The Mysterious Affair at Styles
by Agatha Christie
I GO TO STYLES
CHAPTER I
The intense interest aroused in the public by what was known at the
time as “The Styles Case” has now somewhat subsided. Nevertheless, in
view of the world-wide notoriety which attended it, I have been asked,
both by my friend Poirot and the family themselves, to write an account
of the whole story. This, we trust, will effectually silence the
sensational rumours which still persist.
I will therefore briefly set down the circumstances which led to my
being connected with the affair.
I had been invalided home from the Front; and, after spending some
months in a rather depressing Convalescent Home, was given a month’s
sick leave. Having no near relations or friends, I was trying to make
up my mind what to do, when I ran across John Cavendish. I had seen
very little of him for some years. Indeed, I had never known him
particularly well. He was a good fifteen years my senior, for one
thing, though he hardly looked his forty-five years. As a boy, though,
I had often stayed at Styles, his mother’s place in Essex.
We had a good yarn about old times, and it ended in his inviting me
down to Styles to spend my leave there.
“The mater will be delighted to see you again—after all those years,”
he added.
“Your mother keeps well?” I asked.
“Oh, yes. I suppose you know that she has married again?”
I am afraid I showed my surprise rather plainly. Mrs. Cavendish, who
had married John’s father when he was a widower with two sons, had been
a handsome woman of middle-age as I remembered her. She certainly could
not be a day less than seventy now. I recalled her as an energetic,
autocratic personality, somewhat inclined to charitable and social
notoriety, with a fondness for opening bazaars and playing the Lady
Bountiful. She was a most generous woman, and possessed a considerable
fortune of her own.
Their country-place, Styles Court, had been purchased by Mr. Cavendish
early in their married life. He had been completely under his wife’s
ascendancy, so much so that, on dying, he left the place to her for her
lifetime, as well as the larger part of his income; an arrangement that
was distinctly unfair to his two sons. Their step-mother, however, had
always been most generous to them; indeed, they were so young at the
time of their father’s remarriage that they always thought of her as
their own mother.
Lawrence, the younger, had been a delicate youth. He had qualified as a
doctor but early relinquished the profession of medicine, and lived at
home while pursuing literary ambitions; though his verses never had any
marked success.
John practised for some time as a barrister, but had finally settled
down to the more congenial life of a country squire. He had married two
years ago, and had taken his wife to live at Styles, though I
entertained a shrewd suspicion that he would have preferred his mother
to increase his allowance, which would have enabled him to have a home
of his own. Mrs. Cavendish, however, was a lady who liked to make her
own plans, and expected other people to fall in with them, and in this
case she certainly had the whip hand, namely: the purse strings.
John noticed my surprise at the news of his mother’s remarriage and
smiled rather ruefully.
“Rotten little bounder too!” he said savagely. “I can tell you,
Hastings, it’s making life jolly difficult for us. As for Evie—you
remember Evie?”
“No.”
“Oh, I suppose she was after your time. She’s the mater’s factotum,
companion, Jack of all trades! A great sport—old Evie! Not precisely
young and beautiful, but as game as they make them.”
“You were going to say——?”
“Oh, this fellow! He turned up from nowhere, on the pretext of being a
second cousin or something of Evie’s, though she didn’t seem
particularly keen to acknowledge the relationship. The fellow is an
absolute outsider, anyone can see that. He’s got a great black beard,
and wears patent leather boots in all weathers! But the mater cottoned
to him at once, took him on as secretary—you know how she’s always
running a hundred societies?”
I nodded.
“Well, of course the war has turned the hundreds into thousands. No
doubt the fellow was very useful to her. But you could have knocked us
all down with a feather when, three months ago, she suddenly announced
that she and Alfred were engaged! The fellow must be at least twenty
years younger than she is! It’s simply bare-faced fortune hunting; but
there you are—she is her own mistress, and she’s married him.”
“It must be a difficult situation for you all.”
“Difficult! It’s damnable!”
Thus it came about that, three days later, I descended from the train
at Styles St. Mary, an absurd little station, with no apparent reason
for existence, perched up in the midst of green fields and country
lanes. John Cavendish was waiting on the platform, and piloted me out
to the car.
“Got a drop or two of petrol still, you see,” he remarked. “Mainly
owing to the mater’s activities.”
