Closed Casket: The New Hercule Poirot Mystery (Hercule Poirot Mystery 2) (18 page)

Scotcher had died of strychnine poisoning, and it was the opinion of the garda’s medical expert that the poison was ingested between five in the afternoon and half past seven in the evening, depending on how much poison was swallowed. Death was estimated to have occurred between nine and thirty minutes past. The evidence suggested that Scotcher was moved to the parlour post-mortem, where his head was almost entirely destroyed by a club that had belonged to the Playford family, on which his blood, brains and bone fragments had been found.

The coroner listened to Sophie Bourlet’s account of having witnessed Claudia Playford inflict the damage to Scotcher’s head, after which Inspector Conree was called upon to present the fingerprint evidence. The club, he told us, chin raised only slightly from his chest, was covered in fingerprints, some of which belonged to Claudia Playford. However, the fingerprints of Athelinda Playford, Frederick Hatton, Phyllis Chivers, Randall Kimpton and Harry Playford were also found to be present. This was simply explained: the club was an easily accessible household ornament and many had touched it at one time or another.

Of the bottles in Scotcher’s bedroom, only one was completely empty, and it was this one—the only one that was blue—that had been found to contain traces of strychnine as well as of a harmless herbal remedy, while the other bottles contained an assortment of herbal tonics but no poison.

I was surprised to hear about the tonics. I would have expected the bottles in the room of a dying man to contain various chemical concoctions, but perhaps Scotcher was too far gone for conventional medicines to be beneficial to him.

Sophie Bourlet testified that the blue bottle had been closer to full than to empty when she had last given any of its contents to Joseph. Asked when this was by the coroner, she replied, ‘It was that same day, the day he died. I gave him two spoonfuls at exactly five o’clock. I always do.’

This too puzzled me. Believing in the efficacy of such things as herbal tonics was one thing, but why on earth should it matter at what time of day a person drinks lavender root or eucalyptus tincture or whatever it was?

I should probably, at that point, have had a premonition. Poirot later confessed to me that he had—though of course Randall Kimpton would say that his word alone is no evidence at all.

The coroner ruled that the cause of Joseph Scotcher’s death was murder by person or persons unknown. Then, instead of drawing the inquest to a close, he stood up and cleared his throat.

‘There is something else that I must say, and this will form part of the official record of today’s proceedings. Having informed myself most thoroughly with regard to Inspector Conree’s ongoing investigation into Mr Scotcher’s death, I am aware that one of the more, if you will permit me to use the word,
mysterious
aspects of this matter is the question of why anyone should bother to snuff out the life of a man with so little time left to him. Additionally, I have considered, and Inspector Conree has considered, that a possible motive for murder was the new will made by Lady Playford, which named the deceased, Mr Scotcher, as the sole beneficiary. Therefore, another puzzle was this: why change one’s will in favour of a man who is soon to die? In the light of these still unanswered questions, and after long and careful consideration, I have decided it is my duty to make public an aspect of this unfortunate business that both Inspector Conree and I believe might prove to be significant. It has nothing to do with the physical cause of Mr Scotcher’s death, but it might be pertinent nonetheless. As it is not, strictly speaking, a medical matter but what I believe would have to be called a
human
matter, I made the decision to tell you about it myself rather than have it presented alongside the police doctor’s report.’

‘I wish he’d just say it,’ Lady Playford hissed impatiently.

Did she know what was coming? I wondered. My sense was that she did. I felt an uncomfortable prickling sensation all over my skin.

‘Joseph Scotcher,’ said the coroner, ‘
was not dying.
’

‘What? Not dying? What do you mean, not dying?’ It was Dorro, needless to say, who protested first. ‘You surely do not mean that he was
never
dying? He’s dead, is he not? After he swallowed the poison, he must have been dying. So what precisely do you mean?’

‘Good lord, we shall be here until Christmas,’ Randall Kimpton murmured.

‘Silence, please!’ The coroner sounded more astonished than angry. Perhaps Randall Kimpton was the first person ever to make a joke during one of his inquests. ‘I am presiding over these proceedings, and nobody speaks without my permission. Let me be clear: until he ingested strychnine, Joseph Scotcher was not dying. He was not suffering from Bright’s disease of the kidneys, or from anything else.’

Sophie Bourlet cried out, ‘That is not true! The doctor would be here to say it himself if it were true!’

Mr Peanut stood up and said, ‘I am afraid it is quite true. I have read Dr Clouder’s post-mortem report, and spoken to him about it at length. Mr Scotcher’s kidneys were as plump and pink and healthy as ever two kidneys could be.’

‘Which is why I said that it was not a medical matter,’ explained the coroner. ‘A fatal disease that is
present
is one thing. The absence of Bright’s disease, on the other hand … well, in one who has told everybody that he is soon to die of that very illness, I would call that a matter of psychological interest.’

