Agatha Christie: Murder is Easy

England! England after many years! How was he going to like it? Luke Fitzwilliam asked himself that question as he walked down the gangplank to the dock. It was present at the back of his mind all through the wait in the customs shed. It came suddenly to the fore when he was finally seated in the boat train. Here he was, honorably retired on a pension, with some small private means of his own, a gentleman of leisure, come home to England . What was he going to do with himself? With an effort, Luke Fitzwilliam averted his eyes from the landscape outside the railway-carriage window and settled down to a perusal of the papers he had just bought. The Times, the Daily Clarion and Punch.

He started with the Daily Clarion. The Clarion was given over entirely to Epsom.

He had drawn a horse in the club sweep and he looked now to see what the Clarion's racing correspondent thought of its chances. He found it dismissed contemptuously in a sentence:

Of the others, Jujube the II, Mark's Mile, Santony and Jerry Boy are hardly likely to qualify for a place. A likely outsider is –

But Luke paid no attention to the likely outsider. His eye had shifted to the betting. Jujube the II was listed at a modest 40 to 1. He glanced at his watch. A quarter to four .

"Well," he thought, "it's over now." And he wished he'd had a bet on Clarigold, who was the second favorite.

Then he opened the Times and became absorbed in more serious matters. A full half hour afterward the train slowed down and finally stopped. Luke looked out of the window.

They were in a large empty-looking station with many platforms. He caught sight of a bookstall some way up the platform with a placard DERBY RESULT. Luke opened the door, jumped out, and ran toward the bookstall. A moment later he was staring with a broad grin at a few smudged lines in the stop press.

DERBY RESULT

1st — Jujube the II

2nd — Mazeppa

3rd — Clarigold

Luke grinned broadly. A hundred pounds to blow! Good old Jujube the II, so scornfully dismissed by all the tipsters. He folded the paper, still grinning to himself, and turned back — to face emptiness. In the excitement of Jujube the II's victory, his train had slipped out of the station unnoticed by him. "When the devil did that train go out?" he demanded of a gloomy-looking porter.

"What train? There hasn't been no train since the 3:14 ."

"There was a train here just now. I got out of it. The boat express."

"The boat express don't stop anywhere till London ."

"But it did," Luke assured him. "I got out of it."

Faced by facts, the porter changed his ground. "You didn't ought to have done," he said reproachfully. "It don't stop here."

"But it did."

"That was signal, that was. Signal against it. It didn't what you'd call 'stop.' You didn't ought to have got out."

"We'll admit that," said Luke. "The wrong is done, past all recall. What I'm trying to get at is, what do you, a man experienced in the services of the railway company, advise me to do?"

"Reckon," said the porter, "you'd best go on by the 4:25 ."

"If the 4:25 goes to London ," said Luke, "the 4:25 is the train for me."

Reassured on that point, Luke strolled up and down the platform. A large board informed him that he was at FENNY CLAYTON JUNCTION FOR WYCHWOOD UNDER ASHE, and presently a train consisting of one carriage pushed backward by an antiquated little engine came slowly puffing in and deposited itself in a modest way.

At last, with immense importance, the London train came in. Luke scrutinized each compartment. The first, a smoker, contained a gentleman of military aspects smoking a cigar. He passed on to the next one, which contained a tired-looking, genteel young woman, possibly a nursery governess, and an active-looking small boy of about three. Luke passed on quickly. The next door was open and the carriage contained one passenger, an elderly lady. She reminded Luke slightly of one of his aunts, his Aunt Mildred, who had courageously allowed him to keep a grass snake when he was ten years old. Aunt Mildred had been decidedly a good aunt as aunts go. Luke entered the carriage and sat down.

After some five minutes of intense activity on the part of milk vans, luggage trucks and other excitements, the train moved slowly out of the station. Luke unfolded his paper and turned to such items of news as might interest a man who had already read his morning paper. He did not hope to read it for long. Being a man of many aunts, he was fairly certain that the nice old lady in the corner did not propose to travel in silence to London . He was right — a window that needed adjusting, a dropped umbrella, and the old lady was telling him what a good train this was. "Only an hour and ten minutes. That's very good, you know, very good indeed. Much better than the morning one. That takes an hour and forty minutes." She went on: "Of course, nearly everyone goes by the morning one. I mean when it is the cheap way it's silly to go up in the afternoon. I meant to go up this morning but Wonky Pooh was missing — that's my cat, a Persian; such a beauty, only he's had a painful ear lately — and of course I couldn't leave home till he was found!"

Luke murmured, "Of course not," and let his eyes drop ostentatiously to his paper. But it was of no avail. The flood went on:

"So I just made the best of a bad job and took the afternoon train instead, and, of course, it's a blessing in one way, because it's not so crowded — not that that matters when one is traveling first class. Of course, I don't usually do that, but really I was so upset because, you see, I'm going up on very important business, and I wanted to think out exactly what I was going to say — just quietly, you know." Luke repressed a smile.

"So I thought, just for once, the expense was quite permissible. Of course," she went on quickly, with a swift glance at Luke's bronzed face, "I know soldiers on leave have to travel first class, I mean, being officers, it's expected of them."

Luke sustained the inquisitive glance of a pair of bright twinkling eyes. He capitulated at once. It would come to it, he knew, in the end. "I'm not a soldier," he said.

"Oh, I'm so sorry. I didn't mean — I just thought — you were so brown — perhaps home from the East on leave."

"I'm home from the East," said Luke, "but not on leave." He stalled off further researches with a bald statement, "I'm a policeman."

"In the police? Now, really, that's very interesting. A dear friend of mine, her boy has just joined the Palestinian police."

"Mayang Straits," said Luke, taking another short cut.

"Oh, dear; very interesting. Really, it's quite a coincidence — I mean that you should be traveling in this carriage. Because, you see, this business I'm going up to town about — well, actually it is to Scotland Yard I'm going."

"Really?" said Luke.

The old lady continued happily, "Yes, I meant to go up this morning, and then, as I told you, I was so worried about Wonky Pooh. But you don't think it will be too late, do you? I mean there aren't any special office hours at Scotland Yard."

"I don't think they close down at four or anything like that," said Luke.

"No, of course, they couldn't, could they? I mean somebody might want to report a serious crime at any minute, mightn't they?"

"Exactly," said Luke.

For a moment the old lady relapsed into silence. She looked worried. "I always think it's better to go to the fountain-head," she said at last. "John Reed is quite a nice fellow — that's our constable in Wychwood — a very civil-spoken, pleasant man, but I don't feel, you know, that he would be quite the person to deal with anything serious. He's quite used to dealing with people who've drunk too much, or with exceeding the speed limit, or lighting-up time, or people who haven't taken out a dog license, and perhaps with burglary even. But I don't think — I'm quite sure — he isn't the person to deal with murder!"