The village of Styles St. Mary was situated about two miles from the
little station, and Styles Court lay a mile the other side of it. It
was a still, warm day in early July. As one looked out over the flat
Essex country, lying so green and peaceful under the afternoon sun, it
seemed almost impossible to believe that, not so very far away, a great
war was running its appointed course. I felt I had suddenly strayed
into another world. As we turned in at the lodge gates, John said:
“I’m afraid you’ll find it very quiet down here, Hastings.”
“My dear fellow, that’s just what I want.”
“Oh, it’s pleasant enough if you want to lead the idle life. I drill
with the volunteers twice a week, and lend a hand at the farms. My wife
works regularly ‘on the land’. She is up at five every morning to milk,
and keeps at it steadily until lunchtime. It’s a jolly good life taking
it all round—if it weren’t for that fellow Alfred Inglethorp!” He
checked the car suddenly, and glanced at his watch. “I wonder if we’ve
time to pick up Cynthia. No, she’ll have started from the hospital by
now.”
“Cynthia! That’s not your wife?”
“No, Cynthia is a protégée of my mother’s, the daughter of an old
schoolfellow of hers, who married a rascally solicitor. He came a
cropper, and the girl was left an orphan and penniless. My mother came
to the rescue, and Cynthia has been with us nearly two years now. She
works in the Red Cross Hospital at Tadminster, seven miles away.”
As he spoke the last words, we drew up in front of the fine old house.
A lady in a stout tweed skirt, who was bending over a flower bed,
straightened herself at our approach.
“Hullo, Evie, here’s our wounded hero! Mr. Hastings—Miss Howard.”
Miss Howard shook hands with a hearty, almost painful, grip. I had an
impression of very blue eyes in a sunburnt face. She was a
pleasant-looking woman of about forty, with a deep voice, almost manly
in its stentorian tones, and had a large sensible square body, with
feet to match—these last encased in good thick boots. Her conversation,
I soon found, was couched in the telegraphic style.
“Weeds grow like house afire. Can’t keep even with ’em. Shall press you
in. Better be careful.”
“I’m sure I shall be only too delighted to make myself useful,” I
responded.
“Don’t say it. Never does. Wish you hadn’t later.”
“You’re a cynic, Evie,” said John, laughing. “Where’s tea to-day—inside
or out?”
“Out. Too fine a day to be cooped up in the house.”
“Come on then, you’ve done enough gardening for to-day. ‘The labourer
is worthy of his hire’, you know. Come and be refreshed.”
“Well,” said Miss Howard, drawing off her gardening gloves, “I’m
inclined to agree with you.”
She led the way round the house to where tea was spread under the shade
of a large sycamore.
A figure rose from one of the basket chairs, and came a few steps to
meet us.
“My wife, Hastings,” said John.
I shall never forget my first sight of Mary Cavendish. Her tall,
slender form, outlined against the bright light; the vivid sense of
slumbering fire that seemed to find expression only in those wonderful
tawny eyes of hers, remarkable eyes, different from any other woman’s
that I have ever known; the intense power of stillness she possessed,
which nevertheless conveyed the impression of a wild untamed spirit in
an exquisitely civilised body—all these things are burnt into my
memory. I shall never forget them.
She greeted me with a few words of pleasant welcome in a low clear
voice, and I sank into a basket chair feeling distinctly glad that I
had accepted John’s invitation. Mrs. Cavendish gave me some tea, and
her few quiet remarks heightened my first impression of her as a
thoroughly fascinating woman. An appreciative listener is always
stimulating, and I described, in a humorous manner, certain incidents
of my Convalescent Home, in a way which, I flatter myself, greatly
amused my hostess. John, of course, good fellow though he is, could
hardly be called a brilliant conversationalist.
At that moment a well remembered voice floated through the open French
window near at hand:
“Then you’ll write to the Princess after tea, Alfred? I’ll write to
Lady Tadminster for the second day, myself. Or shall we wait until we
hear from the Princess? In case of a refusal, Lady Tadminster might
open it the first day, and Mrs. Crosbie the second. Then there’s the
Duchess—about the school fête.”
There was the murmur of a man’s voice, and then Mrs. Inglethorp’s rose
in reply:
“Yes, certainly. After tea will do quite well. You are so thoughtful,
Alfred dear.”
