Death On The Nile - Christie Agatha. Страница 51

" "Was there any smell of smoke lingering in the air as there would have been if a firearm had been discharged recently?" "I don't think so. I don't remember it." Poirot sighed.

"Then we are no further." Tim asked curiously.

"Who was it saw me?" "Rosalie Otterbourne. She came round from the other side of the boat and saw you leave Linnet Doyle's cabin and go to your own." "So it was she who told you." Poirot said gently: "Excuse me she did not tell me." "But then how do you know?" "Because I am Hercule Poirot! I do not need to be told. When I taxed her with it, do you know what she said? She said, 'I saw nobody.' And she lied." "But why?" Poirot said in a detached voice: "Perhaps because she thought the man she saw was the murderer. It looked like that, you know." "That seems to me all the more reason for telling you." Poirot shrugged his shoulders.

"She did not think so, it seems." Tim said, a queer note in his voice: "She's an extraordinary sort of a girl. She must have been through a pretty rough time with that mother of hers." "Yes, life has not been easy for her." "Poor kid," Tim muttered.

Then he looked towards Race.

"Well, sir, where do we go from here? I admit taking the pearls from Linnet's cabin and you'll find them just where you say they are. I'm guilty all right. But as far as Miss Southwood is concerned I'm not admitting anything. You've no evidence whatever against her. How I got hold of the fake necklace is my own business." Poirot murmured: "A very correct attitude." Tim said with a flash of humour: "Always the gentleman!" He added: "Perhaps you can imagine how annoying it was to me to find my mother cottoning on to you! I'm not a sufficiently hardened criminal to enjoy sitting cheek by jowl with a successful detective just before bringing off a rather risky coup! Some people might get a kick out of it. I didn't. Frankly, it gave me cold feet." "But it did not deter you from making your attempt?" Tim shrugged his shoulders.

"I couldn't funk it to that extent. The exchange had to be made sometime and I'd got, a unique opportunity on this boat-a cabin only two doors off and Linnet herself so preoccupied with her own troubles that she wasn't likely to detect the change." "I wonder if that was so" Tim looked up sharply.

"What do you mean?" Poirot pressed the bell.

"I am going to ask Miss Otterbourne if she will come here for a minute." Tim frowned but said nothing. A steward came, received the order and went away with the message.

Rosalie came after a few minutes. Her eyes, reddened with recent weeping, widened a little at seeing Tim, but her old attitude of suspicion and defiance seemed entirely absent. She sat down and with a new docility looked from Race to Poirot.

"We're very sorry to bother you, Miss Otterbourne," said Race gently. He was slightly annoyed with Poirot.

The girl said in a low voice:

"It doesn't matter."

Poirot said: "It is necessary to clear up one or two points. When I asked you whether you saw any one on the starboard deck at 1.10 this morning, your answer was that you saw nobody. Fortunately I have been able to arrive at the truth without your help.

Mr. Allerton has admitted that he was in Linnet Doyle's cabin last night." She flashed a swift glance at Tim. Tim, his face grim and set, gave a curt nod.

"The time is correct, Mr. Allerton?"

Allerton replied:

"Quite correct." Rosalie was staring at him. Her lips trembled fell apart.

"But you didn't-you didn't-"

He said quickly: "No, I didn't kill her I'm a thief, not a murderer. It's all going to come out so might as well know. I was after her pearls." Poirot said: you "Mr. Allerton's story is that he went to her cabin last night and exchanged a string of fake pearls for the real ones."

"Did you?" said Rosalie.

Her eyes, grave, sad, childlike, questioned his.

"Yes," said Tim.

There was a pause. Colonel Race shifted resfiessly.

Poirot said in a curious voice:

"That, as I say, is Mr. Allerton's story, partially confirmed by your evidence.

That is to say, there is evidence that he did visit Linnet Doyle's cabin last night, but there is no evidence to show why he did so." Tim stared at him.

"But you know!" "What do I know?"

"Wellpyou know I'vd'got the pearls."

"Mais oui-mais oui-I know you have the pearls-but I do not know when you got them. It may have been before last night… You said just now that Linnet Doyle would not have noticed the substitution. I am not so sure of that.

Supposing she did notice it… Supposing, even, she knew who did it. '… Supposing that last night she threatened to expose the whole business and that you knew she meant to do so… And supposing that you overheard the scene in the saloon between Jacqueline de Bellefort and Simon Doyle and as soon as the saloon was empty you slipped in and secured the pistol, and then an hour later, when the boat had quieted down, you crept along to Linnet Doyle's cabin and made quite sure that no exposure would come…

"My God," said Tim. Out of his ashen face, two tortured agonised eyes gazed dumbly at Hercule Poirot.

The latter went on:

"But somebody else saw youpthe girl Louise. The next day she came to you and blackmailed you. You must pay her handsomely or she would tell what she knew. You realised that to submit to blackmail would be the beginning of the end.

You pretended to agree, made an appointment to come to her cabin just before lunch with the money. Then, when she was counting the notes, you stabbed her.

"But again luck was against you. Somebody saw you go to her cabin-" he half turned to Rosalie. "Your mother. Once again you had to actangerously-foolhardily-but it was the only chance. You had heard Pennington talk about his revolver. Yon rushed into his cabin, got hold of it, listened outside Dr. Bessner's cabin door and shot Mrs. Otterbourne before she could reveal your name-" "N-o!" cried Rosalie. "He didn't! He didn't!"

"After that, you did the only thing you could do-rushed round the stern, and when I rushed after you, you had turned and pretended to be coming in the opposite direction. You had handled the revolver in gloves-those gloves were in your pocket when I asked for them "

Tim said.

"Before God, I swear it isn't true-not a word of it." But his voice, ill assured and trembling, failed to convince.

It was then that Rosalie Otterbourne surprised them.

"Of course it isn't true! And M. Poirot knows it isn't! He's saying it for some reason of his own." Poirot looked at her. A faint smile came to his lips. He spread his hands in token of surrender.

"Mademoiselle is too clever… But you agreeit was a good case?" "What the devil--" Tim began with rising anger, but Poirot held up a hand.

"There is a very good case against you, Mr. Allerton. I wanted you to realise that'. Now I will tell you something more pleasant. I have not yet examined that rosartd in your cabin. It may be that, when I do, I shall find nothing there. And thean, since Mademoiselle Otterbourne sticks to it that she saw no one on the deck last night-eh bien, there is no ease against you at all. The pearls were taken by a ldel tomaniac who has since returned them. They are in a little box on the table by the ' door if you would care to examine them with Mademoiselle." Tim got up. He stood for a moment unable to speak. When he did, his words seermed inadequate but it is possible that they satisfied his listeners.

"Thanks!" he said. "You won't have to give me another chance." He held the door open for the girl, she passed out, and picking up the little cardslboard box, he followed her.

Side by side they went. Tim opened the box, took out the sham string of pearls and J hurled it far from him into the Nile.

"There!" he said. "That's gone, When I return the box to Poirot the real string will Il be in it. What a damned fool I've been." Rosalie said in a low voice: "Why did you come to do it in the first place?" "How did I come to start, do you mean? Oh, I don't know. Boredom- lazi ness-the fun of the thing. Such a much more attractive way of earning a living thaOn just pegging away at a job. Sounds pretty sordid to you, I e,,xpect but you kno-W there was an attraction about it-mainly the risk, I suppose.