Ordeal by Innocence

by Agatha Christie

  Hester cried out impatiently: "What does it matter what other awful things Jacko may have done? That's all over."

  Calgary spoke quickly.

  "Please believe me - there is no question of anything that your brother has done - quite the opposite."

  "I don't see-"

  The door at the far end of the room opened and the young woman whom Calgary had just glimpsed earlier came back into the room. She wore an outdoor coat now, and carried a small attache-case.

  She spoke to Argyle.

  "I'm going now. Is there anything else?"

  There was a momentary hesitation on Argyle's part (he would always hesitate, Calgary thought) and then he laid a hand on her arm and drew her forward.

  "Sit down, Gwenda," he said. "This is - er - Dr. Calgary. This is Miss Vaughan, who is - who is -"

  Again he paused as though in doubt. "Who has been my secretary for some years now." He added: "Dr. Calgary has come to tell us something - or - ask us something - about Jacko -"

  "To tell you something," Calgary interrupted. "And although you don't realise it, every moment you are making it more difficult for me."

  They all looked at him in some surprise, but in Gwenda Vaughan's eyes he saw a flicker of something that looked like comprehension. It was as though he and she were momentarily in alliance, as though she had said: "Yes -1 know how difficult the Argyles can be."

  She was an attractive young woman, he thought, though not so very young -perhaps thirty-seven or eight. A well-rounded figure, dark hair and eyes, a general air of vitality and good health. She gave the impression of being both competent and intelligent.

  Argyle said with a frosty touch in his manner: "I am not at all aware of making things difficult for you, Dr. Calgary. Such was certainly not my intention. If you will come to the point -"

  "Yes, I know. Forgive me for saying what I did. But it is the persistence with which you - and your daughter - are continually underlining that things are over - done with - finished. They are not over. Who is it who said: 'Nothing is ever settled until -'"

  '"Until it is settled right,'" Miss Vaughan finished for him. "Kipling."

  She nodded at him encouragingly. He felt grateful to her.

  "But I'll come to the point," Calgary went on. "When you've heard what I have to say, you'll understand my - my reluctance. More, my distress. To begin with, I must mention a few things about myself. I am a geophysicist, and have recently formed part of an Antarctic expedition. I only returned to England a few weeks ago."

  "The Hayes Bentley Expedition?" asked Gwenda. He turned towards her gratefully.

  "Yes. It was the Hayes Bentley Expedition. I tell you this to explain my background, and also to explain that I have been out of touch for about two years with - with current events."

  She went on helping him: "You mean - with such things as murder trials -" "Yes, Miss Vaughan, that is exactly what I mean." He turned to Argyle.

  "Please forgive me if this is painful, but I must just check over with you certain times and dates. On November 9th, the year before last, at about six o'clock in the evening, your son, Jack Argyle (Jacko to you), called here and had an interview with his mother, Mrs. Argyle."

  "My wife, yes."

  "He told her that he was in trouble and demanded money. This had happened before -"

  "Many times," said Leo with a sigh.

  "Mrs. Argyle refused. He became abusive, threatening. Finally he flung away and left, shouting out that he was coming back and that she had 'jolly well got to stump up.' He said, 'You don't want me to go to prison, do you?' and she replied, 'I am beginning to believe that it may be the best thing for you.'"

  Leo Argyle moved uneasily.

  "My wife and I had talked it over together. We were - very unhappy about the boy. Again and again we had come to his rescue, tried to give him a fresh start. It had seemed to us that perhaps the shock of a prison sentence - the training -" His voice died away. "But please go on."

  Calgary went on: "Later that evening, your wife was killed. Attacked with a poker and struck down. Your son's fingerprints were on the poker, and a large sum of money was gone from the bureau drawer where your wife had placed it earlier. The police picked up your son in Drymouth. The money was found on him, most of it was in five-pound notes, one of which had a name and address written on it which enabled it to be identified by the bank as one that had been paid out to Mrs. Argyle that morning. He was charged and stood his trial." Calgary paused. "The verdict was wilful murder."

  It was out - the fateful word. Murder... not an echoing word; a stifled word, a word that got absorbed into the hangings, the books, the pile carpet... The word could be stifled - but not the act...

  "I have been given to understand by Mr. Marshall, the solicitor for the defence, that your son protested his innocence when arrested, in a cheery, not to say cocksure manner. He insisted that he had a perfect alibi for the time of the murder which was placed by the police at between seven and seven-thirty. At that time, Jack Argyle said, he was hitch-hiking into Drymouth, having been picked up by a car on the main road from Redmyn to Drymouth about a mile from here just before seven. He didn't know the make of the car (it was dark by then) but it was a black or dark blue saloon driven by a middle-aged man. Every effort was made to trace this car and the man who drove it, but no confirmation of his statement could be obtained, and the lawyers themselves were quite convinced that it was a story hastily fabricated by the boy and not very cleverly fabricated at that...

