"Lady Ravenscroft had been in poor health, had she not?"
"Yes. Nothing very serious. Nothing as serious as she had herself feared at one time. But she had suffered a lot of nervous strain and shock and general worry."
"You remained with her?"
"A sister whom I had living in Lausanne received Celia on her arrival and settled her into the institution which was only for about fifteen or sixteen girls, but there she would start her studies and await my return. I returned some three or four weeks later."
"But you were at Overcliffe at the time it happened."
"I was at Overcliffe. General and Lady Ravenscroft went for a walk, as was their habit. They went out and did not return. They were found dead, shot. The weapon was found lying by them. It was one that belonged to General Ravenscroft and had been always kept in a drawer in his study. The fingermarks of both of them were found on that weapon. There was no definite indication of who had held it last. Impressions of both people, slightly smeared, were on it. The obvious solution was a double suicide."
"You found no reason to doubt that?"
"The police found no reason, so I believe."
"Ah," said Poirot.
"I beg your pardon?" said Mademoiselle Meauhourat.
"Nothing. Nothing. Just something upon which I reflect."
Poirot looked at her. Brown hair as yet hardly touched with gray, lips closed firmly together, gray eyes, a face which showed no emotion. She was in control of herself completely.
"So you cannot tell me anything more?"
"I fear not. It was a long time ago."
"You remember that time well enough."
"Yes. One cannot entirely forget such a sad thing."
"And you agreed that Celia should not be told anything more of what had led up to this?"
"Have I not just told you that I had no extra information?"
"You were there, living at Overcliffe, for a period of time before the tragedy, were you not? Four or five weeks - six weeks, perhaps."
"Longer than that, really. Although I had been governess to Celia early, I came back this time, after she went to school, in order to help Lady Ravenscroft."
"Lady Ravenscroft's sister was living with her also about that time, was she not?"
"Yes. She had been in hospital having special treatment for some time. She had shown much improvement and the authorities had felt - the medical authorities I speak of - that she would do better to lead a normal life with her own relations and the atmosphere of a home. As Celia had gone to school, it seemed a good time for Lady Ravenscroft to invite her sister to be with her."
"Were they fond of each other, those two sisters?"
"It was difficult to know," said Mademoiselle Meauhourat.
Her brows drew together. It was as though what Poirot had just said aroused her interest. "I have wondered, you know. I have wondered so much since, and at the time, really. They were identical twins, you know. They had a bond between them, a bond of mutual dependence and love and in many ways they were very alike. But there were ways also in which they were not alike."
"You mean? I should be glad to know just what you mean by that."
"Oh, this has nothing to do with the tragedy. Nothing of that kind. But there was a definite, as I shall put it, a definite physical or mental flaw - whichever way you like to put it. Some people nowadays hold the theory that there is some physical cause for any kind of mental disorder. I believe that it is fairly well recognized by the medical profession that identical twins are born either with a great bond between them, a great likeness in their characters which means that although they may be divided in their environment, where they are brought up, the same things will happen to them at the same time of life. They will take the same trend. Some of the cases quoted as medical examples seem quite extraordinary. Two sisters, one living in Europe, one, say, in France, the other in England, they have a dog of the same kind which they choose at about the same date. They marry men singularly alike. They give birth perhaps to a child almost within a month of each other. It is as though they have to follow the pattern wherever they are and without knowing what the other one is doing. Then there is the opposite to that. A kind of revulsion, a hatred almost, that makes one sister draw apart, or one brother reject the other as though they seek to get away from the sameness, the likeness, the knowledge, the things they have in common. And that can lead to very strange results."
"I know," said Poirot, "I have heard of it. I have seen it once or twice. Love can turn to hate very easily. It is easier to hate where you have loved than it is to be indifferent where you have loved."
"Ah, you know that," said Mademoiselle Meauhourat.
"Yes, I have seen it not once but several times. Lady Ravenscroft's sister was very like her?"
"I think she was still very like her in appearance, though, if I may say so, the expression on her face was very different. She was in a condition of strain as Lady Ravenscroft was not. She had a great aversion to children. I don't know why. Perhaps she had had a miscarriage in early life. Perhaps she had longed for a child and never had one, but she had a kind of resentment against children. A dislike of them."
"That had led to one or two rather serious happenings, had it not?" said Poirot.
"Someone has told you that?"
"I have heard things from people who knew both sisters when they were in India. Lady Ravenscroft was there with her husband and her sister, Dolly, came out to stay with them there. There was an accident to a child there, and it was thought that Dolly might have been partially responsible for it. Nothing was proved definitely, but I gather that Molly's husband took his sister-in-law home to England and she had once more to go into a mental home."
"Yes, I believe that is a very good account of what happened. I do not of course know it of my own knowledge."
"No, but there are things you do know, I think, from your own knowledge."
"If so, I see no reason for bringing them back to mind now. Is it not better to leave things when at least they have been accepted?"
"There are other things that could have happened that day at Overcliffe. It may have been a double suicide, it could have been a murder, it could have been several other things. You were told what had happened, but I think, from one little sentence you just said, that you know what happened of your own knowledge. You know what happened that day and I think you know what happened perhaps - or began to happen, shall we say? - sometime before that. The time when Celia had gone to Switzerland and you were still at Overcliffe. I will ask you one question. I would like to know what your answer would be to it. It is not a thing of direct information. It is a question of what you believe. What were the feelings of General Ravenscroft towards those two sisters, the twin sisters?"
"I know what you mean."
For the first time her manner changed slightly. She was no longer on her guard. She leaned forward now and spoke to Poirot almost as though she definitely found a relief in doing so.
