JК
Five Little Pigs :: Christie Agatha
Страница: 48 из 147I said couldn’t he pull himself together, make a clean break and go back to his wife?’
‘And what did he say?’
Blake said: ‘He just looked-embarrassed. He patted me on the shoulder and said: “You’re a good chap, Merry. But you’re too sentimental. You wait till the picture’s finished and you’ll admit that I was right.”
‘I said: “Damn your picture.” And he grinned and said all the neurotic women in England couldn’t do that. Then I said that it would have been more decent to have kept the whole thing from Caroline until after the picture was finished. He said that that wasn’this fault. It was Elsa who had insisted on spilling the beans. I said, Why? And he said that she had had some idea that it wasn’t straight otherwise. She wanted everything to be clear and above board. Well, of course, in a way, one could understand that and respect the girl for it. However badly she was behaving, she did at least want to be honest.’
‘A lot of additional pain and grief is caused by honesty,’ remarked Hercule Poirot.
Meredith Blake looked at him doubtfully. He did not quite like the sentiment. He sighed:
‘It was a-a most unhappy time for us all.’
‘The only person who does not seem to have been affected by it was Amyas Crale,’ said Poirot.
‘And why? Because he was a rank egoist. I remember him now. Grinning at me as he went off saying: “Don’t worry, Merry. Everything’s going to pan out all right!” ’
‘The incurable optimist,’ murmured Poirot.
Meredith Blake said:
‘He was the kind of man who didn’t take women seriously.I could have told him that Caroline was desperate.’
‘Did she tell you so?’
‘Not in so many words. But I shall always see her face as it was that afternoon. White and strained with a kind of desperate gaiety. She talked and laughed a lot. But her eyes-there was a kind of anguished grief in them that was the most moving thing I have ever known. Such a gentle creature, too.’
Hercule Poirot looked at him for a minute or two without speaking. Clearly the man in front of him felt no incongruity in speaking thus of a woman who on the day after had deliberately killed her husband.
Meredith Blake went on. He had by now quite overcome his first suspicious hostility. Hercule Poirot had the gift of listening. To men such as Meredith Blake, the reliving of the past has a definite attraction. He spoke now almost more to himself than to his guest.
‘I ought to have suspected something, I suppose. It was Caroline who turned the conversation to-to my little hobby. It was, I must confess, an enthusiasm of mine.
‘And what did he say?’
Blake said: ‘He just looked-embarrassed. He patted me on the shoulder and said: “You’re a good chap, Merry. But you’re too sentimental. You wait till the picture’s finished and you’ll admit that I was right.”
‘I said: “Damn your picture.” And he grinned and said all the neurotic women in England couldn’t do that. Then I said that it would have been more decent to have kept the whole thing from Caroline until after the picture was finished. He said that that wasn’this fault. It was Elsa who had insisted on spilling the beans. I said, Why? And he said that she had had some idea that it wasn’t straight otherwise. She wanted everything to be clear and above board. Well, of course, in a way, one could understand that and respect the girl for it. However badly she was behaving, she did at least want to be honest.’
‘A lot of additional pain and grief is caused by honesty,’ remarked Hercule Poirot.
Meredith Blake looked at him doubtfully. He did not quite like the sentiment. He sighed:
‘It was a-a most unhappy time for us all.’
‘The only person who does not seem to have been affected by it was Amyas Crale,’ said Poirot.
‘And why? Because he was a rank egoist. I remember him now. Grinning at me as he went off saying: “Don’t worry, Merry. Everything’s going to pan out all right!” ’
‘The incurable optimist,’ murmured Poirot.
Meredith Blake said:
‘He was the kind of man who didn’t take women seriously.I could have told him that Caroline was desperate.’
‘Did she tell you so?’
‘Not in so many words. But I shall always see her face as it was that afternoon. White and strained with a kind of desperate gaiety. She talked and laughed a lot. But her eyes-there was a kind of anguished grief in them that was the most moving thing I have ever known. Such a gentle creature, too.’
Hercule Poirot looked at him for a minute or two without speaking. Clearly the man in front of him felt no incongruity in speaking thus of a woman who on the day after had deliberately killed her husband.
Meredith Blake went on. He had by now quite overcome his first suspicious hostility. Hercule Poirot had the gift of listening. To men such as Meredith Blake, the reliving of the past has a definite attraction. He spoke now almost more to himself than to his guest.
‘I ought to have suspected something, I suppose. It was Caroline who turned the conversation to-to my little hobby. It was, I must confess, an enthusiasm of mine.