“ Mrs. Ackroyd, Miss Flora Ackroyd, Major Blunt, Mr. Geoffrey Raymond, Mrs. Ralph Paton, John Parker, Elizabeth Russell.”

He laid the paper down on the table.

“What’s the meaning of all this?” began Raymond.

“The list I have just read,” said Poirot, “is a list of suspected persons. Every one of you present had the opportunity to kill Mr. Ackroyd⁠—”

With a cry Mrs. Ackroyd sprang up, her throat working. “I don’t like it,” she wailed. “I don’t like it. I would much prefer to go home.”