The murder of Roger Ackroyd 10 – Christie · Verses Across
Literature · Crime, Thrillers & Mystery
The murder of Roger Ackroyd 10The Parlormaid
18
Literature · Crime, Thrillers & Mystery
The murder of Roger Ackroyd 10
The Parlormaid
ChristieEnglish
We found Mrs. Ackroyd in the hall. With her was a small dried-up little man, with an aggressive chin and sharp gray eyes, and “lawyer” written all over him.
“Mr. Hammond is staying to lunch with us,” said Mrs. Ackroyd. “You know Major Blunt, Mr. Hammond? And dear Dr. Sheppard—also a close friend of poor Roger’s. And, let me see——”
She paused, surveying Hercule Poirot in some perplexity.
“This is M. Poirot, mother,” said Flora. “I told you about him this morning.”
“Oh! yes,” said Mrs. Ackroyd vaguely. “Of course, my dear, of course. He is to find Ralph, is he not?”
“He is to find out who killed uncle,” said Flora.
“Oh! my dear,” cried her mother. “Please! My poor nerves. I am a wreck this morning, a positive wreck. Such a dreadful thing to happen. I can’t help feeling that it must have been an accident of some kind. Roger was so fond of handling queer curios. His hand must have slipped, or something.”
This theory was received in polite silence. I saw Poirot edge up to the lawyer, and speak to him in a confidential undertone. They moved aside into the embrasure of the window. I joined them—then hesitated.
“Perhaps I’m intruding,” I said.
“Not at all,” cried Poirot heartily. “You and I, M. le docteur, we investigate this affair side by side. Without you I should be lost. I desire a little information from the good Mr. Hammond.”
“You are acting on behalf of Captain Ralph Paton, I understand,” said the lawyer cautiously.
Poirot shook his head.
“Not so. I am acting in the interests of justice. Miss Ackroyd has asked me to investigate the death of her uncle.”
Mr. Hammond seemed slightly taken aback.
“I cannot seriously believe that Captain Paton can be concerned in this crime,” he said, “however strong the circumstantial evidence against him may be. The mere fact that he was hard pressed for money——”
“Was he hard pressed for money?” interpolated Poirot quickly.
The lawyer shrugged his shoulders.
“It was a chronic condition with Ralph Paton,” he said dryly. “Money went through his hands like water. He was always applying to his stepfather.”
“Had he done so of late? During the last year, for instance?”
“I cannot say. Mr. Ackroyd did not mention the fact to me.”
“I comprehend. Mr. Hammond, I take it that you are acquainted with the provisions of Mr. Ackroyd’s will?”
“Certainly. That is my principal business here to-day.”
“Then, seeing that I am acting for Miss Ackroyd, you will not object to telling me the terms of that will?”
“They are quite simple. Shorn of legal phraseology, and after paying certain legacies and bequests——”
“Such as——?” interrupted Poirot.
Mr. Hammond seemed a little surprised.
“A thousand pounds to his housekeeper, Miss Russell; fifty pounds to the cook, Emma Cooper; five hundred pounds to his secretary, Mr. Geoffrey Raymond. Then to various hospitals——”
Poirot held up his hand.
“Ah! the charitable bequests, they interest me not.”
“Quite so. The income on ten thousand pounds’ worth of shares to be paid to Mrs. Cecil Ackroyd during her lifetime. Miss Flora Ackroyd inherits twenty thousand pounds outright. The residue—including this property, and the shares in Ackroyd and Son—to his adopted son, Ralph Paton.”
“Mr. Ackroyd possessed a large fortune?”
“A very large fortune. Captain Paton will be an exceedingly wealthy young man.”
There was a silence. Poirot and the lawyer looked at each other.
“Mr. Hammond,” came Mrs. Ackroyd’s voice plaintively from the fireplace.
The lawyer answered the summons. Poirot took my arm and drew me right into the window.
“Regard the irises,” he remarked in rather a loud voice. “Magnificent, are they not? A straight and pleasing effect.”
At the same time I felt the pressure of his hand on my arm, and he added in a low tone:—
“Do you really wish to aid me? To take part in this investigation?”
“Yes, indeed,” I said eagerly. “There’s nothing I should like better. You don’t know what a dull old fogey’s life I lead. Never anything out of the ordinary.”
