Poirot cried out: "We have been idiots - fools! We should have known - then. What did she say? 'What could I have seen or heard? I was on the deck below. Naturally, if I had been unable to sleep, if I had mounted the stairs, then perhaps I might have seen this assassin, this monster, enter or leave Madame's cabin, but as it is -' Of course, that is what did happen! She did come up. She did see someone gliding into Linnet Doyle's cabin - or coming out of it. And, because of her greed, her insensate greed, she lies here -"
"And we are no nearer to knowing who killed her," finished Race disgustedly.
Poirot shook his head. "No, no. We know much more now. We know - we know almost everything. Only what we know seems incredible... Yet it must be so. Only I do not see. Pah! what a fool I was this morning! We felt - both of us felt - that she was keeping something back, and yet we never realized the logical reason, blackmail."
"She must have demanded hush money straight away," said Race. "Demanded it with threats. The murderer was forced to accede to that request and paid her in French notes. Anything there?"
Poirot shook his head thoughtfully. "I hardly think so. Many people take a reserve of money with them when travelling - sometimes five pound notes, sometimes dollars, but very often French notes as well. Possibly the murderer paid her all he had in a mixture of currencies. Let us continue our reconstruction."
"The murderer comes to her cabin, gives her the money, and then -"
"And then," said Poirot, "she counts it. Oh, yes, I know that class. She would count the money, and while she counted it she was completely off her guard. The murderer struck. Having done so successfully, he gathered up the money and fled - not noticing that the corner of one of the notes was torn."
"We may get him that way," suggested Race doubtfully.
"I doubt it," said Poirot. "He will examine those notes, and will probably notice the tear. Of course if he were of a parsimonious disposition he would not be able to bring himself to destroy a mille note - but I fear - I very much fear that his temperament is just the opposite."
"How do you make that out?"
"Both this crime and the murder of Madame Doyle demanded certain qualities - courage, audacity, bold execution, lightning action; those qualities do not accord with a saving, prudent disposition."
Race shook his head sadly. "I'd better get Bessner down," he said.
The stout doctor's examination did not take long. Accompanied by a good many Ach's and So's, he went to work.
"She has been dead not more than an hour," he announced. "Death it was very quick - at once."
"And what weapon do you think was used?"
"Ach, it is interesting, that. It was something very sharp, very thin, very delicate. I could show you the kind of thing."
Back again in his cabin he opened a case and extracted a long, delicate, surgical knife.
"It was something like that, my friend; it was not a common table knife."
"I suppose," suggested Race smoothly, "that none of your own knives are - er - missing, Doctor?"
Bessner stared at him; then his face grew red with indignation.
"What is that you say? Do you think I - I, Carl Bessner - who so well-known is all over Austria - I with my clinics, my highly born patients - I have killed a miserable little femme de chambre?! Ah, but it is ridiculous - absurd, what you say! None of my knives are missing - not one, I tell you. They are all here, correct, in their places. You can see for yourself. And this insult to my profession I will not forget."
Dr Bessner closed his case with a snap, flung it down and stamped out onto the deck.
"Whew! " said Simon. "You've put the old boy's back up."
Poirot shrugged his shoulders. "It is regrettable."
"You're on the wrong track. Old Bessner's one of the best, even though he is a kind of Boche."
Dr Bessner reappeared suddenly.
"Will you be so kind as to leave me now my cabin? I have to do the dressing of my patient's leg."
Miss Bowers had entered with him and stood, brisk and professional, waiting for the others to go.
Race and Poirot crept out meekly. Race muttered something and went off. Poirot turned to his left. He heard scraps of girlish conversation, a little laugh. Jacqueline and Rosalie were together in the latter's cabin. The door was open and the two girls were standing near it. As his shadow fell on them they looked up. He saw Rosalie Otterbourne smile at him for the first time - a shy welcoming smile - a little uncertain in its lines, as of one who does a new and unfamiliar thing.
"You talk the scandal, Mesdemoiselles?" he accused them.
"No, indeed," said Rosalie. "As a matter of fact we were just comparing lipsticks."
Poirot smiled. "Les chiffons d'aujourd hui," he murmured.
But there was something a little mechanical about his smile, and Jacqueline de Bellefort, quicker and more observant than Rosalie, saw it. She dropped the lipstick she was holding and came out upon the deck.
"Has something - what has happened now?"
"It is as you guess, Mademoiselle; something has happened."
"What?" Rosalie came out too.
"Another death," said Poirot.
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