'I'm glad something baffles you,' said Spence.
'Confirm one thing for me, mon cher Spence. Eva Kane left the country before Craig's execution, that is right?'
'Quite right.'
'And she was, at that time, expecting a child?'
'Quite right.'
'Bon Dieu, how stupid I have been,' said Hercule Poirot. 'The whole thing is simple, is it not?'
It was after that remark that there was very nearly a third murder – the murder of Hercule Poirot by Superintendent Spence in Kilchester Police Headquarters.
II
'I want,' said Hercule Poirot, 'a personal call. To Mrs Ariadne Oliver.'
A personal call to Mrs Oliver was not achieved without difficulties. Mrs Oliver was working and could not be disturbed. Poirot, however, disregarded all denials. Presently he heard the authoress's voice.
It was cross and rather breathless.
'Well, what is it?' said Mrs Oliver. 'Have you got to ring me up just now? I've thought of a most wonderful idea for a murder in a draper's shop. You know, the old-fashioned kind that sells combinations and funny vests with long sleeves.'
'I do not know,' said Poirot. 'And anyway what I have to say to you is far more important.'
'It couldn't be,' said Mrs Oliver. 'Not to me, I mean. Unless I get a rough sketch of my idea jotted down, it will go!'
Hercule Poirot paid no attention to this creative agony. He asked sharp imperative questions to which Mrs Oliver replied somewhat vaguely.
'Yes – yes – it's a little Repertory Theatre – I don't know its name… Well, one of them was Cecil Something, and the one I was talking to was Michael.'
'Admirable. That is all I need to know.'
'But why Cecil and Michael?'
'Return to the combinations and the long-sleeved vests, madame.'
'I can't think why you don't arrest Dr Rendell,' said Mrs Oliver. 'I would, if I were the Head of Scotland Yard.'
'Very possibly. I wish you luck with the murder in the draper's shop.'
'The whole idea has gone now,' said Mrs Oliver. 'You've ruined it.'
Poirot apologised handsomely.
He put down the receiver and smiled at Spence.
'We go now – or at least I will go – to interview a young actor whose Christian name is Michael and who plays the less important parts in the Cullenquay Repertory Theatre. I pray only that he is the right Michael.'
'Why on earth -'
Poirot dexterously averted the rising wrath of Superintendent Spence.
'Do you know, cher ami, what is a secret de Polichinelle?'
'Is this a French lesson?' demanded the superintendent wrathfully.
'A secret de Polichinelle is a secret that everyone can know. For this reason the people who do not know it never hear about it – for if everyone thinks you know a thing, nobody tells you.'
'How I manage to keep my hands off you I don't know,' said Superintendent Spence.
Chapter 25
The inquest was over – a verdict had been returned of murder by a person or persons unknown.
After the inquest, at the invitation of Hercule Poirot, those who had attended it came to Long Meadows.
Working diligently, Poirot had induced some semblance of order in the long drawing-room. Chairs had been arranged in a neat semi-circle, Maureen's dogs had been excluded with difficulty, and Hercule Poirot, a self- appointed lecturer, took up his position at the end of the room and initiated proceedings with a slightly self- conscious clearing of the throat.
'Messieurs et Mesdames -'
He paused. His next words were unexpected and seemed almost farcical.
'Mrs McGinty's dead. How did she die?
Down on her knees just like I.
Mrs McGinty's dead. How did she die?
Holding her hand out just like I.
Mrs McGinty's dead. How did she die?
Like this…'
Seeing their expressions, he went on:
'No, I am not mad. Because I repeat to you the childish rhyme of a childish game, it does not mean that I am in my second childhood. Some of you may have played that game as children. Mrs Upward had played it. Indeed she repeated it to me – with a difference. She said: 'Mrs McGinty's dead. How did she die? Sticking her neck out just like I. ' That is what she said – and that is what she did. She stuck her neck out – and so she also, like Mrs McGinty, died…
'For our purpose we must go back to the beginning – to Mrs McGinty – down on her knees scrubbing other people's houses. Mrs McGinty was killed, and a man, James Bentley, was arrested, tried and convicted. For certain reasons, Superintendent Spence, the officer in charge of the case was not convinced of Bentley's guilt, strong though the evidence was. I agreed with him. I came down here to answer a question. 'How did Mrs McGinty die? Why did she die?'
'I will not make you the long and complicated histories. I will say only that as simple a thing as a bottle of ink gave me a clue. In the Sunday Companion, read by Mrs McGinty on the Sunday before her death, four photographs were published. You know all about those photographs by now, so I will only say that Mrs McGinty recognised one of those photographs as a photograph she had seen in one of the houses where she worked.
'She spoke of this to James Bentley though he attached no importance to the matter at the time, nor indeed afterwards. Actually he barely listened. But he had the impression that Mrs McGinty had seen the photograph in Mrs Upward's house and that when she referred to a woman who need not be so proud if all was known, she was referring to Mrs Upward. We cannot depend on that statement of his, but she certainly used that phrase about pride and there is no doubt that Mrs Upward was a proud and imperious woman.
'As you all know – some of you were present and the others will have heard – I produced those four photographs at Mrs Upward's house. I caught a flicker of surprise and recognition in Mrs Upward's expression and taxed her with it. She had to admit it. She said that she 'had seen one of the photographs somewhere but she couldn't remember where.' When asked which photograph, she pointed to a photograph of the child Lily Gamboll. But that, let me tell you, was not the truth. For reasons of her own, Mrs Upward wanted to keep her recognition to herself. She pointed to the wrong photograph to put me off.
'But one person was not deceived – the murderer. One person knew which photograph Mrs Upward had recognised. And here I will not beat to and fro about the bush – the photograph in question was that of Eva Kane – a woman who was accomplice, victim or possibly leading spirit in the famous Craig Murder Case.
'On the next evening Mrs Upward was killed. She was killed for the same reason that Mrs McGinty was killed. Mrs McGinty stuck her hand out, Mrs Upward stuck her neck out – the result was the same.