“Good, we will be colleagues then. In a minute or two I fancy Major Blunt will join us. He is not happy with the good mamma. Now there are some things I want to know—but I do not wish to seem to want to know them. You comprehend? So it will be your part to ask the questions.”
“What questions do you want me to ask?” I asked apprehensively.
“I want you to introduce the name of Mrs. Ferrars.”
“Yes?”
“Speak of her in a natural fashion. Ask him if he was down here when her husband died. You understand the kind of thing I mean. And while he replies, watch his face without seeming to watch it. C’est compris?”
There was no time for more, for at that minute, as Poirot had prophesied, Blunt left the others in his abrupt fashion and came over to us.
I suggested strolling on the terrace, and he acquiesced. Poirot stayed behind.
I stopped to examine a late rose.
“How things change in the course of a day or so,” I observed. “I was up here last Wednesday, I remember, walking up and down this same terrace. Ackroyd was with me—full of spirits. And now—three days later—Ackroyd’s dead, poor fellow, Mrs. Ferrars’s dead—you knew her, didn’t you? But of course you did.”
Blunt nodded his head.
“Had you seen her since you’d been down this time?”
“Went with Ackroyd to call. Last Tuesday, think it was. Fascinating woman—but something queer about her. Deep—one would never know what she was up to.”
I looked into his steady gray eyes. Nothing there surely. I went on:—
“I suppose you’d met her before.”
“Last time I was here—she and her husband had just come here to live.” He paused a minute and then added: “Rum thing, she had changed a lot between then and now.”
“How—changed?” I asked.
“Looked ten years older.”
“Were you down here when her husband died?” I asked, trying to make the question sound as casual as possible.
“No. From all I heard it would be a good riddance. Uncharitable, perhaps, but the truth.”
I agreed.
“Ashley Ferrars was by no means a pattern husband,” I said cautiously.
“Blackguard, I thought,” said Blunt.
“No,” I said, “only a man with more money than was good for him.”
“Oh! money! All the troubles in the world can be put down to money—or the lack of it.”
“Which has been your particular trouble?” I asked.
“I’ve enough for what I want. I’m one of the lucky ones.”
“Indeed.”
“I’m not too flush just now, as a matter of fact. Came into a legacy a year ago, and like a fool let myself be persuaded into putting it into some wild-cat scheme.”
I sympathized, and narrated my own similar trouble.
Then the gong pealed out, and we all went in to lunch. Poirot drew me back a little.
“Eh! bien?”
“He’s all right,” I said. “I’m sure of it.”
“Nothing—disturbing?”
“He had a legacy just a year ago,” I said. “But why not? Why shouldn’t he? I’ll swear the man is perfectly square and aboveboard.”
“Without doubt, without doubt,” said Poirot soothingly. “Do not upset yourself.”
He spoke as though to a fractious child.
We all trooped into the dining-room. It seemed incredible that less than twenty-four hours had passed since I last sat at that table.
Afterwards, Mrs. Ackroyd took me aside and sat down with me on a sofa.
“I can’t help feeling a little hurt,” she murmured, producing a handkerchief of the kind obviously not meant to be cried into. “Hurt, I mean, by Roger’s lack of confidence in me. That twenty thousand pounds ought to have been left to me—not to Flora. A mother could be trusted to safeguard the interests of her child. A lack of trust, I call it.”
“You forget, Mrs. Ackroyd,” I said, “Flora was Ackroyd’s own niece, a blood relation. It would have been different had you been his sister instead of his sister-in-law.”
“As poor Cecil’s widow, I think my feelings ought to have been considered,” said the lady, touching her eye-lashes gingerly with the handkerchief. “But Roger was always most peculiar—not to say mean—about money matters. It has been a most difficult position for both Flora and myself. He did not even give the poor child an allowance. He would pay her bills, you know, and even that with a good deal of reluctance and asking what she wanted all those fal-lals for—so like a man—but—now I’ve forgotten what it was I was going to say! Oh, yes, not a penny we could call our own, you know. Flora resented it—yes, I must say she resented it—very strongly. Though devoted to her uncle, of course. But any girl would have resented it. Yes, I must say Roger had very strange ideas about money. He wouldn’t even buy new face towels, though I told him the old ones were in holes. And then,” proceeded Mrs. Ackroyd, with a sudden leap highly characteristic of her conversation, “to leave all that money—a thousand pounds—fancy, a thousand pounds!—to that woman.”
