‘Charles Vyse.’
‘But he only inherits the house.’
‘Yes—but he may not know that. Did he make Mademoiselle’s will for her? I think not. If so, it would be in his keeping, not “knocking around somewhere”, or whatever the phrase was that Mademoiselle used. So, you see, Hastings, it is quite probable that he knows nothing about that will. He may believe that she has never made a will and that, in that case, he will inherit as next of kin.’
‘You know,’ I said, ‘that really seems to me much more probable.’
‘That is your romantic mind, Hastings. The wicked solicitor. A familiar figure in fiction. If as well as being a solicitor he has an impassive face, it makes the matter almost certain. It is true that, in some ways, he is more in the picture than Madame. He would be more likely to know about the pistol and more likely to use one.’
‘And to send the boulder crashing down.’
‘Perhaps. Though, as I have told you, much can be done by leverage. And the fact that the boulder was dislodged at the wrong minute, and consequently missed Mademoiselle, is more suggestive of feminine agency. The idea of tampering with the interior of a car seems masculine in conception—though many women are as good mechanics as men nowadays. On the other hand, there are one or two gaps in the theory against M. Vyse.’
‘Such as—?’
‘He is less likely to have known of the engagement than Madame. And there is another point. His action was rather precipitate.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Well, until last night there was no certitude that Seton was dead. To act rashly, without due assurance, seems very uncharacteristic of the legal mind.’
‘Yes,’ I said. ‘A woman would jump to conclusions.’
‘Exactly. Ce que femme veut, Dieu veut. That is the attitude.’
‘It’s really amazing the way Nick has escaped. It seems almost incredible.’
And suddenly I remembered the tone in Frederica’s voice as she had said: ‘Nick bears a charmed life.’
I shivered a little.
‘Yes,’ said Poirot, thoughtfully. ‘And I can take no credit to myself. Which is humiliating.’
‘Providence,’ I murmured.
‘Ah! mon ami, I would not put on the shoulders of the good God the burden of men’s wrongdoing. You say that in your Sunday morning voice of thankfulness—without reflecting that what you are really saying is that le bon Dieu has killed Miss Maggie Buckley.’
‘Really, Poirot!’
‘Really, my friend! But I will not sit back and say “le bon Dieu has arranged everything, I will not interfere”. Because I am convinced that le bon Dieu created Hercule Poirot for the express purpose of interfering. It is my métier.’
We had been slowly ascending the zig-zag path up the cliff. It was at this juncture that we passed through the little gate into the grounds of End House.
‘Pouf!’ said Poirot. ‘That ascent is a steep one. I am hot. My moustaches are limp. Yes, as I was saying just now, I am on the side of the innocent. I am on the side of Mademoiselle Nick because she was attacked. I am on the side of Mademoiselle Maggie because she has been killed.’
‘And you are against Frederica Rice and Charles Vyse.’
‘No, no, Hastings. I keep an open mind. I say only that at the moment one of those two is indicated. Chut!’
We had come out on the strip of lawn by the house, and a man was driving a mowing machine. He had a long, stupid face and lack-lustre eyes. Beside him was asmall boy of about ten, ugly but intelligent-looking.
It crossed my mind that we had not heard the mowing machine in action, but I presumed that the gardener was not overworking himself. He had probably been resting from his labours, and had sprung into action on hearing our voices approaching.
‘Good morning,’ said Poirot.
‘Good morning, sir.’
‘You are the gardener, I suppose. The husband of Madame who works in the house.’
‘He’s my Dad,’ said the small boy.
‘That’s right, sir,’ said the man. ‘You’ll be the foreign gentleman, I take it, that’s really a detective. Is there any news of the young mistress, sir?’
‘I come from seeing her at the immediate moment. She has passed a satisfactory night.’
‘We’ve had policemen here,’ said the small boy. ‘That’s where the lady was killed. Here by the steps. I seen a pig killed once, haven’t I, Dad?’
‘Ah!’ said his father, unemotionally.
‘Dad used to kill pigs when he worked on a farm. Didn’t you, Dad? I seen a pig killed. I liked it.’
‘Young ’uns like to see pigs killed,’ said the man, as though stating one of the unalterable facts of nature.
‘Shot with a pistol, the lady was,’ continued the boy. ‘She didn’t have her throat cut. No!’
We passed on to the house, and I felt thankful to get away from the ghoulish child.
Poirot entered the drawing-room, the windows of which were open, and rang the bell. Ellen, neatly attired in black, came in answer to the bell. She showed no surprise at seeing us.
Poirot explained that we were here by permission of Miss Buckley to make a search of the house.
‘Very good sir.’
‘The police have finished?’
‘They said they had seen everything they wanted, sir. They’ve been about the garden since very early in the morning. I don’t know whether they’ve found anything.’
She was about to leave the room when Poirot stopped her with a question.
‘Were you very surprised last night when you heard Miss Buckley had been shot?’
‘Yes, sir, very surprised. Miss Maggie was a nice young lady, sir. I can’t imagine anyone being so wicked as to want to harm her.’
‘If it had been anyone else, you would not have been so surprised—eh?’
‘I don’t know what you mean, sir?’
‘When I came into the hall last night,’ he said, ‘you asked at once whether anyone had been hurt. Were you expecting anything of the kind?’
She was silent. Her fingers pleated a corner of her apron. She shook her head and murmured:
‘You gentlemen wouldn’t understand.’
‘Yes, yes,’ said Poirot, ‘I would understand.
However fantastic what you may say, I would understand.’
She looked at him doubtfully, then seemed to make up her mind to trust him.
‘You see, sir,’ she said, ‘this isn’t a good house.’
I was surprised and a little contemptuous. Poirot, however, seemed to find the remark not in the least unusual.
‘You mean it is an old house.’
‘Yes, sir, not a good house.’
‘You have been here long?’
‘Six years, sir. But I was here as a girl. In the kitchen as kitchen-maid. That was in the time of old Sir Nicholas. It was the same then.’
Poirot looked at her attentively.
In an old house,’ she said, ‘there is sometimes an atmosphere of evil.’
‘That’s it, sir,’ said Ellen, eagerly. ‘Evil. Bad thoughts and bad deeds too. It’s like dry rot in a house, sir, you can’t get it out. It’s a sort of feeling in the air. I always knew something bad would happen in this house, someday.’
‘Well, you have been proved right.’
‘Yes, sir.’
There was a very slight underlying satisfaction in her tone, the satisfaction of one whose gloomy prognostications have been shown to be correct.
‘But you didn’t think it would be Miss Maggie.’
‘No, indeed, I didn’t, sir. Nobody hated her—I’m sure of it.’
It seemed to me that in those words was a clue. I expected Poirot to follow it up, but to my surprise he shifted to quite a different subject.
‘You didn’t hear the shots fired?’
‘I couldn’t have told with the fireworks going on. Very noisy they were.’
‘You weren’t out watching them?’
‘No, I hadn’t finished clearing up dinner.’
‘Was the waiter helping you?’
‘No, sir, he’d gone out into the garden to have a look at the fireworks.’
‘But you didn’t go.’
‘No, sir.’
‘Why was that?’
‘I wanted to get finished.’
‘You don’t care for fireworks?’
‘Oh, yes, sir, it wasn’t that. But you see, there’s two nights of them, and William and I get the evening off tomorrow and go down into the town and see them from there.’