Agatha Christie

Third Girl

A Hercule Poirot Mystery

To Norah Blackmore

One

Hercule Poirot was sitting at the breakfast table. At his right hand was a steaming cup of chocolate. He had always had a sweet tooth. To accompany the chocolate was a brioche. It went agreeably with chocolate. He nodded his approval. This was from the fourth shop he had tried. It was a Danish pÃ¢tisserie but infinitely superior to the so-called French one nearby. That had been nothing less than a fraud.

He was satisfied gastronomically. His stomach was at peace. His mind also was at peace, perhaps somewhat too much so. He had finished his Magnum Opus, an analysis of great writers of detective fiction. He had dared to speak scathingly of Edgar Allen Poe, he had complained of the lack of method or order in the romantic outpourings of Wilkie Collins, had lauded to the skies two American authors who were practically unknown, and had in various other ways given honour where honour was due and sternly withheld it where he considered it was not. He had seen the volume through the press, had looked upon the results and, apart from a really incredible number of printerâs errors, pronounced that it was good. He had enjoyed this literary achievement and enjoyed the vast amount of reading he had had to do, had enjoyed snorting with disgust as he flung a book across the floor (though always remembering to rise, pick it up and dispose of it tidily in the wastepaper basket) and had enjoyed appreciatively nodding his head on the rare occasions when such approval was justified.

And now? He had had a pleasant interlude of relaxation, very necessary after his intellectual labour. But one could not relax forever, one had to go on to the next thing. Unfortunately he had no idea what the next thing might be. Some further literary accomplishment? He thought not. Do a thing well then leave it alone. That was his maxim. The truth of the matter was, he was bored. All this strenuous mental activity in which he had been indulgingâthere had been too much of it. It had got him into bad habits, it had made him restlessâ¦.

Vexatious! He shook his head and took another sip of chocolate.

The door opened and his well-trained servant, George, entered. His manner was deferential and slightly apologetic. He coughed and murmured, âAââ he paused, ââaâyoung lady has called.â

Poirot looked at him with surprise and mild distaste.

âI do not see people at this hour,â he said reprovingly.

âNo, sir,â agreed George.

Master and servant looked at each other. Communication was sometimes fraught with difficulties for them. By inflexion or innuendo or a certain choice of words George would signify that there was something that might be elicited if the right question was asked. Poirot considered what the right question in this case might be.

âShe is good-looking, this young lady?â he inquired carefully.

âIn my viewâno, sir, but there is no accounting for tastes.â

Poirot considered his reply. He remembered the slight pause that George had made before the phraseâyoung lady. George was a delicate social recorder. He had been uncertain of the visitorâs status but had given her the benefit of the doubt.

âYou are of the opinion that she is a young lady rather than, let us say, a young person?â

âI think so, sir, though it is not always easy to tell nowadays.â George spoke with genuine regret.

âDid she give a reason for wishing to see me?â

âShe saidââ George pronounced the words with some reluctance, apologising for them in advance as it were, âthat she wanted to consult you about a murder she might have committed.â

Hercule Poirot stared. His eyebrows rose. âMight have committed? Does she not know?â

âThat is what she said, sir.â

âUnsatisfactory, but possibly interesting,â said Poirot.

âIt mightâhave been a joke, sir,â said George, dubiously.

âAnything is possible, I suppose,â conceded Poirot, âbut one would hardly thinkââ He lifted his cup. âShow her in after five minutes.â

âYes, sir.â George withdrew.

Poirot finished the last sip of chocolate. He pushed aside his cup and rose to his feet. He walked to the fireplace and adjusted his moustaches carefully in the mirror over the chimneypiece. Satisfied, he returned to his chair and awaited the arrival of his visitor. He did not know exactly what to expectâ¦.

He had hoped perhaps for something nearer to his own estimate of female attraction. The outworn phrase âbeauty in distressâ had occurred to him. He was disappointed when George returned ushering in the visitor; inwardly he shook his head and sighed. Here was no beautyâand no noticeable distress either. Mild perplexity would seem nearer the mark.

âPha!â thought Poirot disgustedly. âThese girls! Do they not even try to make something of themselves? Well made-up, attractively dressed, hair that has been arranged by a good hairdresser, then perhaps she might pass. But now!â

His visitor was a girl of perhaps twenty-odd. Long straggly hair of indeterminate colour strayed over her shoulders. Her eyes, which were large, bore a vacant expression and were of a greenish blue. She wore what were presumably the chosen clothes of her generation. Black high leather boots, white openwork woollen stockings of doubtful cleanliness, a skimpy skirt, and a long and sloppy pullover of heavy wool. Anyone of Poirotâs age and generation would have had only one desire. To drop the girl into a bath as soon as possible. He had often felt this same reaction walking along the streets. There were hundreds of girls looking exactly the same. They all looked dirty. And yetâa contradiction in termsâthis one had the look of having been recently drowned and pulled out of a river. Such girls, he reflected, were not perhaps really dirty. They merely took enormous care and pains to look so.

He rose with his usual politeness, shook hands, drew out a chair.

âYou demanded to see me, mademoiselle? Sit down, I pray of you.â

âOh,â said the girl, in a slightly breathless voice. She stared at him.

âEh bien?â said Poirot.

She hesitated. âI think Iâdârather stand.â The large eyes continued to stare doubtfully.

âAs you please.â Poirot resumed his seat and looked at her. He waited. The girl shuffled her feet. She looked down on them then up again at Poirot.

âYouâyou are Hercule Poirot?â

âAssuredly. In what way can I be of use to you?â

âOh, well, itâs rather difficult. I meanââ

Poirot felt that she might need perhaps a little assistance. He said helpfully, âMy manservant told me that you wanted to consult me because you thought you âmight have committed a murder.â Is that correct?â

The girl nodded. âThatâs right.â

âSurely that is not a matter that admits of any doubt. You must know yourself whether you have committed a murder or not.â

âWell, I donât know quite how to put it. I meanââ

âCome now,â said Poirot kindly. âSit down. Relax the muscles. Tell me all about it.â

âI donât thinkâoh dear, I donât know how toâYou see, itâs all so difficult. IâveâIâve changed my mind. I donât want to be rude butâwell, I think Iâd better go.â

âCome now. Courage.â

âNo, I canât. I thought I could come andâand ask you, ask you what I ought to doâbut I canât, you see. Itâs all so different fromââ

âFrom what?â

âIâm awfully sorry and I really donât want to be rude, butââ

She breathed an enormous sigh, looked at Poirot, looked away, and suddenly blurted out, âYouâre too old. Nobody told me you were so old. I really donât want to be rude butâthere it is. Youâre too old. Iâm really very sorry.â

She turned abruptly and blundered out of the room, rather like a desperate moth in lamplight.

Poirot, his mouth open, heard the bang of the front door.

He ejaculated: âNom dâun nom dâun nomâ¦.â

Two

I

The telephone rang.

Hercule Poirot did not even seem aware of the fact.

It rang with shrill and insistent persistence.

George entered the room and stepped towards it, turning a questioning glance towards Poirot.

Poirot gestured with his hand.

âLeave it,â he said.

George obeyed, leaving the room again. The telephone continued to ring. The shrill irritating noise continued. Suddenly it stopped. After a minute or two, however, it commenced to ring again.

âAh Sapristi! That must be a womanâundoubtedly a woman.â

He sighed, rose to his feet and came to the instrument.

He picked up the receiver. ââAllo,â he said.

âAre youâis that M. Poirot?â

âI, myself.â

âItâs Mrs. Oliverâyour voice sounds different. I didnât recognise it at first.â

âBonjour, Madameâyou are well, I hope?â

âOh, Iâm all right.â Ariadne Oliverâs voice came through in its usual cheerful accents. The well-known detective story writer and Hercule Poirot were on friendly terms.

âItâs rather early to ring you up, but I want to ask you a favour.â

âYes?â

âIt is the annual dinner of our Detective Authorsâ Club; I wondered if you would come and be our Guest Speaker this year. It would be very very sweet of you if you would.â

âWhen is this?â

âNext monthâthe twenty-third.â

A deep sigh came over the telephone.

âAlas! I am too old.â

âToo old? What on earth do you mean? Youâre not old at all.â

âYou think not?â

âOf course not. Youâll be wonderful. You can tell us lots of lovely stories about real crimes.â

âAnd who will want to listen?â

âEveryone. TheyâM. Poirot, is there anything the matter? Has something happened? You sound upset.â

âYes, I am upset. My feelingsâah, well, no matter.â

âBut tell me about it.â

âWhy should I make a fuss?â

âWhy shouldnât you? Youâd better come and tell me all about it. When will you come? This afternoon. Come and have tea with me.â

âAfternoon tea, I do not drink it.â

âThen you can have coffee.â

âIt is not the time of day I usually drink coffee.â

âChocolate? With whipped cream on top? Or a tisane. You love sipping tisanes. Or lemonade. Or orangeade. Or would you like decaffeinated coffee if I can get itââ

âAh Ã§a, non, par example! It is an abomination.â

âOne of those sirops you like so much. I know, Iâve got half a bottle of Ribena in the cupboard.â

âWhat is Ribena?â

âBlack currant flavour.â

âIndeed, one has to hand it to you! You really do try, Madame. I am touched by your solicitude. I will accept with pleasure to drink a cup of chocolate this afternoon.â

âGood. And then youâll tell me all about whatâs upset you.â

She rang off.

II

Poirot considered for a moment. Then he dialled a number. Presently he said: âMr. Goby? Hercule Poirot here. Are you very fully occupied at this moment?â

âMiddling,â said the voice of Mr. Goby. âMiddling to fair. But to oblige you, Monsieur Poirot, if youâre in a hurry, as you usually areâwell, I wouldnât say that my young men couldnât manage mostly whatâs on hand at present. Of course good boys arenât as easy to get as they used to be. Think too much of themselves nowadays. Think they know it all before theyâve started to learn. But there! Canât expect old heads on young shoulders. Iâll be pleased to put myself at your disposal, M. Poirot. Maybe I can put one or two of the better lads on the job. I suppose itâs the usualâcollecting information?â

He nodded his head and listened whilst Poirot went into details of exactly what he wanted done. When he had finished with Mr. Goby, Poirot rang up Scotland Yard where in due course he got through to a friend of his. When he in turn had listened to Poirotâs requirements, he replied,

âDonât want much, do you? Any murder, anywhere. Time, place and victim unknown. Sounds a bit of a wild goose chase, if you ask me, old boy.â He added disapprovingly, âYou donât seem really to know anything!â

III

At 4:15 that afternoon Poirot sat in Mrs. Oliverâs drawing room sipping appreciatively at a large cup of chocolate topped with foaming whipped cream which his hostess had just placed on a small table beside him. She added a small plate full of langue de chats biscuits.

âChÃ¨re Madame, what kindness.â He looked over his cup with faint surprise at Mrs. Oliverâs coiffure and also at her new wallpaper. Both were new to him. The last time he had seen Mrs. Oliver, her hairstyle had been plain and severe. It now displayed a richness of coils and twists arranged in intricate patterns all over her head. Its prolific luxury was, he suspected, largely artificial. He debated in his mind how many switches of hair might unexpectedly fall off if Mrs. Oliver was to get suddenly excited, as was her wont. As for the wallpaperâ¦.

âThese cherriesâthey are new?â he waved a teaspoon. It was, he felt, rather like being in a cherry orchard.

âAre there too many of them, do you think?â said Mrs. Oliver. âSo hard to tell beforehand with wallpaper. Do you think my old one was better?â

Poirot cast his mind back dimly to what he seemed to remember as large quantities of bright coloured tropical birds in a forest. He felt inclined to remark âPlus Ã§a change, plus câest la mÃªme chose,â but restrained himself.

âAnd now,â said Mrs. Oliver, as her guest finally replaced his cup on its saucer and sat back with a sigh of satisfaction, wiping remnants of foaming cream from his moustache, âwhat is all this about?â

âThat I can tell you very simply. This morning a girl came to see me. I suggested she might make an appointment. One has oneâs routine, you comprehend. She sent back word that she wanted to see me at once because she thought she might have committed a murder.â

âWhat an odd thing to say. Didnât she know?â

âPrecisely! Câest inouÃ¯! so I instructed George to show her in. She stood there! She refused to sit down. She just stood there staring at me. She seemed quite half-witted. I tried to encourage her. Then suddenly she said that sheâd changed her mind. She said she didnât want to be rude but thatâ(what do you think?)âbut that I was too old.â¦â

Mrs. Oliver hastened to utter soothing words. âOh well, girls are like that. Anyone over thirty-five they think is half dead. Theyâve no sense, girls, you must realise that.â

âIt wounded me,â said Hercule Poirot.

âWell, I shouldnât worry about it, if I were you. Of course it was a very rude thing to say.â

âThat does not matter. And it is not only my feelings. I am worried. Yes, I am worried.â

âWell, I should forget all about it if I were you,â advised Mrs. Oliver comfortably.

âYou do not understand. I am worried about this girl. She came to me for help. Then she decided that I was too old. Too old to be of any use to her. She was wrong of course, that goes without saying, and then she just ran away. But I tell you that girl needs help.â

âI donât suppose she does really,â said Mrs. Oliver soothingly. âGirls make a fuss about things.â

âNo. You are wrong. She needs help.â

âYou donât think she really has committed a murder?â

âWhy not? She said she had.â

âYes, butââ Mrs. Oliver stopped. âShe said she might have,â she said slowly. âBut what can she possibly mean by that?â

âExactly. It does not make sense.â

âWho did she murder or did she think she murdered?â

Poirot shrugged his shoulders.

âAnd why did she murder someone?â

Again Poirot shrugged his shoulders.

âOf course it could be all sorts of things.â Mrs. Oliver began to brighten as she set her ever prolific imagination to work. âShe could have run over someone in her car and not stopped. She could have been assaulted by a man on a cliff and struggled with him and managed to push him over. She could have given someone the wrong medicine by mistake. She could have gone to one of those purple pill parties and had a fight with someone. She could have come to and found she had stabbed someone. Sheââ

âAssez, madame, assez!â

But Mrs. Oliver was well away.

âShe might have been a nurse in the operating theatre and administered the wrong anaesthetic orââ she broke off, suddenly anxious for clearer details. âWhat did she look like?â

Poirot considered for a moment.

âAn Ophelia devoid of physical attraction.â

âOh dear,â said Mrs. Oliver. âI can almost see her when you say that. How queer.â

âShe is not competent,â said Poirot. âThat is how I see her. She is not one who can cope with difficulties. She is not one of those who can see beforehand the dangers that must come. She is one of whom others will look round and say âwe want a victim. That one will do.ââ

But Mrs. Oliver was no longer listening. She was clutching her rich coils of hair with both hands in a gesture with which Poirot was familiar.

âWait,â she cried in a kind of agony. âWait!â

Poirot waited, his eyebrows raised.

âYou didnât tell me her name,â said Mrs. Oliver.

âShe did not give it. Unfortunate, I agree with you.â

âWait!â implored Mrs. Oliver, again with the same agony. She relaxed her grip on her head and uttered a deep sigh. Hair detached itself from its bonds and tumbled over her shoulders, a super imperial coil of hair detached itself completely and fell on the floor. Poirot picked it up and put it discreetly on the table.

âNow then,â said Mrs. Oliver, suddenly restored to calm. She pushed in a hairpin or two, and nodded her head while she thought. âWho told this girl about you, M. Poirot?â

âNo one, so far as I know. Naturally, she had heard about me, no doubt.â

Mrs. Oliver thought that ânaturallyâ was not the word at all. What was natural was that Poirot himself was sure that everyone had always heard of him. Actually large numbers of people would only look at you blankly if the name of Hercule Poirot was mentioned, especially the younger generation. âBut how am I going to put that to him,â thought Mrs. Oliver, âin such a way that it wonât hurt his feelings?â

âI think youâre wrong,â she said. âGirlsâwell, girls and young menâthey donât know very much about detectives and things like that. They donât hear about them.â

âEveryone must have heard about Hercule Poirot,â said Poirot, superbly.

It was an article of belief for Hercule Poirot.

âBut they are all so badly educated nowadays,â said Mrs. Oliver. âReally, the only people whose names they know are pop singers, or groups, or disc jockeysâthat sort of thing. If you need someone special, I mean a doctor or a detective or a dentistâwell, then, I mean you would ask someoneâask whoâs the right person to go to? And then the other person saysââMy dear, you must go to that absolutely wonderful man in Queen Anneâs Street, twists your legs three times round your head and youâre cured,â or âAll my diamonds were stolen, and Henry would have been furious, so I couldnât go to the police, but thereâs a simply uncanny detective, most discreet, and he got them back for me and Henry never knew a thing.ââThatâs the way it happens all the time. Someone sent that girl to you.â

âI doubt it very much.â

âYou wouldnât know until you were told. And youâre going to be told now. Itâs only just come to me. I sent that girl to you.â

Poirot stared. âYou? But why did you not say so at once?â

âBecause itâs only just come to meâwhen you spoke about Opheliaâlong wet-looking hair, and rather plain. It seemed a description of someone Iâd actually seen. Quite lately. And then it came to me who it was.â

âWho is she?â

âI donât actually know her name, but I can easily find out. We were talkingâabout private detectives and private eyesâand I spoke about you and some of the amazing things you had done.â

âAnd you gave her my address?â

âNo, of course I didnât. Iâd no idea she wanted a detective or anything like that. I thought we were just talking. But Iâd mentioned the name several times, and of course it would be easy to look you up in the telephone book and just come along.â

âWere you talking about murder?â

âNot that I can remember. I donât even know how we came to be talking about detectivesâunless, yes, perhaps it was she who started the subjectâ¦.â

âTell me then, tell me all you canâeven if you do not know her name, tell me all you know about her.â

âWell, it was last weekend. I was staying with the Lorrimers. They donât come into it except that they took me over to some friends of theirs for drinks. There were several people thereâand I didnât enjoy myself much because, as you know, I donât really like drink, and so people have to find a soft drink for me which is rather a bore for them. And then people say things to meâyou knowâhow much they like my books, and how theyâve been longing to meet meâand it all makes me feel hot and bothered and rather silly. But I manage to cope more or less. And they say how much they love my awful detective Sven Hjerson. If they knew how I hated him! But my publisher always says Iâm not to say so. Anyway, I suppose the talk about detectives in real life grew out of all that, and I talked a bit about you, and this girl was standing around listening. When you said an unattractive Ophelia it clicked somehow. I thought: âNow who does that remind me of?â And then it came to me: âOf course. The girl at the party that day.â I rather think she belonged there unless Iâm confusing her with some other girl.â

Poirot sighed. With Mrs. Oliver one always needed a lot of patience.

âWho were these people with whom you went to have drinks?â

âTrefusis, I think, unless it was Treherne. That sort of nameâheâs a tycoon. Rich. Something in the City, but heâs spent most of his life in South Africaââ

âHe has a wife?â

âYes. Very good-looking woman. Much younger than he is. Lots of golden hair. Second wife. The daughter was the first wifeâs daughter. Then there was an uncle of incredible antiquity. Rather deaf. Heâs frightfully distinguishedâstrings of letters after his name. An admiral or an air marshal or something. Heâs an astronomer too, I think. Anyway, heâs got a kind of big telescope sticking out of the roof. Though I suppose that might be just a hobby. There was a foreign girl there, too, who sort of trots about after the old boy. Goes up to London with him, I believe, and sees he doesnât get run over. Rather pretty, she was.â

Poirot sorted out the information Mrs. Oliver had supplied him with, feeling rather like a human computer.

âThere lives then in the house Mr. and Mrs. Trefusisââ

âItâs not TrefusisâI remember nowâItâs Restarick.â

âThat is not at all the same type of name.â

âYes it is. Itâs a Cornish name, isnât it?â

âThere lives there then, Mr. and Mrs. Restarick, the distinguished elderly uncle. Is his name Restarick too?â

âItâs Sir Roderick something.â

âAnd there is the au pair girl, or whatever she is, and a daughterâanymore children?â

âI donât think soâbut I donât really know. The daughter doesnât live at home, by the way. She was only down for the weekend. Doesnât get on with the stepmother, I expect. Sheâs got a job in London, and sheâs picked up with a boyfriend they donât much like, so I understand.â

âYou seem to know quite a lot about the family.â

âOh well, one picks things up. The Lorrimers are great talkers. Always chattering about someone or other. One hears a lot of gossip about the people all around. Sometimes, though, one gets them mixed up. I probably have. I wish I could remember that girlâs Christian name. Something connected with a songâ¦Thora? Speak to me, Thora. Thora, Thora. Something like that, or Myra? Myra, oh Myra my love is all for thee. Something like that. I dreamt I dwelt in marble halls. Norma? Or do I mean Maritana? NormaâNorma Restarick. Thatâs right, Iâm sure.â She added inconsequently, âSheâs a third girl.â

âI thought you said you thought she was an only child.â

âSo she isâor I think so.â

âThen what do you mean by saying she is the third girl?â

âGood gracious, donât you know what a third girl is? Donât you read The Times?â

âI read the births, deaths, and marriages. And such articles as I find of interest.â

âNo, I mean the front advertisement page. Only it isnât in the front now. So Iâm thinking of taking some other paper. But Iâll show you.â

She went to a side table and snatched up The Times, turned the pages over and brought it to him. âHere you areâlook. âTHIRD GIRL for comfortable second floor flat, own room, central heating, Earlâs Court.â âThird girl wanted to share flat. 5gns. week own room.â â4th girl wanted. Regentâs park. Own room.â Itâs the way girls like living now. Better than PGs or a hostel. The main girl takes a furnished flat, and then shares out the rent. Second girl is usually a friend. Then they find a third girl by advertising if they donât know one. And, as you see, very often they manage to squeeze in a fourth girl. First girl takes the best room, second girl pays rather less, third girl less still and is stuck in a cat-hole. They fix it among themselves which one has the flat to herself which night a weekâor something like that. It works reasonably well.â

âAnd where does this girl whose name might just possibly be Norma live in London?â

âAs Iâve told you I donât really know anything about her.â

âBut you could find out?â

âOh yes, I expect that would be quite easy.â

âYou are sure there was no talk, no mention of an unexpected death?â

âDo you mean a death in Londonâor at the Restaricksâ home?â

âEither.â

âI donât think so. Shall I see what I can rake up?â

Mrs. Oliverâs eyes sparkled with excitement. She was by now entering into the spirit of the thing.

âThat would be very kind.â

âIâll ring up the Lorrimers. Actually now would be quite a good time.â She went towards the telephone. âI shall have to think of reasons and thingsâperhaps invent things?â

She looked towards Poirot rather doubtfully.

âBut naturally. That is understood. You are a woman of imaginationâyou will have no difficulty. Butânot too fantastic, you understand. Moderation.â

Mrs. Oliver flashed him an understanding glance.

She dialled and asked for the number she wanted. Turning her head, she hissed: âHave you got a pencil and paperâor a notebookâsomething to write down names or addresses or places?â

Poirot had already his notebook arranged by his elbow and nodded his head reassuringly.

Mrs. Oliver turned back to the receiver she held and launched herself into speech. Poirot listened attentively to one side of a telephone conversation.

âHallo. Can I speak toâOh, itâs you, Naomi. Ariadne Oliver here. Oh, yesâwell, it was rather a crowdâ¦Oh, you mean the old boy?â¦No, you know I donâtâ¦Practically blind?â¦I thought he was going up to London with the little foreign girlâ¦Yes, it must be rather worrying for them sometimesâbut she seems to manage him quite wellâ¦One of the things I rang up for was to ask you what the girlâs address wasâNo, the Restarick girl, I meanâsomewhere in South Ken, isnât it? Or was it Knightsbridge? Well, I promised her a book and I wrote down the address, but of course Iâve lost it as usual. I canât even remember her name. Is it Thora or Norma?â¦Yes, I thought it was Norma:â¦Wait a minute, Iâll get a pencilâ¦Yes, Iâm readyâ¦67 Borodene Mansionsâ¦I knowâthat great block that looks rather like Wormwood Scrubs prisonâ¦Yes, I believe the flats are very comfortable with central heating and everythingâ¦Who are the other two girls she lives with?â¦Friends of hers?â¦or advertisements?â¦Claudia Reece-Hollandâ¦her fatherâs the MP, is he? Whoâs the other one?â¦No, I suppose you wouldnât knowâsheâs quite nice, too, I supposeâ¦What do they all do? They always seem to be secretaries, donât they?â¦Oh, the other girlâs an interior decoratorâyou thinkâor to do with an art galleryâNo, Naomi, of course I donât really want to knowâone just wondersâwhat do all the girls do nowadays?âwell, itâs useful for me to know because of my booksâone wants to keep up to dateâ¦What was it you told me about some boyfriendâ¦Yes, but oneâs so helpless, isnât one? I mean girls do just exactly as they likeâ¦does he look very awful? Is he the unshaven dirty kind? Oh, that kindâBrocade waistcoats, and long curling chestnut hairâlying on his shouldersâyes, so hard to tell whether theyâre girls or boys, isnât it?âYes, they do look like Vandykes sometimes if theyâre good-lookingâ¦What did you say? That Andrew Restarick simply hates him?â¦Yes, men usually doâ¦Mary Restarick?â¦Well, I suppose you do usually have rows with a stepmother. I expect she was quite thankful when the girl got a job in London. What do you mean about people saying thingsâ¦Why, couldnât they find out what was the matter with her?â¦Who said?â¦Yes, but what did they hush up?â¦Ohâa nurse?âtalked to the Jennersâ governess? Do you mean her husband? Oh, I seeâThe doctors couldnât find outâ¦No, but people are so ill-natured. I do agree with you. These things are usually quite untrueâ¦Oh, gastric, was it?â¦But how ridiculous. Do you mean people said whatâs his nameâAndrewâYou mean it would be easy with all those weed killers aboutâYes, but why?â¦I mean, itâs not a case of some wife heâs hated for yearsâsheâs the second wifeâand much younger than he is and good-lookingâ¦Yes, I suppose that could beâbut why should the foreign girl want to either?â¦You mean she might have resented things that Mrs. Restarick said to herâ¦Sheâs quite an attractive little thingâI suppose Andrew might have taken a fancy to herânothing serious of courseâbut it might have annoyed Mary, and then she might have pitched into the girl andââ

Out of the corner of her eye, Mrs. Oliver perceived Poirot signalling wildly to her.

âJust a moment, darling,â said Mrs. Oliver into the telephone. âItâs the baker.â Poirot looked affronted. âHang on.â

She laid down the receiver, hurried across the room, and backed Poirot into a breakfast nook.

âYes,â she demanded breathlessly.

âA baker,â said Poirot with scorn. âMe!â

âWell, I had to think of something quickly. What were you signalling about? Did you understand what sheââ

Poirot cut her short.

âYou shall tell me presently. I know enough. What I want you to do is, with your rapid powers of improvisation, to arrange some plausible pretext for me to visit the Restaricksâan old friend of yours, shortly to be in the neighbourhood. Perhaps you could sayââ

âLeave it to me. Iâll think of something. Shall you give a false name?â

âCertainly not. Let us at least try to keep it simple.â

Mrs. Oliver nodded, and hurried back to the abandoned telephone.

âNaomi? I canât remember what we were saying. Why does something always come to interrupt just when one has settled down to a nice gossip? I canât even remember now what I rang you up for to begin withâOh yesâthat child Thoraâs addressâNorma, I meanâand you gave it to me. But there was something else I wanted toâoh, I remember. An old friend of mine. A most fascinating little man. Actually I was talking about him the other day down there. Hercule Poirot his name is. Heâs going to be staying quite close to the Restaricks and he is most tremendously anxious to meet old Sir Roderick. He knows a lot about him and has a terrific admiration for him, and for some wonderful discovery of his in the warâor some scientific thing he didâanyway, he is very anxious to âcall upon him and present his respects,â thatâs how he put it. Will that be all right, do you think? Will you warn them? Yes, heâll probably just turn up out of the blue. Tell them to make him tell them some wonderful espionage storiesâ¦Heâwhat? Oh! your mowers? Yes, of course you must go. Good-bye.â

She put back the receiver and sank down in an armchair. âGoodness, how exhausting. Was that all right?â

âNot bad,â said Poirot.

âI thought Iâd better pin it all to the old boy. Then youâll get to see the lot which I suppose is what you want. And one can always be vague about scientific subjects if one is a woman, and you can think up something more definite that sounds probable by the time you arrive. Now, do you want to hear what she was telling me?â

âThere has been gossip, I gather. About the health of Mrs. Restarick?â

âThatâs it. It seems she had some kind of mysterious illnessâgastric in natureâand the doctors were puzzled. They sent her into hospital and she got quite all right, but there didnât seem any real cause to account for it. And she went home, and it all began to start againâand again the doctors were puzzled. And then people began to talk. A rather irresponsible nurse started it and her sister told a neighbour, and the neighbour went out on daily work and told someone else, and how queer it all was. And then people began saying that her husband must be trying to poison her. The sort of thing people always sayâbut in this case it really didnât seem to make sense. And then Naomi and I wondered about the au pair girl, sheâs a kind of secretary companion to the old boyâso really there isnât any kind of reason why she should administer weed killer to Mrs. Restarick.â

âI heard you suggesting a few.â

âWell, there is usually something possible.â¦â

âMurder desiredâ¦â said Poirot thoughtfullyâ¦âBut not yet committed.â

Three

Mrs. Oliver drove into the inner court of Borodene Mansions. There were six cars filling the parking space. As Mrs. Oliver hesitated, one of the cars reversed out and drove away. Mrs. Oliver hurried neatly into the vacant space.

She descended, banged the door and stood looking up to the sky. It was a recent block, occupying a space left by the havoc of a land mine in the last war. It might, Mrs. Oliver thought, have been lifted en bloc from the Great West Road and, first deprived of some such legend as SKYLARKâS FEATHER RAZOR BLADES, have been deposited as a block of flats in situ. It looked extremely functional and whoever had built it had obviously scorned any ornamental additions.

It was a busy time. Cars and people were going in and out of the courtyard as the dayâs work came to a close.

Mrs. Oliver glanced down at her wrist. Ten minutes to seven. About the right time, as far as she could judge. The kind of time when girls in jobs might be presumed to have returned, either to renew their makeup, change their clothes to tight exotic pants or whatever their particular addiction was, and go out again, or else to settle down to home life and wash their smalls and their stockings. Anyway, quite a sensible time to try. The block was exactly the same on the east and the west, with big swing doors set in the centre. Mrs. Oliver chose the left-hand side but immediately found that she was wrong. All this side was numbers from 100 to 200. She crossed over to the other side.

No. 67 was on the sixth floor. Mrs. Oliver pressed the button of the lift. The doors opened like a yawning mouth with a menacing clash. Mrs. Oliver hurried into the yawning cavern. She was always afraid of modern lifts.

Crash. The doors came to again. The lift went up. It stopped almost immediately (that was frightening too!). Mrs. Oliver scuttled out like a frightened rabbit.

She looked up at the wall and went along the right-hand passage. She came to a door marked 67 in metal numbers affixed to the centre of the door. The numeral 7 detached itself and fell on her feet as she arrived.

âThis place doesnât like me,â said Mrs. Oliver to herself as she winced with pain and picked the number up gingerly and affixed it by its spike to the door again.

She pressed the bell. Perhaps everyone was out.

However, the door opened almost at once. A tall handsome girl stood in the doorway. She was wearing a dark well-cut suit with a very short skirt, a white silk shirt, and was very well shod. She had swept-up dark hair, good but discreet makeup, and for some reason was slightly alarming to Mrs. Oliver.

âOh,â said Mrs. Oliver, galvanizing herself to say the right thing. âIs Miss Restarick in, by any chance?â

âNo, Iâm sorry, sheâs out. Can I give her a message?â

Mrs. Oliver said, âOhâ againâbefore proceeding. She made a play of action by producing a parcel rather untidily done up in brown paper. âI promised her a book,â she explained. âOne of mine that she hadnât read. I hope Iâve remembered actually which it was. She wonât be in soon, I suppose?â

âI really couldnât say. I donât know what she is doing tonight.â

âOh. Are you Miss Reece-Holland?â

The girl looked slightly surprised.

âYes, I am.â

âIâve met your father,â said Mrs. Oliver. She went on, âIâm Mrs. Oliver. I write books,â she added in the usual guilty style in which she invariably made such an announcement.

âWonât you come in?â

Mrs. Oliver accepted the invitation, and Claudia Reece-Holland led her into a sitting room. All the rooms of the flats were papered the same with an artificial raw wood pattern. Tenants could then display their modern pictures or apply any forms of decoration they fancied. There was a foundation of modern built-in furniture, cupboard, bookshelves and so on, a large settee and a pullout type of table. Personal bits and pieces could be added by the tenants. There were also signs of individuality displayed here by a gigantic Harlequin pasted on one wall, and a stencil of a monkey swinging from branches of palm fronds on another wall.

âIâm sure Norma will be thrilled to get your book, Mrs. Oliver. Wonât you have a drink? Sherry? Gin?â

This girl had the brisk manner of a really good secretary. Mrs. Oliver refused.

âYouâve got a splendid view up here,â she said, looking out of the window and blinking a little as she got the setting sun straight in her eyes.

âYes. Not so funny when the lift goes out of order.â

âI shouldnât have thought that lift would dare to go out of order. Itâs soâsoârobot-like.â

âRecently installed, but none the better for that,â said Claudia. âIt needs frequent adjusting and all that.â

Another girl came in, talking as she entered.

âClaudia, have you any idea where I putââ

She stopped, looking at Mrs. Oliver.

Claudia made a quick introduction.

âFrances CaryâMrs. Oliver. Mrs. Ariadne Oliver.â

âOh, how exciting,â said Frances.

She was a tall willowy girl, with long black hair, a heavily made up dead-white face, and eyebrows and eyelashes slightly slanted upwardsâthe effect heightened by mascara. She wore tight velvet pants and a heavy sweater. She was a complete contrast to the brisk and efficient Claudia.

âI brought a book Iâd promised Norma Restarick,â said Mrs. Oliver.

âOh!âwhat a pity sheâs still in the country.â

âHasnât she come back?â

There was quite definitely a pause. Mrs. Oliver thought the two girls exchanged a glance.

âI thought she had a job in London,â said Mrs. Oliver, endeavouring to convey innocent surprise.

âOh yes,â said Claudia. âSheâs in an interior decorating place. Sheâs sent down with patterns occasionally to places in the country.â She smiled. âWe live rather separate lives here,â she explained. âCome and go as we likeâand donât usually bother to leave messages. But I wonât forget to give her your book when she does get back.â

Nothing could have been easier than the casual explanation.

Mrs. Oliver rose. âWell, thank you very much.â

Claudia accompanied her to the door. âI shall tell my father Iâve met you,â she said. âHeâs a great reader of detective stories.â

Closing the door she went back into the sitting room.

The girl Frances was leaning against the window.

âSorry,â she said. âDid I boob?â

âIâd just said that Norma was out.â

Frances shrugged her shoulders.

âI couldnât tell. Claudia, where is that girl? Why didnât she come back on Monday? Where has she gone?â

âI canât imagine.â

âShe didnât stay on down with her people? Thatâs where she went for the weekend.â

âNo. I rang up, actually, to find out.â

âI suppose it doesnât really matterâ¦All the same, she isâwell, thereâs something queer about her.â

âSheâs not really queerer than anyone else.â But the opinion sounded uncertain.

âOh yes, she is,â said Frances. âSometimes she gives me the shivers. Sheâs not normal, you know.â

She laughed suddenly.

âNorma isnât normal! You know she isnât, Claudia, although you wonât admit it. Loyalty to your employer, I suppose.â

Four

Hercule Poirot walked along the main street of Long Basing. That is, if you can describe as a main street a street that is to all intents and purposes the only street, which was the case in Long Basing. It was one of those villages that exhibit a tendency to length without breadth. It had an impressive church with a tall tower and a yew tree of elderly dignity in its churchyard. It had its full quota of village shops disclosing much variety. It had two antique shops, one mostly consisting of stripped pine chimneypieces, the other disclosing a full house of piled up ancient maps, a good deal of porcelain, most of it chipped, some worm-eaten old oak chests, shelves of glass, some Victorian silver, all somewhat hampered in display by lack of space. There were two cafÃ©s, both rather nasty, there was a basket shop, quite delightful, with a large variety of homemade wares, there was a post office-cum-greengrocer, there was a draperâs which dealt largely in millinery and also a shoe department for children and a large miscellaneous selection of haberdashery of all kinds. There was a stationery and newspaper shop which also dealt in tobacco and sweets. There was a wool shop which was clearly the aristocrat of the place. Two white-haired severe women were in charge of shelves and shelves of knitting materials of every description. Also large quantities of dressmaking patterns and knitting patterns and which branched off into a counter for art needlework. What had lately been the local grocerâs had now blossomed into calling itself âa supermarketâ complete with stacks of wire baskets and packaged materials of every cereal and cleaning material, all in dazzling paper boxes. And there was a small establishment with one small window with Lillah written across it in fancy letters, a fashion display of one French blouse, labelled âLatest chic,â and a navy skirt and a purple striped jumper labelled âseparates.â These were displayed by being flung down as by a careless hand in the window.

All of this Poirot observed with a detached interest. Also contained within the limits of the village and facing on the street were several small houses, old-fashioned in style, sometimes retaining Georgian purity, more often showing some signs of Victorian improvement, as a veranda, bow window, or a small conservatory. One or two houses had had a complete face-lift and showed signs of claiming to be new and proud of it. There were also some delightful and decrepit old-world cottages, some pretending to be a hundred or so years older than they were, others completely genuine, any added comforts of plumbing or such being carefully hidden from any casual glance.

Poirot walked gently along digesting all that he saw. If his impatient friend, Mrs. Oliver, had been with him, she would have immediately demanded why he was wasting time, as the house to which he was bound was a quarter of a mile beyond the village limits. Poirot would have told her that he was absorbing the local atmosphere; that these things were sometimes important. At the end of the village there came an abrupt transition. On one side, set back from the road, was a row of newly built council houses, a strip of green in front of them and a gay note set by each house having been given a different coloured front door. Beyond the council houses the sway of fields and hedges resumed its course interspersed now and then by the occasional âdesirable residencesâ of a house agentâs list, with their own trees and gardens and a general air of reserve and of keeping themselves to themselves. Ahead of him farther down the road Poirot descried a house, the top storey of which displayed an unusual note of bulbous construction. Something had evidently been tacked on up there not so many years ago. This no doubt was the Mecca towards which his feet were bent. He arrived at a gate to which the nameplate Crosshedges was attached. He surveyed the house. It was a conventional house dating perhaps to the beginning of the century. It was neither beautiful nor ugly. Commonplace was perhaps the word to describe it. The garden was more attractive than the house and had obviously been the subject of a great deal of care and attention in its time, though it had been allowed to fall into disarray. It still had smooth green lawns, plenty of flower beds, carefully planted areas of shrubs to display a certain landscape effect. It was all in good order. A gardener was certainly employed in this garden, Poirot reflected. A personal interest was perhaps also taken, since he noted in a corner near the house a woman bending over one of the flower beds, tying up dahlias, he thought. Her head showed as a bright circle of pure gold colour. She was tall, slim but square-shouldered. He unlatched the gate, passed through and walked up towards the house. The woman turned her head and then straightened herself, turning towards him inquiringly.

She remained standing, waiting for him to speak, some garden twine hanging from her left hand. She looked, he noted, puzzled.

âYes?â she said.

Poirot, very foreign, took off his hat with a flourish and bowed. Her eyes rested on his moustaches with a kind of fascination.

âMrs. Restarick?â

âYes. Iââ

âI hope I do not derange you, Madame.â

A faint smile touched her lips. âNot at all. Are youââ

âI have permitted myself to pay a visit on you. A friend of mine, Mrs. Ariadne Oliverââ

âOh, of course. I know who you must be. Monsieur Poiret.â

âMonsieur Poirot,â he corrected her with an emphasis on the last syllable. âHercule Poirot, at your service. I was passing through this neighbourhood and I ventured to call upon you here in the hope that I might be allowed to pay my respects to Sir Roderick Horsefield.â

âYes. Naomi Lorrimer told us you might turn up.â

âI hope it is not inconvenient?â

âOh, it is not inconvenient at all. Ariadne Oliver was here last weekend. She came over with the Lorrimers. Her books are most amusing, arenât they? But perhaps you donât find detective stories amusing. You are a detective yourself, arenât youâa real one?â

âI am all that there is of the most real,â said Hercule Poirot.

He noticed that she repressed a smile. He studied her more closely. She was handsome in a rather artificial fashion. Her golden hair was stiffly arranged. He wondered whether she might not at heart be secretly unsure of herself, whether she were not carefully playing the part of the English lady absorbed in her garden. He wondered a little what her social background might have been.

âYou have a very fine garden here,â he said.

âYou like gardens?â

âNot as the English like gardens. You have for a garden a special talent in England. It means something to you that it does not to us.â

âTo French people, you mean? Oh yes. I believe that Mrs. Oliver mentioned that you were once with the Belgian Police Force?â

âThat is so. Me, I am an old Belgian police dog.â He gave a polite little laugh and said, waving his hands, âBut your gardens, you English, I admire. I sit at your feet! The Latin races, they like the formal garden, the gardens of the chÃ¢teau, the ChÃ¢teau of Versailles in miniature, and also of course they invented the potager. Very important, the potager. Here in England you have the potager, but you got it from France and you do not love your potager as much as you love your flowers. Hein? That is so?â

âYes, I think you are right,â said Mary Restarick. âDo come into the house. You came to see my uncle.â

âI came, as you say, to pay homage to Sir Roderick, but I pay homage to you also, Madame. Always I pay homage to beauty when I meet it.â He bowed.

She laughed with slight embarrassment. âYou mustnât pay me so many compliments.â

She led the way through an open French window and he followed her.

âI knew your uncle slightly in 1944.â

âPoor dear, heâs getting quite an old man now. Heâs very deaf, Iâm afraid.â

âIt was long ago that I encountered him. He will probably have forgotten. It was a matter of espionage and of scientific developments of a certain invention. We owed that invention to the ingenuity of Sir Roderick. He will be willing, I hope, to receive me.â

âOh, Iâm sure heâll love it,â said Mrs. Restarick. âHe has rather a dull life in some ways nowadays. I have to be so much in Londonâwe are looking for a suitable house there.â She sighed and said, âElderly people can be very difficult sometimes.â

âI know,â said Poirot. âFrequently I, too, am difficult.â

She laughed. âAh no, M. Poirot, come now, you mustnât pretend youâre old.â

âSometimes I am told so,â said Poirot. He sighed. âBy young girls,â he added mournfully.

âThatâs very unkind of them. Itâs probably the sort of thing that our daughter would do,â she added.

âAh, you have a daughter?â

âYes. At least, she is my stepdaughter.â

âI shall have much pleasure in meeting her,â said Poirot politely.

âOh well, Iâm afraid she is not here. Sheâs in London. She works there.â

âThe young girls, they all do jobs nowadays.â

âEverybodyâs supposed to do a job,â said Mrs. Restarick vaguely. âEven when they get married theyâre always being persuaded back into industry or back into teaching.â

âHave they persuaded you, Madame, to come back into anything?â

âNo. I was brought up in South Africa. I only came here with my husband a short time agoâItâs allârather strange to me still.â

She looked round her with what Poirot judged to be an absence of enthusiasm. It was a handsomely furnished room of a conventional typeâwithout personality. Two large portraits hung on the wallsâthe only personal touch. The first was that of a thin lipped woman in a grey velvet evening dress. Facing her on the opposite wall was a man of about thirty-odd with an air of repressed energy about him.

âYour daughter, I suppose, finds it dull in the country?â

âYes, it is much better for her to be in London. She doesnât like it here.â She paused abruptly, and then as though the last words were almost dragged out of her, she said, ââand she doesnât like me.â

âImpossible,â said Hercule Poirot, with Gallic politeness.

