The Labours of Hercules

‘What on earth do you mean?’

‘I mean that the best way of disposing of this story once and for all is to get the body exhumed and an autopsy performed.’

She took a step back from him. Her lips opened, then shut again. Poirot watched her.

‘Well, Mademoiselle?’ he said at last.

Jean Moncrieffe said quietly:

‘I don’t agree with you.’

‘But why not? Surely a verdict of death from natural causes would silence all tongues?’

‘If you got that verdict, yes.’

‘Do you know what you are suggesting, Mademoiselle?’

Jean Moncrieffe said impatiently:

‘I know what I’m talking about. You’re thinking of arsenic poisoning–you could prove that she was not poisoned by arsenic. But there are other poisons–the vegetable alkaloids. After a year, I doubt if you’d find any traces of them even if they had been used. And I know what these official analyst people are like. They might return a non-committal verdict saying that there was nothing to show what caused death–and then the tongues would wag faster than ever!’

Hercule Poirot was silent for a minute or two. Then he said:

‘Who in your opinion is the most inveterate talker in the village?’

The girl considered. She said at last:

‘I really think old Miss Leatheran is the worst cat of the lot.’

‘Ah! Would it be possible for you to introduce me to Miss Leatheran–in a casual manner if possible?’

‘Nothing could be easier. All the old tabbies are prowling about doing their shopping at this time of the morning. We’ve only got to walk down the main street.’

As Jean had said, there was no difficulty about the procedure. Outside the post office, Jean stopped and spoke to a tall, thin middle-aged woman with a long nose and sharp inquisitive eyes.

‘Good morning, Miss Leatheran.’

‘Good morning, Jean. Such a lovely day, is it not?’

The sharp eyes ranged inquisitively over Jean Moncrieffe’s companion. Jean said:

‘Let me introduce M. Poirot, who is staying down here for a few days.’

III

Nibbling delicately at a scone and balancing a cup of tea on his knee, Hercule Poirot allowed himself to become confidential with his hostess. Miss Leatheran had been kind enough to ask him to tea and had thereupon made it her business to find out exactly what this exotic little foreigner was doing in their midst.

For some time he parried her thrusts with dexterity–thereby whetting her appetite. Then, when he judged the moment ripe, he leant forward:

‘Ah, Miss Leatheran,’ he said. ‘I can see that you are too clever for me! You have guessed my secret. I am down here at the request of the Home Office. But please,’ he lowered his voice, ‘keep this information to yourself.’

‘Of course–of course–’ Miss Leatheran was flustered–thrilled to the core. ‘The Home Office–you don’t mean–not poor Mrs Oldfield?’

Poirot nodded his head slowly several times.

‘We-ell!’ Miss Leatheran breathed into that one word a whole gamut of pleasurable emotion.

Poirot said:

‘It is a delicate matter, you understand. I have been ordered to report whether there is or is not a sufficient case for exhumation.’

Miss Leatheran exclaimed:

‘You are going to dig the poor thing up. How terrible!’

If she had said ‘how splendid’ instead of ‘how terrible’ the words would have suited her tone of voice better.

‘What is your own opinion, Miss Leatheran?’

‘Well, of course, M. Poirot, there has been a lot of talk. But I never listen to talk. There is always so much unreliable gossip going about. There is no doubt that Doctor Oldfield has been very odd in his manner ever since it happened, but as I have said repeatedly we surely need not put that down to a guilty conscience. It might be just grief. Not, of course, that he and his wife were on really affectionate terms. That I do know–on first hand authority. Nurse Harrison, who was with Mrs Oldfield for three or four years up to the time of her death, has admitted that much. And I have always felt, you know, that Nurse Harrison had her suspicions–not that she ever said anything, but one can tell, can’t one, from a person’s manner?’

Poirot said sadly:

‘One has so little to go upon.’

‘Yes, I know, but of course, M. Poirot, if the body is exhumed then you will know.’

‘Yes,’ said Poirot, ‘then we will know.’

‘There have been cases like it before, of course,’ said Miss Leatheran, her nose twitching with pleasurable excitement. ‘Armstrong, for instance, and that other man–I can’t remember his name–and then Crippen, of course. I’ve always wondered if Ethel Le Neve was in it with him or not. Of course, Jean Moncrieffe is a very nice girl, I’m sure…I wouldn’t like to say she led him on exactly–but men do get rather silly about girls, don’t they? And, of course, they were thrown very much together!’

