Агата Кристи - Hercule Poirot's Christmas / Рождество Эркюля Пуаро. Книга для чтения на английском языке

Hilda Lee said quietly: ‘That is an infamous suggestion [414] an infamous suggestion – ( разг. ) гадкое предположение .’

Poirot turned to her. ‘I will offer you another, madame. It was your hand that did the deed. It was you who crept upstairs to execute judgment on a man you considered beyond human forgiveness [415] you considered beyond human forgiveness – ( разг. ) вы считали, что этому человеку нет прощения .

You are of those, madame, who can be terrible in anger…’

Hilda said: ‘I did not kill him.’

Superintendent Sugden said brusquely: ‘Mr Poi-rot’s quite right. There is a possible case against everyone except Mr Alfred Lee, Mr Harry Lee, and Mrs Alfred Lee.’

Poirot said gently: ‘I should not even except those three…’

The superintendent protested: ‘Oh, come now, Mr Poirot!’

Lydia Lee said: ‘And what is the case against me, M. Poirot?’

She smiled a little as she spoke, her brows raised ironically.

Poirot bowed. He said: ‘Your motive, madame, I pass over. It is sufficiently obvious. As to the rest, you were wearing last night a flowered taffeta dress of a very distinctive pattern with a cape. I will remind you of the fact that Tressilian, the butler, is shortsighted. Objects at a distance are dim and vague to him. I will also point out that your drawing-room is big and lighted by heavily shaded lamps. On that night, a minute or two before the cries were heard, Tressilian came into the drawing-room to take away the coffee-cups. He saw you, as he thought, in a familiar attitude [416] in a familiar attitude – ( разг. ) в привычной позе 308 by the far window half-concealed by the heavy curtains.’

Lydia Lee said: ‘He did see me.’

Poirot went on: ‘I suggest that it is possible that what Tressilian saw was the cape of your dress, arranged to show by the window curtain, as though you yourself were standing there.’

Lydia said: ‘I was standing there…’

Alfred said: ‘How dare you suggest – ?’

Harry interrupted him. ‘Let him go on, Alfred. It’s our turn next. How do you suggest that dear Alfred killed his beloved father since we were both together in the dining-room at the time?’

Poirot beamed at him. ‘That,’ he said, ‘is very simple. An alibi gains in force accordingly as it is unwillingly given. You and your brother are on bad terms. It is well known. You jibe at him in public. He has not a good word to say for you! But, supposing that were all part of a very clever plot. Supposing that Alfred Lee is tired of dancing attendance [417] is tired of dancing attendance – ( разг. ) устал ходить на задних лапках (пресмыкаться) upon an exacting taskmaster. Supposing that you and he have got together some time ago. Your plan is laid. You come home. Alfred appears to resent your presence. He shows jealousy and dislike of you. You show contempt for him. And then comes the night of the murder you have so cleverly planned together. One of you remains in the dining-room, talking and perhaps quar relling aloud as though two people were there.The other goes upstairs and commits the crime …’

Alfred sprang to his feet. ‘You devil!’ he said. His voice was inarticulate.

Sugden was staring at Poirot. He said: ‘Do you really mean – ?’

Poirot said, with a sudden ring of authority in his voice: ‘I have had to show you the possibilities! These are the things that might have happened! Which of them actually did happen we can only tell by passing from the outside appearance to the inside reality…’

He paused and then said slowly: ‘We must come back, as I said before, to the character of Simeon Lee himself…’

There was a momentary pause. Strangely enough, all indignation and all rancour had died down. Hercule Poirot held his audience under the spell of his personality. They watched him, fascinated, as he began slowly to speak.

‘It is all there, you see. The dead man is the focus and centre of the mystery! We must probe deep into the heart and mind of Simeon Lee and see what we find there. For a man does not live and die to himself alone. That which he has, he hands on – to those who come after him…

‘What had Simeon Lee to bequeath to his sons and daughter? Pride, to begin with – a pride which, in the old man, was frustrated in his disappointment over his children. Then there was the quality of patience. We have been told that Simeon Lee waited patiently for years in order to revenge himself upon someone who had done him an injury. We see that that aspect of his temperament was inherited by the son who resembled him least in face. David Lee also could remember and continue to harbour resentment [418] continue to harbour resentment – ( разг. ) продолжал таить обиду through long years. In face, Harry Lee was the only one of his children who closely resembled him. That resemblance is quite striking when we examine the portrait of Simeon Lee as a young man. There is the same high-bridged aquiline nose, the long sharp line of the jaw, the backward poise of the head. I think, too, that Harry inherited many of his father’s mannerisms – that habit, for instance, of throwing back his head and laughing, and another habit of drawing his finger along the line of his jaw.

‘Bearing all these things in mind [419] Bearing all these things in mind – ( уст. ) Памятуя об этом , and being convinced that the murder was committed by a person closely connected with the dead man, I studied the family from the psychological standpoint. That is, I tried to decide which of them were psychologically possible criminals. And, in my judgment, only two persons qualified in that respect. They were Alfred Lee and Hilda Lee, David’s wife. David himself I rejected as a possible murderer. I do not think a person of his delicate susceptibilities could have faced the actual bloodshed of a cut throat. George Lee and his wife I likewise rejected. Whatever their desires, I did not think they had the temperament to take a risk. They were both essentially cautious. Mrs Alfred Lee I felt sure was quite incapable of an act of violence. She has too much irony in her nature. About Harry Lee I hesitated. He had a certain coarse truculence of aspect, but I was nearly sure that Harry Lee, in spite of his bluff and his bluster, was essentially a weakling. That, I now know, was also his father’s opinion. Harry, he said, was worth no more than the rest. That left me with two people I have already mentioned. Alfred Lee was a person capable of a great deal of selfless devotion. He was a man who had controlled and subordinated himself to the will of another for many years. It was always possible under these conditions for something to snap [420] for something to snap – ( разг. ) какая-нибудь струна могла и лопнуть . Moreover, he might quite possibly have harboured a secret grudge against his father which might gradually have grown in force through never being expressed in any way. It is the quietest and meekest people who are often capable of the most sudden and unexpected violence for the reason that when their control does snap, it does so entirely! The other person I considered was capable of the crime was Hilda Lee. She is the kind of individual who is capable, on occasions, of taking the law into her own hands – though never through selfish motives. Such people judge and also execute. Many Old Testament characters are of this type. Jael and Judith, for example.

‘And now having got so far I examined the circumstances of the crime itself. And the first thing that arises – that strikes one in the face, as it were – is the extraordinary conditions under which that crime took place! Take your minds back [421] Take your minds back – ( искаж. ) Мысленно вернитесь to that room where Simeon Lee lay dead. If you remember, there was both a heavy table and a heavy chair overturned, a lamp, crockery, glasses, etc. But the chair and the table were especially surprising. They were of solid mahogany. It was hard to see how any struggle between that frail old man and his opponent could result in so much solid furniture being overturned and knocked down. The whole thing seemed unreal. And yet surely no one in their senses would stage such an effect if it had not really occurred – unless possibly Simeon Lee had been killed by a powerful man and the idea was to suggest that the assailant was a woman or somebody of weak physique.