“What woman?”
“That Russell woman. Something very queer about her, and so I’ve always said. But Roger wouldn’t hear a word against her. Said she was a woman of great force of character, and that he admired and respected her. He was always going on about her rectitude and independence and moral worth. I think there’s something fishy about her. She was certainly doing her best to marry Roger. But I soon put a stop to that. She’s always hated me. Naturally. I saw through her.”
I began to wonder if there was any chance of stemming Mrs. Ackroyd’s eloquence, and getting away.
Mr. Hammond provided the necessary diversion by coming up to say good-by. I seized my chance and rose also.
“About the inquest,” I said. “Where would you prefer it to be held. Here, or at the Three Boars?”
Mrs. Ackroyd stared at me with a dropped jaw.
“The inquest?” she asked, the picture of consternation. “But surely there won’t have to be an inquest?”
Mr. Hammond gave a dry little cough and murmured, “Inevitable. Under the circumstances,” in two short little barks.
“But surely Dr. Sheppard can arrange——”
“There are limits to my powers of arrangement,” I said dryly.
“If his death was an accident——”
“He was murdered, Mrs. Ackroyd,” I said brutally.
She gave a little cry.
“No theory of accident will hold water for a minute.”
Mrs. Ackroyd looked at me in distress. I had no patience with what I thought was her silly fear of unpleasantness.
“If there’s an inquest, I—I shan’t have to answer questions and all that, shall I?” she asked.
“I don’t know what will be necessary,” I answered. “I imagine Mr. Raymond will take the brunt of it off you. He knows all the circumstances, and can give formal evidence of identification.”
The lawyer assented with a little bow.
“I really don’t think there is anything to dread, Mrs. Ackroyd,” he said. “You will be spared all unpleasantness. Now, as to the question of money, have you all you need for the present? I mean,” he added, as she looked at him inquiringly, “ready money. Cash, you know. If not, I can arrange to let you have whatever you require.”
“That ought to be all right,” said Raymond, who was standing by. “Mr. Ackroyd cashed a cheque for a hundred pounds yesterday.”
“A hundred pounds?”
“Yes. For wages and other expenses due to-day. At the moment it is still intact.”
“Where is this money? In his desk?”
“No, he always kept his cash in his bedroom. In an old collar-box, to be accurate. Funny idea, wasn’t it?”
“I think,” said the lawyer, “we ought to make sure the money is there before I leave.”
“Certainly,” agreed the secretary. “I’ll take you up now.... Oh! I forgot. The door’s locked.”
Inquiry from Parker elicited the information that Inspector Raglan was in the housekeeper’s room asking a few supplementary questions. A few minutes later the inspector joined the party in the hall, bringing the key with him. He unlocked the door and we passed into the lobby and up the small staircase. At the top of the stairs the door into Ackroyd’s bedroom stood open. Inside the room it was dark, the curtains were drawn, and the bed was turned down just as it had been last night. The inspector drew the curtains, letting in the sunlight, and Geoffrey Raymond went to the top drawer of a rosewood bureau.
“He kept his money like that, in an unlocked drawer. Just fancy,” commented the inspector.
The secretary flushed a little.
“Mr. Ackroyd had perfect faith in the honesty of all the servants,” he said hotly.
“Oh! quite so,” said the inspector hastily.
Raymond opened the drawer, took out a round leather collar-box from the back of it, and opening it, drew out a thick wallet.
“Here is the money,” he said, taking out a fat roll of notes. “You will find the hundred intact, I know, for Mr. Ackroyd put it in the collar-box in my presence last night when he was dressing for dinner, and of course it has not been touched since.”
Mr. Hammond took the roll from him and counted it. He looked up sharply.
“A hundred pounds, you said. But there is only sixty here.”
Raymond stared at him.
“Impossible,” he cried, springing forward. Taking the notes from the other’s hand, he counted them aloud.
Mr. Hammond had been right. The total amounted to sixty pounds.
“But—I can’t understand it,” cried the secretary, bewildered.
Poirot asked a question.
“You saw Mr. Ackroyd put this money away last night when he was dressing for dinner? You are sure he had not paid away any of it already?”
“I’m sure he hadn’t. He even said, ‘I don’t want to take a hundred pounds down to dinner with me. Too bulgy.’”
