Murder in the Mews (Hercule Poirot 18)

Slowly, one by one, the family filed out of the room. Puzzled, uncomprehending, shocked, they cast abashed glances at the trim, upright figure with its neatly-parted grey hair.

Ruth was the last to go. She stood, hesitating in the doorway.

“I don’t understand.” She spoke angrily, defiantly, accusing Poirot. “Just now, you thought I had done it.”

“No, no,” Poirot shook his head. “No, I never thought that.”

Ruth went out slowly.

Poirot was left with the little middle-aged prim woman who had just confessed to a cleverly-planned and cold-blooded murder.

“No,” said Miss Lingard. “You didn’t think she had done it. You accused her to make me speak. That’s right, isn’t it?”

Poirot bowed his head.

“While we’re waiting,” said Miss Lingard in a conversational tone, “you might tell me what made you suspect me.”

“Several things. To begin with, your account of Sir Gervase. A proud man like Sir Gervase would never speak disparagingly of his nephew to an outsider, especially someone in your position. You wanted to strengthen the theory of suicide. You also went out of your way to suggest that the cause of the suicide was some dishonourable trouble connected with Hugo Trent. That, again, was a thing Sir Gervase would never have admitted to a stranger. Then there was the object you picked up in the hall, and the very significant fact that you did not mention that Ruth, when she entered the drawing room, did so from the garden. And then I found the paper bag—a most unlikely object to find in the wastepaper basket in the drawing room of a house like Hamborough Close! You were the only person who had been in the drawing room when the ‘shot’ was heard. The paper bag trick was one that would suggest itself to a woman—an ingenious homemade device. So everything fitted in. The endeavour to throw suspicion on Hugo, and to keep it away from Ruth. The mechanism of crime—and its motive.”

The little grey-haired woman stirred.

“You know the motive?”

“I think so. Ruth’s happiness—that was the motive! I fancy that you had seen her with John Lake—you knew how it was with them. And then with your easy access to Sir Gervase’s papers, you came across the draft of his new will—Ruth disinherited unless she married Hugo Trent. That decided you to take the law into your own hands, using the fact that Sir Gervase had previously written to me. You probably saw a copy of that letter. What muddled feeling of suspicion and fear had caused him to write originally, I do not know. He must have suspected either Burrows or Lake of systematically robbing him. His uncertainty regarding Ruth’s feelings made him seek a private investigation. You used that fact and deliberately set the stage for suicide, backing it up by your account of his being very distressed over something connected with Hugo Trent. You sent a telegram to me and reported Sir Gervase as having said I should arrive ‘too late.’ ”

Miss Lingard said fiercely:

“Gervase Chevenix-Gore was a bully, a snob and a windbag! I wasn’t going to have him ruin Ruth’s happiness.”

Poirot said gently:

“Ruth is your daughter?”

“Yes—she is my daughter—I’ve often—thought about her. When I heard Sir Gervase Chevenix-Gore wanted someone to help him with a family history, I jumped at the chance. I was curious to see my—my girl. I knew Lady Chevenix-Gore wouldn’t recognize me. It was years ago—I was young and pretty then, and I changed my name after that time. Besides Lady Chevenix-Gore is too vague to know anything definitely. I liked her, but I hated the Chevenix-Gore family. They treated me like dirt. And here was Gervase going to ruin Ruth’s life with pride and snobbery. But I determined that she should be happy. And she will be happy—if she never knows about me!”

It was a plea—not a question.

Poirot bent his head gently.

“No one shall know from me.”

Miss Lingard said quietly:

“Thank you.”

III

Later, when the police had come and gone, Poirot found Ruth Lake with her husband in the garden.

She said challengingly:

“Did you really think that I had done it, M. Poirot?”

“I knew, madame, that you could not have done it—because of the michaelmas daisies.”

“The michaelmas daisies? I don’t understand.”

“Madame, there were four footprints and four footprints only in the border. But if you had been picking flowers there would have been many more. That meant that between your first visit and your second, someone had smoothed all those footsteps away. That could only have been done by the guilty person, and since your footprints had not been removed, you were not the guilty person. You were automatically cleared.”