"It is you, mon ami? Attend, I pray. I have news for you. Splendid news. Somebody has tried to kill me..."
He listened with satisfaction to the flow of remarks from the other end.
"No, I am not hurt. But it was a very near thing... Yes, under a train. No, I did not see who did it. But be assured, my friend, I shall find out. We know now - that we are on the right track."
Chapter 12
The man who was testing the electric meter passed the time of day with Guy Carpenter's superior manservant who was watching him.
"Electricity's going to operate on a new basis," he explained. "Graded flat rate according to occupancy."
The superior butler remarked sceptically:
"What you mean is it's going to cost more like everything else?"
"That depends. Fair shares for all, that's what I say. Did you go in to the meeting at Kilchester last night?"
"No."
"Your boss, Mr Carpenter, spoke very well, they say. Think he'll get in?"
"It was a near shave last time, I believe."
"Yes. A hundred and twenty-five majority, something like that. Do you drive him in to these meetings, or does he drive himself?"
"Usually drives himself. Likes driving. He's got a Rolls Bentley."
"Does himself well. Mrs Carpenter drive, too?"
"Yes. Drives a lot too fast, in my opinion."
"Women usually do. Was she at the meeting last night too? Or isn't she interested in politics?"
The superior butler grinned.
"Pretends she is, anyway. However, she didn't stick it out last night. Had a headache or something and left in the middle of the speeches."
"Ah!" the electrician peered into the fuse boxes. "Nearly done now," he remarked. He put a few more desultory questions as he collected his tools and prepared to depart.
He walked briskly down the drive, but round the corner from the gateway, he stopped and made an entry in his pocket book.
"C. drove home alone last night. Reached home 10.30 (approx.). Could have been at Kilchester Central Station at time indicated. Mrs C. left meeting early. Got home only ten minute before C. Said to have come home by train."
It was the second entry in the electrician's book. The first ran:
"Dr R. called out on case last night. Direction of Kilchester. Could have been at Kilchester Central Station at time indicated. Mrs R. alone all evening in house(?) After taking coffee in, Mrs Scott, housekeeper, did not see her again that night. Has small car of her own."
II
At Laburnums, collaboration was in process
Robin Upward was saying earnestly:
"You do see, don't you, what a wonderful line that is? And if we really get a feeling of sex antagonism between the chap and the girl it'll pep the whole thing up enormously!"
Sadly, Mrs Oliver ran her hands through her windswept grey hair, causing it to look as though swept not by wind but by a tornado.
"You do see what I mean, don't you, Ariadne darling?"
"Oh, I see what you mean," said Mrs Oliver gloomily.
"But the main thing is for you to feel really happy about it."
Nobody but a really determined self-deceiver could have thought that Mrs Oliver looked happy.
Robin continued blithely:
"What I feel is, here's that wonderful young man, parachuted down -"
Mrs Oliver interrupted:
"He's sixty."
"Oh no!"
"He is."
"I don't see him like that. Thirty-five - not a day older."
"But I've been writing books about him for thirty years, and he was at least thirty-five in the first one."
"But, darling, if he's sixty, you can't have the tension between him and the girl - what's her name? Ingrid. I mean, it would make him just a nasty old man!"
"It certainly would."
"So you see, he must be thirty-five," said Robin triumphantly.
"Then he can't be Sven Hjerson. Just make him a Norwegian young man who's in the Resistance Movement."
"But darling Ariadne, the whole point of the play is Sven Hjerson. You've got an enormous public who simply adore Sven Hjerson, and who'll flock to see Sven Hjerson. He's box office, darling!"
"But people who read my books know what he's like! You can't invent an entirely new young man in the Norwegian Resistance Movement and just call him Sven Hjerson."
"Ariadne darling, I did explain all that. It's not a book, darling, it's a play. And we've just got to have glamour! And if we get this tension, this antagonism between Sven Hjerson and this - what's-her-name? - Karen - you know, all against each other and yet really frightfully attracted"
"Sven Hjerson never cared for women," said Mrs Oliver coldly.
