Nevertheless, thought Hercule Poirot, looking graciously at the leaping flames, and sipping delicately at a cup of liquid mud euphemistically called coffee, it was better to be full than empty, and after tramping snowbound lanes in patent leather shoes, to sit in front of a fire was Paradise!
There was a knock on the door and the chambermaid appeared.
'Please, sir, the man from the garage is here and would like to see you.'
Hercule Poirot replied amiably: 'Let him mount.'
The girl giggled and retired. Poirot reflected kindly that her account of him to her friends would provide entertainment for many winter days to come.
There was another knock – a different knock – and Poirot called: 'Come in.'
He looked up with approval at the young man who entered and stood there looking ill at ease, twisting his cap in his hands.
Here, he thought, was one of the handsomest specimens of humanity he had ever seen, a simple young man with the outward semblance of a Greek god.
The young man said in a low husky voice: 'About the car, sir, we've brought it in. And we've got at the trouble. It's a matter of an hour's work or so.'
Poirot said: 'What is wrong with it?'
The young man plunged eagerly into technical details. Poirot nodded his head gently, but he was not listening. Perfect physique was a thing he admired greatly. There were, he considered, too many rats in spectacles about. He said to himself approvingly: 'Yes, a Greek god – a young shepherd in Arcady.'
The young man stopped abruptly. It was then that Hercule Poirot's brows knitted themselves for a second. His first reaction had been aesthetic, his second mental. His eyes narrowed themselves curiously, as he looked up.
He said: 'I comprehend. Yes, I comprehend.' He paused and then added: 'My chauffeur, he has already told me that which you have just said.'
He saw the flush that came to the others cheek, saw the fingers grip the cap nervously.
The young man stammered: 'Yes – er – yes, sir. I know.'
Hercule Poirot went on smoothly: 'But you thought that you would also come and tell me yourself?'
'Er – yes, sir, I thought I'd better.'
'That,' said Hercule Poirot, 'was very conscientious of you. Thank you.'
There was a faint but unmistakable note of dismissal in the last words but he did not expect the other to go and he was right. The young man did not move.
His fingers moved convulsively, crushing the tweed cap, and he said in a still lower embarrassed voice: 'Er – excuse me, sir – but it's true, isn't it, that you're the detective gentleman – you're Mr Hercules Pwarrit?' He said the name carefully.
Poirot said: 'That is so.'
Red crept up the young man's face.
He said: 'I read a piece about you in the paper.'
'Yes?'
The boy was now scarlet. There was distress in his eyes – distress and appeal. Hercule Poirot came to his aid.
He said gently: 'Yes? What is it you want to ask me?'
The words came with a rush now.
'I'm afraid you may think it's awful cheek of me, sir. But your coming here by chance like this – well, it's too good to be missed. Having read about you and the clever things you've done. Anyway, I said as after all I might as well ask you. There's no harm in asking, is there?'
Hercule Poirot shook his head. He said: 'You want my help in some way?'
The other nodded. He said, his voice husky and embarrassed: 'It's – it's about a young lady. If – if you could find her for me.'
'Find her? Has she disappeared, then?'
'That's right, sir.'
Hercule Poirot sat up in his chair.
He said sharply: 'I could help you, perhaps, yes. But the proper people for you to go to are the police. It is their job and they have far more resources at their disposal than I have.'
The boy shuffled his feet.
He said awkwardly: 'I couldn't do that, sir. It's not like that at all. It's all rather peculiar, so to speak.'
Hercule Poirot stared at him. Then he indicated a chair.
'Eh bien, then, sit down – what is your name?'
'Williamson, sir, Ted Williamson.'
'Sit down, Ted. And tell me all about it.'
'Thank you, sir.' He drew forward the chair and sat down carefully on the edge of it. His eyes had still that appealing dog-like look.
Hercule Poirot said gently: 'Tell me.'
Ted Williamson drew a deep breath.
'Well, you see, sir, it was like this. I never saw her but the once. And I don't know her right name nor anything. But it's queer like, the whole thing, and my letter coming back and everything.'
'Start,' said Hercule Poirot, 'at the beginning. Do not hurry yourself. Just tell me everything that occurred.'
'Yes, sir. Well, perhaps you know Grasslawn, sir, that big house down by the river past the bridge?'
'I know nothing at all.'
'Belongs to Sir George Sanderfield, it does. He uses it in the summer-time for weekends and parties – rather a gay lot he has down as a rule. Actresses and that. Well, it was last June – and the wireless was out of order and they sent me up to see to it.'
Poirot nodded.
'So I went along. The gentleman was out on the river with his guests and the cook was out and his manservant had gone along to serve the drinks and all that on the launch. There was only this girl in the house – she was the lady's-maid to one of the guests. She let me in and showed me where the set was, and stayed there while I was working on it. And so we got to talking and all that… Nita her name was, so she told me, and she was lady's-maid to a Russian dancer who was staying there.'
'What nationality was she, English?'
'No, sir, she'd be French, I think. She'd a funny sort of accent. But she spoke English all right. She – she was friendly and after a bit I asked her if she could come out that night and go to the pictures, but she said her lady would be needing her. But then she said as how she could get off early in the afternoon because as how they wasn't going to be back off the river till late. So the long and the short of it was that I took the afternoon off without asking (and nearly got the sack for it too) and we went for a walk along by the river.'
He paused. A little smile hovered on his lips. His eyes were dreamy.
Poirot said gently: 'And she was pretty, yes?'
'She was just the loveliest thing you ever saw. Her hair was like gold – it went up each side like wings – and she had a gay kind of way of tripping along. I – I – well, I fell for her right away, sir. I'm not pretending anything else.'
Poirot nodded.
The young man went on: 'She said as how her lady would be coming down again in a fortnight and we fixed up to meet again then.' He paused. 'But she never came. I waited for her at the spot she'd said, but not a sign of her, and at last I made bold to go up to the house and ask for her. The Russian lady was staying there all right and her maid too, they said. Sent for her, they did, but when she came, why, it wasn't Nita at all! Just a dark catty- looking girl – a bold lot if there ever was one. Marie, they called her. 'You want to see me?' she says, simpering all over. She must have seen I was took aback. I said was she the Russian lady's-maid and something about her not being the one I'd seen before, and then she laughed and said that the last maid had been sent away sudden. 'Sent away?' I said. 'What for?' She sort of shrugged her shoulders and stretched out her hands. 'How should I know?' she said. 'I was not there.'
