once.'
'Things came to light to show that the opera girl could have done it quite eaasily,' said Elspeth. 'You see, she wrote a great many of Mrs. Llewellyn-Smythe's letters for her and it seems Mrs. Llewellyn-Smythe had a great dislike of typed Idetters being sent to friends or anything like that.
If it wasn't a business letter, she'd all ways say 'write it in handwriting and make it as much like mine as you can and sign it with my name'. Mrs. Minden, the clesaning woman, heard her say that one day, sand I suppose the girl got used to doing it and copying her employer's handwriting and then it came to her suddenly that she could do this and get away with it. And t that's how it all came about. But as I say, the lawyers were too sharp and spotted it.'
'Mrs. Llewellyn-Smythe's own lawyers?'
'Yes. Fullerton, Harrison and Leadbetter. Very respectable firm in Medchester. They'd always done all her legal business for her. Anyway, they got experts on to it and questions were asked and the girl was asked questions and got the wind up. Just walked out one day leaving half her things behind her. They were preparing to take proceedings against her, but she didn't wait for that. She just got out. It's not so difficult, really, to get out of this country, if you do it in time.
Why, you can go on day trips on the Continent without a passport, and if you've got a little arrangement with someone on the other side, things can be arranged long before there is any real hue and cry. She's probably gone back to her own country or changed her name or gone to friends.'
'But everyone thought that Mrs. Llewellyn-Smythe died a natural death?' asked Poirot.
'Yes, I don't think there was ever any question of that. I only say it's possible because, as I say, these things have happened before where the doctor has no suspicion. Supposing that girl Joyce had heard something, had heard the au pair girl giving medicines to Mrs. Llewellyn-Smythe, and the old lady saying 'this medicine tastes different to the usual one'. Or 'this has got a bitter taste' or 'it's peculiar'.'
'Anyone would think you'd been there listening to things yourself, Elspeth,' said Superintendent Spence. 'This is all your imagination.'
'When did she die?' said Poirot. 'Morning, evening, indoors, out of doors, at home or away from home?'
'Oh, at home. She'd come up from doing things in the garden one day, breathing rather heavily. She said she was very tired and she went to lie down on her bed. And to put it in one sentence, she never woke up.
Which is all very natural, it seems, medically speaking.'
Poirot took out a little notebook. The page was already headed 'Victims'.
Under, he wrote.
'No. 1. suggested, Mrs. Llewellyn-Smythe.' On the next pages of his book he wrote down the other names that Spence had given him. He said, inquiringly:
'Charlotte Benfield?'
Spence replied promptly.
'Sixteen-year-old shop assistant. Multiple head injuries. Found on a footpath near the Quarry Wood. Two young men came under suspicion.
Both had walked out with her from time to time. No evidence.'
'They assisted the police in their inquiries?' asked Poirot.
'As you say. It's the usual phrase. They didn't assist much. They were frightened.
Told a few lies, contradicted themselves.
They didn't carry conviction as likely murderers. But either of them might have been.'
'What were they like?'
'Peter Gordon, twenty-one. Unemployed.
Had had one or two jobs but never kept them. Lazy. Quite good-looking. Had been on probation once or twice for minor pilferings, things of that kind. No record before of violence. Was in with a rather nasty lot of likely young criminals, but usually managed to keep out of serious trouble.'
'And the other one?'
'Thomas Hudd. Twenty. Stammered. Shy. Neurotic. Wanted to be a teacher, but couldn't make the grade.
Mother a widow. The doting mother type. Didn't encourage girl friends. Kept him as close to her apron-strings as she could. He had a job in a stationer's. Nothing criminal known against him, but a possibility psychologically, so it seems. The girl played him up a good deal. Jealousy a possible motive, but no evidence that we could prosecute on. Both of them had alibis. Hudd's was his mother's. She would have sworn to kingdom come that he was indoors with her all that evening, and nobody can say he wasn't or had seen him elsewhere or in the neighbourhood of the murder. Young Gordon was given an alibi by some of his less reputable friends.
Not worth much, but you couldn't disprove it.'
'This happened when?'
'Eighteen months ago.'
'And where?'
'In a footpath in a field not far from Woodleigh Common.'
'Three quarters of a mile,' said Elspeth.
'Near Joyce's house-the Reynolds' house?'
'No, it was on the other side of the village.'
'It seems unlikely to have been the murder Joyce was talking about,' said Poirot thoughtfully. 'If you see a girl being bashed on the head by a young man you'd be likely to think of murder straight away. Not to wait for a year before you began to think it was murder.'
Poirot read another name.
'Lesley Ferrier.'
Spence spoke again.
'Lawyer's clerk, twenty-eight, employed by Messrs. Fullerton, Harrison and Leadbetter of Market Street, Medchester.'
'Those were Mrs. Llewellyn-Smythe's solicitors, I think you said.'
'Yes. Same ones.'
'And what happened to Lesley Ferrier?'
'He was stabbed in the back. Not far from the Green Swan Pub. He was said to have been having an affair with the wife of the landlord, Harry Griffin. Handsome piece, she was, indeed still is. Getting perhaps a bit long in the tooth. Five or six years older than he was, but she liked them young.'
'The weapon?'
'The knife wasn't found. Les was said to have broken with her and taken up with some other girl, but what girl was never satisfactorily discovered.'
'Ah. And who was suspected in this case? The landlord or the wife?'
'Quite right,' said Spence. 'Might have been either. The wife seemed the more likely. She was half gypsy and a temperamental piece. But there were other possibilities. Our Lesley hadn't led a blameless life. Got into trouble in his early twenties, falsifying his accounts somewhere.
With a spot of forgery. Was said to have come from a broken home and all the rest of it. Employers spoke up for him.
He got a short sentence and was taken on by Fullerton, Harrison and Leadbetter when he came out of prison.'
'And after that he'd gone straight?'
'Well, nothing proved. He appeared to do so as far as his employers were concerned, but he had been mixed up in a few questionable transactions with his friends. He's what you might call a wrong 'un but a careful one.'
