Exactly what drove the pair into action could only be guessed at—and I noticed that Holmes in the next room made no attempt to do so, although Long and Hammett happily argued about the possibilities: Hammett proposed that the hair-trigger of Greenfield's guilty conscience needed only the tiniest pressure to perceive us as being on their trail; Long thought it likely that the changes in international relations since the War ended meant that France would be more willing to extradite a resident foreign criminal. Personally, I suspected that Flo's father, now a man in his middle fifties, was simply tiring of Europe, wanted to come home, and knew that if he were to be linked to that dead policeman, he would be a fugitive for the rest of his life. He'd tried, back in 1914, to enter the house, and been thwarted by the watch-dogs. This was his last chance to clean matters up.

In any case, the two had reacted instantaneously, scrambling to locate an aeroplane for Rosa—not Robert, whose memorable scars would surely attract the attention of his fellow passengers and, as far as he knew, be recognisable by me. A brief conversation with a ticket-agent would have told them that the only P. & O. boat whose sailing coincided with our hasty departure from Southern England was the Marguerite, which would be in Port Said on the Tuesday. The aeroplane got Rosa there before us. She boarded as Lilly Montera, kept a low profile, and asked questions of various porters and passengers concerning our status and confirming our San Francisco destination. In Aden, the last port before India, she left the boat.

It was just possible that the aeroplane had continued south after leaving her at Port Said, taking Robert to Aden, where he had set up a desperate and unsuccessful attempt at murder. I was still unconvinced that the falling balcony had not been an accident, but it shouldn't be hugely difficult to find out if he was there.