“Then the affair is very simple,” remarked Poirot. “Either he paid out that forty pounds sometime last evening, or else it has been stolen.”
“That’s the matter in a nutshell,” agreed the inspector. He turned to Mrs. Ackroyd. “Which of the servants would come in here yesterday evening?”
“I suppose the housemaid would turn down the bed.”
“Who is she? What do you know about her?”
“She’s not been here very long,” said Mrs. Ackroyd. “But she’s a nice ordinary country girl.”
“I think we ought to clear this matter up,” said the inspector. “If Mr. Ackroyd paid that money away himself, it may have a bearing on the mystery of the crime. The other servants all right, as far as you know?”
“Oh, I think so.”
“Not missed anything before?”
“No.”
“None of them leaving, or anything like that?”
“The parlormaid is leaving.”
“When?”
“She gave notice yesterday, I believe.”
“To you?”
“Oh, no. I have nothing to do with the servants. Miss Russell attends to the household matters.”
The inspector remained lost in thought for a minute or two. Then he nodded his head and remarked, “I think I’d better have a word with Miss Russell, and I’ll see the girl Dale as well.”
Poirot and I accompanied him to the housekeeper’s room. Miss Russell received us with her usual sang-froid.
Elsie Dale had been at Fernly five months. A nice girl, quick at her duties, and most respectable. Good references. The last girl in the world to take anything not belonging to her.
What about the parlormaid?
“She, too, was a most superior girl. Very quiet and ladylike. An excellent worker.”
“Then why is she leaving?” asked the inspector.
Miss Russell pursed up her lips.
“It was none of my doing. I understand Mr. Ackroyd found fault with her yesterday afternoon. It was her duty to do the study, and she disarranged some of the papers on his desk, I believe. He was very annoyed about it, and she gave notice. At least, that is what I understood from her, but perhaps you’d like to see her yourselves?”
The inspector assented. I had already noticed the girl when she was waiting on us at lunch. A tall girl, with a lot of brown hair rolled tightly away at the back of her neck, and very steady gray eyes. She came in answer to the housekeeper’s summons, and stood very straight with those same gray eyes fixed on us.
“You are Ursula Bourne?” asked the inspector.
“Yes, sir.”
“I understand you are leaving?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Why is that?”
“I disarranged some papers on Mr. Ackroyd’s desk. He was very angry about it, and I said I had better leave. He told me to go as soon as possible.”
“Were you in Mr. Ackroyd’s bedroom at all last night? Tidying up or anything?”
“No, sir. That is Elsie’s work. I never went near that part of the house.”
“I must tell you, my girl, that a large sum of money is missing from Mr. Ackroyd’s room.”
At last I saw her roused. A wave of color swept over her face.
“I know nothing about any money. If you think I took it, and that that is why Mr. Ackroyd dismissed me, you are wrong.”
“I’m not accusing you of taking it, my girl,” said the inspector. “Don’t flare up so.”
The girl looked at him coldly.
“You can search my things if you like,” she said disdainfully. “But you won’t find anything.”
Poirot suddenly interposed.
“It was yesterday afternoon that Mr. Ackroyd dismissed you—or you dismissed yourself, was it not?” he asked.
The girl nodded.
“How long did the interview last?”
“The interview?”
“Yes, the interview between you and Mr. Ackroyd in the study?”
“I—I don’t know.”
“Twenty minutes? Half an hour?”
“Something like that.”
“Not longer?”
“Not longer than half an hour, certainly.”
“Thank you, mademoiselle.”
I looked curiously at him. He was rearranging a few objects on the table, setting them straight with precise fingers. His eyes were shining.
“That’ll do,” said the inspector.
Ursula Bourne disappeared. The inspector turned to Miss Russell.
“How long has she been here? Have you got a copy of the reference you had with her?”
Without answering the first question, Miss Russell moved to an adjacent bureau, opened one of the drawers, and took out a handful of letters clipped together with a patent fastener. She selected one and handed it to the inspector.
“H’m,” said he. “Reads all right. Mrs. Richard Folliott, Marby Grange, Marby. Who’s this woman?”
“Quite good county people,” said Miss Russell.
“Well,” said the inspector, handing it back, “let’s have a look at the other one, Elsie Dale.”
