And although that derisive patronizing attitude was exactly the one which Hercule Poirot had aimed at inducing, nevertheless he found himself annoyed by it.
This man, this successful man of affairs, was unimpressed by Hercule Poirot! It was a scandal.
“I am gratified,” said Poirot untruly, “that I am so well known to you. My success, let me tell you, has been founded on the psychology—the eternal why? of human behaviour. That, Mr. Blake, is what interests the world in crime today. It used to be romance. Famous crimes were retold from one angle only—the love story connected with them. Nowadays it is very different. People read with interest that Dr. Crippen murdered his wife because she was a big bouncing woman and he was little and insignificant and therefore she made him feel inferior. They read of some famous woman criminal that she killed because she’d been snubbed by her father when she was three years old. It is, as I say, the why of crime that interests nowadays.”
Philip Blake said, with a slight yawn:
“The why of most crimes is obvious enough, I should say. Usually money.”
Poirot cried:
“Ah, but my dear sir, the why must never be obvious. That is the whole point!”
“And that’s where you come in?”
“And that, as you say, is where I come in! It is proposed to rewrite the stories of certain bygone crimes—from the psychological angle. Psychology in crime, it is my speciality. I have accepted the commission.”
Philip Blake grinned.
“Pretty lucrative, I suppose?”
“I hope so—I certainly hope so.”
“Congratulations. Now, perhaps, you’ll tell me where I come in?”
“Most certainly. The Crale case, Monsieur.”
Phillip Blake did not look startled. But he looked thoughtful. He said:
“Yes, of course, the Crale case….”
Hercule Poirot said anxiously:
“It is not displeasing to you, Mr. Blake?”
“Oh, as to that.” Philip Blake shrugged his shoulders. “It’s no use resenting a thing that you’ve no power to stop. The trial of Caroline Crale is public property. Anyone can go ahead and write it up. It’s no use my objecting. In a way—I don’t mind telling you—I do dislike it a good deal. Amyas Crale was one of my best friends. I’m sorry the whole unsavoury business has to be raked up again. But these things happen.”
“You are a philosopher, Mr. Blake.”
“No, no. I just know enough not to start kicking against the pricks. I dare say you’ll do it less offensively than many others.”
“I hope, at least, to write with delicacy and good taste,” said Poirot.
Philip Blake gave a loud guffaw but without any real amusement. “Makes me chuckle to hear you say that.”
“I assure you, Mr. Blake, I am really interested. It is not just a matter of money with me. I genuinely want to recreate the past, to feel and see the events that took place, to see behind the obvious and to visualize the thoughts and feelings of the actors in the drama.”
Philip Blake said:
“I don’t know that there was much subtlety about it. It was a pretty obvious business. Crude female jealousy, that was all there was to it.”
“It would interest me enormously, Mr. Blake, if I could have your own reactions to the affair.”
Philip Blake said with sudden heat, his face deepening in colour.
“Reactions! Reactions! Don’t speak so pedantically. I didn’t just stand there and react! You don’t seem to understand that my friend—my friend, I tell you, had been killed—poisoned! And that if I’d acted quicker I could have saved him.”
“How do you make that out, Mr. Blake?”
“Like this. I take it that you’ve already read up the facts of the case?” Poirot nodded. “Very well. Now on that morning my brother Meredith called me up. He was in a pretty good stew. One of his Hell brews was missing—and it was a fairly deadly Hell brew. What did I do? I told him to come along and we’d talk it over. Decide what was best to be done. ‘Decide what was best.’ It beats me now how I could have been such a hesitating fool! I ought to have realized that there was no time to lose. I ought to have gone to Amyas straight away and warned him. I ought to have said: ‘Caroline’s pinched one of Meredith’s patent poisons, and you and Elsa had better look out for yourselves.’”
Blake got up. He strode up and down in his excitement.
