The Adventure of the Christmas Pudding: A Hercule Poirot Short Story. Agatha Christie

out to a hotel somewhere and dance. But the younger generation seem to find all this terribly attractive. Besides,’ added Mrs Lacey practically, ‘schoolboys and schoolgirls are always hungry, aren’t they? I think they must starve them at these schools. After all, one does know children of that age each eat about as much as three strong men.’

      Poirot laughed and said, ‘It is most kind of you and your husband, Madame, to include me in this way in your family party.’

      ‘Oh, we’re both delighted, I’m sure,’ said Mrs Lacey. ‘And if you find Horace a little gruff,’ she continued, ‘pay no attention. It’s just his manner, you know.’

      What her husband, Colonel Lacey, had actually said was: ‘Can’t think why you want one of these damned foreigners here cluttering up Christmas? Why can’t we have him some other time? Can’t stick foreigners! All right, all right, so Edwina Morecombe wished him on us. What’s it got to do with her, I should like to know? Why doesn’t she have him for Christmas?’

      ‘Because you know very well,’ Mrs Lacey had said, ‘that Edwina always goes to Claridge’s.’

      Her husband had looked at her piercingly and said, ‘Not up to something, are you, Em?’

      ‘Up to something?’ said Em, opening very blue eyes. ‘Of course not. Why should I be?’

      Old Colonel Lacey laughed, a deep, rumbling laugh. ‘I wouldn’t put it past you, Em,’ he said. ‘When you look your most innocent is when you are up to something.’

      Revolving these things in her mind, Mrs Lacey went on: ‘Edwina said she thought perhaps you might help us … I’m sure I don’t know quite how, but she said that friends of yours had once found you very helpful in – in a case something like ours. I – well, perhaps you don’t know what I’m talking about?’

      Poirot looked at her encouragingly. Mrs Lacey was close on seventy, as upright as a ramrod, with snow-white hair, pink cheeks, blue eyes, a ridiculous nose and a determined chin.

      ‘If there is anything I can do I shall only be too happy to do it,’ said Poirot. ‘It is, I understand, a rather unfortunate matter of a young girl’s infatuation.’

      Mrs Lacey nodded. ‘Yes. It seems extraordinary that I should – well, want to talk to you about it. After all, you are a perfect stranger …’

      ‘And a foreigner,’ said Poirot, in an understanding manner.

      ‘Yes,’ said Mrs Lacey, ‘but perhaps that makes it easier, in a way. Anyhow, Edwina seemed to think that you might perhaps know something – how shall I put it – something useful about this young Desmond Lee-Wortley.’

      Poirot paused a moment to admire the ingenuity of Mr Jesmond and the ease with which he had made use of Lady Morecombe to further his own purposes.

      ‘He has not, I understand, a very good reputation, this young man?’ he began delicately.

      ‘No, indeed, he hasn’t! A very bad reputation! But that’s no help so far as Sarah is concerned. It’s never any good, is it, telling young girls that men have a bad reputation? It – it just spurs them on!’

      ‘You are so very right,’ said Poirot.

      ‘In my young day,’ went on Mrs Lacey. (‘Oh dear, that’s a very long time ago!) We used to be warned, you know, against certain young men, and of course it did heighten one’s interest in them, and if one could possibly manage to dance with them, or to be alone with them in a dark conservatory –’ she laughed. ‘That’s why I wouldn’t let Horace do any of the things he wanted to do.’

      ‘Tell me,’ said Poirot, ‘exactly what is it that troubles you?’

      ‘Our son was killed in the war,’ said Mrs Lacey. ‘My daughter-in-law died when Sarah was born so that she has always been with us, and we’ve brought her up. Perhaps we’ve brought her up unwisely – I don’t know. But we thought we ought always to leave her as free as possible.’

      ‘That is desirable, I think,’ said Poirot. ‘One cannot go against the spirit of the times.’

      ‘No,’ said Mrs Lacey, ‘that’s just what I felt about it. And, of course, girls nowadays do these sort of things.’

      Poirot looked at her inquiringly.

      ‘I think the way one expresses it,’ said Mrs Lacey, ‘is that Sarah has got in with what they call the coffee-bar set. She won’t go to dances or come out properly or be a deb or anything of that kind. Instead she has two rather unpleasant rooms in Chelsea down by the river and wears these funny clothes that they like to wear, and black stockings or bright green ones. Very thick stockings. (So prickly, I always think!) And she goes about without washing or combing her hair.’

      ‘Ça, c’est tout à fait naturelle,’ said Poirot. ‘It is the fashion of the moment. They grow out of it.’

      ‘Yes, I know,’ said Mrs Lacey. ‘I wouldn’t worry about that sort of thing. But you see she’s taken up with this Desmond Lee-Wortley and he really has a very unsavoury reputation. He lives more or less on well-to-do girls. They seem to go quite mad about him. He very nearly married the Hope girl, but her people got her made a ward in court or something. And of course that’s what Horace wants to do. He says he must do it for her protection. But I don’t think it’s really a good idea, M. Poirot. I mean, they’ll just run away together and go to Scotland or Ireland or the Argentine or somewhere and either get married or else live together without getting married. And although it may be contempt of court and all that – well, it isn’t really an answer, is it, in the end? Especially if a baby’s coming. One has to give in then, and let them get married. And then, nearly always, it seems to me, after a year or two there’s a divorce. And then the girl comes home and usually after a year or two she marries someone so nice he’s almost dull and settles down. But it’s particularly sad, it seems to me, if there is a child, because it’s not the same thing, being brought up by a stepfather, however nice. No, I think it’s much better if we did as we did in my young days. I mean the first young man one fell in love with was always