Edward was sent back to school and I and Celia went to my pensionnat. I came back here-after seeing Celia settled in.
Once the house was empty except for myself, General Ravenscroft and Dorothea and Margaret, nobody had any anxiety. And then one day it happened. The two sisters went out together. Dolly returned alone. She seemed in a very queer and nervous state. She came in and sat down at the tea table. It was then General Ravenscroft noticed that her right hand was covered with blood. He asked her if she had had a fall. She said, 'Oh, no, it was nothing. Nothing at all. I got scratched by a rosebush.' But there were no rosebushes on the Downs. It was a purely foolish remark and we were worried.
If she had said a gorse bush, we might have accepted the remark. General Ravenscroft went out and I went after him.
He kept saying as he walked, 'Something has happened to Margaret. I'm sure something has happened to Molly.' We found her on a ledge a little way down the cliff. She had been battered with a rock and stones. She was not dead, but she had bled heavily. For a moment we hardly knew what we could do. We dared not move her. We must get a doctor, we felt, at once, but before we could do that, she clung to her husband. She said, gasping for breath, 'Yes, it was Dolly. She didn't know what she was doing. She didn't know, Alistair.
You mustn't let her suffer for it. She's never known the things she does or why. She can't help it. She's never been able to help it. You must promise me, Alistair. I think I'm dying now. No-no, we won't have time to get a doctor and a doctor couldn't do anything. I've been lying here bleeding to death-and I'm very close to death. I know that, but promise me. Promise me you'll save her. Promise me you won't let the police arrest her. Promise me that she'll not be tried for killing me, not shut up for life as a criminal. Hide me somewhere so that my body won't be found. Please, please, it's the last thing I ask you. You whom I love more than anything in the world. If I could live for you I would, but I'm not going to live. I can feel that. I crawled a little way, but that was all I could do. Promise me. And you, Zeiie, you love me, too. I know. You've loved me and been good to me and looked after me always. And you loved the children, so you must save Dolly. You must save poor Dolly. Please, please. For all the love we have for each other, Dolly must be saved.' " "And then," said Poirot, "what did you do? It seems to me that you must in some way between you-" "Yes. She died, you know. She died within about ten minutes of those last words, and I helped him. I helped him to hide her body. It was a place a little farther along the cliff.
We carried her there and there were rocks and boulders and stones, and we covered her body as best we could. There was no path to it, really, or no way. You had to scramble. We put her there. All Alistair said again and again' was-'I promised her. I must keep my word. I don't know how to do it. I don't know how anyone can save her. I don't know. But-' Well, we did do it. Dolly was in the house. She was frightened, desperate with fright, but at the same time she showed a horrible kind of satisfaction. She said, 'I always knew. I've known for years that Molly was really evil. She took you away from me, Alistair. You belonged to me-but she took you away from me and made you marry her and I always knew one day I should get even with her. I always knew. Now I'm frightened. What'll they do to me-what'll they say? I can't be shut up again. I can't, I can't. I shall go mad. You won't let me be shut up.
They'll take me away and they'll say I'm guilty of murder. It wasn't murder. I just had to do it. Sometimes I do have to do things. I wanted to see the blood, you know. I couldn't wait to see Molly die, though. I ran away. But I knew she would die. I just hoped you wouldn't find her. She just fell over the cliff.
People would say it was an accident.' " "It's a horrible story," said Desmond.
"Yes," said Celia, "it's a horrible story, but it's better to know. It's better to know, isn't it? I can't even feel sorry for her. I mean for my mother. I know she was sweet. I know there was never any trace of evil in her-she was good all through-and I know, I can understand, why my father didn't want to marry Dolly. He wanted to marry my mother because he loved her and he had found out by then that there was something wrong with Dolly. Something bad and twisted. But how-how did you do it all?" "We told a good many lies," said Zeiie. "We hoped the body would not be found so that later perhaps it might be removed in the night or something like that to somewhere where it could look as though she'd fallen down into the sea. But then we thought of the sleep-walking story. What we had to do was really quite simple. Alistair said, 'It's frightening, you know.
But I promised-I swore to Molly when she was dying. I swore I'd do as she asked. There's a way, a possible way to save Dolly, if only Dolly can do her part. I don't know if she's capable of it.' I said, 'Do what?' And Alistair said, 'Pretend she's Molly and that it's Dorothea who walked in her sleep and fell to her death.' "We managed it. Took Dolly to an empty cottage we knew of and I stayed with her there for some days. Alistair said Molly had been taken to hospital suffering from shock after the discovery that her sister had fallen over the cliff while walking in her sleep at night. Then we brought Dolly back- brought her back as Molly-wearing Molly's clothes and Molly's wig. I got extra wigs-the kind with curls, which really did disguise her. The dear old housekeeper, Janet, couldn't see very well. Dolly and Molly were really very much alike, you know, and their voices were alike. Everyone accepted quite easily that it was Molly, behaving rather peculiarly now and then because of still suffering from shock. It all seemed quite natural. That was the horrible part of it-" "But how could she keep it up?" asked Celia. "It must have been dreadfully difficult." "No-she did not find it difficult. She had got, you see, what she wanted-what she had always wanted. She had got Alistair-" "But Alistair-how could he bear it?" "He told me why and how-on the day he had arranged for me to go back to Switzerland. He told me what I had to do and then he told me what he was going to do.
"He said: "There is only one thing for me to do. I promised Margaret that I wouldn't hand Dolly over to the police, that it should never be known that she was a murderess, that the children were never to know that they had a murderess for an aunt. No one need ever know that Dolly committed murder.
She walked in her sleep and fell over the cliff-a sad accident and she will be buried here in the church, and under her own name.' " 'How can you let that be done?' I asked. I couldn't bear it.
"He said: 'Because of what I am going to do-you have got to know about it.' " 'You see,' he said, 'Dolly has to be stopped from living. If she's near children, she'll take more lives-poor soul; she's not fit to live. But you must understand, Zeiie, that because of what I am going to do, I must pay with my own life, too. I shall live here quietly for a few weeks with Dolly playing the part of my wife-and then there will be another tragedy-' "I didn't understand what he meant. I said, 'Another accident? Sleepwalking again?' And he said, 'No-what will be known to the world is that I and Molly have both committed suicide. I don't suppose the reason will ever be known.
They may think it's because she was convinced she had cancer-or that I thought so-all sorts of things may be suggested. But you see-you must help me, Zeiie. You are the only person who really loves me and loves Molly and loves the children. If Dolly has got to die, I am the only person who must do it. She won't be unhappy or frightened. I shall shoot her and then myself. Her fingerprints will show on the revolver because she handled it not long ago, and mine will be there too. Justice has to be done and I have to be the executioner. The thing I want you to know is that I did-that I still do-love them both. Molly more than my life. Dolly because I pity her so much for what she was born to be.' He said, 'Always remember that-' " Zeiie rose and came towards Celia. "Now you know the truth," she said. "I promised your father that you should never know.