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The Mysterious Affair at Styles :: Christie Agatha
Страница: 110 из 129I utterly reject and disapprove of Sir Ernest Heavywether's insinuations against my brother. My brother, I am convinced, had no more to do with the crime than I have."
Sir Ernest merely smiled, and noted with a sharp eye that John's protest had produced a very favourable impression on the jury.
Then the cross-examination began.
"I understand you to say that it never entered your head that the witnesses at the inquest could possibly have mistaken your voice for that of Mr. Inglethorp. Is not that very surprising?"
"No, I don't think so. I was told there had been a quarrel between my mother and Mr. Inglethorp, and it never occurred to me that such was not really the case."
"Not when the servant Dorcas repeated certain fragments of the conversation-fragments which you must have recognized?"
"I did not recognize them."
"Your memory must be unusually short!"
"No, but we were both angry, and, I think, said more than we meant. I paid very little attention to my mother's actual words."
Mr. Philips' incredulous sniff was a triumph of forensic skill. He passed on to the subject of the note.
"You have produced this note very opportunely. Tell me, is there nothing familiar about the hand-writing of it?"
"Not that I know of."
"Do you not think that it bears a marked resemblance to your own hand-writing-carelessly disguised?"
"No, I do not think so."
"I put it to you that it is your own hand-writing!"
"No."
"I put it to you that, anxious to prove an alibi, you conceived the idea of a fictitious and rather incredible appointment, and wrote this note yourself in order to bear out your statement!"
"No."
"Is it not a fact that, at the time you claim to have been waiting about at a solitary and unfrequented spot, you were really in the chemist's shop in Styles St. Mary, where you purchased strychnine in the name of Alfred Inglethorp?"
"No, that is a lie."
"I put it to you that, wearing a suit of Mr. Inglethorp's clothes, with a black beard trimmed to resemble his, you were there-and signed the register in his name!"
"That is absolutely untrue."
"Then I will leave the remarkable similarity of hand-writing between the note, the register, and your own, to the consideration of the jury," said Mr. Philips, and sat down with the air of a man who has done his duty, but who was nevertheless horrified by such deliberate perjury.
After this, as it was growing late, the case was adjourned till Monday.
Poirot, I noticed, was looking profoundly discouraged.
Sir Ernest merely smiled, and noted with a sharp eye that John's protest had produced a very favourable impression on the jury.
Then the cross-examination began.
"I understand you to say that it never entered your head that the witnesses at the inquest could possibly have mistaken your voice for that of Mr. Inglethorp. Is not that very surprising?"
"No, I don't think so. I was told there had been a quarrel between my mother and Mr. Inglethorp, and it never occurred to me that such was not really the case."
"Not when the servant Dorcas repeated certain fragments of the conversation-fragments which you must have recognized?"
"I did not recognize them."
"Your memory must be unusually short!"
"No, but we were both angry, and, I think, said more than we meant. I paid very little attention to my mother's actual words."
Mr. Philips' incredulous sniff was a triumph of forensic skill. He passed on to the subject of the note.
"You have produced this note very opportunely. Tell me, is there nothing familiar about the hand-writing of it?"
"Not that I know of."
"Do you not think that it bears a marked resemblance to your own hand-writing-carelessly disguised?"
"No, I do not think so."
"I put it to you that it is your own hand-writing!"
"No."
"I put it to you that, anxious to prove an alibi, you conceived the idea of a fictitious and rather incredible appointment, and wrote this note yourself in order to bear out your statement!"
"No."
"Is it not a fact that, at the time you claim to have been waiting about at a solitary and unfrequented spot, you were really in the chemist's shop in Styles St. Mary, where you purchased strychnine in the name of Alfred Inglethorp?"
"No, that is a lie."
"I put it to you that, wearing a suit of Mr. Inglethorp's clothes, with a black beard trimmed to resemble his, you were there-and signed the register in his name!"
"That is absolutely untrue."
"Then I will leave the remarkable similarity of hand-writing between the note, the register, and your own, to the consideration of the jury," said Mr. Philips, and sat down with the air of a man who has done his duty, but who was nevertheless horrified by such deliberate perjury.
After this, as it was growing late, the case was adjourned till Monday.
Poirot, I noticed, was looking profoundly discouraged.