One, Two, Buckle My Shoe Part 21

He was not at all happy.

IV.

He reached Mr Barnes' House at Ealing at 6.45. He remembered that Mr Barnes had called that a good time of day.

Mr Barnes was at work in his garden.

He said by way of greeting: 'We need rain, M. Poirot-need it badly.'

He looked thoughtfully at his guest. He said: 'You don't look very well, M. Poirot?'

'Sometimes,' said Hercule Poirot, 'I do not like the things I have to do.'

Mr Barnes nodded his head sympathetically.

He said: 'I know.'

Hercule Poirot looked vaguely round at the neat arrangement of the small beds. He murmured: 'It is well-planned, this garden. Everything is to scale. It is small but exact.'

Mr Barnes said: 'When you have only a small place you've got to make the most of it. You can't afford to make mistakes in the planning.'

Hercule Poirot nodded.

Barnes went on: 'I see you've got your man?'

'Frank Carter?'

'Yes. I'm rather surprised, really.'

'You did not think that it was, so to speak, a private murder?'

'No. Frankly I didn't. What with Amberiotis and Alistair Blunt-I made sure that it was one of these Espionage or Counter-Espionage mix-ups.'

'That is the view you expounded to me at our first meeting.'

'I know. I was quite sure of it at the time.'

Poirot said slowly: 'But you were wrong.'

'Yes. Don't rub it in. The trouble is, one goes by one's own experience. I've been mixed up in that sort of thing so much I suppose I'm inclined to see it everywhere.'

Poirot said: 'You have observed in your time a conjurer offer a card, have you not? What is called-forcing a card?'

'Yes, of course.'

'That is what was done here. Every time that one thinks of a private reason for Morley's death, hey presto-the card is forced on one. Amberiotis, Alistair Blunt, the unsettled state of politics-of the country-' He shrugged his shoulders. 'As for you, Mr Barnes, you did more to mislead me than anybody.'

'Oh, I say, Poirot, I'm sorry. I suppose that's true.'

'You were in a position toknow , you see. So your words carried weight.'

'Well-I believed what I said. That's the only apology I can make.'

He paused and sighed.

'And all the time, it was a purely private motive?'

'Exactly. It has taken me a long time to see the reason for the murder-although I had one very definite piece of luck.'

'What was that?'

'A fragment of conversation. Really a very illuminating fragment if only I had had the sense to realize its significance at the time.'

Mr Barnes scratched his nose thoughtfully with the trowel. A small piece of earth adhered to the side of his nose.

'Being rather cryptic, aren't you?' he asked genially.

Hercule Poirot shrugged his shoulders. He said: 'I am, perhaps, aggrieved that you were not more frank with me.'

'I?'

'Yes.'

'My dear fellow-I never had the least idea of Carter's guilt. As far as I knew, he'd left the house long before Morley was killed. I suppose now they've found he didn't leave when he said he did?'

Poirot said: 'Carter was in the house at twenty-six minutes past twelve. He actuallysaw the murderer.'

'Then Carter didn't-'

'Carter saw the murderer, I tell you!'

Mr Barnes said: 'Did he recognize him?'

Slowly Hercule Poirot shook his head.

Seventeen, Eighteen, Maids in Waiting

I.

On the following day Hercule Poirot spent some hours with a theatrical agent of his acquaintance. In the afternoon he went to Oxford. On the day after that he drove down to the country-it was late when he returned.

He had telephoned before he left to make an appointment with Mr Alistair Blunt for that same evening. It was half-past nine when he reached the Gothic House.

Alistair Blunt was alone in his library when Poirot was shown in. He looked an eager question at his visitor as he shook hands.

He said: 'Well?'

Slowly, Hercule Poirot nodded his head.

Blunt looked at him in almost incredulous appreciation.

'Have you found her?'

'Yes. Yes, I have found her.'

He sat down. And he sighed.

Alistair Blunt said: 'You are tired?'

'Yes. I am tired. And it is not pretty-what I have to tell you.'

Blunt said: 'Is she dead?'

'That depends,' said Hercule Poirot slowly, 'on how you like to look at it.'

Blunt frowned.

He said: 'My dear man, a personmust be dead or alive. Miss Sainsbury Seale must be one or the other!'

