Thomas Godfrey (Ed) (12 page)

In the meantime the boys and Bridget
were walking back from the lake, still discussing earnestly the problems of
skating. Flecks of snow had been falling, and looking up at the sky it could be
prophesied that before long there was going to be a heavy snowfall.

“It’s going to snow all night,” said
Colin. “Bet you by Christmas morning we have a couple of feet of snow.”

The prospect was a
pleasurable one.

“Let’s make a snow-man,” said
Michael.

“Good lord,” said Colin, “I
haven’t made a snow-man since—well, since I was about four years old.”

“I don’t believe it’s a bit
easy to do,” said Bridget. “I mean, you have to know how.”

“We might make an effigy
of M. Poirot,” said Colin. “Give it a big black moustache. There is one in the
dressing-up box.”

“I don’t see, you know,” said
Michael thoughtfully, “how M. Poirot could ever have been a detective. I don’t
see how he’d ever be able to disguise himself.”

“I know,” said Bridget, “and
one can’t imagine him running about with a microscope and looking for clues or
measuring footprints.”

“I’ve got an idea,” said
Colin. “Let’s put on a show for him!”

“What do you mean, a
show?” asked Bridget.

“Well, arrange a murder
for him.”

“What a gorgeous idea,” said
Bridget. “Do you mean a body in the snow—that sort of thing?”

“Yes. It would make him
feel at home, wouldn’t it?”

Bridget giggled.

“I don’t know that I’d go
as far as that.”

“If it snows,” said
Colin, “we’ll have the perfect setting. A body and footprints—we’ll have to
think that out rather carefully and pinch one of Grandfather’s daggers and make
some blood.”

They came to a halt and
oblivious to the rapidly falling snow, entered into an excited discussion.

“There’s a paintbox in
the old schoolroom. We could mix up some blood—crimson-lake, I should think.”

“Crimson-lake’s a bit too
pink,
I
think,” said Bridget. “It ought to be a bit browner.”

“Who’s going to be the
body?” asked Michael.

“I’ll be the body,” said
Bridget quickly.

“Oh, look here,” said
Colin, “
I
thought of it.”

“Oh, no, no,” said
Bridget, “it must be me. It’s got to be a girl. It’s more exciting. Beautiful
girl lying lifeless in the snow.”

“Beautiful girl! Ah-ha,” said
Michael in derision.

“I’ve got black hair, too,”
said Bridget.

“What’s that got to do
with it?”

“Well, it’ll show up so
well on the snow and I shall wear my red pyjamas.”

“If you wear red pyjamas,
they won’t show the blood-stains,” said Michael in a practical manner.

“But they’d look so
effective against the snow,” said Bridget, “and they’ve got white facings, you
know, so the blood could be on that. Oh, won’t it be gorgeous? Do you think he
will really be taken in?”

“He will if we do it well
enough,” said Michael. “We’ll have just your footprints in the snow and one
other person’s going to the body and coming away from it—a man’s, of course. He
won’t want to disturb them, so he won’t know that you’re not really dead. You
don’t think,” Michael stopped, struck by a sudden idea. The others looked at
him. “You don’t think he’ll be
annoyed
about it?”

“Oh, I shouldn’t think so,”
said Bridget, with facile optimism. “I’m sure he’ll understand that we’ve just
done it to entertain him. A sort of Christmas treat.”

“I don’t think we ought
to do it on Christmas Day,” said Colin reflectively. “I don’t think Grandfather
would like that very much.”

“Boxing Day then,” said
Bridget.

“Boxing Day would be just
right,” said Michael.

“And it’ll give us more
time, too,” pursued Bridget. “After all, there are a lot of things to arrange.
Let’s go and have a look at all the props.”

They hurried into the
house.

The evening was a busy
one. Holly and mistletoe had been brought in in large quantities and a
Christmas tree had been set up at one end of the dining-room. Everyone helped
to decorate it, to put up the branches of holly behind pictures and to hang
mistletoe in a convenient position in the hall.

“I had no idea anything
so archaic still went on,” murmured Desmond to Sarah with a sneer.

“We’ve always done it,” said
Sarah, defensively.

“What a reason!”

“Oh, don’t be tiresome,
Desmond, I think it’s fun.”

“Sarah my sweet, you
can’t!”

“Well, not—not really
perhaps but—I do in a way.”

“Who’s going to brave the
snow and go to midnight mass?” asked Mrs. Lacey at twenty minutes to twelve.

“Not me,” said Desmond. “Come
on, Sarah.”

With a hand on her arm he
guided her into the library and went over to the record case.

“There are limits,
darling,” said Desmond. “Midnight mass!”

“Yes,” said Sarah. “Oh
yes.”

With a good deal of
laughter, donning of coats and stamping of feet, most of the others got off.
The two boys, Bridget, David and Diana set out for the ten minutes’ walk to the
church through the falling snow. Their laughter died away in the distance.

“Midnight mass!” said
Colonel Lacey, snorting. “Never went to midnight mass in my young days.
Mass,
indeed! Popish, that is! Oh, I beg your pardon, Mr.
Poirot.”

Poirot waved a hand. “It
is quite all right. Do not mind me.”

“Matins is good enough
for anybody, I should say,” said the colonel. “Proper Sunday morning service. ‘Hark
the herald angels sing’, and all the good old Christmas hymns. And then back to
Christmas dinner. That’s right, isn’t it, Em?”

