I leaned over the bed, but the broken sounds conveyed no sort of meaning to me. I thought I caught the word “hand,” but in what connection it was used I could not tell. Then it came again, and this time I heard another word, the word “Largo.” I stared in amazement, as the possible juxtaposition of the two suggested itself to me.
“Handel’s Largo?” I queried.
The Chinaman’s eyelids flickered rapidly, as though in assent, and he added another Italian word, the word “carrozza.” Two or three more words of murmured Italian came to my ears, and then he fell back abruptly.
The doctor pushed me aside. It was all over. The man was dead.
I went out into the air again thoroughly bewildered.
“Handel’s Largo,” and a “carrozza.” If I remembered rightly, a carrozza was a carriage. What possible meaning could lie behind those simple words? The man was a Chinaman, not an Italian, why should he speak in Italian? Surely, if he were indeed Ingles’s servant, he must know English? The whole thing was profoundly mystifying. I puzzled over it all the way home. Oh, if only Poirot had been there to solve the problem with his lightning ingenuity!
I let myself in with my latchkey and went slowly up to my room. A letter was lying on the table, and I tore it open carelessly enough. But in a minute I stood rooted to the ground whilst I read.
It was a communication from a firm of solicitors.
Dear Sir (it ran)—As instructed by our late client, M. Hercule
Poirot, we forward you the enclosed letter. This letter was placed in our hands a week before his death, with instructions that in the event of his demise, it should be sent to you at a certain date after his death.
Yours faithfully, etc.
I turned the enclosed missive over and over. It was undoubtably from Poirot. I knew that familiar writing only too well. With a heavy heart, yet a certain eagerness, I tore it open.
Mon Cher Ami (it began)—When you receive this I shall be no more. Do not shed tears about me, but follow my orders. Immediately upon receipt of this, return to South America. Do not be pigheaded about this. It is not for sentimental reasons that I bid you undertake the journey. It is necessary. It is part of the plan of Hercule Poirot! To say more is unnecessary, to anyone who has the acute intelligence of my friend Hastings.
A bas the Big Four! I salute you, my friend, from beyond the grave.
Ever thine,
Hercule Poirot
I read and reread this astonishing communication. One thing was evident. The amazing man had so provided for every eventuality that even his own death did not upset the sequence of his plans! Mine was to be the active part—his the directing genius. Doubtless I should find full instructions awaiting me beyond the seas. In the meantime my enemies, convinced that I was obeying their warning, would cease to trouble their heads about me. I could return, unsuspected, and work havoc in their midst.
There was now nothing to hinder my immediate departure. I sent off cables, booked my passage, and one week later found me embarking in the Ansonia, en route for Buenos Aires.
Just as the boat left the quay, a steward brought me a note. It had been given him, so he explained, by a big gentleman in a fur coat who had left the boat last thing before the gangway planks were lifted.
I opened it. It was terse and to the point.
“You are wise,” it ran. It was signed with a big figure 4.
I could afford to smile to myself!
The sea was not too choppy. I enjoyed a passable dinner, made up my mind as to the majority of my fellow passengers, and had a rubber or two of bridge. Then I turned in and slept like a log as I always do on board ship.
I was awakened by feeling myself persistently shaken. Dazed and bewildered, I saw that one of the ship’s officers was standing over me. He gave a sigh of relief as I sat up.
“Thank the Lord I’ve got you awake at last. I’ve had no end of a job. Do you always sleep like that?”
“What’s the matter?” I asked, still bewildered and not fully awake. “Is there anything wrong with the ship?”
“I expect you know what’s the matter better than I do,” he replied drily. “Special instructions from the Admiralty. There’s a destroyer waiting to take you off.”
“What?” I cried. “In midocean?”
“It seems a most mysterious affair, but that’s not my business. They’ve sent a young fellow aboard who is to take your place, and we are all sworn to secrecy. Will you get up and dress?”
Utterly unable to conceal my amazement I did as I was told. A boat was lowered, and I was conveyed aboard the destroyer. There I was received courteously, but got no further information. The commander’s instructions were to land me at a certain spot on the Belgian coast. There his knowledge and responsibility ended.