Poirot did not speak. He looked at her with an innocent expression of inquiry calculated to produce a further spate of conversation. Inwardly he amused himself by counting the number of times the words ‘of course’ occurred.

‘And, of course, with a post-mortem and all that, so much would be bound to come out, wouldn’t it? Servants and all that. Servants always know so much, don’t they? And, of course, it’s quite impossible to keep them from gossiping, isn’t it? The Oldfields’ Beatrice was dismissed almost immediately after the funeral–and I’ve always thought that was odd–especially with the difficulty of getting maids nowadays. It looks as though Dr Oldfield was afraid she might know something.’

‘It certainly seems as though there were grounds for an inquiry,’ said Poirot solemnly.

Miss Leatheran gave a little shiver of reluctance.

‘One does so shrink from the idea,’ she said. ‘Our dear quiet little village–dragged into the newspapers–all the publicity!’

‘It appals you?’ asked Poirot.

‘It does a little. I’m old-fashioned, you know.’

‘And, as you say, it is probably nothing but gossip!’

‘Well–I wouldn’t like conscientiously to say that. You know, I do think it’s so true–the saying that there’s no smoke without fire.’

‘I myself was thinking exactly the same thing,’ said Poirot.

He rose.

‘I can trust your discretion, Mademoiselle?’

‘Oh, of course! I shall not say a word to anybody.’

Poirot smiled and took his leave.

On the doorstep he said to the little maid who handed him his hat and coat:

‘I am down here to inquire into the circumstances of Mrs Oldfield’s death, but I shall be obliged if you will keep that strictly to yourself.’

Miss Leatheran’s Gladys nearly fell backward into the umbrella stand. She breathed excitedly:

‘Oh, sir, then the doctor did do her in?’

‘You’ve thought so for some time, haven’t you?’

‘Well, sir, it wasn’t me. It was Beatrice. She was up there when Mrs Oldfield died.’

‘And she thought there had been’ –Poirot selected the melodramatic words deliberately–‘“foul play”?’

Gladys nodded excitedly.

‘Yes, she did. And she said so did Nurse that was up there, Nurse Harrison. Ever so fond of Mrs Oldfield Nurse was, and ever so distressed when she died, and Beatrice always said as how Nurse Harrison knew something about it because she turned right round against the doctor afterwards and she wouldn’t of done that unless there was something wrong, would she?’

‘Where is Nurse Harrison now?’

‘She looks after old Miss Bristow–down at the end of the village. You can’t miss it. It’s got pillars and a porch.’

IV

It was a very short time afterwards that Hercule Poirot found himself sitting opposite to the woman who certainly must know more about the circumstances that had given rise to the rumours than anyone else.

Nurse Harrison was still a handsome woman nearing forty. She had the calm serene features of a Madonna with big sympathetic dark eyes. She listened to him patiently and attentively. Then she said slowly:

‘Yes, I know that there are these unpleasant stories going about. I have done what I could to stop them, but it’s hopeless. People like the excitement, you know.’

Poirot said:

‘But there must have been something to give rise to these rumours?’

He noted that her expression of distress deepened. But she merely shook her head perplexedly.

‘Perhaps,’ Poirot suggested, ‘Doctor Oldfield and his wife did not get on well together and it was that that started the rumour?’

Nurse Harrison shook her head decidedly.

‘Oh no, Doctor Oldfield was always extremely kind and patient with his wife.’

‘He was really very fond of her?’

She hesitated.

‘No–I would not quite say that. Mrs Oldfield was a very difficult woman, not easy to please and making constant demands for sympathy and attention which were not always justified.’

‘You mean,’ said Poirot, ‘that she exaggerated her condition?’

The nurse nodded.

‘Yes–her bad health was largely a matter of her own imagination.’

‘And yet,’ said Poirot gravely, ‘she died…’

‘Oh, I know–I know…’

He watched her for a minute or two; her troubled perplexity–her palpable uncertainty.

He said: ‘I think–I am sure–that you do know what first gave rise to all these stories.’

Nurse Harrison flushed.

She said:

‘Well–I could, perhaps, make a guess. I believe it was the maid, Beatrice, who started all these rumours and I think I know what put it into her head.’

‘Yes?’

Nurse Harrison said rather incoherently:

‘You see, it was something I happened to overhear–a scrap of conversation between Doctor Oldfield and Miss Moncrieffe–and I’m pretty certain Beatrice overheard it too, only I don’t suppose she’d ever admit it.’

