He indicated the colander as it reposed beside him on the sofa.
"So that's where I left it." She snatched it up. "Everything is behind hand today..." Her glance took in Hercule Poirot sitting bolt upright.
"What on earth do you want to sit there for? Even on a cushion, it's the most uncomfortable seat in the room. All the springs are broken."
"I know, madame. But I am - I am admiring that picture on the wall."
Maureen glanced up at the oil painting of a naval officer complete with telescope.
"Yes - it's good. About the only good thing in the house. We're not sure that it isn't a Gainsborough." She sighed. "Johnnie won't sell it, though. It's his great-great and I think a few more greats, grandfather and he went down with his ship or did something frightfully gallant. Johnnie's terribly proud of it."
"Yes," said Poirot gently. "Yes, he has something to be proud about, your husband!"
III
It was three o'clock when Poirot arrived at Dr Rendell's house.
He had eaten rabbit stew and spinach and hard potatoes and a rather peculiar pudding, not scorched this time. Instead, "The water got in," Maureen had explained. He had drunk half a cup of muddy coffee. He did not feel well.
The door was opened by the elderly housekeeper Mrs Scott, and he asked for Mrs Rendell.
She was in the drawing-room with the radio on and started up when he was announced.
He had the same impression of her that he had had the first time he saw her. Wary, on her guard, frightened of him, or frightened of what he represented.
She seemed paler and more shadowy than she had done. He was almost certain that she was thinner.
"I want to ask you a question, madame."
"A question? Oh? Oh yes?"
"Did Mrs Upward telephone to you on the day of her death?"
She stared at him. She nodded.
"At what time?"
"Mrs Scott took the message. It was about six o'clock, I think."
"What was the message? To ask you to go there that evening?"
"Yes. She said that Mrs Oliver and Robin were going into Kilchester and she would be all alone as it was Janet's night out. Could I come down and keep her company."
"Was any time suggested?"
"Nine o'clock or after."
"And you went?"
"I meant to. I really meant to. But I don't know how it was, I fell fast asleep after dinner that night. It was after ten when I woke up. I thought it was too late."
"You did not tell the police about Mrs Upward's call?"
Her eyes widened. They had a rather innocent childlike stare.
"Ought I to have done? Since I didn't go, I thought it didn't matter. Perhaps, even, I felt rather guilty. If I'd gone, she might have been alive now." She caught her breath suddenly. "Oh, I hope it wasn't like that."
"Not quite like that," said Poirot.
He paused and then said:
"What are you afraid of, Madame?"
She caught her breath sharply.
"Afraid? I'm not afraid."
"But you are."
"What nonsense. What - what should I be afraid of?"
Poirot paused for a moment before speaking.
"I thought perhaps you might be afraid of me..."
She didn't answer. But her eyes widened. Slowly, defiantly, she shook her head.
Chapter 24
"This way to Bedlam," said Spence.
"It is not as bad as that," said Poirot soothingly.
"That's what you say. Every single bit of information that comes in makes things more difficult. Now you tell me that Mrs Upward rang up three women. Asked them to come that evening. Why three? Didn't she know herself which of them was Lily Gamboll? Or isn't it a case of Lily Gamboll at all? Take that book with the name of Evelyn Hope in it. It suggests, doesn't it, that Mrs Upward and Eva Kane are one and the same."
"Which agrees exactly with James Bentley's impression of what Mrs McGinty said to him."
"I thought he wasn't sure."
"He was not sure. It would be impossible for James Bentley to be sure of anything. He did not listen properly to what Mrs McGinty was saying. Nevertheless, if James Bentley had an impression that Mrs McGinty was talking about Mrs Upward, it may very well be true. Impressions often are."
"Our latest information from Australia (it was Australia she went to, by the way, not America) seems to be to the effect that the 'Mrs Hope' in question died out there twenty years ago."
"I have already been told that," said Poirot.
"You always know everything, don't you, Poirot?"
Poirot took no notice of this gibe. He said:
"At the one end we have Mrs Hope deceased in Australia - and at the other?
