Five

Lord Mayfield was seated at his desk when Poirot entered the study. He swung round, laid downhis pen, and looked up inquiringly.

“Well, M. Poirot, had your interview with Carrington?”

Poirot smiled and sat down.

“Yes, Lord Mayfield. He cleared up a point that had puzzled?me.”

“What was that?”

“The reason for Mrs.?Vanderlyn’s presence here. You comprehend, I thought it possible—”

Mayfield was quick to realize the cause of Poirot’s somewhat exaggerated embarrassment¹.

“You thought I had a weakness for the lady? Not at all. Far from it. Funnily enough,Carrington thought the same.”

“Yes, he has told me of the conversation he held with you on the subject.”

Lord Mayfield looked rather rueful.

“My little scheme didn’t come off. Always annoying to have to admit that a woman has gotthe better of you.”

“Ah, but she has not got the better of you yet, Lord Mayfield.”

“You think we may yet win? Well, I’m glad to hear you say so. I’d like to think it was true.”

He sighed.

“I feel I’ve acted like a complete fool—so pleased with my stratagem² for entrapping³ thelady.”

Hercule Poirot said, as he lit one of his tiny cigarettes:

“What was your stratagem exactly, Lord Mayfield?”

“Well,” Lord Mayfield hesitated. “I hadn’t exactly got down to details.”

“You didn’t discuss it with anyone?”

“No.”

“Not even with Mr.?Carlile?”

“No.”

Poirot smiled.

“You prefer to play a lone⁴ hand, Lord Mayfield.”

“I have usually found it the best way,” said the other a little grimly.

“Yes, you are wise. Trust no one. But you did mention the matter to Sir George Carrington?”

“Simply because I realized that the dear fellow was seriously perturbed⁵ about me.”

Lord Mayfield smiled at the remembrance.

“He is an old friend of yours?”

“Yes. I have known him for over twenty years.”

“And his wife?”

“I have known his wife also, of course.”

“But (pardon me if I am impertinent) you are not on the same terms of intimacy⁶ with her?”

“I don’t really see what my personal relationships to people has to do with the matter in hand,M. Poirot.”

“But I think, Lord Mayfield, that they may have a good deal to do with it. You agreed, didyou not, that my theory of someone in the drawing room was a possible one?”

“Yes. In fact, I agree with you that that is what must have happened.”

“We will not say ‘must.’ That is too self-confident a word. But if that theory of mine is true,who do you think the person in the drawing room could have been?”

“Obviously Mrs.?Vanderlyn. She had been back there once for a book. She could have comeback for another book, or a handbag, or a dropped handkerchief—one of a dozen feminineexcuses. She arranges with her maid to scream and get Carlile away from the study. Then she slipsin and out by the windows as you said.”

“You forget it could not have been Mrs.?Vanderlyn. Carlile heard her call the maid fromupstairs while he was talking to the girl.”

Lord Mayfield bit his lip.

“True. I forgot that.” He looked throughly annoyed.

“You see,” said Poirot gently. “We progress. We have first the simple explanation of a thiefwho comes from outside and makes off with the booty. A very convenient theory as I said at thetime, too convenient to be readily accepted. We have disposed of that. Then we come to the theoryof the foreign agent, Mrs.?Vanderlyn, and that again seems to fit together beautifully up to acertain point. But now it looks as though that, too, was too easy—too convenient—to beaccepted.”

“You’d wash Mrs.?Vanderlyn out of it altogether?”

“It was not Mrs.?Vanderlyn in the drawing room. It may have been an ally ofMrs.?Vanderlyn’s who committed the theft, but it is just possible that it was committed by anotherperson altogether. If so, we have to consider the question of motive⁷.”

“Isn’t this rather far-fetched, M. Poirot?”

“I do not think so. Now what motives⁸ could there be? There is the motive of money. Thepapers may have been stolen with the object of turning them into cash. That is the simplest motiveto consider. But the motive might possibly be something quite different.”

“Such as—”

Poirot said slowly:

“It might have been done definitely with the idea of damaging someone.”

“Who?”

