Elephants Can Remember

by Agatha Christie

  ‘Ah yes. The mademoiselle.’

  ‘Yes, you see being French I thought – I thought perhaps she would tell you things that she knew and wouldn’t wish to speak about to other people.’

  ‘Ah. And the other name you mentioned?’

  ‘Zélie. The same sort of thing, you see. A mademoiselle. Maddy was there, I think, for about two or three years and then, later, she went back to France, or Switzerland I think it was, and this other one came. Younger than Maddy was and we didn’t call her Maddy. Celia called her Zélie. She was very young, pretty and great fun. We were all frightfully fond of her. She played games with us and we all loved her. The family did. And General Ravenscroft was very taken with her. They used to play games together, picquet, you know and lots of things.’

  ‘And Lady Ravenscroft?’

  ‘Oh she was devoted to Zélie too, and Zélie was devoted to her. That’s why she came back again after she’d left.’

  ‘Came back?’

  ‘Yes, when Lady Ravenscroft was ill, and had been in hospital, Zélie came back and was sort of companion to her and looked after her. I don’t know, but I believe, I think, I’m almost sure that she was there when it – the tragedy – happened. And so, you see she’d know – what really happened.’

  ‘And you know her address? You know where she is now?’

  ‘Yes. I know where she is. I’ve got her address. I’ve got both their addresses. I thought perhaps you could go and see her, or both of them. I know it’s a lot to ask –’ He broke off.

  Poirot looked at him for some minutes. Then he said: ‘Yes, it is a possibility – certainly – a possibility.’

  Book 2

  Long Shadows

  Chapter 11

  Superintendent Garroway and Poirot Compare Notes

  Superintendent Garroway looked across the table at Poirot. His eyes twinkled. At his side George delivered a whisky and soda. Passing on to Poirot, he put down a glass filled with a dark purple liquid.

  ‘What’s your tipple?’ said Superintendent Garroway, with some interest.

  ‘A syrup of black currant,’ said Poirot. ‘Well, well,’ said Superintendent Garroway, ‘everyone to their own taste. What was it Spence told me? He told me you used to drink something called a tisane, wasn’t it? What’s that, a variant of French piano or something?’

  ‘No,’ said Poirot, ‘it’s useful for reducing fevers.’ ‘Ah. Invalid dope of some kind.’ He drank from his glass. ‘Well,’ he said, ‘here’s to suicide!’

  ‘It was suicide?’ Poirot asked.

  ‘What else can it be?’ said Superintendent Garroway. ‘The things you wanted to know!’ He shook his head. His smile grew more pronounced.

  ‘I am sorry,’ said Poirot, ‘to have troubled you so much. I am like the animal or the child in one of your stories by Mr Kipling. I Suffer from Insatiable Curiosity.’

  ‘Insatiable curiosity,’ said Superintendent Garroway. ‘Nice stories he wrote, Kipling. Knew his stuff, too. They told me once that that man could go for one short tour round a destroyer and know more about it than one of the top engineers in the Royal Navy.’

  ‘Alas,’ said Hercule Poirot. ‘I do not know everything. Therefore, you see, I have to ask questions. I am afraid that I sent you rather a long list of questions.’

  ‘What intrigued me,’ said Superintendent Garroway, ‘is the way you jumped from one thing to another. Psychiatrists, doctors’ reports, how money was left, who had money, who got money. Who expected money and didn’t get money, particulars of ladies’ hairdressing, wigs, name of the supplier of wigs, charming rose-coloured cardboard boxes they came in by the way.’

  ‘You knew all these things,’ said Poirot. ‘That has amazed me, I can assure you.’

  ‘Ah well, it was a puzzling case and of course we made full notes on the subject. None of this was any good to us but we kept the files and it was all there if one wanted to look for it.’

  He pushed a piece of paper across the table.

  ‘Here you are. Hairdressers. Bond Street. Expensive firm. Eugene and Rosentelle was the name of it. They moved later. Same firm but went into business in Sloane Street. Here’s the address, but it’s a Pet Shop now. Two of their assistants retired some years ago now, but they were the top assistants serving people then, and Lady Ravenscroft was on their list. Rosentelle lives in Cheltenham now. Still in the same line of business – Calls herself a Hair Stylist – That’s the up-to-date term – and you add Beautician. Same man, different hat, as one used to say in my young days.’

