I say to myself—the aunt and niece are in this together.”
“Then you never suspected Norton Kane?”
“Mon ami!
With that moustache?
A criminal is either clean-shaven or he has a proper moustache that can be removed at will.
But what an opportunity for the clever Miss Penn—a shrinking elderly lady with a pink-and-white complexion as we saw her.
But if she holds herself erect, wears large boots, alters her complexion with a few unseemly blotches and—crowning touch—adds a few sparse hairs to her upper lip. What then?
A masculine woman, says Mr. Wood and ‘a man in disguise’ say we at once.”
“She really went to Charlock yesterday?”
“Assuredly.
The train, as you may remember telling me, left here at eleven and got to Charlock Bay at two o’clock.
Then the return train is even quicker—the one we came by.
It leaves Charlock at four-five and gets here at six-fifteen.
Naturally, the miniatures were never in the despatch case at all.
That was artistically forced before being packed.
Mademoiselle Mary has only to find a couple of mugs who will be sympathetic to her charm and champion beauty in distress.
But one of the mugs was no mug—he was Hercule Poirot!”
I hardly liked the inference.
I said hurriedly:
“Then when you said you were helping a stranger, you were wilfully deceiving me.
That’s exactly what you were doing.”
“Never do I deceive you, Hastings.
I only permit you to deceive yourself.
I was referring to Mr. Baker Wood—a stranger to these shores.” His face darkened. “Ah!
When I think of that imposition, that iniquitous overcharge, the same fare single to Charlock as return, my blood boils to protect the visitor!
Not a pleasant man, Mr. Baker Wood, not, as you would say, sympathetic.
But a visitor!
And we visitors, Hastings, must stand together.
Me, I am all for the visitors!”