The French window swung open a little wider, and a handsome
white-haired old lady, with a somewhat masterful cast of features,
stepped out of it on to the lawn. A man followed her, a suggestion of
deference in his manner.
Mrs. Inglethorp greeted me with effusion.
“Why, if it isn’t too delightful to see you again, Mr. Hastings, after
all these years. Alfred, darling, Mr. Hastings—my husband.”
I looked with some curiosity at “Alfred darling”. He certainly struck a
rather alien note. I did not wonder at John objecting to his beard. It
was one of the longest and blackest I have ever seen. He wore
gold-rimmed pince-nez, and had a curious impassivity of feature. It
struck me that he might look natural on a stage, but was strangely out
of place in real life. His voice was rather deep and unctuous. He
placed a wooden hand in mine and said:
“This is a pleasure, Mr. Hastings.” Then, turning to his wife: “Emily
dearest, I think that cushion is a little damp.”
She beamed fondly on him, as he substituted another with every
demonstration of the tenderest care. Strange infatuation of an
otherwise sensible woman!
With the presence of Mr. Inglethorp, a sense of constraint and veiled
hostility seemed to settle down upon the company. Miss Howard, in
particular, took no pains to conceal her feelings. Mrs. Inglethorp,
however, seemed to notice nothing unusual. Her volubility, which I
remembered of old, had lost nothing in the intervening years, and she
poured out a steady flood of conversation, mainly on the subject of the
forthcoming bazaar which she was organizing and which was to take place
shortly. Occasionally she referred to her husband over a question of
days or dates. His watchful and attentive manner never varied. From the
very first I took a firm and rooted dislike to him, and I flatter
myself that my first judgments are usually fairly shrewd.
Presently Mrs. Inglethorp turned to give some instructions about
letters to Evelyn Howard, and her husband addressed me in his
painstaking voice:
“Is soldiering your regular profession, Mr. Hastings?”
“No, before the war I was in Lloyd’s.”
“And you will return there after it is over?”
“Perhaps. Either that or a fresh start altogether.”
Mary Cavendish leant forward.
“What would you really choose as a profession, if you could just
consult your inclination?”
“Well, that depends.”
“No secret hobby?” she asked. “Tell me—you’re drawn to something?
Everyone is—usually something absurd.”
“You’ll laugh at me.”
She smiled.
“Perhaps.”
“Well, I’ve always had a secret hankering to be a detective!”
“The real thing—Scotland Yard? Or Sherlock Holmes?”
“Oh, Sherlock Holmes by all means. But really, seriously, I am awfully
drawn to it. I came across a man in Belgium once, a very famous
detective, and he quite inflamed me. He was a marvellous little fellow.
He used to say that all good detective work was a mere matter of
method. My system is based on his—though of course I have progressed
rather further. He was a funny little man, a great dandy, but
wonderfully clever.”
“Like a good detective story myself,” remarked Miss Howard. “Lots of
nonsense written, though. Criminal discovered in last chapter. Everyone
dumbfounded. Real crime—you’d know at once.”
“There have been a great number of undiscovered crimes,” I argued.
“Don’t mean the police, but the people that are right in it. The
family. You couldn’t really hoodwink them. They’d know.”
“Then,” I said, much amused, “you think that if you were mixed up in a
crime, say a murder, you’d be able to spot the murderer right off?”
“Of course I should. Mightn’t be able to prove it to a pack of lawyers.
But I’m certain I’d know. I’d feel it in my fingertips if he came near
me.”
“It might be a ‘she’,” I suggested.
“Might. But murder’s a violent crime. Associate it more with a man.”
“Not in a case of poisoning.” Mrs. Cavendish’s clear voice startled me.
“Dr. Bauerstein was saying yesterday that, owing to the general
ignorance of the more uncommon poisons among the medical profession,
there were probably countless cases of poisoning quite unsuspected.”
“Why, Mary, what a gruesome conversation!” cried Mrs. Inglethorp. “It
makes me feel as if a goose were walking over my grave. Oh, there’s
Cynthia!”
A young girl in V.A.D. uniform ran lightly across the lawn.
“Why, Cynthia, you are late to-day. This is Mr. Hastings—Miss Murdoch.”
