'There is no one here now but ourselves,'
'Oh well he's inside then. He never loses me. Very efficient fellow. Varies his appearance too from time to time. Quite artistic about it.'
'Ah, but that would not deceive you. You have the very quick and accurate eye.'
'I never forget a face – even a black face, and that's a lot more than most people can say.'
'You are just the person I need,' said Poirot. 'What a chance meeting you today! I need someone with a good eye and a good memory. Malheureusement the two seldom go together. I have asked the Doctor Roberts a question without result and the same with Madame Lorrimer. Now I will try you and see if I get what I want. Cast your mind back to the room in which you played cards at Mr. Shaitana's and tell me what you remember of it.'
Despard looked puzzled. 'I don't quite understand.'
'Give me a description of the room – the furnishings, the objects in it.'
'I don't know that I'm much of a hand at that sort of thing,' said Despard slowly. 'It was a rotten sort of room, to my mind. Not a man's room at all. A lot of brocade and silk and stuff. Sort of room a fellow like Shaitana would have.'
'But to particularize -'
Despard shook his head. 'Afraid I didn't notice. He'd got some good rugs. Two Bokharas and three or four really good Persian ones, including a Hamadan and a Tabriz. Rather a good eland head – no, that was in the hall. From Rowland Ward's I expect.'
'You do not think that the late Mr. Shaitana was one to go out and shoot wild beasts?'
'Not he. Never potted anything but sitting game, I'll bet. What else was there? I'm sorry to fail you, but I really can't help much. Any amount of knickknacks lying about. Tables were thick with them. Only thing I noticed was a rather jolly idol. Easter Island, I should say. Highly polished wood. You don't see many of them. There was some Malay stuff too. No, I'm afraid I can't help you.'
'No matter,' said Poirot, looking slightly crestfallen.
He went on. 'Do you know, Mrs. Lorrimer, she has the most amazing card memory! She could tell me the bidding and play of nearly every hand. It was astonishing.'
Despard shrugged his shoulders.
'Some women are like that. Because they play pretty well all day long, I suppose.'
'You could not do it, eh?'
The other shook his head.
'I just remember a couple of hands. One where I could have got game in diamonds – and Roberts bluffed me out of it. Went down himself, but we didn't double him, worse luck. I remember a no trumper, too. Tricky business – every card wrong. We went down a couple – lucky not to have gone down more,'
'Do you play much bridge, Major Despard?'
'No, I'm not a regular player. It's a good game, though.'
'You prefer it to poker?'
'I do personally. Poker's too much of a gamble.'
Poirot said thoughtfully, 'I do not think Mr. Shaitana played any game – any card game, that is.'
'There's only one game that Shaitana played consistently,' said Despard grimly.
'And that?'
'A low-down game.'
Poirot was silent for a minute then he said, 'Is it that you know that? Or do you just think it?'
Despard went brick red. 'Meaning one oughtn't to say things without giving chapter and verse? I suppose that's true. Well, it's accurate enough. I happen to know. On the other hand I'm not prepared to give chapter and verse. Such information as I've got came to me privately.'
'Meaning a woman or women are concerned?'
'Yes. Shaitana, like the dirty dog he was, preferred to deal with women.'
'You think he was a blackmailer? That is interesting.'
Despard shook his head. 'No, no, you've misunderstood me. In a way, Shaitana was a blackmailer, but not the common or garden sort. He wasn't after money. He was a spiritual blackmailer, if there can be such a thing.'
'And he got out of it – what?'
'He got a kick out of it. That's the only way I can put it. He got a thrill out of seeing people quail and flinch. I suppose it made him feel less of a louse and more of a man. And it's a very effective pose with women. He'd only got to hint that he knew everything, and they'd start telling him a lot of things that perhaps he didn't know. That would tickle his sense of humor. Then he'd strut about in his Mephistophelean attitude of 'I know everything! I am the great Shaitana!' The man was an ape!'
'So you think that he frightened Miss Meredith that way,' said Poirot slowly.
'Miss Meredith?' Despard stared. 'I wasn't thinking of her. She isn't the kind to be afraid of a man like Shaitana.'
'Pardon. You meant Mrs. Lorrimer.'
'No, no, no. You misunderstood me. I was speaking generally. It wouldn't be easy to frighten Mrs. Lorrimer. And she's not the kind of woman who you can imagine having a guilty secret. No, I was not thinking of anyone in particular.'
'It was the general method to which you referred?'
'Exactly.'
'There is no doubt,' said Poirot slowly, 'that a man like that often has a very clever understanding of women. He worms secrets out of them -'
He paused. Despard broke in impatiently.
'It's absurd. The man was a mountebank – nothing really dangerous about him. And yet women were afraid of him. Ridiculously so.'
He started up suddenly.
'Hullo, I've overshot the mark. Got too interested in what we were discussing. Good-by, Monsieur Poirot. Look down and you'll see my faithful shadow leave the bus when I do.'
He hurried to the back and down the steps. The conductor's bell jangled. But a double pull sounded before it had time to stop.
Looking down to the street below, Poirot noticed Despard striding back along the pavement. He did not trouble to pick out the following figure. Something else was interesting him. 'No one in particular,' he murmured to himself. 'Now I wonder.'
Chapter 16
THE EVIDENCE OF ELSIE BATT
Sergeant O'Connor was unkindly nicknamed by his colleagues at the Yard 'The Maidservant's Prayer.'
There was no doubt that he was an extremely handsome man. Tall, erect, broad-shouldered, it was less the regularity of his features than the roguish and daredevil spark in his eye which made him so irresistible to the fair sex. It was indubitable that Sergeant O'Connor got results and got them quickly.
So rapid was he that only four days after the murder of Mr. Shaitana, Sergeant O'Connor was sitting in the three and sixpenny seats at the Willy Nilly Revue side by side with Miss Elsie Batt, late parlormaid to Mrs. Craddock of 117 North Audley Street.
Having laid his line of approach carefully, Sergeant O'Conner was just launching the great offensive.
'Reminds me,' he was saying, 'of the way one of my old governors used to carry on. Name of Craddock. He was an odd cuss, if you like.'
'Craddock,' said Elsie. 'I was with some Craddocks once.'
'Well, that's funny. Wonder whether they were the same?'
'Lived in North Audley Street they did,' said Elsie.