“Good God, man. Do you suppose I haven’t gone over it in my mind again and again? I knew. I had the chance to save him—and I dallied about—waiting for Meredith! Why hadn’t I the sense to realize that Caroline wasn’t going to have any qualms or hesitancies. She’d taken that stuff to use—and, by God, she’d used it at the very first opportunity. She wouldn’t wait till Meredith discovered his loss. I knew—of course I knew—that Amyas was in deadly danger—and I did nothing!”
“I think you reproach yourself unduly, Monsieur. You had not much time—”
The other interrupted him:
“Time? I had plenty of time. Any amount of courses open to me. I could have gone to Amyas, as I say—but there was the chance, of course, that he wouldn’t believe me. Amyas wasn’t the sort of man who’d believe easily in his own danger. He’d have scoffed at the notion. And he never thoroughly understood the sort of devil Caroline was. But I could have gone to her. I could have said: ‘I know what you’re up to. I know what you’re planning to do. But if Amyas or Elsa die of coniine poisoning, you’ll be hanged by your neck!’ That would have stopped her. Or I might have rung up the police. Oh! there were things that could have been done—and instead, I let myself be influenced by Meredith’s slow, cautious methods. ‘We must be sure—talk it over—make quite certain who could have taken it…’ Damned old fool—never made a quick decision in his life! A good thing for him he was the eldest son and has an estate to live on. If he’d ever tried to make money he’d have lost every penny he had.”
Poirot asked:
“You had no doubt yourself who had taken the poison?”
“Of course not. I knew at once it must be Caroline. You see, I knew Caroline very well.”
Poirot said:
“That is very interesting. I want to know, Mr. Blake, what kind of a woman Caroline Crale was?”
Philip Blake said sharply:
“She wasn’t the injured innocent people thought she was at the time of the trial!”
“What was she, then?”
Blake sat down again. He said seriously:
“Would you really like to know?”
“I would like to know very much indeed.”
“Caroline was a rotter. She was a rotter through and through. Mind you, she had charm. She had that kind of sweetness of manner that deceives people utterly. She had a frail, helpless look about her that appealed to people’s chivalry. Sometimes, when I’ve read a bit of history, I think Mary Queen of Scots must have been a bit like her. Always sweet and unfortunate and magnetic—and actually a cold calculating woman, a scheming woman who planned the murder of Darnley and got away with it. Caroline was like that—a cold, calculating planner. And she had a wicked temper.
“I don’t know whether they’ve told you—it isn’t a vital point of the trial, but it shows her up—what she did to her baby sister? She was jealous, you know. Her mother had married again, and all the notice and affection went to little Angela. Caroline couldn’t stand that. She tried to kill the baby with a crowbar—smash its head in. Luckily the blow wasn’t fatal. But it was a pretty ghastly thing to do.”
“Yes, indeed.”
“Well, that was the real Caroline. She had to be first. That was the thing she simply could not stand—not being first. And there was a cold, egotistical devil in her that was capable of being stirred to murderous lengths.
“She appeared impulsive, you know, but she was really calculating. When she stayed at Alderbury as a girl, she gave us all the once over and made her plans. She’d no money of her own. I was never in the running—a youn
ger son with his way to make. (Funny, that, I could probably buy up Meredith and Crale, if he’d lived, nowadays!) She considered Meredith for a bit, but she finally fixed on Amyas. Amyas would have Alderbury, and though he wouldn’t have much money with it, she realized that his talent as a painter was something quite out of the way. She gambled on his being not only a genius but a financial success as well.
“And she won. Recognition came to Amyas early. He wasn’t a fashionable painter exactly—but his genius was recognized and his pictures were bought. Have you seen any of his paintings? There’s one here. Come and look at it.”
He led the way into the dining room and pointed to the left-hand wall.
“There you are. That’s Amyas.”