'Ah, but who is Miss Sainsbury Seale?'

Alistair Blunt said: 'You don't mean that-that there isn't any such person?'

'Oh no, no. There was such a person. She lived in Calcutta. She taught elocution. She busied herself with good works. She came to England in theMaharanah -the same boat in which Mr Amberiotis travelled. Although they were not in the same cla.s.s, he helped her over something-some fuss about her luggage. He was, it would seem, a kindly man in little ways. And sometimes, M. Blunt, kindness is repaid in an unexpected fas.h.i.+on. It was so, you know, with M. Amberiotis. He chanced to meet the lady again in the streets of London. He was feeling expansive, he good naturedly invited her to lunch with him at the Savoy. An unexpected treat for her. And an unexpected windfall for M. Amberiotis! For his kindness was not pre-meditated-he had no idea that this faded, middle-aged lady was going to present him with the equivalent of a gold mine. But nevertheless, that is what she did, though she never suspected the fact herself.

'She was never, you see, of the first order of intelligence. A good, well-meaning soul, but the brain, I should say, of a hen.'

Blunt said: 'Then it wasn't she who killed the Chapman woman?'

Poirot said slowly: 'It is difficult to know just how to present the matter. I shall begin, I think, where the matter began for me. With ashoe !'

Blunt said blankly: 'With ashoe ?'

Hercule Poirot nodded.

'Yes, a buckled shoe. I came out from myseance at the dentist's and as I stood on the steps of 58, Queen Charlotte Street, a taxi stopped outside, the door opened and a woman's foot prepared to descend. I am a man who notices a woman's foot and ankle. It was a well-shaped foot, with a good ankle and an expensive stocking, but I did not like the shoe. It was a new, s.h.i.+ning patent leather shoe with a large ornate buckle. Not chic-not at all chic!

'And whilst I was observing this, the rest of the lady came into sight-and frankly it was a disappointment-a middle-aged lady without charm and badly dressed.'

'Miss Sainsbury Seale?'

'Precisely. As she descended acontretemps occurred-she caught the buckle of her shoe in the door and it was wrenched off. I picked it up and returned it to her. That was all. The incident was closed.

'Later, on that same day, I went with Chief Inspector j.a.pp to interview the lady. (She had not as yet sewn on the buckle, by the way.) 'On that same evening, Miss Sainsbury Seale walked out of her hotel and vanished. That, shall we say, is the end of Part One.

'Part Two began when Chief Inspector j.a.pp summoned me to King Leopold Mansions. There was a fur chest in a flat there, and in that fur chest there had been found a body. I went into the room, I walked up to the chest-and the first thing I saw was a shabby buckled shoe!'

'Well?'

'You have not appreciated the point. It was ashabby shoe-awell-worn shoe. But you see, Miss Sainsbury Seale had come to King Leopold Mansions on the evening of that same day-the day of Mr Morley's murder. In the morning the shoes werenew shoes-in the evening they wereold shoes. One does not wear out a pair of shoes in a day, you comprehend.'

Alistair Blunt said without much interest: 'She could have two pairs of shoes, I suppose?'

'Ah,but that was not so . For j.a.pp and I had gone up to her room at the Glengowrie Court and had looked at all her possessions-and there was no pair of buckled shoes there. She might have had an old pair of shoes, yes. She might have changed into them after a tiring day to go out in the evening, yes? But if so, the other pair would have been at the hotel. It was curious, you will admit?'

'I can't see that it is important.'

'No, not important. Not at all important. But one does not like things that one cannot explain. I stood by the fur chest and I looked at the shoe-the buckle had recently been sewn on by hand. I will confess that I then had a moment of doubt-of myself. Yes, I said to myself, Hercule Poirot, you were a little light-headed perhaps this morning. You saw the world through rosy spectacles. Even the old shoes looked like new ones to you?'

'Perhaps thatwas the explanation?'

'But no, it wasnot . My eyes do not deceive me! To continue, I studied the dead body of this woman and I did not like what I saw. Why had the face been wantonly, deliberately smashed and rendered unrecognizable?'

