The Mystery of Three Quarters: The New Hercule Poirot Mystery

Dockerill’s smile dimmed as he struggled to make sense of Poirot’s announcement. ‘A son who … the great-grandson of … Of course! Yes, she does. She does indeed!’

This meant, thought Poirot, that it was not so simple as two pink squares and two yellow; it was not a case of pairs. Three recipients of the letter could be linked to Barnabas Pandy most definitively, and one could not—at least, not yet.

Two questions interested Poirot: had Barnabas Pandy been murdered? And was John McCrodden the odd one out? Or was he also connected to the deceased Pandy in a manner that was not yet clear?

CHAPTER 5 (#ulink_bb7eac0e-b45f-50ad-8886-47cbe029a1c5)

A Letter with a Hole in it (#ulink_bb7eac0e-b45f-50ad-8886-47cbe029a1c5)

I am producing this account of what Poirot later decided to call ‘The Mystery of Three Quarters’ on a typewriter that has a faulty letter ‘e’. I don’t know if anyone will publish it, but if you are reading a printed version, all of the ‘e’s will be flawless. It is nevertheless significant that in the original typescript there is (or should I say for the benefit of future readers, was?) a small white gap in the middle of the horizontal bar of each letter ‘e’—an extraordinarily tiny hole in the black ink.

Why is this important? To answer that question immediately would be to rush ahead of my own narrative. Let me explain.

My name is Edward Catchpool and I’m an inspector with Scotland Yard. I’m also the person telling this story—not only now, but from the beginning, though I have been helped by several people to fill in those parts of the drama for which I was absent. I am especially grateful to the sharp eyes and the loquaciousness of Hercule Poirot, who, when it comes to detail, misses nothing. Thanks to him, I do not feel that I, in any meaningful sense, missed the events I have so far recounted, all of which occurred before I returned from Great Yarmouth.

The less said about my infuriatingly tedious stay at the seaside, the better. The only relevant point is that I was compelled to return to London sooner than planned (you can imagine my relief) by the arrival of two telegrams. One was from Hercule Poirot, who said he urgently needed my help, and could I come back at once? The other, impossible to ignore, was from my superintendent at Scotland Yard, Nathaniel Bewes. This second telegram, though not from Poirot, was about him. Apparently he was ‘making life difficult’, and Bewes wanted me to stop him.

I was touched by the Super’s quite unjustifiable confidence in my ability to alter the behaviour of my Belgian friend, and so, once back in Bewes’s office, I sat quietly and nodded sympathetically as he gave vent to his dismay. The essence of what was at stake seemed clear enough. Poirot believed the son of Rowland ‘Rope’ McCrodden to be guilty of murder, and had said so, and claimed to be able to prove it. The Super didn’t like this one bit because Rowland Rope was a chum of his, and he wanted me to persuade Poirot to think otherwise.

Instead of paying attention to the Super’s loud and varied expressions of disgust, I was busy rehearsing my answer. Should I say, ‘There’s no point in my talking to Poirot about this—if he’s sure he’s right then he won’t listen to me’? No, that would make me sound both truculent and defeatist. And, since Poirot wanted to talk to me as a matter of urgency, presumably about this very same business, I decided to promise the Super that I would do my best to make him see sense. Then, from Poirot, I would find out why he believed Rowland Rope’s son was a murderer when apparently no one else did, and convey his thoughts back to the Super. All of this seemed manageable. I saw no need to upset the apple cart at work by pointing out that ‘He’s my friend’s son’ is neither proof of innocence nor a viable defence.

Nathaniel Bewes is a mild, even-tempered and fair-minded man—apart from in the immediate aftermath of something that has especially upset him. In those rare moments he is incapable of realizing that he is greatly distressed and that his emotional state might have skewed his perspective. Because his judgement is so often sound, he assumes it will always be, and is therefore liable to make the most absurd pronouncements—things which, in his usual calm frame of mind, he would be the first to call idiotic. Once restored to sanity after one of his episodes, he never refers to the period during which he emitted a series of ridiculous statements and directives, and, as far as I know, no one else ever refers to them either. I certainly don’t. Though it sounds fanciful, I am not convinced that the normal Super is aware of the existence of his deranged counterpart who occasionally understudies for him.

