Yes, I suppose that could be — but why should the foreign girl want to either.
You mean she might have resented things that Mrs. Restarick said to her… She’s quite an attractive little thing — I suppose Andrew might have taken a fancy to her — nothing serious of course — but it might have annoyed Mary, and then she might have pitched into the girl and — ” Out of the corner of her eye, Mrs. Oliver perceived Poirot signalling wildly to her.
“Just a moment, darling,” said Mrs.
Oliver into the telephone. “It’s the baker.” Poirot looked affronted. “Hang on.” She laid down the receiver, hurried across the room, and backed Poirot into a breakfast nook.
“Yes,” she demanded breathlessly.
“A baker,” said Poirot with scorn.
“Me!” “Well, it was necessary to think of something quickly. What were you signalling about? Did you understand what she — ” Poirot cut her short.
“You shall tell me presently. I know enough. What I want you to do is, with your rapid powers of improvisation, to arrange some plausible pretext for me to visit the Restaricks — an old friend of yours, shortly to be in the neighbourhood.
Perhaps you could say — ” “Leave it to me. I’ll think of something.
Shall you give a false name?” “Certainly not. Let us at least try to keep it simple.” Mrs. Oliver nodded, and hurried back to the abandoned telephone.
“Naomi? I can’t remember what we were saying. Why does something always come to interrupt just when one has settled down to a nice gossip. I can’t even remember now what I rang you up for to begin with– Oh yes — that child Thora’s address — Norma, I mean — and you gave it to me. But there was something else I wanted to — oh, I remember. An old friend of mine. A most fascinating little man. Actually I was talking about him the other day down there. Hercule Poirot his name is. He’s going to be staying quite close to the Restaricks and he is most tremendously anxious to meet old Sir Roderick. He knows a lot about him and has a terrific admiration for him, and for some wonderful discovery of his in the war — or some scientific thing he did — anyway, he is very anxious to ‘call upon him and present his respects’ that’s how he put it. Will that be all right, do you think?
Will you warn them? Yes, he’ll probably just turn up out of the blue. Tell them to make him tell them some wonderful espionage stories… He–what? Oh! your mowers? Yes, of course you must go. Goodbye.” She put back the receiver and sank down in an armchair. “Goodness, how exhausting. Was that all right?” “Not bad,” said Poirot.
“I thought I’d better pin it all to the old boy. Then you’ll get to see the lot which I suppose is what you want. And one can always be vague about scientific subjects if one is a woman, and you can think up something more definite that sounds probable by the time you arrive. Now, do you want to hear what she was telling me?” “There has been gossip, I gather. About the health of Mrs. Restarick?” “That’s it. It seems she had some kind of mysterious illness — gastric in nature — and the doctors were puzzled. They sent her into hospital and she got quite all right, but there didn’t seem any real cause to account for it. And she went home, and it all began to start again — and again the doctors were puzzled. And then people began to talk. A rather irresponsible nurse started it and her sister told a neighbour, and the neighbour went out on daily work and told someone else, and how queer it all was. And then people began saying that her husband must be trying to poison her. The sort of thing people always say—but in this case it really didn’t seem to make sense. And then Naomi and I wondered about the au pair girl—at least she isn’t exactly an au pair girl, she’s a kind of secretary companion to the old boy — so really there isn’t any kind of reason why she should administer weed killer to Mrs.