The Monogram Murders (33 page)

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,