“Possibly Mr.?Carlile. He would be the obvious suspect. But there might be more to it thanthat. The men who control the destiny of a country, Lord Mayfield, are particularly vulnerable todisplays of popular feeling.”

“Meaning that the theft was aimed at damaging me?”

Poirot nodded.

“I think I am correct in saying, Lord Mayfield, that about five years ago you passed through asomewhat trying time. You were suspected of friendship with a European Power at that timebitterly unpopular with the electorate⁹ of this country.”

“Quite true, M. Poirot.”

“A statesman in these days has a difficult task. He has to pursue the policy he deemsadvantageous to his country, but he has at the same time to recognize the force of popular feeling.

Popular feeling is very often sentimental¹⁰, muddleheaded, and eminently¹¹ unsound, but it cannot bedisregarded for all that.”

“How well you express it! That is exactly the curse of a politician’s life. He has to bow to thecountry’s feeling, however dangerous and foolhardy he knows it to be.”

“That was your dilemma¹², I think. There were rumours¹³ that you had concluded an agreementwith the country in question. This country and the newspapers were up in arms about it.

Fortunately the Prime Minister was able categorically to deny the story, and you repudiated¹⁴ it,though still making no secret of the way your sympathies lay.”

“All this is quite true, M. Poirot, but why rake up past history?”

“Because I consider it possible that an enemy, disappointed in the way you surmounted¹⁵ thatcrisis, might endeavour to stage a further dilemma. You soon regained¹⁶ public confidence. Thoseparticular circumstances have passed away, you are now, deservedly, one of the most popularfigures in political life. You are spoken of freely as the next Prime Minister when Mr.?Hunberlyretires.”

“You think this is an attempt to discredit¹⁸ me? Nonsense!”

“Tout de même, Lord Mayfield, it would not look well if it were known that the plans ofBritain’s new bomber¹⁹ had been stolen during a weekend when a certain very charming lady hadbeen your guest. Little hints in the newspapers as to your relationship with that lady would create afeeling of distrust in you.”

“Such a thing could not really be taken seriously.”

“My dear Lord Mayfield, you know perfectly²⁰ well it could! It takes so little to underminepublic confidence in a man.”

“Yes, that’s true,” said Lord Mayfield. He looked suddenly very worried. “God! howdesperately complicated this business is becoming. Do you really think—but it’s impossible—impossible.”

“You know of nobody who is—jealous of you?”

“Absurd!”

“At any rate you will admit that my questions about your personal relationships with themembers of this house party are not totally irrelevant²¹.”

“Oh, perhaps—perhaps. You asked me about Julia Carrington. There’s really not very muchto say. I’ve never taken to her very much, and I don’t think she cares for me. She’s one of theserestless, nervy women, recklessly extravagant²² and mad about cards. She’s old-fashioned enough, Ithink, to despise me as being a self-made man.”

Poirot said:

“I looked you up in Who’s Who before I came down. You were the head of a famousengineering firm and you are yourself a first-class engineer.”

“There’s certainly nothing I don’t know about the practical side. I’ve worked my way upfrom the bottom.”

Lord Mayfield spoke¹⁷ rather grimly.

“Oh la la!” cried Poirot. “I have been a fool—but a fool!”

The other stared at him.

“I beg your pardon, M. Poirot?”

“It is that a portion of the puzzle has become clear to me. Something I did not see before . . .

But it all fits in. Yes—it fits in with beautiful precision.”

Lord Mayfield looked at him in somewhat astonished inquiry²³.

But with a slight smile Poirot shook his head.

“No, no, not now. I must arrange my ideas a little more clearly.”

He rose.

“Goodnight, Lord Mayfield. I think I know where those plans?are.”

Lord Mayfield cried out:

“You know? Then let us get hold of them at once!”

Poirot shook his head.

“No, no, that would not do. Precipitancy would be fatal. But leave it all to Hercule Poirot.”

He went out of the room. Lord Mayfield raised his shoulders in contempt.

“Man’s a mountebank,” he muttered. Then, putting away his papers and turning out thelights, he, too, made his way up to bed.

 

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