'Your vitality is marvellous, dear lady,' said Poirot, with the slightly mechanical air of one responding to his cue.
Mrs Clapperton gave a girlish laugh.
'Everyone tells me how young I ami It's absurd. I never try to pretend I'm a day less than forty-three,' she continued with lightly mendacious candour, 'but a lot of people find it hard to believe. "You're so alive, Adeline," they ay to me. But really, M.
Poirot, what would one be if one wasn't alive?' 'Dead,' said Poirot.
Mrs Clapperton frowned. The reply was not to her liking. The man, she decided, was trying to be funny. She got up and said coldly: 'I must find John.' As she stepped through the door she dropped her handbag. It
opened and the contents flew far and wide. Poirot rushed gallantly to the rescue. It was some few minutes before the lipsticks, vanit boxes, cigarette case and lighter and other odds and ends were collected. Mrs Clapperton thanked him politely, then she swep! down the deck and said, 'John ' Colonel Clapperton was still deep in conversation with Mis Henderson. He swung round and came quickly to meet his wife.
He bent over her protectively. Her deck chair - was it in the right place? Wouldn't it be better -? His manner was courteous - full of gentle consideration. Clearly an adored wife spoilt by ar adoring husband.
Miss Ellie Henderson looked out at the horizon as though. something about it rather disgusted her.
Standing in the smoking-room door, Poirot looked on.
A hoarse quavering voice behind him said: 'I'd take a hatchet to that woman if I were her husband.' The old gentleman known disrespectfully among the younger set on board as the Grandfather of All the Tea Planters, had just shuffled in. 'Boyl' he called. 'Get me a whisky peg.' Poirot stooped to retrieve a torn scrap of notepaper, an over. looked item from the contents of Mrs Clapperton's bag. Part of. prescription, he noted, containing digitalin. He put it in hi.' pocket, meaning to restore it to Mrs Clapperton later.
'Yes,' went on the aged passenger. 'Poisonous woman, l remember a woman like that in Poona. In '87 that was.' 'Did anyone take a hatchet to her?' inquired Poirot.
The old gentleman shook his head sadly.
'Worried her husband into his grave within the year. Clapperton ought to assert himself. Gives his wife her head too much.' 'She holds the purse strings,' said Poirot gravely.
'Ha, ha!' chuckled the old gentleman. 'You've put the matter in a nutshell. Holds the purse strings. Ha, hal' Two girls burst into the smoking-room. One had a round face with freckles and dark hair streaming out in a windswept con. fusion, the other had freckles and curly chestnut hair.
'A rescue - a rescue? cried Kitty Mooney. 'Pam and I are going to rescue Colonel Clapperton.'
'From his wife,' gasped Pamela Cregan.
'We think he's a pet…' 'And she's just awful - she won't let him do anything,' the two girls exclaimed.
'And if he isn't with her, he's usually grabbed by the Henderson woman…' 'Who's quite nice. But terribly old…' They ran out, gasping in between giggles: 'A rescue - a rescue
That the rescue of Colonel Clapperton was no isolated sally, but a fixed project was made clear that same evening when the eighteen-year-old Pam Cregan came up to Hercule Poirot, and murmured: 'Watch us, M. Poirot. He's going to be cut out from under her nose and taken to walk in the moonlight on the boat deck.' It was just at that moment that Colonel Clapperton was saying: 'I grant you the price of a Rolls-Royce. But it's practically good for a lifetime. Now my car - ' 'My car, I think, John.' Mrs Clapperton's voice was shrill and penetrating.
He showed no annoyance at her ungraciousness. Either he was used to it by this time, or else 'Or else?' thought Poirot and let himself speculate.
'Certainly, my dear, your car,' Clapperton bowed to his wife and finished what he had been saying, perfectly unruffled.
'Voild ce qu'on appelle le pukka sahib,' thought Poirot. 'But the General Forbes says that Clapperton is no gentleman at all. I wonder now.' There was a suggestion of bridge. Mrs Clapperton, General Forbes and a hawk-eyed couple sat down to it. Miss Henderson had excused herself and gone out on deck.
'What about your husband?' asked General Forbes, hesitating.
'John won't play,' said Mrs Clapperton. 'Most tiresome of him.' The four bridge players began shuffling the cards.
Pam and Kitty advanced on Colonel Clapperton. Each one took an arm.
'You're coming with us!' said Pam. 'To the boat deck. There's a moon.'
'Don't be foolish, John,' said Mrs Clapperton. 'You'll catch a chill.'
'llot with us, he won't,' said Kitty. 'We're hot stuff!'
He went with them, laughing.
Poirot noticed that Mrs Clapperton said No Bid to her initial bid of Two Clubs.
He strolled out on to the promenade deck. Miss Henderson was standing by the rail. She looked round expectantly as he came to stand beside her and he saw the drop in her expression.
They chatted for a while. Then presently as he fell silent she asked: 'What are you thinking about?'
Poirot replied: 'I am wondering about my knowledge of English.
Mrs Clapperton said: "John won't play bridge." Is not "can't play" the usual term?'
'She takes it as a personal insult that he doesn't, I suppose,' said Ellie drily. 'The man was a fool ever to have married her.'
In the darkness Poirot smiled. 'You don't think it's just possible that the marriage may be a success?' he asked diffidently.
'With a woman like that?'
Poirot shrugged his shoulders. 'Many odious women have devoted husbands. An enigma of nature. You will admit that nothing she says or does appears to gall him.' Miss Henderson was considering her reply when Mrs Clapperton's voice floated out through the smoking-room window.
'No - I don't think I will play another rubber. So stuffy. I think I'll go up and get some air on the boat deck.'
'Good night,' said Miss Hendersom 'I'm going to bed.' She disappeared abruptly.
Poirot strolled forward to the lounge - deserted save for Colonel Clapperton and the two girls. He was doing card tricks for them and noting the dexterity of his shuffling and handling of the cards, Poirot remembered the General's story of a career on the music hall stage.
'I see you enjoy the cards even though you do not play bridge,' he remarked.
'I've my reasons for not playing bridge,' said Clapperton, his charming smile breaking out. 'I'll show you. We'll play one hand.' He dealt the cards rapidly. 'Pick up your hands. Well, what about it?' He laughed at the bewildered expression on Kitty's face.
He laid down his hand and the others followed suit. Kitty held the entire club suit, M. Poirot the hearts, Pam the diamonds and Colonel Clapperton the spades.
'You see?' he said. 'A man who can deal his partner and his adversaries any hand he pleases had better stand aloof from a friendly gamet If the luck goes too much his way, ill-natured things might be said.'
'Ohl' gasped Kitty. 'How could you do that? It all looked perfectly ordinary.'
'The quickness of the hand deceives the eye,' said Poirot sententiously - and caught the sudden change in the Colonel's expression.
It was as though he realized that he had been off his guard for a moment or two.
Poirot smiled. The conjuror had shown himself through the mask of the pukka sahib.
The ship reached Alexandria at dawn the following morning.
As Poirot came up from breakfast he found the two girls all ready to go on shore. They were talking to Colonel Clapperton.
'We ought to get off now,' urged Kitty. 'The passport people will be going off the ship presently. You'll come with us, won't you? You wouldn't let us go ashore all by ourselves? Awful things might happen to us.'