Appointment With Death (Hercule Poirot 19)

The Colonel perused this with great satisfaction.

‘Capital!’ he said. ‘Just the thing! You’ve made it difficult—and seemingly irrelevant—absolutely the authentic touch! By the way, it seems to me there are one or two noticeable omissions. But that, I suppose, is what you tempt the mug with?’

Poirot’s eyes twinkled a little, but he did not answer.

‘Point two, for instance,’ said Colonel Carbury tentatively. ‘Dr Gerard missed a hypodermic syringe—yes. He also missed a concentrated solution of digitalis—or something of that kind.’

‘The latter point,’ said Poirot, ‘is not important in the way the absence of his hypodermic syringe is important.’

‘Splendid!’ said Colonel Carbury, his face irradiated with smiles. ‘I don’t get it at all. I should have said the digitalis was much more important than the syringe! And what about that servant motif that keeps cropping up—a servant being sent to tell her dinner was ready—and that story of her shaking her stick at a servant earlier in the afternoon? You’re not going to tell me one of my poor desert mutts bumped her off after all? Because,’ added Colonel Carbury sternly, ‘if so, that would be cheating.’

Poirot smiled, but did not answer.

As he left the office he murmured to himself:

‘Incredible! The English never grow up!’

&n

bsp; Chapter 11

Sarah King sat on a hill-top absently plucking up wild flowers. Dr Gerard sat on a rough wall of stones near her.

She said suddenly and fiercely: ‘Why did you start all this? If it hadn’t been for you—’

Dr Gerard said slowly: ‘You think I should have kept silence?’

‘Yes.’

‘Knowing what I knew?’

‘You didn’t know,’ said Sarah.

The Frenchman sighed. ‘I did know. But I admit one can never be absolutely sure.’

‘Yes, one can,’ said Sarah uncompromisingly.

The Frenchman shrugged his shoulders. ‘You, perhaps!’

Sarah said: ‘You had fever—a high temperature—you couldn’t be clear-headed about the business. The syringe was probably there all the time. And you may have made a mistake about the digitoxin or one of the servants may have meddled with the case.’

Gerard said cynically: ‘You need not worry! The evidence is almost bound to be inconclusive. You will see, your friends the Boyntons will get away with it!’

Sarah said fiercely: ‘I don’t want that, either.’

He shook his head. ‘You are illogical!’

‘Wasn’t it you—’ Sarah demanded, ‘in Jerusalem—who said a great deal about not interfering? And now look!’

‘I have not interfered. I have only told what I know!’

‘And I say you don’t know it. Oh dear, there we are, back again! I’m arguing in a circle.’

Gerard said gently: ‘I am sorry, Miss King.’

Sarah said in a low voice:

‘You see, after all, they haven’t escaped—any of them! She’s still there! Even from her grave she can still reach out and hold them. There was something—terrible about her—she’s just as terrible now she’s dead! I feel—I feel she’s enjoying all this!’