Зло под солнцем / Evil Under the Sun

This isn’t the sort of place you’d get a body!”

Hercule Poirot stirred a little in his chair.

He protested. He said: “But why not, Mademoiselle? Why should there not be what you call a ‘body’ here on Smugglers’ Island?”

Emily Brewster said: “I don’t know. I suppose some places are more unlikely than others. This isn’t the kind of spot – ”

She broke off, finding it difficult to explain her meaning.

“It is romantic, yes,” agreed Hercule Poirot. “It is peaceful. The sun shines. The sea is blue. But you forget, Miss Brewster, there is evil everywhere under the sun.

”

The clergyman stirred in his chair. He leaned forward. His intensely blue eyes lighted up.

Miss Brewster shrugged her shoulders.

“Oh! of course I realize that, but all the same – ”

“But all the same this still seems to you an unlikely setting for crime? You forget one thing, Mademoiselle.”

“Human nature, I suppose?”

“That, yes. That, always. But that was not what I was going to say. I was going to point out to you that here every one is on holiday.

”

Emily Brewster turned a puzzled face to him. “I don’t understand.”

Hercule Poirot beamed kindly at her. He made dabs in the air with an emphatic forefinger.

“Let us say, you have an enemy. If you seek him out in his flat, in his office, in the street – eh bien, you must have a reason – you must account for yourself. But here at the seaside it is necessary for no one to account for himself. You are at Leathercombe Bay, why? Parbleu! it is August – one goes to the seaside in August – one is on one’s holiday.

It is quite natural, you see, for you to be here and for Mr Lane to be here and for Major Barry to be here and for Mrs Redfern and her husband to be here. Because it is the custom in England to go to the seaside in August.”

“Well,” admitted Miss Brewster, “that’s certainly a very ingenious idea. But what about the Gardeners? They’re American.”

Poirot smiled. “Even Mrs Gardener, as she told us, feels the need to relax. Also, since she is ‘doing’ England, she must certainly spend a fortnight at the seaside – as a good tourist, if nothing else.

She enjoys watching people.”

Mrs Redfern murmured: “You like watching the people too, I think?”

“Madame, I will confess it. I do.”

She said thoughtfully: “You see – a good deal.”

There was a pause. Stephen Lane cleared his throat and said with a trace of self-consciousness:

“I was interested, M. Poirot, in something you said just now.