Cynthia Murdoch was a fresh-looking young creature, full of life and
vigour. She tossed off her little V.A.D. cap, and I admired the great
loose waves of her auburn hair, and the smallness and whiteness of the
hand she held out to claim her tea. With dark eyes and eyelashes she
would have been a beauty.
She flung herself down on the ground beside John, and as I handed her a
plate of sandwiches she smiled up at me.
“Sit down here on the grass, do. It’s ever so much nicer.”
I dropped down obediently.
“You work at Tadminster, don’t you, Miss Murdoch?”
She nodded.
“For my sins.”
“Do they bully you, then?” I asked, smiling.
“I should like to see them!” cried Cynthia with dignity.
“I have got a cousin who is nursing,” I remarked. “And she is terrified
of ‘Sisters’.”
“I don’t wonder. Sisters _are_, you know, Mr. Hastings. They simp-ly
_are_! You’ve no idea! But I’m not a nurse, thank heaven, I work in the
dispensary.”
“How many people do you poison?” I asked, smiling.
Cynthia smiled too.
“Oh, hundreds!” she said.
“Cynthia,” called Mrs. Inglethorp, “do you think you could write a few
notes for me?”
“Certainly, Aunt Emily.”
She jumped up promptly, and something in her manner reminded me that
her position was a dependent one, and that Mrs. Inglethorp, kind as she
might be in the main, did not allow her to forget it.
My hostess turned to me.
“John will show you your room. Supper is at half-past seven. We have
given up late dinner for some time now. Lady Tadminster, our Member’s
wife—she was the late Lord Abbotsbury’s daughter—does the same. She
agrees with me that one must set an example of economy. We are quite a
war household; nothing is wasted here—every scrap of waste paper, even,
is saved and sent away in sacks.”
I expressed my appreciation, and John took me into the house and up the
broad staircase, which forked right and left half-way to different
wings of the building. My room was in the left wing, and looked out
over the park.
John left me, and a few minutes later I saw him from my window walking
slowly across the grass arm in arm with Cynthia Murdoch. I heard Mrs.
Inglethorp call “Cynthia” impatiently, and the girl started and ran
back to the house. At the same moment, a man stepped out from the
shadow of a tree and walked slowly in the same direction. He looked
about forty, very dark with a melancholy clean-shaven face. Some
violent emotion seemed to be mastering him. He looked up at my window
as he passed, and I recognized him, though he had changed much in the
fifteen years that had elapsed since we last met. It was John’s younger
brother, Lawrence Cavendish. I wondered what it was that had brought
that singular expression to his face.
Then I dismissed him from my mind, and returned to the contemplation of
my own affairs.
The evening passed pleasantly enough; and I dreamed that night of that
enigmatical woman, Mary Cavendish.
The next morning dawned bright and sunny, and I was full of the
anticipation of a delightful visit.
I did not see Mrs. Cavendish until lunch-time, when she volunteered to
take me for a walk, and we spent a charming afternoon roaming in the
woods, returning to the house about five.
As we entered the large hall, John beckoned us both into the
smoking-room. I saw at once by his face that something disturbing had
occurred. We followed him in, and he shut the door after us.
“Look here, Mary, there’s the deuce of a mess. Evie’s had a row with
Alfred Inglethorp, and she’s off.”
“Evie? Off?”
John nodded gloomily.
“Yes; you see she went to the mater, and—Oh,—here’s Evie herself.”
Miss Howard entered. Her lips were set grimly together, and she carried
a small suit-case. She looked excited and determined, and slightly on
the defensive.
“At any rate,” she burst out, “I’ve spoken my mind!”
“My dear Evelyn,” cried Mrs. Cavendish, “this can’t be true!”
Miss Howard nodded grimly.
“True enough! Afraid I said some things to Emily she won’t forget or
forgive in a hurry. Don’t mind if they’ve only sunk in a bit. Probably
water off a duck’s back, though. I said right out: ‘You’re an old
woman, Emily, and there’s no fool like an old fool. The man’s twenty
years younger than you, and don’t you fool yourself as to what he
married you for. Money! Well, don’t let him have too much of it. Farmer
Raikes has got a very pretty young wife. Just ask your Alfred how much
time he spends over there.’ She was very angry. Natural! I went on,
‘I’m going to warn you, whether you like it or not. That man would as
soon murder you in your bed as look at you. He’s a bad lot. You can say
what you like to me, but remember what I’ve told you. He’s a bad lot!’”
