‘Poor Auntie,’ she said, when Poirot had introduced himself, and explained his business. ‘It’s terribly sad. I’ve been wishing all the morning that I’d been kinder and more patient.’
‘You stood a great deal, Freda,’ interrupted Radnor.
‘Yes, Jacob, but I’ve got a sharp temper, I know. After all, it was only silliness on Auntie’s part. I ought to have just laughed and not minded. Of course, it’s all nonsense her thinking that Uncle was poisoning her. She was worse after any food he gave her—but I’m sure it was only from thinking about it. She made up her mind she would be, and then she was.’
‘What was the actual cause of your disagreement, mademoiselle?’
Miss Stanton hesitated, looking at Radnor. That young gentleman was quick to take the hint.
‘I must be getting along, Freda. See you this evening. Goodbye, gentlemen; you’re on your way to the station, I suppose?’
Poirot replied that we were, and Radnor departed.
‘You are affianced, is it not so?’ demanded Poirot, with a sly smile.
Freda Stanton blushed and admitted that such was the case.
‘And that was really the whole trouble with Auntie,’ she added.
‘She did not approve of the match for you?’
‘Oh, it wasn’t that so much. But you see, she—’ The girl came to a stop.
‘Yes?’ encouraged Poirot gently.
‘It seems rather a horrid thing to say about her—now she’s dead. But you’ll never understand unless I tell you. Auntie was absolutely infatuated with Jacob.’
‘Indeed?’
‘Yes, wasn’t it absurd? She was over fifty, and he’s not quite thirty! But there it was. She was silly about him! I had to tell her at last that it was me he was after—and she carried on dreadfully. She wouldn’t believe a word of it, and was so rude and insulting that it’s no wonder I lost my temper. I talked it over with Jacob, and we agreed that the best thing to do was for me to clear out for a bit till she came to her senses. Poor Auntie—I suppose she was in a queer state altogether.’
‘It would certainly seem so. Thank you, mademoiselle, for making things so clear to me.’
V
A little to my surprise, Radnor was waiting for us in the street below.
‘I can guess pretty well what Freda has been telling you,’ he remarked. ‘It was a most unfortunate thing to happen, and very awkward for me, as you can imagine. I need hardly say that it was none of my doing. I was pleased at first, because I imagined the old woman was helping on things with Freda. The whole thing was absurd—but extremely unpleasant.’
‘When are you and Miss Stanton going to be married?’
‘Soon, I hope. Now, M. Poirot, I’m going to be candid with you. I know a bit more than Freda does. She believes her uncle to be innocent. I’m not so sure. But I can tell you one thing: I’m going to keep my mouth shut about what I do know. Let sleeping dogs lie. I don’t want my wife’s uncle tried and hanged for murder.’
‘Why do you tell me all this?’
‘Because I’ve heard of you, and I know you’re a clever man. It’s quite possible that you might ferret out a case against him. But I put it to you—what good is that? The poor woman is past help, and she’d have been the last person to want a scandal—why, she’d turn in her grave at the mere thought of it.’
‘You are probably right there. You want me to—hush it up, then?’
‘That’s my idea. I’ll admit frankly that I’m selfish about it. I’ve got my way to make—and I’m building up a good little business as a tailor and outfitter.’
‘Most of us are selfish, Mr Radnor. Not all of us admit it so freely. I will do what you ask—but I tell you frankly you will not succeed in hushing it up.’
‘Why not?’
Poirot held up a finger. It was market day, and we were passing the market—a busy hum came from within.
‘The voice of the people—that is why, Mr Radnor. Ah, we must run, or we shall miss our train.’
VI
‘Very interesting, is it not, Hastings?’ said Poirot, as the train steamed out of the station.
He had taken out a small comb from his pocket, also a microscopic mirror, and was carefully arranging his moustache, the symmetry of which had become slightly impaired during our brisk run.
‘You seem to find it so,’ I replied. ‘To me, it is all rather sordid and unpleasant. There’s hardly any mystery about it.’
‘I agree with you; there is no mystery whatever.’
‘I suppose we can accept the girl’s rather extraordinary story of her aunt’s infatuation? That seemed the only fishy part to me. She was such a nice, respectable woman.’
‘There is nothing extraordinary about that—it is completely ordinary. If you read the papers carefully, you will find that often a nice respectable woman of that age leaves a husband she has lived with for twenty years, and sometimes a whole family of children as well, in order to link her life with that of a young man considerably her junior. You admire les femmes, Hastings; you prostrate yourself before all of them who are good-looking and have the good taste to smile upon you; but psychologically you know nothing whatever about them. In the autumn of a woman’s life, there comes always one mad moment when she longs for romance, for adventure—before it is too late. It comes none the less surely to a woman because she is the wife of a respectable dentist in a country town!’
‘And you think—’
‘That a clever man might take advantage of such a moment.’
‘I shouldn’t call Pengelley so clever,’ I mused. ‘He’s got the whole town by the ears. And yet I suppose you’re right. The only two men who know anything, Radnor and the doctor, both want to hush it up. He’s managed that somehow. I wish we’d seen the fellow.’
‘You can indulge your wish. Return by the next train and invent an aching molar.’
I looked at him keenly.
‘I wish I knew what you considered so interesting about the case.’
‘My interest is very aptly summed up by a remark of yours, Hastings. After interviewing the maid, you observed that for someone who was not going to say a word, she had said a good deal.’
‘Oh!’ I said doubtfully; then I harped back to my original criticism: ‘I wonder why you made no attempt to see Pengelley?’
‘Mon ami, I give him just three months. Then I shall see him for as long as I please—in the dock.’
VII
For once I thought Poirot’s prognostications were going to be proved wrong. The time went by, and nothing transpired as to our Cornish case. Other matters occupied us, and I had nearly forgotten the Pengelley tragedy when it was suddenly recalled to me by a short paragraph in the paper which stated that an order to exhume the body of Mrs Pengelley had been obtained from the Home Secretary.
A few days later, and ‘The Cornish Mystery’ was the topic of every paper. It seemed that gossip had never entirely died down, and when the engagement of the widower to Miss Marks, his secretary, was announced, the tongues burst out again louder