Sad Cypress (16 page)

The house had a strange atmosphere in it: it seemed alive with memories and forebodings.

Peter Lord flung up one of the windows.

He said with a slight shiver:

“This place feels like a tomb….”

Poirot said:

“If walls could speak… It is all here, is it not, here in the house—the beginning of the whole story.”

He paused and then said softly:

“It was here in this room that Mary Gerrard died.”

Peter Lord said:

“They found her sitting in that chair by the window….”

Hercule Poirot said thoughtfully:

“A young girl—beautiful—romantic? Did she scheme and intrigue? Was she a superior person who gave herself airs? Was she gentle and sweet, with no thought of intrigue…just a young thing beginning life…a girl like a flower?…”

“Whatever she was,” said Peter Lord, “someone wished her dead.”

Hercule Poirot murmured:

“I wonder….”

Lord stared at him.

“What do you mean?”

Poirot shook his head.

“Not yet.”

He turned about.

“We have been all through the house. We have seen all that there is to be seen here. Let us go down to the Lodge.”

Here again all was in order: the rooms dusty, but neat and emptied of personal possessions. The two men stayed only a few minutes. As they came out into the sun, Poirot touched the leaves of a pillar rose growing up a trellis. It was pink and sweet-scented.

He murmured:

“Do you know the name of this rose? It is Zephyrine Drouhin, my friend.”

Peter Lord said irritably:

“What of it?”

Hercule Poirot said:

“When I saw Elinor Carlisle, she spoke to me of roses. It was then that I began to see—not daylight, but the little glimpse of light that one gets in a train when one is about to come out of a tunnel. It is not so much daylight, but the promise of daylight.”

Peter Lord said harshly:

“What did she tell you?”

“She told me of her childhood, of playing here in this garden, and of how she and Roderick Welman were on different sides. They were enemies, for he preferred the white rose of York—cold and austere—and she, so she told me, loved red roses, the red rose of Lancaster. Red roses that have scent and colour and passion and warmth. And that, my friend, is the difference between Elinor Carlisle and Roderick Welman.”

Peter Lord said:

“Does that explain—anything?”

Poirot said:

“It explains Elinor Carlisle—who is passionate and proud and who loved desperately a man who was incapable of loving her….”

Peter Lord said:

“I don't understand you….”

Poirot said:

“But I understand
her
… I understand both of them. Now my friend, we will go back once more to that little clearing in the shrubbery.”

They went there in silence. Peter Lord's freckled face was troubled and angry.

When they came to the spot, Poirot stood motionless for some time, and Peter Lord watched him.

Then suddenly the little detective gave a vexed sigh.

He said:

“It is so simple, really. Do you not see, my friend, the fatal fallacy in your reasoning? According to your theory someone, a man, presumably, who had known Mary Gerrard in Germany came here intent on killing her. But
look,
my friend,
look!
Use the two eyes of your body, since the eyes of the mind do not seem to serve you. What do you see from here: a window, is it not? And at that window—a girl. A girl cutting sandwiches. That is to say, Elinor Carlisle. But think for a minute of this:
What on earth was to tell the watching man that those sandwiches were going to be offered to Mary Gerrard?
No one knew that
but Elinor Carlisle—herself—nobody!
Not even Mary Gerrard, nor Nurse Hopkins.

“So what follows—if a man stood here watching, and if he afterwards went to that window and climbed in and tampered with the sandwiches? What did he think and believe? He thought, he must have thought,
that the sandwiches were to be eaten by Elinor Carlisle herself
….”

P
oirot knocked at the door of Nurse Hopkins' cottage. She opened it to him with her mouth full of Bath bun.

She said sharply:

“Well, Mr. Poirot, what do you want
now?
”

“I may enter?”

Somewhat grudgingly Nurse Hopkins drew back and Poirot was permitted to cross the threshold. Nurse Hopkins was hospitable with the teapot, and a minute later Poirot was regarding with some dismay a cup of inky beverage.

“Just made—nice and strong!” said Nurse Hopkins.

Poirot stirred his tea cautiously and took one heroic sip.

He said:

“Have you any idea why I have come here?”

“I couldn't say, I'm sure, until you tell me. I don't profess to be a mind reader.”

“I have come to ask you for the truth.”

Nurse Hopkins uprose in wrath.

“And what's the meaning of that, I should like to know? A truthful woman I've always been. Not one to shield myself in any way. I spoke up about that missing tube of morphine at the inquest when many a one in my place would have sat tight and said nothing. For well enough did I know that I should get censured for carelessness in leaving my case about; and, after all, it's a thing might happen to anybody! I was blamed for that—and it won't do me any good in my profession, I can tell you. But that didn't make any difference to me! I knew something that had a bearing on the case, and so I spoke out. And I'll thank you, Mr. Poirot, to keep any nasty insinuations to yourself! There's not a thing about Mary Gerrard's death that I haven't been open and aboveboard as daylight about, and if
you
think differently, I'd be obliged if you'd give chapter and verse for it! I've concealed nothing—nothing at all! And I'm prepared to take the oath and stand up in court and say so.”

Poirot did not attempt to interrupt. He knew only too well the technique of dealing with an angry woman. He allowed Nurse Hopkins to flare up and simmer down. Then he spoke—quietly and mildly.

