AgathaChristie-HalloweenParty Read online

  every time. There were more tigers, if you

  know what I mean. Far more tigers than

  could possibly happen. And elephants,

  too, for that matter. I'd known her before, too, telling tall stories."

  "Always to get attention?"

  "Aye, you're right there. She was a

  great one for getting attention."

  "Because a child told a tall story about

  a travel trip she never took," said Superintendent

  Spence, "you can't say that every

  tall tale she told was a lie."

  "It might not be," said Elspeth, "but

  I'd say the likelihood was that it usually

  would be."

  "So you think that if Joyce Reynolds

  came out with a tale that she'd seen a

  murder committed, you'd say she was

  102

  probably lying and you wouldn't believe

  the story was true?"

  "That's what I'd think," said Mrs.

  McKay.

  "You might be wrong," said her

  brother.

  "Yes," said Mrs. McKay. "Anyone may

  be wrong. It's like the old story of the boy

  who cried 'Wolf, wolf,' and he cried it

  once too often, when it was a real wolf,

  and nobody believed him, and so the wolf

  got him."

  "So you'd sum it up—"

  "I'd still say the probabilities are that

  she wasn't speaking the truth. But I'm a

  fair woman. She may have been. She may

  have seen something. Not quite so much

  as she said she saw, but something."

  "And so she got herself killed," said

  Superintendent Spence. "You've got to

  mind that, Elspeth. She got herself

  killed."

  "That's true enough," said Mrs.

  McKay. "And that's why I'm saying

  maybe I've misjudged her. And if so, I'm

  sorry. But ask anyone who knew her and

  they'll tell you that lies came natural to

  her. It was a party she was at, remember,

  103

  and she was excited. She'd want to make

  an effect."

  "Indeed, they didn't believe her," said

  Poirot.

  Elspeth McKay shook her head

  doubtfully.

  "Who could she have seen murdered?4'

  asked Poirot.

  He looked from brother to sister.

  "Nobody," said Mrs. McKay with

  decision.

  "There must have been deaths here,

  say, over the last three years."

  "Oh that, naturally," said Spence. "Just

  the usual—old folks or invalids or what

  you'd expect—or maybe a hit-and-run

  motorist—"

  "No unusual or unexpected deaths?"

  "Well—" Elspeth hesitated. "I

  mean—"

  Spence took over.

  "I've jotted a few names down here."

  He pushed the paper over to Poirot. "Save

  you a bit of trouble, asking questions

  around."

  "Are these suggested victims?"

  "Hardly as much as that. Say within the

  range of possibility."

  104

  Poirot read aloud.

  "Mrs. Llewellyn-Smythe. Charlotte

  Benfield. Janet White. Lesley Ferrier--"

  He broke off, looked across the table

  and repeated the first name. Mrs.

  LlewellynSmythe.

  "Could be," said Mrs. McKay. "Yes,

  you might have something there." She

  added a word that sounded like "opera".

  "Opera?" Poirot looked puzzled. He

  had heard of no opera.

  "Went off one night, she did," said

  Elspeth, "was never heard of again."

  "Mrs. LlewellynSmythe?"

  "No, no. The opera girl. She could have

  put something in the medicine easily

  enough. And she came into all the money, didn't she--or so she thought at the

  time?"

  Poirot looked at Spence for

  enlightenment.

  "And never been heard of since," said

  Mrs. McKay. "These foreign girls are all

  the same."

  The significance of the word "opera"

  came to Poirot.

  "An au pair girl," he said.

  "That's right. Lived with the old lady,

  105

  and a week or two after the old lady died, the au pair girl just disappeared."

  "Went off with some man, I'd say," said

  Spence.

  "Well, nobody knew of him if so," said

  Elspeth. "And there's usually plenty of

  talk about here. Usually know just who's

  going with who."

  "Did anybody think there had been

  anything wrong about Mrs. LlewellynSmythe's

  death?" asked Poirot.

  "No. She'd got heart trouble. Doctor

  attended her regularly."

  "But you headed your list of possible

  victims with her, my friend?"

  "Well, she was a rich woman, a very

  rich woman. Her death was not unexpected

  but it was sudden. I'd say offhand

  that Dr. Ferguson was surprised, even if

  only slightly surprised. I think he expected

  her to live longer. But doctors do have

  these surprises. She wasn't one to do as

  the doctor ordered. She'd been told not to

  overdo things, but she did exactly as she

  liked. For one thing, she was a passionate

  gardener, and that doesn't do heart cases

  any good."

  Elspeth McKay took up the tale.

  106

  "She came here when her health failed.

