent young men. Superstition runs rife in isolated hamlets. Middle-aged spinsters clank their false scarabs and hold séances and planchettes run luridly over sheets of blank paper. One could really write a very amusing series of articles on it all. Why don’t you try your hand?”
“I don’t think you really understand what I’ve been telling you, Hermia.”
“But I do, Mark! I think it’s all tremendously interesting. It’s a page out of history, all the lingering forgotten lore of the Middle Ages.”
“I’m not interested historically,” I said irritably. “I’m interested in the facts. In a list of names on a sheet of paper. I know what has happened to some of those people. What’s going to happen or has happened to the rest?”
“Aren’t you letting yourself get rather carried away?”
“No,” I said obstinately. “I don’t think so. I think the menace is real. And I’m not alone in thinking so. The vicar’s wife agrees with me.”
“Oh, the vicar’s wife!” Hermia’s voice was scornful.
“No, not ‘the vicar’s wife’ like that! She’s a very unusual woman. This whole thing is real,