  ‘Ah-ha?’ said Poirot.

  ‘Why ah-ha?’ asked Garroway.

  ‘I am immensely obliged to you,’ said Hercule Poirot. ‘You have presented me with an idea. How strange it is the way ideas arrive into one’s head.’

  ‘You’ve too many ideas in your head already,’ said the Superintendent, ‘that’s one of your troubles – you don’t need any more. Now then, I’ve checked up as well as I could on the family history – nothing much there. Alistair Ravenscroft was of Scottish extraction. Father was a clergyman – two uncles in the Army – both quite distinguished. Married Margaret Preston-Grey – well-born girl – presented at Court and all the rest of it. No family scandals. You were quite right about her being one of twin sisters. Don’t know where you picked that up – Dorothea and Margaret Preston-Grey – known colloquially as Dolly and Molly. The Preston-Greys lived at Hatters Green in Sussex. Identical twins – usual kind of history of that kind of twin. Cut their first tooth the same day – both got scarlet fever the same month – wore the same kind of clothes – fell in love with the same kind of man – got married about the same time – both husbands in the Army. Family doctor who attended the family when they were young died some years ago, so there’s nothing of interest to be got out of him. There was an early tragedy, though, connected with one of them.’

  ‘Lady Ravenscroft?’

  ‘No, the other one – she married a Captain Jarrow – had two children; the younger one, a boy of four, was knocked down by a wheelbarrow or some kind of child’s garden toy – or a spade or a child’s hoe. Hit him on his head and he fell into an artificial pond or something and drowned. Apparently it was the older child, a girl of nine who did it. They were playing together and quarrelled, as children do. Doesn’t seem much doubt, but there was another story. Someone said the mother did it – got angry and hit him – and someone else said it was a woman who lived next door who hit him. Don’t suppose it’s of any interest to you – no bearing on a suicide pact entered into by the mother’s sister and her husband years after.’

  ‘No,’ said Poirot, ‘it does not seem to. But one likes to know background.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Garroway, ‘as I told you, one has to look into the past. I can’t say we’d thought of looking into the past as long ago as this. I mean, as I’ve said, all this was some years before the suicide.’

  ‘Were there any proceedings at the time?’

  ‘Yes. I managed to look up the case. Accounts of it. Newspaper accounts. Various things. There were some doubts about it, you know. The mother was badly affected. She broke down completely and had to go into hospital. They do say she was never the same woman again afterwards.’

  ‘But they thought she had done it?’

  ‘Well, that’s what the doctor thought. There was no direct evidence, you understand. She said that she had seen this happen from a window, that she’d seen the older child, the girl, hit the boy and push him in. But her account – well, I don’t think they believed it at the time. She talked so wildly.’

  ‘There was, I suppose, some psychiatric evidence?’

  ‘Yes. She went to a nursing home or hospital of some kind, she was definitely a mental case. She was a good long time in one or two different establishments having treatment, I believe under the care of one of the specialists from St Andrew’s Hospital in London. In the end she was pronounced cured, and released after about three years, and sent home to lead a normal life with her family.’
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  ‘And she was then quite normal?’

  ‘She was always neurotic, I believe –’

  ‘Where was she at the time of the suicide? Was she staying with the Ravenscrofts?’

  ‘No – she had died nearly three weeks before that. She was staying with them at Overcliffe when it happened. It seemed again to be an illustration of the identical twin destiny. She walked in her sleep – had suffered from that over a period of years, it seems. She had had one or two minor accidents that way. Sometimes she took too many tranquilizers and that resulted in her walking round the house and sometimes out of it during the night. She was following a path along the cliff edge, lost her footing and fell over the cliff. Killed immediately – they didn’t find her until the next day. Her sister, Lady Ravenscroft, was terribly upset. They were very devoted to each other and she had to be taken to hospital suffering from shock.’

  ‘Could this tragic accident have led to the Ravenscrofts’ suicide some weeks later?’

  ‘There was never a suggestion of such a thing.’

