Black Coffee

by Agatha Christie

  ‘Darling, I’m not accusing Richard of anything. But you must admit there’s something wrong here. Richard doesn’t seem to want a police investigation into his uncle’s death. It’s almost as though he were afraid of what it might reveal. There’s no way he can stop the police from taking over, of course, but he’s made it perfectly clear that he’s furious with me for having instigated an official investigation. I was only doing my duty as a doctor, after all. How could I possibly have signed a death certificate stating that Sir Claud had died of a heart attack? For heaven’s sake, there was absolutely nothing wrong with his heart when I last gave him a regular check-up only a few weeks ago.’

  ‘Kenny, I don’t want to hear any more. I’m going indoors. You’ll make your own way out through the garden, won’t you? I’ll see you another time.’

  ‘Barbara, I only want –’ But she had already gone, and Dr Graham emitted a deep sigh that was almost a groan. At that moment, Hastings thought it expedient to retrace his steps quickly back to the house without being seen by either of them.

  Chapter 14

  Back in the library, it was only after Hastings, propelled by Hercule Poirot, had made his unwilling exit into the garden that the little detective turned his attention again to Lucia Amory, first taking care to close the french windows.

  Lucia looked at Poirot anxiously. ‘You want to ask me about my maid, I understand, Monsieur Poirot. That is what Mr Raynor told me. But she is a very good girl. I am sure there is nothing wrong with her.’

  ‘Madame,’ Poirot replied, ‘it is not about your maid that I wish to speak to you.’

  Lucia sounded startled as she began, ‘But Mr Raynor said –’

  Poirot interrupted her. ‘I am afraid I allowed Mr Raynor to think so for reasons of my own.’

  ‘Well, what is it then?’ Lucia’s voice was guarded now.

  ‘Madame,’ Poirot observed, ‘you paid me a very pretty compliment yesterday. You said, when you first saw me – you said – that you trusted me.’

  ‘Well?’

  ‘Well, madame, I ask you to trust me now!’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  Poirot observed her solemnly. ‘You have youth, beauty, admiration, love – all the things a woman wants and craves. But there is one thing, madame, that you lack – a father confessor! Let Papa Poirot offer himself for the post.’

  Lucia was about to speak, when Poirot interrupted her. ‘Now, think well before you refuse, madame. It was at your request that I remained here. I stayed to serve you. I still wish to serve you.’

  With a sudden flash of temperament, Lucia replied, ‘You can serve me best now by going, monsieur.’

  ‘Madame,’ Poirot continued imperturbably, ‘do you know that the police have been called in?’

  ‘The police?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘But by whom? And why?’

  ‘Dr Graham and the other doctors, his colleagues,’ Poirot told her, ‘have discovered that Sir Claud Amory was poisoned.’

  ‘Ah, no! No! Not that!’ Lucia sounded more horrified than surprised.

  ‘Yes. So you see, madame, there is very little time for you to decide on the most prudent course of action. At present, I serve you. Later, I may have to serve justice.’

  Lucia’s eyes searched Poirot’s face as though trying to decide whether to confide in him. At last, ‘What do you want me to do?’ she asked, falteringly.

  Poirot sat and faced her. ‘What will you?’ he murmured to himself, and then, addressing Lucia, he suggested gently, ‘Why not simply tell me the truth, madame?’

  Lucia paused. Stretching out her hand towards him, she began, ‘I – I –’ She paused again, irresolutely, and then her expression hardened. ‘Really, Monsieur Poirot, I am at a loss to understand you.’

  Poirot eyed her keenly. ‘Ah! It is to be like that, is it? I am very sorry.’

  Her composure somewhat regained, Lucia spoke coldly. ‘If you will tell me what you want with me, I will answer any questions you wish to ask.’

  ‘So!’ the little detective exclaimed. ‘You pit your wits against Hercule Poirot, do you? Very well, then. Be assured however, madame, that we shall get at the truth just the same.’ He tapped the table. ‘But by a less pleasant process.’

  ‘I have nothing to conceal,’ Lucia told him defiantly.

  Taking from his pocket the letter Edward Raynor had given him, Poirot handed it to Lucia. ‘A few days ago, Sir Claud received this anonymous letter,’ he revealed.

  Lucia glanced through the letter, apparently unmoved. ‘Well, what of it?’ she commented as she handed it back to Poirot.

