He said: “What do you feel yourself, M. Poirot? Have you confidence that you can find my daughter?” “Probably not as quickly as the police could do, but yes. I shall find her.” “And — and if you do — ” “But if you wish me to find her, Mr.
Restarick, you must tell me all the circumstances.”
“But I have told them to you. The time, the place, where she ought to be. I can give you a list of her friends…” Poirot was making some violent shakings of his head. “No, no, I suggest you tell me the truth.” “Do you suggest I haven’t told you the truth?” “You have not told me all of it. Of that I am assured. What are you afraid of? What are the unknown facts — the facts that I have to know if I am to have success. Your daughter dislikes her stepmother. That is plain. There is nothing strange about that.
It is a very natural reaction. You must remember that she may have secretly idealised you for many many years. That is quite possible in the case of a broken marriage where a child has had a severe blow in her affections. Yes, yes, I know what I am talking about. You say a child forgets. That is true. Your daughter could have forgotten you in the sense that when she saw you again she might not remember your face or your voice. She would make her own image of you. You went away.
She wanted you to come back. Her mother, no doubt, discouraged her from talking about you, and therefore she thought about you perhaps all the more. You mattered to her all the more. And because she could not talk about you to her own mother she had what is a very natural reaction with a child — the blaming of the parent who remains for the absence of the parent who has gone. She said to herself something in the nature of ‘Father was fond of me. It’s Mother he didn’t like’, and from that was born a kind of idealisation, a kind of secret liaison between you and her. What had happened was not her father’s fault. She will not believe it!
“Oh yes, that often happens, I assure you. I know something of the psychology.
So when she learns that you are coming home, that you and she will be reunited, many memories that she has pushed aside and not thought of for years return. Her father is coming back! He and she will be happy together! She hardly realises the stepmother, perhaps, until she sees her.
And then she is violently jealous. It is most natural, I assure you. She is violently jealous partly because your wife is a goodlooking woman, sophisticated, and well poised, which is a thing girls often resent because they frequently lack confidence in themselves. She herself is possibly gauche with perhaps an inferiority complex. So when she sees her competent and goodlooking stepmother, quite possibly she hates her; but hates her as an adolescent girl who is still half a child might do.” “Well — ” Restarick hesitated. “That is more or less what the doctor said when we consulted him — I mean — ” “Aha,” said Poirot, “so you consulted a doctor? You must have had some reason, is it not so, for calling in a doctor?” “Nothing really.” “Ah no, you cannot say that to Hercule Poirot. It is not nothing. It was something serious and you had better tell me, because if I know just what has been in this girFs mind, I shall make more progress. Things will go quicker.” Restarick was silent for several moments, then he made up his mind.
“This is in absolute confidence, M.
Poirot? I can rely on you — I have your assurance as to that?” “By all means. What was the trouble?” “I cannot be — be sure.” “Your daughter entered into some action against your wife? Something more than being merely childishly rude or saying unpleasant things. It was something worse than that—something more serious. Did she perhaps attack her physically?” “No, it was not an attack — not a physical attack but — nothing was proved.” “No, no. We will admit that.” “My wife became far from well — ” He hesitated.