mr james ryder was rather surprised when a card bearing the name of m. hercule poirot was brought to him.
he knew that the name was familiar but for the moment he could not remember why. then he said to himself:
"oh, that fellow!" and told the clerk to show the visitor in.
m. hercule poirot was looking very jaunty. in one hand he carried a cane. he had a flower in his buttonhole.
"you will forgive my troubling you, i trust," said poirot. "it is this affair of the death of madame giselle."
"yes?" said mr ryder. "well, what about it? sit down, won't you? have a cigar?"
"i thank you, no. i smoke always my own cigarettes. perhaps you will accept one?"
ryder regarded poirot's tiny cigarettes with a somewhat dubious eye.
"think i'll have one of my own, if it's all the same to you. might swallow one of those by mistake." he laughed heartily.
"the inspector was round here a few days ago," said mr ryder, when he had induced his lighter to work. "nosey, that's what those fellows are. can't mind their own business."
"they have, i suppose, to get information," said poirot mildly.
"they needn't be so offensive about it," said mr ryder bitterly. "a man's got his feelings and his business reputation to think about?"
"you are, perhaps, a little oversensitive."
"i'm in a delicate position, i am," said mr ryder. "sitting where i did - just in front of her - well, it looks fishy, i suppose. i can't help where i sat. if i'd known that woman was going to be murdered, i wouldn't have come by that plane at all. i don't know, though, perhaps i would."
he looked thoughtful for a moment.
"has good come out of evil," asked poirot, smiling.
"it's funny, your saying that. it has and it hasn't, in a manner of speaking. i mean i've had a lot of worry. i've been badgered. things have been insinuated. and why me - that's what i say. why don't they go and worry that doctor hubbard - bryant, i mean. doctors are the people who can get hold of highfaluting undetectable poisons. how'd i get hold of snake juice? i ask you!"
"you were saying," said poirot, "that although you had been put to a lot of inconvenience -"
"ah, yes, there was a bright side to the picture. i don't mind telling you i cleaned up a tidy little sum from the papers. eyewitness stuff - though there was more of the reporter's imagination than of my eyesight; but that's neither here nor there."
"it is interesting," said poirot, "how a crime affects the lives of people who are quite outside it. take yourself, for example; you make suddenly a quite unexpected sum of money - a sum of money perhaps particularly welcome at the moment."
"money's always welcome," said mr ryder.
he eyed poirot sharply.
"sometimes the need of it is imperative. for that reason men embezzle, they make fraudulent entries -" he waved his hands - "all sorts of complications arise."
"well, don't let's get gloomy about it," said mr ryder.
"true. why dwell on the dark side of the picture? this money was grateful to you, since you failed to raise a loan in paris."
"how the devil did you know that?" asked mr ryder angrily.
hercule poirot smiled.
"at any rate, it is true."
"it's true enough. but i don't particularly want it to get about."
"i will be discretion itself, i assure you."
"it's odd," mused mr ryder, "how small a sum will sometimes put a man in queer street. just a small sum of ready money to tide him over a crisis. and if he can't get hold of that infinitesimal sum, to hell with his credit. yes, it's odd. money's odd. credit's odd. come to that, life is odd!"
"very true."
"by the way, what was it you wanted to see me about?"
"it is a little delicate. it has come to my ears - in the course of my profession, you understand - that in spite of your denials, you did have dealings with this woman giselle."
"who says so? it's a lie - a damned lie - i never saw the woman!"
"dear me, that is very curious!"
"curious! it's a damned libel."
poirot looked at him thoughtfully.
"ah," he said. "i must look into the matter."
"what do you mean? what are you getting at?"
poirot shook his head.
"do not enrage yourself. there must be a mistake."
"i should think there was. catch me getting myself mixed with these high-toned society money lenders. society women with gambling debts - that's their sort."
poirot rose.
"i must apologize for having been misinformed." he paused at the door. "by the way, just as a matter of curiosity, what made you call doctor bryant, doctor hubbard just now?"
"blessed if i know. let me see. oh, yes, i think it must have been the flute. the nursery rime, you know. old mother hubbard's dog: 'but when she came back he was playing the flute.' odd thing, how you mix up names."
"ah, yes, the flute. these things interest me, you understand, psychologically."
mr ryder snorted at the word "psychologically." it savored to him of what he called that tom-fool business, psychoanalysis.
he looked at poirot with suspicion.
