Knock and See Who Comes to the Door
AS WE MADE OUR way across town the following morning to pay our mysterious “visit,” Poirot’s mood was as changeable as the London weather, which could not make up its mind between sunny and cloudy. At one moment he would appear to be pleased with himself and at ease, and the next he would furrow his brow as if worrying away at something.
We finally arrived at a modest house on a narrow street. “Number 3 Yarmouth Cottages,” said Poirot, standing outside it. “From where do you know this address, Catchpool? It is familiar to you, no?”
“Yes. Hold on a moment. It will come to me. That’s right—it’s Samuel Kidd’s address, isn’t it?”
“Indeed. Our helpful witness who saw Nancy Ducane run from the Bloxham Hotel and drop two keys, even though Nancy Ducane could not have been at the Bloxham Hotel just after eight o’clock on the night of the murders.”
“Because she was at Louisa Wallace’s house,” I agreed. “So we’re here to give Mr. Kidd a scare, are we, and find out who put him up to lying?”
“Non. Mr. Kidd is not at home today. He has gone to work, I expect.”
“Then . . .”
“Let us play a little game, called Knock-and-See-Who-Comes-to-the-Door,” said Poirot with an enigmatic smile. “Go ahead. I would knock myself if it were not for my gloves. I do not wish to make them dirty.”
I knocked and waited, wondering why Poirot expected anyone to come to the door of a house whose only known occupant was elsewhere. I opened my mouth to ask him, then closed it again. There was, of course, no point. Wistfully, I remembered a time (less than a fortnight ago) when I believed that asking a straight question of someone who knew the answer was a worthwhile thing to do.
The front door of number 3 Yarmouth Cottages opened, and I found myself looking into the large eyes of a person who was not Samuel Kidd. At first I was puzzled, for this was a face I did not know. Then I watched as terror twisted the features, and I knew who it had to be.
“Good morning, Mademoiselle Jennie,” said Poirot. “Catchpool, this is Jennie Hobbs. And this, mademoiselle, is my friend Mr. Edward Catchpool. You might remember that we talked about him at Pleasant’s Coffee House. Allow me to express my profound relief at finding you alive.”
That was when I knew for sure that I knew nothing. The few paltry scraps of certainty upon which I had been relying had proved themselves untrustworthy. How the deuce had Poirot known he would find Jennie Hobbs here? It was simply impossible! And yet, here we were.
After Jennie had composed herself and arranged her expression into something less abject and more guarded, she invited us into the house and bade us wait in a small dark room with shabby furniture. She then excused herself, saying that she would be back shortly.
“You said it was too late to save her!” I said angrily to Poirot. “You lied to me.”
He shook his head. “How did I know that I would find her here? It is thanks to you, mon ami. Again you help Poirot.”
“How?”
“I invite you to think back to your conversation with Walter Stoakley at the King’s Head Inn, to what he said about a woman who could have had a husband, children, a home of her own and a happy life. Do you recall?”
“What about it?”
“A woman who devoted her life to a substantial man? Who sacrificed everything for him? Then, later, Mr. Stoakley said, “She couldn’t marry some kid, not once she had fallen in love with a man of substance. So she left him behind.’ You remember telling me this, mon ami?”
“Of course I do! I’m not an imbecile.”
“You thought that you had found our older woman and much younger man, n’est-ce pas? Rafal Bobak had referred to them at the Bloxham Hotel—he told us that the three murder victims were talking about them—and you thought Walter Stoakley had in mind the same couple, so you asked Mr. Stoakley how much older this woman was than the man whose love she had spurned because you believed that you heard him say, ‘She couldn’t marry some kid.’ But, my friend, you did not hear him say this!”
“Yes—I did, as a matter of fact.”
“Non. What you heard him say was, ‘She couldn’t marry Sam Kidd,’ Mr. Samuel Kidd.”
“But . . . but . . . Oh, dash it all!”
“You leapt to an incorrect conclusion because Walter Stoakley had already used the word ‘kid’ more than once. The young man with whom he had been drinking he had called a kid. Eh bien, your error was one that many in your position would have made. Do not chastise yourself too severely.”
