“You do not like her, Madame?”
“That was a nasty remark of mine.” Mrs. Allerton looked penitent. “You see I’m old-fashioned. I don’t like her much. Tim and she are the greatest of friends, though.”
“I see,” said Poirot.
His companion shot a quick look at him. She changed the subject.
“How very few young people there are out here! That pretty girl with the chestnut hair and the appalling mother in the turban is almost the only young creature in the place. You have talked to her a good deal, I notice. She interests me, that child.”
“Why is that, Madame?”
“I feel sorry for her. You can suffer so much when you are young and sensitive. I think she is suffering.”
“Yes, she is not happy, poor little one.”
“Tim and I call her the ‘sulky girl.’ I’ve tried to talk to her once or twice, but she’s snubbed me on each occasion. However, I believe she’s going on this Nile trip too, and I expect we’ll have to be more or less all matey together, shan’t we?”
“It is a possible contingency, Madame.”
“I’m very matey really—people interest me enormously. All the different types.” She paused, then said: “Tim tells me that that dark girl—her name is de Bellefort—is the girl who was engaged to Simon Doyle. It’s rather awkward for them—meeting like this.”
“It is awkward—yes,” agreed Poirot.
“You know, it may sound foolish, but she almost frightened me. She looked so—intense.”
Poirot nodded his head slowly.
“You were not far wrong, Madame. A great force of emotion is always frightening.”
“Do people interest you too, Monsieur Poirot? Or do you reserve your interest for potential criminals?”
“Madame—that category would not leave many people outside it.”
Mrs. Allerton looked a trifle startled.
“Do you really mean that?”
“Given the particular incentive, that is to say,” Poirot added.
“Which would differ?”
“Naturally.”
Mrs. Allerton hesitated—a little smile on her lips.
“Even I perhaps?”
“Mothers, Madame, are particularly ruthless when their children are in danger.”
She said gravely, “I think that’s true—yes, you’re quite right.”
She was silent a minute or two, then she said, smiling: I’m trying to imagine motives for crime suitable for everyone in the hotel. It’s quite entertaining. Simon Doyle, for instance?”
Poirot said, smiling: “A very simple crime—a direct shortcut to his objective. No subtlety about it.”
“And therefore very easily detected?”
“Yes; he would not be ingenious.”