“There was no man.”
“But I saw him—”
“With the greatest respect, Lord Mayfield, you imagined you saw him. The shadow cast by the branch of a tree deceived you. The fact that a robbery occurred naturally seemed a proof that what you had imagined was true.”
“Really, M. Poirot, the evidence of my own eyes—”
“Back my eyes against yours any day, old boy,” put in Sir George.
“You must permit me, Lord Mayfield, to be very definite on that point. No one crossed the terrace to the grass.”
Looking very pale and speaking stiffly, Mr. Carlile said:
“In that case, if M. Poirot is correct, suspicion automatically attaches itself to me. I am the only person who could possibly have committed the robbery.”
Lord Mayfield sprang up.
“Nonsense. Whatever M. Poirot thinks about it, I don’t agree with him. I am convinced of your innocence, my dear Carlile. In fact, I’m willing to guarantee it.”
Poirot murmured mildly:
“But I have not said that I suspect M. Carlile.”
Carlile answered:
“No, but you’ve made it perfectly clear that no one else had a chance to commit the robbery.”
“Du tout! Du tout!”
“But I have told you nobody passed me in the hall to get to the study door.”
“I agree. But someone might have come in through the study window.”
“But that is just what you said did not happen?”
“I said that no one from outside could have come and left without leaving marks on the grass. But it could have been managed from inside the house. Someone could have gone out from his room by one of these windows, slipped along the terrace, in at the study window, and back again in here.”
Mr. Carlile objected:
“But Lord Mayfield and Sir George Carrington were on the terrace.”
“They were on the terrace, yes, but they were en promenade. Sir George Carrington’s eyes may be of the most reliable”—Poirot made a little bow—“but he does not keep them in the back of his head! The study window is at the extreme left of the terrace, the windows of this room come next, but the terrace continues to the right past one, two, three, perhaps four rooms?”
“Dining room, billiard room, morning room and library,” said Lord Mayfield.
“And you walked up and down the terrace, how many times?”
“At least five or six.”
“You see, it is easy enough, the thief has only to watch for the right moment!”
Carlile said slowly:
“You mean that when I was in the hall, talking to the French girl, the thief was waiting in the drawing room?”
“That is my suggestion. It is, of course, only a suggestion.”
“It doesn’t sound very probable to me,” said Lord Mayfield. “Too risky.”
The Air Marshal demurred.
“I don’t agree with you, Charles. It’s perfectly possible. Wonder I hadn’t the wits to think of it for myself.”
“So you see,” said Poirot, “why I believe that the plans are still in the house. The problem now is to find them!”
Sir George snorted.
“That’s simple enough. Search everybody.”
Lord Mayfield made a movement of dissent, but Poirot spoke before he could.
“No, no, it is not so simple as that. The person who took those plans will anticipate that a search will be made and will make quite sure that they are not found amongst his or her belongings. They will have been hidden in neutral ground.”
“Do you suggest that we’ve got to go playing hide and seek all over the bally house?”
Poirot smiled.
“No, no, we need not be so crude as that. We can arrive at the hiding place (or alternatively at the identity of the guilty person) by reflection. That will simplify matters. In the morning I would like an interview with every person in the house. It would, I think, be unwise to seek those interviews now.”
Lord Mayfield nodded.
“Cause too much comment,” he said, “if we dragged everybody out of their beds at three in the morning. In any case you’ll have to proceed with a good deal of camouflage, M. Poirot. This matter has got to be kept dark.”
Poirot waved an airy hand.
“Leave it to Hercule Poirot. The lies I invent are always most delicate and most convincing. Tomorrow, then, I conduct my investigations. But tonight, I should like to begin by interviewing you, Sir George and you, Lord Mayfield.”
He bowed to them both.
“You mean—alone?”
“That was my meaning.”
Lord Mayfield raised his eyes slightly, then he said:
“Certainly. I’ll leave you alone with Sir George. When you want me, you’ll find me in my study. Come, Carlile.”
He and the secretary went out, shutting the door behind them.
Sir George sat down, reaching mechanically for a cigarette. He turned a puzzled face to Poirot.
“You know,” he said slowly. “I don’t quite get this.”
“That is very simply explained,” said Poirot with a smile. “In two words, to be accurate. Mrs. Vanderlyn!”
“Oh,” said Carrington. “I think I see. Mrs. Vanderlyn?”
“Precisely. It might be, you see, that it would not be very delicate to ask Lord Mayfield the question I want to ask. Why Mrs. Vanderlyn? This lady, she is known to be a suspicious character. Why, then, should she be here? I say to myself there are three explanations. One, that Lord Mayfield has a penchant for the lady (and that is why I seek to talk to you alone. I do not wish to embarrass him). Two, that Mrs. Vanderlyn is perhaps the dear friend of someone else in the house?”
“You can count me out!” said Sir George with a grin.
“Then, if neither of those cases is true, the question returns in redoubled force. Why Mrs. Vanderlyn? And it seems to me I perceive a shadowy answer. There was a reason. Her presence at this particular juncture was definitely desired by Lord Mayfield for a special reason. Am I right?”
Sir George nodded.
