to
talk
a
. tll
'
.
.
I. w(rs,n t
a D hat
w o.
man
the
one n
the Chanel model
- t s
me,he
at?es
-
t nantry,
I
mean.
I
thought
it
was.
I
rec
°
gnizedhe
r ?n )nce.
She's
really
rather
marvellous,
isn't
she?
I
meant
'
-
sJ/.,; nderstand
how
people
go
uite
er
t
.....
car/el .
.
q
a v
abou
her.
ane
lull l -- s y expects them
to!
That's
half the
battle.
116
Those other people who came last night are called Gold. He's
terribly good-looking.'
'Honeymooners?' murmured Sarah in a stifled voice.
Miss Lyall shook her head in an experienced manner.
'Oh, no - her clothes aren't new enough. You can always tell
brides! Don't you think it's the most fascinating thing in the
world to watch'people, M. Poirot, and see what you can fred
out about them by just looking?'
'Not just looking, darling,' said Sarah sweetly. 'You ask a lot
of questions, too.'
'I haven't even spoken to the Golds yet,' said Miss Lyall
with dignity. 'And anyway I don't se why one shouldn't be
interested in one's fellow-creatures? Human nature is simply
fascinating. Don't you think so, M. Poirot?'
This time she paused long enough to allow her companion to
reply.
Without taking his eyes offthe blue water, M. Poirot replied:
Pamela was shocked.
'Oh, M. Poirot! I don't think anything's so interesting - so
incalculable as a human being!'
'Incalculable? That, no.'
'Oh, but they are. Just as you think you've got them
beautifully taped - they do something completely unexpected.'
Hercule Poirot shook his head.
'No, no, that is not true. It is most rare that anyone does an
action that is not clans son caractbre. It is in the end
monotonous.'
She was silent for quite a minute and a half before returning
to the attack.
'As soon as I see people I begin wondering about them what
they're like - what relations they are to each other - what
they're thinking and feeling. It's - oh, it's quite thrilling.'
'Hardly that,' said Hercule Poirot. 'Nature repeats herself
more than one would imagine. The sea,' he added thoughtfully,
'has infinitely more variety.'
117
Sarah turned her head sideways and asked:
'You think that human beings tend to reproduce certain
patterns? Stereotyped patterns?'
'Prcisment,' said Poirot, and traced a design in the sand
with his £mger.
'What's that you're drawing?' asked Pamela curiously.
'A triangle,' said Poirot.
But Pamela's attention had been diverted elsewhere.
'Here are the Chantrys,' she said.
A woman was coming down the beach - a tall woman, very
conscious of herself and her body. She gave a half-nod and
smile and sat down a little distance away on the beach. The
scarlet and gold silk wrap slipped down from her shoulders.
She was wearing a white bathing-dress.
Pamela sighed.
'Hasn't she got a lovely figure?'
But Poirot was looking at her face - the face of a woman of
thirty-nine who had been famous since sixteen for her beauty.
He knew, as everyone knew, all about Valentine Chantry,.
She had been famous for many things - for her caprices, for her
wealth, for her enormous sapphire-blue eyes, for her matrimonial
ventures and adventures. She had had five husbands
and innumerable lovers. She had in mm been the wife of an
Italian count, of ar American steel magnate, of a tennis
professional, of a racing motorist. Of these four the American
had died, but the others had been shed negligently in the
divorce court. Six months ago she had married a fifth time a
commander in the .navy.
He it was who came striding down the beach behind her.
Silent, dark - with a pugnacious jaw and a sullen manner. A
touch of the primeval ape about him.
She said:
'Tony darling - my cigarette case...'
He had it ready for her - lighted her cigarette - helped her
to slip the straps of the white bathing-dress from her shoulders.
She lay, arms outstretched in the sun. He sat by her like some
wild beast that guards it prey.
118
Pamela said, h. her voice just lowered sufficiently:
'You know :ey invest me frightfully... He's such a brute!
So silent and - m0sort ofgIowering. I suppose a woman of her kind
likes that. It rmstmst be le controlling a tiger! I wonder how long
it will last. Sk oae get tired of them very soon, I believe -especially
noWflabadays. All the same, if she tried to get rid of him,
I think he might ;rht be dangerous.'
Another couphlple cae down the beach - rather shyly. They
were the newC0,mers 0fthe night before. Mx and Mxs Douglas
Gold as Miss L:J Lyall knew from her inspection of the hotel
visitors' book. She knew, too, for such were the Italian
regulations - teiiaeir Clfistian names and their ages as set down
from their passpotports.