  She was living abroad before. She came

  here to be near her nephew and niece, Mr.

  and Mrs. Drake, and she bought the

  Quarry House. A big Victorian house

  which included a disused quarry which

  attracted her as having possibilities. She

  spent thousands of pounds on turning that

  quarry into a sunk garden or whatever

  they call the thing. Had a landscape

  gardener down from Wisley or one of these

  places to design it. Oh, I can tell you, it's

  something to look at."

  "I shall go and look at it," said Poirot.

  "Who knows—it might give me ideas."

  "Yes, I would go if I were you. It's well

  worth seeing."

  "And she was rich, you say?" said

  Poirot.

  "Widow of a big shipbuilder. She had

  packets of money."

  "Her death was not unexpected because

  she had a heart condition, but it was

  sudden," said Spence. "No doubts arose

  that it was due to anything but natural

  causes. Cardiac failure, or whatever the

  longer name is that doctors use. Coronary

  something."

  107

  "No question of an inquest ever arose?"

  Spence shook his head.

  "It has happened before," said Poirot.

  "An elderly woman told to be careful, not

  to run up and down stairs, not to do any

  intensive gardening, and so on and so on.

  But if you get an energetic woman who's

  been an enthusiastic gardener all her life

  and done as she liked in most ways, then

  she doesn't always treat these recommendations

  with due respect."

  "That's true enough. Mrs. LlewellynSmythe

  made a wo
nderful thing of the

  quarry--or rather, the landscape artist

  did. Three or four years they worked at

  it, he and his employer. She'd seen some

  garden, in Ireland I think it was, when

  she went on a National Trust tour visiting

  gardens. With that in her mind, they fairly

  transformed the place. Oh yes, it has to be

  seen to be believed."

  "Here is a natural death, then," said

  Poirot, "certified as such by the local

  doctor. Is that the same doctor who is here

  now? And whom I am shortly going to

  see?"

  "Dr. Ferguson--yes. He's a man of

  108

  about sixty, good at his job and well liked

  here."

  "But you suspect that her death might

  have been murder? For any other reasons

  than those that you've already given me?"

  "The opera girl, for one thing," said

  Elspeth.

  "Why?"

  "Well, she must have forged the Will.

  Who forged the Will if she didn't?"

  "You must have more to tell me," said

  Poirot. "What is all this about a forged

  Will?"

  "Well, there was a bit of fuss when it

  came to probating, or whatever you call it,

  the old lady's Will."

  "Was it a new Will?"

  "It was what they call—something that

  sounds like fish—a codi-a codicil."

  Elspeth looked at Poirot, who nodded.

  "She'd made Wills before," said

  Spence. "All much the same. Bequests to

  charities, legacies to old servants, but the

  bulk of her fortune always went to her

  nephew and his wife, who were her near

  relatives."

  "And this particular codicil?"

  "Left everything to the opera girl," said

  109

  Elspeth, "because of her devoted care and

  kindness. Something like that."

  'Tell me, then, more about the au pair girl."

  "She came from some country in the

  middle of Europe. Some long name."

  "How long had she been with the old

  lady?"

  "Just over a year."

  "You call her the old lady always. How

  old was she?"

  "Well in the sixties. Sixty-five or six, say."

  "That is not so very old," said Poirot

  feelingly.

  "Made several Wills, she had, by all

  accounts," said Elspeth. "As Bert has told

  you, all of them much the same. Leaving

  money to one or two charities and then

  perhaps she'd change the charities and

  some different souvenirs to old servants

  and all that. But the bulk of the money

  always went to her nephew and his wife, and I think some other old cousin who was

  dead, though, by the time she died. She

  left the bungalow she'd built to the landscape

  man, for him to live in as long as he

  liked, and some kind of income for which

  110

  he was to keep up the quarry gardem and

  let it be walked in by the public. Something

  like that."

  "I suppose the family claimed thiaat the

  balance of her mind had been distuirbed, that there had been undue influence?'"

  "I think probably it might have come to

  that," said Spence. "But the lawyers*, as I

  say, got on to the forgery sharply. Kt was

  not a very convincing forgery, apparently.

  They spotted it almost at once."

  "Things came to light to show tbiaat the

  opera girl could have done it quite eaasily,"

  said Elspeth. "You see, she wrote a great

  many of Mrs. Llewellyn-Smythe's lietters

  for her and it seems Mrs. LlewcellynSmythe

  had a great dislike of typed Idetters

  being sent to friends or anything like; that.

  If it wasn't a business letter, she'd ailways

  say 'write it in handwriting and makee it as

  much like mine as you can and sign itt with

  my name'. Mrs. Minden, the clesaning

  woman, heard her say that one day, sand I

  suppose the girl got used to doing itit and

  copying her employer's handwriting^ and

  then it came to her suddenly that she c could

  do this and get away with it. And t that's

  111

  how it all came about. But as I say, the

  lawyers were too sharp and spotted it."

