VII

Superintendent¹ Sugden drew a deep breath. He said:

“Either I’m going mad or everybody else is! What you’ve said, Mrs. Lee, is just plumbimpossible. It’s crazy!”

Hilda Lee cried:

“I tell you I heard them fighting in there, and I heard the old man scream when his throat wascut—and no one came out and no one was in the room!”

Hercule Poirot said:

“And all this time you have said nothing.”

Hilda Lee’s face was white, but she said steadily²:

“No, because if I told you what had happened, there’s only one thing you could say or think—that it was I who killed him. .?.?.”

Poirot shook his head.

“No,” he said. “You did not kill him. His son killed him.”

Stephen Farr said:

“I swear before God I never touched him!”

“Not you,” said Poirot. “He had other sons!”

Harry³ said:

“What the hell—”

George stared. David drew his hand across his eyes. Alfred blinked twice.

Poirot said:

“The very first night I was here—the night of the murder—I saw a ghost. It was the ghost ofthe dead man. When I first saw Harry Lee I was puzzled. I felt I had seen him before. Then I notedhis features carefully and I realized how like his father he was, and I told myself that that was whatcaused the feeling of familiarity.

“But yesterday a man sitting opposite me threw back his head and laughed—and I knew whoit was Harry Lee reminded me of. And I traced again, in another face, the features of the deadman.

“No wonder poor old Tressilian felt confused when he had answered the door not to two, butto three men who resembled each other closely. No wonder he confessed to getting muddled⁴ aboutpeople when there were three men in the house who, at a little distance, could pass for each other!

The same build, the same gestures (one in particular, a trick of stroking the jaw), the same habit oflaughing with the head thrown back, the same distinctive⁵ high-bridged nose. Yet the similarity wasnot always easy to see—for the third man had a moustache.”

He leaned forward.

“One forgets sometimes that police officers are men, that they have wives and children,mothers”—he paused—“and fathers .?.?. Remember Simeon Lee’s local reputation: a man whobroke his wife’s heart because of his affairs with women. A son born the wrong side of the blanketmay inherit many things. He may inherit his father’s features and even his gestures. He mayinherit his pride and his patience and his revengeful spirit!”

His voice rose.

“All your life, Sugden, you’ve resented the wrong your father did you. I think youdetermined long ago to kill him. You come from the next county, not very far away. Doubtlessyour mother, with the money Simeon Lee so generously gave her, was able to find a husband whowould stand father to her child. Easy for you to enter the Middleshire Police Force and wait youropportunity. A police superintendent has a grand opportunity of committing a murder and gettingaway with it.”

Sugden’s face had gone white as paper.

He said:

“You’re mad! I was outside the house when he was killed.”

Poirot shook his head.

“No, you killed him before you left the house the first time. No one saw him alive after youleft. It was all so easy for you. Simeon Lee expected you, yes, but he never sent for you. It was youwho rang him up and spoke⁶ vaguely⁷ about an attempt at robbery. You said you would call uponhim just before eight that night and would pretend to be collecting for a police charity. Simeon Leehad no suspicions. He did not know you were his son. You came and told him a tale of substituteddiamonds. He opened the safe to show you that the real diamonds were safe in his possession. Youapologized, came back to the hearth⁸ with him and, catching⁹ him unawares, you cut his throat,holding your hand over his mouth so that he shouldn’t cry out. Child’s play to a man of yourpowerful physique.

“Then you set the scene. You took the diamonds. You piled up tables and chairs, lamps andglasses, and twined a very thin rope or cord which you had brought in coiled round your body, inand out between them. You had with you a bottle of some freshly killed animal’s blood to whichyou had added a quantity of sodium¹⁰ citrate. You sprinkled this about freely and added moresodium citrate to the pool of blood which flowed from Simeon Lee’s wound. You made up up thefire so that the body should keep its warmth. Then you passed the two ends of the cord out throughthe narrow slit¹¹ at the bottom of the window and let them hang down the wall. You left the roomand turned the key from the outside. That was vital, since no one must, by any chance, enter thatroom.