“And then, having misunderstood, I asked Stoakley about the difference in age between the woman who could have married but didn’t and the ne’er-do-well he had been drinking with before I arrived. He must have wondered why I wanted to know, when Jennie Hobbs had nothing to do with the ne’er-do-well.”
“Oui. This he might have asked you, had he not been stupefied by alcohol. Ah, well.” Poirot shrugged.
“So Jennie Hobbs was engaged to Samuel Kidd,” I said, trying to take it all in. “And . . . she left him behind in Cambridge in order to come to Great Holling with Patrick Ive?”
Poirot nodded his agreement. “Fee Spring, the waitress from Pleasant’s—she told me that Jennie suffered a heartbreak in her past. I wonder what it was.”
“Haven’t we just answered that question?” I said. “It must have been leaving Samuel Kidd behind.”
“I think it is more likely to have been the death of Patrick Ive, the man Jennie truly loved. Incidentally, I am certain that this is why she altered her way of speaking: to sound more like someone of his class, in the hope that he might see her as an equal and not merely as a servant.”
“Are you not afraid that she might disappear on you again?” I asked, looking toward the closed door of the sitting room. “What is she doing that is taking so long? You know, we ought to take her straight to a hospital, if she hasn’t already been.”
“A hospital?” Poirot looked surprised.
“Yes. She lost a fair amount of blood in that hotel room.”
“You assume too much,” said Poirot. He looked as if he had considerably more to say, but at that moment Jennie opened the door.
“PLEASE FORGIVE ME, MONSIEUR Poirot,” she said.
“For what, mademoiselle?”
Silence of an uncomfortable sort filled the room. I wanted to speak and put an end to it, but doubted my ability to contribute anything useful.
“Nancy Ducane,” Poirot said very slowly and deliberately. “Was she the person from whom you fled, when you sought refuge in Pleasant’s Coffee House? Was she the one you feared?”
“I know she killed Harriet, Ida and Richard at the Bloxham Hotel,” Jennie whispered. “I’ve read about it in the papers.”
“Since we find you in the home of Samuel Kidd, your former fiancé, can we assume that Mr. Kidd has told you what he saw on the night of the murders?”
Jennie nodded. “Nancy, running from the Bloxham. She dropped two keys on the pavement, he said.”
“It is a coincidence incroyable, mademoiselle: Nancy Ducane, who has murdered three people already and wishes to murder you also, is seen running from the scene of her crimes by none other than the man you once intended to marry!”
Jennie uttered an almost inaudible “Yes.”
“Poirot, he is suspicious of a coincidence so large. You are lying now, and you were lying when we last met!”
“No! I swear—”
“Why did you take a room at the Bloxham Hotel, knowing it was where Harriet Sippel, Ida Gransbury and Richard Negus had met their deaths? You have no answer for that, I see!”
“Allow me to speak and I shall answer. I was tired of running. It seemed easier to have it over with.”
“Is that so? You calmly accepted the fate that awaited you? You embraced it and moved toward it?”
“Yes.”
“Then why—to Mr. Lazzari, the hotel manager—why did you ask him to provide you with a room ‘quickly, quickly,’ as if you were still in flight from your pursuer? And, since you do not appear to be wounded, whose was the blood in Room 402?”
Jennie began to cry, swaying slightly on her feet. Poirot rose and helped her to a chair. He said, “Sit, mademoiselle. It is my turn to stand, and to tell you how I know beyond doubt that nothing you have ever said to me has been the truth.”
“Steady on, Poirot,” I cautioned him. Jennie looked as if she might faint.
Poirot seemed unconcerned. “The murders of Harriet Sippel, Ida Gransbury and Richard Negus were announced in a note,” he said. “ ‘MAY THEY NEVER REST IN PEACE. 121. 238. 317.’ Now, I wonder to myself: a killer who walks in a state of brazen calm to a hotel’s front desk and places a note there advertising three murders—is this the sort of person who would then panic, run from the hotel panting, and drop two room keys in front of a witness? Are we to believe that the killer Nancy Ducane’s panic commenced only after she had left the note on the desk? Why would it start only then? And if Nancy Ducane was making her exit from the Bloxham at shortly after eight o’clock, how could she also be dining with her friend Lady Louisa Wallace at that very same moment?”
“Poirot, don’t you think you ought to go easy on her?”
