Hercule Poirot 100 Years (1916 - 2016)

by Mark Place

  Angela stared at him. Then she said, “I believe - why, yes, that is quite true.” She looked at him with frank curiosity. “How did you know?”

  “I want to show you, mademoiselle, that even in a small, unimportant matter I seam something of a magician. There are things I know without having to be told.”

  The afternoon sun shone into the laboratory at Handcross Manor. Some easy chairs and a settee had been brought into the room, but they served more to emphasize its forlorn aspect than to furnish it. Slightly embarrassed, pulling at his moustache, Meredith Blake talked to Carla in a desultory way. He broke off once to say, “My dear, you are very like your mother - and yet unlike her, too.”

  Carla asked, “How am I like her and how unlike?”

  “You have her colouring and her way of moving, but you are - how shall I put it - more positive than she ever was.”

  Philip Blake, a scowl creasing his forehead, looked out of the window and drummed impatiently on the pane. He said, “What’s the sense of all this? A perfectly fine Saturday afternoon -”

  Hercule Poirot hastened to pour oil on troubled waters.

  “Ah, I apologize - it is, I know, unpardonable to disarrange the golf. But, M. Blake, this is the daughter of your best friend. You will stretch a point for her, will you not?”

  The butler announced, “Miss Warren.”

  Meredith went to welcome her. He said, “It’s good of you to spare the time, Angela. You’re busy, I know.”

  He led her over to the window. Carla said, “Hullo, Aunt, Angela! I read your article in the Times this morning. It’s nice to have a distinguished relative.” She indicated the tall, square-jawed young man with the steady grey eyes. “This is John Rattery. He and I - hope - to be married.”

  Angela Warren said, “Oh! I didn’t know…”

  Meredith went to greet the next arrival.

  “Well, Miss Williams, it’s a good many years since we met.”

  Thin, frail, and indomitable, the elderly governess advanced up the room. Her eyes rested thoughtfully on Poirot for a minute, then they went to the tall, square-shouldered figure in the well-cut tweeds. Angela Warren came forward to meet her and said with a smile, “I feel like a schoolgirl again.”

  “I’m very proud of you, my dear,” said Miss Williams. “You’ve done me credit. This is Carla, I suppose? She won’t remember me. She was too young.”

  Philip Blake said fretfully, “What is all this? Nobody told me-”

  Hercule Poirot said, “I call it - me - an excursion into the past. Shall we not all sit down? Then we shall be ready when the last guest arrives. And when she is here we can proceed to our business - to lay the ghosts.” Philip Blake exclaimed, “What tomfoolery is this? You’re not going to hold a séance, are you?”

  “No, no. We are only going to discuss some events that happened long ago - to discuss them and, perhaps, to see more clearly the course of them. As to the ghosts, they will not materialize, but who is to say they are not here, in this room, although we cannot see them. Who is to say that Amyas and Caroline Crale are not here - listening?”

  Philip Blake said, “Absurd nonsense -” and broke off as the door opened again and the butler announced Lady Dittisham. Conclusion Elsa Dittisham came in with that faint, bored insolence that was a characteristic of hers. She gave Meredith a slight smile, stared coldly at Angela and Philip, and went over to a chair by the window a little apart from the others. She loosened the rich, pale furs round her neck and let them fall back. She looked for a minute or two about the room, at Carla, and the girl stared back, thoughtfully appraising the woman who had wrought the havoc in her parents’ lives. There was no animosity in her young, earnest face, only curiosity. Elsa said, “I am sorry if I am late, M. Poirot.”

  “It was very good of you to come, madame.”

  Cecilia Williams snorted ever so slightly. Elsa met the animosity in her eyes with a complete lack of interest. She said, “I wouldn’t have known you, Angela. How long is it? Sixteen years?”

  Hercule Poirot seized his opportunity. “Yes, it is sixteen years since the events of which we are to speak, but let me first tell you why we are here.” And in a few simple words he outlined Carla’s appeal to him and his acceptance of the task. He went on quickly, ignoring the gathering storm visible on Philip’s face and the shocked distaste on Meredith’s. “I accepted that commission. I set to work to find out - the truth.”

