Read Closed Casket: The New Hercule Poirot Mystery (Hercule Poirot Mystery 2) for Free Online Page B

hung back. Once I was alone in the room, I made for the writing desk. The pages laid upon it were handwritten and almost illegible, but I did see what I thought was ‘Shrimp’ in several places. There were two inks, blue and red: red circles around blue words. It seemed that Sophie was indeed doing some secretarial work for Lady Playford.
    I read a line that seemed to say ‘Shrimp a patch sever ration and the parasols.’ Or was it ‘parasite’?
    I gave up and went in search of dinner.

CHAPTER 5
Tears Before Dinner
    I emerged from the drawing room with not the faintest idea of where to go, though distant voices coming from a certain direction gave me a clue. I was about to follow the sound of laughter and chatter when I heard, from the other side of the house, a more disturbing noise: loud sobbing.
    I stopped, wondering what was the best thing to do. I was famished after my long journey, having been offered nothing since I arrived, but I did not feel I could ignore a display of distress so close to where I stood. Scotcher’s kind words to me in the drawing room—and the knowledge that he, a complete stranger, held me in such high regard and that therefore there might be other strangers out there who did not think too badly of me—had made me feel altogether jollier and more buoyant than I had for a considerable time. I was determined to hunt down and be similarly kind to whomever was crying so piteously.
    Sighing, I went in search of the sobber and soon found her. It was the maid, Phyllis—the poor unfortunate described by Claudia as scatter-witted. She was sitting on the staircase, rubbing at her tears with her sleeve.
    ‘Here,’ I said, passing her a clean handkerchief. ‘It can’t be all that bad, surely.’
    She looked up at me doubtfully. ‘She says it’s for me own good. Yells at me morning to night, she does—for me own good! I’ve had enough of me own good, if that’s what it is! I want to go home!’
    ‘Are you new here, then?’ I asked her.
    ‘No. Been here four years. She’s worse every year! Every day, I sometimes think.’
    ‘Who are you talking about?’
    ‘Cook. “Get out of my kitchen!” she screams, when I’ve done nothing wrong. I can’t help it, I says to her—I try, but I can’t help it!’
    ‘Oh dear. Well, look—’
    ‘And then she comes after me, as if I’ve run away instead of been thrown out by her! “Where the blazes have you got to, girl? Dinner won’t serve itself!” She’ll be after me any second now, you watch!’
    Was Phyllis supposed to be serving our dinner, then? She did not seem in a fit state to do so. This alarmed me more than her tears and tirades. I was starting to feel light-headed from hunger.
    ‘I
would
have run away by now if it weren’t for Joseph!’ Phyllis declared.
    ‘Joseph Scotcher?’
    She nodded. ‘D’you know about him, Mr …?’
    ‘Catchpool. Know what about him? Do you mean his state of health?’
    ‘He hasn’t long. Crying shame, I call it.’
    ‘Indeed.’
    ‘He’s the only one as cares about me. Why can’t one of the others die? One of them as never so much as looks at me.’
    ‘I say, steady on. You really ought not to—’
    ‘Nasty snooty-nosed Claudia or bossy Dorro—they all look past me like I don’t exist, or talk to me like I’m dirt on their shoes! I swear it, once Joseph’s gone, I’ll be gone too. I couldn’t stay here without him. He says to me all the time, he says, “Phyllis, you have great strength and beauty inside you. Silly old Brigid’s not half the woman you are.” That’s Cook, that is—he calls her Brigid, which is her name. “She’s not a patch on you, Phyllis,” he says to me. He says, “That’s why she needs to shout and you don’t.” It’s the weakest as have to shout the loudest, make others suffer, he says.’
    ‘I expect there is some truth in that.’
    Phyllis giggled.
    ‘Did I say something funny?’ I asked.
    ‘Not you. Joseph. He says to me, he says, “Phyllis,