Mrs Clapperton frowned. The reply was not to her liking. The man, she decided, was trying to be funny. She got up and said coldly: ‘I must find John.’ As she stepped through the door she dropped her handbag. It
opened and the contents flew far and wide. Poirot rushed gallantly to the rescue. It was some few minutes before the lipsticks, vanit boxes, cigarette case and lighter and other odds and ends were collected. Mrs Clapperton thanked him politely, then she swep! down the deck and said, ‘John ‘ Colonel Clapperton was still deep in conversation with Mis Henderson. He swung round and came quickly to meet his wife.
He bent over her protectively. Her deck chair – was it in the right place? Wouldn’t it be better – ? His manner was courteous – full of gentle consideration. Clearly an adored wife spoilt by ar adoring husband.
Miss Ellie Henderson looked out at the horizon as though. something about it rather disgusted her.
Standing in the smoking-room door, Poirot looked on.
A hoarse quavering voice behind him said: ‘I’d take a hatchet to that woman if I were her husband.’ The old gentleman known disrespectfully among the younger set on board as the Grandfather of All the Tea Planters, had just shuffled in. ‘Boyl’ he called. ‘Get me a whisky peg.’ Poirot stooped to retrieve a torn scrap of notepaper, an over. looked item from the contents of Mrs Clapperton’s bag. Part of. prescription, he noted, containing digitalin. He put it in hi.’ pocket, meaning to restore it to Mrs Clapperton later.
‘Yes,’ went on the aged passenger. ‘Poisonous woman, l remember a woman like that in Poona. In ’87 that was.’ ‘Did anyone take a hatchet to her?’ inquired Poirot.
The old gentleman shook his head sadly.
‘Worried her husband into his grave within the year. Clapperton ought to assert himself. Gives his wife her head too much.’ ‘She holds the purse strings,’ said Poirot gravely.
‘Ha, ha!’ chuckled the old gentleman. ‘You’ve put the matter in a nutshell. Holds the purse strings. Ha, hal’ Two girls burst into the smoking-room. One had a round face with freckles and dark hair streaming out in a windswept con. fusion, the other had freckles and curly chestnut hair.
‘A rescue – a rescue? cried Kitty Mooney. ‘Pam and I are going to rescue Colonel Clapperton.’
‘From his wife,’ gasped Pamela Cregan.
‘We think he’s a pet…’ ‘And she’s just awful – she won’t let him do anything,’ the two girls exclaimed.
‘And if he isn’t with her, he’s usually grabbed by the Henderson woman…’ ‘Who’s quite nice. But terribly old…’ They ran out, gasping in between giggles: ‘A rescue – a rescue
That the rescue of Colonel Clapperton was no isolated sally, but a fixed project was made clear that same evening when the eighteen-year-old Pam Cregan came up to Hercule Poirot, and murmured: ‘Watch us, M. Poirot. He’s going to be cut out from under her nose and taken to walk in the moonlight on the boat deck.’ It was just at that moment that Colonel Clapperton was saying: ‘I grant you the price of a Rolls-Royce. But it’s practically good for a lifetime. Now my car – ‘ ‘My car, I think, John.’ Mrs Clapperton’s voice was shrill and penetrating.
He showed no annoyance at her ungraciousness. Either he was used to it by this time, or else ‘Or else?’ thought Poirot and let himself speculate.
‘Certainly, my dear, your car,’ Clapperton bowed to his wife and finished what he had been saying, perfectly unruffled.
‘Voild ce qu’on appelle le pukka sahib,’ thought Poirot. ‘But the General Forbes says that Clapperton is no gentleman at all. I wonder now.’ There was a suggestion of bridge. Mrs Clapperton, General Forbes and a hawk-eyed couple sat down to it. Miss Henderson had excused herself and gone out on deck.
‘What about your husband?’ asked General Forbes, hesitating.
‘John won’t play,’ said Mrs Clapperton. ‘Most tiresome of him.’ The four bridge players began shuffling the cards.
Pam and Kitty advanced on Colonel Clapperton. Each one took an arm.
‘You’re coming with us!’ said Pam. ‘To the boat deck. There’s a moon.’