The whole thing was like a dream. The one idea I held to firmly was that all this must be part of Poirot’s plan. I must simply go forward blindly, trusting in my dead friend.
I was duly landed at the spot indicated. There a motor was waiting, and soon I was rapidly whirling across the flat Flemish plains. I slept that night at a small hotel in Brussels. The next day we went on again. The country became wooded and hilly. I realized that we were penetrating into the Ardennes, and I suddenly remembered Poirot’s saying that he had a brother who lived at Spa.
But we did not go to Spa itself. We left the main road and wound into the leafy fastnesses of the hills, till we reached a little hamlet, and an isolated white villa high on the hillside. Here the car stopped in front of the green door of the villa.
The door opened as I alighted. An elderly manservant stood in the doorway bowing.
“M. le Capitaine Hastings?” he said in French. “M. le Capitaine is expected. If he will follow me.”
He led the way across the hall, and flung open a door at the back, standing aside to let me pass in.
I blinked a little, for the room faced west and the afternoon sun was pouring in. Then my vision cleared and I saw a figure waiting to welcome me with outstretched hands.
It was—oh, impossible, it couldn’t be—but yes!
“Poirot!” I cried, and for once did not attempt to evade the embrace with which he overwhelmed me.
“But yes, but yes, it is indeed I! Not so easy to kill Hercule Poirot!”
“But Poirot—why?”
“A ruse de guerre, my friend, a ruse de guerre. All is now ready for our grand coup.”
“But you might have told me!”
“No, Hastings, I could not. Never, never, in a thousand years, could you have acted the part at the funeral. As it was, it was perfect. It could not fail to carry conviction to the Big Four.”
“But what I’ve been through—”
“Do not think me too unfeeling. I carried out the deception partly for your sake. I was willing to risk my own life, but I had qualms about continually risking yours. So, after the explosion, I have an idea of great brilliancy. The good Ridgeway, he enables me to carry it out. I am dead, you will return to South America. But, mon ami, that is just what you would not do. In the end I have to arrange a solicitor’s letter, and a long rigmarole. But, at all events, here you are—that is the great thing. And now we lie here—perdus—till the moment comes for the last grand coup—the final overthrowing of the Big Four.”
Seventeen
NUMBER FOUR WINS A TRICK
From our quiet retreat in the Ardennes we watched the progress of affairs in the great world. We were plentifully supplied with newspapers, and every day Poirot received a bulky envelope, evidently containing some kind of report. He never showed these reports to me, but I could usually tell from his manner whether their contents had been satisfactory or otherwise. He never wavered in his belief that our present plan was the only one likely to be crowned by success.
“As a minor point, Hastings,” he remarked one day, “I was in continual fear of your death lying at my door. And that rendered me nervous—like a cat upon the jumps, as you say. But now I am well satisfied. Even
if they discover that the Captain Hastings who landed in South America is an impostor (and I do not think they will discover it, they are not likely to send an agent out there who knows you personally), they will only believe that you are trying to circumvent them in some clever manner of your own, and will pay no serious attention to discovering your whereabouts. Of the one vital fact, my supposed death, they are thoroughly convinced. They will go ahead and mature their plans.”
“And then?” I asked eagerly.
“And then, mon ami, grand resurrection of Hercule Poirot! At the eleventh hour I reappear, throw all into confusion, and achieve the supreme victory in my own unique manner!”
I realized that Poirot’s vanity was of the case-hardened variety which could withstand all attacks. I reminded him that once or twice the honours of the game had lain with our adversaries. But I might have known that it was impossible to diminish Hercule Poirot’s enthusiasm for his own methods.
“See you, Hastings, it is like the little trick that you play with the cards. You have seen it without doubt? You take the four knaves, you divide them, one on top of the pack, one underneath, and so on—you cut and you shuffle, and there they are all together again. That is my object. So far I have been contending, now against one of the Big Four, now against another. But let me get them all together, like the four knaves in the pack of cards, and then, with one coup, I destroy them all!”
“And how do you propose to get them all together?” I asked.