I nodded judiciously as the understudy ranted and growled, striding up and down his small office, pushing his spectacles back up to the bridge of his nose as they slid down with disconcerting frequency.

‘Rowly’s son, a murderer? Preposterous! He’s the son of Rowland McCrodden! If you were the son of a man like that, Catchpool, would you take up murder as a way of passing the time? Of course you wouldn’t! Only a fool would! Besides, the death of Barnabas Pandy was an accident—I’ve availed myself of the official record of his passing and it’s all there in black and white, plain as day: accident! The man drowned in his bath. Ninety-four, he was. I mean, I ask you—ninety-four! How much longer was he likely to live? Would you risk your neck to murder a ninety-four-year-old man, Catchpool? It beggars belief. No one would. Why would they?’

‘Well—’

‘There could be no reason,’ Bewes concluded. ‘Now, I don’t know what your Belgian chum thinks he’s up to, but you’d better make it clear to him in no uncertain terms that he is to write to Rowly McCrodden at once and convey his most profuse apologies.’ Bewes had clearly forgotten that he too was on friendly terms with Poirot.

There were, of course, many reasons why someone might murder a nonagenarian: if he had threatened to expose their shameful secret to the world the very next day, for instance. And Bewes—the real Bewes, not his unbalanced doppelgänger—knew as well as I did that some murders are initially mistaken for accidents. To grow up as the son of a man famous for helping to dispatch miscreants to the gallows could, arguably, warp a person’s psyche to the point where he might decide to kill.

I knew there was no point saying any of this to the Super today, though in a different mood he would have made the same good points himself. I decided to risk only a minor challenge. ‘Didn’t you say Poirot sent this letter of accusation to Rowland Rope’s son, not to Rowland Rope himself?’

‘Well, what if he did?’ Bewes rounded on me angrily. ‘What difference does that make?’

‘How old is John McCrodden?’

‘How old? What the devil are you talking about? Does his age matter?’

‘Is he a man or a young boy?’ I continued patiently.

‘Have you taken leave of your senses, Catchpool? John McCrodden is a grown man.’

‘Then wouldn’t it make more sense for me to ask Poirot to apologize to John McCrodden, not his father? Assuming he’s mistaken and John McCrodden is innocent. I mean, if John is not a minor—’

‘He used to be a miner, but not any more,’ said Bewes. ‘He worked in a mine somewhere up in the north-east.’

‘Ah,’ I said, knowing that my boss’s ability to understand context would return sooner if I said as little as possible.

‘But that, Catchpool, is beside the point. Poor Rowly’s the one we need to worry about. John is blaming him for the whole mess. Poirot must write to Rowly immediately and grovel for all he’s worth. This is a monstrous accusation—an outrageous slur! Please see to it that this happens, Catchpool.’

‘I’ll do my best, sir.’

‘Good.’

‘Can you tell me any more about the particulars of the case, sir? I don’t suppose Rowland Rope mentioned why Poirot has got hold of this idea that—’

‘How the devil should I know why, Catchpool? Man must have lost his grip on his faculties—that’s the only explanation I can think of. You can read the letter for yourself, if you like!’

‘Do you have it?’

‘John tore it into pieces, which he sent to Rowly with a note of accusation of his own. Rowly taped the pieces together and passed the letter on to me. I don’t know why John thinks Rowly’s behind it. Rowly plays a straight bat. Always has. His son, of all people, should know that. If Rowly had something to say to John, he’d say it himself.’

‘I’d like to see the letter if I may, sir.’