I turned to survey the room—in time to see Randall Kimpton sneer at yet another mention of psychology. His eyes met mine and he smiled in a manner that anyone would have deemed excessive; he looked almost enraptured. The signal was clear: he wanted me to know that he had known, but was there any need to look so gleeful and self-satisfied about it? Of course he was more likely to have tumbled to the truth than I was; he had been acquainted with Scotcher for years, no doubt, and I for only one day.

He was not the only one who had known, it seemed. Claudia had that same look, a mixture of triumph and relief: ‘So now the truth is revealed,’ it seemed to say. ‘I have known all along.’

Michael Gathercole looked guilty rather than triumphant. He glanced at me apologetically. ‘I knew as well,’ was the message. ‘Sorry I said nothing about it.’

Sophie Bourlet sat perfectly still. Silent as tears rolled down her face. Phyllis, Dorro, Harry and Orville Rolfe clucked at one another like flustered chickens: ‘How the …? What a …! Why on earth …? But what the devil …?’ None of them had suspected for a moment that Scotcher was not dying.

I sat, dumbstruck, as the coroner’s words echoed in my head:
Joseph Scotcher was not dying. He was not suffering from Bright’s disease of the kidneys, or from anything else.

Poirot, in front of me, was shaking his head and murmuring to himself. Lady Playford turned to inspect me as I had inspected the others. She too had known. ‘People are peculiar little machines, Edward,’ she whispered to me. ‘Considerably more peculiar than anything else in the world.’

After the inquest, Poirot and I travelled with Sophie Bourlet, Inspector Conree and Sergeant O’Dwyer to Ballygurteen garda station. Conree had sprung this plan on us with his customary charmlessness as we were leaving the courthouse in Clonakilty. He had made it clear, furthermore, that this time he would be asking all the questions and the rest of us were forbidden to speak.

Not speaking was the approach favoured by all, it seemed. On the steps of the courthouse, no one had said a word or even looked at one another. I said nothing myself, though my thoughts were louder than ever:

Joseph Scotcher’s kidneys were healthy before he was murdered. Pink and flawless. No sign of Bright’s disease, or any physical ailment likely to kill him. Yet Scotcher was introduced to me as a man who would face death in the near future. He himself spoke of his imminent demise
…

How could it be? For what possible reason would a healthy man pretend he was dying? Had somebody misled Scotcher deliberately—an irresponsible or malicious doctor? Randall Kimpton’s name leapt to my mind. He was a medical chap, and I could see him being both irresponsible and malicious. But, no, he could not be Scotcher’s doctor. Kimpton lived in Oxford, Scotcher in Clonakilty.

Nevertheless, there was something unsettling here. I felt as if I was circling it, but could not quite catch a glimpse.

Scotcher had told everybody that he was about to die of a disease. And then he had died—from strychnine poisoning. Then his head was smashed in to indicate a third cause of death.

How many ways did Joseph Scotcher need to die in order to please … whom? I liked this question very much, and decided it might be a useful one to ask in all kinds of ways, though I did not know what those ways were. The presence of Conree, O’Dwyer and Sophie Bourlet was rather an irritant. All I wanted was to talk to Poirot alone. I would have given one of my own pink kidneys to know what his thoughts were.

At the garda station in Ballygurteen, Conree led us to a room at the end of a long, narrow corridor that made me think of a schoolroom the moment I walked into it. There were chairs, and a board on the wall; only the desks were missing. On the seat of one chair there was a dusty glass vase with some long-dead flower stalks in it, bound tightly by a pale green ribbon. There was no water in the vase, and the stalks had no flower heads atop them. Water damage had turned the ceiling brown in one corner.

‘Well?’ Conree fired the word at Sophie Bourlet. ‘What have you to say for yourself? You were his nurse—you must have known there was nothing wrong with him.’

‘Your Doctor Clouder is a cruel man,’ Sophie said bitterly. ‘He is a wicked liar! If I believed him, I might imagine I could have had a long and happy life married to Joseph, if only he hadn’t been murdered. What good would it do me to think that?’

Beneath his moustache, Poirot’s lips were moving, though no sound emerged. It would not be long, I guessed, before he intervened; he would not be able to help himself.

‘Dr Clouder has told no lies,’ said Conree. ‘It is you, Miss Bourlet, who are the liar.’

‘Monsieur Poirot, Mr Catchpool, tell him! Joseph was dying of Bright’s disease. His kidneys had almost no life left in them. They must have been brown and shrivelled. It is impossible that they were pink!’

‘Did you see these shrivelled brown kidneys with your own eyes?’ Conree asked.

‘You know I did not. How could I have seen them? I was not present at the autopsy.’

‘Then you have no right to accuse the doctor who performed the post-mortem of lying.’

‘I have every right! Joseph was dying. You only had to look at him! Did you see these two pink, healthy kidneys yourself? No, you did not.’

‘As it happens, I did,’ said Conree. ‘Clouder summoned me immediately. I stood by his side and he pointed them out to me.’

Sophie opened her mouth, then closed it without speaking.

‘Your husband-to-be was a dishonourable liar, Miss Bourlet, and so are you.’