“You’re quite right,” he said. “Mayfield is too old a bird to fall for her wiles. He wanted her here for quite another reason. It was like this.”
He retailed the conversation that had taken place at the dinner table. Poirot listened attentively.
“Ah,” he said. “I comprehend now. Nevertheless, it seems that the lady has turned the tables on you both rather neatly!”
Sir George swore freely.
Poirot watched him with some slight amusement, then he said:
“You do not doubt that this theft is her doing—I mean, that she is responsible for it, whether or no she played an active part?”
Sir George stared.
“Of course not! There isn’t any doubt of that. Why, who else would have any interest in stealing those plans?”
“Ah!” said Hercule Poirot. He leaned back and looked at the ceiling. “And yet, Sir George, we agreed, not a quarter of an hour ago, that these papers represented very definitely money. Not perhaps, in quite so obvious a form as banknotes, or gold, or jewellery, but nevertheless they were potential money. If there were anyone here who was hard up—”
The other interrupted him with a snort.
“Who isn’t these days? I suppose I can say it without incriminating myself.”
He smiled and Poirot smiled politely back at him and murmured:
“Mais oui, you can say what you like, for you, Sir George, have the one unimpeachable alibi in this affair.”
“But I’m damned hard up myself!”
Poirot shook his head sadly.
“Yes, indeed, a man in your position has heavy living expenses. Then you have a young son at a most expensive age—”
Sir George groaned.
“Education’s bad enough, then debts on top of it. Mind you, this lad’s not a bad lad.”
Poirot listened sympathetically. He heard a lot of the Air Marshal’s accum
ulated grievances. The lack of grit and stamina in the younger generation, the fantastic way in which mothers spoilt their children and always took their side, the curse of gambling once it got hold of a woman, the folly of playing for higher stakes than you could afford. It was couched in general terms, Sir George did not allude directly to either his wife or his son, but his natural transparency made his generalizations very easy to see through.
He broke off suddenly.
“Sorry, mustn’t take up your time with something that’s right off the subject, especially at this hour of the night—or rather, morning.”
He stifled a yawn.
“I suggest, Sir George, that you should go to bed. You have been most kind and helpful.”
“Right, think I will turn in. You really think there is a chance of getting the plans back?”
Poirot shrugged his shoulders.
“I mean to try. I do not see why not.”
“Well, I’ll be off. Goodnight.”
He left the room.
Poirot remained in his chair staring thoughtfully at the ceiling, then he took out a little notebook and turning to a clean page, he wrote:
Mrs. Vanderlyn?
Lady Julia Carrington?
Mrs. Macatta?
Reggie Carrington?
Mr. Carlile?
Underneath he wrote:
Mrs. Vanderlyn and Mr. Reggie Carrington?
Mrs. Vanderlyn and Lady Julia?
Mrs. Vanderlyn and Mr. Carlile?
He shook his head in a dissatisifed manner, murmuring: “C’est plus simple que ça.”
Then he added a few short sentences.
Did Lord Mayfield see a “shadow?” If not, why did he say he did? Did Sir George see anything? He was positive he had seen nothing AFTER I examined flower-bed. Note: Lord Mayfield is nearsighted, can read without glasses but has to use a monocle to look across a room. Sir George is long-sighted. Therefore, from the far end of the terrace, his sight is more to be depended upon than Lord Mayfield’s. Yet Lord Mayfield is very positive that he DID see something and is quite unshaken by his friend’s denial.
Can anyone be quite as above suspicion as Mr. Carlile appears to be? Lord Mayfield is very emphatic as to his innocence. Too much so. Why? Because he secretly suspects him and is ashamed of his suspicions? Or because he definitely suspects some other person? That is to say, some person OTHER than Mrs. Vanderlyn?
He put the notebook away.
Then, getting up, he went along to the study.
Five
Lord Mayfield was seated at his desk when Poirot entered the study. He swung round, laid down his pen, and looked up inquiringly.
“Well, M. Poirot, had your interview with Carrington?”
Poirot smiled and sat down.
“Yes, Lord Mayfield. He cleared up a point that had puzzled me.”
“What was that?”
“The reason for Mrs. Vanderlyn’s presence here. You comprehend, I thought it possible—”
Mayfield was quick to realize the cause of Poirot’s somewhat exaggerated embarrassment.
“You thought I had a weakness for the lady? Not at all. Far from it. Funnily enough, Carrington thought the same.”
“Yes, he has told me of the conversation he held with you on the subject.”
Lord Mayfield looked rather rueful.
“My little scheme didn’t come off. Always annoying to have to admit that a woman has got the better of you.”
“Ah, but she has not got the better of you yet, Lord Mayfield.”
“You think we may yet win? Well, I’m glad to hear you say so. I’d like to think it was true.”
He sighed.
“I feel I’ve acted like a complete fool—so pleased with my stratagem for entrapping the lady.”
Hercule Poirot said, as he lit one of his tiny cigarettes:
“What was your stratagem exactly, Lord Mayfield?”
“Well,” Lord Mayfield hesitated. “I hadn’t exactly got down to details.”
“You didn’t discuss it with anyone?”
“No.”
“Not even with Mr. Carlile?”
