Dumb Witness by Agatha Christie
“Oh! It was well-planned! Foreign matches—vermin paste? It is not difficult to get hold of phosphorus and a very small dose will kill. The medicinal dose is from 1/100 to 1/30 grain.
“Voilà. How clear—how marvellously clear the whole business becomes! Naturally, the doctor is deceived—especially as I find his sense of smell is affected—the garlic odour of the breath is a distinct symptom of phosphorus poisoning. He had no suspicions—why should he have? There were no suspicious circumstances and the one thing that might have given him a hint was the one thing he would never hear—or if he did hear it he would only class it as spiritualistic nonsense.
“I was now sure (from the evidence of Miss Lawson and the Misses Tripp) that murder had been committed. The question still was by whom? I eliminated the servants—their mentality was obviously not adapted to such a crime. I eliminated Miss Lawson since she would hardly have prattled on about luminous ectoplasm if she had been connected with the crime. I eliminated Charles Arundell since he knew, having seen the will, that he would gain nothing by his aunt’s death.
“There remained his sister Theresa, Dr. Tanios, Mrs. Tanios and Dr. Donaldson whom I discovered to have been dining in the house on the evening of the dog’s ball incident.
“At this point I had very little to help me. I had to fall back upon the psychology of the crime and the personality of the murderer! Both crimes had roughly the same outline. They were both simple. They were cunning, and carried out with efficiency. They required a certain amount of knowledge but not a great deal. The facts about phosphorus poisoning are easily learned, and the stuff itself, as I say, is quite easily obtained, especially abroad.
“I considered first the two men. Both of them were doctors, and both were clever men. Either of them might have thought of phosphorus and its suitability in this particular case, but the incident of the dog’s ball did not seem to fit a masculine mind. The incident of the ball seemed to me essentially a woman’s idea.
“I considered first of all Theresa Arundell. She had certain potentialities. She was bold, ruthless, and not over scrupulous. She had led a selfish and greedy life. She had always had everything she wanted and she had reached a point where she was desperate for money—both for herself and for the man she loved. Her manner, also, showed plainly that she knew her aunt had been murdered.
“There was an interesting little passage between her and her brother. I conceived the idea that each suspected the other of the crime. Charles endeavoured to make her say that she knew of the existence of the new will. Why? Clearly because if she knew of it she could not be suspected of the murder. She, on the other hand, clearly did not believe Charles’ statement that Miss Arundell had shown it to him! She regarded it as a singularly clumsy attempt on his part to divert suspicion from himself.
“There was another significant point. Charles displayed a reluctance to use the word arsenic. Later I found that he had questioned the old gardener at length upon the strength of some weed killer. It was clear what had been in his mind.”
Charles Arundell shifted his position a little.
“I thought of it,” he said. “But—well, I suppose I hadn’t got the nerve.”
Poirot nodded at him.
“Precisely, it is not in your psychology. Your crimes will always be the crimes of weakness. To steal, to forge—yes, it is the easiest way—but to kill—no! To kill one needs the type of mind that can be obsessed by an idea.”
He resumed his lecturing manner.
“Theresa Arundell, I decided, had quite sufficient strength of mind to carry such a design through, but there were other facts to take into consideration. She had never been thwarted, she had lived fully and selfishly—but that type of person is not the type that kills—except perhaps in sudden anger. And yet—I felt sure—it was Theresa Arundell who had taken the weed killer from the tin.”
Theresa spoke suddenly:
“I’ll tell you the truth. I thought of it. I actually took some weed killer from a tin down at Littlegreen House. But I couldn’t do it! I’m too fond of living—of being alive—I couldn’t do that to anyone—take life from them… I may be bad and selfish but there are things I can’t do! I couldn’t kill a living, breathing human creature!”
Poirot nodded.
“No, that is true. And you are not as bad as you paint yourself, mademoiselle. You are only young—and reckless.”
He went on:
“There remained Mrs. Tanios. As soon as I saw her I realized that she was afraid. She saw that I realized that and she very quickly made capital out of that momentary betrayal. She gave a very convincing portrait of a woman who is afraid for her husband. A little later she changed her tactics. It was very cleverly done—but the change did not deceive me. A woman can be afraid for her husband or she can be afraid of her husband—but she can hardly be both. Mrs. Tanios decided on the latter rôle—and she played her part cleverly—even to coming out after me into the hall of the hotel and pretending that there was something she wanted to tell me. When her husband followed her as she knew he would, she pretended that she could not speak before him.
“I realized at once, not that she feared her husband, but that she disliked him. And at once, summing the matter up, I felt convinced that here was the exact character I had been looking for. Here was—not a self-indulgent woman—but a thwarted one. A plain girl, leading a dull existence, unable to attract the men she would like to attract, finally accepting a man she did not care for rather than be left an old maid. I could trace her growing dissatisfaction with life, her life in Smyrna exiled from all she cared for in life. Then the birth of her children and her passionate attachment to them.
“Her husband was devoted to her but she came secretly to dislike him more and more. He had speculated with her money and lost it—another grudge against him.
“There was only one thing that illuminated her drab life, the expectation of her Aunt Emily’s death. Then she would have money, independence, the means to educate her children as she wished—and remember education meant a lot to her—she was a Professor’s daughter!
“She may have already planned the crime, or had the idea of it in her mind, before she came to England. She had a certain knowledge of chemistry, having assisted her father in the laboratory. She knew the nature of Miss Arundell’s complaint and she was well aware that phosphorus would be an ideal substance for her purpose.
“Then, when she came to Littlegreen House, a simpler method presented itself to her. The dog’s ball—a thread or string across the top of the stairs. A simple, ingenious woman’s idea.
“She made her attempt—and failed. I do not think that she had any idea that Miss Arundell was aware of the true facts of the matter. Miss Arundell’s suspicions were directed entirely against Charles. I doubt if her manner to Bella showed any alteration. And so, quietly and determinedly, this self-contained, unhappy, ambitious woman put her original plan into execution. She found an excellent vehicle for the poison, some patent capsules that Miss Arundell was in the habit of taking after meals. To open a capsule, place the phosphorus inside and close it again, was child’s play.
“The capsule was replaced among the others. Sooner or later Miss Arundell would swallow it. Poison was not likely to be suspected. Even if, by some unlikely chance it was, she herself would be nowhere near Market Basing at the time.
“Yet she took one precaution. She obtained a double supply of chloral hydrate at the chemist’s, forging her husband’s name to the prescription. I have no doubt of what that was for—to keep by her in case anything went wrong.
“As I say, I was convinced from the first moment I saw her that Mrs. Tanios was the person I was looking for, but I had absolutely no proof of the fact. I had to proceed carefully. If Mrs. Tanios had any idea I suspected her, I was afraid that she might proceed to a further crime. Furthermore, I believed that the idea of that crime had already occurred to her. Her one wish in life was to shake herself free of her husband.
“Her
There was a sudden outburst of sobs. Miss Lawson took out her handkerchief and cried into it.
“It’s been dreadful,” she sobbed. “I’ve been wicked! Very wicked. You see, I was very curious about the will—why Miss Arundell had made a new one, I mean. And one day, when Miss Arundell was resting, I managed to unlock the drawer in the desk. And then I found she’d left it all to me! Of course, I never dreamed it was so much. Just a few thousand—that’s all I thought it was. And why not? After all, her own relations didn’t really care for her! But then, when she was so ill, she asked for the will. I could see—I felt sure—she was going to destroy it… And that’s when I was so wicked. I told her she’d sent it back to Mr. Purvis. Poor dear, she was so forgetful. She never remembered what she’d done with things. She believed me. Said I must write for it and I said I would.
“Oh, dear—Oh, dear—and then she got worse and couldn’t think of anything. And she died. And when the will was read and it was all that money I felt dreadful. Three hundred and seventy-five thousand pounds. I’d never dreamed for a minute it was anything like that or I wouldn’t have done it.
“I felt just as though I’d embezzled the money—and I didn’t know what to do. The other day, when Bella came to me, I told her that she should have half of it. I felt sure that then I would feel happy again.”
“You see?” said Poirot, “Mrs. Tanios was succeeding in her object. That is why she was so averse to any attempt to contest the will. She had her own plans and the last thing she wanted to do was to antagonize Miss Lawson. She pretended, of course, to fall in at once with her husband’s wishes, but she made it quite clear what her real feelings were.
“She had at that time two objects, to detach herself and her children from Dr. Tanios and to obtain her share of the money. Then she would have what she wanted—a rich contented life in England with her children.
“As time went on she could no longer conceal her dislike for her husband. In fact, she did not try to. He, poor man, was seriously upset and distressed. Her actions must have seemed quite incomprehensible to him. Really, they were logical enough. She was playing the part of the terrorized woman. If I had suspicions—and she was fairly sure that that must be the case—she wished me to believe that her husband had committed the murder. And at any moment that second murder which I am convinced was already planned in her mind might occur. I knew that she had a lethal dose of chloral in her possession. I feared that she would stage a pretended suicide and confession on his part.
“And still I had no evidence against her! And then, when I was quite in despair, I got something at last! Miss Lawson told me that she had seen Theresa Arundell kneeling on the stairs on the night of Easter Monday. I soon discovered that Miss Lawson could not have seen Theresa at all clearly—not clearly enough to recognize her features. Yet she was quite positive in her identification. On being pressed she mentioned a brooch with Theresa’s initials—T.A.
“On my request Miss Theresa Arundell showed me the brooch in question. At the same time she absolutely denied having been on the stairs at the time stated. At first I fancied someone else had borrowed her brooch, but when I looked at the brooch in the glass the truth leaped at me. Miss Lawson waking up had seen a dim figure with the initials T.A. flashing in the light. She had leapt to the conclusion it was Theresa.
“But if in the glass she had seen the initials T.A.—then the real initials must have been A.T. since the glass naturally reversed the order.