Mr Dougl a Caxeron Gold was thirty-one and Mrs
Marjorie Emro PA Gold was thirty-five.
Miss Lyall'shobbyin life, as has been said, was the study of
human beings. IhTUnlikemost English people, she was capable of
speaking to stmgangers on sight instead of allowing four days to
a week to elaple before making the first cautious advance as is
the customary gnl3ritish habit. She, therefore, noting the slight
hesitancy and shy/yness of Mrs Gold's advance, called out:
'Good molng, isn't it a lovely day?'
Mrs Gold was m.s a small woman - rather like a mouse. She was
not bad-loolg, g, indeed her features were regular and her
complexion g00cl-.bd, but she had a certain air of diffidence and
dowdiness thata,anade her liable to be overlooked. Her husband,
on the other hcbxd, was extremely good-looking, in an almost
theatrical mm:er. Very fair, crisply curling hair, blue eyes,
broad shoulden, a, narrow hips. He looked more like a young
man on the stay te thana young man in real life, but the moment
he opened his narnouth that impression faded. He was quite
natural and zrff,fected, even, perhaps, a little stupid.
Mrs Goldl00keed gratefully at Pamela and sat d
own near her.
'What a ]0vel3lely shade of brown you are. I feel terribly
underdone!'
'One has to k,ke a frightful lot of trouble to brown evenly,'
sighed Miss LtILll.
119
She paused a minute and then went on:
'You've only just arrived, haven't you?'
'Yes. Last night. We came on the Vapo d'Italia boat.'
'Have you ever been to Rhodes before?'
'No. It is lovely, isn't it?'
Herhusband said:
'Pity it's such a long way to come.'
'Yes, if it were only nearer England '
In a muffled voice Sarah said:
'Yes, but then it would be awful. Rows and rows of people
laid out like fish on a slab. Bodies everywhere!'
'That's true, of course,' said Douglas Gold. 'It's a nuisance
the Italian exchange is so absolutely ruinous at present.'
'It does make a difference, doesn't it?'
The conversation was running on strictly stereotyped lines.
It could hardly have been called brilliant.
A little way along the beach, Valentine Chantry stirred and
sat up. With one hand she held her bathing-dress in position
across her breast.
She yawned, a wide yet delicate cat-like yawn. She glanced
casually down the beach. Her eyes slanted past Marjorie Gold
- and stayed thoughtfully on the crisp, golden head of Douglas
Gold.
She moved her shoulders sinuously. She spoke and her voice
was raised a little higher than it need have been.
'Tony darling - isn't it divine - this sun? I simply must have
been a sun worshipper once - don't you think so?'
Her husband grunted something in reply that failed to reach
the others. Vaienfine Chantry went on in that high, drawling
voice.
'Just pull that towel a little flatter, will you, darling?'
She took infinite pains in the resettling of her beautiful body.
'Douglas Gold was looking now. His eyes were frankly
interested.
Mrs Gold chirped happily in a subdued key to Miss Lyall.
'What a beautiful woman!'
120
Pamela, as delighted to give as to receive information,
replied in a lower voice:
'That's Valentine Chantry - you know, who used to be
Valentine Dacres - she is rather marvellous, isn't she? He's
simply crazy about her - won't let her out of his sight!'
Mrs Gold looked once more along the beach. Then she said:
'The sea really is lovely - so blue. I think we ought to go in
now, don't you, Douglas?'
He was still watching Valentine Chantry and took a minute
or two to answer. Then he said, rather absently:
'Go in? Oh, yes, rather, in a minute.'
Marjorie Gold got up and strolled down to the water's edge.
Valentine Chantry rolled over a little on one side. Her eyes
looked along at Douglas Gold. Her scarlet mouth curved
faintly into a smile.
The neck of Mr Douglas Gold became slightly red.
Valentine Chantry said:
'Tony darling - would you mind? I want a little pot of face-cream
- it's up on the dressing-table. I meant to bring it down.
Do get it for me - there's an angel.'
The commander rose obediently. He stalked off into the
hotel.
Marjorie Gold plunged into the sea, calling out:
'It's lovely, Douglas - so warm. Do come.'
Pamela Lyall said to him:
'Aren't you going in?'
He answered vaguely:
'Oh! I like to get well hot-ted up first.'
Valentine Chantry stirred. Her head was lifted for a moment
as though to recall her husband - but he was just passing inside
the wall of the hotel garden.
'I like my dip the last thing,' explained Mr Gold.