“I do not. I ask you, Mademoiselle Jennie: why should Nancy Ducane leave a note at all? Why did the three dead bodies need to be found shortly after eight o’clock that evening? The hotel maids would have found them in due course. What was the hurry? And if Madame Ducane was calm and composed enough to approach the desk and leave the note without arousing suspicion, that must mean she was able to think sensibly about what needed to be done. Why, then, did she not also put the two room keys safely in her deep coat pocket at that point, before she left the hotel? Foolishly, she keeps them in her hand and then drops them in front of Mr. Kidd. He is able to see that they have numbers on them: ‘one hundred and something’ and ‘three hundred and something.’ He also, by fortunate coincidence, happens to recognize the face of this mysterious woman, and after a short pretense of being unable to recall her name, he is most conveniently able to tell us the name of Nancy Ducane. Does all of this sound plausible to you, Miss Hobbs? It does not sound at all plausible to Hercule Poirot—not when he finds you here, in Mr. Kidd’s home, and he knows that Nancy Ducane has an alibi!”
Jennie was weeping into her sleeve.
Poirot turned to me. “Samuel Kidd’s testimony was a lie from start to finish, Catchpool. He and Jennie Hobbs conspired to frame Nancy Ducane for the murders of Harriet Sippel, Ida Gransbury and Richard Negus.”
“You don’t know how wrong you are!” Jennie cried.
“I know that you are a liar, mademoiselle. I have suspected all along that my encounter with you at Pleasant’s was connected to the Bloxham Hotel murders. The two happenings—if we can classify three murders as one happening—had two very important and most unusual features in common.”
That made me sit up straight. I had been waiting to hear these points of likeness for too long.
Poirot went on: “One, a psychological similarity: in both cases there is the suggestion that the victims are guiltier than the murderer. The note left on the desk at the Bloxham—‘MAY THEY NEVER REST IN PEACE’—suggests that Harriet Sippel, Ida Gransbury and Richard Negus deserved to die, and that their killer brought them to justice. And at the coffee house, Mademoiselle Jennie, you said to me that you deserved to die, and that once you had been killed, justice would have been done, finally.”
He was right. How had I missed that?
“Then there is the second similarity, which is not psychological but circumstantial: attached to both the Bloxham Hotel murders and my conversation with the frightened Jennie at the coffee house, there were too many clues—too much information available too soon! Too many leads presenting themselves all at once, almost as if someone wanted to offer the hand of help to the police. From a brief meeting in a coffee house, I was able to glean a surprisingly large number of facts. This Jennie, she felt guilty. She had done something terrible. She did not want her killer to be punished. She made sure to say to me, ‘Oh, please let no one open their mouths’ so that when I hear about three bodies at the Bloxham Hotel with cufflinks in their mouths, I will perhaps remember what she has said and wonder, or perhaps my subconscious will make the connection.”
“You’re wrong about me, Monsieur Poirot,” Jennie protested.
Poirot ignored her, and continued with his speech: “Let us now consider the Bloxham Hotel murders. There again, we found ourselves supplied with much information, suspiciously soon: Richard Negus paid for all three rooms, and for the cars from the railway station to the hotel. All three victims lived or had lived in the village of Great Holling. There was, in addition, the helpful clue of the initials ‘PIJ’ on the cufflinks, to direct us to the reason these three people needed to be punished—that is, for their callous treatment of Reverend Patrick Ive. Furthermore, the note left on the front desk made it clear that the motive was revenge, or a thirst for justice. It is rare, is it not, for a murderer to write down his or her motive and so helpfully leave it lying in a prominent place?”
“Actually, some murderers do wish their motive to be known,” I said.
“Mon ami,” said Poirot with exaggerated patience. “If Nancy Ducane had desired to kill Harriet Sippel, Ida Gransbury and Richard Negus, would she really have done so in a way that led so clearly back to her? Does she wish to go to the gallows? And why did Richard Negus—who, according to his brother, was on the verge of penury—pay for everything? Nancy Ducane is a rich woman. If she is a murderer who enticed her victims to London in order to kill them, why did she not pay for their hotel rooms and transport. None of it fits together!”
“Please let me speak, Monsieur Poirot! I will tell you the truth.”
