Three Act Tragedy (Hercule Poirot 11)

Poirot shook his head in a perplexed manner.

“This telegram complicates the affair,” he murmured. “But we must be quick—extremely quick.”

Mr. Satterthwaite did not see the need for extreme haste, but he agreed politely.

“Certainly, we will go by the first train in the morning. Er—that is to say, is it necessary for us all to go?”

“Sir Charles and I had arranged to go down to Gilling,” said Egg.

“We can postpone that,” said Sir Charles.

“I don’t think we ought to postpone anything,” said Egg. “There is no need for all four of us to go to Yorkshire. It’s absurd. Mass formation. M. Poirot and Mr. Satterthwaite go to Yorkshire and Sir Charles and I go to Gilling.”

“I’d rather like to look into this Rushbridger business,” said Sir Charles with a trace of wistfulness. “You see, I—er—talked to the Matron before—got my foot in, so to speak.”

“That’s just why you’d better keep away,” said Egg. “You involved yourself in a lot of lies, and now this Rushbridger woman has come to herself you’ll be exposed as a thorough-paced liar. It’s far far more important that you should come to Gilling. If we want to see Miss Milray’s mother she’ll open out to you much more than she would to anyone else. You’re her daughter’s employer, and she’ll have confidence in you.”

&nbs

p; Sir Charles looked into Egg’s glowing, earnest face.

“I’ll come to Gilling,” he said. “I think you’re quite right.”

“I know I’m right,” said Egg.

“In my opinion an excellent arrangement,” said Poirot briskly. “As mademoiselle says, Sir Charles is preeminently the person to interview this Mrs. Milray. Who knows, you may learn from her facts of much more importance than those we shall learn in Yorkshire.”

Matters were arranged on this basis, and the following morning Sir Charles picked up Egg in his car at a quarter to ten. Poirot and Mr. Satterthwaite had already left London by train.

It was a lovely crisp morning, with just a touch of frost in the air. Egg felt her spirits rising as they turned and twisted through the various shortcuts which Sir Charles’s experience had discovered south of the Thames.

At last, however, they were flying smoothly along the Folkestone road. After passing through Maidstone, Sir Charles consulted a map, and they turned off from the main road and were shortly winding through country lanes. It was about a quarter to twelve when they at last reached their objective.

Gilling was a village which the world had left behind. It had an old church, a vicarage, two or three shops, a row of cottages, three or four new council houses and a very attractive village green.

Miss Milray’s mother lived in a tiny house on the other side of the green to the church.

As the car drew up Egg asked:

“Does Miss Milray know you are going to see her mother?”

“Oh, yes. She wrote to prepare the old lady.”

“Do you think that was a good thing?”

“My dear child, why not?”

“Oh, I don’t know…You didn’t bring her down with you, though.”

“As a matter of fact, I thought she might cramp my style. She’s so much more efficient than I am—she’d probably try to prompt me.”

Egg laughed.

Mrs. Milray turned out to be almost ludicrously unlike her daughter. Where Miss Milray was hard, she was soft, where Miss Milray was angular, she was round. Mrs. Milray was an immense dumpling of a woman immovably fixed in an armchair conveniently placed so that she could, from the window, observe all that went on in the world outside.

She seemed pleasurably excited by the arrival of her visitors.

“This is very nice of you, I’m sure, Sir Charles. I’ve heard so much about you from my Violet.” (Violet! Singularly incongruous name for Miss Milray.) “You don’t know how much she admires you. It’s been most interesting for her working with you all these years. Won’t you sit down, Miss Lytton Gore? You’ll excuse my not getting up. I’ve lost the use of my limbs for many years now. The Lord’s will, and I don’t complain, and what I say is one can get used to anything. Perhaps you’d like a little refreshment after your drive down?”