“It is a little matter of memory.”
“Memory?”
“Yes, I have already put these questions to Mrs. Lorrimer, to Dr. Roberts and to Major Despard. None of them, alas, have given me the response that I hoped for.”
Anne continued to look at him inquiringly.
“I want you, mademoiselle, to cast your mind back to that evening in the drawing room of Mr. Shaitana.”
A weary shadow passed over Anne’s face. Was she never to be free of that nightmare?”
Poirot noticed the expression.
“C’est pénible, n’est ce pas? That is very natural. You, so young as you are, to be brought in contact with horror for the first time. Probably you have never known or seen a violent death.”
Rhoda’s feet shifted a little uncomfortably on the floor.
“Well?” said Anne.
“Cast your mind back. I want you to tell me what you remember of that room?”
Anne stared at him suspiciously.
“I don’t understand?”
“But yes. The chairs, the tables, the ornaments, the wallpaper, the curtains, the fire irons. You saw them all. Can you not then describe them?”
“Oh, I see.” Anne hesitated, frowning. “It’s difficult. I don’t really think I remember. I couldn’t say what the wallpaper was like. I think the walls were painted—some inconspicuous colour. There were rugs on the floor. There was a piano.” She shook her head. “I really couldn’t tell you any more.”
“But you are not trying, mademoiselle. You must remember some object, some ornament, some piece of bric-à-brac?”
“There was a case of Egyptian jewellery, I remember,” said Anne slowly. “Over by the window.”
“Oh, yes, at the extreme other end of the room from the table on which lay the little dagger.”
Anne looked at him.
“I never heard which table that was on.”
“Pas si bête,” commented Poirot to himself. “But then, no more is Hercule Poirot! If she knew me better she would realize I would never lay a piège as gross as that!”
Aloud he said:
“A case of Egyptian jewellery, you say?”
Anne answered with some enthusiasm.
“Yes—some of it was lovely. Blues and red. Enamel. One or two lovely rings. And scarabs—but I don’t like them so much.”
“He was a great collector, Mr. Shaitana,” murmured Poirot.
“Yes, he must have been,” Anne agreed. “The room was full of stuff. One couldn’t begin to look at it all.”
“So that you cannot mention anything else that particularly struck your notice?”
Anne smiled a little as she said:
“Only a vase of chrysanthemums that badly wanted their water changed.”