The Murder on the Links (12 page)

I
have set down the Beroldy case in full. Of course all the details did not present themselves to my memory as I have recounted them here. Nevertheless, I recalled the case fairly accurately. It had attracted a great deal of interest at the time, and had been fully reported by the English papers, so that it did not need much effort of memory on my part to recollect the salient details.

Just for the moment, in my excitement, it seemed to clear up the whole matter. I admit that I am impulsive, and Poirot deplores my custom of jumping to conclusions, but I think I had some excuse in this instance. The remarkable way in which this discovery justified Poirot's point of view struck me at once.

“Poirot,” I said, “I congratulate you. I see everything now.”

Poirot lit one of his little cigarettes with his usual precision. Then he looked up.

“And since you see everything now,
mon ami,
what exactly is it that you see?”

“Why, that it was Madame Daubreuil—Beroldy—who mur
dered Mr. Renauld. The similarity of the two cases proves that beyond a doubt.”

“Then you consider that Madame Beroldy was wrongly acquitted? That in actual fact she was guilty of connivance in her husband's murder?”

I opened my eyes wide.

“Of course! Don't you?”

Poirot walked to the end of the room, absentmindedly straightened a chair, and then said thoughtfully:

“Yes, that is my opinion. But there is no ‘of course' about it, my friend. Technically speaking, Madame Beroldy is innocent.”

“Of that crime, perhaps. But not of this.”

Poirot sat down again, and regarded me, his thoughtful air more marked than ever.

“So it is definitely your opinion, Hastings, that Madame Daubreuil murdered Monsieur Renauld?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

He shot the question at me with such suddenness that I was taken aback.

“Why?” I stammered. “Why? Oh, because—” I came to a stop.

Poirot nodded his head at me.

“You see, you come to a stumbling block at once. Why should Madame Daubreuil (I shall call her that for clearness' sake) murder Monsieur Renauld? We can find no shadow of a motive. She does not benefit by his death; considered as either mistress or blackmailer she stands to lose. You cannot have a murder without motive. The first crime was different—there we had a rich lover waiting to step into her husband's shoes.”

“Money is not the only motive for murder,” I objected.

“True,” agreed Poirot placidly. “There are two others, the
crime passionnel
is one. And there is the third rare motive, murder for an idea, which implies some form of mental derangement on the part of the murderer. Homicidal mania and religious fanaticism belong to that class. We can rule it out here.”

“But what about the
crime passionnel?
Can you rule that out? If Madame Daubreuil was Renauld's mistress, if she found that his affection was cooling, or if her jealousy was aroused in any way, might she not have struck him down in a moment of anger?”

Poirot shook his head.

“If—I say
if,
you note—Madame Daubreuil was Renauld's mistress, he had not had time to tire of her. And in any case you mistake her character. She is a woman who can simulate great emotional stress. She is a magnificent actress. But, looked at dispassionately, her life disproves her appearance. Throughout, if we examine it, she has been cold-blooded and calculating in her motives and actions. It was not to link her life with that of her young lover that she connived at her husband's murder. The rich American, for whom she probably did not care a button, was her objective. If she committed a crime, she would always do so for gain. Here there was no gain. Besides, how do you account for the digging of the grave? That was a man's work.”

“She might have had an accomplice,” I suggested, unwilling to relinquish my belief.

“I pass to another objection. You have spoken of the similarity between the two crimes. Wherein does that lie, my friend?”

I stared at him in astonishment.

“Why, Poirot, it was you who remarked on that! The story of the masked men, the ‘secret,' the papers!”

Poirot smiled a little.

“Do not be so indignant, I beg of you. I repudiate nothing. The similarity of the two stories links the two cases together inevitably. But reflect now on something very curious. It is not Madame Daubreuil who tells us this tale—if it were, all would indeed be plain sailing—it is Madame Renauld. Is she then in league with the other?”

“I can't believe that,” I said slowly. “If she is, she must be the most consummate actress the world has ever known.”

“Ta-ta-ta!” said Poirot impatiently. “Again you have the sentiment and not the logic! If it is necessary for a criminal to be a consummate actress, then by all means assume her to be one. But is it necessary? I do not believe Mrs. Renauld to be in league with Madame Daubreuil for several reasons, some of which I have already enumerated to you. The others are self-evident. Therefore, that possibility eliminated, we draw very near to the truth, which is, as always, very curious and interesting.”

