The Monogram Murders(92)
Jennie stared blankly ahead. She said nothing.
“Harriet Sippel and Nancy Ducane had something in common,” Poirot went on. “They had both lost their husbands to early tragic death. You told Harriet that, with the help of Patrick Ive, Nancy had been able to communicate with the deceased William Ducane—that money had changed hands. Of course, it would have to be kept secret from the Church and from everybody in the village, but you suggested to Harriet that, if she so wished, Patrick would be able to do for her what he was doing for Nancy. She and George could be . . . well, if not together again then at least there could be communication of a kind between them. Tell me, how did Harriet respond when you said this to her?”
A long silence followed. Then Jennie said, “She was foaming at the mouth for it to happen as soon as possible. She would pay any price, she said, to be able to speak to George again. You cannot imagine how much she loved that man, Monsieur Poirot. Watching her face as I spoke . . . it was like seeing a dead woman come back to life. I tried to explain it all to Patrick: that there had been a problem, but I had solved it. I made the offer to Harriet without asking him first, you see. Oh, I think I knew in my heart that Patrick would never consent to it, but I was desperate! I didn’t want to give him the chance to forbid me. Can you understand that?”
“Oui, mademoiselle.”
“I hoped I would be able to persuade him to agree. He was a principled man, but I knew he would want to shield Frances from a scandal, and protect Nancy, and this was a certain way to guarantee Harriet’s silence. It was the only way! All Patrick would have had to do was say some comforting words to Harriet once in a while and pretend that those words came from George Sippel. There was no need for him to take her money, even. I said all this to him, but he wouldn’t hear of it. He was horrified.”
“He was entirely right to be,” said Poirot quietly. “Continue, please.”
“He said it would be immoral and unfair to do to Harriet what I was proposing; he would sooner face personal ruin. I begged him to reconsider. What harm would it do, if it would make Harriet happy? But Patrick was resolute. He asked me to give her the message that what I had proposed would not, after all, be possible. He was very specific. ‘Do not say that you lied, Jennie, or else she will revert to suspecting the truth,’ he said. My instructions were to tell Harriet only that she could not have what she wanted.”
“So you had no choice but to tell her,” I said.
“No choice at all.” Jennie started to cry. “And from the moment I told Harriet that Patrick had refused her request, she made herself his enemy, repeating my lie to the whole village. Patrick could have ruined her reputation in return, by making it known that she had been eager to avail herself of his unwholesome services, and only started to call them blasphemous and unchristian once she had been thwarted, but he wouldn’t do it. He said that no matter how maliciously Harriet attacked him, he would not blacken her name. Foolish man! He could have shut her up in an instant, but he was too noble for his own good!”
“Was that when you went to Nancy Ducane for advice?” Poirot asked.
“Yes. I didn’t see why Patrick and I should be the only ones to fret. Nancy was part of it too. I asked her if I should publicly admit to my lie, but she advised me not to. She said, ‘I fear that trouble is coming to Patrick now one way or another, and to me. You would be wise to recede into the background and say nothing, Jennie. Do not sacrifice yourself. I am not sure you would be strong enough to withstand Harriet’s vilification.’ She underestimated me. I was upset, you see—I suppose I sort of fell apart a bit, because I was so frightened for Patrick, with Harriet determined to destroy him—but I am not a weak person, Monsieur Poirot.”
“I see that you are not afraid.”
“No. I draw strength from the knowledge that Harriet Sippel—that loathsome hypocrite—is dead. Her killer did the world a great service.”
“Which leads us to the question of that killer’s identity, mademoiselle. Who killed Harriet Sippel? You told us that it was Ida Gransbury, but that was a lie.”
“I hardly need tell you the truth, Monsieur Poirot, when you know it as well as I do.”
“Then I must ask you to take pity on poor Mr. Catchpool here. He does not yet know the whole story.”
“You’d better tell him, then, hadn’t you?” Jennie smiled an absent sort of smile, and I suddenly felt as if there was less of her in the room than there had been only moments ago; she had taken herself away.
“Très bien,” said Poirot. “I will start with Harriet Sippel and Ida Gransbury: two inflexible women so convinced of their own rectitude that they were willing to hound a good man into an early grave. Did they express sorrow after his death? No, instead they objected to his burial in consecrated ground. Did these two women, after much persuasion by Richard Negus, come to regret their treatment of Patrick Ive? No, of course they did not. It is not plausible that they would. That, Mademoiselle Jennie, was when I knew that you were lying: at that point in your story.”
Jennie shrugged. “Anything is possible,” she said.
“Non. Only the truth is possible. I knew that Harriet Sippel and Ida Gransbury would never have agreed to the plan of voluntary execution that you described to me. Therefore, they were murdered. How convenient, to pass off their murders as a kind of delegated suicide! You hoped Poirot might disengage his little gray cells once he heard that all the dead had been so willing to die. It was their great opportunity for redemption! What an imaginative and unusual story—the sort that one hears and assumes must be the truth, for who would think to invent such a fabrication?”