Japp was rather taken aback by the compliment—Poirot being usually given to exclusive self-praise. He reddened and muttered something about there being a lot of doubt about that.
He led the way through the house to the room where the tragedy had occurred—Mr. Paynter’s study. It was a wide, low room, with book-lined walls and big leather armchairs.
Poirot looked across at once to the window which gave upon a gravelled terrace.
“The window, was it unlatched?” he asked.
“That’s the whole point, of course. When the doctor left this room, he merely closed the door behind him. The next morning it was found locked. Who locked it? Mr. Paynter? Ah Ling declares that the window was closed and bolted. Dr. Quentin, on the other hand, has an impression that it was closed, but not fastened, but he won’t swear either way. If he could, it would make a great difference. If the man was murdered, someone entered the room either through the door or the window—if through the door, it was an inside job; if through the window, it might have been anyone. First thing when they had broken the door down, they flung the window open, and the housemaid who did it thinks that it wasn’t fastened, but she’s a precious bad witness—will remember anything you ask her to!”
“What about the key?”
“There you are again. It was on the floor among the wreckage of the door. Might have fallen from the keyhole, might have been dropped there by one of the people who entered, might have been slipped underneath the door from the outside.”
“In fact everything is ‘might have been’?”
“You’ve hit it, Moosior Poirot. That’s just what it is.”
Poirot was looking around him, frowning unhappily.
“I cannot see light,” he murmured. “Just now—yes, I got a gleam, but now all is darkness once more. I have not the clue—the motive.”
“Young Gerald Paynter had a pretty good motive,” remarked Japp grimly. “He’s been wild enough in his time, I can tell you. And extravagant. You know what artists are, too—no morals at all.”
Poirot did not pay much attention to Japp’s sweeping strictures on the artistic temperament. Instead he smiled knowingly.
“My good Japp, is it possible that you throw me the mud in my eyes? I know well enough that it is the Chinaman you suspect. But you are so artful. You want me to help you—and yet you drag the red kipper across the trail.”
Japp burst out laughing.
“That’s you all over, Mr. Poirot. Yes, I’d bet on the Chink, I’ll admit it now. It stands to reason that it was he who doctored the curry, and if he’d try once in an evening to get his master out of the way, he’d try twice.”
“I wonder if he would,” said Poirot softly.
“But it’s the motive that beats me. Some heathen revenge or other, I suppose.”
“I wonder,” said Poirot again. “There has been no robbery? Nothing has disappeared? No jewellery, or money, or papers?”
“No—that is, not exactly.”
I pricked up my ears; so did Poirot.
“There’s been no robbery, I mean,” explained Japp. “But the old boy was writing a book of some sort. We only knew about it this morning when there was a letter from the publishers asking about the manuscript. It was just completed, it seems. Young Paynter and I have searched high and low, but can’t find a trace of it—he must have hidden it away somewhere.”
Poirot’s eyes were shining with the green light I knew so well.
“How was it called, this book?” he asked.
“The Hidden Hand in China, I think it was called.”
“Aha!” said Poirot, with almost a gasp. Then he said quickly, “Let me see the Chinaman, Ah Ling.”
The Chinaman was sent for and appeared, shuffling along, with his eyes cast down, and his pigtail swinging. His impassive face showed no trace of any kind of emotion.
“Ah Ling,” said Poirot, “are you sorry your master is dead?”
“I welly sorry. He good master.”
“You know who kill him?”
“I not know. I tell pleeceman if I know.”
The questions and answers went on. With the same impassive face, Ah Ling described how he had made the curry. The cook had had nothing to do with it, he declared, no hand had touched it but his own. I wondered if he saw where his admission was leading him. He stuck to it too, that the window to the garden was bolted that evening. If it was open in the morning, his master must have opened it himself. At last Poirot dismissed him.
“That will do, Ah Ling.” Just as the Chinaman had got to the door, Poirot recalled him. “And you know nothing, you say, of the Yellow Jasmine?”
“No, what should I know?”
“Nor yet of the sign that was written underneath it?”
Poirot leaned forward as he spoke, and quickly traced something on the dust of a little table. I was near enough to see it before he rubbed it out. A down stroke, a line at right angles, and then a second line down which completed a big 4. The effect on the Chinaman was electrical. For one moment his face was a mask of terror. Then, as suddenly, it was impassive again, and repeating his grave disclaimer, he withdrew.
Japp departed in search of young Paynter, and Poirot and I were left alone together.
“The Big Four, Hastings,” cried Poirot. “Once again, the Big Four. Paynter was a great traveller. In his book there was doubtless some vital information concerning the doings of Number One, Li Chang Yen, the head and brains of the Big Four.”
“But who—how—”
“Hush, here they come.”
Gerald Paynter was an amiable, rather weak-looking young man. He had a soft brown beard, and a peculiar flowing tie. He answered Poirot’s questions readily enough.
“I dined out with some neighbours of ours, the Wycherleys,” he explained. “What time did I get home? Oh, about eleven. I had a latchkey, you know. All the servants had gone to bed, and I naturally thought my uncle had done