‘What was this conversation?’

Nurse Harrison paused for a minute as though to test the accuracy of her own memory, then she said:

‘It was about three weeks before the last attack that killed Mrs Oldfield. They were in the dining-room. I was coming down the stairs when I heard Jean Moncrieffe say:

‘“How much longer will it be? I can’t bear to wait much longer.”

‘And the doctor answered her:

‘“Not much longer now, darling, I swear it.” And she said again:

‘“I can’t bear this waiting. You do think it will be all right, don’t you?” And he said: “Of course. Nothing can go wrong. This time next year we’ll be married.”’

She paused.

‘That was the very first inkling I’d had, M. Poirot, that there was anything between the doctor and Miss Moncrieffe. Of course I knew he admired her and that they were very good friends, but nothing more. I went back up the stairs again–it had given me quite a shock–but I did notice that the kitchen door was open and I’ve thought since that Beatrice must have been listening. And you can see, can’t you, that the way they were talking could be taken two ways? It might just mean that the doctor knew his wife was very ill and couldn’t live much longer–and I’ve no doubt that that was the way he meant it–but to any one like Beatrice it might sound differently–it might look as though the doctor and Jean Moncrieffe were–well–were definitely planning to do away with Mrs Oldfield.’

‘But you don’t think so, yourself ?’

‘No–no, of course not…’

Poirot looked at her searchingly. He said:

‘Nurse Harrison, is there something more that you know? Something that you haven’t told me?’

She flushed and said violently:

‘No. No. Certainly not. What could there be?’

‘I do not know. But I thought that there might be–something?’

She shook her head. The old troubled look had come back.

Hercule Poirot said: ‘It is possible that the Home Office may order an exhumation of Mrs Oldfield’s body!’

‘Oh no!’ Nurse Harrison was horrified. ‘What a horrible thing!’

‘You think it would be a pity?’

‘I think it would be dreadful! Think of the talk it would create! It would be terrible–quite terrible for poor Doctor Oldfield.’

‘You don’t think that it might really be a good thing for him?’

‘How do you mean?’

Poirot said: ‘If he is innocent–his innocence will be proved.’

He broke off. He watched the thought take root in Nurse Harrison’s mind, saw her frown perplexedly, and then saw her brow clear.

She took a deep breath and looked at him.

‘I hadn’t thought of that,’ she said simply. ‘Of course, it is the only thing to be done.’

There were a series of thumps on the floor overhead. Nurse Harrison jumped up.

‘It’s my old lady, Miss Bristow. She’s woken up from her rest. I must go and get her comfortable before her tea is brought to her and I go out for my walk. Yes, M. Poirot, I think you are quite right. An autopsy will settle the business once and for all. It will scotch the whole thing and all these dreadful rumours against poor Doctor Oldfield will die down.’

She shook hands and hurried out of the room.

V

Hercule Poirot walked along to the post office and put through a call to London.

The voice at the other end was petulant.

‘Must you go nosing out these things, my dear Poirot? Are you sure it’s a case for us? You know what these country town rumours usually amount to–just nothing at all.’

‘This,’ said Hercule Poirot, ‘is a special case.’

‘Oh well–if you say so. You have such a tiresome habit of being right. But if it’s all a mare’s nest we shan’t be pleased with you, you know.’

Hercule Poirot smiled to himself. He murmured:

‘No, I shall be the one who is pleased.’

‘What’s that you say? Can’t hear.’

‘Nothing. Nothing at all.’

He rang off.

Emerging into the post office he leaned across the counter. He said in his most engaging tones:

‘Can you by any chance tell me, Madame, where the maid who was formerly with Dr Oldfield–Beatrice her Christian name was–now resides?’

‘Beatrice King? She’s had two places since then. She’s with Mrs Marley over the Bank now.’

Poirot thanked her, bought two postcards, a book of stamps and a piece of local pottery. During the purchase, he contrived to bring the death of the late Mrs Oldfield into the conversation. He was quick to note the peculiar furtive expression that stole across the post-mistress’s face. She said:

‘Very sudden, wasn’t it? It’s made a lot of talk as you may have heard.’

A gleam of interest came into her eyes as she asked:

‘Maybe that’s what you’d be wanting to see Beatrice King for? We all thought it odd the way she was got out of there all of a sudden. Somebody thought she knew something–and maybe she did. She’s dropped some pretty broad hints.’

