Free Three Act Tragedy by Agatha Christie Page A

he hadn’t been so well in his health, so Sir Bartholomew said, and he gave him a couple of months’ holiday, paid for him, too, in a place near the sea down near Brighton - a real kind gentleman the doctor was - and he took Mr. Ellis on temporary for the time being, and so, as I said to that superintendent, I can’t say anything about Mr. Ellis, though, from all he said himself, he seems to have been with the best families, and he certainly had a gentlemanly way with him.”
    “You didn’t find anything - unusual about him?” asked Sir Charles hopefully.
    “Well, it’s odd your saying that, sir, because, if you know what I mean, I did and I didn’t.”
    Sir Charles looked encouraging, and Mrs. Leckie went on:
    “I couldn’t exactly say what it was, sir, but there was something - ”
    There always is - after the event - thought Mr. Satterthwaite to himself grimly. However much Mrs. Leckie had despised the police, she was not proof against suggestion. If Ellis turned out to be the criminal, well, Mrs. Leckie would have noticed something.
    “For one thing, he was standoffish. Oh, quite polite, quite the gentleman - as I said, he’d been used to good houses. But he kept himself to himself, spent a lot of time in his own room; and he was - well, I don’t know how to describe it, I’m sure - he was, well, there was something - ”
    “You didn’t suspect he wasn’t - not really a butler?” suggested Mr. Satterthwaite.
    “Oh, he’d been in service, right enough, sir. The things he knew - and about well-known people in society, too.”
    “Such as?” suggested Sir Charles gently.
    But Mrs. Leckie became vague, and non-committal. She was not going to retail servants’ hall gossip.
    Such a thing would have offended her sense of fitness.
    To put her at her ease, Mr. Satterthwaite said:
    “Perhaps you can describe his appearance.”
    Mrs. Leckie brightened.
    “Yes, indeed, sir. He was a very respectable-looking man - side-whiskers and grey hair, stooped a little, and he was growing stout - it worried him, that did. He had a rather shaky hand, too, but not from the cause you might imagine. He was a most abstemious man - not like many I’ve known. His eyes were a bit weak, I think, sir, the light hurt them - especially a bright light, used to make them water something cruel. Out with us he wore glasses, but not when he was on duty.”
    “No special distinguishing marks?” asked Sir Charles. “No scars? Or broken fingers? Or birth marks?”
    “Oh, no, sir, nothing of that kind.”
    “How superior detective stories are to life,” sighed Sir Charles. “In fiction there is always some distinguishing characteristic.”
    “He had a tooth missing,” said Mr. Satterthwaite.
    “I believe so, sir; I never noticed it myself.”
    “What was his manner on the night of the tragedy?” asked Mr. Satterthwaite in a slightly bookish manner.
    “Well, really, sir, I couldn’t say. I was busy, you see, in my kitchen. I hadn’t time for noticing things.”
    “No, no, quite so.”
    “When the news came out that the master was dead we were struck all of a heap. I cried and couldn’t stop, and so did Beatrice. The young ones, of course, were excited like, though very upset. Mr. Ellis naturally wasn’t so upset as we were, he being new, but he behaved very considerate, and insisted on Beatrice and me taking a little glass of port to counteract the shock. And to think that all the time it was he - the villain - ”
    Words failed Mrs. Leckie, her eyes shone with indignation.
    “He disappeared that night, I understand?”
    “Yes, sir, went to his room like the rest of us, and in the morning he wasn’t there. That’s what set the police on him, of course.”
    “Yes, yes, very foolish of him. Have you any idea how he left the house?”
    “Not the slightest. It seems the police were watching the house all night, and they never saw him go - but, there, that’s what the police are, human like anyone else, in spite of the