Poirot shook his head in a dissatisfied manner.
Fournier looked at him curiously.
'What is it that is in your mind, M. Poirot?'
'Mon ami,' said Poirot, 'my point is this: An affair must be judged by its results. This affair has succeeded. That is my point.'
'And yet,' said the Frenchman thoughtfully, 'it seems almost a miracle.'
'Miracle or no miracle, there it is,' said Japp. 'We've got the medical evidence, we've got the weapon – and if anyone had told me a week ago that I should be investigating a crime where a woman was killed with a poisoned dart with snake venom on it – well, I'd have laughed in his face! It's an insult – that's what this murder is – an insult.'
He breathed deeply. Poirot smiled.
'It is, perhaps, a murder committed by a person with a perverted sense of humor,' said Fournier thoughtfully. 'It is most important in a crime to get an idea of the psychology of the murderer.'
Japp snorted slightly at the word 'psychology,' which he disliked and mistrusted.
'That's the sort of stuff M. Poirot likes to hear,' he said.
'I am very interested, yes, in what you both say.'
'You don't doubt that she was killed that way, I suppose?' Japp asked him suspiciously. 'I know your tortuous mind.'
'No, no, my friend. My mind is quite at ease on that point. The poisoned thorn that I picked up was the cause of death – that is quite certain. But, nevertheless, there are points about this case -'
He paused, shaking his head perplexedly.
Japp went on:
'Well, we get back to our Irish stew, we can't wash out the stewards absolutely, but I think myself it's very unlikely that either of them had anything to do with it. Do you agree, M. Poirot?'
'Oh, you remember what I said. Me, I would not wash out – what a term, mon Dieu! – anybody at this stage.'
'Have it your own way. Now, the passengers. Let's start up at the end by the stewards' pantry and the wash rooms. Seat No. 16.' He jabbed a pencil on the plan. 'That's the hairdressing girl, Jane Grey. Got a ticket in the Irish Sweep – blewed it at Le Pinet. That means the girl's a gambler. She might have been hard up and borrowed from the old dame; doesn't seem likely either that she borrowed a large sum, or that Giselle could have a hold over her. Seems rather too small a fish for what we're looking for. And I don't think a hairdresser's assistant has the remotest chance of laying her hands on snake venom. They don't use it as a hair dye or for face massage.
'In a way, it was rather a mistake to use snake venom; it narrows things down a lot. Only about two people in a hundred would be likely to have any knowledge of it and be able to lay hands on the stuff.'
'Which makes one thing, at least, perfectly clear,' said Poirot.
It was Fournier who shot a quick glance of inquiry at him.
Japp was busy with his own ideas.
'I look at it like this,' he said. 'The murderer has got to fall into one of two categories. Either he's a man who's knocked about the world in queer places – a man who knows something of snakes, and of the more deadly varieties, and of the habits of the native tribes who use the venom to dispose of their enemies. That's Category No. 1.'
'And the other?'
'The scientific line. Research. This boomslang stuff is the kind of thing they experiment with in high-class laboratories. I had a talk with Winterspoon. Apparently, snake venom – cobra venom, to be exact – is sometimes used in medicine. It's used in the treatment of epilepsy with a fair amount of success. There's a lot being done in the way of scientific investigation into snake bite.'
'Interesting and suggestive,' said Fournier.
'Yes. But let's go on. Neither of those categories fits the Grey girl. As far as she's concerned, motive seems unlikely; chances of getting the poison, poor. Actual possibility of doing the blowpipe act very doubtful indeed – almost impossible. See here.'
The three men bent over the plan.
'Here's No. 16,' said Japp. 'And here's No. 2 where Giselle was sitting, with a lot of people and seats intervening. If the girl didn't move from her seat – and everybody says she didn't – she couldn't possibly have aimed the thorn to catch Giselle on the side of the neck. I think we can take it she's pretty well out of it.
'Now then, No. 12, opposite. That's the dentist, Norman Gale. Very much the same applies to him. Small fry. I suppose he'd have a slightly better chance of getting hold of snake venom.'
'It is not an injection favored by dentists,' murmured Poirot gently. 'It would be a case of kill rather than cure.'
'A dentist has enough fun with his patients as it is,' said Japp, grinning. 'Still, I suppose he might move in circles where you could get access to some funny business in drugs. He might have a scientific friend. But as regards possibility, he's pretty well out of it. He did leave his seat, but only to go to the wash room – that's in the opposite direction. On his way back to his seat he couldn't be farther than the gangway here, and to shoot off a thorn from a blowpipe so as to catch the old lady in the neck, he'd have to have a kind of pet thorn that would do tricks and make a right-angle turn. So he's pretty well out of it.'
'I agree,' said Fournier. 'Let us proceed.'
'We'll cross the gangway now. No. 17.'
'That was my seat originally,' said Poirot. 'I yielded it to one of the ladies, since she desired to be near her friend.'
'That's the Honorable Venetia. Well, what about her? She's a big bug. She might have borrowed from Giselle. Doesn't look as though she had any guilty secrets in her life, but perhaps she pulled a horse in a point to point, or whatever they call it. We'll have to pay a little attention to her. The position's possible. If Giselle had got her head turned a little, looking out of the window, the Honorable Venetia could take a sporting shot – or do you call it a sporting puff? – diagonally across down the car, it would be a bit of a fluke, though. I rather think she'd have to stand up to do it. She's the sort of woman who goes out with the guns in the autumn. I don't know whether shooting with a gun is any help to you with a native blowpipe. I suppose it's a question of eye just the same. Eye and practice. And she's probably got friends – men – who've been big-game hunters in odd parts of the globe. She might have got hold of some queer native stuff that way. What balderdash it all sounds, though! It doesn't make sense.'
'It does indeed seem unlikely,' said Fournier. 'Mademoiselle Kerr – I saw her at the inquest today.' He shook his head. 'One does not readily connect her with murder.'
'Seat 13,' said Japp. 'Lady Horbury. She's a bit of a dark horse. I know something about her I'll tell you presently. I shouldn't be surprised if she had a guilty secret or two.'
'I happen to know,' said Fournier, 'that the lady in question has been losing very heavily at the baccarat table at Le Pinet.'
'That's smart of you. Yes, she's the type of pigeon to be mixed up with Giselle.'
'I agree absolutely.'
'Very well, then; so far, so good. But how did she do it? She didn't leave her seat either, you remember. She'd have had to have knelt up in her seat and leaned over the top – with eleven people looking at her. Oh, hell, let's get on.'
'Numbers 9 and 10,' said Fournier, moving his finger on the plan.
'M. Hercule Poirot and Doctor Bryant,' said Japp, 'What has M. Poirot to say for himself?'
Poirot shook his head sadly.
'Mon estomac,' he said pathetically. 'Alas, that the brain should be the servant of the stomach.
'I, too,' said Fournier with sympathy. 'In the air, I do not feel well.'
He closed his eyes and shook his head expressively.
'Now then, Doctor Bryant. What about Doctor Bryant? Big bug in Harley Street. Not very likely to go to a Frechwoman money lender, but you never know. And if any funny business crops up with a doctor, he's done for life! Here's where my scientific theory comes in. A man like Bryant, at the top of the tree, is in with all the medical- research people. He could pinch a test tube of snake venom as easy as winking when he happens to be in some