“What did she say?”
Miss Howard made an extremely expressive grimace.
“‘Darling Alfred’—‘dearest Alfred’—‘wicked calumnies’ —‘wicked
lies’—‘wicked woman’—to accuse her ‘dear husband!’ The sooner I left
her house the better. So I’m off.”
“But not now?”
“This minute!”
For a moment we sat and stared at her. Finally John Cavendish, finding
his persuasions of no avail, went off to look up the trains. His wife
followed him, murmuring something about persuading Mrs. Inglethorp to
think better of it.
As she left the room, Miss Howard’s face changed. She leant towards me
eagerly.
“Mr. Hastings, you’re honest. I can trust you?”
I was a little startled. She laid her hand on my arm, and sank her
voice to a whisper.
“Look after her, Mr. Hastings. My poor Emily. They’re a lot of
sharks—all of them. Oh, I know what I’m talking about. There isn’t one
of them that’s not hard up and trying to get money out of her. I’ve
protected her as much as I could. Now I’m out of the way, they’ll
impose upon her.”
“Of course, Miss Howard,” I said, “I’ll do everything I can, but I’m
sure you’re excited and overwrought.”
She interrupted me by slowly shaking her forefinger.
“Young man, trust me. I’ve lived in the world rather longer than you
have. All I ask you is to keep your eyes open. You’ll see what I mean.”
The throb of the motor came through the open window, and Miss Howard
rose and moved to the door. John’s voice sounded outside. With her hand
on the handle, she turned her head over her shoulder, and beckoned to
me.
“Above all, Mr. Hastings, watch that devil—her husband!”
There was no time for more. Miss Howard was swallowed up in an eager
chorus of protests and good-byes. The Inglethorps did not appear.
As the motor drove away, Mrs. Cavendish suddenly detached herself from
the group, and moved across the drive to the lawn to meet a tall
bearded man who had been evidently making for the house. The colour
rose in her cheeks as she held out her hand to him.
“Who is that?” I asked sharply, for instinctively I distrusted the man.
“That’s Dr. Bauerstein,” said John shortly.
“And who is Dr. Bauerstein?”
“He’s staying in the village doing a rest cure, after a bad nervous
breakdown. He’s a London specialist; a very clever man—one of the
greatest living experts on poisons, I believe.”
“And he’s a great friend of Mary’s,” put in Cynthia, the irrepressible.
John Cavendish frowned and changed the subject.
“Come for a stroll, Hastings. This has been a most rotten business. She
always had a rough tongue, but there is no stauncher friend in England
than Evelyn Howard.”
He took the path through the plantation, and we walked down to the
village through the woods which bordered one side of the estate.
As we passed through one of the gates on our way home again, a pretty
young woman of gipsy type coming in the opposite direction bowed and
smiled.
“That’s a pretty girl,” I remarked appreciatively.
John’s face hardened.
“That is Mrs. Raikes.”
“The one that Miss Howard——”
“Exactly,” said John, with rather unnecessary abruptness.
I thought of the white-haired old lady in the big house, and that vivid
wicked little face that had just smiled into ours, and a vague chill of
foreboding crept over me. I brushed it aside.
“Styles is really a glorious old place,” I said to John.
He nodded rather gloomily.
“Yes, it’s a fine property. It’ll be mine some day—should be mine now
by rights, if my father had only made a decent will. And then I
shouldn’t be so damned hard up as I am now.”
“Hard up, are you?”
“My dear Hastings, I don’t mind telling you that I’m at my wits’ end
for money.”
“Couldn’t your brother help you?”
“Lawrence? He’s gone through every penny he ever had, publishing rotten
verses in fancy bindings. No, we’re an impecunious lot. My mother’s
always been awfully good to us, I must say. That is, up to now. Since
her marriage, of course——” he broke off, frowning.
For the first time I felt that, with Evelyn Howard, something
indefinable had gone from the atmosphere. Her presence had spelt
security. Now that security was removed—and the air seemed rife with
suspicion. The sinister face of Dr. Bauerstein recurred to me
unpleasantly. A vague suspicion of everyone and everything filled my
mind. Just for a moment I had a premonition of approaching evil.
****
