Third Girl

But since I know who you are and something about you, there is no reason we should not discuss together in a friendly fashion the troubles that afflict you. The old, you must remember, though considered incapable of action, have nevertheless a good fund of experience on which to draw." Norma continued to look at him doubtfully, that wide-eyed stare that had disquieted Poirot before. But she was in a sense trapped, and she had at this particular moment, or so Poirot judged, a wish to talk about things. For some reason, Poirot had always been a person it was easy to talk to.

"They think I'm crazy," she said bluntly.

"And - and I rather think I'm crazy, too. Mad." "That is most interesting," said Hercule Poirot, cheerfully. "There are many different names for these things. Very grand names. Names rolled out happily by psychiatrists, psychologists and others. But when you say crazy, that describes very well what the general appearance may be to ordinary, everyday people. Eh bien, then, you are crazy, or you appear crazy or you think you are crazy, and possibly you may be crazy. But all the same that is not to say the condition is serious. It is a thing that people suffer from a good deal, and it is usually easily cured with the proper treatment.

It comes about because people have had too much mental strain, too much worry, have studied too much for examinations, have dwelled too much perhaps on their emotions, have too much religion or have a lamentable lack of religion, or have good reasons for hating their fathers or their mothers! Or, of course, it can be as simple as having an unfortunate love affair." "I've got a stepmother. I hate her and I rather think I hate my father too. That seems rather a lot, doesn't it?" "It is more usual to hate one or the other," said Poirot. "You were, I suppose, very fond of your own mother. Is she divorced or dead?" "Dead. She died two or three years ago." "And you cared for her very much?" "Yes. I suppose I did. I mean of course I did. She was an invalid, you know and i" she had to go to nursing homes a good deal." "And your father?" "Father had gone abroad a long time before that. He went to South America when I was about five or six. I think he wanted Mother to divorce him but she wouldn't. He went to South America and was mixed up with mines or something like that. Anyway, he used to write to me at Christmas, and send me a Christmas present or arrange for one to come to me.

That was about all. So he didn't really seem very real to me. He came home about a year ago because he had to wind up my uncle's affairs and all that sort of financial thing. And when he came home he - he brought this new wife with him." "And you resented the fact?" "Yes, I did." "But your mother was dead by then.

It is not unusual, you know, for a man to marry again. Especially when he and his wife have been estranged for many years.

This wife he brought, was she the same lady he had wished to marry previously, when he asked your mother for a divorce?" "Oh, no, this one is quite young. And she's very good-looking and she acts as though she just owns my father!" She went on after a pause-in a different rather childish voice. "I thought perhaps when he came home this time he would be fond of me and take notice of me and - but she won't let him. She's against me. She's crowded me out." "But that does not matter at all at the age you are. It is a good thing. You do not need anyone to look after you now. You can stand on your own feet, you can enjoy life, you can choose your own friends -" "You wouldn't think so, the way they go on at home! Well, I mean to choose my own friends." "Most girls nowadays have to endure criticism about their friends," said Poirot.

"It was all so different," said Norma.

"My father isn't at all like I remember him when I was five years old. He used to play with me, all the time, and be so gay.

He's not gay now. He's worried and rather fierce and - oh quite different." "That must be nearly fifteen years ago, I presume. People change." "But ought people to change so much?" "Has he changed in appearance?" "Oh no, no, not that. Oh no! If you look at his picture just over his chair, although it's of him when he was much younger, it's exactly like him now. But it isn't at all the way I remembered him." "But you know, my dear," said Poirot gently, "people are never like what you remember them. You make them as the years go by, more and more the way you wish them to be, and as you think you remember them. If you want to remember them as agreeable and gay and handsome, yw make them far more so than they actually were." "Do you think so? Do you really think so?" She paused and then said abruptly, "But why do you think I want to kill people?" The question came out quite naturally. It was there between them.

They had, Poirot felt, got at last to a crucial moment.