He turned a haggard face to me.
“The sanity of a city full of men against the insanity of one man? I fear, Hastings—I very much fear. Remember the long-continued successes of Jack the Ripper.”
“It’s horrible,” I said.
“Madness, Hastings, is a terrible thing…I am afraid…I am very much afraid….”
Nine
THE BEXHILL-ON-SEA MURDER
I still remember my awakening on the morning of the 25th of July. It must have been about seven-thirty.
Poirot was standing by my bedside gently shaking me by the shoulder. One glance at his face brought me from semiconsciousness into the full possession of my faculties.
“What is it?” I demanded, sitting up rapidly.
His answer came quite simply, but a wealth of emotion lay behind the three words he uttered.
“It has happened.”
“What?” I cried. “You mean—but today is the 25th.”
“It took place last night—or rather in the early hours of this morning.”
As I sprang from bed and made a rapid toilet, he recounted briefly what he had just learnt over the telephone.
“The body of a young girl has been found on the beach at Bexhill. She has been identified as Elizabeth Barnard, a waitress in one of the cafés, who lived with her parents in a little recently built bungalow. Medical evidence gave the time of death as between 11:30 and 1 am.”
“They’re quite sure that this is the crime?” I asked, as I hastily lathered my face.
“An A B C open at the trains to Bexhill was found actually under the body.”
I shivered.
“This is horrible!”
“Faites attention, Hastings. I do not want a second tragedy in my rooms!”
I wiped the blood from my chin rather ruefully.
“What is our plan of campaign?” I asked.
“The car will call for us in a few moments’ time. I will bring you a cup of coffee here so that there will be no delay in starting.”
Twenty minutes later we were in a fast police car crossing the Thames on our way out of London.
With us was Inspector Crome, who had been present at the conference the other day, and who was officially in charge of the case.
Crome was a very different type of officer from Japp. A much younger man, he was the silent, superior type. Well educated and well read, he was, for my taste, several shades too pleased with himself. He had lately gained kudos over a series of child murders, having patiently tracked down the criminal who was now in Broadmoor.
He was obviously a suitable person to undertake the present case, but I thought that he was just a little too aware of the fact himself. His manner to Poirot was a shade patronising. He deferred to him as a younger man to an older one—in a rather self-conscious, “public school” way.
“I’ve had a good long talk with Dr. Thompson,” he said. “He’s very interested in the ‘chain’ or ‘series’ type of murder. It’s the product of a particular distorted type of mentality. As a layman one can’t, of course, appreciate the finer points as they present themselves to a medical point of view.” He coughed. “As a matter of fact—my last case—I don’t know whether you read about it—the Mabel Homer case, the Muswell Hill schoolgirl, you know—that man Capper was extraordinary. Amazingly difficult to pin the crime on to him—it was his third, too! Looked as sane as you or I. But there are various tests—verbal traps, you know—quite modern, of course, there was nothing of that kind in your day. Once you can induce a man to give himself away, you’ve got him! He knows that you know and his nerve goes. He starts giving himself away right and left.”
“Even in my day that happened sometimes,” said Poirot.
Inspector Crome looked at him and murmured conversationally: “Oh, yes?”