Agatha Christie - Peril at End House

'It's not a nice profession, ours,' said Japp. 'Stilton, did you say? I don't mind if I do. No, it's not a nice profession. And yours is worse than mine-not official, you see, and therefore a lot more worming yourself into places in underhand ways.'

'I do not disguise myself, Japp. Never have I disguised myself.'

'You couldn't,' said Japp. 'You're unique. Once seen, never forgotten.'

Poirot looked at him rather doubtfully.

'Only my fun,' said Japp. 'Don't mind me. Glass of port? Well, if you say so.'

The evening became thoroughly harmonious. We were soon in the middle of reminiscences. This case, that case, and the other. I must say that I, too, enjoyed talking over the past. Those had been good days. How old and experienced I felt now!

Poor old Poirot. He was perplexed by this case-I could see that. His powers were not what they were. I had the feeling that he was going to fail-that the murderer of Maggie Buckley would never be brought to book.

'Courage, my friend,' said Poirot, slapping me on the shoulder. 'All is not lost. Do not pull the long face, I beg of you.'

'That's all right. I'm all right.'

'And so am I. And so is Japp.'

'We're all all right,' declared Japp, hilariously.

And on this pleasant note we parted.

The following morning we journeyed back to St Loo. On arrival at the hotel Poirot rang up the nursing home and asked to speak to Nick.

Suddenly I saw his face change-he almost dropped the instrument. 'Comment? What is that? Say it again, I beg.'

He waited for a minute or two listening. Then he said: 'Yes, yes, I will come at once.'

He turned a pale face to me.

'Why did I go away, Hastings? Mon Dieu! Why did I go away?'

'What has happened?'

'Mademoiselle Nick is dangerously ill. Cocaine poisoning. They have got at her after all. Mon Dieu! Mon Dieu! Why did I go away?'

All the way to the nursing home Poirot murmured and muttered to himself. He was full of self-reproach.

'I should have known,' he groaned. 'I should have known! And yet, what could I do? I took every precaution. It is impossible-impossible. No one could get to her! Who has disobeyed my orders?'

At the nursing home we were shown into a little room downstairs, and after a few minutes Dr Graham came to us. He looked exhausted and white.

'She'll do,' he said. 'It's going to be all right. The trouble was knowing how much she'd taken of the damned stuff.'

'What was it?’

‘Cocaine.’

‘She will live?’

‘Yes, yes, she'll live.'

'But how did it happen? How did they get at her? Who has been allowed in?' Poirot fairly danced with impotent excitement.

'Nobody has been allowed in.'

'Impossible.'

'It's true.'

'But then-'

'It was a box of chocolates.'

'Ah! Sacre. And I told her to eat nothing-nothing – that came from outside.'

'I don't know about that. It's hard work keeping a girl from a box of chocolates. She only ate one, thank goodness.'

'Was the cocaine in all the chocolates?'

'No. The girl ate one. There were two others in the top layer. The rest were all right.'

'How was it done?'

'Quite clumsily. Chocolate cut in half-the cocaine mixed with the filling and the chocolate stuck together again. Amateurishly. What you might call a homemade job.'

Poirot groaned.

'Ah! if I knew-if I knew. Can I see Mademoiselle?'

'If you come back in an hour I think you can see her,' said the doctor. 'Pull yourself together, man. She isn't going to die.'

For another hour we walked the streets of St Loo. I did my best to distract Poirot's mind-pointing out to him that all was well, that, after all, no mischief had been done.

But he only shook his head, and repeated at intervals: 'I am afraid, Hastings, I am afraid…'

And the strange way he said it made me, too, feel afraid.

Once he caught me by the arm.

'Listen, my friend. I am all wrong. I have been all wrong from the beginning.'

'You mean it isn't the money-'

'No, no, I am right about that. Oh, yes. But those two-it is too simple-too easy, that. There is another twist still. Yes, there is something!'

And then in an outburst of indignation: 'Ah! cette petite! Did I not forbid her? Did I not say, "Do not touch anything from outside?" And she disobeys me-me, Hercule Poirot. Are not four escapes from death enough for her? Must she take a fifth chance? Ah, c'est in oui!'

At last we made our way back. After a brief wait we were conducted upstairs.

Nick was sitting up in bed. The pupils of her eyes were widely dilated. She looked feverish and her hands kept twitching violently.

'At it again,' she murmured.

Poirot experienced real emotion at the sight of her. He cleared his throat and took her hand in his.

'Ah! Mademoiselle-Mademoiselle.'

'I shouldn't care,' she said, defiantly, 'if they had got me this time. I'm sick of it all-sick of it!'

'Pauvre petite!'

'Something in me doesn't like to give them best!'

'That is the spirit-le sport-you must be the good sport, Mademoiselle.'

'Your old nursing home hasn't been so safe after all,' said Nick.

'If you had obeyed orders, Mademoiselle-'

She looked faintly astonished.

'But I have.'

'Did I not impress upon you that you were to eat nothing that came from outside?'

'No more I did.'

'But these chocolates-'

'Well, they were all right. You sent them.'

'What is that you say, Mademoiselle?'

'You sent them!'

'Me? Never. Never anything of the kind.'

'But you did. Your card was in the box.'

'What?'

Nick made a spasmodic gesture towards the table by the bed. The nurse came forward.

'You want the card that was in the box?’

‘Yes, please, nurse.'

There was a moment's pause. The nurse returned to the room with it in her hand.

'Here it is.'

I gasped. So did Poirot. For on the card, in flourishing handwriting, were written the same words that I had seen Poirot inscribe on the card that accompanied the basket of flowers.

'With the Compliments of Hercule Poirot.'

'Sacre tonnerre!'

'You see,' said Nick, accusingly.

'I did not write this!' cried Poirot.

'What?'

'And yet,' murmured Poirot, 'and yet it is my handwriting.'

'I know. It's exactly the same as the card that came with the orange carnations. I never doubted that the chocolates came from you.'

Poirot shook his head.

'How should you doubt? Oh! the devil! The clever, cruel devil! To think of that! Ah! but he has genius, this man, genius! "With the Compliments of Hercule Poirot." So simple. Yes, but one had to think of it. And I-I did not think. I omitted to foresee this move.'

Nick moved restlessly.

'Do not agitate yourself, Mademoiselle. You are blameless-blameless. It is I that am to blame, miserable imbecile that I am! I should have foreseen this move. Yes, I should have foreseen it.'

His chin dropped on his breast. He looked the picture of misery.

'I really think-' said the nurse.

She had been hovering nearby, a disapproving expression on her face.

'Eh? Yes, yes, I will go. Courage, Mademoiselle. This is the last mistake I will make. I am ashamed, desolated-I have been tricked, outwitted-as though I were a little schoolboy. But it shall not happen again. No. I promise you. Come, Hastings.'

Poirot's first proceeding was to interview the matron. She was, naturally, terribly upset over the whole business.

'It seems incredible to me, M. Poirot, absolutely incredible. That a thing like that should happen in my nursing home.'

Poirot was sympathetic and tactful. Having soothed her sufficiently, he began to inquire into the circumstance of the arrival of the fatal packet. Here, the matron declared, he would do best to interview the orderly who had been on duty at the time of its arrival.