The mystery of the Blue Train
caused great anxiety on several occasions. The police would not accept
the view that it was kleptomania. A very clever young gentleman, sir,
but vicious through and through, if you take my meaning. His Grace
shipped him to Australia, and I hear he was convicted out there under
another name. Very odd, sir, but there it is. The young gentleman, I
need hardly say, was not in want financially."
Poirot nodded his head slowly.
"Love of excitement," he murmured, "and a little kink in the brain
somewhere. I wonder now--"
He drew out the telegram from his pocket and read it again.
"Then there was Lady Mary Fox's daughter," continued the valet in a
mood of reminiscence. "Swindled tradespeople something shocking, she
did. Very worrying to the best families, if I may say so, and there are
many other queer cases I could mention."
"You have a wide experience, Georges," murmured Poirot. "I often
wonder having lived so exclusively with titled families that you
demean yourself by coming as a valet to me. I put it down to love of
excitement on your part."
"Not exactly, sir," said George. "I happened to see in _Society
Snippets_ that you had been received at Buckingham Palace. That was
just when I was looking for a new situation. His Majesty, so it said,
had been most gracious and friendly and thought very highly of your
abilities."
"Ah," said Poirot, "one always likes to know the reason for things."
He remained in thought for a few moments and then said:
"You rang up Mademoiselle Papopolous?"
"Yes, sir; she and her father will be pleased to dine with you
to-night."
"Ah," said Poirot thoughtfully. He drank off his chocolate, set the
cup and saucer neatly in the middle of the tray, and spoke gently, more
to himself than to the valet.
"The squirrel, my good Georges, collects nuts. He stores them up in
the autumn so that they may be of advantage to him later. To make a
success of humanity, Georges, we must profit by the lessons of those
below us in the animal kingdom. I have always done so. I have been the
cat, watching at the mouse hole. I have been the good dog following up
the scent, and not taking my nose from the trail. And also, my good
Georges, I have been the squirrel. I have stored away the little fact
here, the little fact there. I go now to my store and I take out one
particular nut, a nut that I stored away--let me see, seventeen years
ago. You follow me, Georges?"
"I should hardly have thought, sir," said George, "that nuts would have
kept so long as that, though I know one can do wonders with preserving
bottles."
Poirot looked at him and smiled.
28. Poirot Plays the Squirrel
Poirot started to keep his dinner appointment with a margin of
three-quarters of an hour to spare. He had an object in this. The car
took him, not straight to Monte Carlo, but to Lady Tamplin's house at
Cap Martin, where he asked for Miss Grey. The ladies were dressing and
Poirot was shown into a small salon to wait, and here, after a lapse of
three or four minutes, Lenox Tamplin came to him.
"Katherine is not quite ready yet," she said. "Can I give her a
message, or would you rather wait until she comes down?"
Poirot looked at her thoughtfully. He was a minute or two in replying,
as though something of great weight hung upon his decision. Apparently
the answer to such a simple question mattered.
"No," he said at last, "no, I do not think it is necessary that I
should wait to see Mademoiselle Katherine. I think, perhaps, that it is
better that I should not. These things are sometimes difficult."
Lenox waited politely, her eyebrows slightly raised.
"I have a piece of news," continued Poirot. "You will, perhaps, tell
your friend. M. Kettering was arrested to-night for the murder of his
wife."
"You want me to tell Katherine that?" asked Lenox. She breathed rather
hard, as though she had been running; her face, Poirot thought, looked
white and strained--rather noticeably so.
"If you please, Mademoiselle."
"Why?" said Lenox. "Do you think Katherine will be upset? Do you think
she cares?"
"I don't know, Mademoiselle," said Poirot. "See, I admit it frankly.
As a rule I know everything, but in this case, I--well, I do not. You,
perhaps, know better than I do."
"Yes," said Lenox, "I know--but I am not going to tell you all the
same."
She paused for a minute or two, her dark brows drawn together in a
frown.
"You believe he did it?" she said abruptly.
Poirot shrugged his shoulders.
"The police say so."
"Ah," said Lenox, "hedging, are you? So there is something to hedge
about."
Again she was silent, frowning. Poirot said gently:
"You have known Derek Kettering a long time, have you not?"
"Off and on ever since I was a kid," said Lenox gruffly.
Poirot nodded his head several times without speaking.
With one of her brusque movements Lenox drew forward a chair and sat
down on it, her elbows on the table and her face supported by her
hands. Sitting thus, she looked directly across the table at Poirot.
"What have they got to go on?" she demanded. "Motive, I suppose.
Probably came into money at her death."
"He came into two million."
"And if she had not died he would have been ruined?"
"Yes."
"But there must have been more than that," persisted Lenox. "He
travelled by the same train, I know, but--that would not be enough to
go on by itself."
"A cigarette case with the letter 'K' on it which did not belong to
Mrs. Kettering was found in her carriage, and he was seen by two people
entering and leaving the compartment just before the train got into
Lyons."
"What two people?"
"Your friend Miss Grey was one of them. The other was Mademoiselle
Mirelle, the dancer."
"And he, Derek, what has he got to say about it?" demanded Lenox
sharply.
"He denies having entered his wife's compartment at all," said Poirot.