  "Mrs. Llewellyn-Smythe's own

  lawyers?"

  "Yes. Fullerton, Harrison and Leadbetter.

  Very respectable firm in Medchester.

  They'd always done all her legal

  business for her. Anyway, they got experts

  on to it and questions were asked and the

  girl was asked questions and got the wind

  up. Just walked out one day leaving half

  her things behind her. They were

  preparing to take proceedings against her, but she didn't wait for that. She just got

  out. It's not so difficult, really, to get out

  of this country, if you do it in time. Why,

  you can go on day trips on the Continent

  without a passport, and if you've got a

  little arrangement with someone on the

  other side, things can be arranged long

  before there is any real hue and cry. She's

  probably gone back to her own country or

  changed her name or gone to friends."

  "But everyone thought that Mrs.

  Llewellyn-Smythe died a natural death?"

  asked Poirot.

  "Yes, I don't think there was ever any

  question of that. I only say it's possible

  112

  because, as I say, these things have

  happened before where the doctor has no

  suspicion. Supposing that girl Joyce had

  heard something, had heard the au pair girl giving medicines to Mrs. LlewellynSmythe, and the old lady saying 'this

  medicine tastes different to the usual one'.

  Or "this has got a bitter taste' or "it's

  peculiar'."

  "Anyone would think you'd been there

  listening to things yourself, Elspeth," said

  Superintendent Spence. "This is all your

  imagination."

  "When did she die?" said Poirot.

  "Morning, evening, indoors, out of doors, at home or away from home?"

  "Oh, at home. She'd come up from

  doing things in the garden one day, breathing rather heavily. She said she was

  very tired and she went to lie down on her

  bed. And to put it in one sentence, she

  never woke up. Which is all very natural, it seems, medically speaking."

  Poirot took out a little notebook. The page was already headed "Victims".

  Under, he wrote. "No. 1. suggested, Mrs.

  Llewellyn-Smythe." On the next pages of

  his book he wrote down the other names

  113

  that Spence had given him. He said, inquiringly:

  "Charlotte Benfield?"

  Spence replied promptly. "Sixteenyear-old

  shop assistant. Multiple head

  injuries. Found on a footpath near the

  Quarry Wood. Two young men came

  under suspicion. Both had walked out with

  her from time to time. No evidence."

  "They assisted the police in their

  inquiries?" asked Poirot.

  "As you say. It's the usual ph
rase. They

  didn't assist much. They were frightened.

  Told a few lies, contradicted themselves.

  They didn't carry conviction as likely

  murderers. But either of them might have

  been."

  "What were they like?"

  "Peter Gordon, twenty-one. Unemployed.

  Had had one or two jobs but never

  kept them. Lazy. Quite good-looking. Had

  been on probation once or twice for minor

  pilferings, things of that kind. No record

  before of violence. Was in with a rather

  nasty lot of likely young criminals, but

  usually managed to keep out of serious

  trouble."

  "And the other one?"

  114

  "Thomas Hudd. Twenty. Stammered.

  Shy. Neurotic. Wanted to be a teacher,

  but couldn't make the grade. Mother a

  widow. The doting mother type. Didn't

  encourage girl friends. Kept him as close

  to her apron-strings as she could. He had

  a job in a stationer's. Nothing criminal

  known against him, but a possibility

  psychologically, so it seems. The girl

  played him up a good deal. Jealousy a

  possible motive, but no evidence that we

  could prosecute on. Both of them had

  alibis. Hudd's was his mother's. She

  would have sworn to kingdom come that

  he was indoors with her all that evening,

  and nobody can say he wasn't or had seen

  him elsewhere or in the neighbourhood of

  the murder. Young Gordon was given an

  alibi by some of his less reputable friends.

  Not worth much, but you couldn't

  disprove it."

  "This happened when?"

  "Eighteen months ago."

  "And where?"

  "In a footpath in a field not far from

  Woodleigh Common."

  "Three quarters of a mile," said

  Elspeth.

  115

  "Near Joyce's house--the Reynolds' house?"

  "No, it was on the other side of the

  village."

  "It seems unlikely to have been the

  murder Joyce was talking about," said

  Poirot thoughtfully. "If you see a girl

  being bashed on the head by a young man

  you'd be likely to think of murder straight

  away. Not to wait for a year before you

  began to think it was murder."

  Poirot read another name.

  "Lesley Ferrier."

  Spence spoke again. "Lawyer's clerk, twenty-eight, employed by Messrs.

  Fullerton, Harrison and Leadbetter of

  Market Street, Medchester."

  "Those were Mrs. LlewellynSmythe's

  solicitors, I think you said."