Agatha Christie - Ordeal by Innocence

"And he was good at that," said Calgary . "Wheedling money out of women, I mean."

"And a very nice safe line it is," said Superintendent Huish. "Women fell for him very easily. Middle-aged or elderly were the ones he usually went for. You'd be surprised how gullible that type of woman can be. He put over a very pretty line. Got them to believe he was passionately in love with them. There's nothing a woman won't believe if she wants to."

"And then?" asked Calgary . Huish shrugged his shoulders.

"Well, sooner or later they were disillusioned. But they don't prosecute, you know. They don't want to tell the world that they've been fooled. Yes, it's a pretty safe line."

"Was there ever blackmail?" Calgary asked.

"Not that we know of," said Huish. "Mind you, I wouldn't have put it past him. Not out and out blackmail, I'd say. Just a hint or two, perhaps. Letters. Foolish letters. Things their husbands wouldn't like to know about. He'd be able to keep a woman quiet that way."

"I see," said Calgary .

"Is that all you wanted to know?" asked Huish.

"There's one member of the Argyle family I haven't met yet," said Calgary . "The eldest daughter."

"Ah, Mrs. Durrant."

"I went to her house, but it was shut up. They told me she and her husband were away."

"They are at Sunny Point." "Still there?"

"Yes. He wanted to stay on. Mr. Durrant," added Huish, "is doing a bit of detecting, I understand."

"He's a cripple, isn't he?"

"Yes, polio. Very sad. He hasn't much to do with his time, poor chap. That's why he's taken up this murder business so eagerly. Thinks he's on to something, too."

"And is he?" asked Calgary . Huish shrugged his shoulders.

"He might be, at that," he said. "He's a better chance that we have, you know. He knows the family and he's a man with a good deal of intuition as well as intelligence."

"Do you think he'll get anywhere?"

"Possibly," said Huish, "but he won't tell us if he does. They'll keep it all in the family."

"Do you yourself know who's guilty, Superintendent?" "You mustn't ask me things like that, Dr. Calgary." "Meaning that you do know?"

"One can think one knows a thing," said Huish slowly, "but if you haven't got evidence there's not much you can do about it, is there?"

"And you're not likely to get the evidence you want?"

"Oh, we're very patient," Huish said. "We shall go on trying."

"What's going to happen to them all if you don't succeed?" said Calgary , leaning forward. "Have you thought of that?"

Huish looked at him.

"That's what's worrying you, is it, sir?"

"They've got to know," said Calgary . "Whatever else happens, they've got to know."

"Don't you think they do know?"

Calgary shook his head.

"No," he said slowly, "that's the tragedy."

II

"Oo," said Maureen Clegg, "it's you again!"

"I'm very, very sorry to bother you," said Calgary .

"Oh, but you're not bothering me a bit. Come in. It's my day off."

That fact Calgary had already found out, and was the reason for his being here.

"I'm expecting Joe back in a minute," said Maureen. "I haven't seen any more about Jacko in the papers. I mean not since it said how he got a free pardon and a bit about a question being asked in Parliament and then saying that it was quite clear he didn't do it. But there's nothing more about what the police are doing and who really did it? Can't they find out?"

"Have you still no idea yourself?"

"Well, I haven't really," said Maureen. "I shouldn't be surprised, though, if it was the other brother. Very queer and moody he is. Joe sees him sometimes driving people around. He works for the Bence Group, you know. He's rather good-looking but terribly moody, I should think. Joe heard a rumour he was going out to Persia or somewhere and that looks bad, I think, don't you?"

"I don't see why it should look bad, Mrs. Clegg."

"Well, it's one of those places the police can't get at you, isn't it?"

"You think that he is running away?"

"He may feel he's got to."

"I suppose that's the sort of thing people do say," Arthur Calgary said.

"Lots of rumours flying around," said Maureen. "They say the husband and the secretary were going on together, too. But if it was the husband I should think he would be more likely to poison her. That's what they usually do, isn't it?"

"Well, you see more films than I do, Mrs. Clegg."

"I don't really look at the screen," said Maureen. "If you work there, you know, you get terribly bored with films. Hallo, here's Joe."

Joe Clegg also looked surprised to see Calgary and possibly not too pleased. They talked together for a while and then Calgary came to the purpose of his visit.

"I wonder," he said, "if you'd mind giving me a name and address?"

He wrote it down carefully in his notebook.

Ill

She was about fifty, he thought, a heavy cumbrous woman who could never have been good-looking. She had nice eyes, though, brown and kindly.

"Well, really, Dr. Calgary –" She was doubtful, upset. "Well, really, I'm sure I don't know…"

He leaned forward, trying his utmost to dispel her reluctance, to soothe her, to make her feel the full force of his sympathy.

"It's so long ago now," she said. "It's –1 really don't want to be reminded of — of things."

"I do understand that," said Calgary , "and it's not as though there were any question of anything being made public. I do assure you of that."

"You say you want to write a book about it, though?"

"Just a book to illustrate a certain type of character," said Calgary . "Interesting, you know, from a medical or psychological standpoint. No names. Just Mr. A., Mrs. B. That sort of thing."

"You've been to the Antarctic, haven't you?" she said suddenly.

He was surprised at the abruptness with which she had changed the subject.

"Yes," he said, "yes, I was with the, the Hayes Bentley Expedition."

The colour came up in her face. She looked younger. Just for a moment he could see the girl she had once been. "I used to read about it… I've always been fascinated, you know, with anything to do with the Poles. That Norwegian, wasn't it, Amundsen, who got there first? I think the Poles are much more exciting than Everest or any of these satellites, or going to the Moon or anything like that."

He seized on his cue and began to talk to her about the Expedition. Odd that her romantic interest should lie there, in Polar Explorations. She said at last with a sigh: "It's wonderful hearing about it all from someone who's actually been there." She went on: "You want to know all about — about Jackie?"

"Yes."

"You wouldn't use my name or anything like that?"

"Of course not. I've told you so. You know how these things are done. Mrs. M. Lady Y. That sort of thing."

"Yes. Yes, I've read that kind of book — and I suppose it was, as you said, path –patho –"

"Pathological," he said.

"Yes, Jackie was definitely a pathological case. He could be ever so sweet, you know," she said. "Wonderful, he was. He'd say things and you'd believe every word of it."

"He probably meant them," said Calgary .

'"I'm old enough to be your mother,' I used to say to him, and he'd say he didn't care for girls. Crude, he used to say girls were. He used to say women who were experienced and mature were what attracted him."

"Was he very much in love with you?" said Calgary .

"He said he was. He seemed to be…" Her lips trembled. "And all the time, I suppose, he was just after the money."

"Not necessarily," said Calgary , straining the truth as far as he could. "He may have been genuinely attracted, you know, as well. Only — he just couldn't help being crooked."

The pathetic middle-aged face brightened a little.