The murder of Roger Ackroyd
Miss Russell sat down with her usual composure. If she felt any inward
agitation, it did not display itself in any outward manifestation.
“It seems a queer way of doing things, if you’ll allow me to say so,”
she remarked.
“Miss Russell—I have news to give you.”
“Indeed!”
“Charles Kent has been arrested at Liverpool.”
Not a muscle of her face moved. She merely opened her eyes a trifle
wider, and asked, with a tinge of defiance:
“Well, what of it?”
But at that moment it came to me—the resemblance that had haunted me
all along, something familiar in the defiance of Charles Kent’s manner.
The two voices, one rough and coarse, the other painfully ladylike—were
strangely the same in timbre. It was of Miss Russell that I had been
reminded that night outside the gates of Fernly Park.
I looked at Poirot, full of my discovery, and he gave me an
imperceptible nod.
In answer to Miss Russell’s question, he threw out his hands in a
thoroughly French gesture.
“I thought you might be interested, that is all,” he said mildly.
“Well, I’m not particularly,” said Miss Russell. “Who is this Charles
Kent anyway?”
“He is a man, mademoiselle, who was at Fernly on the night of the
murder.”
“Really?”
“Fortunately for him, he has an alibi. At a quarter to ten he was at a
public-house a mile from here.”
“Lucky for him,” commented Miss Russell.
“But we still do not know what he was doing at Fernly—who it was he
went to meet, for instance.”
“I’m afraid I can’t help you at all,” said the housekeeper politely.
“Nothing came to _my_ ears. If that is all——”
She made a tentative movement as though to rise. Poirot stopped her.
“It is not quite all,” he said smoothly. “This morning fresh
developments have arisen. It seems now that Mr. Ackroyd was murdered,
not at a quarter to ten, but _before_. Between ten minutes to nine,
when Dr. Sheppard left, and a quarter to ten.”
I saw the color drain from the housekeeper’s face, leaving it dead
white. She leaned forward, her figure swaying.
“But Miss Ackroyd said—Miss Ackroyd said——”
“Miss Ackroyd has admitted that she was lying. She was never in the
study at all that evening.”
“Then——?”
“Then it would seem that in this Charles Kent we have the man we are
looking for. He came to Fernly, can give no account of what he was
doing there——”
“I can tell you what he was doing there. He never touched a hair of old
Ackroyd’s head—he never went near the study. He didn’t do it, I tell
you.”
She was leaning forward. That iron self-control was broken through at
last. Terror and desperation were in her face.
“M. Poirot! M. Poirot! Oh, do believe me.”
Poirot got up and came to her. He patted her reassuringly on the
shoulder.
“But yes—but yes, I will believe. I had to make you speak, you know.”
For an instant suspicion flared up in her.
“Is what you said true?”
“That Charles Kent is suspected of the crime? Yes, that is true. You
alone can save him, by telling the reason for his being at Fernly.”
“He came to see me.” She spoke in a low, hurried voice. “I went out to
meet him——”
“In the summer-house, yes, I know.”
“How do you know?”
“Mademoiselle, it is the business of Hercule Poirot to know things. I
know that you went out earlier in the evening, that you left a message
in the summer-house to say what time you would be there.”
“Yes, I did. I had heard from him—saying he was coming. I dared not
let him come to the house. I wrote to the address he gave me and said
I would meet him in the summer-house, and described it to him so that
he would be able to find it. Then I was afraid he might not wait there
patiently, and I ran out and left a piece of paper to say I would be
there about ten minutes past nine. I didn’t want the servants to see
me, so I slipped out through the drawing-room window. As I came back, I
met Dr. Sheppard, and I fancied that he would think it queer. I was out
of breath, for I had been running. I had no idea that he was expected
to dinner that night.”
She paused.
“Go on,” said Poirot. “You went out to meet him at ten minutes past
nine. What did you say to each other?”
“It’s difficult. You see——”
“Mademoiselle,” said Poirot, interrupting her, “in this matter I must
have the whole truth. What you tell us need never go beyond these four
walls. Dr. Sheppard will be discreet, and so shall I. See, I will help
you. This Charles Kent, he is your son, is he not?”
She nodded. The color had flamed into her cheeks.
“No one has ever known. It was long ago—long ago—down in Kent. I was
not married....”
“So you took the name of the county as a surname for him. I understand.”
“I got work. I managed to pay for his board and lodging. I never told
him that I was his mother. But he turned out badly, he drank, then took
to drugs. I managed to pay his passage out to Canada. I didn’t hear of
him for a year or two. Then, somehow or other, he found out that I was
his mother. He wrote asking me for money. Finally, I heard from him
back in this country again. He was coming to see me at Fernly, he said.
I dared not let him come to the house. I have always been considered
so—so very respectable. If any one got an inkling—it would have been
all up with my post as housekeeper. So I wrote to him in the way I have
just told you.”
“And in the morning you came to see Dr. Sheppard?”
“Yes. I wondered if something could be done. He was not a bad
boy—before he took to drugs.”
“I see,” said Poirot. “Now let us go on with the story. He came that
night to the summer-house?”
“Yes, he was waiting for me when I got there. He was very rough and
abusive. I had brought with me all the money I had, and I gave it to
him. We talked a little, and then he went away.”
“What time was that?”
“It must have been between twenty and twenty-five minutes past nine. It
was not yet half-past when I got back to the house.”