“No.”
Poirot smiled.
“You prefer to play a lone hand, Lord Mayfield.”
“I have usually found it the best way,” said the other a little grimly.
“Yes, you are wise. Trust no one. But you did mention the matter to Sir George Carrington?”
“Simply because I realized that the dear fellow was seriously perturbed about me.”
Lord Mayfield smiled at the remembrance.
“He is an old friend of yours?”
“Yes. I have known him for over twenty years.”
“And his wife?”
“I have known his wife also, of course.”
“But (pardon me if I am impertinent) you are not on the same terms of intimacy with her?”
“I don’t really see what my personal relationships to people has to do with the matter in hand, M. Poirot.”
“But I think, Lord Mayfield, that they may have a good deal to do with it. You agreed, did you not, that my theory of someone in the drawing room was a possible one?”
“Yes. In fact, I agree with you that that is what must have happened.”
“We will not say ‘must.’ That is too self-confident a word. But if that theory of mine is true, who do you think the person in the drawing room could have been?”
“Obviously Mrs. Vanderlyn. She had been back there once for a book. She could have come back for another book, or a handbag, or a dropped handkerchief—one of a dozen feminine excuses. She arranges with her maid to scream and get Carlile away from the study. Then she slips in and out by the windows as you said.”
“You forget it could not have been Mrs. Vanderlyn. Carlile heard her call the maid from upstairs while he was talking to the girl.”
Lord Mayfield bit his lip.
“True. I forgot that.” He looked throughly annoyed.
“You see,” said Poirot gently. “We progress. We have first the simple explanation of a thief who comes from outside and makes off with the booty. A very convenient theory as I said at the time, too convenient to be readily accepted. We have disposed of that. Then we come to the theory of the foreign agent, Mrs. Vanderlyn, and that again seems to fit together beautifully up to a certain point. But now it looks as though that, too, was too easy—too convenient—to be accepted.”
“You’d wash Mrs. Vanderlyn out of it altogether?”
“It was not Mrs. Vanderlyn in the drawing room. It may have been an ally of Mrs. Vanderlyn’s who committed the theft, but it is just possible that it was committed by another person altogether. If so, we have to consider the question of motive.”
“Isn’t this rather far-fetched, M. Poirot?”
“I do not think so. Now what motives could there be? There is the motive of money. The papers may have been stolen with the object of turning them into cash. That is the simplest motive to consider. But the motive might possibly be something quite different.”
“Such as—”
Poirot said slowly:
“It might have been done definitely with the idea of damaging someone.”
“Who?”
“Possibly Mr. Carlile. He would be the obvious suspect. But there might be more to it than that. The men who control the destiny of a country, Lord Mayfield, are particularly vulnerable to displays of popular feeling.”
“Meaning that the theft was aimed at damaging me?”
Poirot nodded.
“I think I am correct in saying, Lord Mayfield, that about five years ago you passed through a somewhat trying time. You were suspected of friendship with a European Power at that time bitterly unpopular with the electorate of this country.”
“Quite true, M. Poirot.”
“A statesman in these days has a difficult task. He has to pursue the policy he deems advantageous to his country, but he has at the same time to recognize the force of popular feeling. Popu
lar feeling is very often sentimental, muddleheaded, and eminently unsound, but it cannot be disregarded for all that.”
“How well you express it! That is exactly the curse of a politician’s life. He has to bow to the country’s feeling, however dangerous and foolhardy he knows it to be.”
“That was your dilemma, I think. There were rumours that you had concluded an agreement with the country in question. This country and the newspapers were up in arms about it. Fortunately the Prime Minister was able categorically to deny the story, and you repudiated it, though still making no secret of the way your sympathies lay.”
“All this is quite true, M. Poirot, but why rake up past history?”
“Because I consider it possible that an enemy, disappointed in the way you surmounted that crisis, might endeavour to stage a further dilemma. You soon regained public confidence. Those particular circumstances have passed away, you are now, deservedly, one of the most popular figures in political life. You are spoken of freely as the next Prime Minister when Mr. Hunberly retires.”
“You think this is an attempt to discredit me? Nonsense!”
“Tout de même, Lord Mayfield, it would not look well if it were known that the plans of Britain’s new bomber had been stolen during a weekend when a certain very charming lady had been your guest. Little hints in the newspapers as to your relationship with that lady would create a feeling of distrust in you.”
“Such a thing could not really be taken seriously.”
“My dear Lord Mayfield, you know perfectly well it could! It takes so little to undermine public confidence in a man.”
“Yes, that’s true,” said Lord Mayfield. He looked suddenly very worried. “God! how desperately complicated this business is becoming. Do you really think—but it’s impossible—impossible.”
“You know of nobody who is—jealous of you?”
“Absurd!”
“At any rate you will admit that my questions about your personal relationships with the members of this house party are not totally irrelevant.”
“Oh, perhaps—perhaps. You asked me about Julia Carrington. There’s really not very much to say. I’ve never taken to her very much, and I don’t think she cares for me. She’s one of these restless, nervy women, recklessly extravagant and mad about cards. She’s old-fashioned enough, I think, to despise me as being a self-made man.”