He said:

“I did not suggest that there is anything about the crime which you have not told.”

“Then what did you suggest, I'd like to know?”

“I asked you to tell the truth—not about the death, but about the
life
of Mary Gerrard.”

“Oh!” Nurse Hopkins seemed momentarily taken aback. She said, “So that's what you're getting at? But it's got nothing to do with the murder.”

“I did not say that it had, I said that you were withholding knowledge concerning her.”

“Why shouldn't I—if it's nothing to do with the crime?”

Poirot shrugged his shoulders.

“Why should you?”

Nurse Hopkins, very red in the face, said:

“Because it's common decency! They're all dead now—everyone concerned. And it's no business of anyone else's!”

“If it is only surmise—perhaps not. But if you have
actual knowledge,
that is different.”

Nurse Hopkins said slowly:

“I don't know exactly what you mean….”

Poirot said:

“I will help you. I have had hints from Nurse O'Brien and I have had a long conversation with Mrs. Slattery, who has a very good memory for events that happened over twenty years ago. I will tell you exactly what I have learned. Well, over twenty years ago there was a love affair between two people. One of them was Mrs. Welman, who had been a widow for some years and who was a woman capable of a deep and passionate love. The other party was Sir Lewis Rycroft, who had the great misfortune to have a wife who was hopelessly insane. The law in those days gave no promise of relief by divorce, and Lady Rycroft, whose physical health was excellent, might live to be ninety. The
liaison
between those two people was, I think, guessed at, but they were both discreet and careful to keep up appearances. Then Sir Lewis Rycroft was killed in action.”

“Well?” said Nurse Hopkins.

“I suggest,” said Poirot, “that there was a child born after his death, and that that child was Mary Gerrard.”

Nurse Hopkins said:

“You seem to know all about it!”

Poirot said:

“That is what I
think.
But it is possible that you have got definite proof that that is so.”

Nurse Hopkins sat silent a minute or two, frowning, then abruptly she rose, went across the room, opened a drawer and took out an envelope. She brought it across to Poirot.

She said:

“I'll tell you how this came into my hands. Mind, I'd had my suspicions. The way Mrs. Welman looked at the girl, for one thing, and then hearing the gossip on top of it. And old Gerrard told me when he was ill that Mary wasn't his daughter.

“Well, after Mary died I finished clearing up the Lodge, and in a drawer amongst some of the old man's things I came across this letter. You see what's written on it.”

Poirot read the superscription written in faded ink:

 

“For Mary—to be sent to her after my death.”

 

Poirot said:

“This writing is not recent?”

“It wasn't Gerrard who wrote that,” explained Nurse Hopkins. “It was Mary's mother, who died fourteen years ago. She meant this for the girl, but the old man kept it among his things and so she never saw it—and I'm thankful she didn't! She was able to hold up her head to the end, and she'd no cause to feel ashamed.”

She paused and then said:

“Well, it was sealed up, but when I found it I'll admit to you that I opened it and read it then and there, which I dare say I should not have done. But Mary was dead, and I guessed more or less at what was inside it and I didn't see that it was any concern of anyone else's. All the same, I haven't liked to destroy it, because I didn't feel somehow it would be right to do that. But, there, you'd better read it yourself.”

Poirot drew out the sheet of paper covered in small angular writing:

Hercule Poirot drew a deep breath and folded up the letter again.

Nurse Hopkins said anxiously:

“What are you going to do about it? They're all dead now! It's no good raking up these things. Everyone looked up to Mrs. Welman in these parts; there's never been anything said against her. All this old scandal—it would be cruel. The same with Mary. She was a sweet girl. Why should anyone have to know she was a bastard? Let the dead rest in peace in their graves, that's what I say.”

Poirot said:

“One has to consider the living.”

Nurse Hopkins said:

“But this has got nothing to do with the murder.”

Hercule Poirot said gravely:

“It may have a great deal to do with it.”

He went out of the cottage, leaving Nurse Hopkins with her mouth open, staring after him.

He had walked some way when he became aware of hesitating footsteps just behind him. He stopped and turned round.

It was Horlick, the young gardener from Hunterbury. He was looking the picture of embarrassment and twisting his cap round and round in his hands.

“Excuse me, sir. Could I have a word with you?”

Horlick spoke with a kind of gulp.

“Certainly. What is it?”

Horlick twisted the cap even more fiercely. He said, averting his eyes and looking the picture of misery and embarrassment:

“It's about that car.”

“The car that was outside the back gate that morning?”

“Yes, sir. Dr. Lord said this morning that it wasn't his car—
but it was, sir.
”

“You know that for a fact?”

“Yes, sir. Because of the number, sir. It was MSS 2022. I noticed it particular—MSS 2022. You see, we know it in the village, and always call it Miss Tou-Tou! I'm quite sure of it, sir.”

Poirot said with a faint smile:

“But Dr. Lord says he was over at Withenbury that morning.”

Horlick said miserably:

“Yes, sir. I heard him. But it
was
his car, sir… I'll take my oath on that.”

Poirot said gently:

“Thank you, Horlick, that's just exactly what you may have to do….”