‘Oh, we all are,’ said Miss Lyall hypocritically. She added, ‘This business is rather in your line. Or it may come to be. Can’t you do anything?’

‘I have done what I could.’

Miss Lyall leaned forward eagerly.

‘What have you done?’ she asked with pleasurable excitement.

‘I advised Mrs Gold to leave the island before it was too late.’

‘Oo-er—so you think—’ she stopped.

‘Yes, mademoiselle?’

‘So that’s what you think is going to happen!’ said Pamela slowly. ‘But he couldn’t—he’d never do a thing like that…He’s so nice really. It’s all that Chantry woman. He wouldn’t—He wouldn’t—do—’

She stopped—then she said softly:

‘Murder? Is that—is that really the word that’s in your mind?’

‘It is in someone’s mind, mademoiselle. I will tell you that.’

Pamela gave a sudden shiver.

‘I don’t believe it,’ she declared.

Chapter 5

The sequence of events on the night of October the twenty-ninth was perfectly clear.

To begin with, there was a scene between the two men—Gold and Chantry. Chantry’s voice rose louder and louder and his last words were overheard by four persons—the cashier at the desk, the manager, General Barnes and Pamela Lyall.

‘You god-damned swine! If you and my wife think you can put this over on me, you’re mistaken! As long as I’m alive, Valentine will remain my wife.’

Then he had flung out of the hotel, his face livid with rage.

That was before dinner. After dinner (how arranged no one knew) a reconciliation took place. Valentine asked Marjorie Gold to come out for a moonlight drive. Pamela and Sarah went with them. Gold and Chantry played billiards together. Afterwards they joined Hercule Poirot and General Barnes in the lounge.

For the first time almost, Chantry’s face was smiling and good-tempered.

‘Have a good game?’ asked the General.

The Commander said:

‘This fellow’s too good for me! Ran out with a break of forty-six.’

Douglas Gold deprecated this modestly.

‘Pure fluke. I assure you it was. What’ll you have? I’ll go and get hold of a waiter.’

‘Pink gin for me, thanks.’

‘Right. General?’

‘Thanks. I’ll have a whisky and soda.’

‘Same for me. What about you, M. Poirot?’

‘You are most amiable. I should like a sirop de cassis.’

‘A sirop—excuse me?’

‘Sirop de cassis. The syrup of blackcurrants.’

‘Oh, a liqueur! I see. I suppose they have it here? I never heard of it.’

‘They have it, yes. But it is not a liqueur.’

Douglas Gold said, laughing:

‘Sounds a funny taste to me—but every man his own poison! I’ll go and order them.’

Commander Chantry sat down. Though not by nature a talkative or a social man, he was clearly doing his best to be genial.

‘Odd how one gets used to doing without any news,’ he remarked.

The General grunted.

‘Can’t say the Continental Daily Mail four days old is much use to me. Of course I get The Times sent to me and Punch every week, but they’re a devilish long time in coming.’