Poirot looked in silence. It came to him with fresh amazement that a man could so imbue a conventional subject with his own particular magic. A vase of roses on a polished mahogany table. That hoary old set piece. How then did Amyas Crale contrive to make his roses flame and burn with a riotous almost obscene life. The polished wood of the table trembled and took on sentient life. How explain the excitement the picture roused? For it was exciting. The proportions of the table would have distressed Superintendent Hale, he would have complained that no known roses were precisely of that shape or colour. And afterwards he would have gone about wondering vaguely why the roses he saw were unsatisfactory, and round mahogany tables would have annoyed him for no known reason.
Poirot gave a little sigh.
He murmured:
“Yes—it is all there.”
Blake led the way back. He mumbled:
“Never have understood anything about art myself. Don’t know why I like looking at that thing so much, but I do. It’s—oh, damn it all, it’s good.”
Poirot nodded emphatically.
Blake offered his guest a cigarette and lit one himself. He said:
“And that’s the man—the man who painted those roses—the man who painted the ‘Woman with a Cocktail Shaker’—the man who painted that amazing painful ‘Nativity,’ that’s the man who was cut short in his prime, deprived of his vivid forceful life all because of a vindictive mean-natured woman!”
He paused:
“You’ll say that I’m bitter—that I’m unduly prejudiced against Caroline. She had charm—I’ve felt it. But I knew—I always knew—the real woman behind. And that woman, Mr. Poirot, was evil. She was cruel and malignant and a grabber!”
“And yet it has been told me that Mrs. Crale put up with many hard things in her married life?”
“Yes, and didn’t she let everybody know about it! Always the martyr! Poor old Amyas. His married life was one long hell—or rather it would have been if it hadn’t been for his exceptional quality. His art, you see—he always had that. It was an escape. When he was painting he didn’t care, he shook off Caroline and her nagging and all the ceaseless rows and quarrels. They were endless, you know. Not a week passed without a thundering row over one thing or another. She enjoyed it. Having rows stimulated her, I believe. It was an outlet. She could say all the hard bitter stinging things she wanted to say. She’d positively purr after one of those set-tos—go off looking as sleek and well-fed as a cat. But it took it out of him. He wanted peace—rest—a quiet life. Of course a man like that ought never to marry—he isn’t out for domesticity. A man like Crale should have affairs but no binding ties. They’re bound to chafe him.”
“He confided in you?”
“Well—he knew that I was a pretty devoted pal. He let me see things. He didn’t complain. He wasn’t that kind of man. Sometimes he’d say, ‘Damn all women.’ Or he’d say, ‘Never get married, old boy. Wait for hell till after this life.’”
“You knew about his attachment to Miss Greer?”
“Oh yes—at least I saw it coming on. He told me he’d met a marvellous girl. She was different, he said, from anything or anyone he’d ever met before. Not that I paid much attention to that. Amyas was always meeting one woman or other who was ‘different.’ Usually a month later he’d stare at you if you mentioned them, and wonder who you were talking about! But this Elsa Greer really was different. I realized that when I came down to Alderbury to stay. She’d got him, you know, hooked him good and proper. The poor mutt fairly ate out of her hand.”
“You did not like Elsa Greer either?”
“No, I didn’t like her. She was definitely a predatory creature. She, too, wanted to own Crale body and soul. But I think, all the same, that she’d have been better for him than Caroline. She might conceivably have let him alone once she was sure of him. Or she might have got tired of him and moved on to someone else. The best thing for Amyas would have been to be quite free of female entanglements.”
“But that, it would seem, was not to his taste?”
Philip Blake said with a sigh:
“The damned fool was always getting himself involved with some woman or other. And yet, in a way, women really meant very little to him. The only two women who really made any impression on him at all in his life were Caroline and Elsa.”
Poirot said:
“Was he fond of the child?”
