“That is unfortunate.”

“I blame you,” Nancy said bluntly. She clasped her hands together. “Oh, I suppose I might as well tell you: I was talking about myself before. I am the person who would murder Harriet, Ida and Richard if anyone did, but, as you heard me say, I did not. So I don’t understand what can have happened.”

“You disliked them?”

“Loathed them. Wished them dead many a time. Oh, my!” Nancy clapped her hands to her cheeks suddenly. “Are they really dead? I suppose I should feel thrilled, or relieved. I want to be happy about it, but I can’t be happy while thinking about Harriet, Richard and Ida. Isn’t that a fine irony?”

“Why did you dislike them so?”

“I would rather not discuss it.”

“Madame, I would not ask if I did not judge it necessary.”

“Nevertheless, I am unwilling to answer.”

Poirot sighed. “Where were you on Thursday evening of last week, between a quarter past seven and eight o’clock?”

Nancy frowned. “I haven’t the faintest idea. I have enough trouble remembering what I need to do this week. Oh, wait. Thursday, of course. I was across the road, at my friend Louisa’s house. Louisa Wallace. I had finished my portrait of her, so I took it round there and stayed for dinner. I think I was there from about six until nearly ten. I might have even stayed longer if Louisa’s husband St. John had not been there too. He’s an appalling snob. Louisa is such a darling, she’s incapable of recognizing fault in anyone—you must know the type. She likes to believe that St. John and I are desperately fond of one another because we’re both artists, but I can’t abide him. He’s certain that his sort of art is superior to mine, and he takes every opportunity to tell me so. Plants and fish—that’s what he paints. Dreary old leaves and chilly-eyed cods and haddocks!”

“He is a zoological and botanical artist?”

“I am not interested in any painter who never paints a human face,” said Nancy flatly. “I’m sorry, but there it is. St. John insists that you can’t paint a face without telling a story, and once you start to impose a story, you inevitably distort the visual data, or some such nonsense! What is wrong with telling a story, for heaven’s sake?”

“Will St. John Wallace tell me the same story that you have told me about last Thursday evening?” asked Poirot. “Will he confirm that you were in his house between six and nearly ten o’clock?”

“Of course. This is absurd, Monsieur Poirot. You’re asking me all the questions you would ask a murderer, and I’m not one. Who has told you that these murders must have been committed by me?”

“You were seen running from the Bloxham Hotel in a state of agitation shortly after eight o’clock. As you ran, you dropped two keys on the ground. You bent to pick them up, then ran away. The witness who saw you, he recognized your face from the newspapers and identified the famous artist Nancy Ducane.”