Hercule Poirot: The Complete Short Stories Read online

  “Someone struck Reedburn a blow with his clenched fist between the eyes. He fell backward on this projecting bit of marble, then slipped to the floor. Afterwards, he was dragged across the floor to the other window, and laid there instead, but not quite at the same angle, as the Doctor’s evidence told us.”

  “But why? It seems utterly unnecessary.”

  “On the contrary, it was essential. Also, it is the key to the murderer’s identity—though, by the way, he had no intention of killing Reedburn, and so it is hardly permissible to call him a murderer. He must be a very strong man!”

  “Because of having dragged the body across the floor?”

  “Not altogether. It has been an interesting case. I nearly made an imbecile of myself, though.”

  “Do you mean to say it is over, that you know everything?”

  “Yes.”

  A remembrance smote me. “No,” I cried. “There is one thing you do not know!”

  “And that?”

  “You do not know where the missing king of clubs is!”

  “Eh? Oh, that is droll! That is very droll, my friend.”

  “Why?”

  “Because it is in my pocket!” He drew it forth with a flourish.

  “Oh!” I said, rather crestfallen. “Where did you find it? Here?”

  “There was nothing sensational about it. It had simply not been taken out with the other cards. It was in the box.”

  “H’m! All the same, it gave you an idea, didn’t it?”

  “Yes, my friend. I present my respects to His Majesty.”

  “And to Madame Zara!”

  “Ah, yes—to the lady also.”

  “Well, what are we going to do now?”

  “We are going to return to town. But I must have a few words with a certain lady at Daisymead first.”

  The same little maid opened the door to us.

  “They’re all at lunch now, sir—unless it’s Miss Saintclair you want to see, and she’s resting.”

  “It will do if I can see Mrs. Oglander for a few minutes. Will you tell her?”

  We were led into the drawing room to wait. I had a glimpse of the family in the dining room as we passed, now reinforced by the presence of two heavy, solid-looking men, one with a moustache, the other with a beard also.

  In a few minutes Mrs. Oglander came into the room, looking inquiringly at Poirot, who bowed.

  “Madame, we, in our country, have a great tenderness, a great respect for the mother. The mère de famille, she is everything!”

  Mrs. Oglander looked rather astonished at this opening.

  “It is for that reason that I have come—to allay a mother’s anxiety. The murderer of Mr. Reedburn will not be discovered. Have no fear. I, Hercule Poirot, tell you so. I am right, am I not? Or is it a wife that I must reassure?”

  There was a moment’s pause. Mrs. Oglander seemed searching Poirot with her eyes. At last she said quietly: “I don’t know how you know—but yes, you are right.”

  Poirot nodded gravely. “That is all, madame. But do not be uneasy. Your English policemen have not the eyes of Hercule Poirot.” He tapped the family portrait on the wall with his fingernail.

  “You had another daughter once. She is dead, madame?”

  Again there was a pause, as she searched him with her eyes. Then she answered: “Yes, she is dead.”

  “Ah!” said Poirot briskly. “Well, we must return to town. You permit that I return the king of clubs to the pack? It was your only slip. You understand, to have played bridge for an hour or so, with only fifty-one cards—well, no one who knows anything of the game would credit it for a minute! Bonjour!”

  “And now, my friend,” said Poirot as we stepped towards the station, “you see it all!”

  “I see nothing! Who killed Reedburn?”

  “John Oglander, Junior. I was not quite sure if it was the father or the son, but I fixed on the son as being the stronger and younger of the two. It had to be one of them, because of the window.”

  “Why?”

  “There were four exits from the library—two doors, two windows; but evidently only one would do. Three exits gave on the front, directly or indirectly. The tragedy had to occur in the back window in order to make it appear that Valerie Saintclair came to Daisymead by chance. Really, of course, she fainted, and John Oglander carried her across over his shoulders. That is why I said he must be a strong man.”

  “Did they go there together, then?”

