III
At 4:15 that afternoon Poirot sat in Mrs. Oliver’s drawing room sipping¹ appreciatively at a largecup of chocolate topped with foaming² whipped cream which his hostess had just placed on a smalltable beside him. She added a small plate full of langue de chats biscuits.
“Chère Madame, what kindness.” He looked over his cup with faint surprise at Mrs. Oliver’scoiffure and also at her new wallpaper. Both were new to him. The last time he had seen Mrs.
Oliver, her hairstyle had been plain and severe. It now displayed a richness of coils and twistsarranged in intricate patterns all over her head. Its prolific³ luxury was, he suspected, largelyartificial. He debated in his mind how many switches of hair might unexpectedly fall off if Mrs.
Oliver was to get suddenly excited, as was her wont⁴. As for the wallpaper….
“These cherries—they are new?” he waved a teaspoon⁵. It was, he felt, rather like being in acherry orchard⁶.
“Are there too many of them, do you think?” said Mrs. Oliver. “So hard to tell beforehand withwallpaper. Do you think my old one was better?”
Poirot cast his mind back dimly to what he seemed to remember as large quantities of brightcoloured tropical birds in a forest. He felt inclined to remark “Plus ?a change, plus c’est la mêmechose,” but restrained himself.
“And now,” said Mrs. Oliver, as her guest finally replaced his cup on its saucer and sat backwith a sigh of satisfaction, wiping remnants of foaming cream from his moustache, “what is allthis about?”
“That I can tell you very simply. This morning a girl came to see me. I suggested she mightmake an appointment. One has one’s routine, you comprehend. She sent back word that shewanted to see me at once because she thought she might have committed a murder.”
“What an odd thing to say. Didn’t she know?”
“Precisely! C’est inou?! so I instructed George to show her in. She stood there! She refused tosit down. She just stood there staring at me. She seemed quite half-witted. I tried to encourage her.

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