  ‘Have you ever heard the name Selma Goetz before?’

  ‘Never! Who is she?’ asked Lucia.

  ‘She died – in Genoa – last November,’ Poirot informed her.

  ‘Indeed?’

  ‘Perhaps you met her there,’ Poirot remarked, replacing the letter in his pocket. ‘In fact, I think you did.’

  ‘I was never in Genoa in my life,’ Lucia insisted, sharply.

  ‘Then, if anyone were to say that they had seen you there?’

  ‘They would – they would be mistaken.’

  Poirot persisted. ‘But I understand, madame, that you first met your husband in Genoa?’

  ‘Did Richard say that? How stupid of him! We met first in Milan.’

  ‘Then the woman you were with in Genoa –’

  Lucia interrupted him angrily. ‘I tell you I was never in Genoa!’

  ‘Ah, pardon!’ exclaimed Poirot. ‘Of course, you said so just now. Yet it is odd!’

  ‘What is odd?’

  Poirot closed his eyes and leaned back in his chair. His voice came purringly from between his lips. ‘I will tell you a little story, madame,’ he announced, taking out a pocket book. ‘I have a friend who does the photography for certain London journals. He takes – how do you say? – the snapshots of contessas and other fashionable ladies who bathe themselves on the Lido. That sort of thing.’ Poirot searched in the pocket book before continuing, ‘Last November, this friend of mine, he finds himself in Genoa, and he recognizes a very notorious lady. The Baronne de Giers, she calls herself at this time, and she is the chère amie of a very noted French diplomat. The world talks, but that does not matter to the lady, because the diplomat, he talks also, and that is what she wants. He is more amorous than discreet, you understand –’ Poirot broke off with an innocent air. ‘I do not bore you, I hope, madame?’

  ‘Not at all, but I hardly see the point of this story.’

  Looking through the contents of his pocket book, Poirot continued. ‘I am arriving at the point, I assure you, madame. My friend, he shows me a snapshot he has taken. We agree with each other that the Baronne de Giers is une très belle femme, and we are not at all surprised at the behaviour of the diplomat.’

  ‘Is that all?’

  ‘No, madame. You see, the lady was not alone. She was photographed walking with her daughter, and that daughter, madame, had a very beautiful face, and one, moreover, that it would not be at all easy to forget.’ Poirot rose, made his most gallant bow, and closed his pocket book. ‘Of course, I recognized that face as soon as I arrived here.’

  Lucia looked at Poirot, and drew her breath in, sharply. ‘Oh!’ she exclaimed. After a moment, she pulled herself together, and laughed. ‘My dear Monsieur Poirot, what a curious mistake. Of course, I see the point of all your questions now. I remember the Baronne de Giers perfectly, and her daughter as well. The daughter was rather a dull girl, but the mother fascinated me. I was quite romantic about her, and went out walking with her on several occasions. I think my devotion amused her. That was doubtless how the mistake arose. That is how someone thought that I must be the woman’s daughter.’ Lucia sank back in her chair.

  Poirot nodded slow appreciation, at which Lucia appeared visibly to relax. Then suddenly, leaning over the table towards her, the detective remarked, ‘But I thought you had never been to Genoa.’

  Taken
unawares, Lucia gasped. She stared at Poirot as he put his pocket book back in an inner pocket of his jacket. ‘You have no photograph,’ she said. It was half question, half statement.

  ‘No,’ Poirot confessed. ‘I have no photograph, madame. I knew the name that Selma Goetz passed under in Genoa. The rest – my friend and his photography – all of that was a harmless little invention of mine!’

  Lucia leapt to her feet, her eyes blazing with anger. ‘You set a trap for me!’ she exclaimed furiously.

  Poirot shrugged his shoulders. ‘Yes, madame,’ he affirmed. ‘I fear I had no alternative.’

  ‘What has all this to do with Sir Claud’s death?’ Lucia muttered as though to herself, looking wildly about the room.

  Poirot affected a tone of indifference as, instead of answering, he posed another question. ‘Madame,’ he asked, brushing an imaginary speck of dust from his jacket as he spoke, ‘is it true that you lost a valuable diamond necklace a little time ago?’

  Lucia glared at him. ‘Again I ask,’ her words emerging as though through clenched teeth, ‘what has that to do with Sir Claud’s death?’

