The Labours of Hercules hp-26 Read online

  "Exactly a week ago."

  "And your wife is by now quite frantic, I presume?"

  Sir Joseph stared.

  He said: "You don't understand. The dog has been returned."

  "Returned? Then, permit me to ask, where do I enter the matter?"

  Sir Joseph went crimson in the face.

  "Because I'm damned if I'll be swindled! Now then, Mr Poirot, I'm going to tell you the whole thing. The dog was stolen a week ago – nipped in Kensington Gardens where he was out with my wife's companion. The next day my wife got a demand for two hundred pounds. I ask you – two hundred pounds! For a damned yapping little brute that's always getting under your feet anyway!"

  Poirot murmured: "You did not approve of paying such a sum, naturally?"

  "Of course I didn't – or wouldn't have if I'd known anything about it! Milly (my wife) knew that well enough. She didn't say anything to me. Just sent off the money – in one-pound notes as stipulated – to the address given."

  "And the dog was returned?"

  "Yes. That evening the bell rang and there was the little brute sitting on the doorstep. And not a soul to be seen."

  "Perfectly. Continue."

  "Then, of course, Milly confessed what she'd done and I lost my temper a bit. However, I calmed down after a while – after all, the thing was done and you can't expect a woman to behave with any sense – and I daresay I should have let the whole thing go if it hadn't been for meeting old Samuelson at the Club."

  "Yes?"

  "Damn it all, this thing must be a positive racket! Exactly the same thing had happened to him. Three hundred pounds they'd rooked his wife of! Well, that was a bit too much. I decided the thing had got to be stopped. I sent for you."

  "But surelyб Sir Joseph, the proper thing (and a very much more inexpensive thing) would have been to send for the police?"

  Sir Joseph rubbed his nose.

  He said: "Are you married, Mr Poirot?"

  "Alas," said Poirot, "I have not that felicity."

  "H'm," said Sir Joseph. "Don't know about felicity, but if you were, you'd know that women are funny creatures. My wife went into hysterics at the mere mention of the police – she'd got it into her head that something would happen to her precious Shan Tung if I went to them. She wouldn't hear of the idea – and I may say she doesn't take very kindly to the idea of your being called in. But I stood firm there and at last she gave way. But, mind you, she doesn't like it."

  Hercule Poirot murmured: "The position is, I perceive, a delicate one. It would be as well, perhaps, if I were to interview Madame your wife and gain further particulars from her whilst at the same time reassuring her as to the future safety of her dog?"

  Sir Joseph nodded and rose to his feet.

  He said: "I'll take you along in the car right away."

  III

  In a large, hot, ornately-furnished drawing-room two women were sitting.

  As Sir Joseph and Hercule Poirot entered, a small Pekinese dog rushed forward, barking furiously, and circling dangerously round Poirot's ankles.

  "Shan – Shan, come here. Come here to mother, lovey – Pick him upб Miss Carnaby."

  The second woman hurried forward and Hercule Poirot murmured: "A veritable lion, indeed."

  Rather breathlessly Shan Tung's captor agreed.

  "Yes, indeed, he's such a good watchdog. He's not frightened of anything or any one. There's a lovely boy, then."

  Having performed the necessary introduction, Sir Joseph said: "Well, Mr Poirot, I'll leave you to get on with it," and with a short nod he left the room.

  Lady Hoggin was a stout, petulant-looking woman with dyed henna red hair. Her companion, the fluttering Miss Carnaby, was a plump, amiable-looking creature between forty and fifty. She treated Lady Hoggin with great deference and was clearly frightened to death of her.

  Poirot said: "Now tell me. Lady Hoggin, the full circumstances of this abominable crime."

  Lady Hoggin flushed. "I'm very glad to hear you say that, Mr Poirot. For it was a crime. Pekinese are terribly sensitive – just as sensitive as children. Poor Shan Tung might have died of fright if of nothing else."

  Miss Carnaby chimed in breathlessly: "Yes, it was wicked – wicked!"

  "Please tell me the facts."

  "Well, it was like this. Shan Tung was out for his walk in the Park with Miss Carnaby -"

  "Oh dear me, yes, it was all my fault," chimed in the companion. "How could I have been so stupid – so careless -"

  Lady Hoggin said acidly: "I don't want to reproach you, Miss Carnaby, but I do think you might have been more alert."

