死亡约会 Part II Chapter 8（3）

（单词翻译）

Hercule Poirot waited a minute, then he said quietly:

‘You were planning together to bring about your stepmother’s death.’

Carol sobbed¹ out brokenly: ‘We were mad—mad—that evening!’

‘Perhaps.’

‘It’s impossible for you to understand the state we were in!’ She sat up, pushing back the hairfrom her face. ‘It would sound fantastic. It wasn’t so bad in America—but travelling brought ithome to us so.’

‘Brought what home to you?’ His voice was kind now, sympathetic.

‘Our being different from—other people! We—we got desperate about it. And there was Jinny.’

‘Jinny?’

‘My sister. You haven’t seen her. She was going—well, queer². And Mother was making herworse. She didn’t seem to realize. We were afraid, Ray and I, that Jinny was going quite, quitemad! And we saw Nadine thought so, too, and that made us more afraid because Nadine knowsabout nursing and things like that.’

‘Yes, yes?’

‘That evening in Jerusalem things kind of boiled up! Ray was beside himself. He and I got allstrung up and it seemed—oh, indeed, it did seem right to plan as we did! Mother—Mother wasn’tsane. I don’t know what you think, but it can seem quite right—almost noble—to kill someone!’

Poirot nodded his head slowly. ‘Yes, it has seemed so, I know, to many. That is proved byhistory.’

‘That’s how Ray and I felt—that night…’ She beat her hand on the table. ‘But we didn’t reallydo it. Of course we didn’t do it! When daylight came the whole thing seemed absurd,melodramatic — oh, yes, and wicked too! Indeed, indeed, M. Poirot, Mother died perfectlynaturally of heart failure. Ray and I had nothing to do with it.’

Poirot said quietly: ‘Will you swear to me, mademoiselle, as you hope for salvation³ after death,that Mrs Boynton did not die as the result of any action of yours?’

She lifted her head. Her voice came steady and deep:

‘I swear,’ said Carol, ‘as I hope for salvation, that I never harmed her…’

Poirot leaned back in his chair.

‘So,’ he said, ‘that is that.’

There was silence. Poirot thoughtfully caressed⁴ his superb⁵ moustaches. Then he said: ‘Whatexactly was your plan?’

‘Plan?’

‘Yes, you and you brother must have had a plan.’

In his mind he ticked off the seconds before her answer came. One, two, three.

‘We had no plan,’ said Carol at last. ‘We never got as far as that.’

Hercule Poirot got up.

‘That is all, mademoiselle. Will you be so good as to send your brother to me?’

Carol rose. She stood undecidedly for a minute.

‘M. Poirot, you do—you do believe me?’

‘Have I said,’ asked Poirot, ‘that I do not?’

‘No, but—’ She stopped.

He said: ‘You will ask your brother to come here?’

‘Yes.’

She went slowly towards the door. She stopped as she got to it, turning round passionately⁶.

‘I have told you the truth—I have!’

Hercule Poirot did not answer.

Carol Boynton went slowly out of the room.