“Poirot,” I cried, “what more do you know?”

“
Mon ami,
you must make your own deductions. You have ‘access to the facts.' Concentrate your grey cells. Reason—not like Giraud—but like Hercule Poirot!”

“But are you
sure?
”

“My friend, in many ways I have been an imbecile. But at last I see clearly.”

“You know everything?”

“I have discovered what Monsieur Renauld sent for me to discover.”

“And you know the murderer?”

“I know one murderer.”

“What do you mean?”

“We talk a little at cross-purposes. There are here not one crime, but two. The first I have solved, the second—
eh bien,
I will confess, I am not sure!”

“But, Poirot, I thought you said the man in the shed had died a natural death?”

“Ta-ta-ta!” Poirot made his favourite ejaculation of impatience. “Still you do not understand. One may have a crime without a murderer, but for two crimes it is essential to have two bodies.”

His remark struck me as so peculiarly lacking in lucidity that I looked at him in some anxiety. But he appeared perfectly normal. Suddenly he rose and strolled to the window.

“Here he is,” he observed.

“Who?”

“Monsieur Jack Renauld. I sent a note up to the Villa to ask him to come here.”

That changed the course of my ideas, and I asked Poirot if he knew that Jack Renauld had been in Merlinville on the night of the crime. I had hoped to catch my astute little friend napping, but as usual he was omniscient. He, too, had inquired at the station.

“And without doubt we are not original in the idea, Hastings. The excellent Giraud, he also has probably made his inquiries.”

“You don't think—” I said, and then stopped. “Ah, no, it would be too horrible!”

Poirot looked inquiringly at me, but I said no more. It had just occurred to me that though there were seven women, directly and indirectly connected with the case—Mrs. Renauld, Madame
Daubreuil and her daughter, the mysterious visitor, and the three servants—there was, with the exception of old Auguste, who could hardly count, only one man—Jack Renauld.
And a man must have dug the grave.

I had no time to develop farther the appalling idea that had occurred to me, for Jack Renauld was ushered into the room.

Poirot greeted him in businesslike manner.

“Take a seat, monsieur. I regret infinitely to derange you, but you will perhaps understand that the atmosphere of the villa is not too congenial to me. Monsieur Giraud and I do not see eye to eye about everything. His politeness to me has not been striking, and you will comprehend that I do not intend any little discoveries I may make to benefit him in any way.”

“Exactly, Monsieur Poirot,” said the lad. “That fellow Giraud is an ill-conditioned brute, and I'd be delighted to see someone score at his expense.”

“Then I may ask a little favour of you?”

“Certainly.”

“I will ask you to go to the railway station and take a train to the next station along the line, Abbalac. Ask at the cloakroom whether two foreigners deposited a valise there on the night of the murder. It is a small station, and they are almost certain to remember. Will you do this?”

“Of course I will,” said the boy, mystified, though ready for the task.

“I and my friend, you comprehend, have business elsewhere,” explained Poirot. “There is a train in a quarter of an hour, and I will ask you not to return to the villa, as I have no wish for Giraud to get an inkling of your errand.”

“Very well, I will go straight to the station.”

He rose to his feet. Poirot's voice stopped him:

“One moment, Monsieur Renauld, there is one little matter that puzzles me. Why did you not mention to Monsieur Hautet this morning that you were in Merlinville on the night of the crime?”

Jack Renauld's face went crimson. With an effort he controlled himself.

“You have made a mistake. I was in Cherbourg as I told the examining magistrate this morning.”

Poirot looked at him, his eyes narrowed, catlike, until they only showed a gleam of green.

“Then it is a singular mistake that I have made there—for it is shared by the station staff. They say you arrived by the 11:40 train.”

For a moment Jack Renauld hesitated, then he made up his mind.

“And if I did? I suppose you do not mean to accuse me of participating in my father's murder?” He asked the question haughtily, his head thrown back.

“I should like an explanation of the reason that brought you here.”

“That is simple enough. I came to see my fiancée, Mademoiselle Daubreuil. I was on the eve of a long voyage, uncertain as to when I should return. I wished to see her before I went, to assure her of my unchanging devotion.”

