The Labours of Hercules. Агата Кристи

of No. 10.

      The barking redoubled–footsteps came to the door, it was opened…

      Miss Amy Carnaby fell back, her hand went to her ample breast.

      ‘You permit that I enter?’ said Hercule Poirot, and entered without waiting for the reply.

      There was a sitting-room door open on the right and he walked in. Behind him Miss Carnaby followed as though in a dream.

      The room was very small and much overcrowded. Amongst the furniture a human being could be discovered, an elderly woman lying on a sofa drawn up to the gas fire. As Poirot came in, a Pekinese dog jumped off the sofa and came forward uttering a few sharp suspicious barks.

      ‘Aha,’ said Poirot. ‘The chief actor! I salute you, my little friend.’

      He bent forward, extending his hand. The dog sniffed at it, his intelligent eyes fixed on the man’s face.

      Miss Carnaby muttered faintly:

      ‘So you know?’

      Hercule Poirot nodded.

      ‘Yes, I know.’ He looked at the woman on the sofa. ‘Your sister, I think?’

      Miss Carnaby said mechanically: ‘Yes, Emily, this–this is Mr Poirot.’

      Emily Carnaby gave a gasp. She said: ‘Oh!’

      Amy Carnaby said:

      ‘Augustus…’

      The Pekinese looked towards her–his tail moved–then he resumed his scrutiny of Poirot’s hand. Again his tail moved faintly.

      Gently, Poirot picked the little dog up and sat down with Augustus on his knee. He said:

      ‘So I have captured the Nemean Lion. My task is completed.’

      Amy Carnaby said in a hard dry voice:

      ‘Do you really know everything?’

      Poirot nodded.

      ‘I think so. You organized this business–with Augustus to help you. You took your employer’s dog out for his usual walk, brought him here and went on to the Park with Augustus. The Park Keeper saw you with a Pekinese as usual. The nurse girl, if we had ever found her, would also have agreed that you had a Pekinese with you when you spoke to her. Then, while you were talking, you cut the lead and Augustus, trained by you, slipped off at once and made a bee-line back home. A few minutes later you gave the alarm that the dog had been stolen.’

      There was a pause. Then Miss Carnaby drew herself up with a certain pathetic dignity. She said:

      ‘Yes. It is all quite true. I –I have nothing to say.’

      The invalid woman on the sofa began to cry softly.

      Poirot said:

      ‘Nothing at all, Mademoiselle?’

      Miss Carnaby said:

      ‘Nothing. I have been a thief–and now I am found out.’

      Poirot murmured:

      ‘You have nothing to say–in your own defence?’

      A spot of red showed suddenly in Amy Carnaby’s white cheeks. She said:

      ‘I –I don’t regret what I did. I think that you are a kind man, Mr Poirot, and that possibly you might understand. You see, I’ve been so terribly afraid.’

      ‘Afraid?’

      ‘Yes, it’s difficult for a gentleman to understand, I expect. But you see, I’m not a clever woman at all, and I’ve no training and I’m getting older–and I’m so terrified for the future. I’ve not been able to save anything–how could I with Emily to be cared for? –and as I get older and more incompetent there won’t be any one who wants me. They’ll want somebody young and brisk. I’ve–I’ve known so many people like I am –nobody wants you and you live in one room and you can’t have a fire or any warmth and not very much to eat, and at last you can’t even pay the rent of your room…There are Institutions, of course, but it’s not very easy to get into them unless you have influential friends, and I haven’t. There are a good many others situated like I am–poor companions–untrained useless women with nothing to look forward to but a deadly fear…’

      Her voice shook. She said:

      ‘And so–some of us–got together and–and I thought of this. It was really having Augustus that put it into my mind. You see, to most people, one Pekinese is very much like another. (Just as we think the Chinese are.) Really, of course, it’s ridiculous. No one who knew could mistake Augustus for Nanki Poo or Shan Tung or any of the other Pekes. He’s far more intelligent for one thing, and he’s much handsomer, but, as I say, to most people a Peke is just a Peke. Augustus put it into my head–that, combined with the fact that so many rich women have Pekinese dogs.’

      Poirot said with a faint smile:

      ‘It must have been a profitable–racket! How many are there in the–the gang? Or perhaps I had better ask how often operations have been successfully carried out?’

      Miss Carnaby said simply:

      ‘Shan Tung was the sixteenth.’

      Hercule Poirot raised his eyebrows.

      ‘I congratulate you. Your organization must have been indeed excellent.’

      Emily Carnaby said:

      ‘Amy was always good at organization. Our father–he was the Vicar of Kellington in Essex–always said that Amy had quite a genius for planning. She always made all the arrangements for the Socials and the Bazaars and all that.’

      Poirot said with a little bow:

      ‘I agree. As a criminal, Mademoiselle, you are quite in the first rank.’

      Amy Carnaby cried:

      ‘A criminal. Oh dear, I suppose I am. But–but it never felt like that.’

      ‘How did it feel?’

      ‘Of course, you are quite right. It was breaking the law. But you see–how can I explain it? Nearly all these women who employ us are so very rude and unpleasant. Lady Hoggin, for instance, doesn’t mind what she says to me. She said her tonic tasted unpleasant the other day and practically accused me of tampering with it. All that sort of thing.’ Miss Carnaby flushed. ‘It’s really very unpleasant. And not being able to say anything or answer back makes it rankle more, if you know what I mean.’

      ‘I know what you mean,’ said Hercule Poirot.

      ‘And then seeing money frittered away so wastefully–that is upsetting. And Sir Joseph, occasionally he used to describe a coup he had made in the City–sometimes something that seemed to me (of course, I know I’ve only got a woman’s brain and don’t understand finance) downright dishonest. Well, you know, M. Poirot, it all–it all unsettled me, and I felt that to take a little money away from these people who really wouldn’t miss it and hadn’t been too scrupulous in acquiring it–well, really it hardly seemed wrong at all.’

      Poirot murmured:

      ‘A modern Robin Hood! Tell me, Miss Carnaby, did you ever have to carry out the threats you used in your letters?’

      ‘Threats?’

      ‘Were you ever compelled to mutilate the animals in the way you specified?’

      Miss Carnaby regarded him in horror.

      ‘Of course, I would never have dreamed of doing such a thing! That was just–just an artistic touch.’

      ‘Very artistic. It worked.’

      ‘Well, of course I knew it would. I know how I should have felt about Augustus, and of course I had to make sure these women never told their husbands until afterwards. The plan worked beautifully every time. In nine cases out of ten the companion