He rang the bell to summon the conductor; then, as you express it, the wind rose in him – he was afraid of being accused of the crime, and he spoke pretending to be Ratchett.”
“C’est possible,” admitted M. Bouc grudgingly.
Poirot looked at Mrs. Hubbard.
“Yes, Madame, you were going to say–”
“Well, I don’t quite know what I was going to say.
Do you think I forgot to put my watch back too?”
“No, Madame.
I think you heard the man pass through – but unconsciously. Later you had a nightmare of a man being in your compartment and woke up with a start and rang for the conductor.”
“Well, I suppose that’s possible,” admitted Mrs. Hubbard.
Princess Dragomiroff was looking at Poirot with a very direct glance.
“How do you explain the evidence of my maid, Monsieur?”
“Very simply, Madame.
Your maid recognised the handkerchief I showed her as yours.
She somewhat clumsily tried to shield you.
She did encounter the man, but earlier – while the train was at Vincovci station.
She pretended to have seen him at a later hour, with a confused idea of giving you a water-tight alibi.”
The Princess bowed her head.
“You have thought of everything, Monsieur.
I – I admire you.”
There was a silence.
Then everyone jumped as Dr. Constantine suddenly hit the table a blow with his fist.
“But no,” he said. “No, no, and again no! That is an explanation that will not hold water.
It is deficient in a dozen minor points.
The crime was not committed so – M. Poirot must know that perfectly well.”
Poirot turned a curious glance on him.
“I see,” he said, “that I shall have to give you my second solution.
But do not abandon this one too abruptly.
You may agree with it later.”
He turned back again to face the others.
“There is another possible solution of the crime.
This is how I arrived at it.
“When I had heard all the evidence, I leaned back and shut my eyes, and began to think.
Certain points presented themselves to me as worthy of attention.
I enumerated these points to my two colleagues.
Some I have already elucidated – such as a grease spot on a passport, and so on.
I will run over the points that remain.
The first and most important is a remark made to me by M. Bouc in the restaurant car at lunch on the first day after leaving Stamboul – to the effect that the company assembled was interesting because it was so varied – representing as it did all classes and nationalities.
“I agreed with him, but when this particular point came into my mind, I tried to imagine whether such an assembly was ever likely to be collected under any other conditions.
And the answer I made to myself was – only in America.
In America there might be a household composed of just such varied nationalities – an Italian chauffeur, an English governess, a Swedish nurse, a German lady’s-maid, and so on.
That led me to my scheme of ‘guessing’ – that is, casting each person for a certain part in the Armstrong drama much as a producer casts a play.
Well, that gave me an extremely interesting and satisfactory result.
“I had also examined in my own mind each separate person’s evidence, with some curious results.
Take first the evidence of Mr. MacQueen.
My first interview with him was entirely satisfactory.
But in my second he made rather a curious remark.
I had described to him the finding of a note mentioning the Armstrong case.
He said,
‘But surely–’ and then paused and went on,
‘I mean – that was rather careless of the old man.’