“And did you see her?” Poirot's eyes never left the other's face.

There was an appreciable pause before Renauld replied. Then he said:

“Yes.”

“And afterwards?”

“I found I had missed the last train. I walked to St. Beauvais, where I knocked up a garage and got a car to take me back to Cherbourg.”

“St. Beauvais? That is fifteen kilometres. A long walk, M. Renauld.”

“I—I felt like walking.”

Poirot bowed his head as a sign that he accepted the explanation. Jack Renauld took up his hat and cane and departed. In a trice Poirot jumped to his feet.

“Quick, Hastings. We will go after him.”

Keeping a discreet distance behind our quarry, we followed him through the streets of Merlinville. But when Poirot saw that he took the turning to the station he checked himself.

“All is well. He has taken the bait. He will go to Abbalac, and will inquire for the mythical valise left by the mythical foreigners. Yes,
mon ami,
all that was a little invention of my own.”

“You wanted him out of the way!” I exclaimed.

“Your penetration is amazing, Hastings! Now, if you please, we will go up to the Villa Geneviève.”

A
rrived at the villa, Poirot led the way up to the shed where the second body had been discovered. He did not, however, go in, but paused by the bench which I have mentioned before as being set some few yards away from it. After contemplating it for a moment or two, he paced carefully from it to the hedge which marked the boundary between the Villa Geneviève and the Villa Marguerite. Then he paced back again, nodding his head as he did so. Returning again to the hedge, he parted the bushes with his hands.

“With good fortune,” he remarked to me over his shoulder, “Mademoiselle Marthe may find herself in the garden. I desire to speak to her and would prefer not to call formally at the Villa Marguerite. Ah, all is well, there she is. Pst, Mademoiselle! Pst!
Un moment, s'il vous plaît.
”

I joined him at the moment that Marthe Daubreuil, looking slightly startled, came running up to the hedge at his call.

“A little word with you, mademoiselle, if it is permitted?”

“Certainly, Monsieur Poirot.”

Despite her acquiescence, her eyes looked troubled and afraid.

“Mademoiselle, do you remember running after me on the road the day that I came to your house with the examining magistrate? You asked me if anyone were suspected of the crime.”

“And you told me two Chileans.” Her voice sounded rather breathless, and her left hand stole to her breast.

“Will you ask me the same question again, mademoiselle?”

“What do you mean?”

“This. If you were to ask me that question again, I should give you a different answer. Someone is suspected—but not a Chilean.”

“Who?” The word came faintly between her parted lips.

“Monsieur Jack Renauld.”

“What?” It was a cry. “Jack? Impossible. Who dares to suspect him?”

“Giraud.”

“Giraud!” The girl's face was ashy. “I am afraid of that man. He is cruel. He will—he will—” She broke off. There was courage gathering in her face, and determination. I realized in that moment that she was a fighter. Poirot, too, watched her intently.

“You know, of course, that he was here on the night of the murder?” he asked.

“Yes,” she replied mechanically. “He told me.”

“It was unwise to have tried to conceal the fact,” ventured Poirot.

“Yes, yes,” she replied impatiently. “But we cannot waste time on regrets. We must find something to save him. He is innocent, of course; but that will not help him with a man like Giraud, who has his reputation to think of. He must arrest someone, and that someone will be Jack.”

“The facts will tell against him,” said Poirot. “You realize that?”

She faced him squarely.

“I am not a child, monsieur. I can be brave and look facts in the face. He is innocent, and we must save him.”

She spoke with a kind of desperate energy, then was silent, frowning as she thought.

“Mademoiselle,” said Poirot, observing her keenly, “is there not something that you are keeping back that you could tell us?”

She nodded perplexedly.

“Yes, there is something, but I hardly know whether you will believe it—it seems so absurd.”

“At any rate, tell us, mademoiselle.”

“It is this. M. Giraud sent for me, as an afterthought, to see if I could identify the man in there.” She signed with her head towards the shed. “I could not. At least I could not at the moment. But since I have been thinking—”

“Well?”

“It seems so queer, and yet I am almost sure. I will tell you. On the morning of the day Monsieur Renauld was murdered, I was walking in the garden here, when I heard a sound of men's voices quarrelling. I pushed aside the bushes and looked through. One of the men was Monsieur Renauld and the other was a tramp, a dreadful-looking creature in filthy rags. He was alternately whining and threatening. I gathered he was asking for money, but at that moment
maman
called me from the house, and I had to go. That is all, only—I am almost sure that the tramp and the dead man in the shed are one and the same.”

