Evil Under the Sun

Chapter 4
The morning of the 25th of August dawned bright and cloudless. It was a morning to tempt even an inveterate sluggard to rise early.

Several people rose early that morning at the Jolly Roger.

It was eight o'clock when Linda, sitting at her dressing-table, turned a little thick calf bound volume face downwards, sprawling it open and looked at her own face in the mirror.

Her lips were set tight together and the pupils of her eyes contracted.

She said below her breath:

'I'll do it...'

She slipped out of her pyjamas and into her bathing-dress. Over it she flung on a bath-robe and laced espadrilles on her feet.

She went out of her room and along the passage. At the end of it a door on to the balcony led to an outside staircase leading directly down to the rocks below the hotel. There was a small iron ladder clamped on to the rocks leading down into the water which was used by many of the hotel guests for a before-breakfast dip as taking up less time than going down to the main bathing beach.

As Linda started down from the balcony she met her father coming up. He said:

'You're up early. Going to have a dip?'

Linda nodded.

They passed each other.

Instead of going on down the rocks, however, Linda skirted round the hotel to the left until she came to the path down to the causeway connecting the hotel with the mainland. The tide was high and the causeway under water, but the boat that took hotel guests across was tied to a little jetty. The man in charge of it was absent at the moment. Linda got in, untied it and rowed herself across.

She tied up the boat on the other side, walked up the slope, past the hotel garage and along until she reached the general shop.

The woman had just taken down the shutters and was engaged in sweeping out the floor. She looked amazed at the sight of Linda.

'Well, Miss, you are up early.'

Linda put her hand in the pocket of her bath-wrap and brought out some money. She proceeded to make her purchases.

II

Christine Redfern was standing in Linda's room when the girl returned.

'Oh, there you are,' Christine exclaimed. 'I thought you couldn't be really up yet.'

Linda said:

'No, I've been bathing.'

Noticing the parcel in her hand, Christine said with surprise:

'The post has come early today.'

Linda flushed. With her habitual nervous clumsiness the parcel slipped from her hand. The flimsy string broke and some of the contents rolled over the floor.

Christine exclaimed:

'What have you been buying candles for?'

But to Linda's relief she did not wait for an answer, but went on, as she helped to pick the things up from the floor.

'I came in to ask whether you would like to come with me to Gull Cove this morning. I want to sketch there.'

Linda accepted with alacrity.

In the last few days she had accompanied Christine Redfern more than once on sketching expeditions. Christine was a most indifferent artist, but it is possible that she found the excuse of painting a help to her pride since her husband now spent most of his time with Arlena Marshall.

Linda Marshall had been increasingly morose and bad tempered. She liked being with Christine who, intent on her work, spoke very little. It was, Linda felt, nearly as good as being by oneself, and in a curious way she craved for company of some kind. There was a subtle kind of sympathy between her and the elder woman, probably based on the fact of their mutual dislike of the same person.

Christine said:

'I'm playing tennis at twelve, so we'd better start fairly early. Half-past ten?'

'Right. I'll be ready. Meet you in the hall.'

III

Rosamund Darnley, strolling out of the dining-room after a very late breakfast, was cannoned into by Linda as the latter came tearing down the stairs.

'Oh! sorry, Miss Darnley.'

Rosamund said: 'Lovely morning, isn't it? One can hardly believe it after yesterday.'

'I know. I'm going with Mrs Redfern to Gull Cove. I said I'd meet her at half-past ten. I thought I was late.'

'No, it's only twenty-five past.'

'Oh! good.'

She was panting a little and Rosamund looked at her curiously.

'You're not feverish, are you, Linda?'

The girls' eyes were very bright and she had a vivid patch of colour in each cheek.

'Oh! no. I'm never feverish.'

Rosamund smiled and said:

'It's such a lovely day I got up for breakfast. Usually I have it in bed. But today I came down and faced eggs and bacon like a man.'

'I know - it's heavenly after yesterday. Gull Cove is nice in the morning. I shall put a lot of oil on and get really brown.'

