“And the amount?” asked Poirot.
“In all, I should say the various sums totalled at least twenty thousand pounds.”
“Twenty thousand pounds!” I exclaimed. “In one year!”
“ Mrs. Ferrars was a very wealthy woman,” said Poirot drily. “And the penalty for murder is not a pleasant one.”
“Is there anything else that I can tell you?” inquired Mr. Hammond.
“I thank you, no,” said Poirot, rising. “All my excuses for having deranged you.”
“Not at all, not at all.”
“The word derange,” I remarked, when we were outside again, “is applicable to mental disorder only.”
“Ah!” cried Poirot, “never will my English be quite perfect. A curious language. I should then have said disarranged, n’est-ce pas?”
“Disturbed is the word you had in mind.”
“I thank you, my friend. The word exact, you are zealous for it. Eh bien , what about our friend Parker now? With twenty thousand pounds in hand, would he have continued being a butler? Je ne pense pas. It is, of course, possible that he banked the money under another name, but I am disposed to believe he spoke the truth to us. If he is a scoundrel, he is a scoundrel on a mean scale. He has not the big ideas. That leaves us as a possibility, Raymond, or—well—Major Blunt.”
“Surely not Raymond,” I objected. “Since we know that he was desperately hard up for a matter of five hundred pounds.”
“That is what he says, yes.”