âNot at all impossible! Oh well, I suppose it often happens. I suppose itâs hard for girls to accept a stepmother.â

âWas your daughter very fond of her own mother?â

âI suppose she must have been. Sheâs a difficult girl. I suppose most girls are.â

Poirot sighed and said, âMothers and fathers have much less control over daughters nowadays. It is not as it used to be in the old good-fashioned days.â

âNo indeed.â

âOne dare not say so, Madame, but I must confess I regret that they show so very little discrimination in choosing theirâhow do you say it?âtheir boyfriends?â

âNorma has been a great worry to her father in that way. However, I suppose it is no good complaining. People must make their own experiments. But I must take you up to Uncle Roddyâhe has his own rooms upstairs.â

She led the way out of the room. Poirot looked back over his shoulder. A dull room, a room without characterâexcept perhaps for the two portraits. By the style of the womanâs dress, Poirot judged that they dated from some years back. If that was the first Mrs. Restarick, Poirot did not think that he would have liked her.

He said, âThose are fine portraits, Madame.â

âYes. Lansberger did them.â

It was the name of a famous and exceedingly expensive fashionable portrait painter of twenty years ago. His meticulous naturalism had now gone out of fashion, and since his death, he was little spoken of. His sitters were sometimes sneeringly spoken of as âclothes props,â but Poirot thought they were a good deal more than that. He suspected that there was a carefully concealed mockery behind the smooth exteriors that Lansberger executed so effortlessly.

Mary Restarick said as she went up the stairs ahead of him:

âThey have just come out of storageâand been cleaned up andââ

She stopped abruptlyâcoming to a dead halt, one hand on the stair rail.

Above her, a figure had just turned the corner of the staircase on its way down. It was a figure that seemed strangely incongruous. It might have been someone in fancy dress, someone who certainly did not match with this house.

He was a figure familiar enough to Poirot in different conditions, a figure often met in the streets of London or even at parties. A representative of the youth of today. He wore a black coat, an elaborate velvet waistcoat, skintight pants, and rich curls of chestnut hair hung down on his neck. He looked exotic and rather beautiful, and it needed a few moments to be certain of his sex.

âDavid!â Mary Restarick spoke sharply. âWhat on earth are you doing here?â

The young man was by no means taken aback. âStartled you?â he asked. âSo sorry.â

âWhat are you doing hereâin this house? Youâhave you come down here with Norma?â

âNorma? No, I hoped to find her here.â

âFind her hereâwhat do you mean? Sheâs in London.â

âOh, but my dear, she isnât. At any rate, sheâs not at 67 Borodene Mansions.â

âWhat do you mean, she isnât there?â

âWell, since she didnât come back this weekend, I thought she was probably here with you. I came down to see what she was up to.â

âShe left here Sunday night as usual.â She added in an angry voice, âWhy didnât you ring the bell and let us know you were here? What are you doing roaming about the house?â

âReally, darling, you seem to be thinking Iâm going to pinch the spoons or something. Surely itâs natural to walk into a house in broad daylight. Why ever not?â

âWell, weâre old-fashioned and we donât like it.â

âOh dear, dear.â David sighed. âThe fuss everyone makes. Well, my dear, if Iâm not going to have a welcome and you donât seem to know where your stepdaughter is, I suppose Iâd better be moving along. Shall I turn out my pockets before I go?â

âDonât be absurd, David.â

âTa-ta, then.â The young man passed them, waved an airy hand and went on down and out through the open front door.

âHorrible creature,â said Mary Restarick, with a sharpness of rancour that startled Poirot. âI canât bear him. I simply canât stand him. Why is En gland absolutely full of these people nowadays?â

âAh, Madame, do not disquiet yourself. It is all a question of fashion. There have always been fashions. You see less in the country, but in London you meet plenty of them.â

âDreadful,â said Mary. âAbsolutely dreadful. Effeminate, exotic.â

âAnd yet not unlike a Vandyke portrait, do you not think so, Madame? In a gold frame, wearing a lace collar, you would not then say he was effeminate or exotic.â

âDaring to come down here like that. Andrew would have been furious. It worries him dreadfully. Daughters can be very worrying. Itâs not even as though Andrew knew Norma well. Heâs been abroad since she was a child. He left her entirely to her mother to bring up, and now he finds her a complete puzzle. So do I for that matter. I canât help feeling that she is a very odd type of girl. One has no kind of authority over them these days. They seem to like the worst type of young men. Sheâs absolutely infatuated with this David Baker. One canât do anything. Andrew forbade him the house, and look, he turns up here, walks in as cool as a cucumber. I thinkâI almost think Iâd better not tell Andrew. I donât want him to be unduly worried. I believe she goes about with this creature in London, and not only with him. There are some much worse ones even. The kind that donât wash, completely unshaven faces and funny sprouting beards and greasy clothes.â

Poirot said cheerfully, âAlas, Madame, you must not distress yourself. The indiscretions of youth pass.â

âI hope so, Iâm sure. Norma is a very difficult girl. Sometimes I think sheâs not right in the head. Sheâs so peculiar. She really looks sometimes as though she isnât all there. These extraordinary dislikes she takesââ

âDislikes?â

âShe hates me. Really hates me. I donât see why itâs necessary. I suppose she was very devoted to her mother, but after all itâs only reasonable that her father should marry again, isnât it?â

âDo you think she really hates you?â

âOh, I know she does. Iâve had ample proof of it. I canât say how relieved I was when she went off to London. I didnât want to make troubleââ She stopped suddenly. It was as though for the first time she realised that she was talking to a stranger.

Poirot had the capacity to attract confidences. It was as though when people were talking to him they hardly realised who it was they were talking to. She gave a short laugh now.

âDear me,â she said, âI donât really know why Iâm saying all this to you. I expect every family has these problems. Poor stepmothers, we have a hard time of it. Ah, here we are.â

She tapped on a door.

âCome in, come in.â

It was a stentorian roar.

âHere is a visitor to see you, Uncle,â said Mary Restarick, as she walked into the room, Poirot behind her.

A broad-shouldered, square-faced, red-cheeked, irascible looking elderly man had been pacing the floor. He stumped forward towards them. At the table behind him a girl was sitting sorting letters and papers. Her head was bent over them, a sleek, dark head.

âThis is Monsieur Hercule Poirot, Uncle Roddy,â said Mary Restarick.

Poirot stepped forward gracefully into action and speech. âAh, Sir Roderick, it is many yearsâmany years since I have had the pleasure of meeting you. We have to go back, so far as the last war. It was, I think, in Normandy the last time. How well I remember, there was there also Colonel Race and there was General Abercromby and there was Air-Marshal Sir Edmund Collingsby. What decisions we had to take! And what difficulties we had with security. Ah, nowadays, there is no longer the need for secrecy. I recall the unmasking of that secret agent who succeeded for so longâyou remember Captain Henderson.â

âAh. Captain Henderson indeed. Lord, that damned swine! Unmasked!â

âYou may not remember me, Hercule Poirot.â

âYes, yes, of course I remember you. Ah, it was a close shave that, a close shave. You were the French representative, werenât you? There were one or two of them, one I couldnât get on withâcanât remember his name. Ah well, sit down, sit down. Nothing like having a chat over old days.â

âI feared so much that you might not remember me or my colleague, Monsieur Giraud.â

âYes, yes, of course I remember both of you. Ah, those were the days, those were the days indeed.â

The girl at the table got up. She moved a chair politely towards Poirot.

âThatâs right, Sonia, thatâs right,â said Sir Roderick. âLet me introduce you,â he said, âto my charming little secretary here. Makes a great difference to me. Helps me, you know, files all my work. Donât know how I ever got on without her.â

Poirot bowed politely. âEnchantÃ©, mademoiselle,â he murmured.

The girl murmured something in rejoinder. She was a small creature with black bobbed hair. She looked shy. Her dark blue eyes were usually modestly cast down, but she smiled up sweetly and shyly at her employer. He patted her on the shoulder.

âDonât know what I should do without her,â he said. âI donât really.â

âOh, no,â the girl protested. âI am not much good really. I cannot type very fast.â

âYou type quite fast enough, my dear. Youâre my memory, too. My eyes and my ears and a great many other things.â

She smiled again at him.

âOne remembers,â murmured Poirot, âsome of the excellent stories that used to go the round. I donât know if they were exaggerated or not. Now, for instance, the day that someone stole your car andââ he proceeded to follow up the tale.

Sir Roderick was delighted. âHa, ha, of course now. Yes, indeed, well, bit of exaggeration, I expect. But on the whole, thatâs how it was. Yes, yes, well, fancy your remembering that, after all this long time. But I could tell you a better one than that now.â He launched forth into another tale. Poirot listened, applauded. Finally he glanced at his watch and rose to his feet.

âBut I must detain you no longer,â he said. âYou are engaged, I can see, in important work. It was just that being in this neighbourhood I could not help paying my respects. Years pass, but you, I see, have lost none of your vigour, of your enjoyment of life.â

âWell, well, perhaps you may say so. Anyway, you mustnât pay me too many complimentsâbut surely youâll stay and have tea. Iâm sure Mary will give you some tea.â He looked round. âOh, sheâs gone away. Nice girl.â

âYes, indeed, and very handsome. I expect she has been a great comfort to you for many years.â

âOh! Theyâve only married recently. Sheâs my nephewâs second wife. Iâll be frank with you. Iâve never cared very much for this nephew of mine, Andrewânot a steady chap. Always restless. His elder brother Simon was my favourite. Not that I knew him well, either. As for Andrew, he behaved very badly to his first wife. Went off, you know. Left her high and dry. Went off with a thoroughly bad lot. Everybody knew about her. But he was infatuated with her. The whole thing broke up in a year or two: silly fellow. The girl heâs married seems all right. Nothing wrong with her as far as I know. Now Simon was a steady chapâdamned dull, though. I canât say I liked it when my sister married into that family. Marrying into trade, you know. Rich, of course, but money isnât everythingâweâve usually married into the Services. I never saw much of the Restarick lot.â

âThey have, I believe, a daughter. A friend of mine met her last week.â

âOh, Norma. Silly girl. Goes about in dreadful clothes and has picked up with a dreadful young man. Ah well, theyâre all alike nowadays. Long-haired young fellows, beatniks, Beatles, all sorts of names theyâve got. I canât keep up with them. Practically talk a foreign language. Still, nobody cares to hear an old manâs criticisms, so there we are. Even MaryâI always thought she was a good, sensible sort, but as far as I can see she can be thoroughly hysterical in some waysâmainly about her health. Some fuss about going to hospital for observation or something. What about a drink? Whisky? No? Sure you wonât stop and have a drop of tea?â

âThank you, but I am staying with friends.â

âWell, I must say I have enjoyed this chat with you very much. Nice to remember some of the things that happened in the old days. Sonia, dear, perhaps youâll take Monsieurâsorry, whatâs your name, itâs gone againâah, yes, Poirot. Take him down to Mary, will you?â

âNo, no,â Hercule Poirot hastily waved aside the offer. âI could not dream of troubling Madame anymore. I am quite all right. Quite all right. I can find my way perfectly. It has been a great pleasure to meet you again.â

He left the room.

âHavenât the faintest idea who that chap was,â said Sir Roderick, after Poirot had gone.

âYou do not know who he was?â Sonia asked, looking at him in a startled manner.

âPersonally I donât remember who half the people are who come up and talk to me nowadays. Of course, I have to make a good shot at it. One learns to get away with that, you know. Same thing at parties. Up comes a chap and says, âPerhaps you donât remember me. I last saw you in 1939.â I have to say âOf course I remember,â but I donât. Itâs a handicap being nearly blind and deaf. We got pally with a lot of frogs like that towards the end of the war. Donât remember half of them. Oh, heâd been there all right. He knew me and I knew a good many of the chaps he talked about. That story about me and the stolen car, that was true enough. Exaggerated a bit, of course, they made a pretty good story of it at the time. Ah well, I donât think he knew I didnât remember him. Clever chap, I should say, but a thorough frog, isnât he? You know, mincing and dancing and bowing and scraping. Now then, where were we?â

Sonia picked up a letter and handed it to him. She tentatively proffered a pair of spectacles which he immediately rejected.

âDonât want those damned thingsâI can see all right.â

He screwed up his eyes and peered down at the letter he was holding. Then he capitulated and thrust it back into her hands.

âWell, perhaps youâd better read it to me.â

She started reading it in her clear soft voice.

Five

I

Hercule Poirot stood upon the landing for a moment. His head was a little on one side with a listening air. He could hear nothing from downstairs. He crossed to the landing window and looked out. Mary Restarick was below on the terrace, resuming her gardening work. Poirot nodded his head in satisfaction. He walked gently along the corridor. One by one in turn he opened the doors. A bathroom, a linen cupboard, a double bedded spare room, an occupied single bedroom, a womanâs room with a double bed (Mary Restarickâs?). The next door was that of an adjoining room and was, he guessed, the room belonging to Andrew Restarick. He turned to the other side of the landing. The door he opened first was a single bedroom. It was not, he judged, occupied at the time, but it was a room which possibly was occupied at weekends. There were toilet brushes on the dressing table. He listened carefully, then tiptoed in. He opened the wardrobe. Yes, there were some clothes hanging up there. Country clothes.

There was a writing table but there was nothing on it. He opened the desk drawers very softly. There were a few odds and ends, a letter or two, but the letters were trivial and dated some time ago. He shut the desk drawers. He walked downstairs, and going out of the house, bade farewell to his hostess. He refused her offer of tea. He had promised to get back, he said, as he had to catch a train to town very shortly afterwards.

âDonât you want a taxi? We could order you one, or I could drive you in the car.â

âNo, no, Madame, you are too kind.â

Poirot walked back to the village and turned down the lane by the church. He crossed a little bridge over a stream. Presently he came to where a large car with a chauffeur was waiting discreetly under a beech tree. The chauffeur opened the door of the car, Poirot got inside, sat down and removed his patent leather shoes, uttering a gasp of relief.

âNow we return to London,â he said.

The chauffeur closed the door, returned to his seat and the car purred quietly away. The sight of a young man standing by the roadside furiously thumbing a ride was not an unusual one. Poirotâs eyes rested almost indifferently on this member of the fraternity, a brightly dressed young man with long and exotic hair. There were many such but in the moment of passing him Poirot suddenly sat upright and addressed the driver.

âIf you please, stop. Yes, and if you can reverse a littleâ¦There is someone requesting a lift.â

The chauffeur turned an incredulous eye over his shoulder. It was the last remark he would have expected. However, Poirot was gently nodding his head, so he obeyed.

The young man called David advanced to the door. âThought you werenât going to stop for me,â he said cheerfully. âMuch obliged, Iâm sure.â

He got in, removed a small pack from his shoulders and let it slide to the floor, smoothed down his copper brown locks. âSo you recognised me,â he said.

âYou are perhaps somewhat conspicuously dressed.â

âOh, do you think so? Not really. Iâm just one of a band of brothers.â

âThe school of Vandyke. Very dressy.â

âOh. Iâve never thought of it like that. Yes, there may be something in what you say.â

âYou should wear a cavalierâs hat,â said Poirot, âand a lace collar, if I might advise.â

âOh, I donât think we go quite as far as that.â The young man laughed. âHow Mrs. Restarick dislikes the mere sight of me. Actually I reciprocate her dislike. I donât care much for Restarick, either. There is something singularly unattractive about successful tycoons, donât you think?â

âIt depends on the point of view. You have been paying attentions to the daughter, I understand.â

âThat is such a nice phrase,â said David. âPaying attentions to the daughter. I suppose it might be called that. But thereâs plenty of fifty-fifty about it, you know. Sheâs paying attention to me, too.â

âWhere is Mademoiselle now?â

David turned his head rather sharply. âAnd why do you ask that?â

âI should like to meet her.â He shrugged his shoulders.

âI donât believe sheâd be your type, you know, anymore than I am. Normaâs in London.â

âBut you said to her stepmotherââ

âOh! We donât tell stepmothers everything.â

âAnd where is she in London?â

âShe works in an interior decoratorâs down the Kingâs Road somewhere in Chelsea. Canât remember the name of it for the moment. Susan Phelps, I think.â

âBut that is not where she lives, I presume. You have her address?â

âOh yes, a great block of flats. I donât really understand your interest.â

âOne is interested in so many things.â

âWhat do you mean?â

âWhat brought you to that houseâ(what is its name?âCrosshedges) today. Brought you secretly into the house and up the stairs.â

âI came in the back door, I admit.â

âWhat were you looking for upstairs?â

âThatâs my business. I donât want to be rudeâbut arenât you being rather nosy?â

âYes, I am displaying curiosity. I would like to know exactly where this young lady is.â

âI see. Dear Andrew and dear Maryâlord rot âemâare employing you, is that it? They are trying to find her?â

âAs yet,â said Poirot, âI do not think they know that she is missing.â

âSomeone must be employing you.â

âYou are exceedingly perceptive,â said Poirot. He leant back.

âI wondered what you were up to,â said David. âThatâs why I hailed you. I hoped youâd stop and give me a bit of dope. Sheâs my girl. You know that, I suppose?â

âI understand that that is supposed to be the idea,â said Poirot cautiously. âIf so, you should know where she is. Is that not so, Mr.âI am sorry, I do not think I know your name beyond, that is, that your Christian name is David.â

âBaker.â

âPerhaps, Mr. Baker, you have had a quarrel.â

âNo, we havenât had a quarrel. Why should you think we had?â

âMiss Norma Restarick left Crosshedges on Sunday evening, or was it Monday morning?â

âIt depends. There is an early bus you can take. Gets you to London a little after ten. It would make her a bit late at work, but not too much. Usually she goes back on Sunday night.â

âShe left there Sunday night but she has not arrived at Borodene Mansions.â

âApparently not. So Claudia says.â

âThis Miss Reece-Hollandâthat is her name, is it not?âwas she surprised or worried?â

âGood lord, no, why should she be. They donât keep tabs on each other all the time, these girls.â

âBut you thought she was going back there?â

âShe didnât go back to work either. Theyâre fed up at the shop, I can tell you.â

âAre you worried, Mr. Baker?â

âNo. NaturallyâI mean, well, Iâm damned if I know. I donât see any reason I should be worried, only timeâs getting on. What is it todayâThursday?â

âShe has not quarrelled with you?â

âNo. We donât quarrel.â

âBut you are worried about her, Mr. Baker?â

âWhat business is it of yours?â

âIt is no business of mine but there has, I understand, been trouble at home. She does not like her stepmother.â

âQuite right too. Sheâs a bitch, that woman. Hard as nails. She doesnât like Norma either.â

âShe has been ill, has she not? She had to go to hospital.â

âWho are you talking aboutâNorma?â

âNo, I am not talking about Miss Restarick. I am talking about Mrs. Restarick.â

âI believe she did go into a nursing home. No reason she should. Strong as a horse, Iâd say.â

âAnd Miss Restarick hates her stepmother.â

âSheâs a bit unbalanced sometimes, Norma. You know, goes off the deep end. I tell you, girls always hate their stepmothers.â

âDoes that always make stepmothers ill? Ill enough to go to hospital?â

âWhat the hell are you getting at?â

âGardening perhapsâor the use of weed killer.â

âWhat do you mean by talking about weed killer? Are you suggesting that Normaâthat sheâd dream ofâthatââ

âPeople talk,â said Poirot. âTalk goes round the neighbourhood.â

âDo you mean that somebody has said that Norma has tried to poison her stepmother? Thatâs ridiculous. Itâs absolutely absurd.â

âIt is very unlikely, I agree,â said Poirot. âActually, people have not been saying that.â

âOh. Sorry. I misunderstood. Butâwhat did you mean?â

âMy dear young man,â said Poirot, âyou must realise that there are rumours going about, and rumours are almost always about the same personâa husband.â

âWhat, poor old Andrew? Most unlikely I should say.â

âYes. Yes, it does not seem to me very likely.â

âWell, what were you there for then? You are a detective, arenât you?â

âYes.â

âWell, then?â

âWe are talking at cross-purposes,â said Poirot. âI did not go down there to inquire into any doubtful or possible case of poisoning. You must forgive me if I cannot answer your question. It is all very hush-hush, you understand.â

âWhat on earth do you mean by that?â

âI went there,â said Poirot, âto see Sir Roderick Horsefield.â

âWhat, that old boy? Heâs practically gaga, isnât he?â

âHe is a man,â said Poirot, âwho is in possession of a great many secrets. I do not mean that he takes an active part in such things nowadays, but he knows a good deal. He was connected with a great many things in the past war. He knew several people.â

âThatâs all over years ago, though.â

âYes, yes, his part in things is all over years ago. But do you not realise that there are certain things that it might be useful to know?â

âWhat sort of things?â

âFaces,â said Poirot. âA well-known face perhaps, which Sir Roderick might recognise. A face or a mannerism, a way of talking, a way of walking, a gesture. People do remember, you know. Old people. They remember, not things that have happened last week or last month or last year, but they remember something that happened, say, nearly twenty years ago. And they may remember someone who does not want to be remembered. And they can tell you certain things about a certain man or a certain woman or something they were mixed up inâI am speaking very vaguely, you understand. I went to him for information.â

âYou went to him for information, did you? That old boy? Gaga. And he gave it to you?â

âLet us say that I am quite satisfied.â

David continued to stare at him. âI wonder now,â he said. âDid you go to see the old boy or did you go to see the little girl, eh? Did you want to know what she was doing in the house? Iâve wondered once or twice myself. Do you think she took that post there to get a bit of past information out of the old boy?â

âI do not think,â said Poirot, âthat it will serve any useful purpose to discuss these matters. She seems a very devoted and attentiveâwhat shall I call herâsecretary?â

âA mixture of a hospital nurse, a secretary, a companion, an au pair girl, an uncleâs help? Yes, one could find a good many names for her, couldnât one? Heâs besotted about her. You noticed that?â

âIt is not unnatural under the circumstances,â said Poirot primly.

âI can tell you someone who doesnât like her, and thatâs our Mary.â

âAnd she perhaps does not like Mary Restarick either.â

âSo thatâs what you think, is it?â said David. âThat Sonia doesnât like Mary Restarick. Perhaps you go as far as thinking that she may have made a few inquiries as to where the weed killer was kept? Bah,â he added, âthe whole thingâs ridiculous. All right. Thanks for the lift. I think Iâll get out here.â

âAha. This is where you want to be? We are still a good seven miles out of London.â

âIâll get out here. Good-bye, M. Poirot.â

âGood-bye.â

Poirot leant back in his seat as David slammed the door.

II

Mrs. Oliver prowled round her sitting room. She was very restless. An hour ago she had parcelled up a typescript that she had just finished correcting. She was about to send it off to her publisher who was anxiously awaiting it and constantly prodding her about it every three or four days.

âThere you are,â said Mrs. Oliver, addressing the empty air and conjuring up an imaginary publisher. âThere you are, and I hope you like it! I donât. I think itâs lousy! I donât believe you know whether anything I write is good or bad. Anyway, I warned you. I told you it was frightful. You said âOh! no, no, I donât believe that for a moment.â

âYou just wait and see,â said Mrs. Oliver vengefully. âYou just wait and see.â

She opened the door, called to Edith, her maid, gave her the parcel and directed that it should be taken to the post at once.

âAnd now,â said Mrs. Oliver, âwhat am I going to do with myself?â

She began strolling about again. âYes,â thought Mrs. Oliver, âI wish I had those tropical birds and things back on the wall instead of these idiotic cherries. I used to feel like something in a tropical wood. A lion or a tiger or a leopard or a cheetah! What could I possibly feel like in a cherry orchard except a bird scarer?â

She looked round again. âCheeping like a bird, thatâs what I ought to be doing,â she said gloomily. âEating cherriesâ¦I wish it was the right time of year for cherries. Iâd like some cherries. I wonder nowââ She went to the telephone. âI will ascertain, Madam,â said the voice of George in answer to her inquiry. Presently another voice spoke.

âHercule Poirot, at your service, Madame,â he said.

âWhereâve you been?â said Mrs. Oliver. âYouâve been away all day. I suppose you went down to look up the Restaricks. Is that it? Did you see Sir Roderick? What did you find out?â

âNothing,â said Hercule Poirot.

âHow dreadfully dull,â said Mrs. Oliver.

âNo, I do not think it is really so dull. It is rather astonishing that I have not found out anything.â

âWhy is it so astonishing? I donât understand.â

âBecause,â said Poirot, âit means either there was nothing to find out, and that, let me tell you, does not accord with the facts; or else something was being very cleverly concealed. That, you see, would be interesting. Mrs. Restarick, by the way, did not know the girl was missing.â

âYou meanâshe has nothing to do with the girl having disappeared?â

âSo it seems. I met there the young man.â

âYou mean the unsatisfactory young man that nobody likes?â

âThat is right. The unsatisfactory young man.â

âDid you think he was unsatisfactory?â

âFrom whose point of view?â

âNot from the girlâs point of view, I suppose.â

âThe girl who came to see me I am sure would have been highly delighted with him.â

âDid he look very awful?â

âHe looked very beautiful,â said Hercule Poirot.

âBeautiful?â said Mrs. Oliver. âI donât know that I like beautiful young men.â

âGirls do,â said Poirot.

âYes, youâre quite right. They like beautiful young men. I donât mean good-looking young men or smart-looking young men or well-dressed or well-washed looking young men. I mean they either like young men looking as though they were just going on in a Restoration comedy, or else very dirty young men looking as though they were just going to take some awful trampâs job.â

âIt seemed that he also did not know where the girl is nowââ

âOr else he wasnât admitting it.â

âPerhaps. He had gone down there. Why? He was actually in the house. He had taken the trouble to walk in without anyone seeing him. Again why? For what reason? Was he looking for the girl? Or was he looking for something else?â

âYou think he was looking for something?â

âHe was looking for something in the girlâs room,â said Poirot.

âHow do you know? Did you see him there?â

âNo, I only saw him coming down the stairs, but I found a very nice little piece of damp mud in Normaâs room that could have come from his shoe. It is possible that she herself may have asked him to bring her something from that roomâthere are a lot of possibilities. There is another girl in that houseâand a pretty oneâHe may have come down there to meet her. Yesâmany possibilities.â

âWhat are you going to do next?â demanded Mrs. Oliver.

âNothing,â said Poirot.

âThatâs very dull,â said Mrs. Oliver disapprovingly.

âI am going to receive, perhaps, a little information from those I have employed to find it; though it is quite possible that I shall receive nothing at all.â

âBut arenât you going to do something?â

âNot till the right moment,â said Poirot.

âWell, I shall,â said Mrs. Oliver.

âPray, pray be very careful,â he implored her.

âWhat nonsense! What could happen to me?â

âWhere there is murder, anything can happen. I tell that to you. I, Poirot.â

Six

I

Mr. Goby sat in a chair. He was a small shrunken little man, so nondescript as to be practically nonexistent.

He looked attentively at the claw foot of an antique table and addressed his remarks to it. He never addressed anybody direct.

âGlad you got the names for me, Mr. Poirot,â he said. âOtherwise, you know, it might have taken a lot of time. As it is, Iâve got the main factsâand a bit of gossip on the sideâ¦Always useful, that. Iâll begin at Borodene Mansions, shall I?â

Poirot inclined his head graciously.

âPlenty of porters,â Mr. Goby informed the clock on the chimneypiece. âI started there, used one or two different young men. Expensive, but worth it. Didnât want it thought that there was anyone making any particular inquiries! Shall I use initials, or names?â

âWithin these walls you can use the names,â said Poirot.

âMiss Claudia Reece-Holland spoken of as a very nice young lady. Father an MP. Ambitious man. Gets himself in the news a lot. Sheâs his only daughter. She does secretarial work. Serious girl. No wild parties, no drink, no beatniks. Shares flat with two others. Number two works for the Wedderburn Gallery in Bond Street. Arty type. Whoops it up a bit with the Chelsea set. Goes around to places arranging exhibitions and art shows.

âThe third one is your one. Not been there long. General opinion is that sheâs a bit âwanting.â Not all there in the top storey. But itâs all a bit vague. One of the porters is a gossipy type. Buy him a drink or two and youâll be surprised at the things heâll tell you! Who drinks, and who drugs, and whoâs having trouble with his income tax, and who keeps his cash behind the cistern. Of course you canât believe it all. Anyway, there was some story about a revolver being fired one night.â

âA revolver fired? Was anyone injured?â

âThere seems a bit of doubt as to that. His story is he heard a shot fired one night, and he comes out and there was this girl, your girl, standing there with a revolver in her hand. She looked sort of dazed. And then one of the other young ladiesâor both of them, in factâthey come running along. And Miss Cary (thatâs the arty one) says, âNorma, what on earth have you done?â and Miss Reece-Holland, she says sharp-like, âShut up, canât you, Frances. Donât be a fool!â and she took the revolver away from your girl and says, âGive me that.â She slams it into her handbag and then she notices this chap Micky, and goes over to him and says, laughing-like, âThat must have startled you, didnât it?â and Micky he says it gave him quite a turn, and she says, âYou neednât worry. Matter of fact, weâd no idea this thing was loaded. We were just fooling about.â And then she says: âAnyway, if anybody asks you questions, tell them it is quite all right,â and then she says: âCome on, Norma,â and took her arm and led her along to the elevator, and they all went up again.

âBut Micky said he was a bit doubtful still. He went and had a good look round the courtyard.â

Mr. Goby lowered his eyes and quoted from his notebook:

ââIâll tell you, I found something, I did! I found some wet patches. Sure as anything I did. Drops of blood they were. I touched them with my finger. I tell you what I think. Somebody had been shotâsome man as he was running awayâ¦I went upstairs and I asked if I could speak to Miss Holland. I says to her: âI think there may have been someone shot, Miss,â I says. âThere are some drops of blood in the courtyard.â âGood gracious,â she says, âHow ridiculous. I expect, you know,â she says, âit must have been one of the pigeons.â And then she says: âIâm sorry if it gave you a turn. Forget about it,â and she slipped me a five pound note. Five pound note, no less! Well, naturally, I didnât open my mouth after that.â

âAnd then, after another whisky, he comes out with some more. âIf you ask me, she took a potshot at that low class young chap that comes to see her. I think she and he had a row and she did her best to shoot him. Thatâs what I think. But least said soonest mended, so Iâm not repeating it. If anyone asks me anything Iâll say I donât know what theyâre talking about.ââ Mr. Goby paused.

âInteresting,â said Poirot.

âYes, but itâs as likely as not that itâs a pack of lies. Nobody else seems to know anything about it. Thereâs a story about a gang of young thugs who came barging into the courtyard one night, and had a bit of a fightâflick-knives out and all that.â

âI see,â said Poirot. âAnother possible source of blood in the courtyard.â

âMaybe the girl did have a row with her young man, threatened to shoot him, perhaps. And Micky overheard it and mixed the whole thing upâespecially if there was a car backfiring just then.â

âYes,â said Hercule Poirot, and sighed, âthat would account for things quite well.â

Mr. Goby turned over another leaf of his notebook and selected his confidant. He chose an electric radiator.

âJoshua Restarick Ltd. Family firm. Been going over a hundred years. Well thought of in the City. Always very sound. Nothing spectacular. Founded by Joshua Restarick in 1850. Launched out after the first war, with greatly increased investments abroad, mostly South Africa, West Africa and Australia. Simon and Andrew Restarickâthe last of the Restaricks. Simon, the elder brother, died about a year ago, no children. His wife had died some years previously. Andrew Restarick seems to have been a restless chap. His heart was never really in the business though everyone says he had plenty of ability. Finally ran off with some woman, leaving his wife and a daughter of five years old. Went to South Africa, Kenya, and various other places. No divorce. His wife died two years ago. Had been an invalid for some time. He travelled about a lot, and wherever he went he seems to have made money. Concessions for minerals mostly. Everything he touched prospered.

âAfter his brotherâs death, he seems to have decided it was time to settle down. Heâd married again and he thought the right thing to do was to come back and make a home for his daughter. Theyâre living at the moment with his uncle Sir Roderick Horsefieldâuncle by marriage that is. Thatâs only temporary. His wifeâs looking at houses all over London. Expense no object. Theyâre rolling in money.â

Poirot sighed. âI know,â he said. âWhat you outline to me is a success story! Everyone makes money! Everybody is of good family and highly respected. Their relations are distinguished. They are well thought of in business circles.

âThere is only one cloud in the sky. A girl who is said to be âa bit wanting,â a girl who is mixed up with a dubious boyfriend who has been on probation more than once. A girl who may quite possibly have tried to poison her stepmother, and who either suffers from hallucinations, or else has committed a crime! I tell you, none of that accords well with the success story you have brought me.â

Mr. Goby shook his head sadly and said rather obscurely:

âThereâs one in every family.â

âThis Mrs. Restarick is quite a young woman. I presume she is not the woman he originally ran away with?â

âOh no, that bust up quite soon. She was a pretty bad lot by all accounts, and a tartar as well. He was a fool ever to be taken in by her.â Mr. Goby shut his notebook and looked inquiringly at Poirot. âAnything more you want me to do?â

âYes. I want to know a little more about the late Mrs. Andrew Restarick. She was an invalid, she was frequently in nursing homes. What kind of nursing homes? Mental homes?â

âI take your point, Mr. Poirot.â

âAnd any history of insanity in the familyâon either side?â

âIâll see to it, Mr. Poirot.â

Mr. Goby rose to his feet. âThen Iâll take leave of you, sir. Good night.â

Poirot remained thoughtful after Mr. Goby had left. He raised and lowered his eyebrows. He wondered, he wondered very much.

Then he rang Mrs. Oliver:

âI told you before,â he said, âto be careful. I repeat thatâBe very careful.â

âCareful of what?â said Mrs. Oliver.

âOf yourself. I think there might be danger. Danger to anyone who goes poking about where they are not wanted. There is murder in the airâI do not want it to be yours.â

âHave you had the information you said you might have?â

âYes,â said Poirot, âI have had a little information. Mostly rumour and gossip, but it seems something happened at Borodene Mansions.â

âWhat sort of thing?â

âBlood in the courtyard,â said Poirot.

âReally!â said Mrs. Oliver. âThatâs just like the title of an old-fashioned detective story. The Stain on the Staircase. I mean nowadays you say something more like She Asked for Death.â

âPerhaps there may not have been blood in the courtyard. Perhaps it is only what an imaginative, Irish porter imagined.â

âProbably an upset milk bottle,â said Mrs. Oliver. âHe couldnât see it at night. What happened?â

Poirot did not answer directly.

âThe girl thought she âmight have committed a murder.â Was that the murder she meant?â

âYou mean she did shoot someone?â

âOne might presume that she did shoot at someone, but for all intents and purposes missed them. A few drops of bloodâ¦That was all. No body.â

âOh dear,â said Mrs. Oliver, âitâs all very confused. Surely if anyone could still run out of a courtyard, you wouldnât think youâd killed him, would you?â

âCâest difficile,â said Poirot, and rang off.

II

âIâm worried,â said Claudia Reece-Holland.

She refilled her cup from the coffee percolator. Frances Cary gave an enormous yawn. Both girls were breakfasting in the small kitchen of the flat. Claudia was dressed and ready to start for her dayâs work. Frances was still in dressing gown and pyjamas. Her black hair fell over one eye.

âIâm worried about Norma,â continued Claudia.

Frances yawned.

âI shouldnât worry if I were you. Sheâll ring up or turn up sooner or later, I suppose.â

âWill she? You know, Fran, I canât help wonderingââ

âI donât see why,â said Frances, pouring herself out more coffee. She sipped it doubtfully. âI meanâNormaâs not really our business, is she? I mean, weâre not looking after her or spoon-feeding her or anything. She just shares the flat. Why all this motherly solicitude? I certainly wouldnât worry.â

âI daresay you wouldnât. You never worry over anything. But itâs not the same for you as it is for me.â

âWhy isnât it the same? You mean because youâre the tenant of the flat or something?â

âWell, Iâm in rather a special position, as you might say.â

Frances gave another enormous yawn.

âI was up too late last night,â she said. âAt Basilâs party. I feel dreadful. Oh well, I suppose black coffee will be helpful. Have some more before Iâve drunk it all? Basil would make us try some new pillsâEmerald Dreams. I donât think itâs really worth trying all these silly things.â

âYouâll be late at your gallery,â said Claudia.

âOh well, I donât suppose it matters much. Nobody notices or cares.

âI saw David last night,â she added. âHe was all dressed up and really looked rather wonderful.â

âNow donât say youâre falling for him, too, Fran. He really is too awful.â

âOh, I know you think so. Youâre such a conventional type, Claudia.â

âNot at all. But I cannot say I care for all your arty set. Trying out all these drugs and passing out or getting fighting mad.â

Frances looked amused.

âIâm not a drug fiend, dearâI just like to see what these things are like. And some of the gang are all right. David can paint, you know, if he wants to.â

âDavid doesnât very often want to, though, does he?â

âYouâve always got your knife into him, Claudiaâ¦You hate him coming here to see Norma. And talking of knivesâ¦.â

âWell? Talking of knives?â

âIâve been worrying,â said Frances slowly, âwhether to tell you something or not.â

Claudia glanced at her wristwatch.

âI havenât got time now,â she said. âYou can tell me this evening if you want to tell me something. Anyway, Iâm not in the mood. Oh dear,â she sighed, âI wish I knew what to do.â

âAbout Norma?â

âYes. Iâm wondering if her parents ought to know that we donât know where she isâ¦.â

âThat would be very unsporting. Poor Norma, why shouldnât she slope off on her own if she wants to?â

âWell, Norma isnât exactlyââ Claudia stopped.

âNo, she isnât, is she? Non compos mentis. Thatâs what you meant. Have you rung up that terrible place where she works? âHomebirds,â or whatever itâs called? Oh yes, of course you did. I remember.â

âSo where is she?â demanded Claudia. âDid David say anything last night?â

âDavid didnât seem to know. Really, Claudia, I canât see that it matters.â

âIt matters for me,â said Claudia, âbecause my boss happens to be her father. Sooner or later, if anything peculiar has happened to her, theyâll ask me why I didnât mention the fact that she hadnât come home.â

âYes, I suppose they might pitch on you. But thereâs no real reason, is there, why Norma should have to report to us every time sheâs going to be away from here for a day or two. Or even a few nights. I mean, sheâs not a paying guest or anything. Youâre not in charge of the girl.â

âNo, but Mr. Restarick did mention he felt glad to know that she had got a room here with us.â

âSo that entitles you to go and tittle-tattle about her every time sheâs absent without leave? Sheâs probably got a crush on some new man.â

âSheâs got a crush on David,â said Claudia. âAre you sure she isnât holed up at his place?â

âOh, I shouldnât think so. He doesnât really care for her, you know.â

âYouâd like to think he doesnât,â said Claudia. âYou are rather sweet on David yourself.â

âCertainly not,â said Frances sharply. âNothing of the kind.â

âDavidâs really keen on her,â said Claudia. âIf not, why did he come round looking for her here the other day?â

âYou soon marched him out again,â said Frances. âI think,â she added, getting up and looking at her face in a rather unflattering small kitchen mirror, âI think it might have been me he really came to see.â

âYouâre too idiotic! He came here looking for Norma.â

âThat girlâs mental,â said Frances.

âSometimes I really think she is!â

âWell, I know she is. Look here, Claudia, Iâm going to tell you that something now. You ought to know. I broke the string of my bra the other day and I was in a hurry. I know you donât like anyone fiddling with your thingsââ

âI certainly donât,â said Claudia.

ââbut Norma never minds, or doesnât notice. Anyway, I went into her room and I rootled in her drawer and Iâwell, I found something. A knife.â

âA knife!â said Claudia, surprised. âWhat sort of a knife?â

âYou know we had that sort of shindy thing in the courtyard? A group of beats, teenagers whoâd come in here and were having a fight with flick-knives and all that? And Norma came in just after.â

âYes, yes, I remember.â

âOne of the boys got stabbed, so a reporter told me, and he ran away. Well, the knife in Normaâs drawer was a flick-knife. It had got a stain on itâlooked like dried blood.â

âFrances! Youâre being absurdly dramatic.â

âPerhaps. But Iâm sure thatâs what it was. And what on earth was that doing hidden away in Normaâs drawer, I should like to know?â

âI supposeâshe might have picked it up.â

âWhatâa souvenir? And hidden it away and never told us?â

âWhat did you do with it?â

âI put it back,â said Frances slowly. âIâI didnât know what else to doâ¦I couldnât decide whether to tell you or not. Then yesterday I looked again and it was gone, Claudia. Not a trace of it.â

âYou think she sent David here to get it?â

âWell, she might have doneâ¦I tell you, Claudia, in future Iâm going to keep my door locked at night.â

Seven

Mrs. Oliver woke up dissatisfied. She saw stretching before her a day with nothing to do. Having packed off her completed manuscript with a highly virtuous feeling, work was over. She had now only, as many times before, to relax, to enjoy herself; to lie fallow until the creative urge became active once more. She walked about her flat in a rather aimless fashion, touching things, picking them up, putting them down, looking in the drawers of her desk, realising that there were plenty of letters there to be dealt with but feeling also that in her present state of virtuous accomplishment, she was certainly not going to deal with anything so tiresome as that now. She wanted something interesting to do. She wantedâwhat did she want?

She thought about the conversation she had had with Hercule Poirot, the warning he had given her. Ridiculous! After all, why shouldnât she participate in this problem which she was sharing with Poirot? Poirot might choose to sit in a chair, put the tips of his fingers together, and set his grey cells whirring to work while his body reclined comfortably within four walls. That was not the procedure that appealed to Ariadne Oliver. She had said, very forcibly, that she at least was going to do something. She was going to find out more about this mysterious girl. Where was Norma Restarick? What was she doing? What more could she, Ariadne Oliver, find out about her?

Mrs. Oliver prowled about, more and more disconsolate. What could one do? It wasnât very easy to decide. Go somewhere and ask questions? Should she go down to Long Basing? But Poirot had already been thereâand found out presumably what there was to be found out. And what excuse could she offer for barging into Sir Roderick Horsefieldâs house?

She considered another visit to Borodene Mansions. Something still to be found out there, perhaps? She would have to think of another excuse for going there. She wasnât quite sure what excuse she would use but anyway, that seemed the only possible place where more information could be obtained. What was the time? Ten a.m. There were certain possibilitiesâ¦.

On the way there she concocted an excuse. Not a very original excuse. In fact, Mrs. Oliver would have liked to have found something more intriguing, but perhaps, she reflected prudently, it was just as well to keep to something completely everyday and plausible. She arrived at the stately if grim elevation of Borodene Mansions and walked slowly round the courtyard considering it.

A porter was conversing with a furniture vanâA milkman, pushing his milk float, came to join Mrs. Oliver near the service lift.

He rattled bottles, cheerfully whistling, whilst Mrs. Oliver continued to stare abstractedly at the furniture van.

âNumber 76 moving out,â explained the milkman to Mrs. Oliver, mistaking her interest. He transferred a clutch of bottles from his float to the lift.

âNot that she hasnât moved already in a manner of speaking,â he added, emerging again. He seemed a cheery kind of milkman.

He pointed a thumb upwards.

âPitched herself out of a windowâseventh floorâonly a week ago, it was. Five oâclock in the morning. Funny time to choose.â

Mrs. Oliver didnât think it so funny.

âWhy?â

âWhy did she do it? Nobody knows. Balance of mind disturbed, they said.â

âWas sheâyoung?â

âNah! Just an old trout. Fifty if she was a day.â

Two men struggled in the van with a chest of drawers. It resisted them and two mahogany drawers crashed to the groundâa loose piece of paper floated toward Mrs. Oliver who caught it.

âDonât smash everything, Charlie,â said the cheerful milkman reprovingly, and went up in the lift with his cargo of bottles.

An altercation broke out between the furniture movers. Mrs. Oliver offered them the piece of paper, but they waved it away.

Making up her mind, Mrs. Oliver entered the building and went up to No. 67. A clank came from inside and presently the door was opened by a middle-aged woman with a mop who was clearly engaged in household labours.