Bewes walked over to his desk, opened one of the drawers and grimaced as he pulled out the offending item. He handed it to me. ‘It’s the purest nonsense!’ he said, in case I was unsure of his opinion of the matter. ‘Malicious rubbish!’

‘But Poirot is never malicious,’ I nearly said; I stopped myself just in time.

I read the letter. It was brief: only one paragraph. Nevertheless, given what it sought to communicate, it could have been half the length. In a muddled and artless way, it accused John McCrodden of the murder of Barnabas Pandy and claimed that there was proof to vindicate the accusation. If McCrodden did not immediately confess to this murder, then this proof would be turned over to the police.

My gaze settled upon the signature at the bottom of the letter. In a sloping hand was written the name ‘Hercule Poirot’.

It would have been useful if I could have recalled my friend’s signature, but I could not, despite having seen it once or twice. Perhaps whoever had sent the letter had meticulously copied Poirot’s handwriting. What they had not done was manage to sound at all like the man they hoped to impersonate, nor to write the sort of letter he might have written.

If Poirot believed that John McCrodden had murdered this Barnabas Pandy fellow and successfully passed his death off as an accident, he would have visited McCrodden accompanied by the police. He wouldn’t have sent this letter and allowed McCrodden the chance to escape or to take his own life before Hercule Poirot had looked him in the eye and explained to him the chain of errors that had led to his unmasking. And the nasty, insinuating tone … No, it was impossible. There was no doubt in my mind.

I had not had time to work out what effect my revelation would have upon the Super, but I felt I must tell him at once: ‘Sir, the situation seems not to be exactly what I … or what you … That is to say, I’m not sure that an apology from Poirot …’ I was making a hash of it.

‘What are you trying to say, Catchpool?’

‘The letter is a fake, sir,’ I said. ‘I don’t know who wrote it, but I can tell you for certain that it was not Hercule Poirot.’

CHAPTER 6 (#ulink_4a4abaa9-0952-57f4-94a3-81eeb150ae58)

Rowland Rope (#ulink_4a4abaa9-0952-57f4-94a3-81eeb150ae58)

The Super’s instructions were clear: I was to find Poirot at once and ask him to accompany me to the offices of Rowland Rope’s firm of solicitors, Donaldson & McCrodden. Once there, we were to explain that the letter sent to John McCrodden had not been written by Poirot, and to apologize fulsomely for the distress caused by neither one of us.

Having already wasted too many days in Great Yarmouth, I had urgent work to catch up with and was displeased to have this task assigned to me. Surely a telephone call from Bewes to Rowland Rope would have sufficed? The two were great friends, after all. But no, the Super had insisted that McCrodden Senior was a more than usually cautious man who would require an assurance from Poirot that he had not written the offending letter. Bewes wanted me to be present so that I could report back to him that the matter had been satisfactorily dealt with.

‘This should all be straightened out within an hour or two,’ I thought to myself as I set off for Whitehaven Mansions. Alas, Poirot was not at home. His valet told me he was likely to be en route to Scotland Yard. He was apparently as keen to locate me as I was to find him.

I made my way back to Scotland Yard and discovered that Poirot had been there, asking for me, and even waited a short while, but was now gone. There was no sign of Superintendent Bewes either, so I could not ask him how I ought to proceed. I tried Pleasant’s Coffee House, but Poirot was not there either. In the end, exasperated, I decided to visit Rowland McCrodden’s offices alone. I reasoned that he would prefer to know as soon as possible that his son did not stand accused of murder by Hercule Poirot; the word of a Scotland Yard inspector ought to be enough even for Rowland Rope.

Donaldson & McCrodden Solicitors occupied the top two floors of a tall stucco-fronted terrace on Henrietta Street, next to the Covent Garden Hotel. I was greeted by a smiling young woman with a pink face and dark brown hair cut into a short and severely geometrical style. She wore a white blouse and checked skirt that brought to mind a picnic blanket.