"At the other end we have Mrs Upward, the widow of a rich North Country manufacturer. She lived with him near Leeds, and had a son. Soon after the son's birth, her husband died. The boy was inclined to be tubercular and since her husband's death she lived mostly abroad."
"And when does this saga begin?"
"The saga begins four years after Eve Kane left England. Upward met his wife somewhere abroad and brought her home after the marriage."
"So actually Mrs Upward could be Eva Kane. What was her maiden name?"
"Hargraves, I understand. But what's in a name?"
"What indeed. Eva Kane, or Evelyn Hope, may have died in Australia - but she may have arranged a convenient decease and resuscitated herself as Hargraves and made a wealthy match."
"It's all a long time ago," said Spence. "But supposing that it's true. Supposing she kept a picture of herself and supposing that Mrs McGinty saw it - then one can only assume that she killed Mrs McGinty."
"That could be, could it not? Robin Upward was broadcasting that night. Mrs Rendell mentions going to the cottage that evening, remember, and not being able to make herself heard. According to Mrs Sweetiman, Janet Groom told her that Mrs Upward was not really as crippled as she made out."
"That's all very well, Poirot, but the fact remains that she herself was killed - after recognising a photograph. Now you want to make out that the two deaths are not connected."
"No, no. I do not say that. They are connected all right."
"I give it up."
"Evelyn Hope. There is the key to the problem."
"Evelyn Carpenter? Is that your idea? Not Lily Gamboll - but Eva Kane's daughter! But surely she wouldn't kill her own mother."
"No, no. This is not matricide."
"What an irritating devil you are, Poirot. You'll be saying next that Eva Kane and Lily Gamboll, and Janice Courtland and Vera Blake are all living in Broadhinny. All four suspects."
"We have more than four. Eva Kane was the Craigs' nursery governess, remember."
"What's that got to do with it?"
"Where there is a nursery governess, there must be children - or at least a child. What happened to the Craig children?"
"There was a girl and a boy, I believe. Some relative took them."
"So there are two more people to take into account. Two people who might have kept a photograph for the third reason I mentioned - revenge."
"I don't believe it," said Spence.
Poirot sighed.
"It has to be considered, all the same. I think I know the truth - though there is one fact that baffles me utterly."
"I'm glad something baffles you," said Spence.
"Confirm one thing for me, mon cher Spence. Eva Kane left the country before Craig's execution, that is right?"
"Quite right."
"And she was, at that time, expecting a child?"
"Quite right."
"Bon Dieu, how stupid I have been," said Hercule Poirot. "The whole thing is simple, is it not?"
It was after that remark that there was very nearly a third murder - the murder of Hercule Poirot by Superintendent Spence in Kilchester Police Headquarters.
II
"I want," said Hercule Poirot, "a personal call. To Mrs Ariadne Oliver."
A personal call to Mrs Oliver was not achieved without difficulties. Mrs Oliver was working and could not be disturbed. Poirot, however, disregarded all denials. Presently he heard the authoress's voice.
It was cross and rather breathless.
"Well, what is it?" said Mrs Oliver. "Have you got to ring me up just now? I've thought of a most wonderful idea for a murder in a draper's shop. You know, the old-fashioned kind that sells combinations and funny vests with long sleeves."
"I do not know," said Poirot. "And anyway what I have to say to you is far more important."
"It couldn't be," said Mrs Oliver. "Not to me, I mean. Unless I get a rough sketch of my idea jotted down, it will go!"
Hercule Poirot paid no attention to this creative agony. He asked sharp imperative questions to which Mrs Oliver replied somewhat vaguely.
"Yes - yes - it's a little Repertory Theatre - I don't know its name... Well, one of them was Cecil Something, and the one I was talking to was Michael."
"Admirable. That is all I need to know."
"But why Cecil and Michael?"
"Return to the combinations and the long-sleeved vests, madame."
"I can't think why you don't arrest Dr Rendell," said Mrs Oliver. "I would, if I were the Head of Scotland Yard."
"Very possibly. I wish you luck with the murder in the draper's shop."
"The whole idea has gone now," said Mrs Oliver. "You've ruined it."
