‘In one of the small gardens constructed by Madame Alfred Lee.’
‘Mrs Alfred?’ Sugden shook his head. ‘Doesn’t seem likely.’
Poirot said:
‘You mean, I suppose, that you do not consider it likely that Mrs Alfred cut her father-in-law’s throat?’
Sugden said quickly:
‘We know she didn’t do that. I meant it seemed unlikely that she pinched these diamonds.’
Poirot said:
‘One would not easily believe her a thief—no.’
Sugden said:
‘Anybody could have hidden them there.’
‘That is true. It was convenient that in that particular garden—the Dead Sea as it represents—there happened to be pebbles very similar in shape and appearance.’
Sugden said:
‘You mean she fixed it like that beforehand? Ready?’
Colonel Johnson said warmly:
‘I don’t believe it for a moment. Not for a moment. Why should she take the diamonds in the first place?’
‘Well, as to that—’ Sugden said slowly.
Poirot nipped in quickly:
‘There is a possible answer to that. She took the diamonds to suggest a motive for the murder. That is to say she knew that murder was going to be done though she herself took no active part in it.’
Johnson frowned.
‘That won’t hold water for a minute. You’re making her out to be an accomplice—but whose accomplice would she be likely to be? Only her husband’s. But as we know that he, too, had nothing to do with the murder, the whole theory falls to the ground.’
Sugden stroked his jaw reflectively.
‘Yes,’ he said, ‘that’s so. No, if Mrs Lee took the diamonds—and it’s a big if—it was just plain robbery, and it’s true she might have prepared that garden specially as a hiding-place for them till the hue and cry had died down. Another possibility is that of coincidence. That garden, with its similarity of pebbles, struck the thief, whoever he or she was, as an ideal hiding-place.’
Poirot said:
‘That is quite possible. I am always prepared to admit one coincidence.’
Superintendent Sugden shook his head dubiously.
Poirot said:
‘What is your opinion, Superintendent?’
The superintendent said cautiously:
‘Mrs Lee’s a very nice lady. Doesn’t seem likely that she’d be mixed up in any business that was fishy. But, of course, one never knows.’
Colonel Johnson said testily: