“How did I . . . how did I get hold of the two keys?”

“Yes. That is the question I asked you. Please answer it.”

“I . . . well, if you must know, I got hold of those keys thanks to my own wits. I had a word in the ear of a member of the hotel staff and asked if they’d be good enough to let me have a master key. And they did. I then returned it to them, once I’d used it. All discreet, like.”

I was standing close enough to Poirot to hear the noise of disapproval that he made. “Which member of staff, monsieur? They are all here in this room. Point to the person who gave you this master key.”

“I can’t remember who it was. A man—that’s all I can tell you. I’ve a pitiful memory for faces.” As he said this, Kidd rubbed the red scratches on his own face with his thumb and forefinger.

“So, with this master key you let yourself into all three rooms?”

“No, only Room 238. That’s where all the keys ought to have ended up, waiting for Jennie to take them, but I could only find two. As you’ve said, one was hidden behind a tile in the fireplace. I didn’t like to stay and search the room for the third key, what with Mr. Negus’s body being there and all.”

“You are lying,” Poirot told him. “It does not matter. You will discover, in due course, that you cannot lie your way out of this predicament. But let us move on. No, do not sit down. I have another question—for you and Jennie Hobbs. It was part of the plan, was it not, that Jennie should bring her tale of mortal fear to me at Pleasant’s Coffee House at just after half past seven on the night of the murders?”

“Yes,” said Jennie, looking not at Poirot but at Samuel Kidd.

“Forgive me, then, but I do not understand something important. You were too afraid to go through with the plan, you say, and so you did not arrive at the hotel at six o’clock. Yet the plan went ahead without you, it seems. The only deviation was that Richard Negus killed himself, yes? He put the poison into his own drink, rather than having it put in his drink by you. Is everything that I have said so far correct, mademoiselle?”

“Yes, it is.”

“In that case, if the only altered detail was Richard Negus killing himself instead of being killed, we can assume that the deaths took place as planned: after the ordering of the sandwiches and scones, between a quarter past seven and eight o’clock. Yes, Miss Hobbs?”

“That is right,” said Jennie. She did not sound quite as certain as she had a moment ago.