“Ah,” said Battle. “I’m beginning to see what you’re driving at.”
“Precisely. As I told you the other day, I place my cards on the table. When you recounted her history the other day, and Mrs. Oliver made her startling announcement, my mind went at once to an important point. The murder could not have been committed for gain, since Miss Meredith had still to earn her living after it happened. Why, then? I considered Miss Meredith’s temperament as it appeared superficially. A rather timid young girl, poor, but well-dressed, fond of pretty things … The temperament, is it not, of a thief, rather than a murderer. And I asked immediately if Mrs. Eldon had been a tidy woman. You replied that no, she had not been tidy. I formed a hypothesis. Supposing that Anne Meredith was a girl with a weak streak in her character—the kind of girl who takes little things from the big shops. Supposing that, poor, and yet loving pretty things, she helped herself once or twice to things from her employer. A brooch, perhaps, an odd half crown or two, a string of beads. Mrs. Eldon, careless, untidy, would put down these disappearances to her own carelessness. She would not suspect her gentle little mother’s help. But, now, suppose a different type of employer—an employer who did notice—accused Anne Meredith of theft. That would be a possible motive for murder. As I said the other evening, Miss Meredith would only commit a murder through fear. She knows that her employer will be able to prove the theft. There is only one thing that can save her: her employer must die. And so she changes the bottles, and Mrs. Benson dies—ironically enough convinced that the mistake is her own, and not suspecting for a minute that the cowed, frightened girl has had a hand in it.”
“It’s possible,” said Superintendent Battle. “It’s only a hypothesis, but it’s possible.”
“It is a little more than possible, my friend—it is also probable. For this afternoon I laid a little trap nicely baited—the real trap—after the sham one had been circumvented. If what I suspect is true, Anne Meredith will never, never be able to resist a really expensive pair of stockings! I ask her to aid me. I let her know carefully that I am not sure exactly how many stockings there are, I go out of the room, leaving her alone—and the result, my friend, is that I have now seventeen pairs of stockings, instead of nineteen, and that two pairs have gone away in Anne Meredith’s handbag.”
“Whew!” Superintendent Battle whistled. “What a risk to take, though.”
“Pas du tout. What does she think I suspect her of? Murder. What is the risk, then, in stealing a pair, or two pairs, of silk stockings? I am not looking for a thief. And, besides, the thief, or the kleptomaniac, is always the same—convinced that she can get away with it.”
Battle nodded his head.
“That’s true enough. Incredibly stupid. The pitcher goes to the well time after time. Well, I think between us we’ve arrived fairly clearly at the truth. Anne Meredith was caught stealing. Anne Meredith changed a bottle from one shelf to another. We know that was murder—but I’m damned if we could ever prove it. Successful crime No. 2. Roberts gets away with it. Anne Meredith gets away with it. But what about Shaitana? Did Anne Meredith kill Shaitana?”
He remained silent for a moment or two, then he shook his head.
“It doesn’t work out right,” he said reluctantly. “She’s not one to take a risk. Change a couple of bottles, yes. She knew no one could fasten that on her. It was absolutely safe—because anyone might have done it! Of course, it mightn’t have worked. Mrs. Benson might have noticed before she drank the stuff, or she mightn’t have died from it. It was what I call a hopeful kind of murder. It might work or it mightn’t. Actually, it did. But Shaitana was a very different pair of shoes. That was deliberate, audacious, purposeful murder.”
Poirot nodded his head.
“I agree with you. The two types of crime are not the same.”
Battle rubbed his nose.
“So that seems to wipe her out as far as he’s concerned. Roberts and the girl, both crossed off our list. What about Despard? Any luck with the Luxmore woman?”
Poirot narrated his adventures of the preceding afternoon.
Battle grinned.
“I know that type. You can’t disentangle what they remember from what they invent.”
Poirot went on. He described Despard’s visit, and the story the latter had told.
“Believe him?” Battle asked abruptly.
“Yes, I do.”
Battle sighed.
“So do I. Not the type to shoot a man because he wanted the man’s wife. Anyway, what’s wrong with the divorce court? Everyone flocks there. And he’s not a professional man; it wouldn’t ruin him, or anything like that. No, I’m of the opinion that our late lamented Mr. Shaitana struck a snag there. Murderer No. 3. wasn’t a murderer, after all.”
He looked at Poirot.
“That leaves—”
“Mrs. Lorrimer,” said Poirot.
The telephone rang. Poirot got up and answered it. He spoke a few words, waited, spoke again. Then he hung up the receiver and returned to Battle.
His face was very grave.
“That was Mrs. Lorrimer speaking,” he said. “She wants me to come round and see her—now.”
He and Battle looked at each other. The latter shook his head slowly.
“Am I wrong?” he said. “Or were you expecting something of the kind?”
“I wondered,” said Hercule Poirot. “That was all. I wondered.”
“You’d better get along,” said Battle. “Perhaps you’ll manage to get at the truth at last.”
Twenty-five
MRS. LORRIMER SPEAKS
The day was not a bright one, and Mrs. Lorrimer’s room seemed rather dark and cheerless. She herself had a grey look, and seemed much older than she had done on the occasion of Poirot’s last visit.
She greeted him with her usual smiling assurance.
“It is very nice of you to come so promptly, M. Poirot. You are a busy man, I know.”
“At your service, madame,” said Poirot with a little bow.
Mrs. Lorrimer pressed the bell by the fireplace.
“We will have tea brought in. I don’t know what you feel about it, but I always think it’s a mistake to rush straight into confidences without any decent paving of the way.”
“There are to be confidences, then, madame?”
Mrs. Lorrimer did not answer, for at that moment her maid answered the bell. When she had received the order and gone again, Mrs. Lorrimer said dryly:
“You said, if you remember, when you were last here, that you would come if I sent for you. You had an idea, I think, of the reason that should prompt me to send.”
There was no more just then. Tea was brought. Mrs. Lorrimer dispensed it, talking intelligently on various topics of the day.
Taking advantage of a pause, Poirot remarked:
“I hear you and little Mademoiselle Meredith had tea together the other day.”
“We did. Have you seen her lately?”
“This very afternoon.”
“She is in London, then, or have you been down to Wallingford?”
“No. She and her friend were so amiable as to pay me a visit.”
“Ah, the friend. I have not met her.”
Poirot said, smiling a little:
“This murder—it has made for me a rapprochement. You and Mademoiselle Meredith have tea together. Major Despard, he, too, cultivates Miss Meredith’s acquaintance. The Dr. Roberts, he is perhaps the only one out of it.”
“I saw him out at bridge the other day,” said Mrs. Lorrimer. “He seemed quite his usual cheerful self.”
“As fond of bridge as ever?”
“Yes—still making the most outrageous bids—and very often getting away with it.”
She was silent for a moment or two, then said:
“Have you seen Superintendent Battle lately?”
“Also this afternoon. He was with me when you telephoned.”
Shading her face from the fire with one hand, Mrs. Lorrimer a
sked:
“How is he getting on?”
Poirot said gravely:
“He is not very rapid, the good Battle. He gets there slowly, but he does get there in the end, madame.”
“I wonder.” Her lips curved in a faintly ironical smile.
She went on:
“He has paid me quite a lot of attention. He has delved, I think, into my past history right back to my girlhood. He has interviewed my friends, and chatted to my servants—the ones I have now and the ones who have been with me in former years. What he hoped to find I do not know, but he certainly did not find it. He might as well have accepted what I told him. It was the truth. I knew Mr. Shaitana very slightly. I met him at Luxor, as I said, and our acquaintanceship was never more than an acquaintanceship. Superintendent Battle will not be able to get away from these facts.”
“Perhaps not,” said Poirot.
“And you, M. Poirot? Have not you made any inquiries?”
“About you, madame?”
“That is what I meant.”
Slowly the little man shook his head.
“It would have been to no avail.”
“Just exactly what do you mean by that, M. Poirot?”
“I will be quite frank, madame. I have realized from the beginning that, of the four persons in Mr. Shaitana’s room that night, the one with the best brains, with the coolest, most logical head, was you, madame. If I had to lay money on the chance of one of those four planning a murder and getting away with it successfully, it is on you that I should place my money.”
Mrs. Lorrimer’s brows rose.
“Am I expected to feel flattered?” she asked drily.
Poirot went on, without paying any attention to her interruption:
“For a crime to be successful, it is usually necessary to think every detail of it out beforehand. All possible contingencies must be taken into account. The timing must be accurate. The placing must be scrupulously correct. Dr. Roberts might bungle a crime through haste and overconfidence; Major Despard would probably be too prudent to commit one; Miss Meredith might lose her head and give herself away. You, madame, would do none of these things. You would be clearheaded and cool, you are sufficiently resolute of character, and could be sufficiently obsessed with an idea to the extent of overruling prudence, you are not the kind of woman to lose her head.”
Mrs. Lorrimer sat silent for a minute or two, a curious smile playing round her lips. At last she said:
“So that is what you think of me, M. Poirot. That I am the kind of woman to commit an ideal murder.”
“At least you have the amiability not to resent the idea.”
“I find it very interesting. So it is your idea that I am the only person who could successfully have murdered Shaitana?”
Poirot said slowly:
“There is a difficulty there, madame.”
“Really? Do tell me.”
“You may have noticed that I said just now a phrase something like this: ‘For a crime to be successful it is usually necessary to plan every detail of it carefully beforehand.’ ‘Usually’ is the word to which I want to draw your attention. For there is another type of successful crime. Have you ever said suddenly to anyone, ‘Throw a stone and see if you can hit that tree,’ and the person obeys quickly, without thinking—and surprisingly often he does hit the tree? But when he comes to repeat the throw it is not so easy—for he has begun to think. ‘So hard—no harder—a little more to the right—to the left.’ The first was an almost unconscious action, the body obeying the mind as the body of an animal does. Eh bien, madame, there is a type of crime like that, a crime committed on the spur of the moment—an inspiration—a flash of genius—without time to pause or think. And that, madame, was the kind of crime that killed Mr. Shaitana. A sudden dire necessity, a flash of inspiration, rapid execution.”
He shook his head.
“And that, madame, is not your type of crime at all. If you killed Mr. Shaitana, it should have been a premeditated crime.”
“I see.” Her hand waved softly to and fro, keeping the heat of the fire from her face. “And, of course, it wasn’t a premeditated crime, so I couldn’t have killed him—eh, M. Poirot?”
Poirot bowed.
“That is right, madame.”
“And yet—” She leaned forward, her waving hand stopped. “I did kill Shaitana, M. Poirot….”
Twenty-six
THE TRUTH
There was a pause—a very long pause.
The room was growing dark. The firelight leaped and flickered.
Mrs. Lorrimer and Hercule Poirot looked not at each other, but at the fire. It was as though time was momentarily in abeyance.
Then Hercule Poirot sighed and stirred.
“So it was that—all the time … Why did you kill him, madame?”
“I think you know why, M. Poirot.”
“Because he knew something about you—something that had happened long ago?”
“Yes.”
“And that something was—another death, madame?”
She bowed her head.
Poirot said gently:
“Why did you tell me? What made you send for me today?”
“You told me once that I should do so someday.”
“Yes—that is, I hoped … I knew, madame, that there was only one way of learning the truth as far as you were concerned—and that was by your own free will. If you did not choose to speak, you would not do so, and you would never give yourself away. But there was a chance—that you yourself might wish to speak.”
Mrs. Lorrimer nodded.
“It was clever of you to foresee that—the weariness—the loneliness—”
Her voice died away.
Poirot looked at her curiously.
“So it has been like that? Yes, I can understand it might be….”
“Alone—quite alone,” said Mrs. Lorrimer. “No one knows what that means unless they have lived, as I have lived, with the knowledge of what one has done.”
Poirot said gently:
“Is it an impertinence, madame, or may I be permitted to offer my sympathy?”
She bent her head a little.
“Thank you, M. Poirot.”
There was another pause, then Poirot said, speaking in a slightly brisker tone:
“Am I to understand, madame, that you took the words Mr. Shaitana spoke at dinner as a direct menace aimed at you?”
She nodded.
“I realized at once that he was speaking so that one person should understand him. That person was myself. The reference to a woman’s weapon being poison was meant for me. He knew. I had suspected it once before. He had brought the conversation round to a certain famous trial, and I saw his eyes watching me. There was a kind of uncanny knowledge in them. But, of course, that night I was quite sure.”
“And you were sure, too, of his future intentions?”
Mrs. Lorrimer said drily:
“It was hardly likely that the presence of Superintendent Battle and yourself was an accident. I took it that Shaitana was going to advertise his own cleverness by pointing out to you both that he had discovered something that no one else had suspected.”
“How soon did you make up your mind to act, madame?”
Mrs. Lorrimer hesitated a little.
“It is difficult to remember exactly when the idea came into my mind,” she said. “I had noticed the dagger before going into dinner. When we returned to the drawing room I picked it up and slipped it into my sleeve. No one saw me do it. I made sure of that.”
“It would be dexterously done, I have no doubt, madame.”
“I made up my mind then exactly what I was going to do. I had only to carry it out. It was risky, perhaps, but I considered that it was worth trying.”
“That is your coolness, your successful weighing of chances, coming into play. Yes, I see that.”
“We started to play bridge,” continued Mrs. Lorrimer. Her voice cool and unemotional. “At last an opport
unity arose. I was dummy. I strolled across the room to the fireplace. Shaitana had dozed off to sleep. I looked over at the others. They were all intent on the game. I leant over and—and did it—”
Her voice shook just a little, but instantly it regained its cool aloofness.
“I spoke to him. It came into my head that that would make a kind of alibi for me. I made some remark about the fire, and then pretended he had answered me and went on again, saying something like: ‘I agree with you. I do not like radiators, either.’”
“He did not cry out at all?”
“No. I think he made a little grunt—that was all. It might have been taken for words from a distance.”
“And then?”
“And then I went back to the bridge table. The last trick was just being played.”
“And you sat down and resumed play?”
“Yes.”
“With sufficient interest in the game to be able to tell me nearly all the calling and the hands two days later?”
“Yes,” said Mrs. Lorrimer simply.
“Epatant!” said Hercule Poirot.
He leaned back in his chair. He nodded his head several times. Then, by way of a change, he shook it.
“But there is still something, madame, that I do not understand.”
“Yes?”
“It seems to me that there is some factor that I have missed. You are a woman who considers and weighs everything carefully. You decide that, for a certain reason, you will run an enormous risk. You do run it—successfully. And then, not two weeks later, you change your mind. Frankly, madame, that does not seem to me to ring true.”
A queer little smile twisted her lips.
“You are quite right, M. Poirot, there is one factor that you do not know. Did Miss Meredith tell you where she met me the other day?”
“It was, I think she said, near Mrs. Oliver’s flat.”
“I believe that is so. But I meant the actual name of the street. Anne Meredith met me in Harley Street.”
“Ah!” He looked at her attentively. “I begin to see.”