Mrs Chantry sat up again. She picked up a flask of sun-bathing
oil. She had some difficulty with it - the screw top
seemed to resist her efforts.
She spoke loudly and petulantly.
'Oh, dear - I can't get this thing undone!'
121
She looked towards the other group 'I
wonder '
Always gallant, Poirot rose to his feet, but Douglas Gold had
the advantage of youth and suppleness. He was by her side in
a moment.
'Can I do it for you?'
'Oh, thank you -' It was the sweet, empty drawl again.
'You are kind. I'm such a fool at undoing things - I always
seem to screw themthe wrong way. Oh! you've done it! Thank
you ever so much -'
Hercule Poirot smiled to himself.
He got up and wandered along the beach in the opposite
direction. He did not go very far but his progress was leisurely.
As he was on his way back, Mrs Gold came out of the sea and
joined him. She had been swimming. Her face, under a
singularly unbecoming bathing cap, was radiant.
She said breathlessly, 'I do love the sea. And it's so warm and
love. ly here.'
She was, he perceived, an enthusiastic bather.
She said, 'Douglas and I are simply mad on bathing, tie can
stay in for hours.'
And at that liercule Poirot's eyes slid over her shoulder to
the spot on the beach where that enthusiastic bather, Mr
Douglas Gold, was sitting talking to Valentine Chantry.
His wife said:
'I can't think why he doesn't come ...'
Her voice held a kind of childish bewilderment.
Poirot's eyes rested thoughtfully on Valentine Chantry. He
thought that other women in their time had made that same
remark.
Beside him, he heard Mrs Gold draw in her breath sharply.
She said - and her voice was cold:
'She's supposed to be very attractive, I believe. But Douglas
doesn't like that type of woman.'
Hercule Poirot did not reply.
Mrs Gold plunged into the sea again.
122
She swam away from the shore with slow, steady strokes.
You could see that she loved the water.
Poirot retraced his steps to the group on the beach.
It had been augmented by the arrival of old General Barnes,
a veteran who was usually in the company of the young. He was
sitting now between Pamela and Sarah, and he and Pamela
were engaged in dishing up various scandals with appropriate
embellishments.
Commander Chantry had returned from his errand. He and
Douglas Gold were sitting on either side of Valentine.
Valentine was sitting up very straight between the two men
and talking. She talked easily and lightly in her sweet, drawling
voice, turning her head to take first one man and then the other
in the conversation.
She was just finishing an anecdote.
'- and what do you think the foolish man said? "It may have
been only a minut, e, but I'd remember you anywhere, Mum!"
Didn't he, Tony? And you know, I thought it was so sweet of
him. I do think it's such a kind world - I mean, everybody is so
frightfully kind to me always - I don't know why - they just are.
But I said to Tony - d'you remember, darling - "Tony, if you
want to be a teeny-weeny bit jealous, you can be jealous of that
commissionaire." Because he really was too adorable.
..'
There was a pause and Douglas Gold said:
'Good fellows - some of these commissionaires.'
'Oh, yes - but he took such trouble - really an immense
amount of trouble - and seemed just pleased to be able to help
me.'
Douglas Gold said:
'Nothing odd about that. Anyone would for you, I'm sure.'
She cried delightedly:
'How nice of you! Tony, did you hear that?'
Commander Chantry grunted.
His wife sighed:
'Tony never makes pretty speeches - do you, my lamb?'
Her white hand with its long red nails ruffled up his dark
head.
123
He gave her a sudden sidelong look. She murmured:
'I don't really know how he puts up with me. He's simply
frightfully clever - absolutely frantic with brains - and I just go
on talking nonsense the whole time, but he doesn't seem to
mind. Nobody minds what I do or say - everybody spoils me.
I'm sure it's frightfully bad for me.'
-Commander Chantry said across her to the other man:
'That your missus in the sea?'
'Yes. Expect it's about time I joir;ed her.'
Valentine murmured:
'But it's so lovely here in the sun. You mustn't go into the sea
yet. Tony darling, I don't think I shall actually bathe today not
my first day. I might get a chill or something. But why
don't you go in now, Tony darling? Mr - Mr Gold will stay and
keep me company while you're in.'
Chantry said rather grimly:
'No, thanks. Shan't go in just yet. Your wife seems to be
waving to you, Gold.'
Valentine said:
'How well your wife swims. I'm sure she's one of those
terribly efficient women who do everything well. They always
frighten me so because I feel they despise me. I'm so frightfully
bad at everything - an absolute duffe?, aren't I, Tony darling?'
But again Commander Chantry only grunted.
His wife murmured affectionately: