“Unless one has a boat,” I said. “If you hate the coast so much, why must we go to Great Yarmouth every year?”
“Oh,summeron the Norfolk coast is a completely different story,” she replied briskly. “Will you kindly accompany me to Munby, Monsieur Poirot? You and Edward? You are so desperately needed there. Stanley Niven was murdered on 8 September, and the police don’t know any more now than they did on that day. It is pitiful! The case has still not been solved, more than three months later. And my friend Vivienne has been subjected to intolerable anguish, which is most unfair given that, as I say, Mr. Niven is a complete stranger to her and to all of us. If only he had been murdered elsewhere... but he was not.” Mother sighed. “He was killed on Ward 6 of St. Walstan’s Hospital, and poor Vivienne is in a quite terrible state about it.”
“Why, if this Niven chap was a stranger to her?” I asked. “Why is your friend so distressed by his having been murdered at this particular hospital?”
“If I explain now, we shall miss our train,” said Mother. “We need to make haste. As soon as we have had our tea—” she glanced again at the closed drawing-room door, “—we must depart. That is, if you are in agreement, Monsieur Poirot? Do, please, assure me that I can count on your help in this matter.”
Chapter 2
An Unplanned Trip to Norfolk
Two hours and forty-five minutes later, Poirot, Mother and I were on a train bound for Norfolk. So much for my always suiting myself. Did she really believe that about me? It was precisely what I thought about her: she always got what she wanted—even, on this occasion, maddeningly, cakes, tea and the benefit of Poirot’s finest china, thanks to his ever-resourceful valet, George.
I had been sure until the very last moment that Poirot was minded to decline her request. I knew only too well the expression that his face assumed when he was preparing to say no to somebody, being so often the person to whom he said it. At a certain juncture, however, Mother had said something that had aroused his interest. I watched it happen. The light in his eyes changed. I could not work out what had made the difference.
She had been talking about Stanley Niven, the murder victim, who, according to Mother, had possessed a sunny nature and a generous and delightful temperament. At thetime of his death, he was sixty-eight years old and had a doting family and no enemies to speak of. He was the favorite patient of every doctor and every nurse at St. Walstan’s Cottage Hospital, always laughing and offering encouragement to others in spite of his own health troubles. His happiness was such that one could not help but feel jolly in his presence, no matter what mood one might have been in before encountering him. At sixty-eight, he was retired, but before that he had been a post office master in Cromer, where his customers and employees could not have been more devoted to him.
Mother had turned her stern gaze upon me at this point in her description of Mr. Niven. “A man like that is not supposed to get murdered, Edward: a cheerful, popular man who has worked hard his whole life and who endures poor health with great fortitude and a smile on his face. Really, you and your friends at Scotland Yard must deliver a clear message to the nation’s rogues: if they insist on depriving people of their lives, they must choose more deserving candidates. Of course, taking another person’s life is always wrong. You do not need to tell me that, Edward—I was the one who taught you about right and wrong, if you recall. But the fact is that not all crimes are equally heinous. What is this great nation coming to, really, when a man like Stanley Niven is not safe? Not that I care about him personally, you understand.”
“Yes, you have made that very clear,” I said. “You care only insofar as it inconveniences your friend Vivienne.”
“Not only her,” said Mother. “The whole family isaffected. And it goes far beyond inconvenience, Edward, so please do not be flippant. Vivienne is... why, in the three months since the murder, she has become a mere shell of a person. It is terrifying to observe. Of course Stanley Niven’s death matters tosomebody somewhere—I do not doubt that. I never intended to suggest otherwise. You are determined, as ever, to interpret everything I say in the most uncharitable manner possible.”
Poirot had asked her to explain the connection between the murder in the hospital and her friend’s anguish: “Why has your friend Vivienne become a shell in great distress?”
“Because if this crime is not solved before the start of the new year, then Arnold might be murdered too—or at least, that is what Vivienne believes. And she herself will certainly go quite mad. Irretrievably so, I fear. Shall I explain, Monsieur Poirot? I might as well tell you a little of the story while we eat our cake.”
Poirot had not replied straight away. Instead, he had muttered to himself, “One could not help but feel jolly in his presence.” Then he had smoothed down his moustaches with his fingers and stared fixedly at the china teapot on the small table between us. Shortly afterwards he said with a sigh, “It appears that we must change our plans, Catchpool, and accompany your mother to Norfolk.”
Was it her reference to the jollity inspired by Stanley Niven that had made up his mind? If so, I could not see the relevance of it. No further explanations were offered—of anything, by anybody—and a flurry of preparations for travel followed. Now, as the train transported us to Norfolk,I was still every bit as baffled as I had been in Poirot’s drawing room about why Stanley Niven’s unsolved murder was ruining the life of Mother’s friend Vivienne and causing her to fear that her husband would be murdered too.
As a ruthless wind howled through our carriage, I clung to the one consolation that had been thrown to me: Poirot’s declaration, as he had donned his hat and coat to depart for the railway station, that “What the Norfolk constabulary has failed to achieve in three months and eleven days, I shall endeavor to bring to a close in... let us say, ten hours.” He smiled. “Not counting the time that I am asleep, naturally. The murder was committed on a hospital ward?Eh bien, some questions asked of the nurses there, more at the police station... Some answers given—true ones, or lies, probably both. Then to sit quietly and let the little grey cells do their work. It might, from start to end, take me as many as fifteen hours to make sense of what has occurred. It is unlikely to take longer than that.”
To Mother he had said, “Be in no doubt, madame: I shall solve the murder of Stanley Niven and return home in a matter of days. Catchpool and I will spend Christmaschez Poirot, as arranged.”
“No, no,” she had waved his words away. “That won’t do at all. You will stay until at least the day after Boxing Day.”
Now she took the opportunity to drive her message home: “Boxing Day is the very soonest that you will be permitted to leave, Monsieur Poirot,” she said firmly. “It is better that you know that from the outset. Oh, I have no doubt that you will make short work of solving thecrime—but, you see, your visit to Munby hastwopurposes, and solving the murder at St. Walstan’s Cottage Hospital is only one of them. Both are equally important.”
“Catchpool, if you would be so kind as to close the window that is open in the next carriage?” said Poirot. “This gale does its best to blow my moustaches from my face, all the way back to Whitehaven Mansions. There is certainly a window open somewhere, and since all the ones I can see are closed...”
I did as he asked; he was, of course, correct.
“So Stanley Niven had undergone surgery at St. Walstan’s Hospital immediately before he was killed?” Poirot was asking Mother when I returned.
“Yes,” she said. “Though don’t ask me what for. All I know is that he was expected to recover. His case was quite different from Arnold’s.”
“Who is Arnold?” asked Poirot.
“Vivienne’s husband. They will be our hosts in Munby: Arnold and Vivienne Laurier. Frellingsloe House belongs to them.”
“Arnold is also sick?” said Poirot.
“Dying,” I guessed aloud. Mother had certainly told me that a member of the Laurier family was terminally ill.
“Yes, the poor man has very little time left,” she confirmed. “Dr. Osgood—he is Arnold’s doctor and also his and Vivienne’s lodger—has said that Arnold has another three to six months at most.”
Even less time than his house has left, I reflected.
