One, Two, Buckle My Shoe Part 6

He made another entry a little farther down: Mr Barnes?

He paused and then wrote: Morley's office? Mark on carpet. Possibilities.

He considered that last entry for some time.

Then he got up, called for his hat and stick and went out.

III.

Three-quarters of an hour later Hercule Poirot came out of the underground station at Ealing Broadway and five minutes after that he had reached his destination-No. 88, Castlegardens Road. It was a small semi-detached house, and the neatness of the front garden drew an admiring nod from Hercule Poirot.

'Admirably symmetrical,' he murmured to himself.

Mr Barnes was at home and Poirot was shown into a small, precise dining-room and here presently Mr Barnes came to him.

Mr Barnes was a small man with twinkling eyes and a nearly bald head. He peeped over the top of his gla.s.ses at his visitor while in his left hand he twirled the card that Poirot had given the maid. He said in a small, prim, almost falsetto voice: 'Well, well, M. Poirot? I am honoured, I am sure.'

'You must excuse my calling upon you in this informal manner,' said Poirot punctiliously.

'Much the best way,' said Mr Barnes. 'And the time is admirable, too. A quarter to seven-very sound time at this period of the year for catching anyone at home.' He waved his hand. 'Sit down, M. Poirot. I've no doubt we've got a good deal to talk about. 58, Queen Charlotte Street, I suppose?'

Poirot said: 'You suppose rightly-but why should you suppose anything of the kind?'

'My dear sir,' said Mr Barnes, 'I've been retired from the Home Office for sometime now-but I've not gonequite rusty yet. If there's any hush-hush business, it's far better not to use the police. Draws attention to it all!'

Poirot said: 'I will ask yet another question. Why should you suppose this is a hush-hush business?'

'Isn't it?' asked the other. 'Well, if it isn't, in my opinion it ought to be.' He leant forward and tapped with his pince-nez on the arm of the chair. 'In Secret Service work it's never the little fry you want-it's the big bugs at the top-but to get them you've got to be careful not to alarm the little fry.'

'It seems to me, Mr Barnes, that you know more than I do,' said Hercule Poirot.

'Don't know anything at all,' replied the other, 'just put two and two together.'

'One of those two being?'

'Amberiotis,' said Mr Barnes promptly. 'You forget I sat opposite him in the waiting-room for a minute or two.He didn't knowme . I was always an insignificant chap. Not a bad thing sometimes. But I knew him all right-and I could guess what he was up to over here.'

'Which was?'

Mr Barnes twinkled more than ever.

'We're very tiresome people in this country. We're conservative, you know, conservative to the backbone. We grumble a lot, but we don't really want to smash our democratic government and try new-fangled experiments. That's what's so heart-breaking to the wretched foreign agitator who's working full time and over! The whole trouble is-from their point of view-that we reallyare , as a country, comparatively solvent. Hardly any other country in Europe is at the moment! To upset England-really upset it-you've got to play h.e.l.l with its finance-that's what it comes to! And you can't play h.e.l.l with its finance when you've got men like Alistair Blunt at the helm.'

Mr Barnes paused and then went on: 'Blunt is the kind of man who in private life would always pay his bills and live within his income-whether he'd got twopence a year or several million makes no difference. He is that type of fellow. And he just simply thinks that there's no reason why acountry shouldn't be the same! No costly experiments. No frenzied expenditure on possible Utopias. That's why'-he paused-'that's why certain people have made up their minds that Blunt must go.'

'Ah,' said Poirot.

Mr Barnes nodded.

'Yes,' he said. 'I know what I'm talking about. Quite nice people some of 'em. Long-haired, earnest-eyed, and full of ideals of a better world. Others not so nice, rather nasty in fact. Furtive little rats with beards and foreign accents. And another lot again of the Big Bully type. But they've all got the same idea: Blunt Must Go!'

He tilted his chair gently back and forward again.

'Sweep away the old order! The Tories, the Conservatives, the Diehards, the hard-headed suspicious Business Men, that's the idea. Perhaps these people are right-Idon't know-but I know one thing-you've got to have something to put in place of the old order-something that will work-not just something thatsounds all right. Well, we needn't go into that. We are dealing with concrete facts, not abstract theories. Take away the props and the building will come down. Blunt is one of the props of Things as They Are.'

He leaned forward.

'They're out after Blunt all right. That Iknow . And it's my opinion that yesterday morningthey nearly got him . I may be wrong-but it's been tried before. The method, I mean.'