  Poirot transferred his gaze to the companion.

  "What happened?"

  Miss Carnaby burst into voluble and slightly flustered speech.

  "Well, it was the most extraordinary thing! We had just been along the flower walk – Shan Tung was on the lead, of course – he'd had his little run on the grass – and I was just about to turn and go home when my attention was caught by a baby in a pram – such a lovely baby – it smiled at me – lovely rosy cheeks and such curls. I couldn't just resist speaking to the nurse in charge and asking how old it was – seventeen months, she said – and I'm sure I was only speaking to her for about a minute or two, and then suddenly I looked down and Shan wasn't there any more. The lead had been cut right through -"

  Lady Hoggin said: "If you'd been paying proper attention to your duties, nobody could have sneaked up and cut that lead."

  Miss Carnaby seemed inclined to burst into tears. Poirot said hastily: "And what happened next?"

  "Well, of course I looked everywhere. And called! And I asked the park attendant if he'd seen a man carrying a Pekinese dog but he hadn't noticed anything of the kind – and I didn't know what to do – and I went on searching, but at last, of course, I had to come home -"

  Miss Carnaby stopped dead. Poirot could imagine the scene that followed well enough. He asked: "And then you received a letter?"

  Lady Hoggin took up the tale.

  "By the first post the following morning. It said that if I wanted to see Shan Tung alive I was to send 200 pounds in one-pound notes in an unregistered packet to Captain Curtis, 38 Bloomsbury Road Square. It said that if the money were marked or the police informed then – then – Shan Tung's ears and tail would be – cut off!"

  Miss Carnaby began to sniff.

  "So awful," she murmured. "How people can be such fiends!"

  Lady Hoggin went on: "It said that if I sent the money at once, Shan Tung would be returned the same evening alive and well, but that if – if afterwards I went to the police, it would be Shan Tung who would suffer for it -"

  Miss Carnaby murmured tearfully: "Oh dear, I'm so afraid that even now – of course, M. Poirot isn't exactly the police -"

  Lady Hoggin said anxiously: "So you see, Mr Poirot, you will have to be very careful."

  Hercule Poirot was quick to allay her anxiety.

  "But I, I am not of the police. My enquiries, they will be conducted very discreetly, very quietly. You can be assured, Lady Hoggin, that Shan Tung will be perfectly safe. That I will guarantee."

  Both ladies seemed relieved by the magic word. Poirot went on: "You have here the letter?"

  Lady Hoggin shook her head.

  "No, I was instructed to enclose it with the money."

  "And you did so?"

  "Yes."

  "H'm, that is a pity."

  Miss Carnaby said brightly: "But I have the dog lead still. Shall I get it?"

  She left the room. Hercule Poirot profited by her absence to ask a few pertinent questions.

  "Amy Carnaby? Oh! she's quite all right. A good soul, though foolish, of course. I have had several companions and they have all been complete fools. But Amy was devoted to Shan Tung and she was terribly upset over the whole thing – as well she might be – hanging over perambulators and neglecting my little sweetheart! These old maids are all the same, idiotic over babies! No, I'm quite sure she had nothing whatev
er to do with it."

  "It does not seem likely," Poirot agreed. "But as the dog disappeared when in her charge one must make quite certain of her honesty. She has been with you long?"

  "Nearly a year. I had excellent references with her. She was with old Lady Hartingfield until she died – ten years, I believe. After that she looked after an invalid sister for a while. She is really an excellent creature – but a complete fool, as I said."

  Amy Carnaby returned at this minute, slightly more out of breath, and produced the cut dog lead which she handed to Poirot with the utmost solemnity, looking at him with hopeful expectancy.

  Poirot surveyed it carefully.

  "Mais oui," he said. "This has undoubtedly been cut."

  The two women still waited expectantly.

  He said: "I will keep this."

  Solemnly he put it in his pocket. The two women breathed a sigh of relief. He had clearly done what was expected of him.

  IV

  It was the habit of Hercule Poirot to leave nothing untested.