“Angela? Oh! we all liked Angela. She was such a sport. She was always game for anything. What a life she led that wretched governess of hers. Yes, Amyas liked Angela all right—but sometimes she went too far and then he used to get really mad with her—and then Caroline would step in—Caro was always on Angela’s side and that would finish Amyas altogether. He hated it when Caro sided with Angela against him. There was a bit of jealousy all round, you know. Amyas was jealous of the way Caro always put Angela first and would do anything for her. And Angela was jealous of Amyas and rebelled against his overbearing ways. It was his decision that she should go to school that autumn, and she was furious about it. Not, I think, because she didn’t like the idea of school, she really rather wanted to go, I believe—but it was Amyas’s high-handed way of settling it all offhand that infuriated her. She played all sorts of tricks on him in revenge. Once she put ten slugs in his bed. On the whole, I think Amyas was right. It was time she got some discipline. Miss Williams was very efficient, but even she confessed that Angela was getting too much for her.”
He paused. Poirot said:
“When I asked if Amyas was fond of the child—I referred to his own child, his daughter?”
“Oh, you mean little Carla? Yes, she was a great pet. He enjoyed playing with her when he was in the mood. But his affection for her wouldn’t have deterred him from marrying Elsa, if that’s what you mean. He hadn’t that kind of feeling for her.”
“Was Caroline Crale very devoted to the child?” A kind of spasm contorted Philip’s face. He said:
“I can’t say that she wasn’t a good mother. No, I can’t say that. It’s the one thing—”
“Yes, Mr. Blake?”
Philip said slowly and painfully:
“It’s the one thing I really—regret—in this affair. The thought of that child. Such a tragic background to her young life. They sent her abroad to Amyas’s cousin and her husband. I hope—I sincerely hope—they managed to keep the truth from her.”
Poirot shook his head. He said:
“The truth, Mr. Blake, has a habit of making itself known. Even after many years.”
The stockbroker murmured: “I wonder.”
Poirot went on:
“In the interests of truth, Mr. Blake, I am going to ask you to do something.”
“What is it?”
“I am going to beg that you will write me out an exact account of what happened on those days at Alderbury. That is to say, I am going to ask you to write me out a full account of the murder and its attendant circumstances.”
“But, my dear fellow, after all this time? I should be hopelessly inaccurate.”
“Not necessarily.”
“Surely.”
“No, for one thing, with the passage of time, the mind retains a hold on essentials and rejects superficial matters.”
“Ho! You
mean a mere broad outline?”
“Not at all. I mean a detailed conscientious account of each event as it occurred, and every conversation you can remember.”
“And supposing I remember them wrong?”
“You can give the wording at least to the best of your reflection. There may be gaps, but that cannot be helped.”
Blake looked at him curiously.
“But what’s the idea? The police files will give you the whole thing far more accurately.”
“No, Mr. Blake. We are speaking now from the psychological point of view. I do not want bare facts. I want your own selections of facts. Time and your memory are responsible for that selection. There may have been things done, words spoken, that I should seek for in vain in the police files. Things and words that you never mentioned because, maybe, you judged them irrelevant, or because you preferred not to repeat them.”
Blake said sharply:
“Is this account of mine for publication?”
“Certainly not. It is for my eye only. To assist me to draw my own deductions.”
“And you won’t quote from it without my consent?”
“Certainly not.”
“Hm,” said Philip Blake. “I’m a very busy man, Mr. Poirot.”
“I appreciate that there will be time and trouble involved. I should be happy to agree to a—reasonable fee.”
There was a moment’s pause. Then Philip Blake said suddenly:
“No, if I do it—I’ll do it for nothing.”
“And you will do it?”
Philip said warningly:
“Remember, I can’t vouch for the accuracy of my memory.”
“That is perfectly understood.”
“Then I think,” said Philip Blake, “that I should like to do it. I feel I owe it—in a way—to Amyas Crale.”
Seven
THIS LITTLE PIG STAYED AT HOME
Hercule Poirot was not a man to neglect details.
His advance towards Meredith Blake was carefully thought out. Meredith Blake was, he already felt sure, a very different proposition from Philip Blake. Rush tactics would not succeed here. The assault must be leisurely.