Beatrice King was a short rather sly-looking girl with adenoids. She presented an appearance of stolid stupidity but her eyes were more intelligent than her manner would have led one to expect. It seemed, however, that there was nothing to be got out of Beatrice King. She repeated:

‘I don’t know nothing about anything…It’s not for me to say what went on up there…I don’t know what you mean by overhearing a conversation betwen the Doctor and Miss Moncrieffe. I’m not one to go listening to doors, and you’ve no right to say I did. I don’t know nothing.’

Poirot said:

‘Have you ever heard of poisoning by arsenic?’

A flicker of quick furtive interest came into the girl’s sullen face.

She said:

‘So that’s what it was in the medicine bottle?’

‘What medicine bottle?’

Beatrice said:

‘One of the bottles of medicine what that Miss Moncrieffe made up for the Missus. Nurse was all upset–I could see that. Tasted it, she did, and smelt it, and then poured it away down the sink and filled up the bottle with plain water from the tap. It was white medicine like water, anyway. And once, when Miss Moncrieffe took up a pot of tea to the Missus, Nurse brought it down again and made it fresh–said it hadn’t been made with boiling water but that was just my eye, that was! I thought it was just the sort of fussing way nurses have at the time–but I dunno–it may have been more than that.’

Poirot nodded. He said:

‘Did you like Miss Moncrieffe, Beatrice?’

‘I didn’t mind her…A bit standoffish. Of course, I always knew as she was sweet on the doctor. You’d only to see the way she looked at him.’

Again Poirot nodded his head. He went back to the inn.

There he gave certain instructions to George.

VI

Dr Alan Garcia, the Home Office Analyst, rubbed his hands and twinkled at Hercule Poirot. He said:

‘Well, this suits you, M. Poirot, I suppose? The man who’s always right.’

Poirot said:

‘You are too kind.’

‘What put you on to it? Gossip?’

‘As you say–Enter Rumour, painted full of tongues.’

The following day Poirot once more took a train to Market Loughborough.

Market Loughborough was buzzing like a beehive. It had buzzed mildly ever since the exhumation proceedings.

Now that the findings of the autopsy had leaked out, excitement had reached fever heat.

Poirot had been at the inn for about an hour and had just finished a hearty lunch of steak and kidney pudding washed down by beer when word was brought to him that a lady was waiting to see him.

It was Nurse Harrison. Her face was white and haggard.

She came straight to Poirot.

‘Is this true? Is this really true, M. Poirot?’

He put her gently into a chair.

‘Yes. More than sufficient arsenic to cause death has been found.’

Nurse Harrison cried:

‘I never thought–I never for one moment thought–’ and burst into tears.

Poirot said gently:

‘The truth had to come out, you know.’

She sobbed.

‘Will they hang him?’

Poirot said:

‘A lot has to be proved still. Opportunity–access to poison–the vehicle in which it was administered.’

‘But supposing, M. Poirot, that he had nothing to do with it–nothing at all.’

‘In that case,’ Poirot shrugged his shoulders, ‘he will be acquitted.’

Nurse Harrison said slowly:

‘There is something–something that, I suppose, I ought to have told you before–but I didn’t think that there was really anything in it. It was just queer.’

‘I knew there was something,’ said Poirot. ‘You had better tell it to me now.’

‘It isn’t much. It’s just that one day when I went down to the dispensary for something, Jean Moncrieffe was doing something rather–odd.’ ‘Yes?’

‘It sounds so silly. It’s only that she was filling up her powder compact–a pink enamel one–’

‘Yes?’

‘But she wasn’t filling it up with powder–with face powder, I mean. She was tipping something into it from one of the bottles out of the poison cupboard. When she saw me she started and shut up the compact and whipped it into her bag–and put back the bottle quickly into the cupboard so that I couldn’t see what it was. I daresay it doesn’t mean anything–but now that I know that Mrs Oldfield really was poisoned–’ She broke off.

Poirot said: ‘You will excuse me?’

He went out and telephoned to Detective Sergeant Grey of the Berkshire Police.

Hercule Poirot came back and he and Nurse Harrison sat in silence.

