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Challenger?’
    ‘He’s at Devonport. He comes over in his car whenever he can—week-ends mostly.’
    Poirot nodded. We were walking back to the house. There was a silence, and then he said suddenly:
    ‘Have you a friend whom you can trust, Mademoiselle?’
    ‘There’s Freddie.’
    ‘Other than Mrs Rice.’
    ‘Well, I don’t know. I suppose I have. Why?’
    ‘Because I want you to have a friend to stay with you—immediately.’
    ‘Oh!’
    Nick seemed rather taken aback. She was silent a moment or two, thinking. Then she said doubtfully:
    ‘There’s Maggie. I could get hold of her, I expect.’
    ‘Who is Maggie?’
    ‘One of my Yorkshire cousins. There’s a large family of them. He’s a clergyman, you know. Maggie’s about my age, and I usually have her to stay sometime or other in the summer. She’s no fun, though—one of those painfully pure girls, with the kind of hair that has just become fashionable by accident. I was hoping to get out of having her this year.’
    ‘Not at all. Your cousin, Mademoiselle, will do admirably. Just the type of person I had in mind.’
    ‘All right,’ said Nick, with a sigh. ‘I’ll wire her. I certainly don’t know who else I could get hold of just now. Everyone’s fixed up. But if it isn’t the Choirboys’ Outing or the Mothers’ Beanfeast she’ll come all right.Though what you expect her to do …’
    ‘Could you arrange for her to sleep in your room?’
    ‘I suppose so.’
    ‘She would not think that an odd request?’
    ‘Oh, no, Maggie never thinks. She just does —earnestly, you know. Christian works—with faith and perseverance. All right, I’ll wire her to come on Monday.’
    ‘Why not tomorrow?’
    ‘With Sunday trains? She’ll think I’m dying if I suggest that. No, I’ll say Monday. Are you going to tell her about the awful fate hanging over me?’
    ‘ Nous verrons . You still make a jest of it? You have courage, I am glad to see.’
    ‘It makes a diversion anyway,’ said Nick.
    Something in her tone struck me and I glanced at her curiously. I had a feeling that there was something she had left untold. We had re-entered the drawing-room. Poirot was fingering the newspaper on the sofa.
    ‘You read this, Mademoiselle?’ he asked, suddenly.
    ‘The St Loo Herald ? Not seriously. I opened it to see the tides. It gives them every week.’
    ‘I see. By the way, Mademoiselle, have you ever made a will?’
    ‘Yes, I did. About six months ago. Just before my op.’
    ‘ Qu’est ce que vous dites ? Your op ?’
    ‘Operation. For appendicitis. Someone said I ought to make a will, so I did. It made me feel quite important.’
    ‘And the terms of that will?’
    ‘I left End House to Charles. I hadn’t much else to leave, but what there was I left to Freddie. I should think probably the—what do you call them—liabilities would have exceeded the assets, really.’
    Poirot nodded absently.
    ‘I will take my leave now. Au revoir, Mademoiselle . Be careful.’
    ‘What of?’ asked Nick.
    ‘You are intelligent. Yes, that is the weak point—in which direction are you to be careful? Who can say? But have confidence, Mademoiselle. In a few days I shall have discovered the truth.’
    ‘Until then beware of poison, bombs, revolver shots, motor accidents and arrows dipped in the secret poison of the South American Indians,’ finished Nick glibly.
    ‘Do not mock yourself, Mademoiselle,’ said Poirot gravely.
    He paused as he reached the door.
    ‘By the way,’ he said. ‘What price did M. Lazarus offer you for the portrait of your grandfather?’
    ‘Fifty pounds.’
    ‘Ah!’ said Poirot.
    He looked earnestly back at the dark saturnine face above the mantelpiece.
    ‘But, as I told you, I don’t want to sell the old boy.’
    ‘No,’ said Poirot, thoughtfully. ‘No, I understand.’

Chapter 4
There Must Be Something!
    ‘Poirot,’ I said, as soon as we were out upon the road. ‘There is one thing I think you ought to know.’
    ‘And