Elsie Dale was a big fair girl, with a pleasant but slightly stupid face. She answered our questions readily enough, and showed much distress and concern at the loss of the money.
“I don’t think there’s anything wrong with her,” observed the inspector, after he had dismissed her.
“What about Parker?”
Miss Russell pursed her lips together and made no reply.
“I’ve a feeling there’s something wrong about that man,” the inspector continued thoughtfully. “The trouble is that I don’t quite see when he got his opportunity. He’d be busy with his duties immediately after dinner, and he’s got a pretty good alibi all through the evening. I know, for I’ve been devoting particular attention to it. Well, thank you very much, Miss Russell. We’ll leave things as they are for the present. It’s highly probable Mr. Ackroyd paid that money away himself.”
The housekeeper bade us a dry good-afternoon, and we took our leave.
I left the house with Poirot.
“I wonder,” I said, breaking the silence, “what the papers the girl disarranged could have been for Ackroyd to have got into such a state about them? I wonder if there is any clew there to the mystery.”
“The secretary said there were no papers of particular importance on the desk,” said Poirot quietly.
“Yes, but——” I paused.
“It strikes you as odd that Ackroyd should have flown into a rage about so trivial a matter?”
“Yes, it does rather.”
“But was it a trivial matter?”
“Of course,” I admitted, “we don’t know what those papers may have been. But Raymond certainly said——”
“Leave M. Raymond out of it for a minute. What did you think of that girl?”
“Which girl? The parlormaid?”
“Yes, the parlormaid. Ursula Bourne.”
“She seemed a nice girl,” I said hesitatingly.
Poirot repeated my words, but whereas I had laid a slight stress on the fourth word, he put it on the second.
“She seemed a nice girl—yes.”
Then, after a minute’s silence, he took something from his pocket and handed it to me.
“See, my friend, I will show you something. Look there.”
The paper he had handed me was that compiled by the inspector and given by him to Poirot that morning. Following the pointing finger, I saw a small cross marked in pencil opposite the name Ursula Bourne.
“You may not have noticed it at the time, my good friend, but there was one person on this list whose alibi had no kind of confirmation. Ursula Bourne.”
“You don’t think——”
“Dr. Sheppard, I dare to think anything. Ursula Bourne may have killed Mr. Ackroyd, but I confess I can see no motive for her doing so. Can you?”
He looked at me very hard—so hard that I felt uncomfortable.
“Can you?” he repeated.
“No motive whatsoever,” I said firmly.
His gaze relaxed. He frowned and murmured to himself:—
“Since the blackmailer was a man, it follows that she cannot be the blackmailer, then——”
I coughed.
“As far as that goes——” I began doubtfully.
He spun round on me.
“What? What are you going to say?”
“Nothing. Nothing. Only that, strictly speaking, Mrs. Ferrars in her letter mentioned a person—she didn’t actually specify a man. But we took it for granted, Ackroyd and I, that it was a man.”
Poirot did not seem to be listening to me. He was muttering to himself again.
“But then it is possible after all—yes, certainly it is possible—but then—ah! I must rearrange my ideas. Method, order; never have I needed them more. Everything must fit in—in its appointed place—otherwise I am on the wrong tack.”
He broke off, and whirled round upon me again.
“Where is Marby?”
“It’s on the other side of Cranchester.”
“How far away?”
“Oh!—fourteen miles, perhaps.”
“Would it be possible for you to go there? To-morrow, say?”
“To-morrow? Let me see, that’s Sunday. Yes, I could arrange it. What do you want me to do there?”
“See this Mrs. Folliott. Find out all you can about Ursula Bourne.”
“Very well. But—I don’t much care for the job.”
“It is not the time to make difficulties. A man’s life may hang on this.”
“Poor Ralph,” I said with a sigh. “You believe him to be innocent, though?”
Poirot looked at me very gravely.
“Do you want to know the truth?”
“Of course.”
“Then you shall have it. My friend, everything points to the assumption that he is guilty.”
“What!” I exclaimed.
Poirot nodded.
“Yes, that stupid inspector—for he is stupid—has everything pointing his way. I seek for the truth—and the truth leads me every time to Ralph Paton. Motive, opportunity, means. But I will leave no stone unturned. I promised Mademoiselle Flora. And she was very sure, that little one. But very sure indeed.”