He paused and then quietly, circ.u.mspectly, he mentioned three names. An unusually able Chancellor of the Exchequer, a progressive and far-sighted manufacturer, and a hopeful young politician who had captured the public fancy. The first had died on the operating table, the second had succ.u.mbed to an obscure disease which had been recognized too late, the third had been run down by a car and killed.

'It's very easy,' said Mr Barnes. 'The anaesthetist m.u.f.fed the giving of the anaesthetic-well, that does happen. In the second case the symptoms were puzzling. The doctor was just a well-meaning G.P., couldn't be expected to recognize them. In the third case, anxious mother was driving car in a hurry to get to her sick child. Sob stuff-the jury acquitted her of blame!'

He paused: 'All quite natural. And soon forgotten. But I'll just tell youwhere those three people are now . The anaesthetist is set up on his own with a first-cla.s.s research laboratory-no expense spared. That G.P. has retired from practice. He's got a yacht, and a nice little place on the Broads. The mother is giving all her children a first-cla.s.s education, ponies to ride in the holidays, nice house in the country with a big garden and paddocks.'

He nodded his head slowly.

'In every profession and walk of life there issomeone who is vulnerable to temptation. The trouble in our case is that Morleywasn't !'

'You think it was like that?' said Hercule Poirot.

Mr Barnes said: 'I do. It's not easy to get at one of these big men, you know. They're fairly well protected. The car stunt is risky and doesn't always succeed. But a man is defenceless enough in a dentist's chair.'

He took off his pince-nez, polished them and put them on again. He said: 'That's my theory!Morley wouldn't do the job . He knew too much, though, so they had to put him out.'

'They?' asked Poirot.

'When I saythey -I mean the organization that's behind all this. Only one person actually did the job, of course.'

'Which person?'

'Well, I could make a guess,' said Mr Barnes, 'but it's only a guess and I might be wrong.'

Poirot said quietly: 'Reilly?'

'Of course! He's the obvious person. I think that probably they never asked Morley to do the job himself . What hewas to do, was to turn Blunt over to his partner at the last minute. Sudden illness, something of that sort. Reilly would have done the actual business-and there would have been another regrettable accident-death of a famous banker-unhappy young dentist in court in such a state of dither and misery that he would have been let down light. He'd have given up dentistry afterwards-and settled down somewhere on a nice income of several thousands a year.'

Mr Barnes looked across at Poirot.

'Don't think I'm romancing,' he said. 'These things happen.'

'Yes, yes, I know they happen.'

Mr Barnes went on, tapping a book with a lurid jacket that lay on a table close at hand: 'I read a lot of these spy yarns. Fantastic, some of them. But curiously enoughthey're not any more fantastic than the real thing . Thereare beautiful adventuresses, and dark sinister men with foreign accents, and gangs and international a.s.sociations and super crooks! I'd blush to see some of the thingsI know set down in print-n.o.body would believe them for a minute!'

Poirot said: 'In your theory,where does Amberiotis come in ?'

'I'm not quite sure. Ithink he was meant to take the rap. He's played a double game more than once and I dare say he was framed. That's only an idea, mind.'

Hercule Poirot said quietly: 'Granting that your ideas are correct-what will happen next?'

Mr Barnes rubbed his nose.

'They'll try to get him again,' he said. 'Oh, yes. They'll have another try. Time's short. Blunt has got people looking after him, I dare say. They'll have to be extra careful. It won't be a man hiding in a bush with a pistol. Nothing so crude as that. You tell 'em to look out for the respectable people-the relations, the old servants, the chemist's a.s.sistant who makes up a medicine, the wine merchant who sells him his port. Getting Alistair Blunt out of the way is worth a great many millions, and it's wonderful what people will do for-say a nice little income of four thousand a year!'

'As much as that?'

'Possibly more...'

Poirot was silent a moment, then he said: 'I have had Reilly in mind from the first.'

'Irish? I.R.A.?'

'Not that so much, but there was a mark, you see, on the carpet, as though the body had been dragged along it. But if Morley had been shot by a patient he would be shot in the surgery and there would be no need to move the body. That is why, from the first, I suspected that he had been shot, not in the surgery, but in his office-next door. That would mean that it was not a patient who shot him, but some member of his own household.'

'Neat,' said Mr Barnes appreciatively.

Hercule Poirot got up and held out a hand.

'Thank you,' he said. 'You have helped me a great deal.'

IV.

On his way home, Poirot called in at the Glengowrie Court Hotel. As a result of that visit he rang j.a.pp up very early the following morning.