"But you can't have him a pansy, darling! Not for this sort of play. I mean it's not green bay trees or anything like that. It's thrills and murders and clean open-air fun."
The mention of open air had its effect.
"I think I'm going out," said Mrs Oliver abruptly. "I need air. I need air badly."
"Shall I come with you?" asked Robin tenderly.
"No, I'd rather go alone."
"Just as you like, darling. Perhaps you're right. I'd better go and whip up an egg nog for Madre. The poor sweet is feeling just a teeny weeny bit left out of things. She does like attention, you know. And you'll think about that scene in the cellar, won't you? The whole thing is coming really wonderfully well. It's going to be the most tremendous success. I know it is!"
Mrs Oliver sighed.
"But the main thing," continued Robin, "is for you to feel happy about it!"
Casting a cold look at him, Mrs Oliver threw a showy military cape which she had once bought in Italy about her ample shoulders and went out into Broadhinny.
She would forget her troubles, she decided, by turning her mind to the elucidation of real crime. Hercule Poirot needed help. She would take a look at the inhabitants of Broadhinny, exercise her woman's intuition which had never failed, and tell Poirot who the murderer was. Then he would only have to get the necessary evidence.
Mrs Oliver started her quest by going down the hill to the post office and buying two pounds of apples. During the purchase, she entered into amicable conversation with Mrs Sweetiman.
Having agreed that the weather was very warm for the time of year, Mrs Oliver remarked that she was staying with Mrs Upward at Laburnums.
"Yes, I know. You'll be the lady from London that writes the murder books? Three of them I've got here now in Penguins."
Mrs Oliver cast a glance over the Penguin display. It was slightly overlaid by children's waders.
"The Affair of the Second Goldfish," she mused, "that's quite a good one. The Cat it was Who Died - that's where I made a blowpipe a foot long and it's really six feet. Ridiculous that a blowpipe should be that size, but someone wrote from a museum to tell me so. Sometimes I think there are people who only read books in the hope of finding mistakes in them. What's the other one of them? Oh! Death of a Debutante - that's frightful tripe! I made sulphonal soluble in water and it isn't, and the whole thing is wildly impossible from start to finish. At least eight people die before Sven Hjerson gets his brainwave."
"Very popular they are," said Mrs Sweetiman, unmoved by this interesting self-criticism. "You wouldn't believe! I've never read any myself, because I don't really get time for reading."
"You had a murder of your own down here, didn't you?" said Mrs Oliver.
"Yes, last November that was. Almost next door here, as you might say."
"I hear there's a detective down here, looking into it?"
"Ah, you mean the little foreign gentleman up at Long Meadows? He was in here only yesterday and -"
Mrs Sweetiman broke off as another customer entered for stamps.
She bustled round to the post office side.
"Good morning, Miss Henderson. Warm for the time of year, today."
"Yes, it is."
Mrs Oliver stared hard at the tall girl's back. She had a Sealyham with her on a lead.
"Means the fruit blossom will get nipped later!" said Mrs Sweetiman, with gloomy relish. "How's Mrs Wetherby keeping?"
"Fairly well, thank you. She hasn't been out much. There's been such an east wind lately."
"There's a very good picture on at Kilchester this week, Miss Henderson. You ought to go."
"I thought of going last night, but I couldn't really bother."
"It's Betty Grable next week - I'm out of 5s. books of stamps. Will two 6d. ones do you?"
As the girl went out, Mrs Oliver said:
"Mrs Wetherby's an invalid, isn't she?"
"That's as may be," Mrs Sweetiman replied rather acidly. "There's some of us as hasn't the time to lay by."
"I do so agree with you," said Mrs Oliver. "I tell Mrs Upward that if she'd only make more of an effort to use her legs it would be better for her."
Mrs Sweetiman looked amused.
"She gets about when she wants to - or so I've heard."
"Does she now?"
Mrs Oliver considered the source of information.
"Janet?" she hazarded.
