“You—you seem to know all about it?”
Rosamund said energetically:
“I don’t know anything! In my opinion a wandering maniac got on to the island and killed Arlena. That’s much the most probable solution. I’m fairly sure that the police will have to accept that in the end. That’s what must have happened! That’s what did happen!”
Linda said:
“If Father—”
Rosamund interrupted her.
“Don’t talk about it.”
Linda said:
“I’ve got to say one thing. My mother—”
“Well, what about her?”
“She—she was tried for murder, wasn’t she?”
“Yes.”
Linda said slowly:
“And then Father married her. That looks, doesn’t it, as though Father didn’t really think murder was very wrong—not always, that is.”
Rosamund said sharply:
“Don’t say things like that—even to me! The police haven’t got anything against your father. He’s got an alibi—an alibi that they can’t break. He’s perfectly safe.”
Linda whispered:
“Did they think at first that Father—?”
Rosamund cried:
“I don’t know what they thought! But they know now that he couldn’t have done it. Do you understand? He couldn’t have done it.”
She spoke with authority, her eyes commanded Linda’s acquiescence. The girl uttered a long fluttering sigh.
Rosamund said:
“You’ll be able to leave here soon. You’ll forget everything—everything!”
Linda said with sudden unexpected violence.
“I shall never forget.”
She turned abruptly and ran back to the hotel. Rosamund stared after her.
III
“There is something I want to know, Madame?”
Christine Redfern glanced up at Poirot in a slightly abstracted manner. She said:
“Yes?”