  Carla Lemarchant, in the big grandfather chair, heard Poirot’s words dimly, from a distance. With her hand shielding her eyes she studied five faces surreptitiously. Could she see any of these people committing murder? Could she - if she tried hard - visualize one of them killing someone? Yes, perhaps; but it wouldn’t be the right kind of murder. She could picture Philip Blake, in an outburst of fury, strangling some woman - yes, she could picture that… And she could picture Meredith Blake threatening a burglar with a revolver – and letting it off by accident… And she could picture Angela Warren, also firing a revolver, but not by accident. With no personal feeling in the matter - the safety of the expedition depended on it! And Elsa, in some fantastic castle, saying from her couch of Oriental silks, “Throw the wretch over the battlements!” All wild fancies - and not even in the wildest flight of fancy could she imagine little Miss Williams killing anybody at all! Hercule Poirot was talking: “That was my task - to put myself in reverse gear, as it were, and go back through the years and discover what really happened.” Philip Blake said, “We all know what happened. To pretend anything else is a swindle - that’s what it is, a barefaced swindle. You’re getting money out of this girl on false pretences.”

  Poirot did not allow himself to be angered. He said: “You say, ‘We all know what happened.’ You speak without reflection. The accepted version of certain facts is not necessarily the true one. On the face of it, for instance, you, Mr Blake, disliked Caroline Crale. That is the accepted version of your attitude. But anyone with the least flair for psychology can perceive at once that the exact opposite was the truth. You were always violently attracted toward Caroline Crale. You resented the fact, and tried to conquer it by steadfastly telling yourself her defects and reiterating your dislike. “In the same way, Mr Meredith Blake had a tradition of devotion to Caroline Crale lasting over many years. In his story of the tragedy he represents himself as resenting Amyas Crale’s conduct on her account, but you have only to read carefully between the lines and you will see that the devotion of a lifetime had worn itself thin and that it was the young, beautiful Elsa Greer that was occupying his mind and thoughts.”

  There was a splutter from Meredith, and Lady Dittisham smiled. Poirot went on: “I mention these matters only as illustrations, though they have their bearing on what happened. And I learned these facts: “That at no time did Caroline Crale protest her innocence (except in that one letter written to her daughter). That Caroline Crale showed no fear in the dock; that she showed, in fact, hardly any interest; that she adopted throughout a thoroughly defeatist attitude. That in prison she was quiet and serene. That in a letter she wrote to her sister immediately after the verdict she expressed herself as acquiescent in the fate that had overtaken her. And in the opinion of everyone I talked to (with one notable exception) Caroline Crale was guilty.”

  Philip Blake nodded his head. “Of course she was!”

  Hercule Poirot said: “But it was not my part to accept the verdict of others. I had to examine the evidence for myself. To examine the facts and to satisfy myself that the psychology of the case accorded itself with them. To do this I went over the police files carefully and I also succeeded in getting the five people who were on the spot to write me out their own accounts of the tragedy. These accounts were very valuable, for they contained certain matter which the police files could not give me – that is to say: A, certain conversations and incidents which, from the police point of view, were not relevant; B, the opinions of the people themselves as to what Caroline Crale was thinking and feeling (not admissible legal
ly as evidence); C, certain facts which had been deliberately withheld from the police.

  I was in a position now to judge the case for myself. There seems no doubt whatever that Caroline Crale had ample motive for the crime. She loved her husband, he had publicly admitted that he was about to leave her for another woman, and by her own admission she was a jealous woman. To come from motives to means - an empty scent bottle that had contained coniine was found in her bureau drawer. There were no fingerprints upon it but hers. When asked about it by the police she admitted taking it from this room we are in now. The coniine bottle there also had her fingerprints upon it. I questioned Mr Meredith Blake as to the order in which the people left this room on that day, for it seemed to me hardly conceivable that anyone should be able to help himself to the poison while five people were in the room. The people left the room in this order: Elsa Greer, Meredith Blake, Angela Warren and Philip Blake, Amyas Crale, and lastly Caroline Crale. Moreover, Mr Meredith Blake had his back to the room while he was waiting for Mrs Crale to come out, so that it was impossible for him to see what she was doing. She had, that is to say, the opportunity. I am therefore satisfied that she did take the coniine. There is indirect confirmation of it.”

