Chapter 8 Possibilities
Japp had to leave us. Poirot and I turned into Regent’s Park and found a quiet seat.
‘I see the point of your rose between the lips now,’ I said, laughing. ‘At the moment I thought you had gone mad.’
He nodded without smiling.
‘You observe, Hastings, that the secretary is a dangerous witness, dangerous because inaccurate¹. You notice that she stated positively² that she saw the visitor’s face? At the time I thought that impossible. Coming from the study – yes, but not going to the study. So I made my little experiment which resulted as I thought, and then sprung my trap upon her. She immediately changed her ground.’
‘Her belief was quite unaltered, though,’ I argued. ‘And after all, a voice and a walk are just as unmistakable.’
‘No, no.’
‘Why, Poirot, I think a voice and the general gait are about the most characteristic things about a person.’
‘I agree. And therefore they are the most easily counterfeited³.’
‘You think –’
‘Cast your mind back a few days. Do you remember one evening as we sat in the stalls of a theatre –’
‘Carlotta Adams? Ah! but then she is a genius.’
‘A well-known person is not so difficult to mimic⁴. But I agree she has unusual gifts. I believe she could carry a thing through without the aid of footlights and distance –’
A sudden thought flashed into my mind.
‘Poirot,’ I cried. ‘You don’t think that possibly – no, that would be too much of a coincidence.’
‘It depends how you look at it, Hastings. Regarded from one angle it would be no coincidence at all.’
‘But why should Carlotta Adams wish to kill Lord Edgware? She did not even know him.’
‘How do you know she did not know him? Do not assume things, Hastings. There may have been some link between them of which we know nothing. Not that that is precisely⁵ my theory.’
‘Then you have a theory?’
‘Yes. The possibility of Carlotta Adams being involved struck me from the beginning.’

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