  Though on the face of it it seemed unlikely that Miss Carnaby was anything but the foolish and rather muddleheaded woman that she appeared to be, Poirot nevertheless managed to interview a somewhat forbidding lady who was the niece of the late Lady Hartingfield.

  "Amy Carnaby?" said Miss Maltravers. "Of course, remember her perfectly. She was a good soul and suited Aunt Julia down to the ground. Devoted to dogs and excellent at reading aloud. Tactful, too, never contradicted an invalid. What's happened to her? Not in distress of any kind, I hope. I gave her a reference about a year ago to some woman – name began with H -"

  Poirot explained hastily that Miss Carnaby was still in her post. There had been, he said, a little trouble over a lost dog.

  "Amy Carnaby is devoted to dogs. My aunt had a Pekinese. She left it to Miss Carnaby when she died and Miss Carnaby was devoted to it. I believe she was quite heart-broken when it died. Oh yes, she's a good soul. Not, of course, precisely intellectual."

  Hercule Poirot agreed that Miss Carnaby could not, perhaps be described as intellectual.

  His next proceeding was to discover the Park Keeper to whom Miss Carnaby had spoken on the fateful afternoon. This he did without much difficulty. The man remembered the incident in question.

  "Middle-aged lady, rather stout – in a regular state she was – lost her Pekinese dog. I knew her well by sight – brings the dog along most afternoons. I saw her come in with it. She was in a rare taking when she lost it. Came running to me to know if I'd seen any one with a Pekinese dog! Well, I ask you! I can tell you, the Gardens is full of dogs – every kind – terriers, Pekes, German sausage-dogs – even them Borzois – all kinds we have. Not likely as I'd notice one Peke more than another."

  Hercule Poirot nodded his head thoughtfully.

  He went to 38 Bloomsbury Road Square.

  Nos.38, 39, and 40 were incorporated together as the Balaclava Private Hotel. Poirot walked up the steps and pushed open the door. He was greeted inside by gloom and a smell of cooking cabbage with a reminiscence of breakfast kippers. On his left was a mahogany table with a sad-looking chrysanthemum plant on it. Above the table was a big baize-covered rack into which letters were stuck. Poirot stared at the board thoughtfully for some minutes. He pushed open a door on his right. It led into a kind of lounge with small tables and some so-called easy-chairs covered with a depressing pattern of cretonne. Three old ladies and one fierce-looking old gentleman raised their heads and gazed at the intruder with deadly venom. Hercule Poirot blushed and withdrew.

  He walked farther along the passage and came to a staircase. On his right a passage branched at right angles to what was evidently the dining-room.

  A little way along this passage was a door marked "office".

  On this Poirot tapped. Receiving no response, he opened the door and looked in. There was a large desk in the room covered with papers but there was no one to be seen. He withdrew, closing the door again. He penetrated to the dining-room.

  A sad-looking girl in a dirty apron was shuffling about with a basket of knives and forks with which she was laying the tables.

  Hercule Poirot said apologetically: "Excuse me, but could I see the manageress?"

  The girl looked at him with lacklustre eyes.

  She said: "I don't know, I'm sure."

  Hercule Poirot said: "There is no one in the office."

  "Well, I don't know where she'd be, I'm sure."

  "Perhaps," Hercule Poirot said, patient and persistent, "you could find out?"

  The girl sighed. Dreary as her day's round was, it had now been made additionally so by this new burden laid upon her. She said sadly: "Well, I'll see what I can do."

  Poirot thanked her and removed himself once more to the hall, not daring to face the malevolent glare of the occupants of the lounge. He was staring up at the baize-covered letter rack when a rustle and a strong smell of Devonshire violets proclaimed the arrival of the Manageress.

  Mrs Harte was full of graciousness. She exclaimed: "So sorry I was not in my office. You were requiring rooms?"

  Hercule Poirot murmured: "Not precisely. I was wondering if a friend of mine had been staying here lately. A Captain Curtis."

  "Curtis," exclaimed Mrs Harte. "Captain Curtis? Now where have I heard that name?"

  Poirot did not help her. She shook her head vexedly.

  He said: "You have not, then, had a Captain Curtis staying here?"

  "Well, not lately, certainly. And yet, you know, the name is certainly familiar to me. Can you describe your friend at all?"

  "That," said Hercule Poirot, "would be difficult." He went on: "I suppose it sometimes happens that letters arrive for people when in actual fact no one of that name is staying here?"

  "That does happen, of course."

  "What do you do with such letters?"

  "Well, we keep them for a time. You see, it probably means that the person in question will arrive shortly. Of course, if letters or parcels are a long time here unclaimed, they are returned to the post office."

  Hercule Poirot nodded thoughtfully.

  He said: "I comprehend." He added: "It is like this, you see. I wrote a letter to my friend here."

  Mrs Harte's face cleared.

  "That explains it. I must have noticed the name on an envelope. But really we have so many ex-Army gentlemen staying here or passing through – Let me see now."

  She peered up at the board.

  Hercule Poirot said: "It is not there now."

  "It must have been returned to the postman, I suppose. I am so sorry. Nothing important, I hope?"

  "No, no, it was of no importance."

  As he moved towards the door, Mrs Harte, enveloped in her pungent odour of violets, pursued him.

  "If your friend should come -"

  "It is most unlikely. I must have made a mistake…"

  "Our terms," said Mrs Harte, "are very moderate. Coffee after dinner is included. I would like you to see one or two of our bed-sitting-rooms…"

  With difficulty Hercule Poirot escaped.

  V

  The drawing-room of Mrs Samuelson was larger, more lavishly furnished, and enjoyed an even more stifling amount of central heating than that of Lady Hoggin. Hercule Poirot picked his way giddily amongst gilded console tables and large groups of statuary.

  Mrs Samuelson was taller than Lady Hoggin and her hair was dyed with peroxide. Her Pekinese was called Nanki Poo. His bulging eyes surveyed Hercule Poirot with arrogance. Miss Keble, Mrs Samuelson's companion, was thin and scraggy where Miss Carnaby had been plump, but she also was voluble and slightly breathless. She, too, had been blamed for Nanki Poo's disappearance.

  "But really, Mr Poirot, it was the most amazing thing. It all happened in a second. Outside Harrods it was. A nurse there asked me the time -"

  Poirot interrupted her.

  "A nurse? A hospital nurse?"

  "No, no – a children's nurse. Such a sweet baby it was, too! A dear little mite. Such
lovely rosy cheeks. They say children don't look healthy in London, but I'm sure -"

  "Ellen," said Mrs Samuelson.

  Miss Keble blushed, stammered, and subsided into silence.

  Mrs Samuelson said acidly: "And while Miss Keble was bending over a perambulator that had nothing to do with her, this audacious villain cut Nanki Poo's lead and made off with him."

  Miss Keble murmured tearfully: "It all happened in a second. I looked round and the darling boy was gone – there was just the dangling lead in my hand. Perhaps you'd like to see the lead, Mr Poirot?"

  "By no means," said Poirot hastily. He had no wish to make a collection of cut dog leads. "I understand," he went on, "that shortly afterwards you received a letter?"

  The story followed the same course exactly – the letter – the threats of violence to Nanki Poo's ears and tail. Only two things were different – the sum of money demanded – £300 – and the address to which it was to be sent, this time it was to Commander Blackleigh, Harrington Hotel, 76 Clonmel Gardens, Kensington.

  Mrs Samuelson went on: "When Nanki Poo was safely back again, I went to the place myself, Mr Poirot. After all, three hundred pounds is three hundred pounds."

  "Certainly it is."

  "The very first thing I saw was my letter enclosing the money in a kind of rack in the hall. Whilst I was waiting for the proprietress I slipped it into my bag. Unfortunately -"

  Poirot said: "Unfortunately, when you opened it it contained only blank sheets of paper."

  "How did you know?" Mrs Samuelson turned on him with awe.

  Poirot shrugged his shoulders.

  "Obviously, chère Madame, the thief would take care to recover the money before he returned the dog. He would then replace the notes with blank paper and return the letter to the rack in case its absence should be noticed."

  "No such person as Commander Blackleigh had ever stayed there."

  Poirot smiled.

  "And of course, my husband was extremely annoyed about the whole thing. In fact, he was livid – absolutely livid!"