  Poirot spoke slowly and deliberately. ‘First a stolen necklace – then a stolen formula. Both would bring in a very large sum of money.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ Lucia gasped.

  ‘I mean, madame, that I would like you to answer this question. How much did Dr Carelli want – this time?’

  Lucia turned away from Poirot. ‘I – I – I will not answer any more questions,’ she whispered.

  ‘Because you are afraid?’ asked Poirot, moving to her.

  Lucia turned to face him again, flinging her head back in a gesture of defiance. ‘No,’ she asserted, ‘I’m not afraid. I simply don’t know what you are talking about! Why should Dr Carelli ask me for money?’

  ‘To buy his silence,’ Poirot replied. ‘The Amorys are a proud family, and you would not have wanted them to know that you are – the daughter of Selma Goetz!’

  Lucia glared at Poirot for a moment without replying, and then, her shoulders sagging, she collapsed onto a stool, resting her head in her hands. At least a minute elapsed before she looked up with a sigh. ‘Does Richard know?’ she murmured.

  ‘He does not know yet, madame,’ Poirot replied slowly.

  Lucia sounded desperate as she pleaded, ‘Don’t tell him, Monsieur Poirot! Please don’t tell him! He is so proud of his family name, so proud of his honour! I was wicked to have married him! But I was so miserable. I hated that life, that awful life I was forced to live with my mother. I felt degraded by it. But what could I do? And then, when Mama died, I was at last free! Free to be honest! Free to get away from that life of lies and intrigue. I met Richard. That was the most wonderful thing that had ever happened to me. Richard came into my life. I loved him, and he wanted to marry me. How could I tell him who I was? Why should I tell him?’

  ‘And then,’ Poirot prompted her gently, ‘Carelli recognized you somewhere with Monsieur Amory, and began to blackmail you?’

  ‘Yes, but I had no money of my own,’ Lucia gasped. ‘I sold the necklace and paid him. I thought that was the end of it all. But yesterday he turned up here. He had heard of this formula that Sir Claud had invented.’

  ‘He wanted you to steal it for him?’

  Lucia sighed. ‘Yes.’

  ‘And did you?’ asked Poirot, moving closer to her.

  ‘You won’t believe me – now,’ murmured Lucia, shaking her head sorrowfully.

  Poirot contemplated the beautiful young woman with a look of sympathy. ‘Yes, yes, my child,’ he assured her. ‘I will still believe you. Have courage, and trust Papa Poirot, yes? Just tell me the truth. Did you take Sir Claud’s secret formula?’

  ‘No, no, I didn’t, I didn’t!’ Lucia declared vehemently. ‘But it’s true that I meant to. Carelli made a key to Sir Claud’s safe from an impression I took.’

  Taking a key from his pocket and showing it to her, Poirot asked, ‘Is this it?’

  Lucia looked at the key. ‘Yes, it was all quite easy. Carelli gave me that key. I was in the study, just steeling myself to open the safe when Sir Claud came in and found me. That’s the truth, I swear it!’

  ‘I believe you, madame,’ said Poirot. He returned the key to his pocket, moved to the arm-chair and sat, placing the tips of his fingers together, and pondering for a moment. ‘And yet you acquiesced eagerly in Sir Claud’s scheme of plunging the room into darkness?’

  ‘I didn’t want to be searched,’ Lucia explained. ‘Carelli had passed me a note at the same time as the key, and they were both in my dress.’

  ‘What did you do with them?’ Poirot asked her.

  ‘When the lights went out, I threw the key as far from me as I could. Over there.’ She pointed in the direction of the chair in which Edward Raynor had sat on the previous evening.

  ‘And the note that Carelli had passed to you?’ Poirot continued.

  ‘I didn’t know what to do with the note.’ Lucia rose and went to the table. ‘So I slipped it between the leaves of a book.’ Taking a book from the table, she searched in it. ‘Yes, it is still here,’ she declared as she removed a piece of paper from the book. ‘Do you wish to see it?’

  ‘No, madame, it is yours,’ Poirot assured her.

  Sitting in a chair by the table, Lucia tore the note into small pieces which she put in her handbag. Poirot watched her, but paused before asking, ‘One little thing more, madame. Did you, by any chance, tear your dress last night?’

  ‘I? No!’ Lucia sounded surprised.