âOh,â said Mrs. Oliver, using her favourite monosyllable. âGood morning. IsâI wonderâis anyone in?â

âNo, Iâm afraid not, Madam. Theyâre all out. Theyâve gone to work.â

âYes, of courseâ¦As a matter of fact when I was here last I left a little diary behind. So annoying. It must be in the sitting room somewhere.â

âWell, I havenât picked up anything of the kind, Madam, as far as I know. Of course I mightnât have known it was yours. Would you like to come in?â She opened the door hospitably, set aside the mop with which she had been treating the kitchen floor, and accompanied Mrs. Oliver into the sitting room.

âYes,â said Mrs. Oliver, determined to establish friendly relations, âyes, I see hereâthatâs the book I left for Miss Restarick, Miss Norma. Is she back from the country yet?â

âI donât think sheâs living here at the moment. Her bed wasnât slept in. Perhaps sheâs still down with her people in the country. I know she was going there last weekend.â

âYes, I expect thatâs it,â said Mrs. Oliver. âThis was a book I brought her. One of my books.â

One of Mrs. Oliverâs books did not seem to strike any chord of interest in the cleaning woman.

âI was sitting here,â went on Mrs. Oliver, patting an armchair, âat least I think so. And then I moved to the window and perhaps to the sofa.â

She dug down vehemently behind the cushions of the chair. The cleaning woman obliged by doing the same thing to the sofa cushions.

âYouâve no idea how maddening it is when one loses something like that,â went on Mrs. Oliver, chattily. âOne has all oneâs engagements written down there. Iâm quite sure Iâm lunching with someone very important today, and I canât remember who it was or where the luncheon was to be. Only, of course, it may be tomorrow. If so, Iâm lunching with someone else quite different. Oh dear.â

âVery trying for you, maâam, Iâm sure,â said the cleaning woman with sympathy.

âTheyâre such nice flats, these,â said Mrs. Oliver, looking round.

âA long way up.â

âWell, that gives you a very good view, doesnât it?â

âYes, but if they face east you get a lot of cold wind in winter. Comes right through these metal window frames. Some people have had double windows put in. Oh yes, I wouldnât care for a flat facing this way in winter. No, give me a nice ground floor flat every time. Much more convenient too if youâve got children. For prams and all that, you know. Oh yes, Iâm all for the ground floor, I am. Think if there was to be a fire.â

âYes, of course, that would be terrible,â said Mrs. Oliver. âI suppose there are fire escapes?â

âYou canât always get to a fire door. Terrified of fire, I am. Always have been. And theyâre ever so expensive, these flats. You wouldnât believe the rents they ask! Thatâs why Miss Holland, she gets two other girls to go in with her.â

âOh yes, I think I met them both. Miss Caryâs an artist, isnât she?â

âWorks for an art gallery, she does. Donât work at it very hard, though. She paints a bitâcows and trees that youâd never recognise as being what theyâre meant to be. An untidy young lady. The state her room is inâyou wouldnât believe it! Now Miss Holland, everything is always as neat as a new pin. She was a secretary in the Coal Board at one time but sheâs a private secretary in the City now. She likes it better, she says. Sheâs secretary to a very rich gentleman just come back from South America or somewhere like that. Heâs Miss Normaâs father, and it was he who asked Miss Holland to take her as a boarder when the last young lady went off to get marriedâand she mentioned as she was looking for another girl. Well, she couldnât very well refuse, could she? Not since he was her employer.â

âDid she want to refuse?â

The woman sniffed.

âI think she would haveâif sheâd known.â

âKnown what?â The question was too direct.

âItâs not for me to say anything, Iâm sure. Itâs not my businessââ

Mrs. Oliver continued to look mildly inquiring. Mrs. Mop fell.

âItâs not that she isnât a nice young lady. Scatty but then theyâre nearly all scatty. But I think as a doctor ought to see her. There are times when she doesnât seem to know rightly what sheâs doing, or where she is. It gives you quite a turn, sometimesâLooks just how my husbandâs nephew does after heâs had a fit. (Terrible fits he hasâyou wouldnât believe!) Only Iâve never known her have fits. Maybe she takes thingsâa lot do.â

âI believe there is a young man her family doesnât approve of.â

âYes, so Iâve heard. Heâs come here to call for her once or twiceâthough Iâve never seen him. One of these Mods by all accounts. Miss Holland doesnât like itâbut what can you do nowadays? Girls go their own way.â

âSometimes one feels very upset about girls nowadays,â said Mrs. Oliver, and tried to look serious and responsible.

âNot brought up right, thatâs what I says.â

âIâm afraid not. No, Iâm afraid not. One feels really a girl like Norma Restarick would be better at home than coming all alone to London and earning her living as an interior decorator.â

âShe donât like it at home.â

âReally?â

âGot a stepmother. Girls donât like stepmothers. From what Iâve heard the stepmotherâs done her best, tried to pull her up, tried to keep flashy young men out of the house, that sort of thing. She knows girls pick up with the wrong young man and a lot of harm may come of it. Sometimesââ the cleaning woman spoke impressively, ââIâm thankful Iâve never had any daughters.â

âHave you got sons?â

âTwo boys, weâve got. Oneâs doing very well at school, and the other one, heâs in a printerâs, doing well there too. Yes, very nice boys they are. Mind you, boys can cause you trouble, too. But girls is more worrying, I think. You feel you ought to be able to do something about them.â

âYes,â said Mrs. Oliver, thoughtfully, âone does feel that.â

She saw signs of the cleaning woman wishing to return to her cleaning.

âItâs too bad about my diary,â she said. âWell, thank you very much and I hope I havenât wasted your time.â

âWell, I hope youâll find it, Iâm sure,â said the other woman obligingly.

Mrs. Oliver went out of the flat and considered what she should do next. She couldnât think of anything she could do further that day, but a plan for tomorrow began to form in her mind.

When she got home, Mrs. Oliver, in an important way, got out a notebook and jotted down in it various things under the heading âFacts I have learned.â On the whole the facts did not amount to very much but Mrs. Oliver, true to her calling, managed to make the most of them that could be made. Possibly the fact that Claudia Reece-Holland was employed by Normaâs father was the most salient fact of any. She had not known that before, she rather doubted if Hercule Poirot had known it either. She thought of ringing him up on the telephone and acquainting him with it but decided to keep it to herself for the moment because of her plan for the morrow. In fact, Mrs. Oliver felt at this moment less like a detective novelist than like an ardent bloodhound. She was on the trail, nose down on the scent, and tomorrow morningâwell, tomorrow morning we would see.

True to her plan, Mrs. Oliver rose early, partook of two cups of tea and a boiled egg and started out on her quest. Once more she arrived in the vicinity of Borodene Mansions. She wondered whether she might be getting a bit well known there, so this time she did not enter the courtyard, but skulked around either one entrance to it or the other, scanning the various people who were turning out into the morning drizzle to trot off on their way to work. They were mostly girls, and looked deceptively alike. How extraordinary human beings were when you considered them like this, emerging purposefully from these large tall buildingsâjust like anthills, thought Mrs. Oliver. One had never considered an anthill properly, she decided. It always looked so aimless, as one disturbed it with the toe of a shoe. All those little things rushing about with bits of grass in their mouths, streaming along industriously, worried, anxious, looking as though they were running to and fro and going nowhere, but presumably they were just as well organised as these human beings here. That man, for instance, who had just passed her. Scurrying along, muttering to himself. âI wonder whatâs upsetting you,â thought Mrs. Oliver. She walked up and down a little more, then she drew back suddenly.

Claudia Reece-Holland came out of the entranceway walking at a brisk businesslike pace. As before, she looked very well turned out. Mrs. Oliver turned away so that she should not be recognised. Once she had allowed Claudia to get a sufficient distance ahead of her, she wheeled round again and followed in her tracks. Claudia Reece-Holland came to the end of the street and turned right into a main thoroughfare. She came to a bus stop and joined the queue. Mrs. Oliver, still following her, felt a momentary uneasiness. Supposing Claudia should turn round, look at her, recognise her? All Mrs. Oliver could think of was to do several protracted but noiseless blows of the nose. But Claudia Reece-Holland seemed totally absorbed in her own thoughts. She looked at none of her fellow waiters for buses. Mrs. Oliver was about third in the queue behind her. Finally the right bus came and there was a surge forward. Claudia got on the bus and went straight up to the top. Mrs. Oliver got inside and was able to get a seat close to the door as the uncomfortable third person. When the conductor came round for fares Mrs. Oliver pressed a reckless one and sixpence into his hand. After all, she had no idea by what route the bus went or indeed how far the distance was to what the cleaning woman had described vaguely as âone of those new buildings by St. Paulâs.â She was on the alert and ready when the venerable dome was at last sighted. Anytime now, she thought to herself, and fixed a steady eye on those who descended from the platform above. Ah yes, there came Claudia, neat and chic in her smart suit. She got off the bus. Mrs. Oliver followed her in due course and kept at a nicely calculated distance.

âVery interesting,â thought Mrs. Oliver. âHere I am actually trailing someone! Just like in my books. And, whatâs more, I must be doing it very well because she hasnât the least idea.â

Claudia Reece-Holland, indeed, looked very much absorbed in her own thoughts. âThatâs a very capable looking girl,â thought Mrs. Oliver, as indeed she had thought before. âIf I was thinking of having a go at guessing a murderer, a good capable murderer, Iâd choose someone very like her.â

Unfortunately, nobody had been murdered yet, that is to say, unless the girl Norma had been entirely right in her assumption that she herself had committed a murder.

This part of London seemed to have suffered or profited from a large amount of building in the recent years. Enormous skyscrapers, most of which Mrs. Oliver thought very hideous, mounted to the sky with a square matchbox-like air.

Claudia turned into a building. âNow I shall find out exactly,â thought Mrs. Oliver and turned into it after her. Four lifts appeared to be all going up and down with frantic haste. This, Mrs. Oliver thought, was going to be more difficult. However, they were of a very large size and by getting into Claudiaâs one at the last minute Mrs. Oliver was able to interpose large masses of tall men between herself and the figure she was following. Claudiaâs destination turned out to be the fourth floor. She went along a corridor and Mrs. Oliver, lingering behind two of her tall men, noted the door where she went in. Three doors from the end of the corridor. Mrs. Oliver arrived at the same door in due course and was able to read the legend on it. âJoshua Restarick Ltd.â was the legend it bore.

Having got as far as that Mrs. Oliver felt as though she did not quite know what to do next. She had found Normaâs fatherâs place of business and the place where Claudia worked, but now, slightly disabused, she felt that this was not as much of a discovery as it might have been. Frankly, did it help? Probably it didnât.

She waited around a few moments, walking from one end to the other of the corridor looking to see if anybody else interesting went in at the door of Restarick Enterprises. Two or three girls did but they did not look particularly interesting. Mrs. Oliver went down again in the lift and walked rather disconsolately out of the building. She couldnât quite think what to do next. She took a walk round the adjacent streets, she meditated a visit to St. Paulâs.

âI might go up in the Whispering Gallery and whisper,â thought Mrs. Oliver. âI wonder now how the Whispering Gallery would do for the scene of a murder?

âNo,â she decided, âtoo profane, Iâm afraid. No, I donât think that would be quite nice.â She walked thoughtfully towards the Mermaid Theatre. That, she thought, had far more possibilities.

She walked back in the direction of the various new buildings. Then, feeling the lack of a more substantial breakfast than she had had, she turned into a local cafÃ©. It was moderately well filled with people having extra late breakfast or else early âelevenses.â Mrs. Oliver, looking round vaguely for a suitable table, gave a gasp. At a table near the wall the girl Norma was sitting, and opposite her was sitting a young man with lavish chestnut hair curled on his shoulders, wearing a red velvet waistcoat and a very fancy jacket.

âDavid,â said Mrs. Oliver under her breath. âIt must be David.â He and the girl Norma were talking excitedly together.

Mrs. Oliver considered a plan of campaign, made up her mind, and nodding her head in satisfaction, crossed the floor of the cafÃ© to a discreet door marked âLadies.â

Mrs. Oliver was not quite sure whether Norma was likely to recognise her or not. It was not always the vaguest looking people who proved the vaguest in fact. At the moment Norma did not look as though she was likely to look at anybody but David, but who knows?

âI expect I can do something to myself anyway,â thought Mrs. Oliver. She looked at herself in a small flyblown mirror provided by the cafÃ©âs management, studying particularly what she considered to be the focal point of a womanâs appearance, her hair. No one knew this better than Mrs. Oliver, owing to the innumerable times that she had changed her mode of hairdressing, and had failed to be recognised by her friends in consequence. Giving her head an appraising eye she started work. Out came the pins, she took off several coils of hair, wrapped them up in her handkerchief and stuffed them into her handbag, parted her hair in the middle, combed it sternly back from her face and rolled it up into a modest bun at the back of her neck. She also took out a pair of spectacles and put them on her nose. There was a really earnest look about her now! âAlmost intellectual,â Mrs. Oliver thought approvingly. She altered the shape of her mouth by an application of lipstick, and emerged once more into the cafÃ©; moving carefully since the spectacles were only for reading and in consequence the landscape was blurred. She crossed the cafÃ©, and made her way to an empty table next to that occupied by Norma and David. She sat down so that she was facing David. Norma, on the near side, sat with her back to her. Norma, therefore, would not see her unless she turned her head right round. The waitress drifted up. Mrs. Oliver ordered a cup of coffee and a Bath bun and settled down to be inconspicuous.

Norma and David did not even notice her. They were deeply in the middle of a passionate discussion. It took Mrs. Oliver just a minute or two to tune into them.

ââ¦But you only fancy these things,â David was saying. âYou imagine them. Theyâre all utter, utter nonsense, my dear girl.â

âI donât know. I canât tell.â Normaâs voice had a queer lack of resonance in it.

Mrs. Oliver could not hear her as well as she heard David, since Normaâs back was turned to her, but the dullness of the girlâs tone struck her disagreeably. There was something wrong here, she thought. Very wrong. She remembered the story as Poirot had first told it to her. âShe thinks she may have committed a murder.â What was the matter with the girl? Hallucinations? Was her mind really slightly affected, or was it no more and no less than truth, and in consequence the girl had suffered a bad shock?

âIf you ask me, itâs all fuss on Maryâs part! Sheâs a thoroughly stupid woman anyway, and she imagines she has illnesses and all that sort of thing.â

âShe was ill.â

âAll right then, she was ill. Any sensible woman would get the doctor to give her some antibiotic or other, and not get het up.â

âShe thought I did it to her. My father thinks so too.â

âI tell you, Norma, you imagine all these things.â

âYou just say that to me, David. You say it to me to cheer me up. Supposing I did give her the stuff?â

âWhat do you mean, suppose? You must know whether you did or you didnât. You canât be so idiotic, Norma.â

âI donât know.â

âYou keep saying that. You keep coming back to that, and saying it again and again. âI donât know.â âI donât know.ââ

âYou donât understand. You donât understand in the least what hate is. I hated her from the first moment I saw her.â

âI know. You told me that.â

âThatâs the queer part of it. I told you that, and yet I donât even remember telling you that. Dâyou see? Every now and then IâI tell people things. I tell people things that I want to do, or that I have done, or that Iâm going to do. But I donât even remember telling them the things. Itâs as though I was thinking all these things in my mind, and sometimes they come out in the open and I say them to people. I did say them to you, didnât I?â

âWellâI meanâlook here, donât letâs harp back to that.â

âBut I did say it to you? Didnât I?â

âAll right, all right! One says things like that. âI hate her and Iâd like to kill her. I think Iâll poison her!â But thatâs only kid stuff, if you know what I mean, as though you werenât quite grown-up. Itâs a very natural thing. Children say it a lot. âI hate so and so. Iâll cut off his head!â Kids say it at school. About some master they particularly dislike.â

âYou think it was just that? Butâthat sounds as though I wasnât grown-up.â

âWell, youâre not in some ways. If youâd just pull yourself together, realise how silly it all is. What can it matter if you do hate her? Youâve got away from home and donât have to live with her.â

âWhy shouldnât I live in my own homeâwith my own father?â said Norma. âItâs not fair. Itâs not fair. First he went away and left my mother, and now, just when heâs coming back to me, he goes and marries Mary. Of course I hate her and she hates me too. I used to think about killing her, used to think of ways of doing it. I used to enjoy thinking like that. But thenâwhen she really got illâ¦.â

David said uneasily:

âYou donât think youâre a witch or anything, do you? You donât make figures in wax and stick pins into them or do that sort of thing?â

âOh no. That would be silly. What I did was real. Quite real.â

âLook here, Norma, what do you mean when you say it was real?â

âThe bottle was there, in my drawer. Yes, I opened the drawer and found it.â

âWhat bottle?â

âThe Dragon Exterminator. Selective weed killer. Thatâs what it was labelled. Stuff in a dark green bottle and you were supposed to spray it on things. And it had labels with Caution and Poison, too.â

âDid you buy it? Or did you just find it?â

âI donât know where I got it, but it was there, in my drawer, and it was half empty.â

âAnd then youâyouârememberedââ

âYes,â said Norma. âYesâ¦â Her voice was vague, almost dreamy. âYesâ¦I think it was then it all came back to me. You think so too, donât you, David?â

âI donât know what to make of you, Norma. I really donât. I think in a way, youâre making it all up, youâre telling it to yourself.â

âBut she went to hospital, for observation. They said they were puzzled. Then they said they couldnât find anything wrong so she came homeâand then she got ill again, and I began to be frightened. My father began looking at me in a queer sort of way, and then the doctor came and they talked together, shut up in Fatherâs study. I went round outside, and crept up to the window and I tried to listen. I wanted to hear what they were saying. They were planning togetherâto send me away to a place where Iâd be shut up! A place where Iâd have a âcourse of treatmentââor something. They thought, you see, that I was crazy, and I was frightenedâ¦Becauseâbecause I wasnât sure what Iâd done or what I hadnât done.â

âIs that when you ran away?â

âNoâthat was laterââ

âTell me.â

âI donât want to talk about it anymore.â

âYouâll have to let them know sooner or later where you areââ

âI wonât! I hate them. I hate my father as much as I hate Mary. I wish they were dead. I wish they were both dead. Thenâthen I think Iâd be happy again.â

âDonât get all het up! Look here, Normaââ He paused in an embarrassed mannerââIâm not very set on marriage and all that rubbishâ¦I mean I didnât think Iâd ever do anything of that kindâ¦oh well, not for years. One doesnât want to tie oneself upâbut I think itâs the best thing we could do, you know. Get married. At a registry office or something. Youâll have to say youâre over twenty-one. Roll up your hair, put on some spectacles or something. Make you look a bit older. Once weâre married, your father canât do a thing! He canât send you away to what you call a âplace.â Heâll be powerless.â

âI hate him.â

âYou seem to hate everybody.â

âOnly my father and Mary.â

âWell, after all, itâs quite natural for a man to marry again.â

âLook what he did to my mother.â

âAll that must have been a long time ago.â

âYes. I was only a child, but I remember. He went away and left us. He sent me presents at Christmasâbut he never came himself. I wouldnât even have known him if Iâd met him in the street by the time he did come back. He didnât mean anything to me by then. I think he got my mother shut up, too. She used to go away when she was ill. I donât know where. I donât know what was the matter with her. Sometimes I wonderâ¦I wonder, David. I think, you know, thereâs something wrong in my head, and someday it will make me do something really bad. Like the knife.â

âWhat knife?â

âIt doesnât matter. Just a knife.â

âWell, canât you tell me what youâre talking about?â

âI think it had bloodstains on itâit was hidden thereâ¦under my stockings.â

âDo you remember hiding a knife there?â

âI think so. But I canât remember what Iâd done with it before that. I canât remember where Iâd beenâ¦There is a whole hour gone out of that evening. A whole hour I didnât know where Iâd been. Iâd been somewhere and done something.â

âHush!â He hissed it quickly as the waitress approached their table. âYouâll be all right. Iâll look after you. Letâs have something more,â he said to the waitress in a loud voice, picking up the menuââTwo baked beans on toast.â

Eight

I

Hercule Poirot was dictating to his secretary, Miss Lemon.

âAnd while I much appreciate the honour you have done me, I must regretfully inform you thatâ¦â

The telephone rang. Miss Lemon stretched out a hand for it. âYes? Who did you say?â She put her hand over the receiver and said to Poirot, âMrs. Oliver.â

âAhâ¦Mrs. Oliver,â said Poirot. He did not particularly want to be interrupted at this moment, but he took the receiver from Miss Lemon. ââAllo,â he said, âHercule Poirot speaks.â

âOh, M. Poirot, Iâm so glad I got you! Iâve found her for you!â

âI beg your pardon?â

âIâve found her for you. Your girl! You know, the one whoâs committed a murder or thinks she has. Sheâs talking about it too, a great deal. I think she is off her head. But never mind that now. Do you want to come and get her?â

âWhere are you, chÃ¨re Madame?â

âSomewhere between St. Paulâs and the Mermaid Theatre and all that. Calthorpe Street,â said Mrs. Oliver, suddenly looking out of the telephone box in which she was standing. âDo you think you can get here quickly? Theyâre in a restaurant.â

âThey?â

âOh, she and what I suppose is the unsuitable boyfriend. He is rather nice really, and he seems very fond of her. I canât think why. People are odd. Well, I donât want to talk because I want to get back again. I followed them, you see. I came into the restaurant and saw them there.â

âAha? You have been very clever, Madame.â

âNo, I havenât really. It was a pure accident. I mean, I walked into a small cafÃ© place and there the girl was, just sitting there.â

âAh. You had the good fortune then. That is just as important.â

âAnd Iâve been sitting at the next table to them, only sheâs got her back to me. And anyway I donât suppose sheâd recognise me. Iâve done things to my hair. Anway, theyâve been talking as though they were alone in the world, and when they ordered another courseâbaked beansâ(I canât bear baked beans, it always seems to me so funny that people should)ââ

âNever mind the baked beans. Go on. You left them and came out to telephone. Is that right?â

âYes. Because the baked beans gave me time. And I shall go back now. Or I might hang about outside. Anway, try and get here quickly.â

âWhat is the name of this cafÃ©?â

âThe Merry Shamrockâbut it doesnât look very merry. In fact, it looks rather sordid, but the coffee is quite good.â

âSay no more. Go back. In due course, I will arrive.â

âSplendid,â said Mrs. Oliver, and rang off.

II

Miss Lemon, always efficient, had preceded him to the street, and was waiting by a taxi. She asked no questions and displayed no curiosity. She did not tell Poirot how she would occupy her time whilst he was away. She did not need to tell him. She always knew what she was going to do and she was always right in what she did.

Poirot duly arrived at the corner of Calthorpe Street. He descended, paid the taxi, and looked around him. He saw The Merry Shamrock but he saw no one in its vicinity who looked at all like Mrs. Oliver, however well disguised. He walked to the end of the street and back. No Mrs. Oliver. So either the couple in which they were interested had left the cafÃ© and Mrs. Oliver had gone on a shadowing expedition, or elseâTo answer âor elseâ he went to the cafÃ© door. One could not see the inside very well from the outside, on account of steam, so he pushed the door gently open and entered. His eyes swept round it.

He saw at once the girl who had come to visit him at the breakfast table. She was sitting by herself at a table against the wall. She was smoking a cigarette and staring in front of her. She seemed to be lost in thought. No, Poirot thought, hardly that. There did not seem to be any thought there. She was lost in a kind of oblivion. She was somewhere else.

He crossed the room quietly and sat down in the chair opposite her. She looked up then, and he was at least gratified to see that he was recognised.

âSo we meet again, Mademoiselle,â he said pleasantly. âI see you recognise me.â

âYes. Yes, I do.â

âIt is always gratifying to be recognised by a young lady one has only met once and for a very short time.â

She continued to look at him without speaking.

âAnd how did you know me, may I ask? What made you recognise me?â

âYour moustache,â said Norma immediately. âIt couldnât be anyone else.â

He was gratified by that observation and stroked it with the pride and vanity that he was apt to display on these occasions.

âAh yes, very true. Yes, there are not many moustaches such as mine. It is a fine one, hein?â

âYesâwell, yesâI suppose it is.â

âAh, you are perhaps not a connoisseur of moustaches, but I can tell you, Miss RestarickâMiss Norma Restarick, is it not?âthat it is a very fine moustache.â

He had dwelt deliberately upon her name. She had at first looked so oblivious to everything around her, so far away, that he wondered if she would notice. She did. It startled her.

âHow did you know my name?â she said.

âTrue, you did not give your name to my servant when you came to see me that morning.â

âHow did you know it? How did you get to know it? Who told you?â

He saw the alarm, the fear.

âA friend told me,â he said. âOneâs friends can be very useful.â

âWho was it?â

âMademoiselle, you like keeping your little secrets from me. I, too, have a preference for keeping my little secrets from you.â

âI donât see how you could know who I was.â

âI am Hercule Poirot,â said Poirot, with his usual magnificence. Then he left the initiative to her, merely sitting there smiling gently at her.

âIââ she began, then stopped. ââWouldââ Again she stopped.

âWe did not get very far that morning, I know,â said Hercule Poirot. âOnly so far as your telling me that you had committed a murder.â

âOh that!â

âYes, Mademoiselle, that.â

âButâI didnât mean it of course. I didnât mean anything like that. I mean, it was just a joke.â

âVraiment? You came to see me rather early in the morning, at breakfast time. You said it was urgent. The urgency was because you might have committed a murder. That is your idea of a joke, eh?â

A waitress who had been hovering, looking at Poirot with a fixed attention, suddenly came up to him and proffered him what appeared to be a paper boat such as is made for children to sail in a bath.

âThis for you?â she said. âMr. Porritt? A lady left it.â

âAh yes,â said Poirot. âAnd how did you know who I was?â

âThe lady said Iâd know by your moustache. Said I wouldnât have seen a moustache like that before. And itâs true enough,â she added, gazing at it.

âWell, thank you very much.â

Poirot took the boat from her, untwisted it and smoothed it out; he read some hastily pencilled words: âHeâs just going. Sheâs staying behind, so Iâm going to leave her for you, and follow him.â It was signed Ariadne.

âAh yes,â said Hercule Poirot, folding it and slipping it into his pocket. âWhat were we talking about? Your sense of humour, I think, Miss Restarick.â

âDo you know just my name orâor do you know everything about me?â

âI know a few things about you. You are Miss Norma Restarick, your address in London is 67 Borodene Mansions. Your home address is Crosshedges, Long Basing. You live there with a father, a stepmother, a great-uncle andâah yes, an au pair girl. You see, I am quite well informed.â

âYouâve been having me followed.â

âNo, no,â said Poirot. âNot at all. As to that, I give you my word of honour.â

âBut you are not police, are you? You didnât say you were.â

âI am not police, no.â

Her suspicion and defiance broke down.

âI donât know what to do,â she said.

âI am not urging you to employ me,â said Poirot. âFor that you have said already that I am too old. Possibly you are right. But since I know who you are and something about you, there is no reason we should not discuss together in a friendly fashion the troubles that afflict you. The old, you must remember, though considered incapable of action, have nevertheless a good fund of experience on which to draw.â

Norma continued to look at him doubtfully, that wide-eyed stare that had disquieted Poirot before. But she was in a sense trapped, and she had at this particular moment, or so Poirot judged, a wish to talk about things. For some reason, Poirot had always been a person it was easy to talk to.

âThey think Iâm crazy,â she said bluntly. âAndâand I rather think Iâm crazy, too. Mad.â

âThat is most interesting,â said Hercule Poirot, cheerfully. âThere are many different names for these things. Very grand names. Names rolled out happily by psychiatrists, psychologists and others. But when you say crazy, that describes very well what the general appearance may be to ordinary, everyday people. Eh bien, then, you are crazy, or you appear crazy or you think you are crazy, and possibly you may be crazy. But all the same that is not to say the condition is serious. It is a thing that people suffer from a good deal, and it is usually easily cured with the proper treatment. It comes about because people have had too much mental strain, too much worry, have studied too much for examinations, have dwelled too much perhaps on their emotions, have too much religion or have a lamentable lack of religion, or have good reasons for hating their fathers or their mothers! Or, of course, it can be as simple as having an unfortunate love affair.â

âIâve got a stepmother. I hate her and I rather think I hate my father too. That seems rather a lot, doesnât it?â

âIt is more usual to hate one or the other,â said Poirot. âYou were, I suppose, very fond of your own mother. Is she divorced or dead?â

âDead. She died two or three years ago.â

âAnd you cared for her very much?â

âYes. I suppose I did. I mean of course I did. She was an invalid, you know, and she had to go to nursing homes a good deal.â

âAnd your father?â

âFather had gone abroad a long time before that. He went to South Africa when I was about five or six. I think he wanted Mother to divorce him but she wouldnât. He went to South Africa and was mixed up with mines or something like that. Anyway, he used to write to me at Christmas, and send me a Christmas present or arrange for one to come to me. That was about all. So he didnât really seem very real to me. He came home about a year ago because he had to wind up my uncleâs affairs and all that sort of financial thing. And when he came home heâhe brought this new wife with him.â

âAnd you resented the fact?â

âYes, I did.â

âBut your mother was dead by then. It is not unusual, you know, for a man to marry again. Especially when he and his wife have been estranged for many years. This wife he brought, was she the same lady he had wished to marry previously, when he asked your mother for a divorce?â

âOh, no, this one is quite young. And sheâs very good-looking and she acts as though she just owns my father!â

She went on after a pauseâin a different, rather childish voice. âI thought perhaps when he came home this time he would be fond of me and take notice of me andâbut she wonât let him. Sheâs against me. Sheâs crowded me out.â

âBut that does not matter at all at the age you are. It is a good thing. You do not need anyone to look after you now. You can stand on your own feet, you can enjoy life, you can choose your own friendsââ

âYou wouldnât think so, the way they go on at home! Well, I mean to choose my own friends.â

âMost girls nowadays have to endure criticism about their friends,â said Poirot.

âIt was all so different,â said Norma. âMy father isnât at all like I remember him when I was five years old. He used to play with me, all the time, and be so gay. Heâs not gay now. Heâs worried and rather fierce andâoh quite different.â

âThat must be nearly fifteen years ago, I presume. People change.â

âBut ought people to change so much?â

âHas he changed in appearance?â

âOh no, no, not that. Oh no! If you look at his picture just over his chair, although itâs of him when he was much younger, itâs exactly like him now. But it isnât at all the way I remember him.â

âBut you know, my dear,â said Poirot gently, âpeople are never like what you remember them. You make them, as the years go by, more and more the way you wish them to be, and as you think you remember them. If you want to remember them as agreeable and gay and handsome, you make them far more so than they actually were.â

âDo you think so? Do you really think so?â She paused and then said abruptly, âBut why do you think I want to kill people?â The question came out quite naturally. It was there between them. They had, Poirot felt, got at last to a crucial moment.

âThat may be quite an interesting question,â said Poirot, âand there may be quite an interesting reason. The person who can probably tell you the answer to that will be a doctor. The kind of doctor who knows.â

She reacted quickly.

âI wonât go to a doctor. I wonât go near a doctor! They wanted to send me to a doctor, and then Iâll be shut up in one of those loony places and they wonât let me out again. Iâm not going to do anything like that.â She was struggling now to rise to her feet.

âIt is not I who can send you to one! You need not be alarmed. You could go to a doctor entirely on your own behalf if you liked. You can go and say to him the things you have been saying to me, and you may ask him why, and he will perhaps tell you the cause.â

âThatâs what David says. Thatâs what David says I should do but I donât thinkâI donât think he understands. Iâd have to tell a doctor that IâI might have tried to do thingsâ¦.â

âWhat makes you think you have?â

âBecause I donât always remember what Iâve doneâor where Iâve been. I lose an hour of timeâtwo hoursâand I canât remember. I was in a corridor onceâa corridor outside a door, her door. Iâd something in my handâI donât know how I got it. She came walking along towards meâBut when she got near me, her face changed. It wasnât her at all. Sheâd changed into somebody else.â

âYou are remembering, perhaps, a nightmare. There people do change into somebody else.â

âIt wasnât a nightmare. I picked up the revolverâIt was lying there at my feetââ

âIn a corridor?â

âNo, in the courtyard. She came and took it away from me.â

âWho did?â

âClaudia. She took me upstairs and gave me some bitter stuff to drink.â

âWhere was your stepmother then?â

âShe was there, tooâNo, she wasnât. She was at Crosshedges. Or in hospital. Thatâs where they found out she was being poisonedâand that it was me.â

âIt need not have been youâIt could have been someone else.â

âWho else could it have been?â

âPerhapsâher husband.â

âFather? Why on earth should Father want to poison Mary. Heâs devoted to her. Heâs silly about her!â

âThere are others in the house, are there not?â

âOld Uncle Roderick? Nonsense!â

âOne does not know,â said Poirot, âhe might be mentally afflicted. He might think it was his duty to poison a woman who might be a beautiful spy. Something like that.â

âThat would be very interesting,â said Norma, momentarily diverted, and speaking in a perfectly natural manner. âUncle Roderick was mixed up a good deal with spies and things in the last war. Who else is there? Sonia? I suppose she might be a beautiful spy, but sheâs not quite my idea of one.â

âNo, and there does not seem very much reason why she should wish to poison your stepmother. I suppose there might be servants, gardeners?â

âNo, they just come in for the days. I donât thinkâwell, they wouldnât be the kind of people to have any reason.â

âShe might have done it herself.â

âCommitted suicide, do you mean? Like the other one?â

âIt is a possibility.â

âI canât imagine Mary committing suicide. Sheâs far too sensible. And why should she want to?â

âYes, you feel that if she did, she would put her head in the gas oven, or she would lie on a bed nicely arranged and take an overdose of sleeping draughts. Is that right?â

âWell, it would have been more natural. So you see,â said Norma earnestly, âit must have been me.â

âAha,â said Poirot, âthat interests me. You would almost, it would seem, prefer that it should be you. You are attracted to the idea that it was your hand who slipped the fatal dose of this, that or the other. Yes, you like the idea.â

âHow dare you say such a thing! How can you?â

âBecause I think it is true,â said Poirot. âWhy does the thought that you may have committed murder excite you, please you?â

âItâs not true.â

âI wonder,â said Poirot.

She scooped up her bag and began feeling in it with shaking fingers.

âIâm not going to stop here and have you say these horrible things to me.â She signalled to the waitress who came, scribbled on a pad of paper, detached it and laid it down by Normaâs plate.

âPermit me,â said Hercule Poirot.

He removed the slip of paper deftly, and prepared to draw his notecase from his pocket. The girl snatched it back again.

âNo, I wonât let you pay for me.â

âAs you please,â said Poirot.

He had seen what he wanted to see. The bill was for two. It would seem therefore that David of the fine feathers had no objection to having his bills paid by an infatuated girl.

âSo it is you who entertain a friend to elevenses, I see.â

âHow did you know that I was with anyone?â

âI tell you, I know a good deal.â

She placed coins on the table and rose. âIâm going now,â she said, âand I forbid you to follow me.â

âI doubt if I could,â said Poirot. âYou must remember my advanced age. If you were to run down the street I should certainly not be able to follow you.â

She got up and went towards the door.

âDo you hear? You are not to follow me.â

âYou permit me at least to open the door for you.â He did so with something of a flourish. âAu revoir, Mademoiselle.â

She threw a suspicious glance at him and walked away down the street with a rapid step, turning her head back over her shoulder from time to time. Poirot remained by the door watching her, but made no attempt to gain the pavement or to catch her up. When she was out of sight, he turned back into the cafÃ©.

âAnd what the devil does all that mean?â said Poirot to himself.

The waitress was advancing upon him, displeasure on her face. Poirot regained his seat at the table and placated her by ordering a cup of coffee. âThere is something here very curious,â he murmured to himself. âYes, something very curious indeed.â

A cup of pale beige fluid was placed in front of him. He took a sip of it and made a grimace.

He wondered where Mrs. Oliver was at this moment.

Nine

Mrs. Oliver was seated in a bus. She was slightly out of breath though full of the zest of the chase. What she called in her own mind the Peacock, had led a somewhat brisk pace. Mrs. Oliver was not a rapid walker. Going along the Embankment she followed him at a distance of some twenty yards or so. At Charing Cross he got into the underground. Mrs. Oliver also got into the underground. At Sloane Square he got out, so did Mrs. Oliver. She waited in a bus queue some three or four people behind him. He got on a bus and so did she. He got out at Worldâs End, so did Mrs. Oliver. He plunged into a bewildering maze of streets between Kingâs Road and the river. He turned into what seemed a builderâs yard. Mrs. Oliver stood in the shadow of a doorway and watched. He turned into an alleyway, Mrs. Oliver gave him a moment or two and then followedâhe was nowhere to be seen. Mrs. Oliver reconnoitred her general surroundings. The whole place appeared somewhat decrepit. She wandered farther down the alleyway. Other alleyways led off from itâsome of them cul-de-sacs. She had completely lost her sense of direction when she once more came to the builderâs yard and a voice spoke behind her, startling her considerably. It said, politely, âI hope I didnât walk too fast for you.â

She turned sharply. Suddenly what had recently been almost fun, a chase undertaken lightheartedly and in the best of spirits, now was that no longer. What she felt now was a sudden unexpected throb of fear. Yes, she was afraid. The atmosphere had suddenly become tinged with menace. Yet the voice was pleasant, polite; but behind it she knew there was anger. The sudden kind of anger that recalled to her in a confused fashion all the things one read in newspapers. Elderly women attacked by gangs of young men. Young men who were ruthless, cruel, who were driven by hate and the desire to do harm. This was the young man whom she had been following. He had known she was there, had given her the slip and had then followed her into this alleyway, and he stood there now barring her way out. As is the precarious fashion of London, one moment you are amongst people all round you and the next moment there is nobody in sight. There must be people in the next street, someone in the houses near, but nearer than that is a masterful figure, a figure with strong cruel hands. She felt that in this moment he was thinking of using those handsâ¦The Peacock. A proud peacock. In his velvets, his tight, elegant black trousers, speaking in that quiet ironical amused voice that held behind it angerâ¦Mrs. Oliver took three big gasps. Then, in a lightning moment of decision she put up a quickly imagined defence. Firmly and immediately she sat down on a dustbin which was against the wall quite close to her.

âGoodness, how you startled me,â she said. âIâd no idea you were there. I hope youâre not annoyed.â

âSo you were following me?â

âYes, Iâm afraid I was. I expect it must have been rather annoying to you. You see I thought it would be such an excellent opportunity. Iâm sure youâre frightfully angry but you neednât be, you know. Not really. You seeââ Mrs. Oliver settled herself more firmly on the dustbin, âyou see I write books. I write detective stories and Iâve really been very worried this morning. In fact I went into a cafÃ© to have a cup of coffee just to try and think things out. Iâd just got to the point in my book where I was following somebody. I mean my hero was following someone and I thought to myself, âReally I know very little about following people.â I mean, Iâm always using the phrase in a book and Iâve read a lot of books where people do follow other people, and I wondered if it was as easy as it seems to be in some peopleâs books or if it was as almost entirely impossible as it seemed in other peopleâs books. So I thought âWell, really, the only thing was to try it out myselfââbecause until you try things out yourself you canât really tell what itâs like. I mean you donât know what you feel like, or whether you get worried at losing a person. As it happened, I just looked up and you were sitting at the next table to me in the cafÃ© and I thought youâd beâI hope you wonât be annoyed againâbut I thought youâd be an especially good person to follow.â

He was still staring at her with those strange, cold blue eyes, yet she felt somehow that the tension had left them.

âWhy was I an especially good person to follow?â

âWell, you were so decorative,â explained Mrs. Oliver. âThey are really very attractive clothesâalmost Regency, you know, and I thought, well, I might take advantage of your being fairly easy to distinguish from other people. So you see, when you went out of the cafÃ© I went out too. And itâs not really easy at all.â She looked up at him. âDo you mind telling me if you knew I was there all the time?â

âNot at once, no.â

âI see,â said Mrs. Oliver thoughtfully. âBut of course Iâm not as distinctive as you are. I mean you wouldnât be able to tell me very easily from a lot of other elderly women. I donât stand out very much, do I?â

âDo you write books that are published? Have I ever come across them?â

âWell, I donât know. You may have. Iâve written forty-three by now. My nameâs Oliver.â

âAriadne Oliver?â

âSo you do know my name,â said Mrs. Oliver. âWell, thatâs rather gratifying, of course, though I daresay you wouldnât like my books very much. You probably would find them rather old-fashionedânot violent enough.â

âYou didnât know me personally beforehand?â

Mrs. Oliver shook her head. âNo, Iâm sure I donâtâdidnât, I mean.â

âWhat about the girl I was with?â

âYou mean the one you were havingâbaked beans, was itâwith in the cafÃ©? No, I donât think so. Of course I only saw the back of her head. She looked to meâwell, I mean girls do look rather alike, donât they?â

âShe knew you,â said the boy suddenly. His tone in a moment had a sudden acid sharpness. âShe mentioned once that sheâd met you not long ago. About a week ago, I believe.â

âWhere? Was it at a party? I suppose I might have met her. Whatâs her name? Perhaps Iâd know that.â

She thought he was in two moods whether to mention the name or not, but he decided to and he watched her face very keenly as he did so.

âHer nameâs Norma Restarick.â

âNorma Restarick. Oh, of course, yes, it was at a party in the country. A place calledâwait a minuteâLong Norton was it?âI donât remember the name of the house. I went there with some friends. I donât think I would have recognised her anyway, though I believe she did say something about my books. I even promised Iâd give her one. Itâs very odd, isnât it, that I should make up my mind and actually choose to follow a person who was sitting with somebody I more or less knew. Very odd. I donât think I could put anything like that in my book. It would look rather too much of a coincidence, donât you think?â

Mrs. Oliver rose from her seat.

âGood gracious, what have I been sitting on? A dustbin! Really! Not a very nice dustbin either.â She sniffed. âWhat is this place Iâve got to?â

David was looking at her. She felt suddenly that she was completely mistaken in everything she had previously thought. âAbsurd of me,â thought Mrs. Oliver, âabsurd of me. Thinking that he was dangerous, that he might do something to me.â He was smiling at her with an extraordinary charm. He moved his head slightly and his chestnut ringlets moved on his shoulders. What fantastic creatures there were in the way of young men nowadays!

âThe least I can do,â he said, âis to show you, I think, where youâve been brought to, just by following me. Come on, up these stairs.â He indicated a ramshackle outside staircase running up to what seemed to be a loft.

âUp those stairs?â Mrs. Oliver was not so certain about this. Perhaps he was trying to lure her up there with his charm, and he would then knock her on the head. âItâs no good, Ariadne,â said Mrs. Oliver to herself, âyouâve got yourself into this spot, and now youâve got to go on with it and find out what you can find out.â

âDo you think theyâll stand my weight?â she said, âthey look frightfully rickety.â

âTheyâre quite all right. Iâll go up first,â he said, âand show you the way.â

Mrs. Oliver mounted the ladderlike stairs behind him. It was no good. She was, deep down, still frightened. Frightened, not so much of the Peacock, as frightened of where the Peacock might be taking her. Well, sheâd know very soon. He pushed open the door at the top and went into a room. It was a large, bare room and it was an artistâs studio, an improvised kind of one. A few mattresses lay here and there on the floor, there were canvasses stacked against the wall, a couple of easels. There was a pervading smell of paint. There were two people in the room. A bearded young man was standing at an easel, painting. He turned his head as they entered.

âHallo, David,â he said, âbringing us company?â

He was, Mrs. Oliver thought, quite the dirtiest-looking young man sheâd ever seen. Oily black hair hung in a kind of circular bob down the back of his neck and over his eyes in front. His face apart from the beard was unshaven, and his clothes seemed mainly composed of greasy black leather and high boots. Mrs. Oliverâs glance went beyond him to a girl who was acting as a model. She was on a wooden chair on a dais, half flung across it, her head back and her dark hair drooping down from it. Mrs. Oliver recognised her at once. It was the second one of the three girls in Borodene Mansions. Mrs. Oliver couldnât remember her last name, but she remembered her first one. It was the highly decorative and languid-looking girl called Frances.