Alistair Blunt moved restlessly. He said: 'Must we go over that again? We know-'

Hercule Poirot said firmly: 'It is necessary. I have to take you over the steps that led me at last to the truth. I said to myself: "Something is wrong here. Here is a dead woman in the clothes of Miss Sainsbury Seale (except, perhaps, the shoes?) and with the handbag of Miss Sainsbury Seale-but why is her face unrecognizable? Is it, perhaps, because the face is not the face of Miss Sainsbury Seale?" And immediately I begin to put together what I have heard of the appearance of theother woman-the woman to whom the flat belongs, and I ask myself-Might it not perhaps bethis other woman who lies dead here? I go then and look at the other woman's bedroom. I try to picture to myself what sort of woman she is. In superficial appearance, very different to the other. Smart, showily dressed, very much made up. But in essentials,not unlike . Hair, build, age...But there is one difference. Mrs Albert Chapman took a five in shoes. Miss Sainsbury Seale, I knew, took a 10-inch stocking-that is to say she would take at least a 6 in shoes. Mrs Chapman, then, had smaller feet than Miss Sainsbury Seale. I went back to the body. If my half-formed idea was right, and the body was that of Mrs Chapman wearing Miss Sainsbury Seale's clothes,then the shoes should be too big . I took hold of one. But it was not loose. It fitted tightly. That looked as though itwere the body of Miss Sainsbury Seale after all! But in that case,why was the face disfigured? Her ident.i.ty was already proved by the handbag, which could easily have been removed, but which hadnot been removed.

'It was a puzzle-a tangle. In desperation I seized on Mrs Chapman's address book-a dentist was the only person who could prove definitely who the dead woman was-or was not. By coincidence, Mrs Chapman's dentist was Mr Morley. Morley was dead, but identification was still possible. You know the result. The body was identified in the Coroner's Court by Mr Morley's successor as that of Mrs Albert Chapman.'

Blunt was fidgeting with some impatience, but Poirot took no notice. He went on: 'I was left now with a psychological problem. What sort of a woman was Mabelle Sainsbury Seale?

There were two answers to that question. The first was the obvious one borne out by her whole life in India and by the testimony of her personal friends. That depicted her as an earnest, conscientious, slightly stupid woman. Was there another Miss Sainsbury Seale? Apparently there was. There was a woman who had lunched with a well-known foreign agent, who had accosted you in the street and claimed to be a close friend of your wife's (a statement that was almost certainly untrue), a woman who had left a man's house very shortly before a murder had been committed, a woman who had visited another woman on the evening when in all probability that other woman had been murdered, and who had since disappeared although she must be aware that the police force of England was looking for her. Were all these actions compatible with the character which her friends gave her? It would seem that they were not. Therefore, if Miss Sainsbury Seale werenot the good, amiable creature she seemed, then it would appear that she was quite possibly a cold-blooded murderess or almost certainly an accomplice after the fact.

'I had one more criterion-my own personal impression. I had talked to Mabelle Sainsbury Seale myself. How had she struckme ? And that, M. Blunt, was the most difficult question to answer of all. Everything that she said, her way of talking, her manner, her gestures, all were perfectly in accord with her given character.But they were equally in accord with a clever actress playing a part . And, after all, Mabelle Sainsbury Seale had started life as an actress.

'I had been much impressed by a conversation I had had with Mr Barnes of Ealing who had also been a patient at 58, Queen Charlotte Street on that particular day. His theory, expressed very forcibly, was that the deaths of Morley and of Amberiotis were only incidental, so to speak-that the intended victim was you .'

Alistair Blunt said: 'Oh, come now-that's a bit far-fetched.'

'Is it, M. Blunt? Is it not true that at this moment there are various groups of people to whom it is vital that you should be-removed, shall we say? Shall be no longer capable of exerting your influence?'

Blunt said: 'Oh yes, that's true enough. But why mix up this business of Morley's death with that?'

Poirot said: 'Because there is a certain-how shall I put it?-lavishness about the case-Expense is no object-human life is no object. Yes, there is a recklessness, a lavishness-that points to abig crime!'

'You don't think Morley shot himself because of a mistake?'

'I never thought so-not for a minute. No, Morley was murdered, Amberiotis was murdered, an unrecognizable woman was murdered-Why? For some big stake. Barnes' theory was that somebody had tried to bribe Morley or his partner to put you out of the way.'

Alistair Blunt said sharply: 'Nonsense!'