‘You are Miss Barnard?’ I asked.

‘I am Megan Barnard. You belong to the police, I suppose?’

‘Well,’ I said. ‘Not exactly—’

She interrupted me.

‘I don’t think I’ve got anything to say to you. My sister was a nice bright girl with no men friends. Good morning.’

She gave me a short laugh as she spoke and regarded me challengingly.

‘That’s the correct phrase, I believe?’ she said.

‘I’m not a reporter, if that’s what you’re getting at.’

‘Well, what are you?’ She looked around. ‘Where’s mum and dad?’

‘Your father is showing the police your sister’s bedroom. Your mother’s in there. She’s very upset.’

The girl seemed to make a decision.

‘Come in here,’ she said.

She pulled open a door and passed through. I followed her and found myself in a small, neat kitchen.

I was about to shut the door behind me—but found an unexpected resistance. The next moment Poirot had slipped quietly into the room and shut the door behind him.

‘Mademoiselle Barnard?’ he said with a quick bow.

‘This is M. Hercule Poirot,’ I said.

Megan Barnard gave him a quick, appraising glance.

‘I’ve heard of you,’ she said. ‘You’re the fashionable private sleuth, aren’t you?’

‘Not a pretty description—but it suffices,’ said Poirot.

The girl sat down on the edge of the kitchen table. She felt in her bag for a cigarette. She placed it between her lips, lighted it, and then said in between two puffs of smoke:

‘Somehow, I don’t see what M. Hercule Poirot is doing in our humble little crime.’

‘Mademoiselle,’ said Poirot. ‘What you do not see and what I do not see would probably fill a volume. But all that is of no practical importance. What is of practical importance is something that will not be easy to find.’

‘What’s that?’

‘Death, mademoiselle, unfortunately creates a prejudice. A prejudice in favour of the deceased. I heard what you said just now to my friend Hastings. “A nice bright girl with no men friends.” You said that in mockery of the newspapers. And it is very true—when a young girl is dead, that is the kind of thing that is said. She was bright. She was happy. She was sweet-tempered. She had not a care in the world. She had no undesirable acquaintances. There is a great charity always to the dead. Do you know what I should like this minute? I should like to find someone who knew Elizabeth Barnard and who does not know she is dead! Then, perhaps, I should hear what is useful to me—the truth.’

Megan Barnard looked at him for a few minutes in silence whilst she smoked. Then, at last, she spoke. Her words made me jump.

‘Betty,’ she said, ‘was an unmitigated little ass!’

Chapter 11

Megan Barnard

As I said, Megan Barnard’s words, and still more the crisp businesslike tone in which they were uttered, made me jump.

Poirot, however, merely bowed his head gravely.

‘Ala bonne heure,’ he said. ‘You are intelligent, mademoiselle.’