Hercule Poirot's Christmas: A Hercule Poirot Mystery (Hercule Poirot 20)

‘He does not seem a strong man, no.’

The doctor said:

‘He was pretty tough, I believe. He’d survived several pretty bad illnesses that would have killed most men.’

Poirot said: ‘I do not mean that. I mean, he was not big, not strong physically.’

‘No, he’s frail enough.’

Poirot turned from the dead man. He bent to examine an overturned chair, a big chair of mahogany. Beside it was a round mahogany table and the fragments of a big china lamp. Two other smaller chairs lay nearby, also the smashed fragments of a decanter and two glasses, a heavy glass paperweight was unbroken, some miscellaneous books, a big Japanese vase smashed in pieces, and a bronze statuette of a naked girl completed the débris.

Poirot bent over all these exhibits, studying them gravely, but without touching them. He frowned to himself as though perplexed.

The chief constable said:

‘Anything strike you, Poirot?’

Hercule Poirot sighed. He murmured:

‘Such a frail shrunken old man—and yet—all this.’

Johnson looked puzzled. He turned away and said to the sergeant, who was busy at his work:

‘What about prints?’

‘Plenty of them, sir, all over the room.’

‘What about the safe?’

‘No good. Only prints on that are those of the old gentleman himself.’

Johnson turned to the doctor.

‘What about bloodstains?’ he asked. ‘Surely whoever killed him must have got blood on him.’

The doctor said doubtfully:

‘Not necessarily. Bleeding was almost entirely from the jugular vein. That wouldn’t spout like an artery.’

‘No, no. Still, there seems a lot of blood about.’

Poirot said:

‘Yes, there is a lot of blood—it strikes one, that. A lot of blood.’

Superintendent Sugden said respectfully:

‘Do you—er—does that suggest anything to you, Mr Poirot?’

Poirot looked about him. He shook his head perplexedly.

He said:

‘There is something here—some violence…’ He stopped a minute, then went on: ‘Yes, that is it—violence…And blood—an insistence on blood…There is—how shall I put it?—there is too much blood. Blood on the chairs, on the tables, on the carpet…The blood ritual? Sacrificial blood? Is that it? Perhaps. Such a frail old man, so thin, so shrivelled, so dried up—and yet—in his death—so much blood…’

His voice died away. Superintendent Sugden, staring at him with round, startled eyes, said in an awed voice:

‘Funny—that’s what she said—the lady…’