Poirot Investigates, Agatha Christie [the false prince .TXT] 📗

a diamond in the possession of the Yardly family. An ancestor of the present Lord Yardly brought it back with him from China, and a romantic story is said to attach to it. According to this, the stone was once the right eye of a temple god. Another diamond, exactly similar in form and size, formed the left eye, and the story goes that this jewel, too, would in course of time be stolen. ‘One eye shall go West, the other East, till they shall meet once more. Then, in triumph shall they return to the god.’ It is a curious coincidence that there is at the present time a stone corresponding closely in description with this one, and known as ‘the Star of the West,’ or ‘the Western Star.’ It is the property of the celebrated film actress, Miss Mary Marvell. A comparison of the two stones would be interesting.”

She stopped.

“Épatant!” murmured Poirot. “Without doubt a romance of the first water.” He turned to Mary Marvell. “And you are not afraid, madame? You have no superstitious terrors? You do not fear to introduce these two Siamese twins to each other lest a Chinaman should appear and, hey presto! whisk them both back to China?”

His tone was mocking, but I fancied that an undercurrent of seriousness lay beneath it.

“I don’t believe that Lady Yardly’s diamond is anything like as good a stone as mine,” said Miss Marvell. “Anyway, I’m going to see.”

What more Poirot would have said I do not know, for at that moment the door flew open, and a splendid-looking man strode into the room. From his crisply curling black head, to the tips of his patent-leather boots, he was a hero fit for romance.

“I said I’d call round for you, Mary,” said Gregory Rolf, “and here I am. Well, what does Monsieur Poirot say to our little problem? Just one big hoax, same as I do?”

Poirot smiled up at the big actor. They made a ridiculous contrast.

“Hoax or no hoax, Mr. Rolf,” he said dryly, “I have advised Madame your wife not to take the jewel with her to Yardly Chase on Friday.”

“I’m with you there, sir. I’ve already said so to Mary. But there! She’s a woman through and through, and I guess she can’t bear to think of another woman outshining her in the jewel line.”

“What nonsense, Gregory!” said Mary Marvell sharply. But she flushed angrily.

Poirot shrugged his shoulders.

“Madame, I have advised. I can do no more. C’est fini.”

He bowed them both to the door.

“Ah! la la,” he observed, returning. “Histoire de femmes! The good husband, he hit the nail on the head⁠—tout de même, he was not tactful! Assuredly not.”

I imparted to him my vague remembrances, and he nodded vigorously.

“So I thought. All the same, there is something curious underneath all this. With your permission, mon ami, I will take the air. Await my return, I beg of you. I shall not be long.”

I was half asleep in my chair when the landlady tapped on the door, and put her head in.

“It’s another lady to see Mr. Poirot, sir. I’ve told her he was out, but she says as how she’ll wait, seeing as she’s come up from the country.”

“Oh, show her in here, Mrs. Murchison. Perhaps I can do something for her.”

In another moment the lady had been ushered in. My heart gave a leap as I recognized her. Lady Yardly’s portrait had figured too often in the Society papers to allow her to remain unknown.

“Do sit down, Lady Yardly,” I said, drawing forward a chair. “My friend Poirot is out, but I know for a fact that he’ll be back very shortly.”

She thanked me and sat down. A very different type, this, from Miss Mary Marvell. Tall, dark, with flashing eyes, and a pale proud face⁠—yet something wistful in the curves of the mouth.

I felt a desire to rise to the occasion. Why not? In Poirot’s presence I have frequently felt a difficulty⁠—I do not appear at my best. And yet there is no doubt that I, too, possess the deductive sense in a marked degree. I leant forward on a sudden impulse.

“Lady Yardly,” I said, “I know why you have come here. You have received blackmailing letters about the diamond.”

There was no doubt as to my bolt having shot home. She stared at me open-mouthed, all colour banished from her cheeks.

“You know?” she gasped. “How?”

I smiled.

“By a perfectly logical process. If Miss Marvell has had warning letters⁠—”

“Miss Marvell? She has been here?”

“She has just left. As I was saying, if she, as the holder of one of the twin diamonds, has received a mysterious series of warnings, you, as the holder of the other stone, must necessarily have done the same. You see how simple it is? I am right, then, you have received these strange communications also?”

For a moment she hesitated, as though in doubt whether to trust me or not, then she bowed her head in assent with a little smile.

“That is so,” she acknowledged.

“Were yours, too, left by hand⁠—by a Chinaman?”

“No, they came by post; but, tell me, has Miss Marvell undergone the same experience, then?”

I recounted to her the events of the morning. She listened attentively.

“It all fits in. My letters are the duplicates of hers. It is true that they came by post, but there is a curious perfume impregnating them⁠—something in the nature of joss-stick⁠—that at once suggested the East to me. What does it all mean?”

I shook my head.

“That is what we must find out. You have the letters with you? We might learn something from the postmarks.”

“Unfortunately I destroyed them. You understand, at the time I regarded it as some foolish joke. Can it be true that some Chinese gang are really trying to recover the diamonds? It seems too incredible.”

We went over the facts again and again, but could get no further towards the elucidation of the mystery. At last Lady Yardly rose.

“I