âMeet Peter,â said David, indicating the somewhat revolting looking artist. âOne of our budding geniuses. And Frances who is posing as a desperate girl demanding abortion.â

âShut up, you ape,â said Peter.

âI believe I know you, donât I?â said Mrs. Oliver, cheerfully, without any air of conscious certainty. âIâm sure Iâve met you somewhere! Somewhere quite lately, too.â

âYouâre Mrs. Oliver, arenât you?â said Frances.

âThatâs what she said she was,â said David. âTrue, too, is it?â

âNow, where did I meet you,â continued Mrs. Oliver. âSome party, was it? No. Let me think. I know. It was Borodene Mansions.â

Frances was sitting up now in her chair and speaking in weary but elegant tones. Peter uttered a loud and miserable groan.

âNow youâve ruined the pose! Do you have to have all this wriggling about? Canât you keep still?â

âNo, I couldnât any longer. It was an awful pose. Iâve got the most frightful crick in my shoulder.â

âIâve been making experiments in following people,â said Mrs. Oliver. âItâs much more difficult than I thought. Is this an artistâs studio?â she added, looking round her brightly.

âThatâs what theyâre like nowadays, a kind of loftâand lucky if you donât fall through the floor,â said Peter.

âItâs got all you need,â said David. âItâs got a north light and plenty of room and a pad to sleep on, and a fourth share in the loo downstairsâand what they call cooking facilities. And itâs got a bottle or two,â he added. Turning to Mrs. Oliver, but in an entirely different tone, one of utter politeness, he said, âAnd can we offer you a drink?â

âI donât drink,â said Mrs. Oliver.

âThe lady doesnât drink,â said David. âWho would have thought it!â

âThatâs rather rude but youâre quite right,â said Mrs. Oliver. âMost people come up to me and say, âI always thought you drank like a fish.ââ

She opened her handbagâand immediately three coils of grey hair fell on the floor. David picked them up and handed them to her.

âOh! thank you.â Mrs. Oliver took them. âI hadnât time this morning. I wonder if Iâve got any more hairpins.â She delved in her bag and started attaching the coils to her head.

Peter roared with laughterââBully for you,â he said.

âHow extraordinary,â Mrs. Oliver thought to herself, âthat I should ever have had this silly idea that I was in danger. Dangerâfrom these people? No matter what they look like, theyâre really very nice and friendly. Itâs quite true what people always say to me. Iâve far too much imagination.â

Presently she said she must be going, and David, with Regency gallantry, helped her down the rickety steps, and gave her definite directions as to how to rejoin the Kingâs Road in the quickest way.

âAnd then,â he said, âyou can get a busâor a taxi if you want it.â

âA taxi,â said Mrs. Oliver. âMy feet are absolutely dead. The sooner I fall into a taxi the better. Thank you,â she added, âfor being so very nice about my following you in what must have seemed a very peculiar way. Though after all I donât suppose private detectives, or private eyes or whatever they call them, would look anything at all like me.â

âPerhaps not,â said David gravely. âLeft hereâand then right, and then left again until you see the river and go towards it, and then sharp right and straight on.â

Curiously enough, as she walked across the shabby yard the same feeling of unease and suspense came over her. âI mustnât let my imagination go again.â She looked back at the steps and the window of the studio. The figure of David still stood looking after her. âThree perfectly nice young people,â said Mrs. Oliver to herself. âPerfectly nice and very kind. Left here, and then right. Just because they look rather peculiar, one goes and has silly ideas about their being dangerous. Was it right again? or left? Left, I thinkâOh goodness, my feet. Itâs going to rain, too.â The walk seemed endless and the Kingâs Road incredibly far away. She could hardly hear the traffic nowâAnd where on earth was the river? She began to suspect that she had followed the directions wrongly.

âOh! well,â thought Mrs. Oliver, âIâm bound to get somewhere soonâthe river, or Putney or Wandsworth or somewhere.â She asked her way to the Kingâs Road from a passing man who said he was a foreigner and didnât speak English.

Mrs. Oliver turned another corner wearily and there ahead of her was the gleam of the water. She hurried towards it down a narrow passageway, heard a footstep behind her, half turned, when she was struck from behind and the world went up in sparks.

Ten

I

A voice said:

âDrink this.â

Norma was shivering. Her eyes had a dazed look. She shrank back a little in the chair. The command was repeated. âDrink this.â This time she drank obediently, then choked a little.

âItâsâitâs very strong,â she gasped.

âItâll put you right. Youâll feel better in a minute. Just sit still and wait.â

The sickness and the giddiness which had been confusing her passed off. A little colour came into her cheeks, and the shivering diminished. For the first time she looked round her, noting her surroundings. She had been obsessed by a feeling of fear and horror but now things seemed to be returning to normal. It was a medium-sized room and it was furnished in a way that seemed faintly familiar. A desk, a couch, an armchair and an ordinary chair, a stethoscope on a side table and some machine that she thought had to do with eyes. Then her attention went from the general to the particular. The man who had told her to drink.

She saw a man of perhaps thirty-odd with red hair and a rather attractive ugly face, the kind of face that is craggy but interesting. He nodded at her in a reassuring fashion.

âBeginning to get your bearings?â

âIâI think so. Iâdid youâwhat happened?â

âDonât you remember?â

âThe traffic. Iâit came at meâitââ She looked at him. âI was run over.â

âOh no, you werenât run over.â He shook his head. âI saw to that.â

âYou?â

âWell, there you were in the middle of the road, a car bearing down on you and I just managed to snatch you out of its way. What were you thinking of to go running into the traffic like that?â

âI canât remember. Iâyes, I suppose I must have been thinking of something else.â

âA Jaguar was coming pretty fast, and there was a bus bearing down on the other side of the road. The car wasnât trying to run you down or anything like that, was it?â

âIâno, no, Iâm sure it wasnât. I mean Iââ

âWell, I wonderedâIt just might have been something else, mightnât it?â

âWhat do you mean?â

âWell, it could have been deliberate, you know.â

âWhat do you mean by deliberate?â

âActually I just wondered whether you were trying to get yourself killed?â He added casually, âWere you?â

âIânoâwellâno, of course not.â

âDamnâ silly way to do it, if so.â His tone changed slightly. âCome now, you must remember something about it.â

She began shivering again. âI thoughtâI thought it would be all over. I thoughtââ

âSo you were trying to kill yourself, werenât you? Whatâs the matter? You can tell me. Boyfriend? That can make one feel pretty bad. Besides, thereâs always the hopeful thought that if you kill yourself you make him sorryâbut one should never trust to that. People donât like feeling sorry or feeling anything is their fault. All the boyfriend will probably say is, âI always thought she was unbalanced. Itâs really all for the best.â Just remember that next time you have an urge to charge Jaguars. Even Jaguars have feelings to be considered. Was that the trouble? Boyfriend walk out on you?â

âNo,â said Norma. âOh no. It was quite the opposite.â She added suddenly, âHe wanted to marry me.â

âThatâs no reason for throwing yourself down in front of a Jaguar.â

âYes it is. I did it becauseââ She stopped.

âYouâd better tell me about it, hadnât you?â

âHow did I get here?â asked Norma.

âI brought you here in a taxi. You didnât seem injuredâa few bruises, I expect. You merely looked shaken to death, and in a state of shock. I asked you your address, but you looked at me as though you didnât know what I was talking about. A crowd was about to collect. So I hailed a taxi and brought you here.â

âIs this aâa doctorâs surgery?â

âThis is a doctorâs consulting room and Iâm the doctor. Stillingfleet, my name is.â

âI donât want to see a doctor! I donât want to talk to a doctor! I donâtââ

âCalm down, calm down. Youâve been talking to a doctor for the last ten minutes. Whatâs the matter with doctors, anyway?â

âIâm afraid. Iâm afraid a doctor would sayââ

âCome now, my dear girl, youâre not consulting me professionally. Regard me as a mere outsider whoâs been enough of a busybody to save you from being killed or, what is far more likely, having a broken arm or a fractured leg or a head injury or something extremely unpleasant which might incapacitate you for life. There are other disadvantages. Formerly, if you deliberately tried to commit suicide you could be had up in Court. You still can if itâs a suicide pact. There now, you canât say I havenât been frank. You could oblige now by being frank with me, and telling me why on earth youâre afraid of doctors. Whatâs a doctor ever done to you?â

âNothing. Nothing has been done to me. But Iâm afraid that they mightââ

âMight what?â

âShut me up.â

Dr. Stillingfleet raised his sandy eyebrows and looked at her.

âWell, well,â he said. âYou seem to have some very curious ideas about doctors. Why should I want to shut you up? Would you like a cup of tea,â he added, âor would you prefer a purple heart or a tranquilliser? Thatâs the kind of thing people of your age go in for. Done a bit yourself in that line, havenât you?â

She shook her head. âNotânot really.â

âI donât believe you. Anyway, why the alarm and despondency? Youâre not really mental, are you? I shouldnât have said so. Doctors arenât at all anxious to have people shut up. Mental homes are far too full already. Difficult to squeeze in another body. In fact lately theyâve been letting a good many people outâin desperationâpushing them out, you might sayâwho jolly well ought to have been kept in. Everythingâs so overcrowded in this country.

âWell,â he went on, âwhat are your tastes? Something out of my drug cupboard or a good solid old-fashioned English cup of tea?â

âIâIâd like some tea,â said Norma.

âIndian or China? Thatâs the thing to ask, isnât it? Mind you, Iâm not sure if Iâve got any China.â

âI like Indian better.â

âGood.â

He went to the door, opened it and shouted, âAnnie. Pot of tea for two.â

He came back and sat down and said, âNow you get this quite clear, young lady. Whatâs your name, by the way?â

âNorma Resââ she stopped.

âYes?â

âNorma West.â

âWell, Miss West, letâs get this clear. Iâm not treating you, youâre not consulting me. You are the victim of a street accidentâthat is the way weâll put it and that is the way I suppose you meant it to appear, which would have been pretty hard on the fellow in the Jaguar.â

âI thought of throwing myself off a bridge first.â

âDid you? You wouldnât have found that so easy. People who build bridges are rather careful nowadays. I mean youâd have had to climb up onto the parapet and itâs not so easy. Somebody stops you. Well, to continue with my dissertation, I brought you home as you were in too much of a state of shock to tell me your address. What is it, by the way?â

âI havenât got an address. IâI donât live anywhere.â

âInteresting,â said Dr. Stillingfleet. âWhat the police call âof no fixed abode.â What do you doâsit out on the Embankment all night?â

She looked at him suspiciously.

âI could have reported the accident to the police but there was no obligation upon me to do so. I preferred to take the view that in a state of maiden meditation you were crossing the street before looking left first.â

âYouâre not at all like my idea of a doctor,â said Norma.

âReally? Well, Iâve been getting gradually disillusioned in my profession in this country. In fact, Iâm giving up my practice here and Iâm going to Australia in about a fortnight. So youâre quite safe from me, and you can if you like tell me how you see pink elephants walking out of the wall, how you think the trees are leaning out their branches to wrap round and strangle you, how you think you know just when the devil looks out of peopleâs eyes, or any other cheerful fantasy, and I shanât do a thing about it! You look sane enough, if I may say so.â

âI donât think I am.â

âWell, you may be right,â said Dr. Stillingfleet handsomely. âLetâs hear what your reasons are.â

âI do things and donât remember about themâ¦I tell people things about what Iâve done but I donât remember telling themâ¦.â

âIt sounds as though you have a bad memory.â

âYou donât understand. Theyâre allâwicked things.â

âReligious mania? Now that would be very interesting.â

âItâs not religious. Itâs justâjust hate.â

There was a tap at the door and an elderly woman came in with a tea tray. She put it down on the desk and went out again.

âSugar?â said Dr. Stillingfleet.

âYes, please.â

âSensible girl. Sugar is very good for you when youâve had a shock.â He poured out two cups of tea, set hers at her side and placed the sugar basin beside it. âNow then,â he sat down. âWhat were we talking about? Oh yes, hate.â

âIt is possible, isnât it, that you could hate someone so much that you really want to kill them?â

âOh, yes,â said Stillingfleet, cheerfully still. âPerfectly possible. In fact, most natural. But even if you really want to do it you canât always screw yourself up to the point, you know. The human being is equipped with a natural braking system and it applies the brakes for you just at the right moment.â

âYou make it sound so ordinary,â said Norma. There was a distinct overtone of annoyance in her voice.

âOh, well, it is quite natural. Children feel like it almost every day. Lose their tempers, say to their mothers or their fathers: âYouâre wicked, I hate you, I wish you were dead.â Mothers, being sometimes sensible people, donât usually pay any attention. When you grow up, you still hate people, but you canât take quite so much trouble wanting to kill them by then. Or if you still doâwell, then you go to prison. That is, if you actually brought yourself to do such a messy and difficult job. You arenât putting all this on, are you, by the way?â he asked casually.

âOf course not.â Norma sat up straight. Her eyes flashed with anger. âOf course not. Do you think I would say such awful things if they werenât true?â

âWell, again,â said Dr. Stillingfleet, âpeople do. They say all sorts of awful things about themselves and enjoy saying them.â He took her empty cup from her. âNow then,â he said, âyouâd better tell me all about everything. Who you hate, why you hate them, what youâd like to do to them.â

âLove can turn to hate.â

âSounds like a melodramatic ballad. But remember hate can turn to love, too. It works both ways. And you say itâs not a boyfriend. He was your man and he did you wrong. None of that stuff, eh?â

âNo, no. Nothing like that. Itâsâitâs my stepmother.â

âThe cruel stepmother motif. But thatâs nonsense. At your age you can get away from a stepmother. What has she done to you besides marrying your father? Do you hate him too, or are you so devoted to him that you donât want to share him?â

âItâs not like that at all. Not at all. I used to love him once. I loved him dearly. He wasâhe wasâI thought he was wonderful.â

âNow then,â said Dr. Stillingfleet, âlisten to me. Iâm going to suggest something. You see that door?â

Norma turned her head and looked in a puzzled fashion at the door.

âPerfectly ordinary door, isnât it? Not locked. Opens and shuts in the ordinary way. Go on, try it for yourself. You saw my housekeeper come in and go out through it, didnât you? No illusions. Come on. Get up. Do what I tell you.â

Norma rose from her chair and rather hesitatingly went to the door and opened it. She stood in the aperture, her head turned towards him inquiringly.

âRight. What do you see? A perfectly ordinary hallway, wants redecorating but itâs not worth having it done when Iâm just off to Australia. Now go to the front door, open it, also no tricks about it. Go outside and down to the pavement and that will show you that you are perfectly free with no attempts to shut you up in any way. After that, when you have satisfied yourself that you could walk out of this place at any minute you like, come back, sit in that comfortable chair over there and tell me all about yourself. After which I will give you my valuable advice. You neednât take it,â he added consolingly. âPeople seldom do take advice, but you might as well have it. See? Agreed?â

Norma got up slowly, she went a little shakily out of the room, out intoâas the doctor had describedâthe perfectly ordinary hallway, opened the front door with a simple catch, down four steps and stood on the pavement in a street of decorous but rather uninteresting houses. She stood there a moment, unaware that she was being watched through a lace blind by Dr. Stillingfleet himself. She stood there for about two minutes, then with a slightly more resolute bearing she turned, went up the steps again, shut the front door and came back into the room.

âAll right?â said Dr. Stillingfleet. âSatisfied you thereâs nothing up my sleeve? All clear and aboveboard.â

The girl nodded.

âRight. Sit down there. Make yourself comfortable. Do you smoke?â

âWell, Iââ

âOnly reefersâsomething of that kind? Never mind, you neednât tell me.â

âOf course I donât take anything of that kind.â

âI shouldnât have said there was any âof courseâ about it, but one must believe what the patient tells one. All right. Now tell me about yourself.â

âIâI donât know. Thereâs nothing to tell really. Donât you want me to lie down on a couch?â

âOh, you mean your memory of dreams and all that stuff? No, not particularly. I just like to get a background. You know. You were born, you lived in the country or the town, you have brothers and sisters or youâre an only child and so on. When your own mother died, were you very upset by her death?â

âOf course I was.â Norma sounded indignant.

âYouâre much too fond of saying of course, Miss West. By the way, West isnât really your name, is it? Oh, never mind, I donât want to know any other one. Call yourself West or East or North or anything you like. Anyway, what went on after your mother died?â

âShe was an invalid for a long time before she died. In nursing homes a good deal. I stayed with an aunt, rather an old aunt, down in Devonshire. She wasnât really an aunt, she was Motherâs first cousin. And then my father came home just about six months ago. Itâit was wonderful.â Her face lighted up suddenly. She was unaware of the quick, shrewd glance the apparently casual young man shot at her. âI could hardly remember him, you know. He must have gone away when I was about five. I didnât really think Iâd ever see him again. Mother didnât very often talk about him. I think at first she hoped that heâd give up this other woman and come back.â

âOther woman?â

âYes. He went away with someone. She was a very bad woman, Mother said. Mother talked about her very bitterly and very bitterly about Father too, but I used to think that perhapsâperhaps Father wasnât as bad as she thought, that it was all this womanâs fault.â

âDid they marry?â

âNo. Mother said she would never divorce Father. She was aâis it an Anglican?âvery High Church, you know. Rather like a Roman Catholic. She didnât believe in divorce.â

âDid they go on living together? What was the womanâs name or is that a secret too?â

âI donât remember her last name.â Norma shook her head. âNo, I donât think they lived together long, but I donât know much about it all, you see. They went to South Africa but I think they quarrelled and parted quite soon because thatâs when Mother said she hoped Father might come back again. But he didnât. He didnât write even. Not even to me. But he sent me things at Christmas. Presents always.â

âHe was fond of you?â

âI donât know. How could I tell? Nobody ever spoke about him. Only Uncle Simonâhis brother, you know. He was in business in the City and he was very angry that Father had chucked up everything. He said he had always been the same, could never settle to anything, but he said he wasnât a bad chap really. He said he was just weak. I didnât often see Uncle Simon. It was always Motherâs friends. Most of them were dreadfully dull. My whole life has been very dullâ¦.

âOh, it seemed so wonderful that Father was really coming home. I tried to remember him better. You know, things he had said, games he had played with me. He used to make me laugh a lot. I tried to see if I couldnât find some old snapshots or photographs of him. They seem all to have been thrown away. I think Mother must have torn them all up.â

âShe had remained vindictive then.â

âI think it was really Louise she was vindictive against.â

âLouise?â

He saw a slight stiffening on the girlâs part.

âI donât rememberâI told youâI donât remember any names.â

âNever mind. Youâre talking about the woman your father ran away with. Is that it?â

âYes. Mother said she drank too much and took drugs and would come to a bad end.â

âBut you donât know whether she did?â

âI donât know anything.ââ¦Her emotion was rising. âI wish you wouldnât ask me questions! I donât know anything about her! I never heard of her again! Iâd forgotten her until you spoke about her. I tell you I donât know anything.â

âWell, well,â said Dr. Stillingfleet. âDonât get so agitated. You donât need to bother about past history. Letâs think about the future. What are you going to do next?â

Norma gave a deep sigh.

âI donât know. Iâve nowhere to go. I canâtâitâs much betterâIâm sure itâs much better toâto end it allâonlyââ

âOnly you canât make the attempt a second time, is that it? It would be very foolish if you did, I can tell you that, my girl. All right, youâve nowhere to go, no one to trust; got any money?â

âYes, Iâve got a banking account, and Father pays so much into it every quarter but Iâm not sureâ¦I think perhaps, by now, they might be looking for me. I donât want to be found.â

âYou neednât be. Iâll fix that up for you all right. Place called Kenway Court. Not as fine as it sounds. Itâs a kind of convalescent nursing home where people go for a rest cure. Itâs got no doctors or couches, and you wonât be shut up there, I can promise you. You can walk out anytime you like. You can have breakfast in bed, stay in bed all day if you like. Have a good rest and Iâll come down one day and talk to you and weâll solve a few problems together. Will that suit you? Are you willing?â

Norma looked at him. She sat, without expression, staring at him; slowly she nodded her head.

II

Later that evening Dr. Stillingfleet made a telephone call.

âQuite a good operation kidnap,â he said. âSheâs down at Kenway Court. Came like a lamb. Canât tell you much yet. The girlâs full of drugs. Iâd say sheâd been taking purple hearts, and dream bombs, and probably LSDâ¦Sheâs been all hopped-up for some time. She says no, but I wouldnât trust much to what she says.â

He listened for a moment. âDonât ask me! One will have to go carefully there. She gets the wind up easyâ¦Yes, sheâs scared of something, or sheâs pretending to be scared of somethingâ¦.

âI donât know yet, I canât tell. Remember people who take drugs are tricky. You canât believe what they say always. We havenât rushed things and I donât want to startle herâ¦.

âA father complex as a child. Iâd say didnât care much for her mother who sounds a grim woman by all accountsâthe self-righteous martyr type. Iâd say Father was a gay one, and couldnât quite stand the grimness of married lifeâKnow of anyone called Louise?â¦The name seemed to frighten herâShe was the girlâs first hate, I should say. She took Father away at the time the child was five. Children donât understand very much at that age, but theyâre very quick to feel resentment of the person they feel was responsible. She didnât see Father again until apparently a few months ago. Iâd say sheâd had sentimental dreams of being her fatherâs companion and the apple of his eye. She got disillusioned apparently. Father came back with a wife, a new young attractive wife. Sheâs not called Louise, is she?â¦Oh well, I only asked. Iâm giving you roughly the picture, the general picture, that is.â

The voice at the other end of the wire said sharply, âWhat is that you say? Say it again.â

âI said Iâm giving you roughly the picture.â

There was a pause.

âBy the way, hereâs one little fact might interest you. The girl made a rather ham-handed attempt to commit suicide. Does that startle you?â¦

âOh, it doesnâtâ¦No, she didnât swallow the aspirin bottle, or put her head in the gas oven. She rushed into the traffic in the path of a Jaguar going faster than it should have doneâ¦I can tell you I only got to her just in timeâ¦Yes, Iâd say it was a genuine impulseâ¦She admitted it. Usual classic phraseâshe âwanted to get out of it all.ââ

He listened to a rapid flow of words, then he said: âI donât know. At this stage, I canât be sureâThe picture presented is clear. A nervy girl, neurotic and in an overwrought state from taking drugs of too many kinds. No, I couldnât tell you definitely what kind. There are dozens of these things going about all producing slightly different effects. There can be confusion, loss of memory, aggression, bewilderment, or sheer fuzzleheadedness! The difficulty is to tell what the real reactions are as opposed to the reactions produced by drugs. There are two choices, you see. Either this is a girl who is playing herself up, depicting herself as neurotic and nervy and claiming suicidal tendencies. It could be actually so. Or it could be a whole pack of lies. I wouldnât put it past her to be putting up this story for some obscure reason of her ownâwanting to give an entirely false impression of herself. If so, sheâs doing it very cleverly. Every now and then, there seems something not quite right in the picture sheâs giving. Is she a very clever little actress acting a part? Or is she a genuine semi-moronic suicidal victim? She could be eitherâ¦What did you say?â¦Oh, the Jaguar!â¦Yes, it was being driven far too fast. You think it mightnât have been an attempt at suicide? That the Jaguar was deliberately meaning to run her down?â

He thought for a minute or two. âI canât say,â he said slowly. âIt just could be so. Yes, it could be so, but I hadnât thought of it that way. The trouble is, everythingâs possible, isnât it? Anyway, Iâm going to get more out of her shortly. Iâve got her in a position where sheâs semi-willing to trust me, so long as I donât go too far too quickly, and make her suspicious. Sheâll become more trusting soon, and tell me more, and if sheâs a genuine case, sheâll pour out her whole story to meâforce it on me in the end. At the moment sheâs frightened of somethingâ¦.

âIf, of course, sheâs leading me up the garden path weâll have to find out the reason why. Sheâs at Kenway Court and I think sheâll stay there. Iâd suggest that you keep someone with an eye on it for a day or so and if she does attempt to leave, someone she doesnât know by sight had better follow her.â

Eleven

I

Andrew Restarick was writing a chequeâhe made a slight grimace as he did so.

His office was large and handsomely furnished in typical conventional tycoon fashionâthe furnishing and fittings had been Simon Restarickâs and Andrew Restarick had accepted them without interest and had made few changes except for removing a couple of pictures and replacing them by his own portrait which he had brought up from the country, and a watercolour of Table Mountain.

Andrew Restarick was a man of middle age, beginning to put on flesh, yet strangely little changed from the man some fifteen years younger in the picture hanging above him. There was the same jutting out chin, the lips firmly pressed together, and the slightly raised quizzical eyebrows. Not a very noticeable manâan ordinary type and at the moment not a very happy man. His secretary entered the roomâshe advanced towards his desk, as he looked up.

âA Monsieur Hercule Poirot is here. He insists that he has an appointment with youâbut I can find no trace of one.â

âA Monsieur Hercule Poirot?â The name seemed vaguely familiar, but he could not remember in what context. He shook his headââI canât remember anything about himâthough I seem to have heard the name. What does he look like?â

âA very small manâforeignâFrench I should sayâwith an enormous moustacheââ

âOf course! I remember Mary describing him. He came to see old Roddy. But whatâs all this about an appointment with me?â

âHe says you wrote him a letter.â

âCanât remember itâeven if I did. Perhaps MaryâOh well, never mindâbring him in. I suppose Iâd better see what this is all about.â

A moment or two later Claudia Reece-Holland returned ushering with her a small man with an egg-shaped head, large moustaches, pointed patent leather shoes and a general air of complacency which accorded very well with the description he had had from his wife.

âMonsieur Hercule Poirot,â said Claudia Reece-Holland.

She went out again as Hercule Poirot advanced towards the desk. Restarick rose.

âMonsieur Restarick? I am Hercule Poirot, at your service.â

âOh yes. My wife mentioned that youâd called upon us or rather called upon my uncle. What can I do for you?â

âI have presented myself in answer to your letter.â

âWhat letter? I did not write to you, M. Poirot.â

Poirot stared at him. Then he drew from his pocket a letter, unfolded it, glanced at it and handed it across the desk with a bow.

âSee for yourself, Monsieur.â

Restarick stared at it. It was typewritten on his own office stationery. His signature was written in ink at the bottom.

Dear Monsieur Poirot,

I should be very glad if you could call upon me at the above address at your earliest convenience. I understand from what my wife tells me and also from what I have learned by making various inquiries in London, that you are a man to be trusted when you agree to accept a mission that demands discretion.

Yours truly,
Andrew Restarick

He said sharply:

âWhen did you receive this?â

âThis morning. I had no matters of moment on my hands so I came along here.â

âThis is an extraordinary thing, M. Poirot. That letter was not written by me.â

âNot written by you?â

âNo. My signature is quite differentâlook for yourself.â He cast out a hand as though looking for some example of his handwriting and without conscious thought turned the cheque book on which he had just written his signature, so that Poirot could see it. âYou see? The signature on the letter is not in the least like mine.â

âBut that is extraordinary,â said Poirot. âAbsolutely extraordinary. Who could have written this letter?â

âThatâs just what Iâm asking myself.â

âIt could notâexcuse meâhave been your wife?â

âNo, no. Mary would never do a thing like that. And anyway why should she sign it with my name? Oh no, she would have told me if sheâd done such a thing, prepared me for your visit.â

âThen you have no idea why anyone might have sent this letter?â

âNo, indeed.â

âHave you no knowledge, Mr. Restarick, as to what the matter might be on which in this letter you apparently want to engage me?â

âHow could I have an idea?â

âExcuse me,â said Poirot, âyou have not yet completely read this letter. You will notice at the bottom of the first page after the signature, there is a small p.t.o.â

Restarick turned the letter over. At the top of the next page the typewriting continued.

The matter on which I wish to consult you concerns my daughter, Norma.

Restarickâs manner changed. His face darkened.

âSo, thatâs it! But who could knowâwho could possibly meddle in this matter? Who knows about it?â

âCould it be a way of urging you to consult me? Some well-meaning friend? You have really no idea who the writer may have been?â

âIâve no idea whatever.â

âAnd you are not in trouble over a daughter of yoursâa daughter named Norma?â

Restarick said slowly:

âI have a daughter named Norma. My only daughter.â His voice changed slightly as he said the last words.

âAnd she is in trouble, difficulty of some kind?â

âNot that I know of.â But he hesitated slightly as he spoke the words.

Poirot leaned forward.

âI donât think that is exactly right, Mr. Restarick. I think there is some trouble or difficulty concerning your daughter.â

âWhy should you think that? Has someone spoken to you on the subject?â

âI was going entirely by your intonation, Monsieur. Many people,â added Hercule Poirot, âare in trouble over daughters at the present date. They have a genius, young ladies, for getting into various kinds of trouble and difficulty. It is possible that the same obtains here.â

Restarick was silent for some few moments, drumming with his fingers on the desk.

âYes, I am worried about Norma,â he said at last. âShe is a difficult girl. Neurotic, inclined to be hysterical. Iâunfortunately I donât know her very well.â

âTrouble, no doubt, over a young man?â

âIn a way, yes, but that is not entirely what is worrying me. I thinkââ he looked appraisingly at Poirot. âAm I to take it that you are a man of discretion?â

âI should be very little good in my profession if I were not.â

âIt is a case, you see, of wanting my daughter found.â

âAh?â

âShe came home last weekend as she usually does to our house in the country. She went back on Sunday night ostensibly to the flat which she occupies in common with two other girls, but I now find that she did not go there. She must have goneâsomewhere else.â

âIn fact, she has disappeared?â

âIt sounds too much of a melodramatic statement, but it does amount to that. I expect thereâs a perfectly natural explanation, butâwell, I suppose any father would be worried. She hasnât rung up, you see, or given any explanation to the girls with whom she shares her flat.â

âThey too are worried?â

âNo, I should not say so. I thinkâwell, I think they take such things easily enough. Girls are very independent. More so than when I left En gland fifteen years ago.â

âWhat about the young man of whom you say you do not approve? Can she have gone away with him?â

âI devoutly hope not. Itâs possible, but I donâtâmy wife doesnât think so. You saw him, I believe, the day you came to our house to call on my uncleââ

âAh yes, I think I know the young man of whom you speak. A very handsome young man but not, if I may say so, a man of whom a father would approve. I noticed that your wife was not pleased, either.â

âMy wife is quite certain that he came to the house that day hoping to escape observation.â

âHe knows, perhaps, that he is not welcome there?â

âHe knows all right,â said Restarick grimly.

âDo you not then think that it is only too likely your daughter may have joined him?â

âI donât know what to think. I didnâtâat first.â

âYou have been to the police.â

âNo.â

âIn the case of anyone who is missing, it is usually much better to go to the police. They too are discreet and they have many means at their disposal which persons like myself have not.â

âI donât want to go to the police. Itâs my daughter, man, you understand? My daughter. If sheâs chosen toâto go away for a short time and not let us know, well, thatâs up to her. Thereâs no reason to believe that sheâs in any danger or anything like that. IâI just want to know for my own satisfaction where she is.â

âIs it possible, Mr. RestarickâI hope I am not unduly presuming, that that is not the only thing that is worrying you about your daughter?â

âWhy should you think there was anything else?â

âBecause the mere fact that a girl is absent for a few days without telling her parents, or the friends with whom she is living, where she is going, is not particularly unusual nowadays. It is that, taken in conjunction with something else, I think, which has caused you this alarm.â

âWell, perhaps youâre right. Itâsââ he looked doubtfully at Poirot. âIt is very hard to speak of these things to strangers.â

âNot really,â said Poirot. âIt is infinitely easier to speak to strangers of such things than it would be to speak of them to friends or acquaintances. Surely you must agree to that?â

âPerhaps. Perhaps. I can see what you mean. Well, I will admit I am upset about my girl. You see sheâsheâs not quite like other girls and thereâs been something already that has definitely worried meâworried us both.â

Poirot said: âYour daughter, perhaps, is at that difficult age of young girlhood, an emotional adolescence when, quite frankly, they are capable of performing actions for which they are hardly to be held responsible. Do not take it amiss if I venture to make a surmise. Your daughter perhaps resents having a stepmother?â

âThat is unfortunately true. And yet she has no reason to do so, M. Poirot. It is not as though my first wife and I had recently parted. The parting took place many years ago.â He paused and then said, âI might as well speak frankly to you. After all, there has been no concealment about the matter. My first wife and I drifted apart. I need not mince matters. I had met someone else, someone with whom I was quite infatuated. I left England and went to South Africa with the other woman. My wife did not approve of divorce and I did not ask her for one. I made suitable financial provision for my wife and for the childâshe was only five years old at the timeââ

He paused and then went on:

âLooking back, I can see that I had been dissatisfied with life for some time. Iâd been yearning to travel. At that period of my life I hated being tied down to an office desk. My brother reproached me several times with not taking more interest in the family business, now that I had come in with him. He said that I was not pulling my weight. But I didnât want that sort of life. I was restless. I wanted an adventurous life. I wanted to see the world and wild placesâ¦.â

He broke off abruptly.

âAnywayâyou donât want to hear the story of my life. I went to South Africa and Louise went with me. It wasnât a success. Iâll admit that straightaway. I was in love with her but we quarrelled incessantly. She hated life in South Africa. She wanted to get back to London and Parisâall the sophisticated places. We parted only about a year after we arrived there.â

He sighed.

âPerhaps I ought to have gone back then, back to the tame life that I disliked the idea of so much. But I didnât. I donât know whether my wife would have had me back or not. Probably she would have considered it her duty to do so. She was a great woman for doing her duty.â

Poirot noted the slight bitterness that ran through that sentence.

âBut I ought to have thought more about Norma, I suppose. Well, there it was. The child was safely with her mother. Financial arrangements had been made. I wrote to her occasionally and sent her presents, but I never once thought of going back to En gland and seeing her. That was not entirely blameworthy on my part. I had adopted a different way of life and I thought it would be merely unsettling for the child to have a father who came and went, and perhaps disturbed her own peace of mind. Anyway, letâs say I thought I was acting for the best.â

Restarickâs words came fast now. It was as though he was feeling a definite solace in being able to pour out his story to a sympathetic listener. It was a reaction that Poirot had often noticed before and he encouraged it.

âYou never wished to come home on your own account?â

Restarick shook his head very definitely. âNo. You see, I was living the kind of life I liked, the kind of life I was meant for. I went from South Africa to East Africa. I was doing very well financially, everything I touched seemed to prosper; projects with which I was associated, occasionally with other people, sometimes on my own, all went well. I used to go off into the bush and trek. That was the life Iâd always wanted. I am by nature an out-of-door man. Perhaps thatâs why when I was married to my first wife I felt trapped, held down. No, I enjoyed my freedom and Iâd no wish to go back to the conventional type of life that Iâd led here.â

âBut you did come back in the end?â

Restarick sighed. âYes. I did come back. Ah well, one grows old, I suppose. Also, another man and I had made a very good strike. Weâd secured a concession which might have very important consequences. It would need negotiation in London. There I could have depended on my brother to act, but my brother died. I was still a partner in the firm. I could return if I chose and see to things myself. It was the first time I had thought of doing so. Of returning, I mean, to City life.â

âPerhaps your wifeâyour second wifeââ

âYes, you may have something there. I had been married to Mary just a month or two when my brother died. Mary was born in South Africa but she had been to England several times and she liked the life there. She liked particularly the idea of having an English garden!

âAnd I? Well, for the first time perhaps I felt I would like life in England, too. And I thought of Norma as well. Her mother had died two years earlier. I talked to Mary about it all, and she was quite willing to help me make a home for my daughter. The prospects all seemed good and soââ he smiled, ââand so I came home.â

Poirot looked at the portrait that hung behind Restarickâs head. It was in a better light here than it had been at the house in the country. It showed very plainly the man who was sitting at the desk; there were the distinctive features, the obstinancy of the chin, the quizzical eyebrows, the poise of the head, but the portrait had one thing that the man sitting in the chair beneath it lacked. Youth!

Another thought occurred to Poirot. Why had Andrew Restarick moved the portrait from the country to his London office? The two portraits of him and his wife had been companion portraits done at the same time and by that particular fashionable artist of the day whose speciality was portrait painting. It would have been more natural, Poirot thought, to have left them together, as they had been meant to be originally. But Restarick had moved one portrait, his own, to his office. Was it a kind of vanity on his partâa wish to display himself as a City man, as someone important to the City? Yet he was a man who had spent his time in wild places, who professed to prefer wild places. Or did he perhaps do it in order to keep before his mind himself in his City personality? Did he feel the need of reinforcement?

âOr, of course,â thought Poirot, âit could be simple vanity!

âEven I myself,â said Poirot to himself, in an unusual fit of modesty, âeven I myself am capable of vanity on occasions.â

The short silence, of which both men had seemed unaware, was broken. Restarick spoke apologetically.

âYou must forgive me, M. Poirot. I seem to have been boring you with the story of my life.â

âThere is nothing to excuse, Mr. Restarick. You have been talking really only of your life as it may have affected that of your daughter. You are much disquieted about your daughter. But I do not think that you have yet told me the real reason. You want her found, you say?â

âYes, I want her found.â

âYou want her found, yes, but do you want her found by me? Ah, do not hesitate. La politesseâit is very necessary in life, but it is not necessary here. Listen. I tell you, if you want your daughter found I advise you, IâHercule Poirotâto go to the police for they have the facilities. And from my own knowledge they can be discreet.â

âI wonât go to the police unlessâwell, unless I get very desperate.â

âYou would rather go to a private agent?â

âYes. But you see, I donât know anything about private agents. I donât know whoâwho can be trusted. I donât know whoââ

âAnd what do you know about me?â

âI do know something about you. I know, for instance, that you held a responsible position in Intelligence during the war, since, in fact, my own uncle vouches for you. That is an admitted fact.â

The faintly cynical expression on Poirotâs face was not perceived by Restarick. The admitted fact was, as Poirot was well aware, a complete illusionâalthough Restarick must have known how undependable Sir Roderick was in the matter of memory and eyesightâhe had swallowed Poirotâs own account of himself, hook, line and sinker. Poirot did not disillusion him. It merely confirmed him in his long-held belief that you should never believe anything anyone said without first checking it. Suspect everybody, had been for many years, if not his whole life, one of his first axioms.

âLet me reassure you,â said Poirot. âI have been throughout my career exceptionally successful. I have been indeed in many ways unequalled.â

Restarick looked less reassured by this than he might have been! Indeed, to an Englishman, a man who praised himself in such terms aroused some misgivings.

He said: âWhat do you feel yourself, M. Poirot? Have you confidence that you can find my daughter?â

âProbably not as quickly as the police could do, but yes. I shall find her.â

âAndâand if you doââ

âBut if you wish me to find her, Mr. Restarick, you must tell me all the circumstances.â

âBut I have told them to you. The time, the place, where she ought to be. I can give you a list of her friendsâ¦.â

Poirot was making some violent shakings of his head. âNo, no, I suggest you tell me the truth.â

âDo you suggest I havenât told you the truth?â

âYou have not told me all of it. Of that I am assured. What are you afraid of? What are the unknown factsâthe facts that I have to know if I am to have success? Your daughter dislikes her stepmother. That is plain. There is nothing strange about that. It is a very natural reaction. You must remember that she may have secretly idealised you for many many years. That is quite possible in the case of a broken marriage where a child has had a severe blow in her affections. Yes, yes, I know what I am talking about. You say a child forgets. That is true. Your daughter could have forgotten you in the sense that when she saw you again she might not remember your face or your voice. She would make her own image of you. You went away. She wanted you to come back. Her mother, no doubt, discouraged her from talking about you, and therefore she thought about you perhaps all the more. You mattered to her all the more. And because she could not talk about you to her own mother she had what is a very natural reaction with a childâthe blaming of the parent who remains for the absence of the parent who has gone. She said to herself something in the nature of âFather was fond of me. Itâs Mother he didnât like,â and from that was born a kind of idealisation, a kind of secret liaison between you and her. What had happened was not her fatherâs fault. She will not believe it!

âOh yes, that often happens, I assure you. I know something of the psychology. So when she learns that you are coming home, that you and she will be reunited, many memories that she has pushed aside and not thought of for years return. Her father is coming back! He and she will be happy together! She hardly realises the stepmother, perhaps, until she sees her. And then she is violently jealous. It is most natural, I assure you. She is violently jealous partly because your wife is a good-looking woman, sophisticated, and well poised, which is a thing girls often resent because they frequently lack confidence in themselves. She herself is possibly gauche with perhaps an inferiority complex. So when she sees her competent and good-looking stepmother, quite possibly she hates her; but hates her as an adolescent girl who is still half a child might do.â

âWellââ Restarick hesitated. âThat is more or less what the doctor said when we consulted himâI meanââ

âAha,â said Poirot, âso you consulted a doctor? You must have had some reason, is it not so, for calling in a doctor?â

âNothing really.â

âAh no, you cannot say that to Hercule Poirot. It was not nothing. It was something serious and you had better tell me, because if I know just what has been in this girlâs mind, I shall make more progress. Things will go quicker.â

Restarick was silent for several moments, then he made up his mind.

âThis is in absolute confidence, M. Poirot? I can rely on youâI have your assurance as to that?â

âBy all means. What was the trouble?â

âI cannot beâbe sure.â

âYour daughter entered into some action against your wife? Something more than being merely childishly rude or saying unpleasant things. It was something worse than thatâsomething more serious. Did she perhaps attack her physically?â

âNo, it was not an attackânot a physical attack butânothing was proved.â

âNo, no. We will admit that.â

âMy wife became far from wellââ He hesitated.

âAh,â said Poirot. âYes, I seeâ¦And what was the nature of her illness? Digestive, possibly? A form of enteritis?â

âYouâre quick, M. Poirot. Youâre very quick. Yes, it was digestive. This complaint of my wifeâs was puzzling, because she had always had excellent health. Finally they sent her to hospital for âobservation,â as they call it. A check-up.â

âAnd the result?â

âI donât think they were completely satisfiedâ¦She appeared to regain her health completely and was sent home in due course. But the trouble recurred. We went carefully over the meals she had, the cooking. She seemed to be suffering from a form of intestinal poisoning for which there appeared to be no cause. A further step was taken, tests were made of the dishes she ate. By taking samples of everything, it was definitely proved that a certain substance had been administered in various dishes. In each case it was a dish of which only my wife had partaken.â

âIn plain language somebody was giving her arsenic. Is that right?â

âQuite right. In small doses which would in the end have a cumulative effect.â

âYou suspected your daughter?â

âNo.â

âI think you did. Who else could have done it? You suspected your daughter.â

Restarick gave a deep sigh.

âFrankly, yes.â

II

When Poirot arrived home, George was awaiting him:

âA woman named Edith rang up, sirââ

âEdith?â Poirot frowned.

âShe is, I gather, in the service of Mrs. Oliver. She asked me to inform you that Mrs. Oliver is in St. Gilesâs Hospital.â

âWhat has happened to her?â

âI understand she has beenâerâcoshed.â George did not add the latter part of the message, which had beenâââand you tell him itâs been all his fault.â

Poirot clicked his tongue. âI warned herâI was uneasy last night when I rang her up, and there was no answer. Les Femmes!â

Twelve

âLetâs buy a peacock,â said Mrs. Oliver suddenly and unexpectedly. She did not open her eyes as she made this remark, and her voice was weak though full of indignation.

Three people brought startled eyes to bear upon her. She made a further statement.

âHit on the head.â

She opened badly focused eyes and endeavoured to make out where she was.

The first thing she saw was a face entirely strange to her. A young man who was writing in a notebook. He held the pencil poised in his hand.

âPoliceman,â said Mrs. Oliver decisively.

âI beg your pardon, Madam?â

âI said you were a policeman,â said Mrs. Oliver. âAm I right?â

âYes, Madam.â

âCriminal assault,â said Mrs. Oliver and closed her eyes in a satisfied manner. When she opened them again, she took in her surroundings more fully. She was in a bed, one of those rather high hygienic-looking hospital beds, she decided. The kind that you shoot up and down and round and about. She was not in her own house. She looked round and decided on her environment.

