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It did not change, that face. He read the telegram, smoothed it out, folded it up neatly and put it in his pocket.
Mrs. Mercado was watching him. She said in a choked voice: “Is that—from America?”
“No, madame,” he said. “It is from Tunis.”
She stared at him for a moment as though she did not understand, then with a long sigh, she leant back in her seat.
“Father Lavigny,” she said. “I was right. I’ve always thought there was something queer about him. He said things to me once—I suppose he’s mad . . .” She paused and then said, “I’ll be quiet. But I must leave this place. Joseph and I can go in and sleep at the Rest House.”
“Patience, madame,” said Poirot. “I will explain everything.”
Captain Maitland was looking at him curiously.
“Do you consider you’ve definitely got the hang of this business?” he demanded.
Poirot bowed.
It was a most theatrical bow. I think it rather annoyed Captain Maitland.
“Well,” he barked. “Out with it, man.”
But that wasn’t the way Hercule Poirot did things. I saw perfectly well that he meant to make a song and dance of it. I wondered if he really did know the truth, or if he was just showing off.
He turned to Dr. Reilly.
“Will you be so good, Dr. Reilly, as to summon the others?”
Dr. Reilly jumped up and went off obligingly. In a minute or two the other members of the expedition began to file into the room. First Reiter and Emmott. Then Bill Coleman. Then Richard Carey and finally Mr. Mercado.
Poor man, he really looked like death. I suppose he was mortally afraid that he’d get hauled over the coals for carelessness in leaving dangerous chemicals about.
Everyone seated themselves round the table very much as we had done on the day M. Poirot arrived. Both Bill Coleman and David Emmott hesitated before they sat down, glancing towards Sheila Reilly. She had her back to them and was standing looking out of the window.
“Chair, Sheila?” said Bill.
David Emmott said in his low pleasant drawl, “Won’t you sit down?”
She turned then and stood for a minute looking at them. Each was indicating a chair, pushing it forward. I wondered whose chair she would accept.
In the end she accepted neither.
“I’ll sit here,” she said brusquely. And she sat down on the edge of a table quite close to the window.
“That is,” she added, “if Captain Maitland doesn’t mind my staying?”
I’m not quite sure what
Captain Maitland would have said. Poirot forestalled him.
“Stay by all means, mademoiselle,” he said. “It is, indeed, necessary that you should.”
She raised her eyebrows.
“Necessary?”
“That is the word I used, mademoiselle. There are some questions I shall have to ask you.”
Again her eyebrows went up but she said nothing further. She turned her face to the window as though determined to ignore what went on in the room behind her.
