The goods had to be of small bulk, but thousands of pounds’ worth of gems and narcotics occupy a very small space. Everything went well until one of those unforeseen chances occurred. A police officer came one day to a students’ hostel to make inquiries in connection with a murder near Cambridge. I think you know the reason why that particular piece of information should cause Nigel to panic. He thought the police were after him.
He removed certain electric light bulbs so that the light should be dim and he also, in a panic, took a certain racksack out into the back yard, hacked it to pieces and threw it behind the boiler since he feared traces of narcotic might be found in its false bottom.
“His panic was quite unfounded-the police had merely come to ask questions about a certain Eurasian student-but one of the girls living in the Hostel had happened to look out of her window and had seen. him destroying the rucksack. That did not immediately sign her death warrant. Instead, a clever scheme was ,thought up by which she herself was induced to commit certain foolish actions which would place her in a very invidious position. But they carried that scheme too far. I was called in. I advised going to the police. The girl lost her head and confessed. She confessed, that is, to the things that she had done. But she went, I think, to Nigel, and urged him to confess also to the rucksack business and to spilling ink over a fellow student’s work. Neither Nigel nor his accomplice could consider attention being called to the rucksack-their whole plan of campaign would be ruined.
Moreover Celia, the girl in question, had another dangerous piece of knowledge which she revealed, as it happened, the night I dined there. She knew who Nigel really was.” “But surely-was Mr. Endicott frowned.
“Nigel had moved from one world to another. Any former friends he met might know that he now called himself Chapman, but they knew nothing of what he was doing.
In the Hostel nobody knew that his real name was Stanley-but Celia suddenly revealed that she knew him in both capacities. She also knew that Valerie Hobhouse, on one occasion at least, had travelled abroad on a false passport. She knew too much. The next evening she went out to meet him by appointment somewhere. He gave her a drink of coffee and in it was morphia. She died in her sleep with everything arranged to look like suicide.” Mr. Endicott stirred. An expression of deep distress crossed his face. He murmured something under his breath.
“But that was not the end,” said Poirot. “The woman who owned the chain of hosters and students’ clubs died soon after in suspicious circumstances and then, finally, there came the last most cruel and heartless crime. Patricia Lane, a girl who was devoted to Nigel and of whom he himself was really fond, meddled unwittingly in his all airs, and moreover insisted that he should be reconciled to his father before the latter died. He told her a string of lies, but rearised that her obstinacy might urge her actually to write a second letter after the first was destroyed. I think, my friend, that you can tell me why, from his point of view, that would have been such a fatal thing to happen.” Mr. Endicott rose. He went across the room to a safe, unlocked it, and came back with a long envelope in his hand. It had a broken red seal on the back of it. He drew out two enclosures and laid them before Poirot.
Dear Endicott. You will open this after I am dead. I wish you to trace my son Nigel and find out If he has been guilty of any criminal actions whatsoever.
“The facts I am about to tell you are known to me only. Nigel has always been profoundly unsatisfactory in his character. He has twice been guilty of forging my name to a cheque. On each occasion I acknowledged the signature as mine, but warned him that I would not do so again. On the third occasion it was his mother’s name he forged. She charged him with it. He begged her to keep silence.