阳光下的罪恶09

IV

When you came out of the hotel on the south side the terraces and the bathing beach wereimmediately below you. There was also a path that led off round the cliff on the southwest side ofthe island. A little way along it, a few steps led down to a series of recesses² cut into the cliff andlabelled on the hotel map of the island as Sunny Ledge³. Here cut out of the cliff were niches⁴ withseats in them.

To one of these, immediately after dinner, came Patrick Redfern and his wife. It was a lovelyclear night with a bright moon.

The Redferns sat down. For a while they were silentAt last Patrick Redfern said:

“It’s a glorious evening, isn’t it, Christine?”

“Yes.”

Something in her voice may have made him uneasy. He sat without looking at her.

Christine Redfern asked in her quiet voice:

“Did you know that woman was going to be here?”

He turned sharply. He said:

“I don’t know what you mean.”

“I think you do.”

“Look here, Christine. I don’t know what has come over you—”

She interrupted. Her voice held feeling now. It trembled.

“Over me? It’s what has come over you!”

“Nothing’s come over me.”

“Oh! Patrick! it has! You insisted so on coming here. You were quite vehement⁵. I wanted to goto Tintagel again where—where we had our honeymoon⁶. You were bent⁷ on coming here.”

“Well, why not? It’s a fascinating spot.”

“Perhaps. But you wanted to come here because she was going to be here.”

“She? Who is she?”

“Mrs. Marshall. You—you’re infatuated with her.”

“For God’s sake, Christine, don’t make a fool of yourself. It’s not like you to be jealous.”

His bluster⁸ was a little uncertain. He exaggerated it.

She said:

“We’ve been so happy.”

“Happy? Of course we’ve been happy! We are happy. But we shan’t go on being happy if Ican’t even speak to another woman without you kicking up a row.”

“It’s not like that.”

“Yes, it is. In marriage one has got to have — well — friendships with other people. Thissuspicious attitude is all wrong. I—I can’t speak to a pretty woman without your jumping to theconclusion that I’m in love with her—”

He stopped. He shrugged⁹ his shoulders.

Christine Redfern said:

“You are in love with her….”

“Oh, don’t be a fool, Christine! I’ve—I’ve barely spoken to her.”

“That’s not true.”

“Don’t for goodness” sake get into the habit of being jealous of every pretty woman we comeacross.”

Christine Redfern said:

“She’s not just any pretty woman! She’s—she’s different! She’s a bad lot! Yes, she is. She’ll doyou harm, Patrick, please, give it up. Let’s go away from here.”

Patrick Redfern stuck out his chin mutinously¹⁰. He looked, somehow, very young as he saiddefiantly:

“Don’t be ridiculous, Christine. And—and don’t let’s quarrel about it.”

“I don’t want to quarrel.”

“Then behave like a reasonable human being. Come on, let’s go back to the hotel.”

He got up. There was a pause, then Christine Redfern got up too.

She said:

“Very well….”

In the recess¹ adjoining, on the seat there, Hercule Poirot sat and shook his head sorrowfully.

Some people might have scrupulously¹¹ removed themselves from earshot of a privateconversation. But not Hercule Poirot. He had no scruples¹² of that kind.

“Besides,” as he explained to his friend Hastings at a later date, “it was a question of murder.”

Hastings said, staring:

“But the murder hadn’t happened, then.”

Hercule Poirot sighed. He said:

“But already, mon cher, it was very clearly indicated.”

“Then why didn’t you stop it?”

And Hercule Poirot, with a sigh, said as he had said once before in Egypt, that if a person isdetermined to commit murder it is not easy to prevent them. He does not blame himself for whathappened. It was, according to him, inevitable¹³.

 

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