“But naturally! In your own surgery!”
“You know,” I said, throwing down the pincers I was holding, “it’s extraordinarily intriguing, the whole thing. Every new development that arises is like the shake you give to a kaleidoscope—the thing changes entirely in aspect. Now, why are you so anxious to see Miss Russell?”
Poirot raised his eyebrows. “Surely it is obvious?” he murmured.
“There you go again,” I grumbled. “According to you everything is obvious. But you leave me walking about in a fog.”
Poirot shook his head genially to me. “You mock yourself at me. Take the matter of Mademoiselle Flora. The inspector was surprised—but you—you were not.”
“I never dreamed of her being the thief,” I expostulated.
“That—perhaps no. But I was watching your face and you were not—like Inspector Raglan—startled and incredulous.”
I thought for a minute or two. “Perhaps you are right,” I said at last. “All along I’ve felt that Flora was keeping back something—so the truth, when it came, was subconsciously expected. It upset Inspector Raglan very much indeed, poor man.”
“Ah! pour ça, oui! The poor man must rearrange all his ideas. I profited by his state of mental chaos to induce him to grant me a little favour.”
“What was that?”
Poirot took a sheet of notepaper from his pocket. Some words were written on it, and he read them aloud.
“The police have, for some days, been seeking for Captain Ralph Paton, the nephew of Mr. Ackroyd of Fernly Park,