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Fifteen
THE EVIDENCE OF THE PASSENGERS’ LUGGAGE
Having delivered himself of various polite insincerities, and having told Mrs. Hubbard that he would order coffee to be brought to her, Poirot was able to take his leave accompanied by his two friends.
“Well, we have made a start and drawn a blank,” observed M. Bouc. “Whom shall we tackle next?”
“It would be simplest, I think, just to proceed along the train carriage by carriage. That means that we start with No. 16—the amiable M. Hardman.”
Mr. Hardman, who was smoking a cigar, welcomed them affably.
“Come right in, gentlemen—that is, if it’s humanly possible. It’s just a mite cramped in here for a party.”
M. Bouc explained the object of their visit, and the big detective nodded comprehendingly.
“That’s O.K. To tell the truth, I’ve been wondering you didn’t get down to it sooner. Here are my keys, gentlemen and if you like to search my pockets too, why, you’re welcome. Shall I reach the grips down for you?”
“The conductor will do that. Michel!”
The contents of Mr. Hardman’s two “grips” were soon examined and passed. They contained perhaps an undue proportion of spirituous liquor. Mr. Hardman winked.
“It’s not often they search your grips at the frontiers—not if you fix the conductor. I handed out a wad of Turkish notes right away, and there’s been no trouble so far.”
“And at Paris?”
Mr. Hardman winked again.
“By the time I get to Paris,” he said, “what’s left over of this little lot will go into a bottle labelled hairwash.”
“You are not a believer in Prohibition, Monsieur Hardman,” said M. Bouc with a smile.
“Well,” said Hardman. “I can’t say Prohibition has ever worried me any.”
“Ah!” said M. Bouc. “The speakeasy.” He pronounced the word with care, savouring it.
“Your American terms are so quaint, so expressive,” he said.
“Me, I would much like to go to America,” said Poirot.
“You’d learn a few go-ahead methods over there,” said Hardman. “Europe wants waking up. She’s half asleep.”
“It is true that America is the country of progress,” agreed Poirot. “There is much that I admire about Americans. Only—I am perhaps old-fashioned—but me, I find the American woman less charming than my own countrywomen. The French or Belgian girl, coquettish, charming—I think there is no one to touch her.”
Hardman turned away to peer out at the snow for a minute.
“Perhaps you’re right, M. Poirot,” he said. “But I guess every nation likes its own girls best.”
He blinked as though the snow hurt his eyes.
“Kind of dazzling, isn’t it?” he remarked. “Say, gentlemen, this business is getting on my nerves. Murder and the snow and all, and nothing doing. Just hanging about and killing time. I’d like to get busy after someone or something.”
“The true Western spirit of hustle,” said Poirot with a smile.
The conductor replaced the bags and they moved on to the next compartment. Colonel Arbuthnot was sitting in a corner smoking a pipe and reading a magazine.
Poirot explained their errand. The Colonel made no demur. He had two heavy leather suitcases.
“The rest of my kit has gone by long sea,” he explained.
Like most Army men, the Colonel was a neat packer. The examination of his baggage took only a few minutes. Poirot noted a packet of pipe cleaners.
“You always use the same kind?” he asked.
“Usually. If I can get ’em.”
“Ah!” Poirot nodded.
These pipe cleaners were identical with the one he had found on the floor of the dead man’s compartment.
Dr. Constantine remarked as much when they were out in the corridor again.
“Tout de même,” murmured Poirot, “I can hardly believe it. It is not dans son caractère, and when you have said that you have said everything.”
The door of the next compartment was closed. It was that occupied by Princess Dragomiroff. They knocked on the door and the Princess’s deep voice called, “Entrez.”
M. Bouc was spokesman. He was very deferential and polite as he explained their errand.
The Princess listened to him in silence, her small toad-like face quite impassive.
“If it is necessary, Messieurs,” she said quietly when he had finished, “that is all there is to it. My maid has the keys. She will attend to it with you.”
