Agatha Christie - Detectives and Young Adventurers - The Complete Short Stories

Tommy nodded thoughtfully.

‘What do you suspect exactly?’

‘I don’t know. But I feel there’s something wrong.’

With a quick movement, Stavansson took a case from his pocket and laid it open before them.

‘That is Hermione,’ he said. ‘I will leave it with you.’

The photograph represented a tall, willowy woman, no longer in her first youth, but with a charming frank smile and lovely eyes.

‘Now, Mr Stavansson,’ said Tommy, ‘there is nothing you have omitted to tell me?’

‘Nothing whatever.’

‘No detail, however small?’

‘I don’t think so.’

Tommy sighed.

‘That makes the task harder,’ he observed. ‘You must often have noticed, Mr Stavansson, in reading of crime, how one small detail is all the great detective needs to set him on the track. I may say that this case presents some unusual features. I have, I think, partially solved it already, but time will show.’

He picked up a violin which lay on the table and drew the bow once or twice across the strings. Tuppence ground her teeth, and even the explorer blenched. The performer laid the instrument down again.

‘A few chords from Mosgovskensky,’ he murmured. ‘Leave me your address, Mr Stavansson, and I will report progress to you.’

As the visitor left the office, Tuppence grabbed the violin, and putting it in the cupboard turned the key in the lock.

‘If you must be Sherlock Holmes,’ she observed, ‘I’ll get you a nice little syringe and a bottle labelled cocaine, but for God’s sake leave that violin alone. If that nice explorer man hadn’t been as simple as a child, he’d have seen through you. Are you going on with the Sherlock Holmes touch?’

‘I flatter myself that I have carried it through very well so far,’ said Tommy with some complacence. ‘The deductions were good, weren’t they? I had to risk the taxi. After all, it’s the only sensible way of getting to this place.’

‘It’s lucky I had just read the bit about his engagement in this morning’s Daily Mirror ,’ remarked Tuppence.

‘Yes, that looked well for the efficiency of Blunt’s Brilliant Detectives. This is decidedly a Sherlock Holmes case. Even you cannot have failed to notice the similarity between it and the disappearance of Lady Frances Carfax.’

‘Do you expect to find Mrs Leigh Gordon’s body in a coffin?’

‘Logically, history should repeat itself. Actually – well, what do you think?’

‘Well,’ said Tuppence. ‘The most obvious explanation seems to be that for some reason or other, Hermy, as he calls her, is afraid to meet her fiancé, and that Lady Susan is backing her up. In fact, to put it bluntly, she’s come a cropper of some kind, and has got the wind up about it.’

‘That occurred to me also,’ said Tommy. ‘But I thought we’d better make pretty certain before suggesting that explanation to a man like Stavansson. What about a run down to Maldon, old thing? And it would do no harm to take some golf clubs with us.’

Tuppence agreeing, the International Detective Agency was left in the charge of Albert.

Maldon, though a well-known residential place, did not cover a large area. Tommy and Tuppence, making every possible inquiry that ingenuity could suggest, nevertheless drew a complete blank. It was as they were returning to London that a brilliant idea occurred to Tuppence.

‘Tommy, why did they put Maldon, Surrey, on the telegram?’

‘Because Maldon is in Surrey, idiot.’

‘Idiot yourself – I don’t mean that. If you get a telegram from – Hastings, say, or Torquay, they don’t put the county after it. But from Richmond, they do put Richmond, Surrey. That’s because there are two Richmonds.’

Tommy, who was driving, slowed up.

‘Tuppence,’ he said affectionately, ‘your idea is not so dusty. Let us make inquiries at yonder post office.’

They drew up before a small building in the middle of a village street. A very few minutes sufficed to elicit the information that there were two Maldons. Maldon, Surrey, and Maldon, Sussex, the latter, a tiny hamlet but possessed of a telegraph office.

‘That’s it,’ said Tuppence excitedly. ‘Stavansson knew Maldon was in Surrey, so he hardly looked at the word beginning with S after Maldon.’

‘Tomorrow,’ said Tommy, ‘we’ll have a look at Maldon, Sussex.’

Maldon, Sussex, was a very different proposition to its Surrey namesake. It was four miles from a railway station, possessed two public houses, two small shops, a post and telegraph office combined with a sweet and picture postcard business, and about seven small cottages. Tuppence took on the shops whilst Tommy betook himself to the Cock and Sparrow. They met half an hour later.

‘Well?’ said Tuppence.

‘Quite good beer,’ said Tommy, ‘but no information.’

‘You’d better try the King’s Head,’ said Tuppence. ‘I’m going back to the post office. There’s a sour old woman there, but I heard them yell to her that dinner was ready.’

She returned to the place and began examining postcards. A fresh-faced girl, still munching, came out of the back room.

‘I’d like these, please,’ said Tuppence. ‘And do you mind waiting whilst I just look over these comic ones?’

She sorted through a packet, talking as she did so.

‘I’m ever so disappointed you couldn’t tell me my sister’s address. She’s staying near here and I’ve lost her letter. Leigh Gordon, her name is.’

The girl shook her head.

‘I don’t remember it. And we don’t get many letters through here either – so I probably should if I’d seen it on a letter. Apart from the Grange, there isn’t many big houses round about.’

‘What is the Grange?’ asked Tuppence. ‘Who does it belong to?’

‘Dr Horriston has it. It’s turned into a nursing home now. Nerve cases mostly, I believe. Ladies that come down for rest cures, and all that sort of thing. Well, it’s quiet enough down here, heaven knows.’ She giggled.

Tuppence hastily selected a few cards and paid for them.

‘That’s Doctor Horriston’s car coming along now,’ exclaimed the girl.

Tuppence hurried to the shop door. A small two-seater was passing. At the wheel was a tall dark man with a neat black beard and a powerful unpleasant face. The car went straight on down the street. Tuppence saw Tommy crossing the road towards her.

‘Tommy, I believe I’ve got it. Doctor Horriston’s nursing home.’

‘I heard about it at the King’s Head, and I thought there might be something in it. But if she’s had a nervous breakdown or anything of that sort, her aunt and her friends would know about it surely.’

‘Ye-es. I didn’t mean that. Tommy, did you see that man in the twoseater?’

‘Unpleasant-looking brute, yes.’

‘That was Doctor Horriston.’

Tommy whistled.

‘Shifty looking beggar. What do you say about it, Tuppence? Shall we go and have a look at the Grange?’

They found the place at last, a big rambling house, surrounded by deserted grounds, with a swift mill stream running behind the house.

‘Dismal sort of abode,’ said Tommy. ‘It gives me the creeps, Tuppence. You know, I’ve a feeling this is going to turn out a far more serious matter than we thought at first.’

‘Oh, don’t. If only we are in time. That woman’s in some awful danger; I feel it in my bones.’

‘Don’t let your imagination run away with you.’

‘I can’t help it. I mistrust that man. What shall we do? I think it would be a good plan if I went and rang the bell alone first and asked boldly for Mrs Leigh Gordon just to see what answer I get. Because, after all, it may be perfectly fair and above board.’