Eight
It was six o’clock at Pine Crest¹. Hercule Poirot put a piece of sausage into his mouth and followedit up with a sip² of tea. The tea was strong and to Poirot singularly unpalatable. The sausage, on theother hand, was delicious. Cooked to perfection. He looked with appreciation³ across the table towhere Mrs. McKay presided over the large brown teapot.
Elspeth McKay was as unlike her brother, Superintendent⁴ Spence, as she could be in every way.
Where he was broad, she was angular. Her sharp, thin face looked out on the world with shrewdappraisal. She was thin as a thread, yet there was a certain likeness⁵ between them. Mainly the eyesand the strongly marked line of the jaw⁶. Either of them, Poirot thought, could be relied upon forjudgement and good sense. They would express themselves differently, but that was all.
Superintendent Spence would express himself slowly and carefully as the result of due thoughtand deliberation. Mrs. McKay would pounce⁷, quick and sharp, like a cat upon a mouse.
“A lot depends,” said Poirot, “upon the character of this child. Joyce Reynolds. This is whatpuzzles me most.”
He looked inquiringly at Spence.
“You can’t go by me,” said Spence, “I’ve not lived here long enough. Better ask Elspeth.”
Poirot looked across the table, his eyebrows⁸ raised inquiringly. Mrs. McKay was sharp as usualin response.
“I’d say she was a proper little liar,” she said.
“Not a girl whom you’d trust and believe what she said?”
Elspeth shook her head decidedly.
“No, indeed. Tell a tall tale, she would, and tell it well, mind you. But I’d never believe her.”
“Tell it with the object of showing off?”
“That’s right. They told you the Indian story, didn’t they? There’s many as believed that, youknow. Been away for the holidays, the family had. Gone abroad somewhere. I don’t know if it washer father and mother or her uncle and aunt, but they went to India and she came back from thoseholidays with tall tales of how she’d been taken there with them. Made a good story of it, she did.

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