LITMIR.BIZ

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of a violent yolk-of-egg rough tweed coat and skirt and a rather bilious-looking mustard-coloured jumper.

      ‘I knew you’d come,’ said Mrs Oliver cheerfully.

      ‘You could not possibly have known,’ said Poirot severely.

      ‘Oh, yes, I did.’

      ‘I still ask myself why I am here.’

      ‘Well, I know the answer. Curiosity.’

      Poirot looked at her and his eyes twinkled a little. ‘Your famous woman’s intuition,’ he said, ‘has, perhaps, for once not led you too far astray.’

      ‘Now, don’t laugh at my woman’s intuition. Haven’t I always spotted the murderer right away?’

      Poirot was gallantly silent. Otherwise he might have replied, ‘At the fifth attempt, perhaps, and not always then!’

      Instead he said, looking round him:

      ‘It is indeed a beautiful property that you have here.’

      ‘This? But it doesn’t belong to me, M. Poirot. Did you think it did? Oh, no, it belongs to some people called Stubbs.’

      ‘Who are they?’

      ‘Oh, nobody really,’ said Mrs Oliver vaguely. ‘Just rich. No, I’m down here professionally, doing a job.’

      ‘Ah, you are getting local colour for one of your chefs-d’oeuvre?’

      ‘No, no. Just what I said. I’m doing a job. I’ve been engaged to arrange a murder.’

      Poirot stared at her.

      ‘Oh, not a real one,’ said Mrs Oliver reassuringly. ‘There’s a big fête thing on tomorrow, and as a kind of novelty there’s going to be a Murder Hunt. Arranged by me. Like a Treasure Hunt, you see; only they’ve had a Treasure Hunt so often that they thought this would be a novelty. So they offered me a very substantial fee to come down and think it up. Quite fun, really – rather a change from the usual grim routine.’

      ‘How does it work?’

      ‘Well, there’ll be a Victim, of course. And Clues. And Suspects. All rather conventional – you know, the Vamp and the Blackmailer and the Young Lovers and the Sinister Butler and so on. Half a crown to enter and you get shown the first Clue and you’ve got to find the Victim, and the Weapon and say Whodunnit and the Motive. And there are Prizes.’

      ‘Remarkable!’ said Hercule Poirot.

      ‘Actually,’ said Mrs Oliver ruefully, ‘it’s all much harder to arrange than you’d think. Because you’ve got to allow for real people being quite intelligent, and in my books they needn’t be.’

      ‘And it is to assist you in arranging this that you have sent for me?’

      Poirot did not try very hard to keep an outraged resentment out of his voice.

      ‘Oh, no,’ said Mrs Oliver. ‘Of course not! I’ve done all that. Everything’s all set for tomorrow. No, I wanted you for quite another reason.’

      ‘What reason?’

      Mrs Oliver’s hands strayed upward to her head. She was just about to sweep them frenziedly through her hair in the old familiar gesture when she remembered the intricacy of her hair-do. Instead, she relieved her feelings by tugging at her ear lobes.

      ‘I dare say I’m a fool,’ she said. ‘But I think there’s something wrong.’

       Chapter 2

      There was a moment’s silence as Poirot stared at her. Then he asked sharply: ‘Something wrong? How?’

      ‘I don’t know…That’s what I want you to find out. But I’ve felt – more and more – that I was being – oh! – engineered…jockeyed along…Call me a fool if you like, but I can only say that if there was to be a real murder tomorrow instead of a fake one, I shouldn’t be surprised!’

      Poirot stared at her and she looked back at him defiantly.

      ‘Very interesting,’ said Poirot.

      ‘I suppose you think I’m a complete fool,’ said Mrs Oliver defensively.

      ‘I have never thought you a fool,’ said Poirot.

      ‘And I know what you always say – or look – about intuition.’

      ‘One calls things by different names,’ said Poirot. ‘I am quite ready to believe that you have noticed something, or heard something, that has definitely aroused in you anxiety. I think it is possible that you yourself may not even know just what it is that you have seen or noticed or heard. You are aware only of the result. If I may so put it, you do not know what it is that you know. You may label that intuition if you like.’

      ‘It makes one feel such a fool,’ said Mrs Oliver, ruefully, ‘not to be able to be definite.’

      ‘We shall arrive,’ said Poirot encouragingly. ‘You say that you have had the feeling of being – how did you put it – jockeyed along? Can you explain a little more clearly what you mean by that?’

      ‘Well, it’s rather difficult…You see, this is my murder, so to speak. I’ve thought it out and planned it and it all fits in – dovetails. Well, if you know anything at all about writers, you’ll know that they can’t stand suggestions. People say “Splendid, but wouldn’t it be better if so and so did so and so?” or “Wouldn’t it be a wonderful idea if the victim was A instead of B? Or the murderer turned out to be D instead of E?” I mean, one wants to say: “All right then, write it yourself if you want it that way!”’

      Poirot nodded.

      ‘And that is what has been happening?’

      ‘Not quite…That sort of silly suggestion has been made, and then I’ve flared up, and they’ve given in, but have just slipped in some quite minor trivial suggestion and because I’ve made a stand over the other, I’ve accepted the triviality without noticing much.’

      ‘I see,’ said Poirot. ‘Yes – it is a method, that…Something rather crude and preposterous is put forward – but that is not really the point. The small minor alteration is really the objective. Is that what you mean?’

      ‘That’s exactly what I mean,’ said Mrs Oliver. ‘And, of course, I may be imagining it, but I don’t think I am – and none of the things seem to matter anyway. But it’s got me worried – that, and a sort of – well – atmosphere.’

      ‘Who has made these suggestions of alterations to you?’

      ‘Different people,’ said Mrs Oliver. ‘If it was just one person I’d be more sure of my ground. But it’s not just one person – although I think it is really. I mean it’s one person working through other quite unsuspecting people.’

      ‘Have you an idea as to who that one person is?’

      Mrs Oliver shook her head.

      ‘It’s somebody very clever and very careful,’ she said. ‘It might be anybody.’

      ‘Who is there?’ asked Poirot. ‘The cast of characters must be fairly limited?’

      ‘Well,’ began Mrs Oliver. ‘There’s Sir George Stubbs who owns this place. Rich and plebeian and frightfully stupid outside business, I should think, but probably dead sharp in it. And there’s Lady Stubbs – Hattie – about twenty years younger than he is, rather beautiful, but dumb as a fish – in fact, I think she’s definitely halfwitted. Married him for his money, of course, and doesn’t think about anything but clothes and jewels. Then there’s Michael Weyman – he’s an architect, quite young, and good-looking in a craggy kind of artistic way. He’s designing a tennis pavilion for Sir George and repairing the Folly.’

      ‘Folly?

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