“I prefer, for the time being, that I tell you the truth, mademoiselle. Forgive me, but I find myself to be more reliable. Before you told me your story, you asked me if I was retired, did you not? You made a great show of checking that I had no powers to arrest anybody or enforce the law in this country. Only then, once I had reassured you on this point, did you confide in me. But I had already told you that I had a friend at Scotland Yard. You spoke to me not because you believed me to be powerless to arrest a murderer, but because you knew perfectly well that I had influence with the police—because you wished to see Nancy Ducane framed and hanged for murder!”
“I wish no such thing!” Jennie turned her tear-streaked face to me. “Please, stop him!”
“I will stop when I am ready,” said Poirot. “You were a regular visitor to Pleasant’s Coffee House, mademoiselle. The waitresses have said so. They talk about their customers a great deal in their absence. I expect you heard them speak about me: the fussy European gentleman with the mustache who used to be a policeman on the Continent—and my friend Catchpool here, from Scotland Yard. You heard them say that I dine at Pleasant’s every Thursday evening at half past seven precisely. Oh, yes, mademoiselle, you knew where to find me, and you knew that Hercule Poirot would be perfect for your devious purposes! You arrived at the coffee house in an apparent state of terror, but it was all a lie, an act! You stared out of the window for a long time, as if fearful of someone in pursuit, but you cannot have seen anything out of that window except the reflection of the room that you were in. And one of the waitresses, she saw your eyes reflected and saw that you were watching her, not the street. You were calculating, were you not? ‘Will anyone suspect that I am feigning my state of distress? Will that sharp-eyed waitress guess the truth and prevent my plan from being successful?’ ”
I rose to my feet. “Poirot, I don’t doubt that you’re right, but you can’t simply go on at the poor woman without allowing her to say a word in her defense.”
“Be quiet, Catchpool. Have I not just explained to you that Miss Hobbs is excellent at creating an appearance of great unhappiness while, underneath, her true self is composed and calculating?”
“You are a cold-hearted man!” Jennie wailed.
“Au contraire, mademoiselle. In due course you will have your turn to speak, you may rest assured, but first I have another question for you. You said to me, ‘Oh, please let no one open their mouths!’ How did you know that Nancy Ducane, after killing her three victims, had placed cufflinks in their mouths? It seems to me odd that you should know this. Did Mrs. Ducane threaten that it would happen? I can imagine a murderer threatening violence in order to scare—‘If I catch you, I will cut your throat,’ or something of that nature—but I cannot imagine a killer saying, ‘After I have murdered you, I intend to place a monogrammed cufflink in your mouth.’ I cannot imagine any person saying that, and I am a man of considerable imagination!
“And—pardon me!—one final observation, mademoiselle. Whatever guilt was yours for the tragic fate of Patrick and Frances Ive, three people were as guilty as you if not more so: Harriet Sippel, Ida Gransbury and Richard Negus. They were the people who believed your lie and turned the whole village against the Reverend Ive and his wife. Now, at Pleasant’s you said to me, ‘Once I am dead, justice will have been done, finally,’ and you placed the stress upon the ‘I’: ‘once I am dead.’ This indicates to me that you knew that Harriet Sippel, Ida Gransbury and Richard Negus were already dead. But if I look at all the evidence as it has been presented to me, the three murders at the Bloxham Hotel might not yet have been committed.”
“Stop, please, stop!” Jennie cried, weeping.
“In a moment, with pleasure. Let me only say that it was approximately a quarter to eight when you spoke those words to me—‘Once I am dead, justice will have been done, finally’—and yet we know that the three Bloxham murders were only discovered by the hotel’s staff after ten minutes past eight. Yet somehow you, Jennie Hobbs, had advance knowledge of these murders. How?”
“If you will only stop accusing me, I shall tell you everything! I’ve been so desperate. Having to keep it all secret and lie constantly—it was a torment. I can’t bear it any longer!”
“Bon,” said Poirot quietly. He sounded suddenly kinder. “You have had a severe shock today, have you not? Perhaps you will now see that you cannot deceive Poirot?”
“I do see. Let me tell you the story, from the beginning. It will be such a relief to be able to tell the truth at last.”
Jennie spoke at length then, and neither I nor Poirot interrupted her until she indicated that she had finished. What follows is in her words, and is, I hope, a faithful and complete account of what she said.