Poirot uttered an exclamation.

“But why did you not say at the time, mademoiselle?”

“Because at first it only struck me that the face was vaguely familiar in some way. The man was differently dressed, and apparently belonged to a superior station in life.”

A voice called from the house.

“Maman,”
whispered Marthe: “I must go.” And she slipped away through the trees.

“Come,” said Poirot and, taking my arm, turned in the direction of the villa.

“What do you really think?” I asked in some curiosity. “Was that story true, or did the girl make it up in order to divert suspicion from her lover?”

“It is a curious tale,” said Poirot, “but I believe it to be the absolute truth. Unwittingly, Mademoiselle Marthe told us the truth on another point—and incidentally gave Jack Renauld the lie. Did you notice his hesitation when I asked him if he saw Marthe Daubreuil on the night of the crime? He paused and then said ‘Yes.' I suspected that he was lying. It was necessary for me to see Mademoiselle Marthe before he could put her on her guard. Three little words gave me the information I wanted. When I asked her if she knew that Jack Renauld was here that night, she answered, ‘He
told
me.' Now, Hastings, what was Jack Renauld doing here on that eventful evening, and if he did not see Mademoiselle Marthe whom did he see?”

“Surely, Poirot,” I cried, aghast, “you cannot believe that a boy like that would murder his own father!”

“Mon ami,”
said Poirot. “You continue to be of a sentimentality unbelievable! I have seen mothers who murdered their little
children for the sake of the insurance money! After that, one can believe anything.”

“And the motive?”

“Money of course. Remember that Jack Renauld thought that he would come into half his father's fortune at the latter's death.”

“But the tramp. Where does he come in?”

Poirot shrugged his shoulders.

“Giraud would say that he was an accomplice—an apache who helped young Renauld to commit the crime, and who was conveniently put out of the way afterwards.”

“But the hair round the dagger? The woman's hair?”

“Ah!” said Poirot, smiling broadly. “That is the cream of Giraud's little jest. According to him, it is not a woman's hair at all. Remember that the youths of today wear their hair brushed straight back from the forehead with pomade or hair wash to make it lie flat. Consequently some of the hairs are of considerable length.”

“And you believe that too?”

“No,” said Poirot, with a curious smile. “For I know it to be the hair of a woman—and more, which woman!”

“Madame Daubreuil,” I announced positively.

“Perhaps,” said Poirot, regarding me quizzically. But I refused to allow myself to get annoyed.

“What are we going to do now?” I asked, as we entered the hall of the Villa Geneviève.

“I wish to make a search among the effects of M. Jack Renauld. That is why I had to get him out of the way for a few hours.”

Neatly and methodically, Poirot opened each drawer in turn, examined the contents, and returned them exactly to their places.
It was a singularly dull and uninteresting proceeding. Poirot waded on through collars, pyjamas, and socks. A purring noise outside drew me to the window. Instantly I became galvanized into life.

“Poirot!” I cried. “A car has just driven up. Giraud is in it, and Jack Renauld, and two gendarmes.”

“
Sacré tonnerre!
” growled Poirot. “That animal of a Giraud, could he not wait? I shall not be able to replace the things in this last drawer with the proper method. Let us be quick.”

Unceremoniously he tumbled out the things on the floor, mostly ties and handkerchiefs. Suddenly with a cry of triumph Poirot pounced on something, a small square of cardboard, evidently a photograph. Thrusting it into his pocket, he returned the things pell-mell to the drawer, and seizing me by the arm dragged me out of the room and down the stairs. In the hall stood Giraud, contemplating his prisoner.

“Good afternoon, Monsieur Giraud,” said Poirot. “What have we here?”

Giraud nodded his head towards Jack.

“He was trying to make a getaway, but I was too sharp for him. He's under arrest for the murder of his father, Monsieur Paul Renauld.”

Poirot wheeled round to confront the boy, who was leaning limply against the door, his face ashy pale.

“What do you say to that,
jeune homme?
”

Jack Renauld stared at him stonily.

“Nothing,” he said.