  ‘During those moments of darkness,’ asked Poirot, ‘did you hear the sound of a dress tearing?’

  Lucia considered for a few seconds. Then, ‘Yes, now that you mention it,’ she said, ‘I believe I did. But it was not mine. It must have been Miss Amory’s or Barbara’s.’

  ‘Well, we will not worry about that,’ remarked Poirot dismissively. ‘Now, let us pass on to something else. Who poured out Sir Claud’s coffee last night?’

  ‘I did.’

  ‘And you put it down on that table, beside your own cup?’

  ‘Yes.’

  Poirot rose, leaned forward over the table towards Lucia, and suddenly shot his next question at her. ‘Into which cup did you put the hyoscine?’

  Lucia looked at him wildly. ‘How did you know?’ she gasped.

  ‘It is my business to know things. Into which cup, madame?’

  Lucia sighed. ‘My own.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because I wanted – I wanted to die. Richard suspected that there was something between Carelli and me – that we were having an affair. He could not have been further from the truth. I hated Carelli! I hate him now. But, as I had failed to obtain the formula for him, I was sure he would expose me to Richard. To kill myself was a way out – the only way. A swift, dreamless sleep – and no awakening – that’s what he said.’

  ‘Who said that to you?’

  ‘Dr Carelli.’

  ‘I begin to see – I begin to see,’ said Poirot slowly. He pointed to the cup on the table. ‘This is your cup, then? A full cup, untasted?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘What made you change your mind about drinking it?’

  ‘Richard came over to me. He said that he would take me away – abroad – that he would get the money to do so, somehow. He gave me back – hope.’

  ‘Now, listen to me carefully, madame,’ said Poirot gravely. ‘This morning, Dr Graham took away the cup that was beside Sir Claud’s chair.’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘His fellow-doctors will have found nothing but the dregs of coffee in it –’ He paused.

  Without looking at him, Lucia answered, ‘Of – of course.’

  ‘That is correct, yes?’ Poirot persisted.

  Lucia looked straight ahead of her without replying. Then, looking up at Poirot, she exclaimed, ‘Why are you staring at me like that? You frighten me!’

  ‘I said,’ Poirot repeated, ‘that they t
ook away the cup that was beside Sir Claud’s chair this morning. Let us suppose instead that they had taken away the cup that was by his chair last night?’ He moved to the table near the door and took a coffee cup from the plant bowl. ‘Let us suppose that they had taken this cup!’

  Lucia rose quickly, putting her hands up to her face. ‘You know!’ she gasped.

  Poirot moved to her. ‘Madame!’ His voice now was stern. ‘They will test their cup, if they have not already done so, and they will find – nothing. But last night I took some of the dregs from the original cup. What would you say if I were to tell you that there was hyoscine in Sir Claud’s cup?’

  Lucia looked stricken. She swayed, but then recovered herself. For a moment she said nothing. Then, ‘You are right,’ she whispered. ‘You are quite right. I killed him.’ Her voice rang out suddenly. ‘I killed him! I put the hyoscine in his cup.’ Going to the table, she grasped the full cup of coffee. ‘This one – is only coffee!’

  She raised the full cup to her lips, but Poirot sprang forward, interposing his hand between the cup and her lips. They looked at each other intently for a time, then Lucia burst into sobs. Poirot took the cup from her, and placed it on the table. ‘Madame!’ he exclaimed.

  ‘Why did you stop me?’ Lucia murmured.

  ‘Madame,’ Poirot told her, ‘the world is very beautiful. Why should you wish to leave it?’

  ‘I – Oh!’ Lucia collapsed onto the settee, sobbing bitterly.

  When Poirot spoke, his voice was warm and gentle. ‘You told me the truth. You put the hyoscine in your own cup. I believe you. But there was hyoscine in the other cup as well. Now, speak the truth to me again. Who put the hyoscine in Sir Claud’s cup?’

  Lucia stared at Poirot in terror. ‘No, no, you’re wrong. He didn’t. I killed him,’ she cried hysterically.

  ‘Who didn’t? Whom are you shielding, madame? Tell me,’ Poirot demanded.

  ‘He didn’t, I tell you,’ Lucia sobbed.

  There was a knock at the door. ‘That will be the police!’ declared Poirot. ‘We have very little time. I will make you two promises, madame. Promise number one is that I will save you –’