‘I am not a liar, Inspector,’ said the nurse. ‘Neither am I heartless, as you are. Please, continue to speak your mind with no consideration for my feelings. There could be no better demonstration of the difference between your character and mine.’

‘You were Scotcher’s nurse for how long?’ Conree asked her.

‘Two years.’

‘And that whole time he was dying, was he?’

‘No. At first there was the possibility that he might, but … we hoped and prayed. And then, a little over a year ago …’ Sophie covered her mouth with her hand.

‘A little over a year? Tell me, did you ever read up on Bright’s disease?’

‘I did. Every word I could find, the better to help Joseph.’

‘Did you miss the part about how long it takes to kill, once it has become terminal? A person would be lucky to last two months!’ Conree turned to me and Poirot. ‘Gentlemen, I have read the testimonials Miss Bourlet offered to Lady Playford when she sought employment. I don’t mind telling you, they appeared a little too exemplary. I suspected they were falsified.’

‘You are ridiculous,’ Sophie told him. ‘This is slander.’

Conree made the gun shape with his index finger and thumb. ‘I know now that I was wrong about that,’ he said. ‘I sent one of my men from Dublin to speak in person to those who recommended you for employment. That is how I know you are a fine nurse—among the best the profession has to offer.’

‘And this is how you reward me, by suggesting—’

‘Shut up!’ Conree bellowed.

O’Dwyer muttered something under his breath. It sounded as if it ended with the word ‘draw’.

‘You have something to say?’ the inspector asked him.

‘Oh, no, not at all. It was only that it occurred to me … But it’s not important.’

‘Out with it,’ barked Conree.

With a look of what can only be described as terror on his face, O’Dwyer said, ‘When I was a boy, my brother and I used to fight like rats in a barrel. Our mammy would watch us kick and punch the stuffing out of one another and she’d not say a word, but if one of us ever told the other to shut up—well, her face would be a picture! There was no difference in her mind between “Shut up” and the foulest obscenities. Sir, I swear, this has nothing to do with—’

‘Continue,’ Conree ordered.

‘Well, we didn’t want our mouths washed out with soap, but we still longed to tell each other to shut up as much as we ever had, so we found a way round it. We would say, “Shut up the drawer, without the drawer.” If Mammy heard us, we pretended we were only talking about a drawer that one of us had left open. But we both knew what we really meant. “Shut up the drawer, without the drawer” leaves you with plain old “Shut up”. It was you saying those words that made me think of it, sir.’

I released the breath I had been holding for several seconds.

Conree behaved in every respect as if O’Dwyer had not spoken. He said to Sophie, ‘You pushed Scotcher around in a wheelchair, knowing he could walk as easily as anyone. You gave him medicine that turns out not to be medicine at all—’

‘I did not know that! The bottles were labelled by Joseph’s doctor in Oxford.’

‘Oxford?’ Conree responded, as if she had spoken of the planet Mars.

‘That is where Joseph lived before he came to Lillieoak,’ said Sophie.

‘And why did he not find himself a doctor in Clonakilty once he settled there?’

‘He was fond of his Oxford doctor, whom he knew well.’

‘What was the fellow’s name?’ Conree asked.

‘I … I do not know,’ said Sophie. ‘Joseph did not like to talk about him.’

‘I’ll bet he didn’t! How often did he travel to Oxford to see this chap?’

‘Once or twice a year.’

‘Did you go with him?’

‘No, he preferred to make the journey alone.’

‘Naturally—because he was a lying scoundrel through and through.’ Conree raised his chin so that it could take a good old run at his chest for greater impact, then slammed it down. ‘A dying man who needs a nurse to move him from one room of a house to another, but who hares off to Oxford on his own with no trouble at all, to visit a doctor who doesn’t exist! The same doctor sends labelled bottles of herbal nonsense, pretending to be medicine.
Do you still deny that you knew the truth all along?
’

Sophie looked him in the eye. ‘I knew, and know, the truth. Joseph was dying of Bright’s disease. He would not have lied to me.’

‘He would and he did,’ said Conree. ‘Of that there is no doubt. And by lying to me, you are helping his murderer to escape justice.’

‘On the contrary.’ Sophie rose to her feet. ‘I told you that I saw Claudia Playford bring down that club on Joseph’s head until there was nothing left of it but blood and splinters of bone. I told you straight away who the murderer was, yet you have not arrested her. And you wonder why I disbelieve your doctor? Your ever-so-proper inquest? I almost pity you.’

Sophie walked slowly towards Inspector Conree. ‘If you care about catching Joseph’s killer, you will listen to me as I say this one last time—and then I am finished with you.
I heard Joseph speak to Claudia Playford
, when he was supposed to have been already dead an hour from strychnine poisoning. He was not! He was alive! He begged Claudia not to kill him, as she stood with the club raised above her head. I do not deny that he might have had strychnine in his system, but Dr Clouder’s report that was read out at the inquest
cannot be true
. Why do you trust a man who cannot button his own shirt correctly? Whose shoelaces are untied, whose belongings spill out of his pockets as he walks?’

Conree turned to O’Dwyer. ‘Take this liar away,’ he said.