  ‘Odd things happen with twins as you say – Lady Ravenscroft might have killed herself because of the link between her and her twin sister. Then the husband may have shot himself because possibly he felt guilty in some way –’

  Superintendent Garroway said: ‘You have too many ideas, Poirot. Alistair Ravenscroft couldn’t have had an affair with his sister-in-law without everyone knowing about it. There was nothing of that kind – if that’s what you’ve been imagining.’

  The telephone rang – Poirot rose and answered it. It was Mrs Oliver.

  ‘Monsieur Poirot, can you come to tea or sherry tomorrow? I have got Celia coming – and later on the bossy woman. That’s what you wanted, isn’t it?’

  Poirot said it was just what he wanted.

  ‘I’ve got to dash now,’ said Mrs Oliver, ‘Going to meet an old War Horse – provided by my elephant No. 1, Julia Carstairs. I think she’s got his name wrong – she always does – but I hope she’s got his address right.’

  Chapter 12

  Celia Meets Hercule Poirot

  ‘Well, madame,’ said Poirot, ‘and how did you fare with Sir Hugo Foster?’

  ‘To begin with his name wasn’t Foster – it was Fothergill. Trust Julia to get a name wrong. She’s always doing it.’

  ‘So elephants are not always reliable in the names they remember?’

  ‘Don’t talk of elephants – I’ve finished with elephants.’

  ‘And your War Horse?’

  ‘Quite an old pet – but useless as a source of information. Obsessed by some people called Barnet who did have a child killed in an accident in Malaya. But nothing to do with the Ravenscrofts. I tell you I’ve finished with elephants –’

  ‘Madame, you have been most persevering, most noble.’

  ‘Celia is coming along in about half an hour’s time. You wanted to meet her, didn’t you? I’ve told her that you are – well, helping me in this matter. Or would you rather she came to see you?’

  ‘No,’ said Poirot, ‘I think I should like her to come in the way you have arranged.’

  ‘I don’t suppose she’ll stay very long. If we get rid of her in about an hour, that would be all right, just to think over things a bit, and then Mrs Burton-Cox is coming.’

  ‘Ah yes. That will be interesting. Yes, that will bevery interesting.’

  Mrs Oliver sighed. ‘Oh dear, it’s a pity, though, isn’t it?’ She said again, ‘We do have too much material, don’t we?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Poirot. ‘We do not know what we are looking for. All we know of still is, in all probability, the double suicide of a married couple who lived quiet and happy lives together. And what have we got to show for cause, for reason? We’ve gone forward and back to the right, to the left, to the west, to the east.’

  ‘Quite right,’ said Mrs Oliver. ‘Everywhere. We haven’t been to the North Pole yet,’ she added.

  ‘Nor to the South Pole,’ said Poirot. ‘So what is there, when it all comes to it?’

  ‘Various things,’ said Poirot. ‘I have made here a list. Do you want to read it?’

  Mrs Oliver came over and sat beside him and looked over his shoulder.

  ‘Wigs,’ she said, pointing to the first item. ‘Why wigs first?’

  ‘Four wigs,’ said Poirot, ‘seem to be interesting. Interesting and rather difficult to solve.’

  ‘I believe the shop she got her wigs from has gone out of the trade now. People go to quite different places for wigs and they’re not wearing so many as they did just then. People used to wear wigs to go abroad. You know, because it saves bother in travelling.’

  ‘Yes, yes,’ said Poirot, ‘we will do what we can with wigs. Anyway, that is one thing that interests me. And then there are other stories. Stories of mental disturbance in the family. Stories of a twin sister who was mentally disturbed and spent a good many years of her life in a mental home.’

  ‘It doesn’t seem to lead anywhere,’ said Mrs Oliver. ‘I mean to say, I suppose she could have come and shot the two of them, but I don’t really see why.’

  ‘No,’ said Poirot, ‘the fingerprints on the revolver were definitely only the fingerprints of General Ravenscroft and his wife, I understand. Then there are stories of a child, a child in Malaya was murdered or attacked, possibly by this twin sister of Lady Ravenscroft. Possibly by some quite different woman – possibly by an amah or a servant. Point two. You know a little more about money.’