Poirot was seeing the face of a girl with red hair and hearing a clear hard voice say: ‘I don’t agree.’ Jean Moncrieffe had not wanted an autopsy. She had given a plausible enough excuse, but the fact remained. A competent girl–efficient–resolute. In love with a man who was tied to a complaining invalid wife, who might easily live for years since, according to Nurse Harrison, she had very little the matter with her.

Hercule Poirot sighed.

Nurse Harrison said:

‘What are you thinking of ?’

Poirot answered:

‘The pity of things…’

Nurse Harrison said:

‘I don’t believe for a minute he knew anything about it.’

Poirot said:

‘No. I am sure he did not.’

The door opened and Detective Sergeant Grey came in. He had something in his hand, wrapped in a silk handkerchief. He unwrapped it and set it carefully down. It was a bright rose pink enamel compact.

Nurse Harrison said:

‘That’s the one I saw.’

Grey said:

‘Found it pushed right to the back of Miss Moncrieffe’s bureau drawer. Inside a handkerchief sachet. As far as I can see there are no fingerprints on it, but I’ll be careful.’

With the handkerchief over his hand he pressed the spring. The case flew open. Grey said:

‘This stuff isn’t face powder.’

He dipped a finger and tasted it gingerly on the tip of his tongue.

‘No particular taste.’

Poirot said:

‘White arsenic does not taste.’

Grey said:

‘It will be analysed at once.’ He looked at Nurse Harrison. ‘You can swear to this being the same case?’

‘Yes. I’m positive. That’s the case I saw Miss Moncrieffe with in the dispensary about a week before Mrs Oldfield’s death.’

Sergeant Grey sighed. He looked at Poirot and nodded. The latter rang the bell.

‘Send my servant here, please.’

George, the perfect valet, discreet, unobtrusive, entered and looked inquiringly at his master.

Hercule Poirot said:

‘You have identified this powder compact, Miss Harrison, as one you saw in the possession of Miss Moncrieffe over a year ago. Would you be surprised to learn that this particular case was sold by Messrs Woolworth only a few weeks ago and that, moreover, it is of a pattern and colour that has only been manufactured for the last three months?’

Nurse Harrison gasped. She stared at Poirot, her eyes round and dark. Poirot said:

‘Have you seen this compact before, Georges?’

George stepped forward:

‘Yes, sir. I observed this person, Nurse Harrison, purchase it at Woolworth’s on Friday the 18th. Pursuant to your instructions I followed this lady whenever she went out. She took a bus over to Darnington on the day I have mentioned and purchased this compact. She took it home with her. Later, the same day, she came to the house in which Miss Moncrieffe lodges. Acting as by your instructions, I was already in the house. I observed her go into Miss Moncrieffe’s bedroom and hide this in the back of the bureau drawer. I had a good view through the crack of the door. She then left the house believing herself unobserved. I may say that no one locks their front doors down here and it was dusk.’

Poirot said to Nurse Harrison, and his voice was hard and venomous:

‘Can you explain these facts, Nurse Harrison? I think not. There was no arsenic in that box when it left Messrs Woolworth, but there was when it left Miss Bristow’s house.’ He added softly, ‘It was unwise of you to keep a supply of arsenic in your possession.’

Nurse Harrison buried her face in her hands. She said in a low dull voice:

‘It’s true–it’s all true…I killed her. And all for nothing–nothing…I was mad.’

VII

Jean Moncrieffe said:

‘I must ask you to forgive me, M. Poirot. I have been so angry with you–so terribly angry with you. It seemed to me that you were making everything so much worse.’

Poirot said with a smile:

‘So I was to begin with. It is like in the old legend of the Lernean Hydra. Every time a head was cut off, two heads grew in its place. So, to begin with, the rumours grew and multiplied. But you see my task, like that of my namesake Hercules, was to reach the first–the original head. Who had started this rumour? It did not take me long to discover that the originator of the story was Nurse Harrison. I went to see her. She appeared to be a very nice woman–intelligent and sympathetic. But almost at once she made a bad mistake–she repeated to me a conversation which she had overheard taking place between you and the doctor, and that conversation, you see, was all wrong. It was psychologically most unlikely. If you and the doctor had planned together to kill Mrs Oldfield, you are both of you far too intelligent and level-headed to hold such a conversation in a room with an open door, easily overheard by someone on the stairs or someone in the kitchen. Moreover, the words attributed to you did not fit in at all with your mental make-up. They were the words of a much older woman and of one of a quite different type. They were words such as would be imagined by Nurse Harrison as being used by herself in like circumstances.