There were three distinct ways the murderer might have gone."
Jacqueline looked puzzled. She said, "Three?"
"He might have gone to the right, or he might have gone to the left, but I don't see any other way," puzzled Cornelia.
Jacqueline too frowned.
Then her brow cleared.
She said: "Of course. He could move in two directions on one plane, but he could go at right angles to that plane too.
That is, he couldn't go up very well, but he could go down."
Poirot smiled.
"You have brains, Mademoiselle."
Cornelia said, "I know I'm just a plain mutt, but I still don't see."
Jacqueline said,
"Monsieur Poirot means, darling, that he could swing himself over the rail and down onto the deck below."
"My!" gasped Cornelia. "I never thought of that.
He'd have to be mighty quick about it, though.
I suppose he could just do it?"
"He could do it easily enough," said Tim Allerton. "Remember, there's always a minute of shock after a thing like this.
One hears a shot and one's too paralysed to move for a second or two."
"That was your experience, Monsieur Allerton?"
"Yes, it was.
I just stood like a dummy for quite five seconds. Then I fairly sprinted round the deck."
Race came out of Bessner's cabin and said authoritatively:
"Would you mind all clearing off? We want to bring out the body."
Everyone moved away obediently.
Poirot went with them.
Cornelia said to him with sad earnestness:
"I'll never forget this trip as long as I live.
Three deaths....
It's just like living in a nightmare."
Ferguson overheard her.
He said aggressively: "That's because you're overcivilized. You should look on death as the Oriental does. It's a mere incident - hardly noticeable."
"That's all very well," Cornelia said. "They're not educated, poor creatures."
"No, and a good thing too.
Education has devitalized the white races.
Look at America - goes in for an orgy of culture.
Simply disgusting."
"I think you're talking nonsense," said Cornelia flushing. "I attend lectures every winter on Greek Art and the Renaissance, and I went to some on Famous Women of History."
Mr Ferguson groaned in agony.
"Greek Art!
Renaissance!
Famous Women of History!
It makes me quite sick to hear you.
It's the future that matters, woman, not the past.
Three women are dead on this boat.
Well, what of it? They're no loss!
Linnet Doyle and her money! The French maid - a domestic parasite. Mrs Otterbourne - a useless fool of a woman.
Do you think anyone really cares whether they're dead or not?
I don't.
I think it's a damned good thing!"
"Then you're wrong!" Cornelia blazed out at him. "And it makes me sick to hear you talk and talk, as though nobody mattered but you.
I didn't like Mrs Otterbourne much, but her daughter was ever so fond of her, and she's all broken up over her mother's death.