“Which way did he go?”
“Straight out the same way he came, by the path that joined the drive
just inside the lodge gates.”
Poirot nodded.
“And you, what did you do?”
“I went back to the house. Major Blunt was walking up and down the
terrace smoking, so I made a detour to get round to the side door. It
was then just on half-past nine, as I tell you.”
Poirot nodded again. He made a note or two in a microscopic pocket-book.
“I think that is all,” he said thoughtfully.
“Ought I——” she hesitated. “Ought I to tell all this to Inspector
Raglan?”
“It may come to that. But let us not be in a hurry. Let us proceed
slowly, with due order and method. Charles Kent is not yet formally
charged with murder. Circumstances may arise which will render your
story unnecessary.”
Miss Russell rose.
“Thank you very much, M. Poirot,” she said. “You have been very
kind—very kind indeed. You—you do believe me, don’t you? That Charles
had nothing to do with this wicked murder!”
“There seems no doubt that the man who was talking to Mr. Ackroyd in
the library at nine-thirty could not possibly have been your son. Be of
good courage, mademoiselle. All will yet be well.”
Miss Russell departed. Poirot and I were left together.
“So that’s that,” I said. “Every time we come back to Ralph Paton. How
did you manage to spot Miss Russell as the person Charles Kent came to
meet? Did you notice the resemblance?”
“I had connected her with the unknown man long before we actually
came face to face with him. As soon as we found that quill. The quill
suggested dope, and I remembered your account of Miss Russell’s visit
to you. Then I found the article on cocaine in that morning’s paper. It
all seemed very clear. She had heard from some one that morning—some
one addicted to drugs, she read the article in the paper, and she came
to you to ask a few tentative questions. She mentioned cocaine, since
the article in question was on cocaine. Then, when you seemed too
interested, she switched hurriedly to the subject of detective stories
and untraceable poisons. I suspected a son or a brother, or some other
undesirable male relation. Ah! but I must go. It is the time of the
lunch.”
“Stay and lunch with us,” I suggested.
Poirot shook his head. A faint twinkle came into his eye.
“Not again to-day. I should not like to force Mademoiselle Caroline to
adopt a vegetarian diet two days in succession.”
It occurred to me that there was not much which escaped Hercule Poirot.
CHAPTER XXI
THE PARAGRAPH IN THE PAPER
Caroline, of course, had not failed to see Miss Russell come
to the surgery door. I had anticipated this, and had ready an
elaborate account of the lady’s bad knee. But Caroline was not in a
cross-questioning mood. Her point of view was that she knew what Miss
Russell had really come for and that _I_ didn’t.
“Pumping you, James,” said Caroline. “Pumping you in the most shameless
manner, I’ve not a doubt. It’s no good interrupting. I dare say you
hadn’t the least idea she was doing it even. Men _are_ so simple. She
knows that you are in M. Poirot’s confidence, and she wants to find out
things. Do you know what I think, James?”
“I couldn’t begin to imagine. You think so many extraordinary things.”
“It’s no good being sarcastic. I think Miss Russell knows more about
Mr. Ackroyd’s death than she is prepared to admit.”
Caroline leaned back triumphantly in her chair.
“Do you really think so?” I said absently.
“You are very dull to-day, James. No animation about you. It’s that
liver of yours.”
Our conversation then dealt with purely personal matters.
The paragraph inspired by Poirot duly appeared in our daily paper the
next morning. I was in the dark as to its purpose, but its effect on
Caroline was immense.
She began by stating, most untruly, that she had said as much all
along. I raised my eyebrows, but did not argue. Caroline, however, must
have felt a prick of conscience, for she went on:—
“I mayn’t have actually mentioned Liverpool, but I knew he’d try to get
away to America. That’s what Crippen did.”
“Without much success,” I reminded her.
“Poor boy, and so they’ve caught him. I consider, James, that it’s your
duty to see that he isn’t hung.”
“What do you expect me to do?”
“Why, you’re a medical man, aren’t you? You’ve known him from a boy
upwards. Not mentally responsible. That’s the line to take, clearly. I
read only the other day that they’re very happy in Broadmoor—it’s quite
like a high-class club.”
But Caroline’s words had reminded me of something.
“I never knew that Poirot had an imbecile nephew?” I said curiously.
“Didn’t you? Oh, he told me all about it. Poor lad. It’s a great grief
to all the family. They’ve kept him at home so far, but it’s getting
to such a pitch that they’re afraid he’ll have to go into some kind of
institution.”
“I suppose you know pretty well everything there is to know about
Poirot’s family by this time,” I said, exasperated.
“Pretty well,” said Caroline complacently. “It’s a great relief to
people to be able to tell all their troubles to some one.”
“It might be,” I said, “if they were ever allowed to do so
spontaneously. Whether they enjoy having confidences screwed out of
them by force is another matter.”
Caroline merely looked at me with the air of a Christian martyr
enjoying martyrdom.
“You are so self-contained, James,” she said. “You hate speaking out,
or parting with any information yourself, and you think everybody else
must be just like you. I should hope that I never screw confidences out
of anybody. For instance, if M. Poirot comes in this afternoon, as he
said he might do, I shall not dream of asking him who it was arrived at
his house early this morning.”
“Early this morning?” I queried.
“Very early,” said Caroline. “Before the milk came. I just happened