Poirot apologised handsomely.
He put down the receiver and smiled at Spence.
"We go now - or at least I will go - to interview a young actor whose Christian name is Michael and who plays the less important parts in the Cullenquay Repertory Theatre. I pray only that he is the right Michael."
"Why on earth -"
Poirot dexterously averted the rising wrath of Superintendent Spence.
"Do you know, cher ami, what is a secret de Polichinelle?"
"Is this a French lesson?" demanded the superintendent wrathfully.
"A secret de Polichinelle is a secret that everyone can know. For this reason the people who do not know it never hear about it - for if everyone thinks you know a thing, nobody tells you."
"How I manage to keep my hands off you I don't know," said Superintendent Spence.
Chapter 25
The inquest was over - a verdict had been returned of murder by a person or persons unknown.
After the inquest, at the invitation of Hercule Poirot, those who had attended it came to Long Meadows.
Working diligently, Poirot had induced some semblance of order in the long drawing-room. Chairs had been arranged in a neat semi-circle, Maureen's dogs had been excluded with difficulty, and Hercule Poirot, a self-appointed lecturer, took up his position at the end of the room and initiated proceedings with a slightly self-conscious clearing of the throat.
"Messieurs et Mesdames -"
He paused. His next words were unexpected and seemed almost farcical.
"Mrs McGinty's dead. How did she die?
Down on her knees just like I.
Mrs McGinty's dead. How did she die?
Holding her hand out just like I.
Mrs McGinty's dead. How did she die?
Like this..."
Seeing their expressions, he went on:
"No, I am not mad. Because I repeat to you the childish rhyme of a childish game, it does not mean that I am in my second childhood. Some of you may have played that game as children. Mrs Upward had played it. Indeed she repeated it to me - with a difference. She said: 'Mrs McGinty's dead. How did she die? Sticking her neck out just like I.' That is what she said - and that is what she did. She stuck her neck out - and so she also, like Mrs McGinty, died...
"For our purpose we must go back to the beginning - to Mrs McGinty - down on her knees scrubbing other people's houses. Mrs McGinty was killed, and a man, James Bentley, was arrested, tried and convicted. For certain reasons, Superintendent Spence, the officer in charge of the case was not convinced of Bentley's guilt, strong though the evidence was. I agreed with him. I came down here to answer a question. 'How did Mrs McGinty die? Why did she die?'
"I will not make you the long and complicated histories. I will say only that as simple a thing as a bottle of ink gave me a clue. In the Sunday Companion, read by Mrs McGinty on the Sunday before her death, four photographs were published. You know all about those photographs by now, so I will only say that Mrs McGinty recognised one of those photographs as a photograph she had seen in one of the houses where she worked.
"She spoke of this to James Bentley though he attached no importance to the matter at the time, nor indeed afterwards. Actually he barely listened. But he had the impression that Mrs McGinty had seen the photograph in Mrs Upward's house and that when she referred to a woman who need not be so proud if all was known, she was referring to Mrs Upward. We cannot depend on that statement of his, but she certainly used that phrase about pride and there is no doubt that Mrs Upward was a proud and imperious woman.
"As you all know - some of you were present and the others will have heard - I produced those four photographs at Mrs Upward's house. I caught a flicker of surprise and recognition in Mrs Upward's expression and taxed her with it. She had to admit it. She said that she 'had seen one of the photographs somewhere but she couldn't remember where.' When asked which photograph, she pointed to a photograph of the child Lily Gamboll. But that, let me tell you, was not the truth. For reasons of her own, Mrs Upward wanted to keep her recognition to herself. She pointed to the wrong photograph to put me off.
"But one person was not deceived - the murderer. One person knew which photograph Mrs Upward had recognised. And here I will not beat to and fro about the bush - the photograph in question was that of Eva Kane - a woman who was accomplice, victim or possibly leading spirit in the famous Craig Murder Case.
"On the next evening Mrs Upward was killed. She was killed for the same reason that Mrs McGinty was killed. Mrs McGinty stuck her hand out, Mrs Upward stuck her neck out - the result was the same.