"Fool!" said Lenox crisply, frowning. "Just before Lyons, you say? Does
nobody know when--when she died?"
"The doctors' evidence necessarily cannot be very definite," said
Poirot; "they are inclined to think that death was unlikely to have
occurred after leaving Lyons. And we know this much, that a few moments
after leaving Lyons Mrs. Kettering was dead."
"How do you know that?"
Poirot was smiling rather oddly to himself.
"Some one else went into her compartment and found her dead."
"And they did not rouse the train?"
"No."
"Why was that?"
"Doubtless they had their reasons."
Lenox looked at him sharply.
"Do you know the reason?"
"I think so--yes."
Lenox sat still turning things over in her mind. Poirot watched her in
silence. At last she looked up. A soft colour had come into her cheeks
and her eyes were shining.
"You think some one on the train must have killed her, but that need
not be so at all. What is to stop any one swinging themselves on to
the train when it stopped at Lyons? They could go straight to her
compartment, strangle her, and take the rubies and drop off the train
again without any one being the wiser. She may have been actually
killed while the train was in Lyons station. Then she would have been
alive when Derek went in, and dead when the other person found her."
Poirot leant back in his chair. He drew a deep breath. He looked across
at the girl and nodded his head three times, then he heaved a sigh.
"Mademoiselle," he said, "what you have said there is very just--very
true. I was struggling in darkness, and you have shown me a light.
There was a point that puzzled me and you have made it plain."
He got up.
"And Derek?" said Lenox.
"Who knows?" said Poirot, with a shrug of his shoulders. "But I will
tell you this, Mademoiselle. I am not satisfied; no, I, Hercule Poirot,
am not yet satisfied. It may be that this very night I shall learn
something more. At least, I go to try."
"You are meeting some one?"
"Yes."
"Some one who knows something?"
"Some one who might know something. In these matters one must leave no
stone unturned. Au revoir, Mademoiselle."
Lenox accompanied him to the door.
"Have I--helped?" she asked.
Poirot's face softened as he looked up at her standing on the doorstep
above him.
"Yes, Mademoiselle, you have helped. If things are very dark, always
remember that."
When the car had driven off he relapsed into a frowning absorption, but
in his eyes was that faint green light which was always the precursor
of the triumph to be.
He was a few minutes late at the rendezvous, and found that M.
Papopolous and his daughter had arrived before him. His apologies were
abject, and he outdid himself in politeness and small attentions.
The Greek was looking particularly benign and noble this evening, a
sorrowful patriarch of blameless life. Zia was looking handsome and
good humoured. The dinner was a pleasant one. Poirot was his best and
most sparkling self. He told anecdotes, he made jokes, he paid graceful
compliments to Zia Papopolous, and he told many interesting incidents
of his career. The menu was a carefully selected one, and the wine was
excellent.
At the close of dinner M. Papopolous inquired politely:
"And the tip I gave you? You have had your little flutter on the horse?"
"I am in communication with--er--my bookmaker," replied Poirot.
The eyes of the two men met.
"A well-known horse, eh?"
"No," said Poirot; "it is what our friends, the English, call a dark
horse."
"Ah!" said M. Papopolous thoughtfully.
"Now we must step across to the Casino and have our little flutter at
the roulette table," cried Poirot gaily.
At the Casino the party separated, Poirot devoting himself solely to
Zia, whilst Papopolous himself drifted away.
Poirot was not fortunate, but Zia had a run of good luck, and had soon
won a few thousand francs.
"It would be as well," she observed drily to Poirot, "if I stopped now."
Poirot's eyes twinkled.
"Superb!" he exclaimed. "You are the daughter of your father,
Mademoiselle Zia. To know when to stop. Ah! that is the art."
He looked round the rooms.
"I cannot see your father anywhere about," he remarked carelessly. "I
will fetch your cloak for you, Mademoiselle, and we will go out in the
gardens."
He did not, however, go straight to the cloak-room. His sharp eyes had
seen but a little while before the departure of M. Papopolous. He was
anxious to know what had become of the wily Greek. He ran him to earth
unexpectedly in the big entrance hall. He was standing by one of the
pillars, talking to a lady who had just arrived. The lady was Mirelle.
Poirot sidled unostentatiously round the room. He arrived at the other
side of the pillar, and unnoticed by the two who were talking together
in an animated fashion--or rather, that is to say, the dancer was
talking, Papopolous contributing an occasional monosyllable and a good
many expressive gestures.
"I tell you I must have time," the dancer was saying. "If you give me
time I will get the money."
"To wait"--the Greek shrugged his shoulders--"it is awkward."
"Only a very little while," pleaded the other. "Ah! but you must! A
week--ten days--that is all I ask. You can be sure of your affair. The
money will be forthcoming."
Papopolous shifted a little and looked round him uneasily--to find
Poirot almost at his elbow with a beaming innocent face.
"_Ah! vous voilà_, M. Papopolous. I have been looking for you. It
is permitted that I take Mademoiselle Zia for a little turn in the
gardens? Good evening, Mademoiselle." He bowed very low to Mirelle. "A
thousand pardons that I did not see you immediately."
The dancer accepted his greetings rather impatiently. She was clearly
annoyed at the interruption of her _tête-à-tête_. Poirot was quick
to take the hint. Papopolous had already murmured: "Certainly--but