'Well, I decided that I'd best come clean. About yesterday, I mean. That was a fake show all right! You see, I was watching his lordship come out of 10 Downing Street and I saw Ram Lal fire at him. I know Ram Lal. He's a nice kid. A bit excitable but he feels the wrongs of India very keenly. Well, there was no harm done, that precious pair of stuffed shirts weren't harmed – the bullet had missed 'em both by miles – so I decided to put up a show and hope the Indian kid would get clear. I grabbed hold of a shabby little guy just by me and called out that I'd got the villain and hoped Ram Lal was beating it all right. But the dicks were too smart. They were onto him in a flash. That's just how it was. See?'
Hercule Poirot said:
'And today?'
'That's different. There weren't any Ram Lals about today. Carter was the only man on the spot. He fired that pistol all right! It was still in his hand when I jumped on him. He was going to try a second shot, I expect.'
Poirot said:
'You were very anxious to preserve the safety of M. Blunt?'
Raikes grinned – an engaging grin.
'A bit odd, you think, after all I've said? Oh, I admit it. I think Blunt is a guy who ought to be shot – for the sake of progress and humanity – I don't mean personally – he's a nice enough old boy in his British way. I think that, and yet when I saw someone taking a pot shot at him I leaped in and interfered. That shows you how illogical the human animal is. It's crazy, isn't it?'
'The gap between theory and practice is a wide one.'
'I'll say it is!' Mr. Raikes got up from the bed where he had been sitting.
His smile was easy and confiding.
'I just thought,' he said, 'that I'd come along and explain the thing to you.'
He went out, shutting the door carefully behind him.
V
'Deliver me, O Lord, from the evil man, and preserve me from the wicked man,' sang Mrs. Olivera in a firm voice, slightly off the note.
There was a relentlessness about her enunciation of the sentiment which made Hercule Poirot deduce that Mr. Howard Raikes was the wicked man immediately in her mind.
Hercule Poirot had accompanied his host and the family to the morning service in the village church.
Howard Raikes had said with a faint sneer:
'So you always go to church, Mr. Blunt?'
And Alistair had murmured vaguely something about it being expected of you in the country – can't let the parson down, you know – which typically English sentiment had merely bewildered the young man, and had made Hercule Poirot smile comprehendingly.
Mrs. Olivera had tactfully accompanied her host and commanded Jane to do likewise.
'They have sharpened their tongues like a serpent,' sang the choir boys in shrill treble, 'adder's poison is under their lips.'
The tenors and basses demanded with gusto: 'Keep me, O Lord, from the hands of the ungodly. Preserve me from the wicked men who are purposed to overthrow my doings.'
Hercule Poirot essayed a hesitant baritone.
'The proud have laid a snare for me,' he sang, 'and spread a net with cords: yea, and set traps in my way…
His mouth remained open.
He saw it – saw clearly the trap into which he had so nearly fallen!
A snare cunningly laid – a net with cords – a pit open at his feet – dug carefully so that he should fall into it.
Like a man in a trance Hercule Poirot remained, mouth open, staring into space. He remained there as the congregation seated themselves with a rustle; until Jane Olivera tugged at his arm and murmured a sharp, 'Sit down.'
Hercule Poirot sat down. An aged clergyman with a beard intoned, 'Here beginneth the fifteenth chapter of the First Book of Samuel,' and began to read.
But Poirot heard nothing of the smiting of the Amalekites.
He was in a daze – a glorious daze where isolated facts spun wildly round before settling neatly into their appointed places.
It was like a kaleidoscope – shoe buckles, size ten stockings, a damaged face, the low tastes in literature of Alfred the page boy, the activities of Mr. Amberiotis, and the part played by the late Mr. Morley, all rose up and whirled and settled themselves down into a coherent pattern.
For the first time, Hercule Poirot was looking at the case the right way up.
'For rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft and stubbornness is as iniquity and idolatry. Because thou hast rejected the word of the Lord he hath also rejected thee from being king. Here endeth the first lesson,' quavered the aged clergyman all in one breath.
As one in a dream, Hercule Poirot rose to praise the Lord in the Te Deum.
Chapter 7
THIRTEEN, FOURTEEN, MAIDS ARE COURTING
I
'M. Reilly, is it not?'
The young Irishman started as the voice spoke at his elbow.
He turned.
Standing next to him at the counter of the Shipping Company was a small man with large moustache and an egg-shaped head.
'You do not remember me, perhaps?'
'You do yourself an injustice, M. Poirot. You're not a man who's easily forgotten.'
He turned back to speak to the clerk who was waiting behind the counter.
The voice at his elbow murmured:
'You are going abroad for a holiday?'
'It's not a holiday I'm taking. And you yourself, M. Poirot? You're not turning your back on the country, I hope?'
'Sometimes,' said Hercule Poirot, 'I return for a short while to my own country – Belgium.'
'I'm going further than that,' said Reilly. 'It's America for me.'
He added: 'And I don't think I'll be coming back, either.'
'I'm sorry to hear that, Mr. Reilly. You are, then, abandoning your practice in Queen Charlotte Street?'
'If you'd say it was abandoning me, you'd be nearer the mark.'
'Indeed? That is very sad.'
'It doesn't worry me. When I think of the debts I shall leave blind me unpaid, I'm a happy man.'
He grinned engagingly.
'It's not I who'll be shooting myself because of money troubles. Leave them behind you, I say, and start