'Bonjour, mon ami. The inquest is today, is it not?'

'It is. Are you going to attend?'

'I do not think so.'

'It won't really be worth your while, I expect.'

'Are you calling Miss Sainsbury Seale as a witness?'

'The lovely Mabelle-why can't she just spell it plain Mabel. These women get my goat! No, I'm not calling her. There's no need.'

'You have heard nothing from her?'

'No, why should I?'

Hercule Poirot said: 'I wondered, that was all. Perhaps it may interest you to learn that Miss Sainsbury Seale walked out of the Glengowrie Court Hotel just before dinner the night before last-and did not come back.'

'What? She's hooked it?'

'That is a possible explanation.'

'But why should she? She's quite all right, you know. Perfectly genuine and above-board. I cabled Calcutta about her-that was before I knew the reason for Amberiotis' death, otherwise I shouldn't have bothered-and I got the reply last night. Everything O.K. She's been known there for years, and her whole account of herself is true-except that she's slurred over her marriage a bit. Married a Hindu student and then found he'd got a few attachments already. So she resumed her maiden name and took to good works. She's hand and glove with the missionaries-teaches elocution, and helps in amateur dramatic shows. In fact, what I call a terrible woman-but definitely above suspicion of being mixed up in a murder. Andnow you say she's walked out on us! I can't understand it.' He paused a minute and then went on doubtfully: 'Perhaps she just got fed up with that hotel? I could have easily.'

Poirot said: 'Her luggage is still there. She took nothing with her.'

j.a.pp swore.

'When did she go?'

'About a quarter-to-seven.'

'What about the hotel people?'

'They're very upset. Manageress looked quite distraught.'

'Why didn't they report to the police?'

'Because,mon cher , supposing that a lady does happen to stay out for a night (however unlikely it may seem from her appearance) she will be justifiably annoyed by finding on her return that the police have been called in. Mrs Harrison, the manageress in question, called up various hospitals in case there had been an accident. She was considering notifying the police when I called. My appearance seemed to her like an answer to a prayer. I charged myself with everything, and explained that I would enlist the help of a very discreet police officer.'

'The discreet police officer being yours truly, I suppose?'

'You suppose rightly.'

j.a.pp groaned: 'All right. I'll meet you at the Glengowrie Court Hotel after the inquest.'

V.

j.a.pp grumbled as they were waiting for the manageress.

'What does the woman want to disappear for?'

'It is curious, you admit?'

They had no time for more.

Mrs Harrison, proprietor of the Glengowrie Court, was with them. Mrs Harrison was voluble and almost tearful. She was so worried about Miss Sainsbury Seale. What could have happened to her? Rapidly she went over every possibility of disaster. Loss of memory, sudden illness, haemorrhage, run down by an omnibus, robbery and a.s.sault- She paused at last for breath, murmuring: 'Such a nice type of woman-and she seemed so happy and comfortable here.'

She took them, at j.a.pp's request, up to the chaste bedroom occupied by the missing lady. Everything was neat and orderly. Clothes hung in the wardrobe, nightclothes were folded ready on the bed, in a corner were Miss Sainsbury Seale's two modest suitcases. A row of shoes stood under the dressing-table-some serviceable Oxfords, two pairs of rather meretricious glace fancy shoes with court heels and ornament with bows of leather, some plain black satin evening shoes, practically new, and a pair of moccasins. Poirot noted that the evening shoes were a size smaller than the day ones-a fact that might be put down to corns or to vanity. He wondered whether Miss Sainsbury Seale had found time to sew the second buckle on her shoe before she went out. He hoped so. Slovenliness in dress always annoyed him.

j.a.pp was busy looking through some letters in a drawer of the dressing-table. Hercule Poirot gingerly pulled open a drawer of the chest of drawers. It was full of underclothing. He shut it again modestly, murmuring that Miss Sainsbury Seale seemed to believe in wearing wool next to the skin, and opened another drawer which contained stockings.

j.a.pp said: 'Got anything, Poirot?'

Poirot said sadly, as he dangled a pair: 'Ten inch, cheap shiny silk, price probably two-and-eleven.'

j.a.pp said: 'You're not valuing for probate, old boy. Two letters here from India, one or two receipts from charitable organizations, no bills. Most estimable character, our Miss Sainsbury Seale.'

'But very little taste in dress,' said Poirot sadly.

'Probably thought dress wordly.' j.a.pp was noting down an address from an old letter dated two months back.

'These people may know something about her,' he said. 'Address up Hampstead way. Sound as though they were fairly intimate.'