"Janet Groom grumbles a bit," said Mrs Sweetiman. "And you can hardly wonder, can you? Miss Groom's not so young herself and she has the rheumatism cruel bad when the wind's in the east. But arthritis, it's called, when it's the gentry has it, and invalid chairs and what not. Ah well, I wouldn't risk losing the use of my legs, I wouldn't. But there, nowadays even if you've got a chilblain you run to the doctor with it so as to get your money's worth out of the National Health. Too much of this health business we've got. Never did you any good thinking how bad you feel."
"I expect you're right," said Mrs Oliver.
She picked up her apples and went out in pursuit of Deirdre Henderson. This was not difficult, since the Sealyham was old and fat and was enjoying a leisurely examination of tufts of grass and pleasant smells.
Dogs, Mrs Oliver considered, were always a means at introduction.
"What a darling!" she exclaimed.
The big young woman with the plain face looked gratified.
"He is rather attractive," she said. "Aren't you, Ben?"
Ben looked up, gave a slight wiggle of his sausage-like body, resumed his nasal inspection of a tuft of thistles, approved it and proceeded to register approval in the usual manner.
"Does he fight?" asked Mrs Oliver. "Sealyhams do very often."
"Yes, he's an awful fighter. That's why I keep him on the lead."
"I thought so."
Both women considered the Sealyham.
Then Deirdre Henderson said with a kind of rush:
"You're - you're Ariadne Oliver, aren't you?"
"Yes. I'm staying with the Upwards."
"I know. Robin told us you were coming. I must tell you how much I enjoy your books."
Mrs Oliver, as usual, went purple with embarrassment.
"Oh," she murmured unhappily. "I'm very glad," she added gloomily.
"I haven't read as many of them as I'd like to, because we get books sent down from the Times Book Club and Mother doesn't like detective stories. She's frightfully sensitive and they keep her awake at night. But I adore them."
"You've had a real crime down here, haven't you?" said Mrs Oliver. "Which house was it? One of these cottages?"
"That one there."
Deirdre Henderson spoke in a rather choked voice.
Mrs Oliver directed her gaze on Mrs McGinty's former dwelling, the front doorstep of which was at present occupied by two unpleasant little Kiddles who were happily torturing a cat. As Mrs Oliver stepped forward to remonstrate, the cat escaped by a firm use of its claws.
The eldest Kiddle, who had been severely scratched, set up a howl.
"Serves you right," said Mrs Oliver, adding to Deirdre Henderson: "It doesn't look like a house where there's been a murder, does it?"
Both women seemed to be in accord about that.
Mrs Oliver continued.
"An old charwoman, wasn't it, and somebody robbed her?"
"Her lodger She had some money - under the floor."
"I see."
Deirdre Henderson said suddenly:
"But perhaps it wasn't him after all. There's a funny little man down here - a foreigner. His name's Hercule Poirot. -"
"Hercule Poirot? Oh yes, I know all about him."
"Is he really a detective?"
"My dear, he's frightfully celebrated. And terribly clever."
"Then perhaps he'll find out that he didn't do it after all."
"Who?"
"The - the lodger. James Bentley. Oh, I hope he'll get off."
"Do you? Why?"
"Because I don't want it to be him. I ever wanted it to be him."
Mrs Oliver looked at her curiously, startled by the passion in her voice.
"Did you know him?"
"No," said Deirdre slowly, "I didn't know him. But once Ben got his foot caught in a trap and he helped me to get him free. And we talked a little..."
"What was he like?"
"He was dreadfully lonely. His mother had just died. He was frightfully fond of his mother."
"And you are very fond of yours?" said Mrs Oliver acutely.
"Yes. That made me understand. Understand what he felt, I mean. Mother and I - we've just got each other, you see."
"I thought Robin told me that you had a stepfather."
Deirdre said bitterly: "Oh yes, I've got a stepfather."
Mrs Oliver said vaguely: "It's not the same thing, is it, as one's own father. Do you remember your own father?"
"No, he died before I was born. Mother married Mr Wetherby when I was four years old. I - I've always hated him. And Mother -" She paused before saying: "Mother's had a very sad life. She's had no sympathy or understanding. My stepfather is a most unfeeling man, hard and cold."