“Does your maid always carry your keys, Madame?” asked Poirot.
“Certainly, Monsieur.”
“And if during the night at one of the frontiers the Customs officials should require a piece of luggage to be opened?”
The old lady shrugged her shoulders.
“It is very unlikely. But in such a case this conductor would fetch her.”
“You trust her, then, implicitly, Madame?”
“I have told you so already,” said the Princess quietly. “I do not employ people whom I do not trust.”
“Yes,” said Poirot thoughtfully. “Trust is indeed something in these days. It is, perhaps, better to have a homely woman whom one can trust than a more chic maid—for example, some smart Parisienne.”
He saw the dark intelligent eyes come slowly round and fasten themselves upon his face.
“What exactly are you implying, M. Poirot?”
“Nothing, Madame. I? Nothing.”
“But yes. You think, do you not, that I should have a smart Frenchwoman to attend to my toilet?”
“It would be, perhaps, more usual, Madame.”
She shook her head.
“Schmidt is devoted to me.” Her voice dwelt lingeringly on the words. “Devotion—c’est impayable.”
The German woman had arrived with the keys. The Princess spoke to her in her own language, telling her to open the valises and help the gentlemen in their search. She herself remained in the corridor looking out at the snow and Poirot remained with her, leaving M. Bouc to the task of searching the luggage.
She regarded him with a grim smile.
“Well, Monsieur, do you not wish to see what my valises contain?”
He shook his head.
“Madame, it is a formality, that is all.”
“Are you so sure?”
“In your case, yes.”
“And yet I knew and loved Sonia Armstrong. What do you think, then? That I would not soil my hands with killing such canaille as that man Cassetti? Well, perhaps you are right.”
She was silent a minute or two, then she said:
“With such a man as that, do you know what I should have liked to have done? I should have liked to call to my servants: “Flog this man to death and fling him out on the rubbish heap.” That is the way things were done when I was young. Monsieur.”
Still he did not speak, just listened attentively.
She looked at him with a sudden impetuosity.
“You do not say anything, M. Poirot. What is it that you are thinking, I wonder?”
He looked at her with a very direct glance.
“I think, Madame, that your strength is in your will—not in your arm.”
She glanced down at her thin, black-clad arms ending in those claw-like yellow hands with the rings on the fingers.
“It is true,” she said. “I have no strength in these—none. I do not know if I am sorry or glad.”
Then she turned abruptly back towards her carriage, where the maid was busily packing up the cases.
The Princess cut short M. Bouc’s apologies.
“There is not need for you to apologize, Monsieur,” she said. “A murder has been committed. Certain actions have to be performed. That is all there is to it.”
“Vous êtes bien amiable, Madame.”
She inclined her head slightly as they departed.
The doors of the next two carriages were shut. M. Bouc paused and scratched his h
ead.
“Diable!” he said. “This may be awkward. These are diplomatic passports. Their baggage is exempt.”
“From Customs examination, yes. But a murder is different.”
“I know. All the same—we do not want to have complications—”
“Do not distress yourself, my friend. The Count and Countess will be reasonable. See how amiable Princess Dragomiroff was about it.”
“She is truly grande dame. These two are also of the same position, but the Count impressed me as a man of somewhat truculent disposition. He was not pleased when you insisted on questioning his wife. And this will annoy him still further. Suppose—eh—we omit them. After all, they can have nothing to do with the matter. Why should I stir up needless trouble for myself.”
“I do not agree with you,” said Poirot. “I feel sure that Count Andrenyi will be reasonable. At any rate, let us make the attempt.”
And, before M. Bouc could reply, he rapped sharply on the door of No. 13.
A voice from within cried, “Entrez.”
The Count was sitting in the corner near the door reading a newspaper. The Countess was curled up in the opposite corner near the window. There was a pillow behind her head, and she seemed to have been asleep.
