Agatha Christie - One, Two, Buckle My Shoe

"When you have only a small place you've got to make the most of it. You can't afford to make mistakes in the planning."

Hercule Poirot nodded.

Barnes went on:

"I see you've got your man?"

"Frank Carter?"

"Yes. I'm rather surprised, really."

"You did not think that it was, so to speak, a private murder?"

"No. Frankly I didn't. What with Amberiotis and Alistair Blunt – I was sure that it was of Espionage or Counter-Espionage mix-ups."

"That is the view you expounded to me at our first meeting."

"I know. I was quite sure of it at the time."

Poirot said slowly:

"But you were wrong."

"Yes. Don't rub it in. The trouble is, one has got one's own experience, I've been mixed up in that sort of thing so much I suppose I'm inclined to see it everywhere."

Poirot said:

"You have observed in your time an obvious a card, have you not? What is called forcing a card?"

"Yes, of course."

"That is what was done here. Every time one thinks of a private reason for Morley's dismiss, Adipresto! – the card is forced on one. Ambition – of Alistair Blunt, the unsettled state of politics of the country -" He shrugged his shoulders. "Ma foi, Mr. Barnes, you did more to mislead me than anybody."

"Oh, I say, Poirot, I'm sorry. I suppose that's true."

"You were in a position to know, your words carried weight."

"Well – I believed what I said. That's the only apology I can make."

He paused and sighed.

"And all the time, it was a purely private reasons?"

"Exactly. It has taken me a long time to check every reason for the murder – although I had a definite piece of luck."

"What was that?"

"A fragment of a conversation. Really, a very illuminating fragment if only I had had the sense to realize its significance at the time."

Mr. Barnes scratched his nose thoughtfully with the trowl. A small piece of earth adhered to the side of his nose.

"Being rather cryptic, aren't you?" he asked genially.

Hercule Poirot shrugged his shoulders. He said:

"I am, perhaps, aggrieved that you were not more frank with me."

"I?"

"Yes."

"My dear fellow – I never had the least idea of Carter's guilt. As far as I knew, he'd left the house long before Morley was killed. I suppose now they've found he didn't leave when he said he did?"

Poirot said:

"Carter was in the house at twenty-six minutes past twelve. He actually saw the murderer."

"Then Carter didn't -"

"Carter saw the murderer, I tell you!"

Mr. Barnes said:

"Did – did he recognize him?"

Slowly Hercule Poirot shook his head.

On the following day Hercule Poirot spent some hours with a theatrical agent of his acquaintance. In the afternoon he went to Oxford. On the day after that he drove down to the country – it was late when he returned.

He had telephoned before he left to make an appointment with Mr. Alistair Blunt for that same evening.

It was half past nine when he reached the Gothic House.

Alistair Blunt was alone in his library when Poirot was shown in.

He looked an eager question at his visitor as he shook hands. He said: "Well?"

Slowly Hercule Poirot nodded his head.

Blunt looked at him in almost incredulous appreciation.

"Have you found her?"

"Yes. Yes, I have found her."

He sat down. And he sighed.

Alistair Blunt said: "You are tired?"

"Yes. I am tired. And it is not pretty – what I have to tell you."

Blunt said:

"Is she dead?"

"That depends," said Hercule Poirot slowly, "on how you like to look at it."

Blunt frowned.

He said:

"My dear man, a person must be dead or alive. Miss Sainsbury Seale must be one or the other?"

"Ah, but who is Miss Sainsbury Seale?"

Alistair Blunt said:

"You don't mean that – that there isn't any such person?"

"Oh, no, no. There was such a person. She lived in Calcutta. She taught elocution. She busied herself with good works. She came to England in the Maharanah – the same boat in which Mr. Amberiotis travelled. Although they were not in the same class, he helped her over something – some fuss about her luggage. He was, it would seem, a kindly man in little ways. And sometimes, Mr. Blunt, kindness is repaid in an unexpected fashion. It was so, you know, with Mr. Amberiotis. He chanced to meet the lady again in the streets of London. He was feeling expansive, he good-naturedly invited her to lunch with him at the Savoy. An unexpected treat for her. And an unexpected windfall for Mr. Amberiotis! For his kindness was not premeditated – he had no idea that this faded, middle-aged lady was going to present him with the equivalent of a gold mine. But, nevertheless, that is what she did, though she never suspected the fact herself.

"She was never, you see, of the first order of intelligence. A good, well-meaning soul, but the brain, I should say, of a hen."

Blunt said:

"Then it wasn't she who killed the Chapman woman?"

Poirot said slowly:

"It is difficult to know just how to present the matter. I shall begin, I think, where the matter began for me. With a shoe."

Blunt said blankly:

"With a shoe?"

Hercule Poirot nodded.

"Yes, a buckled shoe. I came out from my séance at the dentist's and as I stood on the steps of 58 Queen Charlotte Street, a taxi stopped outside, the door opened and a woman's foot prepared to descend. I am a man who notices a woman's foot and ankle. It was a well-shaped foot, with a good ankle and an expensive stocking, but I did not like the shoe. It was a new, shining, patent leather shoe with a large ornate buckle. Not chic – not at all chic!

"And whilst I was observing this, the rest of the lady came into sight – and frankly it was a disappointment – a middle-aged lady without charm and badly dressed."

"Miss Sainsbury Seale?"

"Precisely. As she descended a contretemps occurred – she caught the buckle of her shoe in the door and it was wrenched off. I picked it up and returned it to her. Later that same day I went with Chief Inspector Japp to talk to this lady (she had not as yet fixed the shoe). On the same evening Miss Sainsbury Seale leaves the hotel and disappears. End of the first part.

"There is a second part to it. That, we shall say, began when Inspector Japp summoned me to King Leopold Mansions. There was a fur chest, and in that fur chest there was a body. I went into the room, I look into the chest – and the first thing I saw was buckled shoe!"

"And so?"

"You have not appreciated the point. It was a shabby shoe – a well-worn shoe. But you see, Miss Sainsbury Seale had come to King Leopold Mansions on the evening of that same day – the day of Mr. Morley's murder. In the morning the shoes were new shoes – in the evening they were worn shoes. One does not wear out a pair of shoes in a day, you comprehend."

Alistair Blunt said without much interest:

"She could have two pairs of shoes, I suppose?"

"Ah, but that was not so. For Japp and I had gone up to her room at the Glengowrie Court and had looked at all her possessions – and there was no pair of buckled shoes there. She might have had an old pair of shoes, yes. She might have changed into them after a tiring day to go out in the evening, yes? But if so, the other pair would have been at the hotel. It was curious, you will admit?"

Blunt smiled a little. He said:

"I can't see that it is important."

"No, not important. Not at all important. But one does not like things that one cannot explain. I stood by the fur chest and I looked at the shoe – the buckle had recently been sewn on by hand. I will confess that I then had a moment of doubt – of myself. Yes, I said to myself, Hercule Poirot, you were a little light-headed perhaps this morning. You saw the world through rosy spectacles. Even the old shoes looked like new ones to you!"