âHospital, or could be nursing home,â she said.

A sister was standing with an air of authority at the door, and a nurse was standing by her bed. She identified a fourth figure. âNobody,â said Mrs. Oliver, âcould mistake those moustaches. What are you doing here, M. Poirot?â

Hercule Poirot advanced towards the bed. âI told you to be careful, Madame,â he said.

âAnyone might lose their way,â said Mrs. Oliver, somewhat obscurely, and added, âMy head aches.â

âWith good cause. As you surmise, you were hit on the head.â

âYes. By the Peacock.â

The policeman stirred uneasily then said, âExcuse me, Madam, you say you were assaulted by a peacock?â

âOf course. Iâd had an uneasy feeling for some timeâyou know, atmosphere.â Mrs. Oliver tried to wave her hand in an appropriate gesture to describe atmosphere, and winced. âOuch,â she said, âIâd better not try that again.â

âMy patient must not get overexcited,â said the sister with disapproval.

âCan you tell me where this assault occurred?â

âI havenât the faintest idea. Iâd lost my way. I was coming from a kind of studio. Very badly kept. Dirty. The other young man hadnât shaved for days. A greasy leather jacket.â

âIs this the man who assaulted you?â

âNo, itâs another one.â

âIf you could just tell meââ

âI am telling you, arenât I? Iâd followed him, you see, all the way from the cafÃ©âonly Iâm not very good at following people. No practice. Itâs much more difficult than youâd think.â

Her eyes focused on the policeman. âBut I suppose you know all about that. You have coursesâin following people, I mean? Oh, never mind, it doesnât matter. You see,â she said, speaking with sudden rapidity, âitâs quite simple. I had got off at The Worldâs End, I think it was, and naturally I thought he had stayed with the othersâor gone the other way. But instead, he came up behind me.â

âWho was this?â

âThe Peacock,â said Mrs. Oliver, âand he startled me, you see. It does startle you when you find things are the wrong way round. I mean he following you instead of you following himâonly it was earlierâand I had a sort of uneasy feeling. In fact, you know, I was afraid. I donât know why. He spoke quite politely but I was afraid. Anyway there it was and he said âCome up and see the studioâ and so I came up rather a rickety staircase. A kind of ladder staircase and there was this other young manâthe dirty young manâand he was painting a picture, and the girl was acting as model. She was quite clean. Rather pretty really. And so there we were and they were quite nice and polite, and then I said I must be getting home, and they told me the right way to get back to the Kingâs Road. But they canât really have told me the right way. Of course I might have made a mistake. You know, when people tell you second left and third right, well, you sometimes do it the wrong way round. At least I do. Anyway, I got into a rather peculiar slummy part quite close to the river. The afraid feeling had gone away by then. I must have been quite off my guard when the Peacock hit me.â

âI think sheâs delirous,â said the nurse in an explanatory voice.

âNo, Iâm not,â said Mrs. Oliver. âI know what Iâm talking about.â

The nurse opened her mouth, caught the sisterâs admonitory eye and shut it again quickly.

âVelvets and satins and long curly hair,â said Mrs. Oliver.

âA peacock in satin? A real peacock, Madam. You thought you saw a peacock near the river in Chelsea?â

âA real peacock?â said Mrs. Oliver. âOf course not. How silly. What would a real peacock be doing down on Chelsea Embankment?â

Nobody appeared to have an answer to this question.

âHe struts,â said Mrs. Oliver, âthatâs why I nicknamed him a peacock. Shows off, you know. Vain, I should think. Proud of his looks. Perhaps a lot of other things as well.â She looked at Poirot. âDavid something. You know who I mean.â

âYou say this young man of the name of David assaulted you by striking you on the head?â

âYes I do.â

Hercule Poirot spoke. âYou saw him?â

âI didnât see him,â said Mrs. Oliver, âI didnât know anything about it. I just thought I heard something behind me, and before I could turn my head to lookâit all happened! Just as if a ton of bricks or something fell on me. I think Iâll go to sleep now,â she added.

She moved her head slightly, made a grimace of pain, and relapsed into what appeared to be a perfectly satisfactory unconsciousness.

Thirteen

Poirot seldom used the key to his flat. Instead, in an old-fashioned manner, he pressed the bell and waited for that admirable factotum, George, to open the door. On this occasion, however, after his visit to the hospital, the door was opened to him by Miss Lemon.

âYouâve got two visitors,â said Miss Lemon, pitching her voice in an admirable tone, not as carrying as a whisper but a good many notes lower than her usual pitch. âOneâs Mr. Goby and the other is an old gentleman called Sir Roderick Horsefield. I donât know which you want to see first.â

âSir Roderick Horsefield,â mused Poirot. He considered this with his head on one side, looking rather like a robin while he decided how this latest development was likely to affect the general picture. Mr. Goby, however, materialised with his usual suddenness from the small room which was sacred to Miss Lemonâs typewriting and where she had evidently kept him in storage.

Poirot removed his overcoat. Miss Lemon hung it up on the hall stand, and Mr. Goby, as was his fashion, addressed the back of Miss Lemonâs head.

âIâll have a cup of tea in the kitchen with George,â said Mr. Goby. âMy time is my own. Iâll keep.â

He disappeared obligingly into the kitchen. Poirot went into his sitting room where Sir Roderick was pacing up and down full of vitality.

âRun you down, my boy,â he said genially. âWonderful thing the telephone.â

âYou remembered my name? I am gratified.â

âWell, I didnât exactly remember your name,â said Sir Roderick. âNames, you know, have never been my strong point. Never forget a face,â he ended proudly. âNo. I rang up Scotland Yard.â

âOh!â Poirot looked faintly startled, though reflecting that that was the sort of thing that Sir Roderick would do.

âAsked me who I wanted to speak to. I said, put me on to the top. Thatâs the thing to do in life, my boy. Never accept second in charge. No good. Go to the top, thatâs what I say. I said who I was, mind you. Said I wanted to speak to the top brass and I got on to it in the end. Very civil fellow. Told him I wanted the address of a chap in Allied Intelligence who was out with me at a certain place in France at a certain date. The chap seemed a bit at sea, so I said: âYou know who I mean.â A Frenchman, I said, or a Belgian. Belgian, werenât you? I said: âHeâs got a Christian name something like Achilles. Itâs not Achilles,â I said, âbut itâs like Achilles. Little chap,â I said, âbig moustaches.â And then he seemed to catch on, and he said youâd be in the telephone book, he thought. I said thatâs all right, but I said: âHe wonât be listed under Achilles or Hercules (as he said it was), will he? and I canât remember his second name.â So then he gave it me. Very civil sort of fellow. Very civil, I must say.â

âI am delighted to see you,â said Poirot, sparing a hurried thought for what might be said to him later by Sir Roderickâs telephone acquaintance. Fortunately it was not likely to have been quite the top brass. It was presumably someone with whom he was already acquainted, and whose job it was to produce civility on tap for distinguished persons of a bygone day.

âAnyway,â said Sir Roderick, âI got here.â

âI am delighted. Let me offer you some refreshment. Tea, a grenadine, a whisky and soda, some sirop de cassisââ

âGood lord, no,â said Sir Roderick, alarmed at the mention of sirop de cassis. âIâll take whisky for choice. Not that Iâm allowed it,â he added, âbut doctors are all fools, as we know. All they care for is stopping you having anything youâve a fancy for.â

Poirot rang for George and gave him the proper instructions. The whisky and the siphon were placed at Sir Roderickâs elbow and George withdrew.

âNow,â said Poirot, âwhat can I do for you?â

âGot a job for you, old boy.â

After the lapse of time, he seemed even more convinced of the close liaison between him and Poirot in the past, which was as well, thought Poirot, since it would produce an even greater dependence on his, Poirotâs, capabilities by Sir Roderickâs nephew.

âPapers,â said Sir Roderick, dropping his voice. âLost some papers and Iâve got to find âem, see? So I thought what with my eyes not being as good as they were, and the memory being a trifle off-key sometimes, Iâd better go to someone in the know. See? You came along in the nick of time the other day, just in time to be useful, because Iâve got to cough âem up, you understand.â

âIt sounds most interesting,â said Poirot. âWhat are these papers, if I may ask?â

âWell, I suppose if youâre going to find them, youâll have to ask, wonât you? Mind you, theyâre very secret and confidential. Top secretâor they were once. And it seems as though they are going to be again. An interchange of letters, it was. Not of any particular importance at the timeâor it was thought they were of no importance; but then of course politics change. You know the way it is. They go round and face the other way. You know how it was when the war broke out. None of us knew whether we were on our head or on our heels. One war weâre pals with the Italians, next war weâre enemies. I donât know which of them all was the worst. First war the Japanese were our dear allies, and the next war there they are blowing up Pearl Harbor! Never knew where you were! Start one way with the Russians, and finish the opposite way. I tell you, Poirot, nothingâs more difficult nowadays than the question of allies. They can change overnight.â

âAnd you have lost some papers,â said Poirot, recalling the old man to the subject of his visit.

âYes. Iâve got a lot of papers, you know, and Iâve dug âem out lately. I had âem put away safely. In a bank, as a matter of fact, but I got âem all out and I began sorting through them because I thought why not write my memoirs. All the chaps are doing it nowadays. Weâve had Montgomery and Alanbrooke and Auchinleck all shooting their mouths off in print, mostly saying what they thought of the other generals. Weâve even had old Moran, a respectable physician, blabbing about his important patient. Donât know what things will come to next! Anyway, there it is, and I thought Iâd be quite interested myself in telling a few facts about some people I knew! Why shouldnât I have a go as well as everyone else? I was in it all.â

âI am sure it could be a matter of much interest to people,â said Poirot.

âAh-ha, yes! One knew a lot of people in the news. Everyone looked at them with awe. They didnât know they were complete fools, but I knew. My goodness, the mistakes some of those brass hats madeâyouâd be surprised. So I got out my papers, and I had the little girl help me sort âem out. Nice little girl, that, and quite bright. Doesnât know English very well, but apart from that, sheâs very bright and helpful. Iâd salted away a lot of stuff, but everything was in a bit of a muddle. The point of the whole thing is, the papers I wanted werenât there.â

âWerenât there?â

âNo. We thought weâd given it a miss by mistake to begin with, but we went over it again and I can tell you, Poirot, a lot of stuff seemed to me to have been pinched. Some of it wasnât important. Actually, the stuff I was looking for wasnât particularly importantâI mean, nobody had thought it was, otherwise I suppose I shouldnât have been allowed to keep it. But anyway, these particular letters werenât there.â

âI wish of course to be discreet,â said Poirot, âbut can you tell me at all the nature of these letters you refer to?â

âDonât know that I can, old boy. The nearest I can go is of somebody whoâs shooting off his mouth nowadays about what he did and what he said in the past. But heâs not speaking the truth, and these letters just show exactly how much of a liar he is! Mind you, I donât suppose theyâd be published now. Weâll just send him nice copies of them, and tell him this is exactly what he did say at the time, and that weâve got it in writing. I shouldnât be surprised ifâwell, things went a bit differently after that. See? I hardly need ask that, need I? Youâre familiar with all that kind of talky-talky.â

âYouâre quite right, Sir Roderick. I know exactly the kind of thing you mean, but you see also that it is not easy to help you recover something if one does not know what that something is, and where it is likely to be now.â

âFirst things first: I want to know who pinched âem, because you see thatâs the important point. There may be more top secret stuff in my little collection, and I want to know whoâs tampering with it.â

âHave you any ideas yourself?â

âYou think I ought to have, heh?â

âWell, it would seem that the principal possibilityââ

âI know. You want me to say itâs the little girl. Well, I donât think it is the little girl. She says she didnât, and I believe her. Understand?â

âYes,â said Poirot with a slight sigh, âI understand.â

âFor one thing sheâs too young. She wouldnât know these things were important. Itâs before her time.â

âSomeone else might have instructed her as to that,â Poirot pointed out.

âYes, yes, thatâs true enough. But itâs too obvious as well.â

Poirot sighed. He doubted if it was any use insisting in view of Sir Roderickâs obvious partiality. âWho else had access?â

âAndrew and Mary, of course, but I doubt if Andrew would even be interested in such things. Anyway, heâs always been a very decent boy. Always was. Not that Iâve ever known him very well. Used to come for the holidays once or twice with his brother and thatâs about all. Of course, he ditched his wife, and went off with an attractive bit of goods to South Africa, but that might happen to any man, especially with a wife like Grace. Not that I ever saw much of her, either. Kind of woman who looked down her nose and was full of good works. Anyway you canât imagine a chap like Andrew being a spy. As for Mary, she seems all right. Never looks at anything but a rose bush as far as I can make out. Thereâs a gardener but heâs eighty-three and has lived in the village all his life, and there are a couple of women always dodging about the house making a noise with Hoovers, but I canât see them in the role of spies either. So you see itâs got to be an outsider. Of course Mary wears a wig,â went on Sir Roderick rather inconsequently. âI mean it might make you think she was a spy because she wore a wig, but thatâs not the case. She lost her hair in a fever when she was eighteen. Pretty bad luck for a young woman. Iâd no idea she wore a wig to begin with but a rose bush caught in her hair one day and whisked it sideways. Yes, very bad luck.â

âI thought there was something a little odd about the way she had arranged her hair,â said Poirot.

âAnyway, the best secret agents never wear wigs,â Sir Roderick informed him. âPoor devils have to go to plastic surgeons and get their faces altered. But someoneâs been mucking about with my private papers.â

âYou donât think that you may perhaps have placed them in some different containerâin a drawer or a different file. When did you see them last?â

âI handled these things about a year ago. I remember I thought then, theyâd make rather good copy, and I noted those particular letters. Now theyâre gone. Somebodyâs taken them.â

âYou do not suspect your nephew Andrew, his wife or the domestic staff. What about the daughter?â

âNorma? Well Normaâs a bit off her onion, Iâd say. I mean she might be one of those kleptomaniacs who take peopleâs things without knowing theyâre taking them but I donât see her fumbling about among my papers.â

âThen what do you think?â

âWell, youâve been in the house. You saw what the house is like. Anyone can walk in and out anytime they like. We donât lock our doors. We never have.â

âDo you lock the door of your own roomâif you go up to London, for instance?â

âI never thought of it as necessary. I do now of course, but whatâs the use of that? Too late. Anyway, Iâve only an ordinary key, fits any of the doors. Someone must have come in from outside. Why nowadays thatâs how all the burglaries take place. People walk in in the middle of the day, stump up the stairs, go into any room they like, rifle the jewel box, go out again, and nobody sees them or cares who they are. They probably look like mods or rockers or beatniks or whatever they call these chaps nowadays with the long hair and the dirty nails. Iâve seen more than one of them prowling about. One doesnât like to say âWho the devil are you?â You never know which sex they are, which is embarrassing. The place crawls with them. I suppose theyâre Normaâs friends. Wouldnât have been allowed in the old days. But you turn them out of the house, and then you find out itâs Viscount Endersleigh or Lady Charlotte Marjoribanks. Donât know where you are nowadays.â He paused. âIf anyone can get to the bottom of it, you can, Poirot.â He swallowed the last mouthful of whisky and got up.

âWell, thatâs that. Itâs up to you. Youâll take it on, wonât you?â

âI will do my best,â said Poirot.

The front-door bell rang.

âThatâs the little girl,â said Sir Roderick. âPunctual to the minute. Wonderful, isnât it? Couldnât go about London without her, you know. Blind as a bat. Canât see to cross the road.â

âCan you not have glasses?â

âIâve got some somewhere, but theyâre always falling off my nose or else I lose them. Besides, I donât like glasses. Iâve never had glasses. When I was sixty-five I could see to read without glasses and thatâs pretty good.â

âNothing,â said Hercule Poirot, âlasts forever.â

George ushered in Sonia. She was looking extremely pretty. Her slightly shy manner became her very well, Poirot thought. He moved forward with Gallic empressement.

âEnchantÃ©, Mademoiselle,â he said, bowing over her hand.

âIâm not late, am I, Sir Roderick,â she said, looking past him. âI have not kept you waiting. Please I hope not.â

âExactly to the minute, little girl,â said Sir Roderick. âAll shipshape and Bristol fashion,â he added.

Sonia looked slightly perplexed.

âMade a good tea, I hope,â Sir Roderick went on. âI told you, you know, to have a good tea, buy yourself some buns or Ã©clairs or whatever it is young ladies like nowadays, eh? You obeyed orders, I hope.â

âNo, not exactly. I took the time to buy a pair of shoes. Look, they are pretty, are they not?â She stuck out a foot.

It was certainly a very pretty foot. Sir Roderick beamed at it.

âWell, we must go and catch our train,â he said. âI may be old-fashioned but Iâm all for trains. Start to time and get there on time, or they should do. But these cars, they get in a queue in the rush hour and you may idle the time away for about an hour and a half more than you need. Cars! Pah!â

âShall I ask Georges to get you a taxi?â asked Hercule Poirot. âIt will be no trouble, I assure you.â

âI have a taxi already waiting,â said Sonia.

âThere you are,â said Sir Roderick, âyou see, she thinks of everything.â He patted her on the shoulder. She looked at him in a way that Hercule Poirot fully appreciated.

Poirot accompanied them to the hall door and took a polite leave of them. Mr. Goby had come out of the kitchen and was standing in the hall giving, it could be said, an excellent performance of a man who had come to see about the gas.

George shut the hall door as soon as they had disappeared into the lift, and turned to meet Poirotâs gaze.

âAnd what is your opinion of that young lady, Georges, may I ask?â said Poirot. On certain points he always said George was infallible.

âWell, sir,â said George, âif I might put it that way, if youâll allow me, I would say heâd got it badly, sir. All over her as you might say.â

âI think you are right,â said Hercule Poirot.

âItâs not unusual of course with gentlemen of that age. I remember Lord Mountbryan. Heâd had a lot of experience in his life and youâd say he was as fly as anyone. But youâd be surprised. A young woman as came to give him massage. Youâd be surprised at what he gave her. An evening frock, and a pretty bracelet. Forget-me-nots, it was. Turquoise and diamonds. Not too expensive but costing quite a pretty penny all the same. Then a fur wrapânot mink, Russian ermine, and a petty point evening bag. After that her brother got into trouble, debt or something, though whether she ever had a brother I sometimes wondered. Lord Mountbryan gave her the money to square itâshe was so upset about it! All platonic, mind you, too. Gentlemen seem to lose their sense that way when they get to that age. Itâs the clinging ones they go for, not the bold type.â

âI have no doubt that you are quite right, Georges,â said Poirot. âIt is all the same not a complete answer to my question. I asked what you thought of the young lady.â

âOh, the young ladyâ¦Well, sir, I wouldnât like to say definitely, but sheâs quite a definite type. Thereâs never anything that you could put your finger on. But they know what theyâre doing, Iâd say.â

Poirot entered his sitting room and Mr. Goby followed him, obeying Poirotâs gesture. Mr. Goby sat down on an upright chair in his usual attitude. Knees together, toes turned in. He took a rather dog-eared little notebook from his pocket, opened it carefully and then proceeded to survey the soda water siphon severely.

âRe the backgrounds you asked me to look up.

âRestarick family, perfectly respectable and of good standing. No scandal. The father, James Patrick Restarick, said to be a sharp man over a bargain. Business has been in the family three generations. Grandfather founded it, father enlarged it, Simon Restarick kept it going. Simon Restarick had coronary trouble two years ago, health declined. Died of coronary thrombosis, about a year ago.

âYoung brother Andrew Restarick came into the business soon after he came down from Oxford, married Miss Grace Baldwin. One daughter, Norma. Left his wife and went out to South Africa. A Miss Birell went with him. No divorce proceedings. Mrs. Andrew Restarick died two and a half years ago. Had been an invalid for some time. Miss Norma Restarick was a boarder at Meadowfield Girlsâ School. Nothing against her.â

Allowing his eyes to sweep across Hercule Poirotâs face, Mr. Goby observed, âIn fact everything about the family seems quite OK and according to Cocker.â

âNo black sheep, no mental instability?â

âIt doesnât appear so.â

âDisappointing,â said Poirot.

Mr. Goby let this pass. He cleared his throat, licked his finger, and turned over a leaf of his little book.

âDavid Baker. Unsatisfactory record. Been on probation twice. Police are inclined to be interested in him. Heâs been on the fringe of several rather dubious affairs, thought to have been concerned in an important art robbery but no proof. Heâs one of the arty lot. No particular means of subsistence but he does quite well. Prefers girls with money. Not above living on some of the girls who are keen on him. Not above being paid off by their fathers either. Thorough bad lot if you ask me but enough brains to keep himself out of trouble.â

Mr. Goby shot a sudden glance at Poirot.

âYou met him?â

âYes,â said Poirot.

âWhat conclusions did you form, if I may ask?â

âThe same as you,â said Poirot. âA gaudy creature,â he added thoughtfully.

âAppeals to women,â said Mr. Goby. âTrouble is nowadays they wonât look twice at a nice hardworking lad. They prefer the bad lotsâthe scroungers. They usually say âhe hasnât had a chance, poor boy.ââ

âStrutting about like peacocks,â said Poirot.

âWell, you might put it like that,â said Mr. Goby, rather doubtfully.

âDo you think heâd use a cosh on anyone?â

Mr. Goby thought, then very slowly shook his head at the electric fire.

âNobodyâs accused him of anything like that. I donât say heâd be past it, but I wouldnât say it was his line. He is a smooth-spoken type, not one for the rough stuff.â

âNo,â said Poirot, âno, I should not have thought so. He could be bought off? That was your opinion?â

âHeâd drop any girl like a hot coal if it was made worth his while.â

Poirot nodded. He was remembering something. Andrew Restarick turning a cheque towards him so that he could read the signature on it. It was not only the signature that Poirot had read, it was the person to whom the cheque was made out. It had been made out to David Baker and it was for a large sum. Would David Baker demur at taking such a cheque, Poirot wondered. He thought not on the whole. Mr. Goby clearly was of that opinion. Undesirable young men had been bought off in any time or age, so had undesirable young women. Sons had sworn and daughters had wept but money was money. To Norma, David had been urging marriage. Was he sincere? Could it be that he really cared for Norma? If so, he would not be so easily paid off. He had sounded genuine enough. Norma no doubt believed him genuine. Andrew Restarick and Mr. Goby and Hercule Poirot thought differently. They were very much more likely to be right.

Mr. Goby cleared his throat and went on.

âMiss Claudia Reece-Holland? Sheâs all right. Nothing against her. Nothing dubious, that is. Father a Member of Parliament, well off. No scandals. Not like some MPs weâve heard about. Educated Roedean, Lady Margaret Hall, came down and did a secretarial course. First secretary to a doctor in Harley Street, then went to the Coal Board. First-class secretary. Has been secretary to Mr. Restarick for the last two months. No special attachments, just what youâd call minor boyfriends. Eligible and useful if she wants a date. Nothing to show thereâs anything between her and Restarick. I shouldnât say there is, myself. Has had a flat in Borodene Mansions for the last three years. Quite a high rent there. She usually has two other girls sharing it, no special friends. They come and go. Young lady, Frances Cary, the second girl, has been there some time. Was at RADA for a time, then went to the Slade. Works for the Wedderburn Galleryâwell-known place in Bond Street. Specialises in arranging art shows in Manchester, Birmingham, sometimes abroad. Goes to Switzerland and Portugal. Arty type and has a lot of friends amongst artists and actors.â

He paused, cleared his throat and gave a brief look at the little notebook.

âHavenât been able to get much from South Africa yet. Donât suppose I shall. Restarick moved about a lot. Kenya, Uganda, Gold Coast, South America for a while. He just moved about. Restless chap. Nobody seems to have known him particularly well. Heâd got plenty of money of his own to go where he liked. He made money, too, quite a lot of it. Liked going to out of the way places. Everyone who came across him seems to have liked him. Just seems as though he was a born wanderer. He never kept in touch with anyone. Three times I believe he was reported deadâgone off into the bush and not turned up againâbut he always did in the end. Five or six months and heâd pop up in some entirely different place or country.

âThen last year his brother in London died suddenly. They had a bit of trouble in tracing him. His brotherâs death seemed to give him a shock. Perhaps heâd had enough, and perhaps heâd met the right woman at last. Good bit younger than him, she was, and a teacher, they say. The steady kind. Anyway he seems to have made up his mind then and there to chuck wandering about, and come home to England. Besides being a very rich man himself, heâs his brotherâs heir.â

âA success story and an unhappy girl,â said Poirot. âI wish I knew more about her. You have ascertained for me all that you could, the facts I needed. The people who surrounded that girl, who might have influenced her, who perhaps did influence her. I wanted to know something about her father, her stepmother, the boy she is in love with, the people she lived with, and worked for in London. You are sure that in connection with this girl there have been no deaths? That is importantââ

âNot a smell of one,â said Mr. Goby. âShe worked for a firm called Homebirdsâon the verge of bankruptcy, and they didnât pay her much. Stepmother was in hospital for observation recentlyâin the country, that was. A lot of rumours flying about, but they didnât seem to come to anything.â

âShe did not die,â said Poirot. âWhat I need,â he added in a bloodthirsty manner, âis a death.â

Mr. Goby said he was sorry about that and rose to his feet. âWill there be anything more you are wanting at present?â

âNot in the nature of information.â

âVery good, sir.â As he replaced his notebook in his pocket, Mr. Goby said: âYouâll excuse me, sir, if Iâm speaking out of turn, but that young lady you had here just nowââ

âYes, what about her?â

âWell, of course itâsâI donât suppose itâs anything to do with this, but I thought I might just mention it to you, sirââ

âPlease do. You have seen her before, I gather?â

âYes. Couple of months ago.â

âWhere did you see her?â

âKew Gardens.â

âKew Gardens?â Poirot looked slightly surprised.

âI wasnât following her. I was following someone else, the person who met her.â

âAnd who was that?â

âI donât suppose as it matters mentioning it to you, sir. It was one of the junior attachÃ©s of the Hertzogovinian Embassy.â

Poirot raised his eyebrows. âThat is interesting. Yes, very interesting. Kew Gardens,â he mused. âA pleasant place for a rendezvous. Very pleasant.â

âI thought so at the time.â

âThey talked together?â

âNo, sir, you wouldnât have said they knew each other. The young lady had a book with her. She sat down on a seat. She read the book for a little then she laid it down beside her. Then my bloke came and sat there on the seat also. They didnât speakâonly the young lady got up and wandered away. He just sat there and presently he gets up and walks off. He takes with him the book that the young lady has left behind. Thatâs all, sir.â

âYes,â said Poirot. âIt is very interesting.â

Mr. Goby looked at the bookcase and said good night to it. He went.

Poirot gave an exasperated sigh.

âEnfin,â he said, âit is too much! There is far too much. Now we have espionage and counterespionage. All I am seeking is one perfectly simple murder. I begin to suspect that that murder only occurred in a drug addictâs brain!â

Fourteen

âChÃ¨re Madame,â Poirot bowed and presented Mrs. Oliver with a bouquet, very stylised, a posy in the Victorian manner.

âM. Poirot! Well, really, that is very nice of you, and itâs very like you somehow. All my flowers are always so untidy.â She looked towards a vase of rather temperamental-looking chrysanthemums, then back to the prim circle of rosebuds. âAnd how nice of you to come and see me.â

âI come, Madame, to offer you my felicitations on your recovery.â

âYes,â said Mrs. Oliver, âI suppose I am all right again.â She shook her head to and fro rather gingerly. âI get headaches, though,â she said. âQuite bad headaches.â

âYou remember, Madame, that I warned you not to do anything dangerous.â

âNot to stick my neck out, in fact. That I suppose is just what I did do.â She added, âI felt something evil was about. I was frightened, too, and I told myself I was a fool to be frightened, because what was I frightened of? I mean, it was London. Right in the middle of London. People all about. I meanâhow could I be frightened? It wasnât like a lonely wood or anything.â

Poirot looked at her thoughtfully. He wondered, had Mrs. Oliver really felt this nervous fear, had she really suspected the presence of evil, the sinister feeling that something or someone wished her ill, or had she read it into the whole thing afterwards? He knew only too well how easily that could be done. Countless clients had spoken in much the same words that Mrs. Oliver had just used. âI knew something was wrong. I could feel evil. I knew something was going to happen,â and actually they had not felt anything of the kind. What kind of a person was Mrs. Oliver?

He looked at her consideringly. Mrs. Oliver in her own opinion was famous for her intuition. One intuition succeeded another with remarkable rapidity and Mrs. Oliver always claimed the right to justify the particular intuition which turned out to be right!

And yet one shared very often with animals the uneasiness of a dog or a cat before a thunderstorm, the knowledge that there is something wrong, although one does not know what it is that is wrong.

âWhen did it come upon you, this fear?â

âWhen I left the main road,â said Mrs. Oliver. âUp till then it was all ordinary and quite exciting andâyes, I was enjoying myself, though vexed at finding how difficult it was to trail anybody.â

She paused, considering. âJust like a game. Then suddenly it didnât seem so much like a game, because there were queer little streets and rather sort of broken-down places, and sheds and open spaces being cleared for buildingâoh, I donât know, I canât explain it. But it was all different. Like a dream really. You know how dreams are. They start with one thing, a party or something, and then suddenly you find youâre in a jungle or somewhere quite differentâand itâs all sinister.â

âA jungle?â said Poirot. âYet, it is interesting you should put it like that. So it felt to you as though you were in a jungle and you were afraid of a peacock?â

âI donât know that I was especially afraid of him. After all, a peacock isnât a dangerous sort of animal. Itâsâwell I mean I thought of him as a peacock because I thought of him as a decorative creature. A peacock is very decorative, isnât it? And this awful boy is decorative too.â

âYou didnât have any idea anyone was following you before you were hit?â

âNo. No, Iâd no ideaâbut I think he directed me wrong all the same.â

Poirot nodded thoughtfully.

âBut of course it must have been the Peacock who hit me,â said Mrs. Oliver. âWho else? The dirty boy in the greasy clothes? He smelt nasty but he wasnât sinister. And it could hardly be that limp Frances somethingâshe was draped over a packing case with long black hair streaming all over the place. She reminded me of some actress or other.â

âYou say she was acting as a model?â

âYes. Not for the Peacock. For the dirty boy. I canât remember if youâve seen her or not.â

âI have not yet had that pleasureâif it is a pleasure.â

âWell, sheâs quite nice looking in an untidy, arty sort of way. Very much made up. Dead white and lots of mascara and the usual kind of limp hair hanging over her face. Works in an art gallery so I suppose itâs quite natural that she should be all among the beatniks, acting as a model. How these girls can! I suppose she might have fallen for the Peacock. But itâs probably the dirty one. All the same I donât see her coshing me on the head somehow.â

âI had another possibility in mind, Madame. Someone may have noticed you following Davidâand in turn followed you.â

âSomeone saw me trailing David, and then they trailed me?â

âOr someone may have been already in the mews or the yard, keeping perhaps an eye on the same people that you were observing.â

âThatâs an idea, of course,â said Mrs. Oliver. âI wonder who they could be?â

Poirot gave an exasperated sigh. âAh, it is there. It is difficultâtoo difficult. Too many people, too many things. I cannot see anything clearly. I see only a girl who said that she may have committed a murder! That is all that I have to go on and you see even there there are difficulties.â

âWhat do you mean by difficulties?â

âReflect,â said Poirot.

Reflection had never been Mrs. Oliverâs strong point.

âYou always mix me up,â she complained.

âI am talking about a murder, but what murder?â

âThe murder of the stepmother, I suppose.â

âBut the stepmother is not murdered. She is alive.â

âYou really are the most maddening man,â said Mrs. Oliver.

Poirot sat up in his chair. He brought the tips of his fingers together and preparedâor so Mrs. Oliver suspectedâto enjoy himself.

âYou refuse to reflect,â he said. âBut to get anywhere we must reflect.â

âI donât want to reflect. What I want to know is what youâve been doing about everything while Iâve been in hospital. You must have done something. What have you done?â

Poirot ignored this question.

âWe must begin at the beginning. One day you ring me up. I was in distress. Yes, I admit it, I was in distress. Something extremely painful had been said to me. You, Madame, were kindness itself. You cheered me, you encouraged me. You gave me a delicious tasse de chocolat. And what is more you not only offered to help me, but you did help me. You helped me to find a girl who had come to me and said that she thought she might have committed a murder! Let us ask ourselves, Madame, what about this murder? Who has been murdered? Where have they been murdered? Why have they been murdered?â

âOh do stop,â said Mrs. Oliver. âYouâre making my head ache again, and thatâs bad for me.â

Poirot paid no attention to this plea. âHave we got a murder at all? You sayâthe stepmotherâbut I reply that the stepmother is not deadâso as yet we have no murder. But there ought to have been a murder. So me, I inquire first of all, who is dead? Somebody comes to me and mentions a murder. A murder that has been committed somewhere and somehow. But I cannot find that murder, and what you are about to say once again, that the attempted murder of Mary Restarick will do very well, does not satisfy Hercule Poirot.â

âI really canât think what more you want,â said Mrs. Oliver.

âI want a murder,â said Hercule Poirot.

âIt sounds very bloodthirsty when you say it like that!â

âI look for a murder and I cannot find a murder. It is exasperatingâso I ask you to reflect with me.â

âIâve got a splendid idea,â said Mrs. Oliver. âSuppose Andrew Restarick murdered his first wife before he went off in a hurry to South Africa. Had you thought of that possibility?â

âI certainly did not think of any such thing,â said Poirot indignantly.

âWell, Iâve thought of it,â said Mrs. Oliver. âItâs very interesting. He was in love with this other woman, and he wanted like Crippen to go off with her, and so he murdered the first one and nobody ever suspected.â

Poirot drew a long, exasperated sigh. âBut his wife did not die until eleven or twelve years after heâd left this country for South Africa, and his child could not have been concerned in the murder of her own mother at the age of five years old.â

âShe could have given her mother the wrong medicine or perhaps Restarick just said that she died. After all, we donât know that sheâs dead.â

âI do,â said Hercule Poirot. âI have made inquiries. The first Mrs. Restarick died on the 14th April, 1963.â

âHow can you know these things?â

âBecause I have employed someone to check the facts. I beg of you, Madame, do not jump to impossible conclusions in this rash way.â

âI thought I was being rather clever,â said Mrs. Oliver obstinately. âIf I was making it happen in a book thatâs how I would arrange it. And Iâd make the child have done it. Not meaning to, but just by her father telling her to give her mother a drink made of pounded up box hedge.â

âNon dâun nom dâun nom!â said Poirot.

âAll right,â said Mrs. Oliver. âYou tell it your way.â

âAlas, I have nothing to tell. I look for a murder and I do not find one.â

âNot after Mary Restarick is ill and goes to hospital and gets better and comes back and is ill again, and if they looked theyâd probably find arsenic or something hidden away by Norma somewhere.â

âThat is exactly what they did find.â

âWell, really, M. Poirot, what more do you want?â

âI want you to pay some attention to the meaning of language. That girl said to me the same thing as she had said to my manservant, Georges. She did not say on either occasion âI have tried to kill someoneâ or âI have tried to kill my stepmother.â She spoke each time of a deed that had been done, something that had already happened. Definitely happened. In the past tense.â

âI give up,â said Mrs. Oliver. âYou just wonât believe that Norma tried to kill her stepmother.â

âYes, I believe it is perfectly possible that Norma may have tried to kill her stepmother. I think it is probably what happenedâit is in accord psychologically. With her distraught frame of mind. But it is not proved. Anyone, remember, could have hidden a preparation of arsenic amongst Normaâs things. It could even have been put there by the husband.â

âYou always seem to think that husbands are the ones who kill their wives,â said Mrs. Oliver.

âA husband is usually the most likely person,â said Hercule Poirot, âso one considers him first. It could have been the girl, Norma, or it could have been one of the servants, or it could have been the au pair girl, or it could have been old Sir Roderick. Or it could have been Mrs. Restarick herself.â

âNonsense. Why?â

âThere could be reasons. Rather far-fetched reasons, but not beyond the bounds of belief.â

âReally, Monsieur Poirot, you canât suspect everybody.â

âMais oui, that is just what I can do. I suspect everybody. First I suspect, then I look for reasons.â

âAnd what reason would that poor foreign child have?â

âIt might depend on what she is doing in that house, and what her reasons are for coming to England and a good deal more beside.â

âYouâre really crazy.â

âOr it could have been the boy David. Your Peacock.â

âMuch too far-fetched. David wasnât there. Heâs never been near the house.â

âOh yes he has. He was wandering about its corridors the day I went there.â

âBut not putting poison in Normaâs room.â

âHow do you know?â

âBut she and that awful boy are in love with each other.â

âThey appear to be so, I admit.â

âYou always want to make everything difficult,â complained Mrs. Oliver.

âNot at all. Things have been made difficult for me. I need information and there is only one person who can give me information. And she has disappeared.â

âYou mean Norma.â

âYes, I mean Norma.â

âBut she hasnât disappeared. We found her, you and I.â

âShe walked out of that cafÃ© and once more she has disappeared.â

âAnd you let her go?â Mrs. Oliverâs voice quivered with reproach.

âAlas!â

âYou let her go? You didnât even try to find her again?â

âI did not say I had not tried to find her.â

âBut so far you have not succeeded. M. Poirot, I really am disappointed with you.â

âThere is a pattern,â said Hercule Poirot almost dreamily. âYes, there is a pattern. But because there is one factor missing, the pattern does not make sense. You see that, donât you?â

âNo,â said Mrs. Oliver, whose head was aching.

Poirot continued to talk more to himself than his listener. If Mrs. Oliver could be said to be listening. She was highly indignant with Poirot and she thought to herself that the Restarick girl had been quite right and that Poirot was too old! There, she herself had found the girl for him, had telephoned him so that he might arrive in time, had gone off herself to shadow the other half of the couple. She had left the girl to Poirot, and what had Poirot doneâlost her! In fact she could not really see that Poirot had done anything at all of any use at any time whatever. She was disappointed in him. When he stopped talking she would tell him so again.

Poirot was quietly and methodically outlining what he called âthe pattern.â

âIt interlocks. Yes, it interlocks and that is why it is difficult. One thing relates to another and then you find that it relates to something else that seems outside the pattern. But it is not outside the pattern. And so it brings more people again into a ring of suspicion. Suspicion of what? There again one does not know. We have first the girl and through all the maze of conflicting patterns I have to search the answer to the most poignant of questions. Is the girl a victim, is she in danger? Or is the girl very astute? Is the girl creating the impression she wants to create for her own purposes? It can be taken either way. I need something still. Some one sure pointer, and it is there somewhere. I am sure it is there somewhere.â

Mrs. Oliver was rummaging in her handbag.

âI canât think why I can never find my aspirin when I want it,â she said in a vexed voice.

âWe have one set of relationships that hook up. The father, the daughter, the stepmother. Their lives are interrelated. We have the elderly uncle, somewhat gaga, with whom they live. We have the girl Sonia. She is linked with the uncle. She works for him. She has pretty manners, pretty ways. He is delighted with her. He is, shall we say, a little soft about her. But what is her role in the household?â

âWants to learn English, I suppose,â said Mrs. Oliver.

âShe meets one of the members of the Herzogovinian Embassyâin Kew Gardens. She meets him there, but she does not speak to him. She leaves behind her a book and he takes it awayââ

âWhat is all this?â said Mrs. Oliver.

âHas this anything to do with the other pattern? We do not as yet know. It seems unlikely but it may not be unlikely. Had Mary Restarick unwittingly stumbled upon something which might be dangerous to the girl?â

âDonât tell me all this has something to do with espionage or something.â

âI am not telling you. I am wondering.â

âYou said yourself that old Sir Roderick was gaga.â

âIt is not a question of whether he is gaga or not. He was a person of some importance during the war. Important papers passed through his hands. Important letters can have been written to him. Letters which he was at perfect liberty to have kept once they had lost their importance.â

âYouâre talking of the war and that was ages ago.â

âQuite so. But the past is not always done with, because it is ages ago. New alliances are made. Public speeches are made repudiating this, denying that, telling various lies about something else. And suppose there exist still certain letters or documents that will change the picture of a certain personality. I am not telling you anything, you understand. I am only making assumptions. Assumptions such as I have known to be true in the past. It might be of the utmost importance that some letters or papers should be destroyed, or else passed to some foreign government. Who better to undertake that task than a charming young lady who assists and aids an elderly notability to collect material for his memoirs. Everyone is writing their memoirs nowadays. One cannot stop them from doing so! Suppose that the stepmother gets a little something in her food on the day that the helpful secretary plus au pair girl is doing the cooking? And suppose it is she who arranges that suspicion should fall on Norma?â

âWhat a mind you have,â said Mrs. Oliver. âTortuous, thatâs what I call it. I mean, all these things canât have happened.â

âThat is just it. There are too many patterns. Which is the right one? The girl Norma leaves home, goes to London. She is, as you have instructed me, a third girl sharing a flat with two other girls. There again you may have a pattern. The two girls are strangers to her. But then what do I learn? Claudia Reece-Holland is private secretary to Norma Restarickâs father. Here again we have a link. Is that mere chance? Or could there be a pattern of some kind behind it? The other girl, you tell me, acts as a model, and is acquainted with the boy you call âthe Peacockâ with whom Norma is in love. Again a link. More links. And what is Davidâthe Peacockâdoing in all this? Is he in love with Norma? It would seem so. Her parents dislike it as is only probable and natural.â

âItâs odd about Claudia Reece-Holland being Restarickâs secretary,â said Mrs. Oliver thoughtfully. âI should judge she was unusually efficient at anything she undertook. Perhaps it was she who pushed the woman out of the window on the seventh floor.â

Poirot turned slowly towards her.

âWhat are you saying?â he demanded. âWhat are you saying?â

âJust someone in the flatsâI donât even know her name, but she fell out of a window or threw herself out of a window on the seventh floor and killed herself.â

Poirotâs voice rose high and stern.

âAnd you never told me?â he said accusingly.

Mrs. Oliver stared at him in surprise.

âI donât know what you mean.â

âWhat I mean? I ask you to tell me of a death. That is what I mean. A death. And you say there are no deaths. You can think only of an attempted poisoning. And yet here is a death. A death atâwhat is the name of those mansions?â

âBorodene Mansions.â

âYes, yes. And when did it happen?â

âThis suicide? Or whatever it was? I thinkâyesâI think it was about a week before I went there.â

âPerfect! How did you hear about it?â

âA milkman told me.â

âA milkman, bon Dieu!â

âHe was just being chatty,â said Mrs. Oliver. âIt sounded rather sad. It was in the daytimeâvery early in the morning, I think.â

âWhat was her name?â

âIâve no idea. I donât think he mentioned it.â

âYoung, middle-aged, old?â

Mrs. Oliver considered. âWell, he didnât say her exact age. Fifty-ish, I think, was what he said.â

âI wonder now. Anyone the three girls knew?â

âHow can I tell? Nobody has said anything about it.â

âAnd you never thought of telling me.â

âWell, really, M. Poirot, I cannot say that it has anything to do with all this. Well, I suppose it may haveâbut nobody seems to have said so, or thought of it.â

âBut yes, there is the link. There is this girl, Norma, and she lives in those flats, and one day somebody commits suicide (for that, I gather, was the general impression). That is, somebody throws herself or falls out of a seventh-floor high window and is killed. And then? Some days later this girl Norma, after having heard you talk about me at a party, comes to call upon me and she says to me that she is afraid that she may have committed a murder. Do you not see? A deathâand not many days later someone who thinks she may have committed a murder. Yes, this must be the murder.â

Mrs. Oliver wanted to say âNonsenseâ but she did not quite dare to do so. Nevertheless, she thought it.

âThis then must be the one piece of knowledge that had not yet come to me. This ought to tie up the whole thing! Yes, yes, I do not see yet how, but it must be so. I must think. That is what I must do. I must go home and think until slowly the pieces fit togetherâbecause this will be the key piece that ties them all togetherâ¦Yes. At last. At last I shall see my way.â

He rose to his feet and said, âAdieu, chÃ¨re Madame,â and hurried from the room. Mrs. Oliver at last relieved her feelings.