“Of course! Mrs. Tanios’ mother was Arabella Arundell. Bella is only a contraction. A.T. stood for Arabella Tanios. There was nothing odd in Mrs. Tanios possessing a similar type of brooch. It had been exclusive last Christmas but by the spring they were all the rage, and I had already observed that Mrs. Tanios copied her cousin Theresa’s hats and clothes as far as she was able with her limited means.
“In my own mind, at any rate, my case was proved.
“Now—what was I to do? Obtain a Home Office order for the exhumation of the body? That could doubtless be managed. I might prove that Miss Arundell had been poisoned with phosphorus though there was a little doubt about that. The body had been buried two months, and I understand that there have been cases of phosphorus poisoning where no lesions have been found and where the postmortem appearances are very indecisive. Even then, could I connect Mrs. Tanios with the purchase or possession of phosphorus? Very doubtful, since she had probably obtained it abroad.
“At this juncture Mrs. Tanios took a decisive action. She left her husband, throwing herself on the pity of Miss Lawson. She also definitely accused her husband of the murder.
“Unless I acted I felt convinced that he would be her next victim. I took steps to isolate them one from the other on the pretext that it was for her safety. She could not very well contradict that. Really, it was his safety I had in mind. And then—and then—” He paused—a long pause. His face had gone rather white.
“But that was only a temporary measure. I had to make sure that the killer would kill no more. I had to assure the safety of the innocent.
“So I wrote out my construction of the case and gave it to Mrs. Tanios.”
There was a long silence.
Dr. Tanios cried out:
“Oh, my God, so that’s why she killed herself.”
Poirot said gently:
“Was it not the best way? She thought so. There were, you see, the children to consider.”
Dr. Tanios buried his face in his hands.
Poirot came forward and laid a hand on his shoulder.
“It had to be. Believe me it was necessary. There would have been more deaths. First yours—then possibly, under certain circumstances, Miss Lawson’s. And so it goes on.”
He paused.
In a broken voice Tanios said:
“She wanted me—to take a sleeping draught one night… There was something in her face—I threw it away. That was when I began to believe her mind was going….”
“Think of it that way. It is indeed partly true. But not in the legal meaning of the term. She knew the meaning of her action….”
Dr. Tanios said wistfully:
“She was much too good for me—always.”
A strange epitaph on a self-confessed murderess!
Thirty
THE LAST WORD
There is very little more to tell.
Theresa married her doctor shortly afterwards. I know them fairly well now and I have learnt to appreciate Donaldson—his clarity of vision and the deep, underlying force and humanity of the man. His manner I may say is just as dry and precise as ever, Theresa often mimics him to his face. She is, I think, amazingly happy and absolutely wrapped up in her husband’s career. He is already making a big name for himself and is an authority on the functions of ductless glands.
Miss Lawson, in an acute attack of conscience, had to be restrained forcibly from denuding herself of every penny. A settlement agreeable to all parties was drawn up by Mr. Purvis whereby Miss Arundell’s fortune was shared out between Miss Lawson, the two Arundells and the Tanios children.
Charles went through his share in a little over a year and is now, I believe, in British Columbia.
Just two incidents.
“You’re a downy fellow, ain’t you?” said Miss Peabody, stopping us as we emerged from the gate of Littlegreen House one day. “Managed to hush everything up! No exhumation. Everything done decently.”
“There seems to be no doubt that Miss Arundell died of yellow atrophy of the liver,” said Poirot gently.
“That’s very satisfactory,” said Miss Peabody. “Bella Tanios took an overdose of sleeping stuff, I hear.”
“Yes, it was very sad.”
“She was a miserable kind of woma
“One hopes so, madame. One hopes so.”
“Well,” said Miss Peabody, preparing to resume her walk, “I’ll say this for you. You’ve hushed things up nicely. Very nicely indeed.” She walked on.
There was a plaintive “Wuff” behind me.
I turned and opened the gate.
“Come on, old man.”
Bob bounced through. There was a ball in his mouth.
“You can’t take that for a walk.”
Bob sighed, turned and slowly ejected the ball inside the gate. He looked at it anxiously then passed through.
He looked up at me.
“If you say so, master, I suppose it’s all right.”
I drew a long breath.
“My word, Poirot, it’s good to have a dog again.”
“The spoils of war,” said Poirot. “But I would remind you, my friend, that it was to me that Miss Lawson presented Bob, not to you.”
“Possibly,” I said. “But you’re not really any good with a dog, Poirot. You don’t understand dog psychology! Now Bob and I understand each other perfectly, don’t we?”
“Woof,” said Bob in energetic assent.
* * *
The Agatha Christie Collection
THE HERCULE POIROT MYSTERIES
Match your wits with the famous Belgian detective.
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The Murder on the Links
Poirot Investigates
The Murder of Roger Ackroyd
The Big Four
The Mystery of the Blue Train
Peril at End House
Lord Edgware Dies
Murder on the Orient Express
Three Act Tragedy
Death in the Clouds
The A.B.C. Murders
Murder in Mesopotamia