No, I …’ I stopped and cleared my throat. Reporting the facts of the case was straightforward enough, but I had no wish to explain to Poirot how my mood had been affected by what I had seen, or to tell him that I had been at the Bloxham for no more than five minutes before I succumbed to the powerful urge to leave.
The way all three had been laid out on their backs so formally: arms by their sides, palms of their hands touching the floor, legs together …
Laying out the dead. The phrase forced its way into my mind, accompanied by a vision of a dark room from many years ago—a room I had been compelled to enter as a young child, and had been refusing to enter in my imagination ever since. I fully intended to carry on refusing for the rest of my life.
Lifeless hands, palms facing downwards.
‘Hold his hand, Edward.’
‘Don’t worry, there are plenty of police crawling about the place,’ I said quickly and loudly, to banish the unwelcome vision. ‘Tomorrow morning is soon enough for me to go back.’ Seeing that he was waiting for a fuller answer, I added, ‘I had to clear my head. Frankly, I’ve never seen anything as peculiar as these three murders in all my life.’
‘In what way peculiar?’
‘Each of the victims had something in his or her mouth—the same thing.’
‘Non.’ Poirot wagged his finger at me. ‘This is not possible, mon ami. The same thing cannot be inside three different mouths at the same time.’
‘Three separate things, all identical,’ I clarified. ‘Three cufflinks, solid gold from the look of them. Monogrammed. Same initials on all three: PIJ. Poirot? Are you all right? You look—’
‘Mon Dieu!’ He had risen to his feet and begun to pace around the room. ‘You do not see what this means, mon ami. No, you do not see it at all, because you have not heard the story of my encounter with Mademoiselle Jennie. Quickly I must tell you what happened so that you understand.’
Poirot’s idea of telling a story quickly is rather different from most people’s. Every detail matters to him equally, whether it’s a fire in which three hundred people perish or a small dimple on a child’s chin. He can never be induced to rush to the nub of a matter, so I settled into my chair and let him tell it in his own way. By the time he had finished, I felt as if I had experienced the events first-hand—more comprehensively, indeed, than I experience many scenes from my life in which I personally participate.
‘What an extraordinary thing to happen,’ I said. ‘On the same night as the three murders at the Bloxham, too. Quite a coincidence.’
Poirot sighed. ‘I do not think it is a coincidence, my friend. One accepts that the coincidences happen from time to time, but here there is a clear connection.’
‘You mean murder on the one hand, and the fear of being murdered on the other?’
‘Non. That is one connection, yes, but I am talking about something different.’ Poirot stopped promenading around the drawing room and turned to face me. ‘You say that in your three murder victims’ mouths are found three gold cufflinks bearing the monogram “PIJ”?’
‘That’s right.’
‘Mademoiselle Jennie, she said to me quite clearly: “Promise me this: if I’m found dead, you’ll tell your friend the policeman not to look for my killer. Oh, please let no one open their mouths! This crime must never be solved.” What do you think she meant by “Oh, please let no one open their mouths”?’
Was he joking? Apparently not. ‘Well,’ I said, ‘it’s clear, isn’t it? She feared she would be murdered, didn’t want her killer punished and was hoping no one would say anything to point the finger at him. She believes she is the one who deserves to be punished.’
‘You choose the meaning that at first seems obvious,’ said Poirot. He sounded disappointed in me. ‘Ask yourself if there is another possible meaning of those words: “Oh, please let no one open their mouths”. Reflect upon your three gold cufflinks.’
‘They are not mine,’ I said emphatically, wishing at that moment that I could push the whole case very far away from me. ‘All right, I see what you’re driving at, but—’
‘What do you see? Je conduis ma voiture à quoi?’
‘Well … “Please let no one open their mouths” could, at a stretch, mean “Please let no one open the mouths of the three murder victims at the Bloxham Hotel.”’ I felt an utter fool giving voice to this preposterous theory.
‘Exactement! “Please let no one open their mouths and find the gold cufflinks with the initials PIJ.” Is it not possible that this is what Jennie meant? That she knew about the three murder victims at the hotel, and that she knew that whoever killed them was also intent on killing her?’
Without waiting for my answer, Poirot proceeded with his imaginings. ‘And the letters PIJ, the person who has those initials, he is very important to the story, n’est-ce pas? Jennie, she knows this. She knows that if you find these three letters you will be on your way to finding the murderer, and she wants to prevent this. Alors, you must catch him, before it is too late for Jennie, or else Hercule Poirot, he shall not forgive himself!’
I was alarmed to hear this. I felt a pressing sense of responsibility for catching this killer as it was, and did not wish also to be responsible for Poirot never forgiving himself. Did he really look at me and see a man capable of apprehending a murderer with a mind of this sort—a mind that would think to place monogrammed cufflinks in the mouths of the dead? I have always been a straightforward person and I work best at straightforward things.
‘I think you must go back to the hotel,’ said Poirot. He meant immediately.
I shuddered at the memory of those three rooms. ‘First thing tomorrow will be soon enough,’ I said, studiously avoiding his gleaming eyes. ‘I should tell you, I’m not going to make a fool of myself by bringing up this Jennie person. It would only confuse everybody. You have come up with a possible meaning for what she said and I have come up with another. Yours is the more interesting, but mine is twenty times more likely to be correct.’
‘It is not,’ came the contradiction.
‘We shall have to disagree about it,’ I said firmly. ‘If we were to ask a hundred people, they would all agree with me and not with you, I suspect.’
‘I too suspect this.’ Poirot sighed. ‘Allow me to convince you if I can. A few moments ago, you said to me about the murders at the hotel, “Each of the victims had something in his or her mouth”, did you not?’
I agreed that I had.
‘You did not say, “in their mouth”, you said, “his or her”—because you are an educated man and you speak in the singular and not the plural: “his or her”, to go with “each”—it is grammatically correct. Mademoiselle Jennie, she is a housemaid, but she has the speech of an educated person and the vocabulary also. She used the word “inevitable” when talking about her death, her murder. And then she said to me, “So you see, there is no help to be had, and even if there were, I should not deserve it.” She is a woman who uses the English language as it should be used. Therefore, mon ami …’ Poirot was up on his feet again. ‘Therefore! If you are correct and Jennie meant to say, “Please let no one open their mouths” in the sense of “Please let no one give information to the police”, why did she not say, “Please let no one open his or her mouth?” The word “no one” requires the singular, not the plural!’
I stared up at him with an ache in my neck, too bewildered and weary to respond. Hadn’t he told me himself that Jennie was in a frightful panic? In my experience, people who are stricken with terror tend not to fuss about grammar.
I had always thought of Poirot as among the most intelligent