“Much more sensible – the things we wear nowadays,” said Miss Brewster.
“Why, yes, M. Poirot,” said Mrs Gardener. “I do think, you know, that our girls and boys nowadays lead a much more natural healthy life. They just romp about together and they – well, they – ” Mrs Gardener blushed slightly for she had a nice mind – “they think nothing of it, if you know what I mean?”
“I do know,” said Hercule Poirot. “It is deplorable!”
“Deplorable?” squeaked Mrs Gardener.
“To remove all the romance all the mystery! Today everything is standardized!” He waved a hand towards the recumbent figures. “That reminds me very much of the Morgue in Paris.”
“M. Poirot!” Mrs Gardener was scandalized.
“Bodies arranged on slabs like butcher’s meat!”
“But M. Poirot, isn’t that too far-fetched for words?”
Hercule Poirot admitted: “It may be, yes.”
“All the same,” Mrs Gardener knitted with energy, “I’m inclined to agree with you on one point. These girls that lie out like that in the sun will grow hair on their legs and arms. I’ve said so to Irene – that’s my daughter, M. Poirot. Irene, I said to her, if you lie out like that in the sun, you’ll have hair all over you, hair on your arms and hair on your legs and hair on your bosom, and what will you look like then? I said to her. Didn’t I, Odell?”
“Yes, darling,” said Mr Gardener.
Everyone was silent, perhaps making a mental picture of Irene when the worst had happened.
Mrs Gardener rolled up her knitting and said:
“I wonder now – ”
Mr Gardener said: “Yes, darling?” He struggled out of the hammock chair and took Mrs Gardener’s knitting and her book. He asked: “What about joining us for a drink, Miss Brewster?”
“Not just now, thanks.”
The Gardeners went up to the hotel. Miss Brewster said:
“American husbands are wonderful!”
Mrs Gardener’s place was taken by the Reverend Stephen Lane. Mr Lane was a tall vigorous clergyman of fifty odd. His face was tanned and his dark grey flannel trousers were holidayfied and disreputable. He said with enthusiasm:
“Marvellous country! I’ve been from Leathercombe Bay to Harford and back over the cliffs.”
“Warm work walking today,” said Major Barry who never walked.
“Good exercise,” said Miss Brewster. “I haven’t been for my row yet. Nothing like rowing for your stomach muscles.”
The eyes of Hercule Poirot dropped somewhat ruefully to a certain protuberance in his middle. Miss Brewster, noting the glance, said kindly:
“You’d soon get that off, M. Poirot, if you took a rowing-boat out every day.”
