‘Actually,’ said Mrs Oliver ruefully, ‘it’s all much harder to arrange than you’d think. Because you’ve got to allow for real people being quite intelligent, and in my books they needn’t be.’

‘And it is to assist you in arranging this that you have sent for me?’

Poirot did not try very hard to keep an outraged resentment out of his voice.

‘Oh, no,’ said Mrs Oliver. ‘Of course not! I’ve done all that. Everything’s all set for tomorrow. No, I wanted you for quite another reason.’

‘What reason?’

Mrs Oliver’s hands strayed upward to her head. She was just about to sweep them frenziedly through her hair in the old familiar gesture when she remembered the intricacy of her hair-do. Instead, she relieved her feelings by tugging at her ear lobes.

‘I dare say I’m a fool,’ she said. ‘But I think there’s something wrong.’

Chapter 2

Chapter 2

There was a moment’s silence as Poirot stared at her. Then he asked sharply: ‘Something wrong? How?’

‘I don’t know…That’s what I want you to find out. But I’ve felt – more and more – that I was being – oh! – engineered…jockeyed along…Call me a fool if you like, but I can only say that if there was to be a real murder tomorrow instead of a fake one, I shouldn’t be surprised!’

Poirot stared at her and she looked back at him defiantly.

‘Very interesting,’ said Poirot.

‘I suppose you think I’m a complete fool,’ said Mrs Oliver defensively.

‘I have never thought you a fool,’ said Poirot.

‘And I know what you always say – or look – about intuition.’

‘One calls things by different names,’ said Poirot. ‘I am quite ready to believe that you have noticed something, or heard something, that has definitely aroused in you anxiety. I think it is possible that you yourself may not even know just what it is that you have seen or noticed or heard. You are aware only of the result. If I may so put it, you do not know what it is that you know. You may label that intuition if you like.’

‘It makes one feel such a fool,’ said Mrs Oliver, ruefully, ‘not to be able to be definite.’

‘We shall arrive,’ said Poirot encouragingly. ‘You say that you have had the feeling of being – how did you put it – jockeyed along? Can you explain a little more clearly what you mean by that?’