  “Mr Meredith Blake said to me the other day, ‘I can remember standing here and smelling the jasmine through the open window.’ But the month was September, and the jasmine creeper outside that window would have finished flowering. It is the ordinary jasmine which blooms in June and July. But the scent bottle found in her room and which contained the dregs of coniine had originally contained jasmine scent. I take it as certain, then, that Mrs Crale decided to steal the coniine, and surreptitiously emptied out the scent from a bottle she had in her bag. I tested that a second time the other day when I asked Mr Blake to shut his eyes and try and remember the order of leaving the room. A whiff of jasmine scent stimulated his memory immediately. We are all more influenced by smell than we know.”

  “So we come to the morning of the fatal day. So far the facts are not in dispute. Miss Greer’s sudden revealing of the fact that she and Mr Crale contemplate marriage, Amyas Crale’s confirmation of that, and Caroline Crale’s deep distress. None of these things depend on the evidence of one witness only. On the following morning there is a scene between husband and wife in the library. The first thing that is overheard is Caroline Crale saying, ‘You and your women!’ in a bitter voice and finally going on to say, ‘Someday I’ll kill you.’ Philip Blake overheard this from the hall. And Miss Greer overheard it from the terrace outside. She then heard Mr Crale ask his wife to be reasonable. And she heard Mrs Crale say, ‘Sooner than let you go to that girl - I’ll kill you.’ Soon after this, Amyas comes out and brusquely tells Elsa Greer to come down and pose for him. She gets a pullover and accompanies him.”

  “There is nothing so far that seems psychologically, incorrect. Everyone has behaved as he or she might be expected to behave. But we come now to something that is incongruous. Meredith Blake discovers his loss, telephones his brother. They meet down at the landing stage and they come up past the Battery Garden, where Caroline Crale is having a discussion with her husband on the subject of Angela’s going to school. Now, that does strike me as very odd. Husband and wife have a terrific scene, ending in a distinct threat on Caroline’s part, and yet, twenty minutes or so later, she goes down and starts a trivial domestic argument.”

  Poirot turned to Meredith Blake: “You speak in your narrative of certain words you overheard Crale say. These were: ‘It’s all settled - I’ll see to her packing.’ That is right?”

  Meredith Blake said, “It was something like that - yes.”

  Poirot turned to Philip Blake. “Is your recollection the same?”

  The latter frowned. “I didn’t remember it till you say so, but I do remember now. Something was said about packing!”

  “Said by Mr Crale - not Mrs Crale?”

  “Amyas said it. All I heard Caroline say was something about its being very hard on the girl. Anyway, what does all this matter? We all know Angela was off to school in a day or two.”

  Poirot said, “You do not see the force of my objection. Why should Amyas Crale pack for the girl? It is absurd, that! There was Mrs Crale, there was Miss Williams, there was a housemaid. It is a woman’s job to pack - not a man’s.”

  “What does it matter?” Philip Blake said impatiently. “It has nothing to do with the crime.”

  “You think not? For me, it was the first point that struck me as suggestive. And it is immediately followed by another. Mrs Crale, a desperate woman, broken hearted, who has threatened her husband a short while before and who is certainly contemplating either suicide or murder, now offers in the most amicable manner to bring her husband down some iced beer.”

  Meredith Blake said slowly, “That isn’t odd if she was contemplating murder. Then, surely, it is just what she would do. Dissimulate!”

  “You think so? She has decided to poison her husband; she has already got the poison. Her husband keeps a supply of beer down in the Battery Garden. Surely, if she has any intelligence at all she will put the poison in one of those bottles at a moment when there is no one about.” Meredith Blake objected. “She couldn’t have done that. Somebody else might have drunk it.”

  “Yes, Elsa Greer. Do you tell me that having made up her mind to murder her husband, Caroline Crale would have scruples against killing the girl, too?

  “But let us not argue the point. Let us confine ourselves to facts. Caroline Crale says she will send her husband down some iced beer. She goes up to the house, fetches a bottle from the conservatory, where it was kept, and takes it down to him. She pours it out and gives it to him. Amyas Crale drinks it off and says, ‘Everything tastes foul today.’

