Agatha Christie - The Mysterious Mr. Quin

"Any excuse that has brought me such a charming lady guest must be welcomed by me," said Mr. Satterthwaite in an old-fashioned gallant manner.

" ow nice you are to me," said Aspasia Glen. "My dear lady," said Mr. Satterthwaite," may I thank you here and now for the pleasure you have so often given me― in my seat in the stalls." She smiled delightfully at him.

"I am coming straight to the point. I was at the Harchester Galleries to-day. I saw a picture there I simply couldn't live without. I wanted to buy it and I couldn't because you had already bought it. So"―she paused―"I do want it so," she went on. "Dear Mr. Satterthwaite, I simply must have it. I brought my cheque book." She looked at him hopefully." Everyone tells me you arc so frightfully kind. People are kind to me, you know. It is very bad for me―but there it is."

So these were Aspasia Glen's methods. Mr. Satterthwaite was inwardly coldly critical of this ultra-femininity and of this spoilt child pose. It ought to appeal to him, he supposed, but it didn't. Aspasia Glen had made a mistake. She had judged him as an elderly dilettante, easily flattered by a pretty woman. But Mr. Satterthwaite behind his gallant manner had a shrewd and critical mind. He saw people pretty well as they were, not as they wished to appear to him. He saw before him, not a charming woman pleading for a whim, but a ruthless egoist determined to get her own way for some reason which was obscure to him. And he knew quite certainly that Aspasia Glen was not going to get her own way. He was not going to give up the picture of the Dead Harlequin to her. He sought rapidly in his mind for the best way of circumventing her without overt rudeness.

"I am sure," he said, "that everyone gives you your own way as often as they can and is only too delighted to do so." "Then you are really going to let me have the picture?" Mr. Satterthwaite shook his head slowly and regretfully. "I am afraid that is impossible. You see"―he paused―"I bought that picture for a lady. It is a present."

"Oh! but surely―――"

The telephone on the table rang sharply. With a murmured word of excuse Mr. Satterthwaite took up the receiver. A voice spoke to him, a small, cold voice that sounded very far away.

"Can I speak to Mr. Satterthwaite, please?" "It is Mr. Satterthwaite speaking"

"I am Lady Charnley, Alix Charnley. I daresay you don't remember me, Mr. Satterthwaite, it is a great many years since we met."

"My dear Alix. Of course, I remember you."

"There is something I wanted to ask you. I was at the Harchester Galleries at an exhibition of pictures today, there was one called The Dead Harlequin, perhaps you recognised it―it was the Terrace Room at Charnley. I―I want to have that picture. It was sold to you." She paused.

"Mr. Satterthwaite, for reasons of my own I want that picture. Will you resell it to me?"

Mr. Satterthwaite thought to himself―"Why, this is a miracle."

As he spoke into the receiver he was thankful that Aspasia Glen could only hear one side of the conversation.

"If you will accept my gift, dear lady, it will make me very happy." He heard a sharp exclamation behind him and hurried on.

"I bought it for you. I did indeed. But listen, | my dear Alix, I want to ask you to do me a great favour, if you will."

"Of course. Mr. Satterthwaite, I am so very grateful."

He went on. "I want you to come round now to my house, at once."

There was a slight pause and then she answered quietly―"I will come at once."

Mr. Satterthwaite put down the receiver and turned to Miss Glen.

She said quickly and angrily―"That was the picture you were talking about?"

"Yes," said Mr. Satterthwaite, "the lady to whom I am presenting it is coming round to this house in a few minutes."

Suddenly Aspasia Glen's face broke once more into smiles.

"You will give me a chance of persuading her to turn the picture over to me?"

"I will give you a chance of persuading her." Inwardly he was strangely excited. He was in the midst of a drama that was shaping itself to some foredoomed end. He, the looker on, was playing a star part. He turned to Miss Glen.

"Will you come into the other room with me? I should like you to meet some friends of mine."

He held the door open for her and, crossing the hall, opened the door of the smoking-room.

"Miss Glen," he said, "let me introduce you to an old friend of mine, Colonel Monckton. Mr. Bristow, the painter of the picture you admire so much." Then he started as a third figure rose from the chair which he had left empty beside his own.

"I think you expected me this evening," said Mr. Quin. "During your absence I introduced myself to your friends. I am so glad I was able to drop in."

"My dear friend," said Mr. Satterthwaite, "I―I have been carrying on as well as I am able, but―――" he stopped before the slightly sardonic glance of Mr. Quin's dark eyes.

"Let me introduce you. Mr. Harley Quin, Miss Aspasia Glen.

"Was it fancy―or did she shrink back slightly. A curious expression flitted over her face.

Suddenly Bristow broke in boisterously. "I have got it."

"Got what?"

"Got hold of what was puzzling me. There is a likeness, there is a distinct likeness." he was staring curiously at Mr. Quin. "You see it?"―he turned to Mr. Satterthwaite―"don't you see a distinct likeness to the Harlequin of my picture―the man looking in through the window?"

It was no fancy this time. He distinctly heard Miss Glen draw in her breath sharply and even saw that she stepped back one pace.

"I told you that I was expecting someone," said Mr. Satterthwaite. He spoke with an air of triumph. "I must tell you that my friend, Mr. Quin, is a most extraordinary person. He can unravel mysteries. He can make you see things."

"Are you a medium, sir?" demanded Colonel Monckton, eyeing Mr. Quin doubtfully.

The latter smiled and slowly shook his head.

"Mr. Satterthwaite exaggerates," he said quietly. "Once or twice when I have been with him he has done some extraordinary good deductive work. Why he puts the credit down to me I can't say. His modesty, I suppose."

"No, no," said Mr. Satterthwaite excitedly. "It isn't. You make me see things―things that I ought to have seen all along―that I actually have seen―but without knowing that I saw them."

"It sounds to me deuced complicated," said Colonel

Monckton.

"Not really," said Mr. Quin. "The trouble Is that we are not content just to see things―we will tack the wrong interpretation on to the things we see."

Aspasia Glen turned to Frank Bristow.

"I want to know," she said nervously, "what put the idea of painting that picture into your head?"

Bristow shrugged his shoulders.

"I don't quite know," he confessed. "Something about the place―about Charnley, I mean, took hold of my imagination The big empty room. The terrace outside, the idea of ghosts and things, I suppose.

I have just been hearing the tale of the last Lord Charnley, who shot himself. Supposing you are dead, and your spirit lives on? It must be odd, you know. You might stand outside on the terrace looking in at the window at your own dead body, and you would see everything."

"What do you mean?" said Aspasia Glen. "See everything?"

"Well, you would see what happened. You would see―――"

The door opened and the butler announced Lady Charnley.

Mr. Satterthwaite went to meet her. He had not seen her for nearly thirteen years. He remembered her as she once was, an eager, glowing girl. And now he saw―a Frozen Lady. Very fair, very pale, with an air of drifting rather than walking, a snowflake driven at random by an icy breeze. Something unreal about her. So cold, so far away.

"It was very good of you to come," said Mr. Satterthwaite.