Five Little Pigs   ::   Christie Agatha

‘Thatnever really hada leg to stand upon. Mind you, I don’t say Depleach didn’t do his best with it. He was magnificent. He painted a most moving picture of a great-hearted, pleasure-loving, temperamental man, suddenly overtaken by a passion for a lovely young girl, conscience stricken, yet unable to resist. Then his recoil, his disgust with himself, his remorse for the way he was treating his wife and child and his sudden decision to end it all! The honourable way out. I can tell you, it was a most moving performance; Depleach’s voice brought tears to your eyes. You saw the poor wretch torn by his passions and his essential decency. The effect was terrific. Only-when it was all over-and the spell was broken, you couldn’t quite square that mythical figure with Amyas Crale. Everybody knew too much about Crale. He wasn’t at all that kind of man. And Depleach hadn’t been able to get hold of any evidence to show that he was. I should say Crale came as near as possible to being a man without even a rudimentary conscience. He was a ruthless, selfish, good-tempered happy egoist. Any ethics he had would have applied to painting. He wouldn’t, I’m convinced, have painted a sloppy, bad picture-no matter what the inducement. But for the rest, he was a full-blooded man and he loved life-he had a zest for it. Suicide? Not he!’

‘Not, perhaps, a very good defence to have chosen?’

Fogg shrugged his thin shoulders. He said:

‘What else was there? Couldn’t sit back and plead that there was no case for the jury-that the prosecution had got to prove their case against the accused. There was a great deal too much proof. She’d handled the poison-admitted pinching it, in fact. There was means, motive, opportunity-everything.’

‘One might have attempted to show that these things were artificially arranged?’

Fog said bluntly:

‘She admitted most of them. And, in any case, it’s too far-fetched. You’re implying, I presume, that somebody else murdered him and fixed it up to look as though she had done it.’

‘You think that quite untenable?’

Fogg said slowly:

‘I’m afraid I do. You’re suggesting the mysterious X. Where do we look for him?’

Poirot said:

‘Obviously in a close circle. There were five people, were there not, whocould have been concerned?’

‘Five? Let me see. There was the old duffer who messed about with his herb brewing. A dangerous hobby-but an amiable creature. Vague sort of person. Don’t see him as X. There was the girl-she might have polished off Caroline, but certainly not Amyas.