  “Mrs Crale goes up again to the house. She has lunch and appears much as usual. It has been said of her that she looks a little worried and preoccupied. That does not help us, for there is no criterion of behaviour for a murderer. There are calm murderers and excited murderers. “After lunch she goes down again to the Battery. She discovers her husband dead, and does, shall we say, the obviously expected things. She registers emotion and she sends the governess to telephone for a doctor. We now come to a fact which has previously not been known.”

  He looked at Miss Williams. “You do not object?”

  Miss Williams was rather pale. She said, “I did not pledge you to secrecy.”

  Quietly, but with telling effect, Poirot recounted what the governess had seen. Elsa Dittisham moved her position. She stared at the drab little woman in the big chair. She said incredulously, “You actually saw her do that?”

  Philip Blake sprang up. “But that settles it!” he shouted. “That settles it once and for all.”

  Hercule Poirot looked at him mildly. He said, “Not necessarily.”

  Angela Warren said sharply, “I don’t believe it.” There was a quick, hostile glint in the glance she shot at the little governess. Meredith Blake was pulling at his moustache, his face dismayed. Alone, Miss Williams remained undisturbed. She sat very upright and there was a spot of colour in each check. She said, “That is what I saw.”

  Poirot said slowly, “There is, of course, only your word for it…”

  “There is only my word for it.” The indomitable grey eyes met his. “I am not accustomed, M. Poirot, to having my word doubted.”

  Hercule Poirot bowed his head. He said, “I do not doubt your word, Miss Williams. What you saw took place exactly as you say it did, and because of what you saw I realized that Caroline Crale was not guilty - could not possibly be guilty.”

  For the first time, that tall, anxious-faced young man, John Rattery, spoke. He said, “I’d be interested to know why you say that, M. Poirot.” Poirot turned to him.

  “Certainly. I will tell you. What did Miss Williams see? She saw Caroline Crale very carefully and anxiously wiping off fingerprints and subsequently imposing her dead husband’s fingerprints on the beer bottle. On the beer bottle, mar
k. But the coniine was in the glass – not in the bottle. The police found no traces of coniine in the bottle. There had never been any coniine in the bottle. And Caroline Crale didn’t know that.

  “She, who is supposed to have poisoned her husband, didn’t know how he had been poisoned. She thought the poison was in the bottle.”

  Meredith objected. “But why -”

  Poirot interrupted him in a flash: “Yes - why? Why did Caroline Crale try so desperately to establish the theory of suicide. The answer is - must be - quite simple. Because she knew who had poisoned him and she was willing to do anything - endure anything - rather than let that person be suspected. There is not far to go now. Who could that person be? Would she have shielded Philip Blake? Or Meredith? Or Elsa Greer? Or Cecilia Williams? No, there is only one person whom she would be willing to protect at all costs.”

  He paused. “Miss Warren, if you have brought your sister’s last letter with you, I should like to read it aloud.”

  “Angela Warren said, ‘No.’

  “But, Miss Warren -”

  Angela got up. Her voice rang out, cold as steel. “I realize very well what you are suggesting. You are saying - are you not? - that I killed Amyas Crale and that my sister knew it. I deny that allegation utterly.”

  Poirot said, “The letter”

  “That letter was meant for my eyes alone.”

  Poirot looked to where the two youngest people in the room stood together.

  Carla Lemarchant said, “Please, Aunt Angela, won’t you do as M. Poirot asks?”

  Angela Warren said bitterly, “Really, Carla! Have you no sense of decency? She was your mother - you -”

  Carla’s voice rang out clear and fierce.

  “Yes, she was my mother. That’s why I’ve a right to ask you. I’m speaking for her. I want that letter read.”

  Slowly Angela Warren took out the letter from her bag and handed it to Poirot. She said bitterly, “I wish I had never shown it to you.” Turning away from them she stood looking out of the window. As Hercule Poirot read aloud Caroline Crale’s last letter, the shadows were deepening in the corners of the room. Carla had a sudden feeling of someone in the room, gathering shape, listening, breathing, waiting. She thought: “She’s here - my mother’s here. Caroline - Caroline Crale is here in this room!”