“Yes, dear,” said Mrs.
Lacey. “That’s what
we do.
But the young ones enjoy the midnight service. And it’s nice, really, that they
want
to go.”

“Sarah and that fellow
don’t want to go.”

“Well, there dear, I
think you’re wrong,” said Mrs. Lacey. “Sarah, you know,
did
want to go, but she didn’t like to say so.”

“Beats me why she cares
what that fellow’s opinion is.”

“She’s very young,
really,” said Mrs. Lacey placidly. “Are you going to bed, M. Poirot? Good
night. I hope you’ll sleep well.”

“And you, Madame? Are you
not going to bed yet?”

“Not just yet,” said Mrs.
Lacey. “I’ve got the stockings to fill, you see. Oh, I know they’re all
practically grown up, but they do
like
their stockings. One puts jokes in them! Silly little things. But it all makes
for a lot of fun.”

“You work very hard to
make this a happy house at Christmas time,” said Poirot. “I honour you.”

He raised her hand to his
lips in a courtly fashion.

“Hm,” grunted Colonel
Lacey, as Poirot departed. “Flowery sort of fellow. Still—he appreciates you.”

Mrs. Lacey dimpled up at
him. “Have you noticed, Horace, that I’m standing under the mistletoe?” she
asked with the demureness of a girl of nineteen.

Hercule Poirot entered
his bedroom. It was a large room well provided with radiators. As he went over
towards the big four-poster bed he noticed an envelope lying on his pillow. He
opened it and drew out a piece of paper. On it was a shakily printed message in
capital letters.

DON’T EAT NONE OF THE PLUM PUDDING.
ONE AS WISHES YOU WELL.

Hercule Poirot stared at
it. His eyebrows rose. “Cryptic,” he murmured, “and most unexpected.”

Christmas dinner took
place at 2 p.m. and was a feast indeed. Enormous logs crackled merrily in the
wide fireplace and above their crackling rose the babel of many tongues talking
together. Oyster soup had been consumed, two enormous turkeys had come and
gone, mere carcasses of their former selves. Now, the supreme moment, the
Christmas pudding was brought in, in state! Old Peverell, his hands and his
knees shaking with the weakness of his eighty years, permitted no one but
himself to bear it in. Mrs. Lacey sat, her hands pressed together in nervous
apprehension. One Christmas, she felt sure, Peverell would fall down dead.
Having either to take the risk of letting him fall down dead or of hurting his
feelings to such an extent that he would probably prefer to be dead than alive,
she had so far chosen the former alternative. On a silver dish the Christmas
pudding reposed in its glory. A large football of a pudding, a piece of holly
stuck in it like a triumphant flag and glorious flames of blue and red rising
round it. There was a cheer and cries of “Ooh-ah.”

One thing Mrs. Lacey had
done: prevailed upon Peverell to place the pudding in front of her so that she
could help serve it rather than hand it in turn round the table. She breathed a
sigh of relief as it was deposited safely in front of her. Rapidly the plates
were passed round, flames still licking the portions.

“Wish, M. Poirot,” cried
Bridget. “Wish before the flame goes. Quick, Gran darling, quick.”

Mrs. Lacey leant back
with a sigh of satisfaction. Operation Pudding had been a success. In front of
everyone was a helping with flames still licking it. There was a momentary
silence all round the table as everyone wished hard.

There was nobody to
notice the rather curious expression on the face of M. Poirot as he surveyed
the portion of pudding on his plate.
“Don’t eat none of the
plum pudding.”
What on earth did that sinister
warning mean? There could be nothing different about his portion of plum
pudding from that of everyone else! Sighing as he admitted himself baffled—and
Hercule Poirot never liked to admit himself baffled—he picked up his spoon and
fork.

“Hard sauce, M. Poirot?”

Poirot helped himself
appreciatively to hard sauce.

“Swiped my best brandy
again, eh Em?” said the colonel good-humouredly from the other end of the
table. Mrs. Lacey twinkled at him.

“Mrs. Ross insists on
having the best brandy, dear,” she said. “She says it makes all the difference.”

“Well, well,” said
Colonel Lacey, “Christmas comes but once a year and Mrs. Ross is a great woman.
A great woman and a great cook.”

“She is indeed,” said
Colin. “Smashing plum pudding, this. Mmmm.” He filled an appreciative mouth.

Gently, almost gingerly,
Hercule Poirot attacked his portion of pudding. He ate a mouthful. It was
delicious! He ate another. Something tinkled on his place. He investigated with
a fork. Bridget, on his left, came to his aid.

“You’ve got something, M.
Poirot,” she said. “I wonder what it is.”

Poirot detached a little
silver object from the surrounding raisins that clung to it.

“Oooh,” said Bridget, “it’s
the bachelor’s button! M. Poirot’s got the bachelor’s button!”

Hercule Poirot dipped the
small silver button into the finger-glass of water that stood by his plate, and
washed it clear of pudding crumbs.

“It is very pretty,” he
observed.

“That means you’re going
to be a bachelor, M. Poirot,” explained Colin helpfully.

“That is to be expected,”
said Poirot gravely. “I have been a bachelor for many long years and it is
unlikely that I shall change that status now.”

“Oh, never say die,” said
Michael. “I saw in the paper that someone of ninety-five married a girl of
twenty-two the other day.”

“You encourage me,” said
Hercule Poirot.

Colonel Lacey uttered a
sudden exclamation. His face became purple and his hand went to his mouth.