Agatha Christie - They Do It With Mirrors

'I see… I see…' He watched her speculatively.

'There's one thing I don't quite get, Mrs Strete. The position of the two Restarick brothers?'

'More foolish sentiment. Their father married my poor mother for her money. Two years afterwards he ran away with a Jugoslavian singer of the lowest morals. He was a very unworthy person. My mother was softhearted enough to be sorry for these two boys. Since it was out of the question for them to spend their holidays with a woman of such notorious morals, she more or less adopted them. They have been hangers-on here ever since. Oh yes, we've plenty of spongers in this house, I can tell you that.'

'Alex Restarick had an opportunity of killing Christian Gulbrandsen. He was in his car alone - driving from the Lodge to the house - what about Stephen?'

'Stephen was in the Hall with us. I don't approve of Alex Restarick - he is getting to look very coarse, and I imagine he leads an irregular life - but I don't really see him as a murderer. Besides, why should he kill my brother?'

'That's what we always come back to, isn't it?' said Inspector Curry genially. 'What did Christian Gulbrandsen know - about someone - that made it necessary for that someone to kill him?'

'Exactly,' said Mrs Strete triumphantly. 'It must be Walter Hudd.'

'Unless it's someone nearer home.'

Mildred said sharply: 'What did you mean by that?' Inspector Curry said slowly: 'Mr Gulbrandsen seemed very concerned about Mrs Serrocold's health whilst he was here.' Mrs Strete frowned.

'They always fuss over mother because she looks fragile. I think she likes them to! Or else Christian had been listening to Juliet Believer.'

'You're not worried about your mother's health yourself, Mrs Strete?'

'No. I hope I'm sensible. Naturally mother is not young-'

'And death comes to all of us,' said Inspector Curry. 'But not ahead of its appointed time. That's what we have to prevent.' He spoke meaningly. Mildred Strete flared into sudden animation.

'Oh it's wicked - wicked. No one else here really seems to care. Why should they? I'm the only person who was a blood relation to Christian. To mother, he was only a grown-up stepson. To Gina, he isn't really any relation at all. But he was my own brother.'

'Half-brother,' suggested Inspector Curry.

'Half-brother, yes. But we were both Gulbrandsens in spite of the difference in age.' Curry said gently: 'Yes - yes, I see your point…'

Tears in her eyes, Mildred Strete marched out. Curry looked at Lake.

'So she's quite sure it's Walter Hudd,' he said. 'Won't entertain for a moment the idea of its being anybody else.'

'And she may be right.'

'She certainly may. Wally fits. Opportunity - and motive. Because if he wants money quick, his wife's mother would have to die. So Wally tampers with her tonic, and Christian Gulbrandsen sees him do it - or hears about it in some way. Yes, it fits very nicely.' He paused and said:

'By the way, Mildred Strete likes money… She mayn't spend it, but she likes it. I'm not sure why… She may be a miser - with a miser's passion. Or she may like the power that money gives. Money for benevolence, perhaps? She's a Gulbrandsen. She may want to emulate Father.'

'Complex, isn't it?' said Sergeant Lake, and scratched his head.

Inspector Curry said:

'We'd better see this screwy young man Lawson, and after that we'll go to the Great Hall and work out who was where - and if- and why - and when… We've heard one or two rather interesting things this morning.'

It was very difficult, Inspector Curry thought, to get a true estimate of someone from what other people said.

Edgar Lawson had been described by a good many different people that morning, but looking at him now, Curry's own impressions were almost ludicrously different.

Edgar did not impress him as 'queer' or 'dangerous,' or 'arrogant' or even as 'abnormal.' He seemed a very ordinary young man, very much cast down and in a state of humility approaching that of Uriah Heep's. He looked young and slightly common and rather pathetic.

He was only too anxious to talk and to apologize.

'I know I've done very wrong. I don't know what came over me - really I don't. Making that scene and kicking up such a row. And actually shooting off a pistol. At Mr Serrocold too, who's been so good to me and so patient, too.'

He twisted his hands nervously. They were rather pathetic hands, with bony wrists.

'If I've got to be had up for it, I'll come with you at once. I deserve it. I'll plead guilty.'

'No charge has been made against you,' said Inspector Curry crisply. 'So we've no evidence on which to act.

According to Mr Serrocold, letting off the pistol was an accident.'

'That's because he's so good. There never was a man as good as Mr Serrocold! He's done everything for me. And I go and repay him by acting like this.'

'What made you act as you did?' Edgar looked embarrassed.

'I made a fool of myself.' Inspector Curry said drily:

'So it seems. You told Mr Serrocold in the presence of witnesses that you had discovered that he was your father. Was that true?'

'No, it wasn't.'

'What put that idea into your head? Did someone suggest it to you?'

'Well, it's a bit hard to explain.'

Inspector Curry looked at him thoughtfully, then said in a kindly voice: 'Suppose you try. We don't want to make things hard for you.'

'Well, you see, I had a rather hard time of it as a kid.

The other boys jeered at me. Because I hadn't got a father. Said I was a little bastard - which I was, of course.

Mum was usually drunk and she had men coming in all the time. My father was a foreign seaman, I believe. The house was always filthy, and it was all pretty fair hell. And then I got to thinking, supposing my Dad had been not just some foreign sailor, but someone important - and I used to make up a thing or two. Kid stuff first - changed at birth - really the rightful heir - that sort of thing. And then I went to a new school and I tried it on once or twice hinting things. Said my father was really an Admiral in the Navy. I got to believing it myself. I didn't feel so bad then.' He paused and then went on: 'And then - later - I thought up some other ideas. I used to stay at hotels and told a lot of silly stories about being a fighter pilot - or about being in Military Intelligence. I got all sort of mixed up. I didn't seem able to stop telling lies.

'Only I didn't really try to get money by it. It was just swank so as to make people think a bit more of me. I didn't want to be dishonest. Mr Serrocold will tell you and Dr Maverick - they've got all the stuff about it.' Inspector Curry nodded. He had already studied Edgar's case history and his police record.

'Mr Serrocold got me clear in the end and brought me down here. He said he needed a secretary to help him and I did help him! I really did. Only the others laughed at me. They were always laughing at me.'

'What others? Mrs Serrocold?'

'No, not Mrs Serrocold. She's a lady - she's always gentle and kind. No, but Gina treated me like dirt. And Stephen Restarick. And Mrs Strete looked down on me for not being a gentleman. So did Miss Bellever - and what's she? She's a paid companion, isn't she?' Curry noted the signs of rising excitement.

'So you didn't find them very sympathetic?'

Edgar said passionately: 'It was because of me being a bastard. If I'd had a proper father they wouldn't have gone on like that.'

'So you appropriated a couple of famous fathers?' Edgar blushed.

'I always seem to get to telling lies,' he muttered.

'And finally you said Mr Serrocold was your father.

Why?'

'Because that would stop them once for all, wouldn't it? If he was my father they couldn't do anything to me.'

'Yes. But you accused him of being your enemy - of persecuting you.'