  "At the trial the main line of defence was the evidence of psychologists who sought to prove that Jack Argyle had always been mentally unstable. The judge was somewhat scathing in his comments on this evidence and summed up dead against the prisoner. Jack Argyle was sentenced to imprisonment for life. He died of pneumonia in prison six months after he began to serve his sentence."

  Calgary stopped. Three pairs of eyes were fastened on him. Interest and close attention in Gwenda Vaughan's, suspicion still in Hester's. Leo Argyle's seemed blank.

  Calgary said, "You will confirm that I have stated the facts correctly?"

  "You are perfectly correct," said Leo, "though I do not yet see why it has been necessary to go over painful facts which we are all trying to forget."

  "Forgive me. I had to do so. You do not, I gather, dissent from the verdict?"

  "I admit that the facts were as stated - that is, if you do not go behind the facts, it was, crudely, murder. But if you do go behind the facts, there is much to be said in mitigation. The boy was mentally unstable, though unfortunately not in the legal sense of the term.

  The McNaughten rules are narrow and unsatisfactory. I assure you, Dr. Calgary, that Rachel herself, my late wife, I mean - would have been the first to forgive and excuse that unfortunate boy for his rash act. She was a most advanced and humane thinker and had a profound knowledge of psychological factors. She would not have condemned."

  "She knew just how violent Jacko could be," said Hester. "He always was - he just didn't seem able to help it."

  "So you all," said Calgary slowly, "had no doubts? No doubts of his guilt, I mean."

  Hester stared.

  "How could we? Of course he was guilty."

  "Not really guilty," Leo dissented. "I don't like that word."

  "It isn't a true word, either." Calgary took a deep breath. "Jack Argyle was -innocent!"

  Chapter 2

  It should have been a sensational announcement.

  Instead, it fell flat. Calgary had expected bewilderment, incredulous gladness struggling with incomprehension, eager questions... There was none of that. There seemed only wariness and suspicion. Gwenda Vaughan was frowning. Hester stared at him with dilated eyes. Well, perhaps it was natural - such an announcement was hard to take in all at once.

  Leo Argyle said hesitantly: "You mean, Dr. Calgary, that you agree with my attitude? You don't feel he was responsible for his actions?"

  "I mean he didn't do it! Can't you take it in, man? He didn'
t do it. He couldn't have done it. But for the most extraordinary and unfortunate combination of circumstances he could have proved that he was innocent. I could have proved that he was innocent."

  "You?"

  "I was the man in the car."

  He said it so simply that for the moment they did not take it in. Before they could recover themselves, there was an interruption. The door opened and the woman with the homely face marched in. She spoke directly and to the point.

  "I hear as I am passing the door outside. This man is saying that Jacko did not kill Mrs. Argyle. Why does he say this? How does he know?"

  Her face, which had been militant and fierce, suddenly seemed to pucker. "I must hear too," she said piteously. "I cannot stay outside and not know."

  "Of course not, Kirsty. You're one of the family." Leo Argyle introduced her. "Miss Lindstrom, Dr. Calgary. Dr. Calgary is saying the most incredible things."

  Calgary was puzzled by the Scottish name of Kirsty. Her English was excellent but a faint foreign intonation remained.

  She spoke accusingly to him.

  "You should not come here and say things like that - upsetting people. They have accepted tribulation. Now you upset them by what you tell. What happened was the will of God."

  He was repelled by the glib complacence of her statement. Possibly, he thought, she was one of those ghoulish people who positively welcome disaster. Well, she was going to be deprived of all that.

  He spoke in a quick, dry voice.

  "At five minutes to seven on that evening, I picked up a young man on the main Redmyn to Drymouth road who was thumbing for a lift. I drove him into Drymouth. We talked. He was, I thought, an engaging and likeable young man."

  "Jacko had great charm," said Gwenda. "Everyone found him attractive. It was his temper let him down. And he was crooked, of course," she added thoughtfully. "But people didn't find that out for some time."

  Miss Lindstrom turned on her.

  "You should not speak so when he is dead."

  Leo Argyle said with a faint asperity: "Please go on, Dr. Calgary. Why didn't you come forward at the time?"

  "Yes." Hester's voice sounded breathless. "Why did you skulk away from it all? There were appeals in the paper - advertisements. How could you be so selfish, so wicked -"

  "Hester - Hester!" her father checked her. "Dr. Calgary is still telling us his story."

  Calgary addressed the girl direct.

  "I know only too well how you feel. I know what I feel myself - what I shall always feel -" He pulled himself together and went on: "To continue with my story: There was a lot of traffic on the roads that evening. It was well after half past seven when I dropped the young man, whose name I did not know, in the middle of Drymouth. That, I understand, clears him completely, since the police are quite definite that the crime was committed between seven and half past."