âNonsense,â she said to the empty room. âAbsolute nonsense. I wonder if four would be too many aspirins to take?â

Fifteen

At Hercule Poirotâs elbow was a tisane prepared for him by George. He sipped at it and thought. He thought in a certain way peculiar to himself. It was the technique of a man who selected thoughts as one might select pieces of a jigsaw puzzle. In due course they would be reassembled together so as to make a clear and coherent picture. At the moment the important thing was the selection, the separation. He sipped his tisane, put down the cup, rested his hands on the arms of his chair and let various pieces of his puzzle come one by one into his mind. Once he recognised them all, he would select. Pieces of sky, pieces of green bank, perhaps striped pieces like those of a tigerâ¦.

The painfulness of his own feet in patent leather shoes. He started there. Walking along a road set on this path by his good friend, Mrs. Oliver. A stepmother. He saw himself with his hand on a gate. A woman who turned, a woman bending her head cutting out the weak growth of a rose, turning and looking at him? What was there for him there? Nothing. A golden head, a golden head bright as a cornfield, with twists and loops of hair slightly reminiscent of Mrs. Oliverâs own in shape. He smiled a little. But Mary Restarickâs hair was more tidily arranged than Mrs. Oliverâs ever was. A golden frame for her face that seemed just a little too large for her. He remembered that old Sir Roderick had said that she had to wear a wig, because of an illness. Sad for so young a woman. There was, when he came to think of it, something unusually heavy about her head. Far too static, too perfectly arranged. He considered Mary Restarickâs wigâif it was a wigâfor he was by no means sure that he could depend on Sir Roderick. He examined the possibilities of the wig in case they should be of significance. He reviewed the conversation they had had. Had they said anything important? He thought not. He remembered the room into which they had gone. A characterless room recently inhabited in someone elseâs house. Two pictures on the wall, the picture of a woman in a dove-grey dress. Thin mouth, lips set closely together. Hair that was greyish brown. The first Mrs. Restarick. She looked as though she might have been older than her husband. His picture was on the opposite wall, facing her. Good portraits, both of them. Lansberger had been a good portrait painter. His mind dwelt on the portrait of the husband. He had not seen it so well that first day, as he had later in Restarickâs officeâ¦.

Andrew Restarick and Claudia Reece-Holland. Was there any thing there? Was their association more than a merely secretarial one? It need not be. Here was a man who had come back to this country after years of absence, who had no near friends or relatives, who was perplexed and troubled over his daughterâs character and conduct. It was probably natural enough that he should turn to his recently acquired eminently competent secretary and ask her to suggest somewhere for his daughter to live in London. It would be a favour on her part to provide that accommodation since she was looking for a Third Girl. Third girlâ¦The phrase that he had acquired from Mrs. Oliver always seemed to be coming to his mind. As though it had a second significance which for some reason he could not see.

His manservant, George, entered the room, closing the door discreetly behind him.

âA young lady is here, sir. The young lady who came the other day.â

The words came too aptly with what Poirot was thinking. He sat up in a startled fashion.

âThe young lady who came at breakfast time?â

âOh no, sir. I mean the young lady who came with Sir Roderick Horsefield.â

âAh, indeed.â

Poirot raised his eyebrows. âBring her in. Where is she?â

âI showed her into Miss Lemonâs room, sir.â

âAh. Yes, bring her in.â

Sonia did not wait for George to announce her. She came into the room ahead of him with a quick and rather aggressive step.

âIt has been difficult for me to get away, but I have come to tell you that I did not take those papers. I did not steal anything. You understand?â

âHas anybody said that you had?â Poirot asked. âSit down, Mademoiselle.â

âI do not want to sit down. I have very little time. I just came to tell you that it is absolutely untrue. I am very honest and I do what I am told.â

âI take your point. I have already taken it. Your statement is that you have not removed any papers, information, letters, documents of any kind from Sir Roderick Horsefieldâs house? That is so, is it not?â

âYes, and Iâve come to tell you it is so. He believes me. He knows that I would not do such a thing.â

âVery well then. That is a statement and I note it.â

âDo you think you are going to find those papers?â

âI have other inquiries in hand,â said Poirot. âSir Roderickâs papers will have to take their turn.â

âHe is worried. He is very worried. There is something that I cannot say to him. I will say it to you. He loses things. Things are not put away where he thinks they are. He puts them inâhow do you say itâin funny places. Oh I know. You suspect me. Everyone suspects me because I am foreign. Because I come from a foreign country and so they thinkâthey think I steal secret papers like in one of your silly English spy stories. I am not like that. I am an intellectual.â

âAha,â said Poirot. âIt is always nice to know.â He added: âIs there anything else you wish to tell me?â

âWhy should I?â

âOne never knows.â

âWhat are these other cases you speak of?â

âAh, I do not want to detain you. It is your day out, perhaps.â

âYes. I have one day a week when I can do what I like. I can come to London. I can go to the British Museum.â

âAh yes and to the Victoria and Albert also, no doubt.â

âThat is so.â

âAnd to the National Gallery and see the pictures. And on a fine day you can go to Kensington Gardens, or perhaps as far as Kew Gardens.â

She stiffenedâ¦She shot him an angry questioning glance.

âWhy do you say Kew Gardens?â

âBecause there are some very fine plants and shrubs and trees there. Ah! you should not miss Kew Gardens. The admission fee is very small. A penny I think, or twopence. And for that you can go and see tropical trees, or you can sit on a seat and read a book.â He smiled at her disarmingly and was interested to notice that her uneasiness was increased. âBut I must not detain you, Mademoiselle. You have perhaps friends to visit at one of the Embassies, maybe.â

âWhy do you say that?â

âNo particular reason. You are, as you say, a foreigner and it is quite possible you may have friends connected with your own Embassy here.â

âSomeone has told you things. Someone has made accusations against me! I tell you he is a silly old man who mislays things. That is all! And he knows nothing of importance. He has no secret papers or documents. He never has had.â

âAh, but you are not quite thinking of what you are saying. Time passes, you know. He was once an important man who did know important secrets.â

âYou are trying to frighten me.â

âNo, no. I am not being so melodramatic as that.â

âMrs. Restarick. It is Mrs. Restarick who has been telling you things. She does not like me.â

âShe has not said so to me.â

âWell, I do not like her. She is the kind of woman I mistrust. I think she has secrets.â

âIndeed?â

âYes, I think she has secrets from her husband. I think she goes up to London or to other places to meet other men. To meet at any rate one other man.â

âIndeed,â said Poirot, âthat is very interesting. You think she goes to meet another man?â

âYes, I do. She goes up to London very often and I do not think she always tells her husband, or she says it is shopping or things she has to buy. All those sort of things. He is busy in the office and he does not think of why his wife comes up. She is more in London than she is in the country. And yet she pretends to like gardening so much.â

âYou have no idea who this man is whom she meets?â

âHow should I know? I do not follow her. Mr. Restarick is not a suspicious man. He believes what his wife tells him. He thinks perhaps about business all the time. And, too, I think he is worried about his daughter.â

âYes,â said Poirot, âhe is certainly worried about his daughter. How much do you know about the daughter? How well do you know her?â

âI do not know her very well. If you ask what I thinkâwell, I tell you! I think she is mad.â

âYou think she is mad? Why?â

âShe says odd things sometimes. She sees things that are not there.â

âSees things that are not there?â

âPeople that are not there. Sometimes she is very excited and other times she seems as though she is in a dream. You speak to her and she does not hear what you say to her. She does not answer. I think there are people who she would like to have dead.â

âYou mean Mrs. Restarick?â

âAnd her father. She looks at him as though she hates him.â

âBecause they are both trying to prevent her marrying a young man of her choice?â

âYes. They do not want that to happen. They are quite right, of course, but it makes her angry. Someday,â added Sonia, nodding her head cheerfully, âI think she will kill herself. I hope she will do nothing so foolish, but that is the thing one does when one is much in love.â She shrugged her shoulders. âWellâI go now.â

âJust tell me one thing. Does Mrs. Restarick wear a wig?â

âA wig? How should I know?â She considered for a moment. âShe might, yes,â she admitted. âIt is useful for travelling. Also it is fashionable. I wear a wig myself sometimes. A green one! Or I did.â She added again, âI go now,â and went.

Sixteen

âToday I have much to do,â Hercule Poirot announced as he rose from the breakfast table next morning and joined Miss Lemon. âInquiries to make. You have made the necessary researches for me, the appointments, the necessary contacts?â

âCertainly,â said Miss Lemon. âIt is all here.â She handed him a small briefcase. Poirot took a quick glance at its contents and nodded his head.

âI can always rely on you, Miss Lemon,â he said. âCâest fantastique.â

âReally, Monsieur Poirot, I cannot see anything fantastic about it. You gave me instructions and I carried them out. Naturally.â

âPah, it is not so natural as that,â said Poirot. âDo I not give instructions often to the gas men, the electricians, the man who comes to repair things, and do they always carry out my instructions? Very, very seldom.â

He went into the hall.

âMy slightly heavier overcoat, Georges. I think the autumn chill is setting in.â

He popped his head back in his secretaryâs room. âBy the way, what did you think of that young woman who came yesterday?â

Miss Lemon, arrested as she was about to plunge her fingers on the typewriter, said briefly, âForeign.â

âYes, yes.â

âObviously foreign.â

âYou do not think anything more about her than that?â

Miss Lemon considered. âI had no means of judging her capability in any way.â She added rather doubtfully, âShe seemed upset about something.â

âYes. She is suspected, you see, of stealing! Not money, but papers, from her employer.â

âDear, dear,â said Miss Lemon. âImportant papers?â

âIt seems highly probable. It is equally probable though, that he has not lost anything at all.â

âOh well,â said Miss Lemon, giving her employer a special look that she always gave and which announced that she wished to get rid of him so that she could get on with proper fervour with her work. âWell, I always say that itâs better to know where you are when you are employing someone, and buy British.â

Hercule Poirot went out. His first visit was to Borodene Mansions. He took a taxi. Alighting at the courtyard he cast his eyes around. A uniformed porter was standing in one of the doorways, whistling a somewhat doleful melody. As Poirot advanced upon him, he said:

âYes, sir?â

âI wondered,â said Poirot, âif you can tell me anything about a very sad occurrence that took place here recently.â

âSad occurrence?â said the porter. âNothing that I know of.â

âA lady who threw herself, or shall we say fell from one of the upper storeys, and was killed.â

âOh, that. I donât know anything about that because Iâve only been here a week, you see. Hi, Joe.â

A porter emerging from the opposite side of the block came over.

âYouâd know about the lady as fell from the seventh. About a month ago, was it?â

âNot quite as much as that,â said Joe. He was an elderly, slow-speaking man. âNasty business it was.â

âShe was killed instantly?â

âYes.â

âWhat was her name? It may, you understand, have been a relative of mine,â Poirot explained. He was not a man who had any scruples about departing from the truth.

âIndeed, sir. Very sorry to hear it. She was a Mrs. Charpentier.â

âShe had been in the flat some time?â

âWell, let me see now. About a yearâa year and a half perhaps. No, I think it must have been about two years. No. 76, seventh floor.â

âThat is the top floor?â

âYes, sir. A Mrs. Charpentier.â

Poirot did not press for any other descriptive information since he might be presumed to know such things about his own relative. Instead he asked:

âDid it cause much excitement, much questioning? What time of day was it?â

âFive or six oâclock in the morning, I think. No warning or anything. Just down she came. In spite of being so early we got a crowd almost at once, pushing through the railing over there. You know what people are.â

âAnd the police, of course.â

âOh yes, the police came quite quickly. And a doctor and an ambulance. All the usual,â said the porter rather in the weary tone of one who had had people throwing themselves out of a seventh-storey window once or twice every month.

âAnd I suppose people came down from the flats when they heard what had happened.â

âOh, there wasnât so many coming from the flats because for one thing with the noise of traffic and everything around here most of them didnât know about it. Someone or other said she gave a bit of a scream as she came down, but not so that it caused any real commotion. It was only people in the street, passing by, who saw it happen. And then, of course, they craned their necks over the railings, and other people saw them craning, and joined them. You know what an accident is!â

Poirot assured him he knew what an accident was.

âShe lived alone?â he said, making it only half a question.

âThatâs right.â

âBut she had friends, I suppose, among the other flat dwellers?â

Joe shrugged and shook his head. âMay have done. I couldnât say. Never saw her in the restaurant much with any of our lot. She had outside friends to dinner here sometimes. No, I wouldnât say she was specially pally with anybody here. Youâd do best,â said Joe, getting slightly restive, âto go and have a chat with Mr. McFarlane whoâs in charge here if you want to know about her.â

âAh, I thank you. Yes, that is what I mean to do.â

âHis office is in that block over there, sir. On the ground floor. Youâll see it marked up on the door.â

Poirot went as directed. He detached from his briefcase the top letter with which Miss Lemon had supplied him, and which was marked âMr. McFarlane.â Mr. McFarlane turned out to be a good-looking, shrewd-looking man of about forty-five. Poirot handed him the letter. He opened and read it.

âAh yes,â he said, âI see.â

He laid it down on the desk and looked at Poirot.

âThe owners have instructed me to give you all the help I can about the sad death of Mrs. Louise Charpentier. Now what do you want to know exactly, Monsieurââhe glanced at the letter againââMonsieur Poirot?â

âThis is, of course, all quite confidential,â said Poirot. âHer relatives have been communicated with by the police and by a solicitor, but they were anxious, as I was coming to England, that I should get a few more personal facts, if you understand me. It is distressing when one can get only official reports.â

âYes, quite so. Yes, I quite understand that it must be. Well, Iâll tell you anything I can.â

âHow long had she been here and how did she come to take the flat?â

âSheâd been hereâI can look it up exactlyâabout two years. There was a vacant tenancy and I imagine that the lady who was leaving, being an acquaintance of hers, told her in advance that she was giving it up. That was a Mrs. Wilder. Worked for the BBC. Had been in London for some time, but was going to Canada. Very nice ladyâI donât think she knew the deceased well at all. Just happened to mention she was giving up the flat. Mrs. Charpentier liked the flat.â

âYou found her a suitable tenant?â There was a very faint hesitation before Mr. McFarlane answered:

âShe was a satisfactory tenant, yes.â

âYou need not mind telling me,â said Hercule Poirot. âThere were wild parties, eh? A little tooâshall we sayâgay in her entertaining?â

Mr. McFarlane stopped being so discreet.

âThere were a few complaints from time to time, but mostly from elderly people.â

Hercule Poirot made a significant gesture.

âA bit too fond of the bottle, yes, sirâand in with quite a gay lot. It made for a bit of trouble now and again.â

âAnd she was fond of the gentlemen?â

âWell, I wouldnât like to go as far as that.â

âNo, no, but one understands.â

âOf course she wasnât so young.â

âAppearances are very often deceptive. How old would you have said she was?â

âItâs difficult to say. Fortyâforty-five.â He added, âHer health wasnât good, you know.â

âSo I understand.â

âShe drank too muchâno doubt about it. And then sheâd get very depressed. Nervous about herself. Always going to doctors, I believe, and not believing what they told her. Ladies do get it into their headsâespecially about that time of lifeâshe thought that she had cancer. Was quite sure of it. The doctor reassured her but she didnât believe him. He said at the inquest that there was nothing really wrong with her. Oh well, one hears of things like that every day. She got all worked up and one fine dayââ he nodded.

âIt is very sad,â said Poirot. âDid she have any special friends among the residents of the flats?â

âNot that I know of. This place, you see, isnât what I call the matey kind. Theyâre mostly people in business, in jobs.â

âI was thinking possibly of Miss Claudia Reece-Holland. I wondered if they had known each other.â

âMiss Reece-Holland? No, I donât think so. Oh I mean they were probably acquaintances, talked when they went up in the lift together, that sort of thing. But I donât think there was much social contact of any kind. You see, they would be in a different generation. I meanââ Mr. McFarlane seemed a little flustered. Poirot wondered why.

He said, âOne of the other girls who share Miss Hollandâs flat knew Mrs. Charpentier, I believeâMiss Norma Restarick.â

âDid she? I wouldnât knowâsheâs only come here quite recently, I hardly know her by sight. Rather a frightened-looking young lady. Not long out of school, Iâd say.â He added, âIs there anything more I can do for you, sir?â

âNo, thank you. Youâve been most kind. I wonder if possibly I could see the flat. Just in order to be able to sayââ Poirot paused, not particularising what he wanted to be able to say.

âWell, now, let me see. A Mr. Travers has got it now. Heâs in the City all day. Yes, come up with me if you like, sir.â

They went up to the seventh floor. As Mr. McFarlane introduced his key one of the numbers fell from the door and narrowly avoided Poirotâs patent leather shoe. He hopped nimbly and then bent to pick it up. He replaced the spike which fixed it on the door very carefully.

âThese numbers are loose,â he said.

âIâm very sorry, sir. Iâll make a note of it. Yes, they wear loose from time to time. Well, here we are.â

Poirot went into the living room. At the moment it had little personality. The walls were papered with a paper resembling grained wood. It had conventional comfortable furniture, the only personal touch was a television set and a certain number of books.

âAll the flats are partly furnished, you see,â said Mr. McFarlane. âThe tenants donât need to bring anything of their own, unless they want to. We cater very largely for people who come and go.â

âAnd the decorations are all the same?â

âNot entirely. People seem to like this raw wood effect. Good background for pictures. The only things that are different are on the one wall facing the door. We have a whole set of frescoes which people can choose from.

âWe have a set of ten,â said Mr. McFarlane with some pride. âThere is the Japanese oneâvery artistic, donât you think?âand there is an English garden one; a very striking one of birds; one of trees, a Harlequin one, a rather interesting abstract effectâlines and cubes, in vividly contrasting colours, that sort of thing. Theyâre all designs by good artists. Our furniture is all the same. Two choices of colours, or of course people can add what they like of their own. But they donât usually bother.â

âMost of them are not, as you might say, homemakers,â Poirot suggested.

âNo, rather the bird of passage type, or busy people who want solid comfort, good plumbing and all that but arenât particularly interested in decoration, though weâve had one or two of the do-it-yourself type, which isnât really satisfactory from our point of view. Weâve had to put a clause in the lease saying theyâve got to put things back as they found themâor pay for that being done.â

They seemed to be getting rather far away from the subject of Mrs. Charpentierâs death. Poirot approached the window.

âIt was from here?â he murmured delicately.

âYes. Thatâs the window. The left-hand one. It has a balcony.â

Poirot looked out down below.

âSeven floors,â he said. âA long way.â

âYes, death was instantaneous, I am glad to say. Of course, it might have been an accident.â

Poirot shook his head.

âYou cannot seriously suggest that, Mr. McFarlane. It must have been deliberate.â

âWell, one always likes to suggest an easier possibility. She wasnât a happy woman, Iâm afraid.â

âThank you,â said Poirot, âfor your great courtesy. I shall be able to give her relations in France a very clear picture.â

His own picture of what had occurred was not as clear as he would have liked. So far there had been nothing to support his theory that the death of Louise Charpentier had been important. He repeated the Christian name thoughtfully. Louiseâ¦Why had the name Louise some haunting memory about it? He shook his head. He thanked Mr. McFarlane and left.

Seventeen

Chief Inspector Neele was sitting behind his desk looking very official and formal. He greeted Poirot politely and motioned him to a chair. As soon as the young man who had introduced Poirot to the presence had left, Chief Inspector Neeleâs manner changed.

âAnd what are you after now, you secretive old devil?â he said.

âAs to that,â said Poirot, âyou already know.â

âOh yes, Iâve rustled up some stuff but I donât think thereâs much for you from that particular hole.â

âWhy call it a hole?â

âBecause youâre so exactly like a good mouser. A cat sitting over a hole waiting for the mouse to come out. Well, if you ask me, there isnât any mouse in this particular hole. Mind you, I donât say that you couldnât unearth some dubious transactions. You know these financiers. I daresay thereâs a lot of hoky-poky business, and all that, about minerals and concessions and oil and all those things. But Joshua Restarick Ltd. has got a good reputation. Family businessâor used to beâbut you canât call it that now. Simon Restarick hadnât any children, and his brother Andrew Restarick only has this daughter. There was an old aunt on the motherâs side. Andrew Restarickâs daughter lived with her after she left school and her own mother died. The aunt died of a stroke about six months ago. Mildly potty, I believeâbelonged to a few rather peculiar religious societies. No harm in them. Simon Restarick was a perfectly plain type of shrewd businessman, and had a social wife. They were married rather late in life.â

âAnd Andrew?â

âAndrew seems to have suffered from wanderlust. Nothing known against him. Never stayed anywhere long, wandered about South Africa, South America, Kenya and a good many other places. His brother pressed him to come back more than once, but he wasnât having any. He didnât like London or business, but he seems to have had the Restarick family flair for making money. He went after mineral deposits, things like that. He wasnât an elephant hunter or an archaeologist or a plant man or any of those things. All his deals were business deals and they always turned out well.â

âSo he also in his way is conventional?â

âYes, that about covers it. I donât know what made him come back to England after his brother died. Possibly a new wifeâheâs married again. Good-looking woman a good deal younger than he is. At the moment theyâre living with old Sir Roderick Horsefield whose sister had married Andrew Restarickâs uncle. But I imagine thatâs only temporary. Is any of this news to you? Or do you know it all already?â

âIâve heard most of it,â said Poirot. âIs there any insanity in the family on either side?â

âShouldnât think so, apart from old Auntie and her fancy religions. And thatâs not unusual in a woman who lives alone.â

âSo all you can tell me really is that there is a lot of money,â said Poirot.

âLots of money,â said Chief Inspector Neele. âAnd all quite respectable. Some of it, mark you, Andrew Restarick brought into the firm. South African concessions, mines, mineral deposits. Iâd say that by the time these were developed, or placed on the market, thereâd be a very large sum of money indeed.â

âAnd who will inherit it?â said Poirot.

âThat depends on how Andrew Restarick leaves it. Itâs up to him, but Iâd say that thereâs no one obvious, except his wife and his daughter.â

âSo they both stand to inherit a very large amount of money one day?â

âI should say so. I expect there are a good many family trusts and things like that. All the usual City gambits.â

âThere is, for instance, no other woman in whom he might be interested?â

âNothing known of such a thing. I shouldnât think it likely. Heâs got a good-looking new wife.â

âA young man,â said Poirot thoughtfully, âcould easily learn all this?â

âYou mean and marry the daughter? Thereâs nothing to stop him, even if she was made a ward of Court or something like that. Of course her father could then disinherit her if he wanted to.â

Poirot looked down at a neatly written list in his hand.

âWhat about the Wedderburn Gallery?â

âI wondered how youâd got onto that. Were you consulted by a client about a forgery?â

âDo they deal in forgeries?â

âPeople donât deal in forgeries,â said Chief Inspector Neele reprovingly. âThere was a rather unpleasant business. A millionaire from Texas over here buying pictures, and paying incredible sums for them. They sold him a Renoir and a Van Gogh. The Renoir was a small head of a girl and there was some query about it. There seemed no reason to believe that the Wedderburn Gallery had not bought it in the first place in all good faith. There was a case about it. A great many art experts came and gave their verdicts. In fact, as usual, in the end they all seemed to contradict each other. The gallery offered to take it back in any case. However, the millionaire didnât change his mind, since the latest fashionable expert swore that it was perfectly genuine. So he stuck to it. All the same thereâs been a bit of suspicion hanging round the gallery ever since.â

Poirot looked again at his list.

âAnd what about Mr. David Baker? Have you looked him up for me?â

âOh, heâs one of the usual mob. Riffraffâgo about in gangs and break up nightclubs. Live on purple heartsâheroinâCokeâGirls go mad about them. Heâs the kind they moan over saying his life has been so hard and heâs such a wonderful genius. His painting is not appreciated. Nothing but good old sex, if you ask me.â

Poirot consulted his list again.

âDo you know anything about Mr. Reece-Holland, MP?â

âDoing quite well, politically. Got the gift of the gab all right. One or two slightly peculiar transactions in the City, but heâs wriggled out of them quite neatly. Iâd say he was a slippery one. Heâs made quite a good deal of money off and on by rather doubtful means.â

Poirot came to his last point.

âWhat about Sir Roderick Horsefield?â

âNice old boy but gaga. What a nose you have, Poirot, get it into everything, donât you? Yes, thereâs been a lot of trouble in the Special Branch. Itâs this craze for memoirs. Nobody knows what indiscreet revelations are going to be made next. All the old boys, service and otherwise, are racing hard to bring out their own particular brand of what they remember of the indiscretions of others! Usually it doesnât much matter, but sometimesâwell, you know, Cabinets change their policies and you donât want to afront someoneâs susceptibilities or give the wrong publicity, so we have to try and muffle the old boys. Some of them are not too easy. But youâll have to go to the Special Branch if you want to nose into any of that. I shouldnât think there was much wrong. The trouble is they donât destroy the papers they should. They keep the lot. However, I donât think there is much in that, but we have evidence that a certain Power is nosing around.â

Poirot gave a deep sigh.

âHavenât I helped?â asked the Chief Inspector.

âI am very glad to get the real lowdown from official quarters. But no, I donât think there is much help in what you have told me.â He sighed and then said, âWhat would be your opinion if someone said to you casually that a womanâa young attractive womanâwore a wig?â

âNothing in that,â said Chief Inspector Neele, and added, with a slight asperity, âmy wife wears a wig when weâre travelling anytime. It saves a lot of trouble.â

âI beg your pardon,â said Hercule Poirot.

As the two men bade each other good-bye, the Chief Inspector asked:

âYou got all the dope, I suppose, on that suicide case you were asking about in the flats? I had it sent round to you.â

âYes, thank you. The official facts, at least. A bare record.â

âThere was something you were talking about just now that brought it back to my mind. Iâll think of it in a moment. It was the usual, rather sad story. Gay woman, fond of men, enough money to live upon, no particular worries, drank too much and went down the hill. And then she gets what I call the health bug. You know, theyâre convinced they have cancer or something in that line. They consult a doctor and he tells them theyâre all right, and they go home and donât believe him. If you ask me itâs usually because they find theyâre no longer as attractive as they used to be to men. Thatâs whatâs really depressing them. Yes, it happens all the time. Theyâre lonely, I suppose, poor devils. Mrs. Charpentier was just one of them. I donât suppose that anyââ he stopped. âOh yes, of course, I remember. You were asking about one of our MPs, Reece-Holland. Heâs a fairly gay one himself in a discreet way. Anyway, Louise Charpentier was his mistress at one time. Thatâs all.â

âWas it a serious liaison?â

âOh I shouldnât say so particularly. They went to some rather questionable clubs together and things like that. You know, we keep a discreet eye on things of that kind. But there was never anything in the Press about them. Nothing of that kind.â

âI see.â

âBut it lasted for a certain time. They were seen together, off and on, for about six months, but I donât think she was the only one and I donât think he was the only one either. So you canât make anything of that, can you?â

âI do not think so,â said Poirot.

âBut all the same,â he said to himself as he went down the stairs, âall the same, it is a link. It explains the embarrassment of Mr. McFarlane. It is a link, a tiny link, a link between Emlyn Reece-Holland, MP, and Louise Charpentier.â It didnât mean anything probably. Why should it? But yetââI know too much,â said Poirot angrily to himself. âI know too much. I know a little about everything and everyone but I cannot get my pattern. Half these facts are irrelevant. I want a pattern. A pattern. My kingdom for a pattern,â he said aloud.

âI beg your pardon, sir,â said the lift boy, turning a startled head.

âIt is nothing,â said Poirot.

Eighteen

Poirot paused at the doorway of the Wedderburn Gallery to inspect a picture which depicted three aggressive-looking cows with vastly elongated bodies overshadowed by a colossal and complicated design of windmills. The two seemed to have nothing to do with each other or the very curious purple colouring.

âInteresting, isnât it?â said a soft purring voice.

A middle-aged man, who at first sight seemed to have shown a smile which exhibited an almost excessive number of beautiful white teeth, was at his elbow.

âSuch freshness.â

He had large white plump hands which he waved as though he was using them in an arabesque.

âClever exhibition. Closed last week. Claude Raphael show opened the day before yesterday. Itâs going to do well. Very well indeed.â

âAh,â said Poirot and was led through grey velvet curtains into a long room.

Poirot made a few cautious if doubtful remarks. The plump man took him in hand in a practised manner. Here was someone, he obviously felt, who must not be frightened away. He was a very experienced man in the art of salesmanship. You felt at once that you were welcome to be in his gallery all day if you liked without making a purchase. Sheerly, solely looking at these delightful picturesâthough when you entered the gallery you might not have thought that they were delightful. But by the time you went out you were convinced that delightful was exactly the word to describe them. After receiving some useful artistic instruction, and making a few of the amateurâs stock remarks such as âI rather like that one,â Mr. Boscombe responded encouragingly by some such phrase as:

âNow thatâs very interesting that you should say that. It shows, if I may say so, great perspicacity. Of course you know it isnât the ordinary reaction. Most people prefer somethingâwell, shall I say slightly obvious like thatââhe pointed to a blue and green striped effect arranged in one corner of the canvasââbut this, yes, youâve spotted the quality of the thing. Iâd say myselfâof course itâs only my personal opinionâthat thatâs one of Raphaelâs masterpieces.â

Poirot and he looked together with both their heads on one side at an orange lopsided diamond with two human eyes depending from it by what looked like a spidery thread. Pleasant relations established and time obviously being infinite, Poirot remarked:

âI think a Miss Frances Cary works for you, does she not?â

âAh yes. Frances. Clever girl that. Very artistic and very competent too. Just come back from Portugal where sheâs been arranging an art show for us. Very successful. Quite a good artist herself, but not I should say really creative, if you understand me. She is better on the business side. I think she recognises that herself.â

âI understand that she is a good patron of the arts?â

âOh yes. Sheâs interested in Les Jeunes. Encourages talent, persuaded me to give a show for a little group of young artists last spring. It was quite successfulâthe Press noticed itâall in a small way, you understand. Yes, she has her protÃ©gÃ©s.â

âI am, you understand, somewhat old-fashioned. Some of these young menâvraiment!â Poirotâs hands went up.

âAh,â said Mr. Boscombe indulgently, âyou mustnât go by their appearances. Itâs just a fashion, you know. Beards and jeans or brocades and hair. Just a passing phase.â

âDavid someone,â said Poirot. âI forget his last name. Miss Cary seemed to think highly of him.â

âSure you donât mean Peter Cardiff? Heâs her present protÃ©gÃ©. Mind you, Iâm not quite so sure about him as she is. Heâs really not so much avant-garde as he isâwell, positively reactionary. QuiteâquiteâBurne-Jones sometimes! Still, one never knows. You do get these reactions. She acts as his model occasionally.â

âDavid Bakerâthat was the name I was trying to remember,â said Poirot.

âHe is not bad,â said Mr. Boscombe, without enthusiasm. âNot much originality, in my opinion. He was one of the group of artists I mentioned, but he didnât make any particular impression. A good painter, mind, but not striking. Derivative!â

Poirot went home. Miss Lemon presented him with letters to sign, and departed with them duly signed. George served him with an omellette fines herbes garnished, as you might say, with a discreetly sympathetic manner. After lunch, as Poirot was setting himself in his square-backed armchair with his coffee at his elbow, the telephone rang.

âMrs. Oliver, sir,â said George, lifting the telephone and placing it at his elbow.

Poirot picked up the receiver reluctantly. He did not want to talk to Mrs. Oliver. He felt that she would urge upon him something which he did not want to do.

âM. Poirot?â

âCâest moi.â

âWell, what are you doing? What have you done?â

âI am sitting in this chair,â said Poirot. âThinking,â he added.

âIs that all?â said Mrs. Oliver.

âIt is the important thing,â said Poirot. âWhether I shall have success in it or not I do not know.â

âBut you must find that girl. Sheâs probably been kidnapped.â

âIt would certainly seem so,â said Poirot. âAnd I have a letter here which came by the midday post from her father, urging me to come and see him and tell him what progress I have made.â

âWell, what progress have you made?â

âAt the moment,â said Poirot reluctantly, ânone.â

âReally, M. Poirot, you really must take a grip on yourself.â

âYou, too!â

âWhat do you mean, me too?â

âUrging me on.â

âWhy donât you go down to that place in Chelsea, where I was hit on the head?â

âAnd get myself hit on the head also?â

âI simply donât understand you,â said Mrs. Oliver. âI gave you a clue by finding the girl in the cafÃ©. You said so.â

âI know, I know.â

âWhat about that woman who threw herself out of a window? Havenât you got anything out of that?â

âI have made inquiries, yes.â

âWell?â

âNothing. The woman is one of many. They are attractive when young, they have affairs, they are passionate, they have still more affairs, they get less attractive, they are unhappy and drink too much, they think they have cancer or some fatal disease and so at last in despair and loneliness they throw themselves out of a window!â

âYou said her death was importantâthat it meant something.â

âIt ought to have done.â

âReally!â At a loss for further comment, Mrs. Oliver rang off.

Poirot leant back in his armchair, as far as he could lean back since it was of an upright nature, waved to George to remove the coffee pot and also the telephone and proceeded to reflect upon what he did or did not know. To clarify his thoughts he spoke out loud. He recalled three philosophic questions.

âWhat do I know? What can I hope? What ought I to do?â

He was not sure that he got them in the right order or indeed if they were quite the right questions, but he reflected upon them.

âPerhaps I am too old,â said Hercule Poirot, at the bottom depths of despair. âWhat do I know?â

Upon reflection he thought that he knew too much! He laid that question aside for the moment.

âWhat can I hope?â Well, one could always hope. He could hope that those excellent brains of his, so much better than anybody elseâs, would come up sooner or later with an answer to a problem which he felt uneasily that he did not really understand.

âWhat ought I to do?â Well, that was very definite. What he ought to do was to go and call upon Mr. Andrew Restarick who was obviously distraught about his daughter, and who would no doubt blame Poirot for not having by now delivered the daughter in person. Poirot could understand that, and sympathised with his point of view, but disliked having to present himself in such a very unfavourable light. The only other thing he could do was to telephone to a certain number and ask what developments there had been.

But before he did that, he would go back to the question he had laid aside.

âWhat do I know?â

He knew that the Wedderburn Gallery was under suspicionâso far it had kept on the right side of the law, but it would not hesitate at swindling ignorant millionaires by selling them dubious pictures.

He recalled Mr. Boscombe with his plump white hands and his plentiful teeth, and decided that he did not like him. He was the kind of man who was almost certainly up to dirty work, though he would no doubt protect himself remarkably well. That was a fact that might come into use because it might connect up with David Baker. Then there was David Baker himself, the Peacock. What did he know about him? He had met him, he had conversed with him, and he had formed certain opinions about him. He would do a crooked deal of any kind for money, he would marry a rich heiress for her money and not for love, he might perhaps be bought off. Yes, he probably could be bought off. Andrew Restarick certainly believed so and he was probably right. Unlessâ

He considered Andrew Restarick, thinking more of the picture on the wall hanging above him than of the man himself. He remembered the strong features, the jutting out chin, the air of resolution, of decision. Then he thought of Mrs. Andrew Restarick, deceased. The bitter lines of her mouthâ¦Perhaps he would go down to Crosshedges again and look at that portrait, so as to see it more clearly because there might be a clue to Norma in that. Normaâno, he must not think of Norma yet. What else was there?

There was Mary Restarick whom the girl Sonia said must have a lover because she went up to London so often. He considered that point but he did not think that Sonia was right. He thought Mrs. Restarick was much more likely to go to London in order to look at possible properties to buy, luxury flats, houses in Mayfair, decorators, all the things that money in the metropolis could buy.

Moneyâ¦It seemed to him that all the points that had been passing through his mind came to this in the end. Money. The importance of money. There was a great deal of money in this case. Somehow, in some way that was not obvious, money counted. Money played its part. So far there had been nothing to justify his belief that the tragic death of Mrs. Charpentier had been the work of Norma. No sign of evidence, no motive; yet it seemed to him that there was an undeniable link. The girl had said that she âmight have committed a murder.â A death had taken place only a day or two previously. A death that had occurred in the building where she lived. Surely it would be too much of a coincidence that that death should not be connected in any way? He thought again of the mysterious illness which had affected Mary Restarick. An occurrence so simple as to be classic in its outline. A poison case where the poisoner wasâmust beâone of the household. Had Mary Restarick poisoned herself, had her husband tried to poison her, had the girl Sonia administered poison? Or had Norma been the culprit? Everything pointed, Hercule Poirot had to confess, to Norma as being the logical person.

âTout de mÃªme,â said Poirot, âsince I cannot find anything, et bien then the logic falls out of the window.â

He sighed, rose to his feet and told George to fetch him a taxi. He must keep his appointment with Andrew Restarick.

Nineteen

Claudia Reece-Holland was not in the office today. Instead, a middle-aged woman received Poirot. She said that Mr. Restarick was waiting for him and ushered him into Restarickâs room.

âWell?â Restarick hardly waited until he had come through the door. âWell, what about my daughter?â

Poirot spread out his hands.

âAs yetânothing.â

âBut look here, man, there must be somethingâsome clue. A girl canât just disappear into thin air.â

âGirls have done it before now and will do it again.â

âDid you understand that no expense was to be spared, none whatever? IâI canât go on like this.â

He seemed completely on edge by this time. He looked thinner and his red-rimmed eyes spoke of sleepless nights.

âI know what your anxiety must be, but I assure you that I have done everything possible to trace her. These things, alas, cannot be hurried.â

âShe may have lost her memory orâor she mayâI mean, she might be sick. Ill.â

Poirot thought he knew what the broken form of the sentence meant. Restarick had been about to say âshe may perhaps be dead.â

He sat down on the other side of the desk and said:

âBelieve me, I appreciate your anxiety and I have to say to you once again that the results would be a lot quicker if you consulted the police.â

âNo!â The word broke out explosively.

âThey have greater facilities, more lines of inquiry. I assure you it is not only a question of money. Money cannot give you the same result as a highly efficient organisation can do.â

âMan, itâs no use your talking in that soothing way. Norma is my daughter. My only daughter, the only flesh and blood Iâve got.â

âAre you sure that you have told me everythingâeverything possibleâabout your daughter?â

âWhat more can I tell you?â

âThat is for you to say, not me. Have there been, for instance, any incidents in the past?â

âSuch as? What do you mean, man?â

âAny definite history of mental instability.â

âYou think thatâthatââ

âHow do I know? How can I know?â

âAnd how do I know?â said Restarick, suddenly bitter. âWhat do I know of her? All these years. Grace was a bitter woman. A woman who did not easily forgive or forget. Sometimes I feelâI feel that she was the wrong person to have brought Norma up.â

He got up, walked up and down the room and then sat down again.

âOf course I shouldnât have left my wife. I know that. I left her to bring up the child. But then at the time I suppose I made excuses for myself. Grace was a woman of excellent character devoted to Norma. A thoroughly good guardian for her. But was she? Was she really? Some of the letters Grace wrote to me were as though they breathed anger and revenge. Well, I suppose thatâs natural enough. But I was away all those years. I should have come back, come back more often and found out how the child was getting on. I suppose I had a bad conscience. Oh, itâs no good making excuses now.â

He turned his head sharply.

âYes. I did think when I saw her again that Normaâs whole attitude was neurotic, indisciplined. I hoped she and Mary wouldâwould get on better after a little while but I have to admit that I donât feel the girl was entirely normal. I felt it would be better for her to have a job in London and come home for weekends, but not to be forced into Maryâs company the whole time. Oh, I suppose Iâve made a mess of everything. But where is she, M. Poirot? Where is she? Do you think she may have lost her memory? One hears of such things.â

âYes,â said Poirot, âthat is a possibility. In her state, she may be wandering about quite unaware of who she is. Or she may have had an accident. That is less likely. I can assure you that I have made all inquiries in hospitals and other places.â

âYou donât think she isâyou donât think sheâs dead?â

âShe would be easier to find dead than alive, I can assure you. Please calm yourself, Mr. Restarick. Remember she may have friends of whom you know nothing. Friends in any part of England, friends whom she has known while living with her mother, or with her aunt, or friends who were friends of school friends of hers. All these things take time to sort out. It may beâyou must prepare yourselfâthat she is with a boyfriend of some kind.â

âDavid Baker? If I thought thatââ

âShe is not with David Baker. That,â said Poirot dryly, âI ascertained first of all.â

âHow do I know what friends she has?â He sighed. âIf I find her, when I find herâIâd rather put it that wayâIâm going to take her out of all this.â

âOut of all what?â

âOut of this country. I have been miserable, M. Poirot, miserable ever since I returned here. I always hated City life. The boring round of office routine, continual consultations with lawyers and financiers. The life I liked was always the same. Travelling, moving about from place to place, going to wild and inaccessible places. Thatâs the life for me. I should never have left it. I should have sent for Norma to come out to me and, as I say, when I find her thatâs what Iâm going to do. Already Iâm being approached with various takeover bids. Well, they can have the whole caboodle on very advantageous terms. Iâll take the cash and go back to a country that means something, thatâs real.â

âAha! And what will your wife say to that?â

âMary? Sheâs used to that life. Thatâs where she comes from.â

âTo les femmes with plenty of money,â said Poirot, âLondon can be very attractive.â

âSheâll see it my way.â

The telephone rang on his desk. He picked it up.

âYes? Oh. From Manchester? Yes. If itâs Claudia Reece-Holland, put her through.â

He waited a minute.

âHallo, Claudia. Yes. Speak upâitâs a very bad line, I canât hear you. They agreed?â¦Ah, pityâ¦No, I think you did very wellâ¦Rightâ¦All right then. Take the evening train back. Weâll discuss it further tomorrow morning.â

He replaced the telephone on its rest.

âThatâs a competent girl,â he said.

âMiss Reece-Holland?â

âYes. Unusually competent. Takes a lot of bother off my shoulders. I gave her pretty well carte blanche to put through this deal in Manchester on her own terms. I really felt I couldnât concentrate. And sheâs done exceedingly well. Sheâs as good as a man in some ways.â

He looked at Poirot, suddenly bringing himself back to the present.

âAh yes, M. Poirot. Well, Iâm afraid Iâve rather lost my grip. Do you need more money for expenses?â

âNo, Monsieur. I assure you that I will do my utmost to restore your daughter sound and well. I have taken all possible precautions for her safety.â

He went out through the outer office. When he reached the street he looked up at the sky.

âA definite answer to one question,â he said, âthat is what I need.â

Twenty

Hercule Poirot looked up at the faÃ§ade of the dignified Georgian house in what had been until recently a quiet street in an old-fashioned market town. Progress was rapidly overtaking it, but the new supermarket, the Gifte Shoppe, Margeryâs Boutique, Pegâs CafÃ©, and a palatial new bank, had all chosen sites in Croft Road and not encroached on the narrow High Street.

The brass knocker on the door was brightly polished, Poirot noted with approval. He pressed the bell at the side.

It was opened almost at once by a tall distinguished-looking woman with upswept grey hair and an energetic manner.

âM. Poirot? You are very punctual. Come in.â

âMiss Battersby?â

âCertainly.â She held back the door. Poirot entered. She deposited his hat on the hall stand and led the way to a pleasant room overlooking a narrow walled garden.

She waved towards a chair and sat down herself in an attitude of expectation. It was clear that Miss Battersby was not one to lose time in conventional utterances.

âYou are, I think, the former Principal of Meadowfield School?â

âYes. I retired a year ago. I understand you wished to see me on the subject of Norma Restarick, a former pupil.â

âThat is right.â

âIn your letters,â said Miss Battersby, âyou gave me no further details.â She added, âI may say that I know who you are, M. Poirot. I should therefore like a little more information before I proceed further. Are you, for instance, thinking of employing Norma Restarick?â

âThat is not my intention, no.â

âKnowing what your profession is you understand why I should want further details. Have you, for instance, an introduction to me from any of Normaâs relations?â

âAgain, no,â said Hercule Poirot. âI will explain myself further.â

âThank you.â

âIn actual fact, I am employed by Miss Restarickâs father, Andrew Restarick.â

âAh. He has recently returned to England, I believe, after many yearsâ absence.â

âThat is so.â

âBut you do not bring me a letter of introduction from him?â

âI did not ask him for one.â

Miss Battersby looked at him inquiringly.

