The Peril at End House Read Online Free PDF Page B

directly over the bed-head.
    With a murmured, 'You permit, Mademoiselle,' Poirot removed his shoes and mounted upon the bed. He examined the picture and the cord, and gingerly tested the weight of the painting. With an elegant grimace he descended.
    'To have that descend on one's head-no, it would not be pretty. The cord by which it was hung, Mademoiselle, was it, like this one, a wire cable?'
    'Yes, but not so thick. I got a thicker one this time.'
    'That is comprehensible. And you examined the break-the edges were frayed?'
    'I think so-but I didn't notice particularly. Why should I?'
    'Exactly. As you say, why should you? All the same, I should much like to look at that piece of wire. Is it about the house anywhere?'
    'It was still on the picture. I expect the man who put the new wire on just threw the old one away.'
    'A pity. I should like to have seen it.'
    'You don't think it was just an accident after all? Surely it couldn't have been anything else.'
    'It may have been an accident. It is impossible to say. But the damage to the brakes of your car-that was not an accident. And the stone that rolled down the cliff-I should like to see the spot where that accident occurred.'
    Nick took us out in the garden and led us to the cliff edge. The sea glittered blue below us. A rough path led down the face of the rock. Nick described just where the accident occurred and Poirot nodded thoughtfully. Then he asked: 'How many ways are there into your garden, Mademoiselle?'
    'There's the front way-past the lodge. And a tradesman's entrance-a door in the wall half-way up that lane. Then there's a gate just along here on the cliff edge. It leads out on to a zig zag path that leads up from that beach to the Majestic Hotel. And then, of course, you can go straight through a gap in the hedge into the Majestic garden-that's the way I went this morning. To go through the Majestic garden is a short cut to the town anyway.'
    'And your gardener-where does he usually work?'
    'Well, he usually potters round the kitchen garden, or else he sits in the potting-shed and pretends to be sharpening the shears.'
    'Round the other side of the house, that is to say?'
    'So that if anyone were to come in here and dislodge a boulder he would be very unlikely to be noticed.'
    Nick gave a sudden little shiver.
    'Do you-do you really think that is what happened?' she asked, 'I can't believe it somehow. It seems so perfectly futile.'
    Poirot drew the bullet from his pocket again and looked at it. 'That was not futile, Mademoiselle,' he said gently. 'It must have been some madman.'
    'Possibly. It is an interesting subject of after-dinner conversation-are all criminals really madmen? There may be a malformation in their little grey cells-yes, it is very likely. That, it is the affair of the doctor. For me-I have different work to perform. I have the innocent to think of, not the guilty-the victim, not the criminal. It is you I am considering now, Mademoiselle, not your unknown assailant. You are young and beautiful, and the sun shines and the world is pleasant, and there is life and love ahead of you. It is all that of which I think, Mademoiselle. Tell me, these friends of yours, Mrs Rice and Mr Lazarus-they have been down here, how long?'
    'Freddie came down on Wednesday to this part of the world. She stopped with some people near Tavistock for a couple of nights. She came on here yesterday. Jim has been touring round about, I believe.'
    'And Commander Challenger?'
    'He's at Devonport. He comes over in his car whenever he can-week-ends mostly.'
    Poirot nodded. We were walking back to the house. There was a silence, and then he said suddenly: 'Have you a friend whom you can trust, Mademoiselle?'
    'There's Freddie.'
    'Other than Mrs Rice.'
    'Well, I don't know. I suppose I have. Why?'
    'Because I want you to have a friend to stay with you-immediately.'
    'Oh!'
    Nick seemed rather taken aback. She was silent a moment or two, thinking. Then she said doubtfully: 'There's