  "Yes," said Hester. "But you -"

  "Please be patient. To make you understand, I must go back a little. I had been staying in Drymouth for a couple of days in a friend's flat. This friend, a naval man, was at sea. He had also lent me his car which he kept in a private lock-up. On this particular day, November the 9th, I was due to return to London. I decided to go up by the evening train and to spend the afternoon seeing an old nurse of whom our family were very fond and who lived in a little cottage at Polgarth about forty miles west of Drymouth. I carried out my programme. Though very old and inclined to wander in her mind, she recognised me and was very pleased to see me, and quite excited because she had read in the papers about my 'going to the Pole,' as she put it. I stayed only a short time, so as not to tire her, and on leaving decided not to return direct to Drymouth along the coast road as I had come, but instead to go north to Redmyn and see old Canon Peasmarsh, who has some very rare books in his library, including an early treatise on navigation from which I was anxious to copy a passage. The old gentleman refuses to have the telephone which he regards as a device of the devil, and on a par with radio, television, cinema organs and jet planes, so I had to take a chance of finding him at home. I was unlucky. His house was shuttered and he was evidently away. I spent a little time in the Cathedral, and then started back to Drymouth by the main road, thus completing the third side of a triangle. I had left myself comfortable time to pick up my bag from the flat, return the car to its lock-up, and catch my train.

  "On the way, as I have told you, I picked up an unknown hitch-hiker, and after dropping him in the town, I carried out my own programme. After arrival at the station, I still had time in hand, and I went outside the station into the main street to get some cigarettes. As I crossed the road a lorry came round a corner at high speed and knocked me down.

  "According to the accounts of passers-by, I got up, apparently uninjured and behaving quite normally. I said I was quite all right and that I had a train to catch and hurried back to the station. When the train arrived at Paddington I was unconscious and taken by ambulance to hospital, where I was found to be suffering from concussion - apparently this delayed effect is not uncommon.

  "When I regained consciousness, some days later, I remembered nothing of the accident, or of coming to London. The last thing I could remember was starting out to visit my old nurse at Polgarth. After that, a complete blank. I was reassured by being told that such an occurrence is quite common. There seemed no reason to believe that the missing hours in my life were of any importance. Neither I myself, nor anyone else, had the faintest idea that I had driven along the Redmyn-Drymouth road that evening.

  "There was only a very narrow margin of time before I was due to leave England. I was kept in hospital, in absolute quiet, with no newspapers. On leaving I drove straight to the airport to fly to Australia and to join up with the Expedition. There was some doubt as to whether I was fit to go, but this I overruled. I was far too busy with my preparations and anxieties to take any interest in reports of murders, and in any case excitement died down after the arrest, and by the time the case came to trial and was fully reported, I was on my way to the Antarctic."

  He paused. They were listening to him with close attention.

  "It was about a month ago, just after my return to England, that I made the discovery. I wanted some old newspapers for packing specimens. My landlady brought me up a pile of old papers out of her stockhold. Spreading one out on the table I saw the reproduced photograph of a young man whose face seemed very familiar to me. I tried to remember where I had met him and who he was. I could not do so and yet, very strangely, I remembered holding a conversation with him - it had been about eels. He had been intrigued and fascinated by hearing the saga of an eel's life. But when? Where? I read the paragraph, read that this young man was Jack Argyle, accused of murder, read that he had told the police that he had been given a lift by a man in a black saloon car.

  "And then, quite suddenly, that lost bit of my life came back I had picked up this selfsame young man, and driven him into Drymouth, parting from him there, going back to the flat - crossing the street on foot to buy my cigarettes. I remembered just a glimpse of the lorry as it hit me - after that, nothing until hospital. I still had no memory of going to the station and taking the train to London. I read and re-read the paragraph. The trial was over a year ago, the case almost forgotten. 'A young fellow what did his mother in,' my landlady remembered vaguely. 'Don't know what happened - think they hanged him.' I read up the files of the newspapers for the appropriate dates, then I went to Marshall & Marshall, who had been the lawyers for the defence. I learned that I was too late to free the unfortunate boy. He had died of pneumonia in prison. Though justice could no longer be done to him, justice could be done to his memory. I went with Mr. Marshall to the police. The case is being laid before the Public Prosecutor. Marshall has little doubt that he will refer it to the Home Secretary.

  "You will, of course, receive a full report from him. He has only delayed it because I was anxious to be the one who first acquainted you with the truth. I felt that that was an ordeal it was m
y duty to go through. You understand, I am sure, that I shall always feel a deep load of guilt. If I had been more careful crossing the street -" He broke off. "I understand that your feelings towards me can never be kindly - though I am, technically, blameless - you, all of you, must blame me."

  Gwenda Vaughan said quickly, her voice warm and kindly: "Of course we don't blame you. It's just - one of those things. Tragic - incredible - but there it is."

  Hester said: "Did they believe you?"

  He looked at her in surprise.

  "The police - did they believe you? Why shouldn't you be making it all up?"

  He smiled a little in spite of himself.

  "I'm a very reputable witness," he said gently. "I have no axe to grind, and they have gone into my story very closely; medical evidence, various corroborating details from Drymouth. Oh yes. Marshall was cautious, of course, like all lawyers. He didn't want to raise your hopes until he was pretty certain of success."