Caroline was hovering by my elbow.

 

“It was M. Poirot he wanted to see,” she said. “He’d just come from The Larches.

M. Poirot was out. Mr. Raymond thought that he might be here, or that you might

know where he was.”

 

“I haven’t the least idea.”

 

“I tried to make him wait,” said Caroline, “but he said he would call back at

The Larches in half an hour, and went away down the village. A great pity,

because M. Poirot came in practically the minute after he left.”

 

“Came in here?”

 

“No, to his own house.”

 

“How do you know?”

 

“The side window,” said Caroline briefly.

 

It seemed to me that we had now exhausted the topic. Caroline thought otherwise.

 

“Aren’t you going across?”

 

“Across where?”