Poirot asked:
“Do you think Sir Gervase had a definite reason for asking you to make these arrangements, instead of asking Mr. Burrows to do so?”
Miss Lingard considered.
“Well, he may have had . . . I did not think of it at the time. I thought it was just a matter of convenience. Still, it’s true now I come to think of it, that he did ask me not to tell anyone that M. Poirot was coming. It was to be a surprise, he said.”
“Ah! he said that, did he? Very curious, very interesting. And did you tell anyone?”
“Certainly not, M. Poirot. I told Snell about dinner and to send the chauffeur to meet the seven-fifty as a gentleman was arriving by it.”
“Did Sir Gervase say anything else that may have had a bearing on the situation?”
Miss Lingard thought.
“No—I don’t think so—he was very much strung up—I do remember that just as I was leaving the room, he said, ‘Not that it’s any good his coming now. It’s too late.’ ”
“And you have no idea at all what he meant by that?”
“N—no.”
Just the faintest suspicion of indecision about the simple negative. Poirot repeated with a frown:
“ ‘Too late.’ That is what he said, is it? ‘Too late.’ ”
Major Riddle said:
“You can give us no idea, Miss Lingard, as to the nature of the circumstance that so distressed Sir Gervase?”
Miss Lingard said slowly:
“I have an idea that it was in some way connected with Mr. Hugo Trent.”
“With Hugo Trent? Why do you think that?”
“Well, it was nothing definite, but yesterday afternoon we were just touching on Sir Hugo de Chevenix (who, I’m afraid, didn’t bear too good a character in the Wars of the Roses), and Sir Gervase said, ‘My sister would choose the family name of Hugo for her son! It’s always been an unsatisfactory name in our family. She might have known no Hugo would turn out well.’ ”
“What you tell us there is suggestive,” said Poirot. “Yes, it suggests a new idea to me.”
“Sir Gervase said nothing more definite than that?” asked Major Riddle.
Miss Lingard shook her head.
“No, and of course it wouldn’t have done for me to say anything. Sir Gervase was really just talking to himself. He was
n’t really speaking to me.”
“Quite so.”
Poirot said:
“Mademoiselle, you, a stranger, have been here for two months. It would be, I think, very valuable if you were to tell us quite frankly your impressions of the family and household.”
Miss Lingard took off her pince-nez and blinked reflectively.
“Well, at first, quite frankly, I felt as though I’d walked straight into a madhouse! What with Lady Chevenix-Gore continually seeing things that weren’t there, and Sir Gervase behaving like—like a king—and dramatizing himself in the most extraordinary way—well, I really did think they were the queerest people I had ever come across. Of course, Miss Chevenix-Gore was perfectly normal, and I soon found that Lady Chevenix-Gore was really an extremely kind, nice woman. Nobody could be kinder and nicer to me than she has been. Sir Gervase—well, I really think he was mad. His egomania—isn’t that what you call it?—was getting worse and worse every day.”
“And the others?”