  “Yes. You remember Valerie’s hesitation when I asked her if she was not afraid to go alone? John Oglander went with her—which didn’t improve Reedburn’s temper, I fancy. They quarrelled, and it was probably some insult levelled at Valerie that made Oglander hit him. The rest, you know.”

  “But why the bridge?”

  “Bridge presupposes four players. A simple thing like that carries a lot of conviction. Who would have supposed that there had been only three people in that room all the evening?”

  I was still puzzled.

  “There’s one thing I don’t understand. What have the Oglanders to do with the dancer Valerie Saintclair?”

  “Ah, that I wonder you did not see. And yet you looked long enough at that picture on the wall—longer than I did. Mrs. Oglander’s other daughter may be dead to her family, but the world knows her as Valerie Saintclair!”

  “What?”

  “Did you not see the resemblance the moment you saw the two sisters together?”

  “No,” I confessed. “I only thought how extraordinarily dissimilar they were.”

  “That is because your mind is so open to external romantic impressions, my dear Hastings. The features are almost identical. So is the colouring. The interesting thing is that Valerie is ashamed of her family, and her family is ashamed of her. Nevertheless, in a moment of peril, she turned to her brother for help, and when things went wrong, they all hung together in a remarkable way. Family strength is a marvellous thing. They can all act, that family. That is where Valerie gets her histrionic talent from. I, like Prince Paul, believe in heredity! They deceived me! But for a lucky accident, and test question to Mrs. Oglander by which I got her to contradict her daughter’s account of how they were sitting, the Oglander family would have put a defeat on Hercule Poirot.”

  “What shall you tell the Prince?”

  “That Valerie could not possibly have committed the crime, and that I doubt if that tramp will ever be found. Also, to convey my compliments to Zara. A curious coincidence, that! I think I shall call this little affair the Adventure of the King of Clubs. What do you think, my friend?”

  Four

  THE DISAPPEARANCE OF MR. DAVENHEIM

  “The Disappearance of Mr. Davenheim” was first published in The Sketch, March 28, 1923.

  Poirot and I were expecting our old friend Inspector Japp of Scotland Yard to tea. We were sitting round the tea table awaiting his arrival. Poirot had just finished carefully straightening the cups and saucers which our landlady was in the habit of throwing, rather than placing, on the table. He had also breathed heavily on the metal teapot, and polished it with a silk handkerchief. The kettle was on the boil, and a small enamel saucepan beside it contained some thick, sweet chocolate which was more to Poirot’s palate than what he described as “your English poison.”

  A sharp “rat-tat” sounded below, and a few minutes afterwards Japp entered briskly.

  “Hope I’m not late,” he said as he greeted us. “To tell the truth, I was yarning with Miller, the man who’s in charge of the Davenheim case.”

  I pricked up my ears. For the last three days the papers had been full of the strange disappearance of Mr. Davenheim, senior partner of Davenheim and Salmon, the well-known bankers and financiers. On Saturday last he had walked out of his house, and had never been seen since. I looked forward to extracting some interesting details from Japp.

  “I should have thought,” I remarked, “that it would be almost impossible for anyone to ‘disappear’ nowadays.”
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  Poirot moved a plate of bread and butter the eighth of an inch, and said sharply:

  “Be exact, my friend. What do you mean by ‘disappear’? To which class of disappearance are you referring?”

  “Are disappearances classified and labelled, then?” I laughed.

  Japp smiled also. Poirot frowned at both of us.

  “But certainly they are! They fall into three categories: First, and most common, the voluntary disappearance. Second, the much abused ‘loss of memory’ case—rare, but occasionally genuine. Third, murder, and a more or less successful disposal of the body. Do you refer to all three as impossible of execution?”

  “Very nearly so, I should think. You might lose your own memory, but someone would be sure to recognize you—especially in the case of a well-known man like Davenheim. Then ‘bodies’ can’t be made to vanish into thin air. Sooner or later they turn up, concealed in lonely places, or in trunks. Murder will out. In the same way, the absconding clerk, or the domestic defaulter, is bound to be run down in these days of wireless telegraphy. He can be headed off from foreign countries; ports and railway stations are watched; and as for concealment in this country, his features and appearance will be known to everyone who reads a daily newspaper. He’s up against civilization.”

  “Mon ami,” said Poirot, “you make one error. You do not allow for the fact that a man who had decided to make away with another man—or with himself in a figurative sense—might be that rare machine, a man of method. He might bring intelligence, talent, a careful calculation of detail to the task; and then I do not see why he should not be successful in baffling the police force.”

  “But not you, I suppose?” said Japp good-humouredly, winking at me. “He couldn’t baffle you, eh, Monsieur Poirot?”

  Poirot endeavoured, with a marked lack of success, to look modest. “Me also! Why not? It is true that I approach such problems with an exact science, a mathematical precision, which seems, alas, only too rare in the new generation of detectives!”

  Japp grinned more widely.

  “I don’t know,” he said. “Miller, the man who’s on this case, is a smart chap. You may be very sure he won’t overlook a footprint, or a cigar ash, or a crumb even. He’s got eyes that see everything.”

  “So, mon ami,” said Poirot, “has the London sparrow. But all the same, I should not ask the little brown bird to solve the problem of Mr. Davenheim.”

  “Come now, monsieur, you’re not going to run down the value of details as clues?”

  “By no means. These things are all good in their way. The danger is they may assume undue importance. Most details are insignificant; one or two are vital. It is the brain, the little grey cells”—he tapped his forehead—“on which one must rely. The senses mislead. One must seek the truth within—not without.”

  “You don’t mean to say, Monsieur Poirot, that you would undertake to solve a case without moving from your chair, do you?”

  “That is exactly what I do mean—granted the facts were placed before me. I regard myself as a consulting specialist.”

  Japp slapped his knee. “Hanged if I don’t take you at your word. Bet you a fiver that you can’t lay your hand—or rather tell me where to lay my hand—on Mr. Davenheim, dead or alive, before a week is out.”

  Poirot considered. “Eh bien, mon ami, I accept. Le sport, it is the passion of you English. Now—the facts.”

  “On Saturday last, as is his usual custom, Mr. Davenheim took the 12:40 train from Victoria to Chingside, where his palatial country seat, The Cedars, is situated. After lunch, he strolled round the grounds, and gave various directions to the gardeners. Everybody agrees that his manner was absolutely normal and as usual. After tea he put his head into his wife’s boudoir, saying that he was going to stroll down to the village and post some letters. He added that he was expecting a Mr. Lowen, on business. If he should come before he himself returned, he was to be shown into the study and asked to wait. Mr. Davenheim then left the house by the front door, passed leisurely down the drive, and out at the gate, and—was never seen again. From that hour, he vanished completely.”

  “Pretty—very pretty—altogether a charming little problem,” murmured Poirot. “Proceed, my good friend.”

  “About a quarter of an hour later a tall, dark man with a thick black moustache rang the front doorbell, and explained that he had an appointment with Mr. Davenheim. He gave the name of Lowen, and in accordance with the banker’s instructions was shown into the study. Nearly an hour passed. Mr. Davenheim did not return. Finally Mr. Lowen rang the bell, and explained that he was unable to wait any longer, as he must catch his train back to town.

  Mrs. Davenheim apologized for her husband’s absence, which seemed unaccountable, as she knew him to have been expecting the visitor. Mr. Lowen reiterated his regrets and took his departure.

  “Well, as everyone knows, Mr. Davenheim did not return. Early on Sunday morning the police were communicated with, but could make neither head nor tail of the matter. Mr. Davenheim seemed literally to have vanished into thin air. He had not been to the post office; nor had he been seen passing through the village. At the station they were positive he had not departed by any train. His own motor had not left the garage. If he had hired a car to meet him in some lonely spot, it seems almost certain that by this time, in view of the large reward offered for information, the driver of it would have come forward to tell what he knew. True, there was a small race meeting at Entfield, five miles away, and if he had walked to that station he might have passed unnoticed in the crowd. But since then his photograph and a full description of him have been circulated in every newspaper, and nobody has been able to give any news of him. We have, of course, received many letters from all over England, but each clue, so far, has ended in disappointment.

  “On Monday morning a further sensational discovery came to light. Behind a portière in Mr. Davenheim’s study stands a safe, and that safe had been broken into and rifled. The windows were fastened securely on the inside, which seems to put an ordinary burglary out of court, unless, of course, an accomplice within the house fastened them again afterwards. On the other hand, Sunday having intervened, and the household being in a state of chaos, it is likely that the burglary was committed on the Saturday, and remained undetected until Monday.”

  “Précisément,” said Poirot dryly. “Well, is he arrested, ce pauvre M. Lowen?”

  Japp grinned. “Not yet. But he’s under pretty close supervision.”

  Poirot nodded. “What was taken from the safe? Have you any idea?”

  “We’ve been going into that with the junior partner of the firm and Mrs. Davenheim. Apparently there was a considerable amount in bearer bonds, and a very large sum in notes, owing to some large transaction having been just carried through. There was also a small fortune in jewellery. All Mrs. Davenheim’s jewels were kept in the safe. The purchasing of them had become a passion with her husband of late years, and hardly a month passed that he did not make her a present of some rare and costly gem.”

  “Altogether a good haul,” said Poirot thoughtfully. “Now, what about Lowen? Is it known what his business was with Davenheim that evening?”

  “Well, the two men were apparently not on very good terms. Lowen is a speculator in quite a small way. Nevertheless, he has been able once or twice to score a coup off Davenheim in the market, though it seems they seldom or never actually met. It was a matter concerning some South American shares which led the banker to make his appointment.”

  “Had Davenheim interests in South America, then?”

  “I believe so. Mrs. Davenheim happened to mention that he spent all last autumn in Buenos Aires.”

  “Any trouble in his home life? Were the husband and wife on good terms?”

  “I should say his domestic life was quite peaceful and uneventful. Mrs. Davenheim is a pleasant, rather unintelligent woman. Quite a nonentity, I think.”

  “Then we must not look for the solution of the mystery ther
e. Had he any enemies?”

  “He had plenty of financial rivals, and no doubt there are many people whom he has got the better of who bear him no particular goodwill. But there was no one likely to make away with him—and, if they had, where is the body?”

  “Exactly. As Hastings says, bodies have a habit of coming to light with fatal persistency.”

  “By the way, one of the gardeners says he saw a figure going round to the side of the house towards the rose garden. The long French window of the study opens on to the rose garden, and Mr. Davenheim frequently entered and left the house that way. But the man was a good way off, at work on some cucumber frames, and cannot even say whether it was the figure of his master or not. Also, he cannot fix the time with any accuracy. It must have been before six, as the gardeners cease work at that time.”

  “And Mr. Davenheim left the house?”

  “About half past five or thereabouts.”

  “What lies beyond the rose garden?”

  “A lake.”

  “With a boathouse?”

  “Yes, a couple of punts are kept there. I suppose you’re thinking of suicide, Monsieur Poirot? Well, I don’t mind telling you that Miller’s going down tomorrow expressly to see that piece of water dragged. That’s the kind of man he is!”

  Poirot smiled faintly, and turned to me. “Hastings, I pray you, hand me that copy of Daily Megaphone. If I remember rightly, there is an unusually clear photograph there of the missing man.”

  I rose, and found the sheet required. Poirot studied the features attentively.

  “H’m!” he murmured. “Wears his hair rather long and wavy, full moustache and pointed beard, bushy eyebrows. Eyes dark?”

  “Yes.”

  “Hair and beard turning grey?”

  The detective nodded. “Well, Monsieur Poirot, what have you got to say to it all? Clear as daylight, eh?”

  “On the contrary, most obscure.”

  The Scotland Yard man looked pleased.

  “Which gives me great hopes of solving it,” finished Poirot placidly.