He stared over toward the big iron safe, which was curiously set into the wall within the confines of a large rosewood desk. When the sloping lid was closed it entirely shut the safe from view. At present the lid was up and the safe-door ajar, just as it had been when the murder was discovered, Inspector Rossiter had informed us.
“I do not quite follow you, Pons.”
“Do you not, Parker. When a person calls here, for example, and the three ladies of the household are discussing financial matters of a confidential nature, he cannot help hearing, even though the people concerned are out of sight, right round the angle of the L-shaped room.”
He paused, as though for effect and went on more slowly.
“For example a man in business, extremely hard-pressed as many people are in these impoverished times, has come to seek Miss Schneider for payment of a long-outstanding debt.
While standing there he hears an altercation going on about money. The safe-door is opened during that time and there is the clink of coins and the rustle of notes. As a local person he knows there is the sum of ten thousand pounds in that safe and that it is open and the cash so close to him.”
I stared at my companion.
“I follow you, Pons. It was a crime committed on the spur of the moment, when exposed to temptation and with a sense of injustice at the non-payment of his bill.”
Pons nodded, his eyes shining.
“Excellent, Parker! You have excelled yourself. There you have it in a nutshell. The people in the room, though they had invited him in and knew he was there, had temporarily forgotten him in the heat of their arguments. Is that not so, Mrs. Hambleton?”
The housekeeper nodded.
“You could say so, Mr. Pons. Every person in this room, saving yourself, the doctor, the young lady, and the police, was in that situation, you might say. All were owed money by Miss Schneider, all had mentioned that fact to her, and every single one had been invited in to hear what she had to say to myself and Mrs. Rose on the subject of thrift and money. That is a fact, Mr. Pons, strange as you may find it.”
Solar Pons rubbed his right ear gently with his forefinger.
“I believe you, Mrs. Hambleton. Nothing is so singular as human nature, and I have had long observation of it. But surely the postman, Mr. Biggs here, was not owed money?”
The man indicated, a long, stringy individual with a morose face, shifted uneasily in his chair.
“My job is not a well-paid one, sir. In my spare time I do shoe repairs for the people of the village. Miss Schneider owed me £30 for work and materials, which is a lot of money to me, Mr. Pons. But I would not have killed her for it, if the amount had been three thousand pounds.”
Solar Pons smiled thinly.
“I am inclined to believe you, Mr. Biggs.”
He turned back to me and I took the opportunity to ask him the question which had been on my tongue for the last minute or two.
“You said the problem was difficult and yet easy, Pons.”
“Indeed. Difficult, inasmuch as a number of people who came here knew about the safe, of the money in it, and that it was open. Easy, because of the geography of the room. He was in the room, could hear what was going on but could not himself be seen because the three involved in the argument were round the angle, up in the far corner of the room.”
“But why easy, Pons?”
“Because he had an ideal opportunity, Parker.”
I looked at my companion with increasing bewilderment. “Opportunity for what, Pons?”
“Tut, Parker. It is obvious. To remove that bundle of logs from the basket in the fireplace and quietly place it behind the study door yonder.”
It had grown very quiet in the room but now Inspector Rossiter cleared his throat harshly, making a jarring, divisive noise in the darkling room.
“You surely cannot place any significance on that trivial matter, Mr. Pons.”
Solar Pons shook his head impatiently.
“On the contrary, Inspector, that trivial fact is of vital importance and immediately pointed me in the right direction.”
My companion had come back down the room and stood in front of the fireplace looking thoughtfully about him.
“The solution of his financial problems had come to him in a flash, Parker. He had only to be patient. But he could not directly face the woman he intended to kill. So he hid those logs behind the door while the three women were arguing among themselves, out of sight at the far corner of the room.”
“With what purpose, Pons?”
“Tut, Parker, it is surely elementary. It was a bitterly cold day. During the course of the late afternoon or evening the fire would go out. Miss Schneider would discover there were no logs in the basket and would have to go out to the woodshed for fuel to replenish the fire.”
I stared at him in astonishment.
“Of course, Pons!”
Pons chuckled ironically.
“Of course, Parker. It was self-evident. That solution presented itself to me very early on and when I examined that pile of logs for myself and saw the lay-out of the room the explanation readily suggested itself.
“The Inspector has been looking at the problem of a murderer who walked into that building and never came out. Looked at from another viewpoint, that of the snowfall, it was the problem, in a sense, of a murderer who came out and never went in.”
“But we saw his foot-prints going in!” insisted Inspector Rossiter.
Solar Pons shook his head.
“We saw his foot-prints coming out, Inspector.”
“But how, Pons?” I asked.
“Because he was already there, before the snow began.” Solar Pons looked almost dreamily about the room, conscious of the uneasy shifting of his audience.
“Except for the brutality of the crime and the horror of the situation in that lonely shed one could almost feel sorry for the man.”
“Sorry, Pons?”
My companion nodded, with an ironical glance at Inspector Rossiter.
“Here we have a highly respectable man, short of money, who is brought low for lack of cash during the current recession. Like millions of others he has no control over his own destiny. But he suddenly sees an opportunity of securing wealth beyond his wildest expectations. The old woman owes him money and with typical meanness refuses to pay. He will take the money for himself. So he secretes himself in that shed. One wonders what his thoughts were as he waited hour after hour in that freezing wooden building, waiting for the fire to burn low, for the old woman, his victim, to come out to her lonely death.”
There was a quality in Pons’ tones which I had seldom heard before and I must confess I could not repress a shudder at his words. I glanced round at the large group of people in the farmhouse parlour and could see that they were similarly affected.
“So the murderer was already in the shed, Pons?”
“Exactly. That was why there were no footprints going there. He hid himself long before the snow began. And he must have been appalled when he first looked out and saw that whatever he did, he could not avoid leaving traces of his presence upon the scene.”
“Good Lord, Pons!” I could not help bursting out.
Inspector Rossiter took one step toward Pons and looked at him in stupefaction.
“You will have to prove that, Mr. Pons,” he said in almost inaudible tones.
“I intend to do so, Inspector.”
My companion’s deep-set eyes were shining as they raked over the oddly assorted group of men and women sitting before him.
“No, Parker, there were no implausible dives into cold water for our man. He was far too intelligent for that. He improvised brilliantly to stage what seemed like an impossible crime. A man who walked down the drive and then from the house to the woodshed, to strangle an old woman before disappearing into thin air.”