âHe might have insisted on coming with me,â said Hercule Poirot. âThat would have hampered me in asking you the questions that I wish to ask, because it is likely that the answers to them might cause him pain and distress. There is no reason why he should be caused further distress than he is already suffering at this moment.â

âHas anything happened to Norma?â

âI hope notâ¦There is, however, a possibility of that. You remember the girl, Miss Battersby?â

âI remember all my pupils. I have an excellent memory. Meadowfield, in any case, is not a very large school. Two hundred girls, no more.â

âWhy have you resigned from it, Miss Battersby?â

âReally, M. Poirot, I cannot see that that is any of your business.â

âNo, I am merely expressing my quite natural curiosity.â

âI am seventy. Is that not a reason?â

âNot in your case, I should say. You appear to me to be in full vigour and energy, fully capable of continuing your headmistressship for a good many years to come.â

âTimes change, M. Poirot. One does not always like the way they are changing. I will satisfy your curiosity. I found I was having less and less patience with parents. Their aims for their daughters are shortsighted and quite frankly stupid.â

Miss Battersby was, as Poirot knew from looking up her qualifications, a very well-known mathematician.

âDo not think that I lead an idle life,â said Miss Battersby. âI lead a life where the work is far more congenial to me. I coach senior students. And now, please, may I know the reason for your interest in the girl, Norma Restarick?â

âThere is some occasion for anxiety. She has, to put it baldly, disappeared.â

Miss Battersby continued to look quite unconcerned.

âIndeed? When you say âdisappeared,â I presume you mean that she has left home without telling her parents where she was going. Oh, I believe her mother is dead, so without telling her father where she was going. That is really not at all uncommon nowadays, M. Poirot. Mr. Restarick has not consulted the police?â

âHe is adamant on that subject. He refuses definitely.â

âI can assure you that I have no knowledge as to where the girl is. I have heard nothing from her. Indeed, I have had no news from her since she left Meadowfield. So I fear I cannot help you in any way.â

âIt is not precisely that kind of information that I want. I want to know what kind of a girl she isâhow you would describe her. Not her personal appearance. I do not mean that. I mean as to her personality and characteristics.â

âNorma, at school, was a perfectly ordinary girl. Not scholastically brilliant, but her work was adequate.â

âNot a neurotic type?â

Miss Battersby considered. Then she said slowly: âNo, I would not say so. Not more, that is, than might be expected considering her home circumstances.â

âYou mean her invalid mother?â

âYes. She came from a broken home. The father, to whom I think she was very devoted, left home suddenly with another womanâa fact which her mother quite naturally resented. She probably upset her daughter more than she need have done by voicing her resentment without restraint.â

âPerhaps it may be more to the point if I ask you your opinion of the late Mrs. Restarick?â

âWhat you are asking me for is my private opinion?â

âIf you do not object?â

âNo, I have no hesitation at all in answering your question. Home conditions are very important in a girlâs life and I have always studied them as much as I can through the meagre information that comes to me. Mrs. Restarick was a worthy and upright woman, I should say. Self-righteous, censorious and handicapped in life by being an extremely stupid one!â

âAh,â said Poirot appreciatively.

âShe was also, I would say, a malade imaginaire. A type that would exaggerate her ailments. The type of woman who is always in and out of nursing homes. An unfortunate home background for a girlâespecially a girl who has no very definite personality of her own. Norma had no marked intellectual ambitions, she had no confidence in herself, she was not a girl to whom I would recommend a career. A nice ordinary job followed by marriage and children was what I would have hoped for her.â

âYou sawâforgive me for askingâno signs at any time of mental instability?â

âMental instability?â said Miss Battersby. âRubbish!â

âSo that is what you say. Rubbish! And not neurotic?â

âAny girl, or almost any girl, can be neurotic, especially in adolescence, and in her first encounters with the world. She is still immature, and needs guidance in her first encounters with sex. Girls are frequently attracted to completely unsuitable, sometimes even dangerous young men. There are, it seems, no parents nowadays, or hardly any, with the strength of character to save them from this, so they often go through a time of hysterical misery, and perhaps make an unsuitable marriage which ends not long after in divorce.â

âBut Norma showed no signs of mental instability?â Poirot persisted with the question.

âShe is an emotional but normal girl,â said Miss Battersby. âMental instability! As I said beforeârubbish! Sheâs probably run away with some young man to get married, and thereâs nothing more normal than that!â

Twenty-one

Poirot sat in his big square armchair. His hands rested on the arms, his eyes looked at the chimneypiece in front of him without seeing it. By his elbow was a small table and on it, neatly clipped together, were various documents. Reports from Mr. Goby, information obtained from his friend, Chief Inspector Neele, a series of separate pages under the heading of âHearsay, gossip, rumourâ and the sources from which it had been obtained.

At the moment he had no need to consult these documents. He had, in fact, read them through carefully and laid them there in case there was any particular point he wished to refer to once more. He wanted now to assemble together in his mind all that he knew and had learned because he was convinced that these things must form a pattern. There must be a pattern there. He was considering now, from what exact angle to approach it. He was not one to trust in enthusiasm for some particular intuition. He was not an intuitive personâbut he did have feelings. The important thing was not the feelings themselvesâbut what might have caused them. It was the cause that was interesting, the cause was so often not what you thought it was. You had very often to work it out by logic, by sense and by knowledge.

What did he feel about this caseâwhat kind of a case was it? Let him start from the general, then proceed to the particular. What were the salient facts of this case?

Money was one of them, he thought, though he did not know how. Somehow or other, moneyâ¦He also thought, increasingly so, that there was evil somewhere. He knew evil. He had met it before. He knew the tang of it, the taste of it, the way it went. The trouble was that here he did not yet know exactly where it was. He had taken certain steps to combat evil. He hoped they would be sufficient. Something was happening, something was in progress, that was not yet accomplished. Someone, somewhere, was in danger.

The trouble was that the facts pointed both ways. If the person he thought was in danger was really in danger, there seemed so far as he could see no reason why. Why should that particular person be in danger? There was no motive. If the person he thought was in danger was not in danger, then the whole approach might have to be completely reversedâ¦Everything that pointed one way he must turn round and look at from the complete opposite point of view.

He left that for the moment in the balance, and he came from there to the personalitiesâto the people. What pattern did they make? What part were they playing?

FirstâAndrew Restarick. He had accumulated by now a fair amount of information about Andrew Restarick. A general picture of his life before and after going abroad. A restless man, never sticking to one place or purpose long, but generally liked. Nothing of the wastrel about him, nothing shoddy or tricky. Not, perhaps, a strong personality? Weak in many ways?

Poirot frowned, dissatisfied. That picture did not somehow fit the Andrew Restarick that he himself had met. Not weak surely, with that thrust-out chin, the steady eyes, the air of resolution. He had been a successful businessman, too, apparently. Good at his job in the earlier years, and he had put through good deals in South Africa and in South America. He had increased his holdings. It was a success story that he had brought home with him, not one of failure. How then could he be a weak personality? Weak, perhaps, only where women were concerned. He had made a mistake in his marriageâmarried the wrong womanâ¦Pushed into it perhaps by his family? And then he had met the other woman. Just that one woman? Or had there been several women? It was hard to find a record of that kind after so many years. Certainly he had not been a notoriously unfaithful husband. He had had a normal home, he had been fond, by all accounts, of his small daughter. But then he had come across a woman whom he had cared for enough to leave his home and to leave his country. It had been a real love affair.

But had it, perhaps, matched up with any additional motive? Dislike of office work, the City, the daily routine of London? He thought it might. It matched the pattern. He seemed, too, to have been a solitary type. Everyone had liked him both here and abroad, but there seemed no intimate friends. Indeed, it would have been difficult for him to have intimate friends abroad because he had never stopped in any one spot long enough. He had plunged into some gamble, attempted a coup, had made good, then tired of the thing and gone on somewhere else. Nomadic! A wanderer.

It still did not quite accord with his own picture of the manâ¦A picture? The word stirred in his mind the memory of the picture that hung in Restarickâs office, on the wall behind his desk. It had been a portrait of the same man fifteen years ago. How much difference had those fifteen years made in the man sitting there? Surprisingly little, on the whole! More grey in the hair, a heavier set to the shoulders, but the lines of character on the face were much the same. A determined face. A man who knew what he wanted, who meant to get it. A man who would take risks. A man with a certain ruthlessness.

Why, he wondered, had Restarick brought that picture up to London? They had been companion portraits of a husband and wife. Strictly speaking artistically, they should have remained together. Would a psychologist have said that subconsciously Restarick wanted to dissociate himself from his former wife once more, to separate himself from her? Was he then mentally still retreating from her personality although she was dead? An interesting pointâ¦.

The pictures had presumably come out of storage with various other family articles of furnishing. Mary Restarick had no doubt selected certain personal objects to supplement the furniture of Crosshedges for which Sir Roderick had made room. He wondered whether Mary Restarick, the new wife, had liked hanging up that particular pair of portraits. More natural, perhaps, if she had put the first wifeâs portrait in an attic! But then he reflected that she would probably not have had an attic to stow away unwanted objects at Crosshedges. Presumably Sir Roderick had made room for a few family things whilst the returned couple were looking about for a suitable house in London. So it had not mattered much, and it would have been easier to hang both portraits. Besides, Mary Restarick seemed a sensible type of womanânot a jealous or emotional type.

âTout de mÃªme,â thought Hercule Poirot to himself, âles femmes, they are all capable of jealousy, and sometimes the one you would consider the least likely!â

His thoughts passed to Mary Restarick, and he considered her in turn. It struck him that what was really odd was that he had so few thoughts about her! He had seen her only the once, and she had, somehow or other, not made much impression on him. A certain efficiency, he thought, and also a certainâhow could he put it?âartificiality? (âBut there, my friend,â said Hercule Poirot, again in parenthesis, âthere you are considering her wig!â)

It was absurd really that one should know so little about a woman. A woman who was efficient and who wore a wig, and who was good-looking, and who was sensible, and who could feel anger. Yes, she had been angry when she had found the Peacock Boy wandering uninvited in her house. She had displayed it sharply and unmistakably. And the boyâhe had seemed what? Amused, no more. But she had been angry, very angry at finding him there. Well, that was natural enough. He would not be any motherâs choice for her daughterâ

Poirot stopped short in his thoughts, shaking his head vexedly. Mary Restarick was not Normaâs mother. Not for her the agony, the apprehension about a daughter making an unsuitable unhappy marriage, or announcing an illegitimate baby with an unsuitable father! What did Mary feel about Norma? Presumably, to begin with, that she was a thoroughly tiresome girlâwho had picked up with a young man who was going to be obviously a source of worry and annoyance to Andrew Restarick. But after that? What had she thought and felt about a stepdaughter who was apparently deliberately trying to poison her?

Her attitude seemed to have been the sensible one. She had wanted to get Norma out of the house, herself out of danger; and to cooperate with her husband in suppressing any scandal about what had happened. Norma came down for an occasional weekend to keep up appearances, but her life henceforward was bound to centre in London. Even when the Restaricks moved into the house they were looking for, they would not suggest Norma living with them. Most girls, nowadays, lived away from their families. So that problem had been settled.

Except that, for Poirot, the question of who had administered poison to Mary Restarick was very far from settled. Restarick himself believed it was his daughterâ

But Poirot wonderedâ¦.

His mind played with the possibilities of the girl Sonia. What was she doing in that house? Why had she come there? She had Sir Roderick eating out of her hand all rightâperhaps she had no wish to go back to her own country? Possibly her designs were purely matrimonialâold men of Sir Roderickâs age married pretty young girls every day of the week. In the worldly sense, Sonia could do very well for herself. A secure social position, and widowhood to look forward to with a settled and sufficient incomeâor were her aims quite different? Had she gone to Kew Gardens with Sir Roderickâs missing papers tucked between the pages of a book?

Had Mary Restarick become suspicious of herâof her activities, of her loyalties, of where she went on her days off, and of whom she met? And had Sonia, then, administered the substances which, in cumulative small doses, would arouse no suspicion of anything but ordinary gastroenteritis?

For the time being, he put the household at Crosshedges out of his mind.

He came, as Norma had come, to London, and proceeded to the consideration of three girls who shared a flat.

Claudia Reece-Holland, Frances Cary, Norma Restarick. Claudia Reece-Holland, daughter of a well-known Member of Parliament, well-off, capable, well-trained, good-looking, a first-class secretary. Frances Cary, a country solicitorâs daughter, artistic, had been to drama school for a short time, then to the Slade, chucked that also, occasionally worked for the Arts Council, now employed by an art gallery. Earned a good salary, was artistic and had bohemian associations. She knew the young man, David Baker, though not apparently more than casually. Perhaps she was in love with him? He was the kind of young man, Poirot thought, disliked generally by parents, members of the Establishment and also the police. Where the attraction lay for wellborn girls Poirot failed to see. But one had to acknowledge it as a fact. What did he himself think of David?

A good-looking boy with the impudent and slightly amused air whom he had first seen in the upper storeys of Crosshedges, doing an errand for Norma (or reconnoitring on his own, who should say?). He had seen him again when he gave him a lift in his car. A young man of personality, giving indeed an impression of ability in what he chose to do. And yet there was clearly an unsatisfactory side to him. Poirot picked up one of the papers on the table by his side and studied it. A bad record though not positively criminal. Small frauds on garages, hooliganism, smashing up things, on probation twice. All those things were the fashion of the day. They did not come under Poirotâs category of evil. He had been a promising painter, but had chucked it. He was the kind that did no steady work. He was vain, proud, a peacock in love with his own appearance. Was he anything more than that? Poirot wondered.

He stretched out an arm and picked up a sheet of paper on which was scribbled down the rough heads of the conversation held between Norma and David in the cafÃ©âthat is, as well as Mrs. Oliver could remember them. And how well was that, Poirot thought? He shook his head doubtfully. One never knew quite at what point Mrs. Oliverâs imagination would take over! Did the boy care for Norma, really want to marry her? There was no doubt about her feelings for him. He had suggested marrying her. Had Norma got money of her own? She was the daughter of a rich man, but that was not the same thing. Poirot made an exclamation of vexation. He had forgotten to inquire the terms of the late Mrs. Restarickâs will. He flipped through the sheets of notes. No, Mr. Goby had not neglected this obvious need. Mrs. Restarick apparently had been well provided for by her husband during her lifetime. She had had, apparently, a small income of her own amounting perhaps to a thousand a year. She had left everything she possessed to her daughter. It would hardly amount, Poirot thought, to a motive for marriage. Probably, as his only child, she would inherit a lot of money at her fatherâs death but that was not at all the same thing. Her father might leave her very little indeed if he disliked the man she had married.

He would say then, that David did care for her, since he was willing to marry her. And yetâPoirot shook his head. It was about the fifth time he had shaken it. All these things did not tie up, they did not make a satisfactory pattern. He remembered Restarickâs desk, and the cheque he had been writingâapparently to buy off the young manâand the young man, apparently, was quite willing to be bought off! So that again did not tally. The cheque had certainly been made out to David Baker and it was for a very largeâreally a preposterousâsum. It was a sum that might have tempted any impecunious young man of bad character. And yet he had suggested marriage to her only a day before. That, of course, might have been just a move in the gameâa move to raise the price he was asking. Poirot remembered Restarick sitting there, his lips hard. He must care a great deal for his daughter to be willing to pay so high a sum; and he must have been afraid too that the girl herself was quite determined to marry him.

From thoughts of Restarick, he went on to Claudia. Claudia and Andrew Restarick. Was it chance, sheer chance, that she had come to be his secretary? There might be a link between them. Claudia. He considered her. Three girls in a flat, Claudia Reece-Hollandâs flat. She had been the one who had taken the flat originally, and shared it first with a friend, a girl she already knew, and then with another girl, the third girl. The third girl, thought Poirot. Yes, it always came back to that. The third girl. And that is where he had come in the end. Where he had had to come. Where all this thinking out of patterns had led. To Norma Restarick.

A girl who had come to consult him as he sat at breakfast. A girl whom he had joined at a table in a cafÃ© where she had recently been eating baked beans with the young man she loved. (He always seemed to see her at mealtimes, he noted!) And what did he think about her? First, what did other people think about her? Restarick cared for her and was desperately anxious about her, desperately frightened for her. He not only suspectedâhe was quite sure, apparently, that she had tried to poison his recently married wife. He had consulted a doctor about her. Poirot felt he would like dearly to talk to that doctor himself, but he doubted if he would get anywhere. Doctors were very chary of parting with medical information to anyone but a duly accredited person such as the parents. But Poirot could imagine fairly well what the doctor had said. He had been cautious, Poirot thought, as doctors are apt to be. Heâd hemmed and hawed and spoken perhaps of medical treatment. He had not stressed too positively a mental angle, but had certainly suggested it or hinted at it. In fact, the doctor probably was privately sure that that was what had happened. But he also knew a good deal about hysterical girls, and that they sometimes did things that were not really the result of mental causes, but merely of temper, jealousy, emotion, and hysteria. He would not be a psychiatrist himself nor a neurologist. He would be a GP who took no risks of making accusations about which he could not be sure, but suggested certain things out of caution. A job somewhere or otherâa job in London, later perhaps treatment from a specialist?

What did anyone else think of Norma Restarick? Claudia Reece-Holland? He didnât know. Certainly not from the little that he knew about her. She was capable of hiding any secret, she would certainly let nothing escape her which she did not mean to let escape. She had shown no signs of wanting to turn the girl outâwhich she might have done if she had been afraid of her mental condition. There could not have been much discussion between her and Frances on the subject since the other girl had so innocently let escape the fact that Norma had not returned to them after her weekend at home. Claudia had been annoyed about that. It was possible that Claudia was more in the pattern than she appeared. She had brains, Poirot thought, and efficiencyâ¦He came back to Norma, came back once again to the third girl. What was her place in the pattern? The place that would pull the whole thing together. Ophelia, he thought? But there were two opinions to that, just as there were two opinions about Norma. Was Ophelia mad or was she pretending madness? Actresses had been variously divided as to how the part should be playedâor perhaps, he should say, producers. They were the ones who had the ideas. Was Hamlet mad or sane? Take your choice. Was Ophelia mad or sane?

Restarick would not have used the word âmadâ even in his thoughts about his daughter. Mentally disturbed was the term that everyone preferred to use. The other word that had been used of Norma had been âbatty.â âSheâs a bit batty.â âNot quite all there.â âA bit wanting, if you know what I mean.â Were âdaily womenâ good judges? Poirot thought they might be. There was something odd about Norma, certainly, but she might be odd in a different way to what she seemed. He remembered the picture she had made slouching into his room, a girl of today, the modern type looking just as so many other girls looked. Limp hair hanging on her shoulders, the characterless dress, a skimpy look about the kneesâall to his old-fashioned eyes looking like an adult girl pretending to be a child.

âIâm sorry, you are too old.â

Perhaps it was true. Heâd looked at her through the eyes of someone old, without admiration, to him just a girl without apparently will to please, without coquetry. A girl without any sense of her own femininityâno charm or mystery or enticement, who had nothing to offer, perhaps, but plain biological sex. So it may be that she was right in her condemnation of him. He could not help her because he did not understand her, because it was not even possible for him to appreciate her. He had done his best for her, but what had that meant up to date? What had he done for her since that one moment of appeal? And in his thoughts the answer came quickly. He had kept her safe. That at least. If, indeed, she needed keeping safe. That was where the whole point lay. Did she need keeping safe? That preposterous confession! Really, not so much a confession as an announcement: âI think I may have committed a murder.â

Hold on to that, because that was the crux of the whole thing. That was his mÃ©tier. To deal with murder, to clear up murder, to prevent murder! To be the good dog who hunts down murder. Murder announced. Murder somewhere. He had looked for it and had not found it. The pattern of arsenic in the soup? A pattern of young hooligans stabbing each other with knifes? The ridiculous and sinister phrase, bloodstains in the courtyard. A shot fired from a revolver. At whom, and why?

It was not as it ought to be, a form of crime that would fit with the words she had said: âI may have committed a murder.â He had stumbled on in the dark, trying to see a pattern of crime, trying to see where the third girl fitted into that pattern, and coming back always to the same urgent need to know what this girl was really like.

And then with a casual phrase, Ariadne Oliver had, as he thought, shown him the light. The supposed suicide of a woman at Borodene Mansions. That would fit. It was where the third girl had her living quarters. It must be the murder that she had meant. Another murder committed about the same time would have been too much of a coincidence! Besides there was no sign or trace of any other murder that had been committed about then. No other death that could have sent her hotfoot to consult him, after listening at a party to the lavish admiration of his own achievements which his friend, Mrs. Oliver, had given to the world. And so, when Mrs. Oliver had informed him in a casual manner of the woman who had thrown herself out of the window, it had seemed to him that at last he had got what he had been looking for.

Here was the clue. The answer to his perplexity. Here he would find what he needed. The why, the when, the where.

âQuelle dÃ©ception,â said Hercule Poirot, out loud.

He stretched out his hand, and sorted out the neatly typed rÃ©sumÃ© of a womanâs life. The bald facts of Mrs. Charpentierâs existence. A woman of forty-three of good social position, reported to have been a wild girlâtwo marriagesâtwo divorcesâa woman who liked men. A woman who of late years had drunk more than was good for her. A woman who liked parties. A woman who was now reported to go about with men a good many years younger than herself. Living in a flat alone in Borodene Mansions, Poirot could understand and feel the sort of woman she was, and had been, and he could see why such a woman might wish to throw herself out of a high window one early morning when she awoke to despair.

Because she had cancer or thought she had cancer? But at the inquest, the medical evidence had said very definitely that that was not so.

What he wanted was some kind of a link with Norma Restarick. He could not find it. He read through the dry facts again.

Identification had been supplied at the inquest by a solicitor. Louise Carpenter, though she had used a Frenchified form of her surnameâCharpentier. Because it went better with her Christian name? Louise? Why was the name Louise familiar? Some casual mention?âa phrase?âhis fingers riffled neatly through typewritten pages. Ah! there it was! Just that one reference. The girl for whom Andrew Restarick had left his wife had been a girl named Louise Birell. Someone who had proved to be of little significance in Restarickâs later life. They had quarrelled and parted after about a year. The same pattern, Poirot thought. The same thing obtaining that had probably obtained all through this particular womanâs life. To love a man violently, to break up his home, perhaps, to live with him, and then quarrel with him and leave him. He felt sure, absolutely sure, that this Louise Charpentier was the same Louise.

Even so, how did it tie up with the girl Norma? Had Restarick and Louise Charpentier come together again when he returned to England? Poirot doubted it. Their lives had parted years ago. That they had by any chance come together again seemed unlikely to the point of impossibility! It had been a brief and in reality unimportant infatuation. His present wife would hardly be jealous enough of her husbandâs past to wish to push his former mistress out of a window. Ridiculous! The only person so far as he could see who might have been the type to harbour a grudge over many long years, and wish to execute revenge upon the woman who had broken up her home, might have been the first Mrs. Restarick. And that sounded wildly impossible also, and anyway, the first Mrs. Restarick was dead!

The telephone rang. Poirot did not move. At this particular moment he did not want to be disturbed. He had a feeling of being on a trail of some kindâ¦He wanted to pursue itâ¦The telephone stopped. Good. Miss Lemon would be coping with it.

The door opened and Miss Lemon entered.

âMrs. Oliver wants to speak to you,â she said.

Poirot waved a hand. âNot now, not now, I pray you! I cannot speak to her now.â

âShe says there is something that she has just thought ofâsomething she forgot to tell you. About a piece of paperâan unfinished letter, which seems to have fallen out of a blotter in a desk in a furniture van. A rather incoherent story,â added Miss Lemon, allowing a note of disapproval to enter her voice.

Poirot waved more frantically.

âNot now,â he urged. âI beg of you, not now.â

âI will tell her you are busy.â

Miss Lemon retreated.

Peace descended once more upon the room. Poirot felt waves of fatigue creeping over him. Too much thinking. One must relax. Yes, one must relax. One must let tension goâin relaxation the pattern would come. He closed his eyes. There were all the components there. He was sure of that now, there was nothing more he could learn from outside. It must come from inside.

Â 

And quite suddenlyâjust as his eyelids were relaxing in sleepâit came.â¦

It was all thereâwaiting for him! He would have to work it all out. But he knew now. All the bits were there, disconnected bits and pieces, all fitting in. A wig, a picture, 5 a.m., women and their hairdos, the Peacock Boyâall leading to the phrase with which it had begun:

Third Girlâ¦

âI may have committed a murderâ¦â Of course!

A ridiculous nursery rhyme came into his mind. He repeated it aloud.

Rub a dub dub, three men in a tub

And who do you think they be?

A butcher, a baker, a candlestick makerâ¦.

Too bad, he couldnât remember the last line. A baker, yes, and in a far-fetched way, a butcherâHe tried out a feminine parody:

Pat a cake, pat, three girls in a flat

And who do you think they be?

A Personal Aide and a girl from the Slade

And the Third is aâ

Miss Lemon came in.

âAhâI remember nowââAnd they all came out of a weenie POTATO.ââ

Miss Lemon looked at him in anxiety.

âDr. Stillingfleet insists on speaking to you at once. He says it is urgent.â

âTell Dr. Stillingfleet he canâDr. Stillingfleet, did you say?â

He pushed past her, caught up the receiver. âI am here. Poirot speaking! Something has happened?â

âSheâs walked out on me.â

âWhat?â

âYou heard me. Sheâs walked out. Walked out through the front gate.â

âYou let her go?â

âWhat else could I do?â

âYou could have stopped her.â

âNo.â

âTo let her go was madness.â

âNo.â

âYou donât understand.â

âThat was the arrangement. Free to go at any time.â

âYou donât understand what may be involved.â

âAll right then, I donât. But I know what Iâm doing. And if I donât let her go, all the work Iâve done on her would go for nothing. And I have worked on her. Your job and my job arenât the same. Weâre not out for the same thing. I tell you I was getting somewhere. Getting somewhere, so that I was quite sure she wouldnât walk out on me.â

âAh yes. And then, mon ami, she did.â

âFrankly, I canât understand it. I canât see why the setback came.â

âSomething happened.â

âYes, but what?â

âSomebody she saw, somebody who spoke to her, somebody who found out where she was.â

âI donât see how that could have happenedâ¦But what you donât seem to see is that sheâs a free agent. She had to be a free agent.â

âSomebody got at her. Somebody found out where she was. Did she get a letter, a telegram, a telephone call?â

âNo, nothing of that kind. That I am quite sure of.â

âThen howâof course! Newspapers. You have newspapers, I suppose, in that establishment of yours?â

âCertainly. Normal everyday life, thatâs what I stand for in my place of business.â

âThen that is how they got at her. Normal, everyday life. What papers do you take?â

âFive.â He named the five.

âWhen did she go?â

âThis morning. Half past ten.â

âExactly. After she read the papers. That is good enough to start on. Which paper did she usually read?â

âI donât think she had any special choice. Sometimes one, sometimes another, sometimes the whole lot of themâsometimes only glanced at them.â

âWell, I must not waste time talking.â

âYou think she saw an advertisement. Something of that kind?â

âWhat other explanation can there be? Good-bye, I can say no more now. I have to search. Search for the possible advertisement and then get on quickly.â

He replaced the receiver.

âMiss Lemon, bring me our two papers. The Morning News and the Daily Comet. Send Georges out for all the others.â

As he opened out the papers to the Personal advertisements and went carefully down them, he followed his line of thought.

He would be in time. He must be in timeâ¦There had been one murder already. There would be another one to come. But he, Hercule Poirot, would prevent thatâ¦If he was in timeâ¦He was Hercule Poirotâthe avenger of the innocent. Did he not say (and people laughed when he said it), âI do not approve of murder.â They had thought it an understatement. But it was not an understatement. It was a simple statement of fact without melodrama. He did not approve of murder.

George came in with a sheaf of newspapers.

âThere are all this morningâs, sir.â

Poirot looked at Miss Lemon, who was standing by waiting to be efficient.

âLook through the ones that I have searched in case I have missed anything.â

âThe Personal column, you mean?â

âYes. I thought there would be the name David perhaps. A girlâs name. Some pet name or nickname. They would not use Norma. An appeal for help, perhaps, or to a meeting.â

Miss Lemon took the papers obediently with some distaste. This was not her kind of efficiency, but for the moment he had no other job to give her. He himself spread out the Morning Chronicle. That was the biggest field to search. Three columns of it. He bent over the open sheet.

A lady who wanted to dispose of her fur coatâ¦Passengers wanted for a car trip abroadâ¦Lovely period house for saleâ¦Paying guestsâ¦Backward childrenâ¦Homemade chocolatesâ¦âJulia. Shall never forget. Always yours.â That was more the kind of thing. He considered it, but passed on. Louis XVth furnitureâ¦Middle-aged lady to help run a hotelâ¦âIn desperate trouble. Must see you. Come to flat 4:30 without fail. Our code Goliath.â

He heard the doorbell ring just as he called out: âGeorges, a taxi,â slipped on his overcoat, and went into the hall just as George was opening the front door and colliding with Mrs. Oliver. All three of them struggled to disentangle themselves in the narrow hall.

Twenty-two

I

Frances Cary, carrying her overnight bag, walked down Mandeville Road, chattering with the friend she had just met on the corner, towards the bulk of Borodene Mansions.

âReally, Frances, itâs like living in a prison block, that building. Wormwood Scrubs or something.â

âNonsense, Eileen. I tell you, theyâre frightfully comfortable, these flats. Iâm very lucky and Claudia is a splendid person to share withânever bothers you. And sheâs got a wonderful daily. The flatâs really very nicely run.â

âAre there just the two of you? I forget. I thought you had a third girl?â

âOh, well, she seems to have walked out on us.â

âYou mean she doesnât pay her rent?â

âOh, I think the rentâs all right. I think sheâs probably having some affair with a boyfriend.â

Eileen lost interest. Boyfriends were too much a matter of course.

âWhere are you coming back from now?â

âManchester. Private view was on. Great success.â

âAre you really going to Vienna next month?â

âYes, I think so. Itâs pretty well fixed up by now. Rather fun.â

âWouldnât it be awful if some of the pictures got stolen?â

âOh, theyâre all insured,â said Frances. âAll the really valuable ones, anyway.â

âHow did your friend Peterâs show go?â

âNot terribly well, Iâm afraid. But there was quite a good review by the critic of The Artist, and that counts a lot.â

Frances turned into Borodene Mansions, and her friend went on her way to her own small mews house farther down the road. Frances said âGood eveningâ to the porter, and went up in the lift to the sixth floor. She walked along the passage, humming a little tune to herself.

She inserted her key in the door of the flat. The light in the hall was not on yet. Claudia was not due back from the office for another hour and a half. But in the sitting room, the door of which was ajar, the light was on.

Frances said aloud: âLightâs on. Thatâs funny.â

She slipped out of her coat, dropped her overnight bag, pushed the sitting room door farther open and went inâ¦.

Then she stopped dead. Her mouth opened and then shut. She stiffened all overâher eyes staring at the prone figure on the floor; then they rose slowly to the mirror on the wall that reflected back at her her own horror-stricken faceâ¦.

Then she drew a deep breath. The momentary paralysis over, she flung back her head and screamed. Stumbling over her bag on the hall floor and kicking it aside, she ran out of the flat and along the passage and beat frenziedly at the door of the next flat.

An elderly woman opened it.

âWhat on earthââ

âThereâs someone deadâsomeone dead. And I think itâs someone I knowâ¦David Baker. Heâs lying there on the floorâ¦I think heâs stabbedâ¦he must have been stabbed. Thereâs bloodâblood everywhere.â

She began to sob hysterically. Miss Jacobs shoved a glass into her hand. âStay there and drink it.â

Frances sipped obediently. Miss Jacobs went rapidly out of the door along the passage and through the open door from which the light was pouring out. The living room door was wide open and Miss Jacobs went straight through it.

She was not the kind of woman who screams. She stood just within the doorway, her lips pursed hard together.

What she was looking at had a nightmarish quality. On the floor lay a handsome young man, his arms flung wide, his chestnut hair falling on his shoulders. He wore a crimson velvet coat, and his white shirt was dappled with bloodâ¦.

She was aware with a start that there was a second figure with her in the room. A girl was standing pressed back against the wall, the great Harlequin above seeming to be leaping across the painted sky.

The girl had a white woollen shift dress on, and her pale brown hair hung limp on either side of her face. In her hand she was holding a kitchen knife.

Miss Jacobs stared at her and she stared back at Miss Jacobs.

Then she said in a quiet reflective voice, as though she was answering what someone had said to her:

âYes, Iâve killed himâ¦The blood got on my hands from the knifeâ¦I went into the bathroom to wash it offâbut you canât really wash things like that off, can you? And then I came back in here to see if it was really trueâ¦But it isâ¦Poor Davidâ¦But I suppose I had to do it.â

Shock forced unlikely words from Miss Jacobs. As she said them, she thought how ridiculous they sounded!

âIndeed? Why did you have to do anything of the kind?â

âI donât knowâ¦At leastâI suppose I doâreally. He was in great trouble. He sent for meâand I cameâ¦But I wanted to be free of him. I wanted to get away from him. I didnât really love him.â

She laid the knife carefully on the table and sat down on a chair.

âIt isnât safe, is it?â she said. âTo hate anyoneâ¦It isnât safe because you never know what you might doâ¦Like Louiseâ¦.â

Then she said quietly, âHadnât you better ring up the police?â

Obediently, Miss Jacobs dialled 999.

II

There were six people now in the room with the Harlequin on the wall. A long time had passed. The police had come and gone.

Andrew Restarick sat like a man stunned. Once or twice he said the same words. âI canât believe itâ¦â Telephoned for, he had come from his office, and Claudia Reece-Holland had come with him. In her quiet way, she had been ceaselessly efficient. She had put through telephone calls to lawyers, had rung Crosshedges and two firms of estate agents to try and get in touch with Mary Restarick. She had given Frances Cary a sedative and sent her to lie down.

Hercule Poirot and Mrs. Oliver sat side by side on a sofa. They had arrived together at the same time as the police.

Last of all to arrive, when nearly everyone else had gone, had been a quiet man with grey hair and a gentle manner, Chief Inspector Neele of Scotland Yard, who had greeted Poirot with a slight nod, and been introduced to Andrew Restarick. A tall red-haired young man was standing by the window staring down into the courtyard.

What were they all waiting for? Mrs. Oliver wondered. The body had been removed, the photographers and other police officers had done their work, they themselves, after being herded into Claudiaâs bedroom, had been readmitted into the sitting room, where they had been waiting, she supposed, for the Scotland Yard man to arrive.

âIf you want me to go,â Mrs. Oliver said to him uncertainlyâ

âMrs. Ariadne Oliver, arenât you? No, if you have no objection, Iâd rather you remained. I know it hasnât been pleasantââ

âIt didnât seem real.â

Mrs. Oliver shut her eyesâseeing the whole thing again. The Peacock Boy, so picturesquely dead that he had seemed like a stage figure. And the girlâthe girl had been differentânot the uncertain Norma from Crosshedgesâthe unattractive Ophelia, as Poirot had called herâbut some quiet figure of tragic dignityâaccepting her doom.

Poirot had asked if he might make two telephone calls. One had been to Scotland Yard, and that had been agreed to, after the sergeant had made a preliminary suspicious inquiry on the phone. The sergeant had directed Poirot to the extension in Claudiaâs bedroom, and he had made his call from there, closing the door behind him.

The sergeant had continued to look doubtful, murmuring to his subordinate, âThey say itâs all right. Wonder who he is? Odd-looking little bloke.â

âForeign, isnât he? Might be Special Branch?â

âDonât think so. It was Chief Inspector Neele he wanted.â

His assistant raised his eyebrows and suppressed a whistle.

After making his calls, Poirot had reopened the door and beckoned Mrs. Oliver from where she was standing uncertainly inside the kitchen, to join him. They had sat down side by side on Claudia Reece-Hollandâs bed.

âI wish we could do something,â said Mrs. Oliverâalways one for action.

âPatience, chÃ¨re Madame.â

âSurely you can do something?â

âI have. I have rung up the people it is necessary to ring up. We can do nothing here until the police have finished their preliminary investigations.â

âWho did you ring up after the inspector man? Her father? Couldnât he come and bail her out or something?â

âBail is not likely to be granted where murder is concerned,â said Poirot dryly. âThe police have already notified her father. They got his number from Miss Cary.â

âWhere is she?â

âHaving hysterics in the flat of a Miss Jacobs next door, I understand. She was the one who discovered the body. It seems to have upset her. She rushed out of here screaming.â

âSheâs the arty one, isnât she? Claudia would have kept her head.â

âI agree with you. A veryâpoised young woman.â

âWho did you ring up, then?â

âFirst, as perhaps you heard, Chief Inspector Neele of Scotland Yard.â

âWill this lot like his coming and meddling?â

âHe is not coming to meddle. He has of late been making certain inquiries for me, which may throw light on this matter.â

âOhâI seeâ¦Who else did you ring up?â

âDr. John Stillingfleet.â

âWhoâs he? To say that poor Norma is potty and canât help killing people?â

âHis qualifications would entitle him to give evidence to that effect in court if necessary.â

âDoes he know anything about her?â

âA good deal, I should say. She has been in his care since the day you found her in the Shamrock cafÃ©.â

âWho sent her there?â

Poirot smiled. âI did. I made certain arrangements by telephone before I came to join you at the cafÃ©.â

âWhat? All the time I was so disappointed in you and kept urging you to do somethingâyou had done something? And you never told me! Really, Poirot! Not a word! How could you be soâso mean.â

âDo not enrage yourself, Madame, I beg. What I did, I did for the best.â

âPeople always say that when they have done something particularly maddening. What else did you do?â

âI arranged that my services should be retained by her father, so that I could make the necessary arrangements for her safety.â

âMeaning this Doctor Stillingwater?â

âStilling fleet. Yes.â

âHow on earth did you manage that? I shouldnât have thought for a moment that you would be the kind of person that her father would choose to make all these arrangements. He looks the kind of man who would be very suspicious of foreigners.â

âI forced myself upon himâas a conjurer forces a card. I called upon him, purporting to have received a letter from him asking me to do so.â

âAnd did he believe you?â

âNaturally. I showed the letter to him. It was typed on his office stationery and signed with his nameâthough as he pointed out to me, the handwriting was not his.â

âDo you mean you had actually written that letter yourself?â

âYes. I judged correctly that it would awaken his curiosity, and that he would want to see me. Having got so far, I trusted to my own talents.â

âYou told him what you were going to do about this Dr. Stillingfleet?â

âNo. I told no one. There was danger, you see.â

âDanger to Norma?â

âTo Norma, or Norma was dangerous to someone else. From the very beginning there have always been the two possibilities. The facts could be interpreted in either way. The attempted poisoning of Mrs. Restarick was not convincingâit was delayed too long, it was not a serious attempt to kill. Then there was an indeterminate story of a revolver shot fired here in Borodene Mansionsâand another tale of flick-knives and bloodstains. Every time these things happen, Norma knows nothing about them, cannot remember, etcetera. She finds arsenic in a drawerâbut does not remember putting it there. Claims to have had lapses of memory, to have lost long periods of time when she does not remember what she had been doing. So one has to ask oneselfâis what she says true, or did she, for some reason of her own, invent it? Is she a potential victim of some monstrous and perhaps crazy plotâor is it she herself who is the moving spirit? Is she painting a picture of herself as a girl suffering from mental instability, or has she murder in mind, with a defence of diminished responsibility?â

âShe was different today,â said Mrs. Oliver slowly. âDid you notice? Quite different. Notânot scatty any longer.â

Poirot nodded.

âNot OpheliaâIphigeneia.â

A sound of added commotion outside in the flat diverted the attention of both of them.

âDo you thinkââ Mrs. Oliver stopped. Poirot had gone to the window and was looking down to the courtyard far below. An ambulance was drawn up there.

âAre they going to take It away?â asked Mrs. Oliver in a shaky voice. And then added in a sudden rush of pity: âPoor Peacock.â

âHe was hardly a likeable character,â said Poirot coldly.

âHe was very decorativeâ¦And so young,â said Mrs. Oliver.

âThat is sufficient for les femmes.â Poirot was opening the bedroom door a careful crack, as he peered out.

âExcuse me,â he said, âif I leave you for a moment.â

âWhere are you going?â demanded Mrs. Oliver suspiciously.

âI understood that that was not a question considered delicate in this country,â said Poirot reproachfully.

âOh, I beg your pardon.

âAnd thatâs not the way to the loo,â she breathed sotto voce after him, as she too applied an eye to the crack of the door.

She went back to the window to observe what was going on below.

âMr. Restarick has just driven up in a taxi,â she observed when Poirot slipped back quietly into the room a few minutes later, âand Claudia has come with him. Did you manage to get into Normaâs room, or wherever you really wanted to go?â

âNormaâs room is in the occupation of the police.â

âHow annoying for you. What are you carrying in that kind of black folder thing youâve got in your hand?â

Poirot in his turn asked a question.

âWhat have you got in that canvas bag with Persian horses on it?â

âMy shopping bag? Only a couple of Avocado pears, as it happens.â

âThen if I may, I will entrust this folder to you. Do not be rough with it, or squeeze it, I beg.â

âWhat is it?â

âSomething that I hoped to findâand that I have foundâAh, things begin to pass themselvesââ He referred to increased sounds of activities.

Poirotâs words struck Mrs. Oliver as being much more exactly descriptive than English words would have been. Restarick, his voice loud and angry. Claudia coming in to telephone. A glimpse of a police stenographer on an excursion to the flat next door to take statements from Frances Cary and a mythical person called Miss Jacobs. A coming and going of ordered business, and a final departure of two men with cameras.

Then unexpectedly the sudden incursion into Claudiaâs bedroom of a tall loosely-jointed young man with red hair.

Without taking any notice of Mrs. Oliver, he spoke to Poirot.

âWhatâs she done? Murder? Who is it? The boyfriend?â

âYes.â

âShe admits it?â

âIt would seem so.â

âNot good enough. Did she say so in definite words?â

âI have not heard her do so. I have had no chance of asking her anything myself.â

A policeman looked in.

âDr. Stillingfleet?â he asked. âThe police surgeon would like a word with you.â

Dr. Stillingfleet nodded and followed him out of the room.

âSo thatâs Dr. Stillingfleet,â said Mrs. Oliver. She considered for a moment or two. âQuite something, isnât he?â

Twenty-three

Chief Inspector Neele drew a sheet of paper towards him, jotted one or two notes on it; and looked round at the other five people in the room. His voice was crisp and formal.

âMiss Jacobs?â he said. He looked towards the policeman who stood by the door. âSergeant Conolly, I know, has taken her statement. But Iâd like to ask her a few questions myself.â

Miss Jacobs was ushered into the room a few minutes later. Neele rose courteously to greet her.

âI am Chief Inspector Neele,â he said, shaking hands with her. âI am sorry to trouble you for a second time. But this time it is quite informal. I just want to get a clearer picture of exactly what you saw and heard. Iâm afraid it may be painfulââ

âPainful, no,â said Miss Jacobs, accepting the chair he offered her. âIt was a shock, of course. But no emotions were involved.â She added: âYou seem to have tidied up things.â

He presumed she was referring to the removal of the body.

Her eyes, both observant and critical, passed lightly over the assembled people, registering, for Poirot, frank astonishment (What on earth is this?), for Mrs. Oliver, mild curiosity; appraisement for the back of Dr. Stillingfleetâs red head, neighbourly recognition for Claudia to whom she vouchsafed a slight nod, and finally dawning sympathy for Andrew Restarick.

