Best Detective Stories of Agatha Christie

Haydock stared at his friend.

“Well, what about it?”

“Just this. In my profession we’ve got tests too -tests for murder. There’s adding up the facts – weighing them, dissecting the residue when you’ve allowed for prejudicc and the general inaccuracy of witnesses. But there’s another test of murder -one that is fairly accurate, but rather -dangerous! A murderer is seldom content with one crime. Give him time, and a lack of suspicion, and he’ll commit another. You catch a man -has he murdered his wife or hasn’t he? – perhaps the case isn’t very black against him. Look into his past – if` you find that he’s had several wives – and that they’ve all died shall we say – rather curiously? – then you know! I’m not speaking legally, you understand. I’m speaking of moral certainty. Once you know, you can go ahead looking for evidence.”

“Well?”

“I’m coming to the point. That’s all right if there is a past to look into. But suppose you catch your murderer at his or her first crime? Then that test will be one from which you get no reaction. But suppose the prisoner was acquitted – starting life under another name. Will or will not the murderer repeat the crime?”

“That’s a horrible idea!”

“Do you still say it’s none of our business?”

“Yes, I do. You’ve no reason to think that Mrs Merrowdene is anything but a Perfectly innocent woman.”

The ex-inspector was silent for a moment. Then he said slowly:

“I told you that we looked into her past and found nothing. That’s not quite true. There was a stepfather. As a girl of eighteen she had a fancy for some young man – and her stepfather exerted his authority to keep them apart. She and her stepfather went for a walk along a rather dangerous part of the cliff. There was an accident – the stepfather went too near the edge – it gave way, and he went over and was killed.”

“You don’t think – “

“It was an accident. Accident! Anthony’s overdose of arsenic was an accident. She’d never have been tried if it hadn’t transpired that there was another man – he sheered off, by the way. Looked as though he weren’t satisfied even if the jury? were. I tell you, Haydock, where that woman is concerned I’m afraid of another – accident!”

The old captain shrugged his shoulders.

“It’s been nine years since that affair. Why should there be another ‘accident,’ as you call it, now?”

“I didn’t say now. I said some day or other. If the necessary motive arose.”

Captain Haydock shrugged his shoulders.

“Well, I don’t know how you’re going to guard against that.”

“Neither do I,” said Evans ruefully.

“I should leave well alone,” said Captain Haydock. “No good ever came of butting into other people’s affairs.”

But that advice was not Palatable to the ex-inspector. He was a man of patience but determination. Taking leave of his friend, he sauntered down to the village, revolving in his mind the possibilities of some kind of successful action.

Turning into the post office to buy some stamps, he ran into the object of his solicitude, George Merrowdene. The ex-chemistry professor was a small dreamy-looking man, gentle and kindly in manner, and usually completely absent-minded. He recognized the other and greeted him amicably, stooping to recover the letters that the impact had caused him to drop on the ground. Evans stooped also and, more rapid in his movements than the other, secured them first, handing them back to their owner with an apology.

He glanced down at them in doing so, and the address on the topmost suddenly awakened all his suspicions anew. It bore the name of a well-known insurance firm.

Instantly his mind was made up. The guileless George Merrowdene hardly realized how it came about that he and the ex-inspector were strolling down the village together, and still less could he have said how it came about that the conversation should come round to the subject of life insurance.

Evans had no difficulty in attaining his object. Merrowdene of his own accord volunteered the information that he had just insured his life for his wife’s benefit, and asked Evans’s opinion of the company in question.

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