‘You think so? I will not press the point. Tell me, instead, what were Ralph Paton’s reasons for disappearing?’ ‘That’s rather more difficult,’ I said slowly. ‘I shall have to speak as a medical man. Ralph’s nerves must have gone phut! If he suddenly found out that his uncle had been murdered within a few minutes of his leaving him – after, perhaps, a rather stormy interview – well, he might get the wind up and clear right out. Men have been known to do that – act guiltily when they’re perfectly innocent.’ ‘Yes, that is true,’ said Poirot. ‘But we must not lose sight of one thing.’ ‘I know what you’re going to say,’ I remarked: ‘motive.
Ralph Paton inherits a great fortune by his uncle’s death.’ ‘That is one motive,’ agreed Poirot.
‘One?’ ^Mais ow. Do you realize that there are three separate motives staring us in the face. Somebody certainly stole the blue envelope and its contents. That is one motive.
Blackmail! Ralph Paton may have been the man who blackmailed Mrs Ferrars. Remember, as far as Hammond knew, Ralph Paton had not applied to his uncle for help of late. That looks as though he were being supplied with money elsewhere. Then there is the fact that he was in some – how do you say – scrape? – which he feared might get to his uncle’s ears. And finally there is the one you have just mentioned.’ ‘Dear me,’ I said, rather taken aback. ‘The case does seem black against him.’ ‘Does it?’ said Poirot. ‘That is where we disagree, you and I. Three motives – it is almost too much. I am inclined to believe that, after all, Ralph Paton is innocent.’ After the evening talk I have just chronicled, the affair seemed to me to enter on a different phase. The whole thing can be divided into two parts, each clear and distinct from the other. Part I ranges from Ackroyd’s death on the Friday evening to the following Monday night. It is the straightforward narrative of what occurred, as presented to Hercule Poirot. I was at Poirot’s elbow the whole time. I saw what he saw. I tried my best to read his mind. As I know now, I failed in this latter task. Though Poirot showed me all his discoveries – as, for instance, the gold wedding-ring – he held back the vital and yet logical impressions that he formed. As I came to know later, this secrecy was characteristic of him. He would throw out hints and suggestions, but beyond that he would not go.
As I say, up till the Monday evening, my narrative might have been that of Poirot himself. I played Watson to his Sherlock. But after Monday our ways diverged. Poirot was busy on his own account. I got to hear of what he was doing, because in King’s Abbot, you get to hear of everything, but he did not take me into his confidence beforehand. And I, too, had my own preoccupations.
On looking back, the thing that strikes me most is the piecemeal character of this period. Everyone had a hand in the elucidation of the mystery. It was rather like a jigsaw puzzle to which everyone contributed their own little piece of knowledge or discovery. But their task ended there. To Poirot alone belongs the renown of fitting those pieces into their correct place.
Some of the incidents seemed at the time irrelevant and unmeaning. There was, for instance, the question of the black boots. But that comes later… To take things strictly in chronological order, I must begin with the summons from Mrs Ackroyd.
She sent for me early on Tuesday morning, and since the summons sounded an urgent one, I hastened there, expecting to find her in extremis.
The lady was in bed. So much did she concede to the etiquette of the situation. She gave me her bony hand, and indicated a chair drawn up to the bedside.
‘Well, Mrs Ackroyd,’ I said, ‘and what’s the matter with you?’ I spoke with that kind of spurious geniality which seems to be expected of general practitioners.
‘I’m prostrated,’ said Mrs Ackroyd in a faint voice. ‘Absolutely prostrated. It’s the shock of poor Roger’s death.