âYou must be the girlâs father,â she said to him. âThereâs not much point to condolences from a total stranger. Theyâre better left unsaid. Itâs a sad world we live in nowadaysâor so it seems to me. Girls study too hard in my opinion.â

Then she turned her face composedly towards Neele.

âYes?â

âI would like you, Miss Jacobs, to tell me in your own words exactly what you saw and heard.â

âI expect it will vary from what I said before,â said Miss Jacobs unexpectedly. âThings do, you know. One tries to make oneâs description as accurate as possible, and so one uses more words. I donât think one is any more accurate; I think, unconsciously, one adds things that you think you may have seen or ought to have seenâor heard. But I will do my best.

âIt started with screams. I was startled. I thought someone must have been hurt. So I was already coming to the door when someone began beating on it, and still screaming. I opened it and saw it was one of my next-door neighboursâthe three girls who live in 67. Iâm afraid I donât know her name, though I know her by sight.â

âFrances Cary,â said Claudia.

âShe was quite incoherent, and stammered out something about someone being deadâsomeone she knewâDavid SomeoneâI didnât catch his last name. She was sobbing and shaking all over. I brought her in, gave her some brandy, and went to see for myself.â

Everyone felt that throughout life that would be what Miss Jacobs would invariably do.

âYou know what I found. Need I describe it?â

âJust briefly, perhaps.â

âA young man, one of these modern young menâgaudy clothes and long hair. He was lying on the floor and he was clearly dead. His shirt was stiff with blood.â

Stillingfleet stirred. He turned his head and looked keenly at Miss Jacobs.

âThen I became aware that there was a girl in the room. She was holding a kitchen knife. She seemed quite calm and self-possessedâreally, most peculiar.â

Stillingfleet said: âDid she say anything?â

âShe said she had been into the bathroom to wash the blood off her handsâand then she said, âBut you canât wash things like that off, can you?ââ

âOut, damnÃ©d spot, in fact?â

âI cannot say that she reminded me particularly of Lady Macbeth. She wasâhow shall I put it?âperfectly composed. She laid the knife down on the table and sat down on a chair.â

âWhat else did she say?â asked Chief Inspector Neele, his eyes dropping to a scrawled note in front of him.

âSomething about hate. That it wasnât safe to hate anybody.â

âShe said something about âpoor David,â didnât she? Or so you told Sergeant Conolly. And that she wanted to be free of him.â

âIâd forgotten that. Yes. She said something about his making her come hereâand something about Louise, too.â

âWhat did she say about Louise?â It was Poirot who asked, leaning forward sharply. Miss Jacobs looked at him doubtfully.

âNothing, really, just mentioned the name. âLike Louise,â she said, and then stopped. It was after she had said about its not being safe to hate peopleâ¦.â

âAnd then?â

âThen she told me, quite calmly, I had better ring up the police. Which I did. We justâsat there until they cameâ¦I did not think I ought to leave her. We did not say anything. She seemed absorbed in her thoughts, and Iâwell, frankly, I couldnât think of anything to say.â

âYou could see, couldnât you, that she was mentally unstable?â said Andrew Restarick. âYou could see that she didnât know what she had done or why, poor child?â

He spoke pleadinglyâhopefully.

âIf it is a sign of mental instability to appear perfectly cool and collected after committing a murder, then I will agree with you.â

Miss Jacobs spoke in the voice of one who quite decidedly did not agree.

Stillingfleet said:

âMiss Jacobs, did she at any time admit that she had killed him?â

âOh yes. I should have mentioned that beforeâIt was the very first thing she did say. As though she was answering some question I had asked her. She said, âYes. Iâve killed him.â And then went on about having washed her hands.â

Restarick groaned and buried his face in his hands. Claudia put her hand on his arm.

Poirot said:

âMiss Jacobs, you say the girl put down the knife she was carrying on that table. It was quite near you? You saw it clearly? Did it appear to you that the knife also had been washed?â

Miss Jacobs looked hesitantly at Chief Inspector Neele. It was clear that she felt that Poirot struck an alien and unofficial note in this presumably official inquiry.

âPerhaps you would be kind enough to answer that?â said Neele.

âNoâI donât think the knife had been washed or wiped in any way. It was stained and discoloured with some thick sticky substance.â

âAh.â Poirot leaned back in his chair.

âI should have thought you would have known all about the knife yourself,â said Miss Jacobs to Neele accusingly. âDidnât your police examine it? It seems to me very lax if they didnât.â

âOh yes, the police examined it,â said Neele. âBut weâerâalways like to get corroboration.â

She darted him a shrewd glance.

âWhat you really mean, I suppose, is that you like to find out how accurate the observation of your witnesses is. How much they make up, or how much they actually see, or think they have seen.â

He smiled slightly as he said:

âI donât think we need have doubts about you, Miss Jacobs. You will make an excellent witness.â

âI shanât enjoy it. But itâs the kind of thing one has to go through with, I suppose.â

âIâm afraid so. Thank you, Miss Jacobs.â He looked round. âNo one has any additional questions?â

Poirot indicated that he had. Miss Jacobs paused near the doorway, displeased.

âYes?â she said.

âAbout this mention of someone called Louise. Did you know who it was the girl meant?â

âHow should I know?â

âIsnât it possible that she might have meant Mrs. Louise Charpentier? You knew Mrs. Charpentier, didnât you?â

âI did not.â

âYou knew that she recently threw herself out of a window in this block of flats?â

âI knew that, of course. I didnât know her Christian name was Louise, and I was not personally acquainted with her.â

âNor, perhaps, particularly wished to be?â

âI have not said so, since the woman is dead. But I will admit that that is quite true. She was a most undesirable tenant, and I and other residents have frequently complained to the management here.â

âOf what exactly?â

âTo speak frankly, the woman drank. Her flat was actually on the top floor above mine and there were continual disorderly parties, with broken glass, furniture knocked over, singing and shouting, a lot ofâerâcoming and going.â

âShe was, perhaps, a lonely woman,â suggested Poirot.

âThat was hardly the impression she conveyed,â said Miss Jacobs acidly. âIt was put forward at the inquest that she was depressed over the state of her health. Entirely her own imagination. She seems to have had nothing the matter with her.â

And having disposed of the late Mrs. Charpentier without sympathy, Miss Jacobs took her departure.

Poirot turned his attention to Andrew Restarick. He asked delicately:

âAm I correct in thinking, Mr. Restarick, that you were at one time well acquainted with Mrs. Charpentier?â

Restarick did not answer for a moment or two. Then he sighed deeply and transferred his gaze to Poirot.

âYes. At one time, many years ago, I knew her very well indeedâ¦Not, I may say, under the name of Charpentier. She was Louise Birell when I knew her.â

âYou wereâerâin love with her!â

âYes, I was in love with herâ¦Head over ears in love with her! I left my wife on her account. We went to South Africa. After barely a year the whole thing blew up. She returned to England. I never heard from her again. I never even knew what had become of her.â

âWhat about your daughter? Did she, also, know Louise Birell?â

âNot to remember her, surely. A child of five years old!â

âBut did she know her?â Poirot persisted.

âYes,â said Restarick slowly. âShe knew Louise. That is to say, Louise came to our house. She used to play with the child.â

âSo it is possible that the girl might remember her, even after a lapse of years?â

âI donât know. I simply donât know. I donât know what she looked like; how much Louise might have changed. I never saw her again, as I told you.â

Poirot said gently, âBut you heard from her, didnât you, Mr. Restarick? I mean, you have heard from her since your return to England?â

Again there came that pause, and the deep unhappy sigh:

âYesâI heard from herâ¦â said Restarick. And then, with sudden curiosity, he asked: âHow did you know that, M. Poirot?â

From his pocket, Poirot drew a neatly folded piece of paper. He unfolded it and handed it to Restarick.

The latter looked at it with a faintly puzzled frown.

Dear Andy

I see from the papers youâre home again. We must meet and compare notes as to what weâve both been doing all these yearsâ

It broke off hereâand started again.

AndyâGuess who this is from! Louise. Donât dare to say youâve forgotten me!â

Dear Andy,

As you will see by this letterhead, Iâm living in the same block of flats as your secretary. What a small world it is! We must meet. Could you come for a drink Monday or Tuesday next week?

Andy darling, I must see you againâ¦Nobody has ever mattered to me but youâyou havenât really forgotten me, either, have you?

âHow did you get this?â asked Restarick of Poirot, tapping it curiously.

âFrom a friend of mine via a furniture van,â said Poirot, with a glance at Mrs. Oliver.

Restarick looked at her without favour.

âI couldnât help it,â said Mrs. Oliver, interpreting his look correctly. âI suppose it was her furniture being moved out, and the men let go of a desk, and a drawer fell out and scattered a lot of things, and the wind blew this along the courtyard, so I picked it up and tried to give it back to them, but they were cross and didnât want it, so I just put it in my coat pocket without thinking. And I never even looked at it until this afternoon when I was taking things out of pockets before sending the coat to the cleaners. So it really wasnât my fault.â

She paused, slightly out of breath.

âDid she get her letter to you written in the end?â Poirot asked.

âYesâshe didâone of the more formal versions! I didnât answer it. I thought it would be wiser not to do so.â

âYou didnât want to see her again?â

âShe was the last person I wanted to see! She was a particularly difficult womanâalways had been. And Iâd heard things about herâfor one that she had become a heavy drinker. And wellâother things.â

âDid you keep her letter to you?â

âNo, I tore it up!â

Dr. Stillingfleet asked an abrupt question.

âDid your daughter ever speak about her to you?â

Restarick seemed unwilling to answer.

Dr. Stillingfleet urged him:

âIt might be significant if she did, you know.â

âYou doctors! Yes, she did mention her once.â

âWhat did she say exactly?â

âShe said quite suddenly: âI saw Louise the other day, Father.â I was startled. I said: âWhere did you see her?â And she said: âIn the restaurant of our flats.â I was a bit embarrassed. I said: âI never dreamed youâd remembered her.â And she said: âIâve never forgotten. Mother wouldnât have let me forget, even if I wanted to.ââ

âYes,â said Dr. Stillingfleet. âYes, that could certainly be significant.â

âAnd you, Mademoiselle,â said Poirot, turning suddenly to Claudia. âDid Norma ever speak to you about Louise Carpenter?â

âYesâit was after the suicide. She said something about her being a wicked woman. She said it in rather a childish way, if you know what I mean.â

âYou were here in the flats yourself on the nightâor more correctly the early morning when Mrs. Carpenterâs suicide occurred?â

âI was not here that night, no! I was away from home. I remember arriving back here the next day and hearing about it.â

She half turned to Restarickâ¦âYou remember? It was the twenty-third. I had gone to Liverpool.â

âYes, of course. You were to represent me at the Hever Trust meeting.â

Poirot said:

âBut Norma slept here that night?â

âYes.â Claudia seemed uncomfortable.

âClaudia?â Restarick laid his hand on her arm. âWhat is it you know about Norma? Thereâs something. Something that youâre holding back.â

âNothing! What should I know about her?â

âYou think sheâs off her head, donât you?â said Dr. Stillingfleet in a conversational voice. âAnd so does the girl with the black hair. And so do you,â he added, turning suddenly on Restarick. âAll of us behaving nicely and avoiding the subject and thinking the same thing! Except, that is, the chief inspector. Heâs not thinking anything. Heâs collecting the facts: mad or a murderess. What about you, Madam?â

âMe?â Mrs. Oliver jumped. âIâdonât know.â

âYou reserve judgment? I donât blame you. Itâs difficult. On the whole, most people agree on what they think. They use different terms for itâthatâs all. Bats in the Belfry. Wanting in the top storey. Off her onion. Mental. Delusions. Does anyone think that girl is sane?â

âMiss Battersby,â said Poirot.

âWho the devil is Miss Battersby?â

âA schoolmistress.â

âIf I ever have a daughter I shall send her to that schoolâ¦Of course Iâm in a different category. I know. I know everything about that girl!â

Normaâs father stared at him.

âWho is this man?â he demanded of Neele. âWhat can he possibly mean by saying that he knows everything about my daughter?â

âI know about her,â said Stillingfleet, âbecause sheâs been under my professional care for the last ten days.â

âDr. Stillingfleet,â said Chief Inspector Neele, âis a highly qualified and reputable psychiatrist.â

âAnd how did she come into your clutchesâwithout someone getting my consent first?â

âAsk Moustaches,â said Dr. Stillingfleet, nodding towards Poirot.

âYouâyouâ¦â

Restarick could hardly speak he was so angry.

Poirot spoke placidly.

âI had your instructions. You wanted care and protection for your daughter when she was found. I found herâand I was able to interest Dr. Stillingfleet in her case. She was in danger, Mr. Restarick, very grave danger.â

âShe could hardly be in any more danger than she is now! Arrested on a charge of murder!â

âTechnically she is not yet charged,â murmured Neele.

He went on:

âDr. Stillingfleet, do I understand that you are willing to give your professional opinion as to Miss Restarickâs mental condition, and as to how well she knows the nature and meaning of her acts?â

âWe can save the MâNaughten act for court,â said Stillingfleet. âWhat you want to know now is, quite simply, if the girl is mad or sane? All right, Iâll tell you. That girl is saneâas sane as any one of you sitting here in this room!â

Twenty-four

I

They stared at him.

âDidnât expect that, did you?â

Restarick said angrily: âYouâre wrong. That girl doesnât even know what sheâs done. Sheâs innocentâcompletely innocent. She canât be held responsible for what she doesnât know sheâs done.â

âYou let me talk for a while. I know what Iâm talking about. You donât. That girl is sane and responsible for her actions. In a moment or two weâll have her in and let her speak for herself. Sheâs the only one who hasnât had the chance of speaking for herself! Oh yes, theyâve got her here stillâlocked up with a police matron in her bedroom. But before we ask her a question or two, Iâve got something to say that youâd better hear first.

âWhen that girl came to me she was full of drugs.â

âAnd he gave them to her!â shouted Restarick. âThat degenerate, miserable boy.â

âHe started her on them, no doubt.â

âThank God,â said Restarick. âThank God for it.â

âWhat are you thanking God for?â

âI misunderstood you. I thought you were going to throw her to the lions when you kept harping on her being sane. I misjudged you. It was the drugs that did it. Drugs that made her do things she would never have done of her own volition, and left her with no knowledge of having done them.â

Stillingfleet raised his voice:

âIf you let me talk instead of talking so much yourself, and being so sure you know all about everything, we might get on a bit. First of all, sheâs not an addict. There are no marks of injections. She didnât sniff snow. Someone or other, perhaps the boy, perhaps someone else, was administering drugs to her without her knowledge. Not just a purple heart or two in the modern fashion. A rather interesting medley of drugsâLSD giving vivid dream sequencesânightmares or pleasurable. Hemp distorting the time factor, so that she might believe an experience has lasted an hour instead of a few minutes. And a good many other curious substances that I have no intention of letting any of you know about. Somebody who was clever with drugs played merry hell with that girl. Stimulants, sedatives, they all played their part in controlling her, and showing her to herself as a completely different person.â

Restarick interrupted: âThatâs what I say. Norma wasnât responsible! Someone was hypnotising her to do these things.â

âYou still havenât got the point! Nobody could make the girl do what she didnât want to do! What they could do, was make her think she had done it. Now weâll have her in and make her see whatâs been happening to her.â

He looked inquiringly at Chief Inspector Neele, who nodded.

Stillingfleet spoke over his shoulder to Claudia, as he went out of the sitting room. âWhereâd you put that other girl, the one you took away from Jacobs, gave a sedative to? In her room on her bed? Better shake her up a bit, and drag her along, somehow. Weâll need all the help we can get.â

Claudia also went out of the sitting room.

Stillingfleet came back, propelling Norma, and uttering rough encouragement.

âThereâs a good girlâ¦Nobodyâs going to bite you. Sit there.â

She sat obediently. Her docility was still rather frightening.

The policewoman hovered by the door looking scandalised.

âAll Iâm asking you to do is to speak the truth. It isnât nearly as difficult as you think.â

Claudia came in with Frances Cary. Frances was yawning heavily. Her black hair hung like a curtain hiding half her mouth as she yawned and yawned again.

âYou need a pick-me-up,â said Stillingfleet to her.

âI wish youâd all let me go to sleep,â murmured Frances indistinctly.

âNobodyâs going to have a chance of sleep until Iâve done with them! Now, Norma, you answer my questionsâThat woman along the passage says you admitted to her that you killed David Baker. Is that right?â

Her docile voice said:

âYes. I killed David.â

âStabbed him?â

âYes.â

âHow do you know you did?â

She looked faintly puzzled. âI donât know what you mean. He was there on the floorâdead.â

âWhere was the knife?â

âI picked it up.â

âIt had blood on it?â

âYes. And on his shirt.â

âWhat did it feel likeâthe blood on the knife? The blood that you got on your hand and had to wash offâWet? Or more like strawberry jam?â

âIt was like strawberry jamâsticky.â She shivered. âI had to go and wash it off my hands.â

âVery sensible. Well, that ties up everything very nicely. Victim, murdererâyouâall complete with the weapon. Do you remember actually doing it?â

âNoâ¦I donât remember thatâ¦But I must have done it, mustnât I?â

âDonât ask me! I wasnât there. Itâs you are the one whoâs saying it. But there was another killing before that, wasnât there? An earlier killing.â

âYou meanâLouise?â

âYes. I mean Louiseâ¦When did you first think of killing her?â

âYears ago. Oh, years ago.â

âWhen you were a child.â

âYes.â

âHad to wait a long time, didnât you?â

âIâd forgotten all about it.â

âUntil you saw her again and recognised her?â

âYes.â

âWhen you were a child, you hated her. Why?â

âBecause she took Father, my father, away.â

âAnd made your mother unhappy?â

âMother hated Louise. She said Louise was a really wicked woman.â

âTalked to you about her a lot, I suppose?â

âYes. I wish she hadnâtâ¦I didnât want to go on hearing about her.â

âMonotonousâI know. Hate isnât creative. When you saw her again did you really want to kill her?â

Norma seemed to consider. A faintly interested look came into her face.

âI didnât, really, you knowâ¦It seemed all so long ago. I couldnât imagine myselfâthatâs whyââ

âWhy you werenât sure you had?â

âYes. I had some quite wild idea that I hadnât killed her at all. That it had been all a dream. That perhaps she really had thrown herself out of the window.â

âWellâwhy not?â

âBecause I knew I had done itâI said I had done it.â

âYou said you had done it? Who did you say that to?â

Norma shook her head. âI mustnâtâ¦It was someone who tried to be kindâto help me. She said she was going to pretend to have known nothing about it.â She went on, the words coming fast and excitedly: âI was outside Louiseâs door, the door of 76, just coming out of it. I thought Iâd been walking in my sleep. Theyâsheâsaid there had been an accident. Down in the courtyard. She kept telling me it had been nothing to do with me. Nobody would ever knowâAnd I couldnât remember what I had doneâbut there was stuff in my handââ

âStuff? What stuff? Do you mean blood?â

âNo, not bloodâtorn curtain stuff. When Iâd pushed her out.â

âYou remember pushing her out, do you?â

âNo, no. Thatâs what was so awful. I didnât remember anything. Thatâs why I hoped. Thatâs why I wentââ She turned her head towards Poirotââto himââ

She turned back again to Stillingfleet.

âI never remembered the things Iâd done, none of them. But I got more and more frightened. Because there used to be quite long times that were blankâquite blankâhours I couldnât account for, or remember where Iâd been and what Iâd been doing. But I found thingsâthings I must have hidden away myself. Mary was being poisoned by me, they found out she was being poisoned at the hospital. And I found the weed killer Iâd hidden away in the drawer. In the flat here there was a flick-knife. And I had a revolver that I didnât even know Iâd bought! I did kill people, but I didnât remember killing them, so Iâm not really a murdererâIâm justâmad! I realised that at last. Iâm mad, and I canât help it. People canât blame you if you do things when you are mad. If I could come here and even kill David, it shows I am mad, doesnât it?â

âYouâd like to be mad, very much?â

âIâyes, I suppose so.â

âIf so, why did you confess to someone that you had killed a woman by pushing her out of the window? Who was it you told?â

Norma turned her head, hesitated. Then raised her hand and pointed.

âI told Claudia.â

âThat is absolutely untrue.â Claudia looked at her scornfully. âYou never said anything of the kind to me!â

âI did. I did.â

âWhen? Where?â

âIâdonât know.â

âShe told me that she had confessed it all to you,â said Frances indistinctly. âFrankly, I thought she was hysterical and making the whole thing up.â

Stillingfleet looked across at Poirot.

âShe could be making it all up,â he said judicially. âThere is quite a case for that solution. But if so, we would have to find the motive, a strong motive, for her desiring the death of those two people, Louise Carpenter and David Baker. A childish hate? Forgotten and done with years ago? Nonsense. Davidâjust to be âfree of him?â It is not for that that girls kill! We want better motives than that. A whacking great lot of moneyâsay!âGreed!â He looked round him and his voice changed to a conventional tone.

âWe want a little more help. Thereâs still one person missing. Your wife is a long time joining us here, Mr. Restarick?â

âI canât think where Mary can be. Iâve rung up. Claudia has left messages in every place we can think of. By now she ought to have rung up at least from somewhere.â

âPerhaps we have the wrong idea,â said Hercule Poirot. âPerhaps Madame is at least partly here alreadyâin a manner of speaking.â

âWhat on earth do you mean?â shouted Restarick angrily.

âMight I trouble you, chÃ¨re Madame?â

Poirot leaned towards Mrs. Oliver. Mrs. Oliver stared.

âThe parcel I entrusted to youââ

âOh.â Mrs. Oliver dived into her shopping bag. She handed the black folder to him.

He heard a sharply indrawn breath near him, but did not turn his head.

He shook off the wrappings delicately and held upâa wig of bouffant golden hair.

âMrs. Restarick is not here,â he said, âbut her wig is. Interesting.â

âWhere the devil did you get that, Poirot?â asked Neele.

âFrom the overnight bag of Miss Frances Cary from which she had as yet no opportunity of removing it. Shall we see how it becomes her?â

With a single deft movement, he swept aside the black hair that masked Francesâs face so effectively. Crowned with a golden aureole before she could defend herself, she glared at them.

Mrs. Oliver exclaimed:

âGood graciousâit is Mary Restarick.â

Frances was twisting like an angry snake. Restarick jumped from his seat to come to herâbut Neeleâs strong grip restrained him.

âNo. We donât want any violence from you. The gameâs up, you know, Mr. Restarickâor shall I call you Robert Orwellââ

A stream of profanity came from the manâs lips. Francesâs voice was raised sharply:

âShut up, you damned fool!â she said.

II

Poirot had abandoned his trophy, the wig. He had gone to Norma, and taken her hand gently in his.

âYour ordeal is over, my child. The victim will not be sacrificed. You are neither mad, nor have you killed anyone. There are two cruel and heartless creatures who plotted against you, with cunningly administered drugs, with lies, doing their best to drive you either to suicide or to belief in your own guilt and madness.â

Norma was staring with horror at the other plotter.

âMy father. My father? He could think of doing that to me. His daughter. My father who loved meââ

âNot your father, mon enfantâa man who came here after your fatherâs death, to impersonate him and lay hands on an enormous fortune. Only one person was likely to recognise himâor rather to recognise that this man was not Andrew Restarickâthe woman who had been Andrew Restarickâs mistress fifteen years ago.â

Twenty-five

Four people sat in Poirotâs room. Poirot in his square chair was drinking a glass of sirop de cassis. Norma and Mrs. Oliver sat on the sofa. Mrs. Oliver was looking particularly festive in unbecoming apple green brocade, surmounted by one of her more painstaking coiffures. Dr. Stillingfleet was sprawled out in a chair with his long legs stretched out, so that they seemed to reach half across the room.

âNow then, there are lots of things I want to know,â said Mrs. Oliver. Her voice was accusatory.

Poirot hastened to pour oil on troubled waters.

âBut, chÃ¨re Madame, consider. What I owe to you I can hardly express. All, but all my good ideas were suggested to me by you.â

Mrs. Oliver looked at him doubtfully.

âWas it not you who introduced to me the phrase âThird Girl?â It is there that I startedâand there, too, that I endedâat the third girl of three living in a flat. Norma was always technically, I suppose, the Third Girlâbut when I looked at things the right way round it all fell into place. The missing answer, the lost piece of the puzzle, every time it was the sameâthe third girl.

âIt was always, if you comprehend me, the person who was not there. She was a name to me, no more.â

âI wonder I never connected her with Mary Restarick,â said Mrs. Oliver. âIâd seen Mary Restarick at Crosshedges, talked to her. Of course the first time I saw Frances Cary, she had black hair hanging all over her face. That would have put anyone off!â

âAgain it was you, Madame, who drew my attention to how easily a womanâs appearance is altered by the way she arranges her hair. Frances Cary, remember, had had dramatic training. She knew all about the art of swift makeup. She could alter her voice at need. As Frances, she had long black hair, framing her face and half hiding it, heavy dead white maquillage, dark pencilled eyebrows and mascara, with a drawling husky voice. Mary Restarick, with her wig of formally arranged golden hair with crimped waves, her conventional clothes, her slight Colonial accent, her brisk way of talking, presented a complete contrast. Yet one felt, from the beginning, that she was not quite real. What kind of a woman was she? I did not know.

âI was not clever about herâNoâI, Hercule Poirot, was not clever at all.â

âHear, hear,â said Dr. Stillingfleet. âFirst time Iâve ever heard you say that, Poirot! Wonders will never cease!â

âI donât really see why she wanted two personalities,â said Mrs. Oliver. âIt seems unnecessarily confusing.â

âNo. It was very valuable to her. It gave her, you see, a perpetual alibi whenever she wanted it. To think that it was there, all the time, before my eyes, and I did not see it! There was the wigâI kept being subconsciously worried by it, but not seeing why I was worried. Two womenânever, at any time, seen together. Their lives so arranged that no one noticed the large gaps in their time schedules when they were unaccounted for. Mary goes often to London, to shop, to visit house agents, to depart with a sheaf of orders to view, supposedly to spend her time that way. Frances goes to Birmingham, to Manchester, even flies abroad, frequents Chelsea with her special coterie of arty young men whom she employs in various capacities which would not be looked on with approval by the law. Special picture frames were designed for the Wedderburn Gallery. Rising young artists had âshowsâ thereâtheir pictures sold quite well, and were shipped abroad or sent on exhibition with their frames stuffed with secret packets of heroinâArt racketsâskilful forgeries of the more obscure Old MastersâShe arranged and organised all these things. David Baker was one of the artists she employed. He had the gift of being a marvellous copyist.â

Norma murmured: âPoor David. When I first met him I thought he was wonderful.â

âThat picture,â said Poirot dreamily. âAlways, always, I came back to that in my mind. Why had Restarick brought it up to his office? What special significance did it have for him? Enfin, I do not admire myself for being so dense.â

âI donât understand about the pictures.â

âIt was a very clever idea. It served as a kind of certificate of identity. A pair of portraits, husband and wife, by a celebrated and fashionable portrait painter of his day. David Baker, when they come out of store, replaces Restarickâs portrait with one of Orwell, making him about twenty years younger in appearance. Nobody would have dreamed that the portrait was a fake; the style, the brush strokes, the canvas, it was a splendidly convincing bit of work. Restarick hung it over his desk. Anyone who knew Restarick years ago, might say: âIâd hardly have known you!â Or âYouâve changed quite a lot,â would look up at the portrait, but would only think he himself had really forgotten what the other man had looked like!â

âIt was a great risk for Restarickâor rather Orwellâto take,â said Mrs. Oliver thoughtfully.

âLess than you might think. He was never a claimant, you see, in the Tichborne sense. He was only a member of a well-known City firm, returning home after his brotherâs death to settle up his brotherâs affairs after having spent some years abroad. He brought with him a young wife recently acquired abroad, and took up residence with an elderly, half blind but extremely distinguished uncle by marriage who had never known him well after his schoolboy days, and who accepted him without question. He had no other near relations, except for the daughter whom he had last seen when she was a child of five. When he originally left for South Africa, the office staff had had two very elderly clerks, since deceased. Junior staff never remains anywhere long nowadays. The family lawyer is also dead. You may be sure that the whole position was studied very carefully on the spot by Frances after they had decided on their coup.

âShe had met him, it seems, in Kenya about two years ago. They were both crooks, though with entirely different interests. He went in for various shoddy deals as a prospectorâRestarick and Orwell went together to prospect for mineral deposits in somewhat wild country. There was a rumour of Restarickâs death (probably true) which was later contradicted.â

âA lot of money in the gamble, I suspect?â said Stillingfleet.

âAn enormous amount of money was involved. A terrific gambleâfor a terrific stake. It came off. Andrew Restarick was a very rich man himself and he was his brotherâs heir. Nobody questioned his identity. And thenâthings went wrong. Out of the blue, he got a letter from a woman who, if she ever came face to face with him, would know at once that he wasnât Andrew Restarick. And a second piece of bad fortune occurredâDavid Baker started to blackmail him.â

âThat might have been expected, I suppose,â said Stillingfleet thoughtfully.

âThey didnât expect it,â said Poirot. âDavid had never blackmailed before. It was the enormous wealth of this man that went to his head, I expect. The sum he had been paid for faking the portrait seemed to him grossly inadequate. He wanted more. So Restarick wrote him large cheques, and pretended that it was on account of his daughterâto prevent her from making an undesirable marriage. Whether he really wanted to marry her, I do not knowâhe may have done. But to blackmail two people like Orwell and Frances Cary was a dangerous thing to do.â

âYou mean those two just cold-bloodedly planned to kill two peopleâquite calmlyâjust like that?â demanded Mrs. Oliver.

She looked rather sick.

âThey might have added you to their list, Madame,â said Poirot.

âMe? Do you mean that it was one of them who hit me on the head? Frances, I suppose? Not the poor Peacock?â

âI do not think it was the Peacock. But you had been already to Borodene Mansions. Now you perhaps follow Frances to Chelsea, or so she thinks, with a rather dubious story to account for yourself. So she slips out and gives you a nice little tap on the head to put paid to your curiosity for a while. You would not listen when I warned you there was danger about.â

âI can hardly believe it of her! Lying about in attitudes of a Burne-Jones heroine in that dirty studio that day. But whyââ She looked at Normaâthen back at Poirot. âThey used herâdeliberatelyâworked upon her, drugged her, made her believe that she had murdered two people. Why?â

âThey wanted a victimâ¦â said Poirot.

He rose from his chair and went to Norma.

âMon enfant, you have been through a terrible ordeal. It is a thing that need never happen to you again. Remember that now, you can have confidence in yourself always. To have known, at close quarters, what absolute evil means, is to be armoured against what life can do to you.â

âI suppose you are right,â said Norma. âTo think you are madâreally to believe it, is a frightening thingâ¦â She shivered. âI donât see, even now, why I escapedâwhy anyone managed to believe that I hadnât killed Davidânot when even I believed I had killed him?â

âBlood was wrong,â said Dr. Stillingfleet in a matter-of-fact tone. âStarting to coagulate. Shirt was âstiff with it,â as Miss Jacobs said, not wet. You were supposed to have killed him not more than about five minutes before Francesâs screaming act.â

âHow did sheââ Mrs. Oliver began to work things out. âShe had been to Manchesterââ

âShe came home by an earlier train, changed into her Mary wig and makeup on the train. Walked into Borodene Mansions and went up in the lift as an unknown blonde. Went into the flat where David was waiting for her, as she had told him to do. He was quite unsuspecting, and she stabbed him. Then she went out again, and kept watch until she saw Norma coming. She slipped into a public cloakroom, changed her appearance, and joined a friend at the end of the road and walked with her, said good-bye to her at Borodene Mansions and went up herself and did her stuffâquite enjoying doing it, I expect. By the time the police had been called and got there, she didnât think anyone would suspect the time lag. I must say, Norma, you gave us all a hell of a time that day. Insisting on having killed everyone the way you did!â

âI wanted to confess and get it all overâ¦Did youâdid you think I might really have done it, then?â

âMe? What do you take me for? I know what my patients will do or wonât do. But I thought you were going to make things damned difficult. I didnât know how far Neele was sticking his neck out. Didnât seem proper police procedure to me. Look at the way he gave Poirot here his head.â

Poirot smiled.

âChief Inspector Neele and I have known each other for many years. Besides, he had been making inquiries about certain matters already. You were never really outside Louiseâs door. Frances changed the numbers. She reversed the 6 and the 7 on your own door. Those numbers were loose, stuck on with spikes. Claudia was away that night. Frances drugged you so that the whole thing was a nightmare dream to you.

âI saw the truth suddenly. The only other person who could have killed Louise was the real âthird girl,â Frances Cary.â

âYou kept half recognising her, you know,â said Stillingfleet, âwhen you described to me how one person seemed to turn into another.â

Norma looked at him thoughtfully.

âYou were very rude to people,â she said to Stillingfleet. He looked slightly taken aback.

âRude?â

âThe things you said to everyone. The way you shouted at them.â

âOh well, yes, perhaps I wasâ¦Iâve got in the way of it. People are so damned irritating.â

He grinned suddenly at Poirot.

âSheâs quite a girl, isnât she?â

Mrs. Oliver rose to her feet with a sigh.

âI must go home.â She looked at the two men and then at Norma. âWhat are we going to do with her?â she asked.

They both looked startled.

âI know sheâs staying with me at the moment,â she went on. âAnd she says sheâs quite happy. But I mean there it is, quite a problem. Lots and lots of money because your fatherâthe real one, I meanâleft it all to you. And that will cause complications, and begging letters and all that. She could go and live with old Sir Roderick, but that wouldnât be fun for a girlâheâs pretty deaf already as well as blindâand completely selfish. By the way, what about his missing papers, and the girl, and Kew Gardens?â

âThey turned up where he thought heâd already lookedâSonia found them,â said Norma, and added, âUncle Roddy and Sonia are getting marriedânext weekââ

âNo fool like an old fool,â said Stillingfleet.

âAha!â said Poirot. âSo the young lady prefers life in England to being embroiled in la politique. She is perhaps wise, that little one.â

âSo thatâs that,â said Mrs. Oliver with finality. âBut to go on about Norma, one has to be practical. Oneâs got to make plans. The girl canât know what she wants to do all by herself. Sheâs waiting for someone to tell her.â

She looked at them severely.

Poirot said nothing. He smiled.

âOh, her?â said Dr. Stillingfleet. âWell, Iâll tell you, Norma. Iâm flying to Australia Tuesday week. I want to look around firstâsee if whatâs been fixed up for me is going to work, and all that. Then Iâll cable you and you can join me. Then we get married. Youâll have to take my word for it that itâs not your money I want. Iâm not one of those doctors who want to endow whacking great research establishments and all that. Iâm just interested in people. I think, too, that youâd be able to manage me all right. All that about my being rude to peopleâI hadnât noticed it myself. Itâs odd, really, when you think of all the mess youâve been inâhelpless as a fly in treacleâyet itâs not going to be me running you, itâs going to be you running me.â

Norma stood quite still. She looked at John Stillingfleet very carefully, as though she was considering something that she knew from an entirely different point of view.

And then she smiled. It was a very nice smileâlike a happy young nannie.

âAll right,â she said.

She crossed the room to Hercule Poirot.

âI was rude, too,â she said. âThe day I came here when you were having breakfast. I said to you that you were too old to help me. That was a rude thing to say. And it wasnât true.â¦â

She put her hands on his shoulders and kissed him.

âYouâd better get us a taxi,â she said to Stillingfleet.

Dr. Stillingfleet nodded and left the room. Mrs. Oliver collected a handbag and a fur stole and Norma slipped on a coat and followed her to the door.

âMadame, un petit momentââ

Mrs. Oliver turned. Poirot had collected from the recesses of the sofa a handsome coil of grey hair.

Mrs. Oliver exclaimed vexedly: âItâs just like everything that they make nowadays, no good at all! Hairpins, I mean. They just slip out, and everything falls off!â

She went out frowning.

A moment or two later she poked her head round the door again. She spoke in a conspiratorial whisper:

âJust tell meâitâs all right, Iâve sent her on downâdid you send that girl to this particular doctor on purpose?â

âOf course I did. His qualifications areââ

âNever mind his qualifications. You know what I mean. He and sheâDid you?â

âIf you must know, yes.â

âI thought so,â said Mrs. Oliver. âYou do think of things, donât you.â

The Agatha Christie Collection

THE HERCULE POIROT MYSTERIES

Match your wits with the famous Belgian detective.

Â 

The Mysterious Affair at Styles

The Murder on the Links

Poirot Investigates

The Murder of Roger Ackroyd

The Big Four

The Mystery of the Blue Train

Peril at End House

Lord Edgware Dies

Murder on the Orient Express

Three Act Tragedy

Death in the Clouds

The A.B.C. Murders

Murder in Mesopotamia

Cards on the Table

Murder in the Mews

Dumb Witness

Death on the Nile

Appointment with Death

Hercule Poirotâ€™s Christmas

Sad Cypress

One, Two, Buckle My Shoe

Evil Under the Sun

Five Little Pigs

The Hollow

The Labors of Hercules

Taken at the Flood

The Underdog and Other Stories

Mrs. McGintyâ€™s Dead

After the Funeral

Hickory Dickory Dock

Dead Manâ€™s Folly

Cat Among the Pigeons

The Clocks

Third Girl

Halloweâ€™en Party

Elephants Can Remember

Curtain: Poirotâ€™s Last Case

Â 

Explore more at www.AgathaChristie.com

The Agatha Christie Collection

THE MISS MARPLE MYSTERIES

Join the legendary spinster sleuth from St. Mary Mead in solving murders far and wide.

Â 

The Murder at the Vicarage

The Body in the Library

The Moving Finger

A Murder Is Announced

They Do It with Mirrors

A Pocket Full of Rye

4:50 From Paddington

The Mirror Crackâ€™d from Side to Side

A Caribbean Mystery

At Bertramâ€™s Hotel

Nemesis

Sleeping Murder

Miss Marple: The Complete Short Stories

THE TOMMY AND TUPPENCE MYSTERIES

Jump on board with the entertaining crime-solving couple from Young Adventurers Ltd.

The Secret Adversary

Partners in Crime

N or M?

By the Pricking of My Thumbs

Postern of Fate

Â 

Explore more at www.AgathaChristie.com

The Agatha Christie Collection

Donâ€™t miss a single one of Agatha Christieâ€™s stand-alone novels and short-story collections.

The Man in the Brown Suit

The Secret of Chimneys

The Seven Dials Mystery

The Mysterious Mr. Quin

The Sittaford Mystery

Parker Pyne Investigates

Why Didnâ€™t They Ask Evans?

Murder Is Easy

The Regatta Mystery and Other Stories

And Then There Were None

Towards Zero

Death Comes as the End

Sparkling Cyanide

The Witness for the Prosecution and Other Stories

Crooked House

Three Blind Mice and Other Stories

They Came to Baghdad

Destination Unknown

Ordeal by Innocence

Double Sin and Other Stories

The Pale Horse

Star over Bethlehem: Poems and Holiday Stories

Endless Night

Passenger to Frankfurt

The Golden Ball and Other Stories

The Mousetrap and Other Plays

The Harlequin Tea Set

Â 

Explore more at www.AgathaChristie.com

About the Author

Agatha Christie is the most widely published author of all time and in any language, outsold only by the Bible and Shakespeare. Her books have sold more than a billion copies in English and another billion in a hundred foreign languages. She is the author of eighty crime novels and short-story collections, nineteen plays, two memoirs, and six novels written under the name Mary Westmacott.

She first tried her hand at detective fiction while working in a hospital dispensary during World War I, creating the now legendary Hercule Poirot with her debut novel The Mysterious Affair at Styles. With The Murder in the Vicarage, published in 1930, she introduced another beloved sleuth, Miss Jane Marple. Additional series characters include the husband-and-wife crime-fighting team of Tommy and Tuppence Beresford, private investigator Parker Pyne, and Scotland Yard detectives Superintendent Battle and Inspector Japp.

Many of Christieâ€™s novels and short stories were adapted into plays, films, and television series. The Mousetrap, her most famous play of all, opened in 1952 and is the longest-running play in history. Among her best-known film adaptations are Murder on the Orient Express (1974) and Death on the Nile (1978), with Albert Finney and Peter Ustinov playing Hercule Poirot, respectively. On the small screen Poirot has been most memorably portrayed by David Suchet, and Miss Marple by Joan Hickson and subsequently Geraldine McEwan and Julia McKenzie.

Christie was first married to Archibald Christie and then to archaeologist Sir Max Mallowan, whom she accompanied on expeditions to countries that would also serve as the settings for many of her novels. In 1971 she achieved one of Britainâ€™s highest honors when she was made a Dame of the British Empire. She died in 1976 at the age of eighty-five. Her one hundred and twentieth anniversary was celebrated around the world in 2010.

www.AgathaChristie.com

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THE AGATHA CHRISTIE COLLECTION

The Man in the Brown Suit

The Secret of Chimneys

The Seven Dials Mystery

The Mysterious Mr. Quin

The Sittaford Mystery

Parker Pyne Investigates

Why Didnâ€™t They Ask Evans?

Murder Is Easy

The Regatta Mystery and Other Stories

And Then There Were None

Towards Zero

Death Comes as the End

Sparkling Cyanide

The Witness for the Prosecution and
Â Â Â Â Â  Other Stories

Crooked House

Three Blind Mice and Other Stories

They Came to Baghdad

Destination Unknown

Ordeal by Innocence

Double Sin and Other Stories

The Pale Horse

Star over Bethlehem: Poems and
Â Â Â Â Â  Holiday Stories

Endless Night

Passenger to Frankfurt

The Golden Ball and Other Stories

The Mousetrap and Other Plays

The Harlequin Tea Set

The Hercule Poirot Mysteries

The Mysterious Affair at Styles

The Murder on the Links

Poirot Investigates

The Murder of Roger Ackroyd

The Big Four

The Mystery of the Blue Train

Peril at End House

Lord Edgware Dies

Murder on the Orient Express

Three Act Tragedy

Death in the Clouds

The A.B.C. Murders

Murder in Mesopotamia

Cards on the Table

Murder in the Mews

Dumb Witness

Death on the Nile

Appointment with Death

Hercule Poirotâ€™s Christmas

Sad Cypress

One, Two, Buckle My Shoe

Evil Under the Sun

Five Little Pigs

The Hollow

The Labors of Hercules

Taken at the Flood

The Underdog and Other Stories

Mrs. McGintyâ€™s Dead

After the Funeral

Hickory Dickory Dock

Dead Manâ€™s Folly

Cat Among the Pigeons

The Clocks

Third Girl

Halloweâ€™en Party

Elephants Can Remember

Curtain: Poirotâ€™s Last Case

The Miss Marple Mysteries

The Murder at the Vicarage

The Body in the Library

The Moving Finger

A Murder Is Announced

They Do It with Mirrors

A Pocket Full of Rye

4:50 from Paddington

The Mirror Crackâ€™d from Side to Side

A Caribbean Mystery

At Bertramâ€™s Hotel

Nemesis

Sleeping Murder

Miss Marple: The Complete
Â Â Â Â Â  Short Stories

The Tommy and Tuppence Mysteries

The Secret Adversary

Partners in Crime

N or M?

By the Pricking of My Thumbs

Postern of Fate

Memoirs

An Autobiography

Come, Tell Me How You Live

Credits

Cover design and illustration by Faith Laurel

Copyright

This book is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, and dialogue are drawn from the authorâ€™s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

AGATHA CHRISTIEÂ® POIROTÂ® THIRD GIRLâ„¢. Copyright Â© 1966 Agatha Christie Limited (a Chorion company). All rights reserved.

THIRD GIRL Â© 1967. Published by permission of G.P. Putnamâ€™s Sons, a member of Penguin Group (USA) Inc. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available upon request.

ISBN 978-0-06-207376-1

EPub Edition Â© MAY 2011 ISBN: 978-0-06-175390-9

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