“Then you went out and hid the diamonds in the stone sink garden. If, sooner or later, theywere discovered there, they would only focus suspicion more strongly where you wanted it: on themembers of Simeon Lee’s legitimate¹² family. A little before nine fifteen you returned and, going upto the wall underneath¹³ the window, you pulled on the cord. That dislodged the carefully piled-upstructure you had arranged. Furniture and china fell with a crash. You pulled on one end of thecord and rewound it round your body under your coat and waistcoat.

“You had one further device!”

He turned to the others.

“Do you remember, all of you, how each of you described the dying scream of Mr. Lee in adifferent way? You, Mr. Lee, described it as the cry of a man in mortal agony. Your wife andDavid Lee both used the expression: a soul in hell. Mrs. David Lee, on the contrary, said it was thecry of someone who had no soul. She said it was inhuman¹⁴, like a beast. It was Harry Lee whocame nearest to the truth. He said it sounded like killing¹⁵ a pig.

“Do you know those long pink bladders that are sold at fairs with faces painted on themcalled ‘Dying Pigs?’ As the air rushes out they give forth¹⁶ an inhuman wail¹⁷. That, Sugden, wasyour final touch. You arranged one of those in the room. The mouth of it was stopped up with apeg, but that peg¹⁸ was connected to the cord. When you pulled on the cord the peg came out andthe pig began to deflate. On top of the falling furniture came the scream of the ‘Dying Pig.’ ”

He turned once more to the others.

“You see now what it was that Pilar Estravados picked up? The superintendent had hoped toget there in time to retrieve¹⁹ that little wisp of rubber before anyone noticed it. However, he took itfrom Pilar quickly enough in his most official manner. But remember he never mentioned thatincident to anyone. In itself, that was a singularly suspicious fact. I heard of it from MagdaleneLee and tackled him about it. He was prepared for that eventuality. He had snipped²⁰ a piece fromMr. Lee’s rubber spongebag and produced that, together with a wooden peg. Superficially itanswered to the same description—a fragment of rubber and a piece of wood. It meant, as Irealized at the time, absolutely nothing! But, fool that I was, I did not at once say; ‘This meansnothing, so it cannot have been there, and Superintendent Sugden is lying .?.?.’ No, I foolishlywent on trying to find an explanation for it. It was not until Mademoiselle Estravados was playingwith a balloon that burst, and she cried out that it must have been a burst balloon she picked up inSimeon Lee’s room, that I saw the truth.

“You see now how everything fits in? The improbable struggle, which is necessary toestablish a false time of death; the locked door—so that nobody shall find the body too soon; thedying man’s scream. The crime is now logical and reasonable.

“But from the moment that Pilar Estravados cried aloud her discovery about the balloon, shewas a source of danger to the murderer. And if that remark had been heard by him from the house(which it well might, for her voice was high and clear and the windows were open), she herselfwas in considerable danger. Already she had given the murderer one very nasty moment. She hadsaid, speaking of old Mr. Lee, ‘He must have been very good-looking when he was young.’ Andhad added, speaking directly to Sugden: ‘Like you.’ She meant that literally²¹, and Sugden knew it.

No wonder Sugden went purple in the face and nearly choked. It was so unexpected and so deadlydangerous. He hoped, after that, to fix the guilt²² on her, but it proved unexpectedly difficult, since,as the old man’s portionless granddaughter, she had obviously no motive²³ for the crime. Later,when he overheard from the house her clear, high voice calling out its remark about the balloon,he decided²⁴ on desperate measures. He set that booby trap when we were at lunch. Luckily, almostby a miracle, it failed. .?.?.”

There was dead silence. Then Sugden said quietly:

“When were you sure?”

Poirot said:

“I was not quite sure till I brought home a false moustache and tried it on Simeon Lee’spicture. Then—the face that looked at me was yours.”

Sugden said:

“God rot his soul in hell! I’m glad I did it!”

 

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