  ‘Where does money come into it?’ said Mrs Oliver, in some surprise.

  ‘It does not come into it,’ said Poirot. ‘That is what is so interesting. Money usually comes in. Money someone got as a result of that suicide. Money lost as a resultof it. Money somewhere causing difficulties, causing trouble, causing covetousness and desire. It is difficult, that. Difficult to see. There does not seem to have been any large amount of money anywhere. There are various stories of love-affairs, women who were attractive to the husband, men who were attractive to the wife. An affair on one side or the other could have led to suicide or to murder. It very often does. Then we come to what at the moment inclines me to the most interest. That is why I am so anxious to meet Mrs Burton-Cox.’

  ‘Oh. That awful woman. I don’t see why you think she’s important. All she did was to be a noseyparker and want me to find out things.’

  ‘Yes, but why did she want you to find out things? It seems to me very odd, that. It seems to me that that is something that one has to find out about. She is the link, you see.’

  ‘The link?’

  ‘Yes. We do not know what the link was, where it was, how it was. All we know is that she wants desperately to learn more about this suicide. Being a link, she connects both with your godchild, Celia Ravenscroft, and with the son who is not her son.’

  ‘What do you mean – not her son?’

  ‘He is an adopted son,’ said Poirot. ‘A son she adopted because her own son died.’

  ‘How did her own child die? Why? When?’

  ‘All these things I asked myself. She could be a link, a link of emotion, a wish for revenge through hatred, through some love-affair. At any rate I must see her. I must make up my mind about her. Yes, I cannot help but think that is very important.’

  There was a ring at the bell and Mrs Oliver went out of the room to answer it.

  ‘This, I think, could be Celia,’ she said. ‘You’re sure it’s all right?’

  ‘By me, yes,’ said Poirot. ‘By her also, I hope.

  ’Mrs Oliver came back a few minutes later. Celia Ravenscroft was with her. She had a doubtful, suspicious look.

  ‘I don’t know,’ she said, ‘if I –’ She stopped, staring at Hercule Poirot.

  ‘I want to introduce you,’ said Mrs Oliver, ‘to someone who is helping me, and I hope is helping you also. That is, helping you in what you want to know and to find out. This is Monsieur Hercule Poirot. He has special genius in finding out things.’

  ‘Oh,’ said Ce
lia.

  She looked very doubtfully at the egg-shaped head, the monstrous moustaches and the small stature.

  ‘I think,’ she said, rather doubtfully, ‘that I have heard of him.’

  Hercule Poirot stopped himself with a slight effort from saying firmly ‘Most people have heard of me.’ It was not quite as true as it used to be because many people who had heard of Hercule Poirot and known him, were now reposing with suitable memorial stones over them, in churchyards. He said,

  ‘Sit down, mademoiselle. I will tell you this much about myself. That when I start an investigation I pursue it to the end. I will bring to light the truth and if it is, shall we say, truly the truth that you want, then I will deliver that knowledge to you. But it may be that you want reassuring. That is not the same thing as the truth. I can find various aspects that might reassure you. Will that be enough? If so, do not ask for more.’

  Celia sat down in the chair he had pushed towards her, and looked at him rather earnestly. Then she said,

  ‘You don’t think I’d care for the truth, is that it?’

  ‘I think,’ said Poirot, ‘that the truth might be – a shock, a sorrow, and it might be that you would have said “Why did I not leave all this behind? Why did I ask for knowledge? It is painful knowledge about which I can do nothing helpful or hopeful.” It is a double suicide by a father and a mother that I – well, we’ll admit it – that I loved. It is not a disadvantage to love a mother and father.’

  ‘It seems to be considered so nowadays occasionally,’ said Mrs Oliver. ‘New article of belief, shall we say.’

  ‘That’s the way I’ve been living,’ said Celia. ‘Beginning to wonder, you know. Catching on to odd things that people said sometimes. People who looked at me rather pityingly. But more than that. With curiosity as well. One begins to find out, you know, things about people, I mean. People you meet, people you know, people who used to know your family. I don’t want this life. I want . . . you think I don’t really want it but I do – I want truth. I’m able to deal with truth. Just tell me something.’