帷幕23

Chapter 13

IThere is something about writing down an anti-climax in cold blood that issomewhat shattering to one’s self-esteem.

For the truth of the matter is, you see, that I sat there waiting for Aller-ton and that I fell asleep!

Not so surprising really, I suppose. I had slept very badly the night be-fore. I had been out in the air the whole day. I was worn out with worryand the strain of nerving myself for doing what I had decided to do. Ontop of all that was the heavy thundery weather. Possibly even the fierce ef-fort of concentration I was making helped.

Anyway, it happened. I fell asleep there in my chair, and when I wokebirds were twittering outside, the sun was up and there was I, crampedand uncomfortable, slipped down in my chair in my evening dress, with afoul taste in the mouth and a splitting head.

I was bewildered, incredulous, disgusted, and finally immeasurably andoverwhelmingly relieved.

Who was it who wrote, ‘The darkest day, lived till tomorrow, will havepassed away’? And how true it is. I saw now, clearly and sanely, how over-wrought and wrong-headed I had been. Melodramatic, lost to all sense ofproportion. I had actually made up my mind to kill another human being.

At this moment my eyes fell on the glass of whisky in front of me. With ashudder I got up, drew the curtains and poured it out of the window. Imust have been mad last night!

I shaved, had a bath and dressed. Then, feeling very much better, I wentacross to Poirot. He always woke very early, I knew. I sat down and madea clean breast of the whole thing to him.

I may say it was a great relief.

He shook his head gently at me. ‘Ah, but what follies it is you contem-plate. I am glad you came to confess your sins to me. But why, my dearfriend, did you not come to me last night and tell me what was in yourmind?’

I said shame-facedly: ‘I was afraid, I suppose, that you would have triedto stop me.’

‘Assuredly I would have stopped you. Ah that, certainly. Do you think Iwant to see you hanged by the neck, all on account of a very unpleasantscoundrel called Major Allerton?’

‘I shouldn’t have been caught,’ I said. ‘I’d taken every precaution.’

‘That is what all murderers think. You had the true mentality! But let metell you, mon ami, you were not as clever as you thought yourself.’

‘I took every precaution. I wiped my fingerprints off the bottle.’

‘Exactly. You also wiped Allerton’s fingerprints off. And when he isfound dead, what happens? They perform the autopsy and it is establishedthat he died of an overdose of Slumberyl. Did he take it by accident or in-tention? Tiens, his fingerprints are not on the bottle. But why not?

Whether accident or suicide he would have no reason to wipe them off.

And then they analyse the remaining tablets and find nearly half of themhave been replaced by aspirin.’

‘Well, practically everyone has aspirin tablets,’ I murmured weakly.

‘Yes, but it is not everyone who has a daughter whom Allerton is pursu-ing with dishonourable intentions – to use an old- fashioned dramaticphrase. And you have had a quarrel with your daughter on the subject theday before. Two people, Boyd Carrington and Norton, can swear to yourviolent feeling against the man. No, Hastings, it would not have looked toogood. Attention would immediately have been focused upon you, and bythat time you would probably have been in such a state of fear – or evenremorse – that some good solid inspector of police would have made uphis mind quite definitely that you were the guilty party. It is quite possible,even, that someone may have seen you tampering with the tablets.’

‘They couldn’t. There was no one about.’

‘There is a balcony outside the window. Somebody might have beenthere, peeping in. Or, who knows, someone might have been lookingthrough the keyhole.’

‘You’ve got keyholes on the brain, Poirot. People don’t really spend theirtime looking through keyholes as much as you seem to think.’

Poirot half closed his eyes and remarked that I had always had too trust-ing a nature.

‘And let me tell you, very funny things happen with keys in this house.

Me, I like to feel that my door is locked on the inside, even if the good Cur-tiss is in the adjoining room. Soon after I am here, my key disappears – butentirely! I have to have another one made.’

‘Well, anyway,’ I said with a deep breath of relief, my mind still ladenwith my own troubles, ‘it didn’t come off. It’s awful to think one can getworked up like that.’ I lowered my voice. ‘Poirot, you don’t think that be-cause – because of that murder long ago there’s a sort of infection in theair?’

‘A virus of murder, you mean? Well, it is an interesting suggestion.’

‘Houses do have an atmosphere,’ I said thoughtfully. ‘This house has abad history.’

Poirot nodded. ‘Yes. There have been people here – several of them –who desired deeply that someone else should die. That is true enough.’

‘I believe it gets hold of one in some way. But now, Poirot, tell me, whatam I to do about all this – Judith and Allerton, I mean. It’s got to be stoppedsomehow. What do you think I’d better do?’

‘Do nothing,’ said Poirot with emphasis.

‘Oh, but –’

‘Believe me, you will do least harm by not interfering.’

‘If I were to tackle Allerton –’

‘What can you say or do? Judith is twenty-one and her own mistress.’

‘But I feel I ought to be able –’

Poirot interrupted me. ‘No, Hastings. Do not imagine that you are cleverenough, forceful enough, or even cunning enough to impose your person-ality on either of those two people. Allerton is accustomed to dealing withangry and impotent fathers and probably enjoys it as a good joke. Judith isnot the sort of creature who can be browbeaten. I would advise you – if Iadvised you at all – to do something very different. I would trust her if Iwere you.’

I stared at him.

‘Judith,’ said Hercule Poirot, ‘is made of very fine stuff. I admire hervery much.’

I said, my voice unsteady: ‘I admire her, too. But I’m afraid for her.’

Poirot nodded his head with sudden energy. ‘I, too, am afraid for her,’

he said. ‘But not in the way you are. I am terribly afraid. And I am power-less – or nearly so. And the days go by. There is danger, Hastings, and it isvery close.’

 

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