"They were both beautiful," she said, "as girls. I heard that from many people. General Ravenscroft fell in love with Dolly, the mentally afflicted sister. Although she had a disturbed personality, she was exceedingly attractive - sexually attractive. He loved her very dearly, and then I don't know whether he discovered in her some characteristic, something perhaps that alarmed him or in which he found a repulsion of some kind. He saw perhaps the beginning of insanity in her, the dangers connected with her. His affections went to her sister. He fell in love with the sister and married her."
"He loved them both, you mean. Not at the same time, but in each case there was genuine fact of love."
"Oh, yes, he was devoted to Molly, relied on her and she on him. He was a very lovable man."
"Forgive me," said Poirot. "You, too, were in love with him, I think."
"You - you dare say that to me?"
"Yes. I dare say it to you. I am not suggesting that you and he had a love affair. Nothing of that kind. I'm only saying that you loved him."
"Yes," said Zélie Meauhourat. "I loved him. In a sense, I still love him. There's nothing to be ashamed of. He trusted me and relied on me, but he was never in love with me. You can love and serve and still be happy. I wanted no more than I had. Trust, sympathy, belief in me -"
"And you did," said Poirot, "what you could to help him in a terrible crisis in his life. There are things you do not wish to tell me. There are things that I will say to you, things that I have gathered from various information that has come to me, that I know something about. Before I have come to see you, I have heard from others, from people who have known not only Lady Ravenscroft, not only Molly, but who have known Dolly. And I know something of Dolly, the tragedy of her life, the sorrow, the unhappiness and also the hatred, the streak perhaps of evil, the love of destruction that can be handed down in families. If she loved the man she was engaged to, she must have, when he married her sister, felt hatred perhaps towards that sister. Perhaps she never quite forgave her. But what of Molly Ravenscroft? Did she dislike her sister? Did she hate her?"
"Oh, no," said Zélie Meauhourat, "she loved her sister. She loved her with a very deep and protective love. That I do know. It was she who always asked that her sister should come and make her home with her. She wanted to save her sister from unhappiness, from danger too, because her sister would often relapse into fits of rather dangerous rages. She was frightened sometimes. Well, you know enough. You have already said that there was a strange dislike of children from which Dolly suffered."
"You mean that she disliked Celia?"
"No, no, not Celia. The other one. Edward. The younger one. Twice Edward had dangers of an accident. Once some kind of tinkering with a car and once some outburst of violent annoyance. I know Molly was glad when Edward went back to school. He was very young, remember - much younger than Celia. He was only eight or nine at preparatory school. He was vulnerable. Molly was frightened about him."
"Yes," said Poirot, "I can understand that. Now, if I may, I will talk of wigs. Wigs, the wearing of wigs. Four wigs. That is a lot for one woman to possess at one time. I know what they were like, what they looked like. I know that when more were needed, a French lady went to the shop in London and spoke about them and ordered them. There was a dog, too. A dog who went for a walk on the day of the tragedy with General Ravenscroft and his wife. Earlier that dog, some little time earlier, had bitten his mistress, Molly Ravenscroft."
"Dogs are like that," said Zélie Meauhourat. "They are never quite to be trusted. Yes, I know that."
"And I will tell you what I think happened on that day, and what happened before that. Some little time before that."
"And if I will not listen to you?"
"You will listen to me. You may say that what I have imagined is false. Yes, you might even do that, but I do not think you will. I am telling you and I believe it with all my heart, that what is needed here is the truth. It is not just imagining, it is not just wondering. There is a girl and a boy who care for each other and who are frightened of the future because of what may have happened and what there might be handed down from the father or the mother to the child. I am thinking of the girl, Celia. A rebellious girl, spirited, difficult perhaps to manage but with brains, a good mind, capable of happiness, capable of courage, but needing - there are people who need - truth. Because they can face truth without dismay. They can face it with that brave acceptance that you have to have in life if life is to be any good to you. And the boy that she loves, he wants that for her, too. Will you listen to me?"
"Yes," said Zélie Meauhourat, "I am listening. You understand a great deal, I think, and I think you know more than I could have imagined you would know. Speak and I will listen."
Chapter 20
COURT OF INQUIRY
Once more Hercule Poirot stood on the cliff overlooking the rocks below and the sea breaking against them. Here where he stood the bodies of a husband and wife had been found. Here, three weeks before that a woman had walked in her sleep and fallen to her death.
"Why had these things happened?" That had been Superintendent Garroway's question.
Why? What had led to it?
An accident first - and three weeks later a double suicide.
Old sins that had left long shadows. A beginning that had led years later to a tragic end.
Today there would be people meeting here. A boy and a girl who sought the truth. Two people who knew the truth.
Hercule Poirot turned away from the sea and back along the narrow path that led to a house once called Overcliffe.
It was not very far. He saw cars parked against a wall. He saw the outline of a house against the sky. A house that was clearly empty, that needed repainting. A house agent's board hung there, announcing that "this desirable property" was for sale. On the gate the word Overcliffe had a line drawn over it and the name Down House replaced it. He went to meet two people who were walking towards him. One was Desmond Burton-Cox and the other was Celia Ravenscroft.
"I got an order from the house agent," said Desmond, "saying we wanted to view it or however they put it. I've got the key in case we want to go inside. It's changed hands twice in the last five years. But there wouldn't be anything to see there now, would there?"
"I shouldn't think so," said Celia. "After all, it's belonged to lots of people already. Some people called Archer who first bought it, and then somebody called Fallowfield, I think. They said it was too lonely. And now these last people are selling it, too. Perhaps they were haunted."
"Do you really believe in haunted houses?" said Desmond.
"Well now, of course I don't think so really," said Celia, "but this might be, mightn't it? I mean, the sort of things that happened, the sort of place it is and everything..."
