Hercule Poirot's Christmas

‘Oh, really – I don’t know – I don’t remember what I said… I was so upset…’

Sugden said:

‘We’ve got it all written down, you know.’

She turned her batteries on him – wide appealing eyes – quivering mouth. But she met in return the rigid aloofness of a man of stern respectability who didn’t approve of her type.

She said uncertainly:

‘I – I – of course I telephoned. I can’t be quite sure just when –’

She stopped.

George said:

‘What’s all this? Where did you telephone from? Not in here.’

Superintendent Sugden said:

‘I suggest, Mrs Lee, that you didn’t telephone at all. In that case, where were you and what were you doing?’

Magdalene glanced distractedly about her and burst into tears. She sobbed:

‘George, don’t let them bully me! You know that if anyone frightens me and thunders questions at me, I can’t remember anything at all! I – I don’t know what I was saying that night – it was all so horrible – and I was so upset – and they’re being so beastly to me…’

She jumped up and ran sobbing out of the room.

Springing up, George Lee blustered:

‘What d’you mean? I won’t have my wife bullied and frightened out of her life! She’s very sensitive. It’s disgraceful! I shall have a question asked in the House about the disgraceful bullying methods of the police. It’s absolutely disgraceful!’

He strode out of the room and banged the door.

Superintendent Sugden threw his head back and laughed.

He said:

‘We’ve got them going properly! Now we’ll see!’

Johnson said frowning:

‘Extraordinary business! Looks fishy. We must get a further statement out of her.’

Sugden said easily:

‘Oh! She’ll be back in a minute or two. When she’s decided what to say. Eh, Mr Poirot?’

Poirot, who had been sitting in a dream, gave a start.

‘Pardon!’

‘I said she’ll be back.’

‘Probably – yes, possibly – oh, yes!’

Sugden said, staring at him:

‘What’s the matter, Mr Poirot? Seen a ghost?’

Poirot said slowly:

‘You know – I am not sure that I have not done just exactly that.’

Colonel Johnson said impatiently:

‘Well, Sugden, anything else?’ 

Sugden said:

‘I’ve been trying to check up on the order in which everyone arrived on the scene of the murder. It’s quite clear what must have happened. After the murder when the victim’s dying cry had given the alarm, the murderer slipped out, locked the door with pliers, or something of that kind, and a moment or two later became one of the people hurrying to the scene of the crime. Unfortunately it’s not easy to check exactly whom everyone has seen because people’s memories aren’t very accurate on a point like that. Tressilian says he saw Harry and Alfred Lee cross the hall from the dining-room and race upstairs. That lets them out, but we don’t suspect them anyway. As far as I can make out, Miss Estravados got there late – one of the last. The general idea seems to be that Farr, Mrs George, and Mrs David were the first. Each of those three says one of the others was just ahead of them. That’s what’s so difficult, you can’t distinguish between a deliberate lie and a genuine haziness of recollection. Everybody ran there – that’s agreed, but in what order they ran isn’t so easy to get at.’

Poirot said slowly:

‘You think that important?’

Sugden said:

‘It’s the time element. The time, remember, was incredibly short.’ 

Poirot said:

‘I agree with you that the time element is very important in this case.’

Sugden went on:

‘What makes it more difficult is that there are two staircases. There’s the main one in the hall here about equidistant from the dining-room and the drawing-room doors. Then there’s one the other end of the house. Stephen Farr came up by the latter. Miss Estravados came along the upper landing from that end of the house (her room is right the other end). The others say they went up by this one.’

Poirot said:

‘It is a confusion, yes.’

The door opened and Magdalene came quickly in. She was breathing fast and had a bright spot of colour in each cheek. She came up to the table and said quietly:

‘My husband thinks I’m lying down. I slipped out of my room quietly. Colonel Johnson,’ she appealed to him with wide, distressed eyes, ‘if I tell you the truth you will keep quiet about it, won’t you? I mean you don’t have to make everything public?’

Colonel Johnson said:

‘You mean, I take it, Mrs Lee, something that has no connection with the crime?’

‘Yes, no connection at all. Just something in my – my private life.’ 

The chief constable said:

‘You’d better make a clean breast of it, Mrs Lee, and leave us to judge.’

Magdalene said, her eyes swimming:

‘Yes, I will trust you. I know I can. You look so kind. You see, it’s like this. There’s somebody–’ She stopped.

‘Yes, Mrs Lee?’

‘I wanted to telephone to somebody last night – a man – a friend of mine, and I didn’t want George to know about it. I know it was very wrong of me – but well, it was like that. So I went to telephone after dinner when I thought George would be safely in the dining-room. But when I got here I heard him telephoning, so I waited.’

‘Where did you wait, madame?’ asked Poirot.