The Murder on the Links Read Online Free PDF Page A

not likely to use the car, and that Masters might just as well take a holiday.
    A perplexed frown was beginning to gather between Poirot’s eyes.
    â€œWhat is it?” I whispered.
    He shook his head impatiently, and asked a question:
    â€œPardon, Monsieur Bex, but without doubt Monsieur Renauld could drive the car himself?”
    The commissary looked over at Françoise, and the old woman replied promptly:
    â€œNo, Monsieur did not drive himself.”
    Poirot’s frown deepened.
    â€œI wish you would tell me what is worrying you,” I said impatiently.
    â€œSee you not? In his letter Monsieur Renauld speaks of sending the car for me to Calais.”
    â€œPerhaps he meant a hired car,” I suggested.
    â€œDoubtless, that is so. But why hire a car when you have one of your own? Why choose yesterday to send away the chauffeur on a holiday—suddenly, at a moment’s notice? Was it that for some reason he wanted him out of the way before we arrived?”

Four
T HE L ETTER S IGNED “B ELLA”
    F rançoise had left the room. The magistrate was drumming thoughtfully on the table.
    â€œMonsieur Bex,” he said at length, “here we have directly conflicting testimony. Which are we to believe, Françoise or Denise?”
    â€œDenise,” said the commissary decidedly. “It was she who let the visitor in. Françoise is old and obstinate, and has evidently taken a dislike to Madame Daubreuil. Besides, our own knowledge tends to show that Renauld was entangled with another woman.”
    â€œTiens!” cried M. Hautet. “We have forgotten to inform Monsieur Poirot of that.” He searched among the papers on the table, and finally handed the one he was in search of to my friend. “This letter, Monsieur Poirot, we found in the pocket of the dead man’s overcoat.”
    Poirot took it and unfolded it. It was somewhat worn and crumpled, and was written in English in a rather unformed hand:
    My Dearest One,—Why have you not written for so long? You do love me still, don’t you? Your letters lately have been so different, cold, and strange, and now this long silence. It makes me afraid. If you were to stop loving me! But that’s impossible—what a silly kid I am—always imagining things! But if you did stop loving me, I don’t know what I should do—kill myself perhaps! I couldn’t live without you. Sometimes I fancy another woman is coming between us. Let her look out, that’s all—and you too! I’d as soon kill you as let her have you! I mean it.
    But there, I’m writing high-flown nonsense. You love me, and I love you—yes, love you, love you, love you!
    Your own adoring
    Bella.
    There was no address or date. Poirot handed it back with a grave face.
    â€œAnd the assumption is—?”
    The examining magistrate shrugged his shoulders.
    â€œObviously Monsieur Renauld was entangled with this Englishwoman—Bella! He comes over here, meets Madame Daubreuil, and starts an intrigue with her. He cools off to the other, and she instantly suspects something. This letter contains a distinct threat. Monsieur Poirot, at first sight the case seemed simplicity itself. Jealousy! The fact that Monsieur Renauld was stabbed in the back seemed to point distinctly to its being a woman’s crime.”
    Poirot nodded.
    â€œThe stab in the back, yes—but not the grave! That was laborious work, hard work—no woman dug that grave, Monsieur. That was a man’s doing.”
    The commissary exclaimed excitedly:
    â€œYes, yes, you are right. We did not think of that.”
    â€œAs I said,” continued M. Hautet, “at first sight the case seemed simple, but the masked men, and the letter you received from Monsieur Renauld, complicate matters. Here we seem to have an entirely different set of circumstances, with no relationship between the two. As regards the letter written to yourself, do you