Rosamund said:

'Yes, Gull Cove is nice in the morning. And it's more peaceful than the beach here.'

Linda said, rather shyly:

'Come too.'

Rosamund shook her head.

She said:

'Not this morning. I've other fish to fry.'

Christine Redfern came down the stairs.

She was wearing beach pyjamas of a loose floppy pattern with long sleeves and wide legs. They were made of some green material with a yellow design. Rosamund's tongue itched to tell her that yellow and green were the most unbecoming colours possible for her fair, slightly anaemic complexion. It always annoyed Rosamund when people had no clothes sense.

She thought: 'If I dressed that girl, I'd soon make her husband sit up and take notice. However much of a fool Arlena is, she does know how to dress. This wretched girl looks just like a wilting lettuce.'

Aloud she said:

'Have a nice time. I'm going to Sunny Ledge with a book.'

IV

Hercule Poirot breakfasted in his room as usual off coffee and rolls.

The beauty of the morning, however, tempted him to leave the hotel earlier than usual. It was ten o'clock, at least half an hour before his usual appearance, when he descended to the bathing beach. The beach itself was empty save for one person.

That person was Arlena Marshall.

Clad in her white bathing-dress, the green Chinese hat on her head, she was trying to launch a white wooden float. Poirot came gallantly to the rescue, completely immersing a pair of white suede shoes in doing so.

She thanked him with one of those sideways glances of hers.

Just as she was pushing off, she called him.

'M. Poirot?'

Poirot leaped to the water's edge.

'Madame.'

Arlena Marshall said:

'Do something for me, will you?'

'Anything.'

She smiled at him. She murmured:

'Don't tell any one where I am.' She made her glance appealing. 'Every one will follow me about so. I just want for once to be alone.'

She paddled off vigorously.

Poirot walked up the beach. He murmured to himself:

'Ah ça, jamais! That, par exemple, I do not believe.'

He doubted if Arlena Stuart, to give her her stage name, had ever wanted to be alone in her life.

Hercule Poirot, that man of the world, knew better. Arlena Marshall was doubtless keeping a rendezvous, and Poirot had a very good idea with whom.

Or thought he had, but there he found himself proved wrong.

For just as she floated rounded the point of the bay and disappeared out of sight, Patrick Redfern closely followed by Kenneth Marshall, came striding down the beach from the hotel.

Marshall nodded to Poirot, ' 'Morning, Poirot. Seen my wife anywhere about?'

Poirot's answer was diplomatic.

'Has Madame then risen so early?'

Marshall said:

'She's not in her room.' He looked up at the sky. 'Lovely day. I shall have a bathe right away. Got a lot of typing to do this morning.'

Patrick Redfern, less openly, was looking up and down the beach. He sat down near Poirot and prepared to wait for the arrival of his lady.

Poirot said:

'And Madame Redfern? Has she too risen early?'

Patrick Redfern said:

'Christine? Oh, she's going off sketching. She's rather keen on art just now.'

He spoke impatiently, his mind clearly elsewhere. As time passed he displayed his impatience for Arlena's arrival only too crudely. At every footstep he turned an eager head to see who it was coming down from the hotel.

Disappointment followed disappointment.

First Mr and Mrs Gardener complete with knitting and book and then Miss Brewster arrived.

Mrs Gardener, industrious as ever, settled herself in her chair, and began to knit vigorously and talk at the same time.

'Well. M. Poirot. The beach seems very deserted this morning. Where is everybody?'

Poirot replied that the Mastermans and the Cowans, two families with young people in them, had gone off on an all-day sailing excursion.

'Why that certainly does make all the difference, not having them about laughing and calling out. And only one person bathing, Captain Marshall.'

Marshall had just finished his swim. He came up the beach swinging his towel.

'Pretty good in the sea this morning,' he said. 'Unfortunately I've got a lot of work to do. Must go and get on with it.'

'Why, if that isn't too bad, Captain Marshall. On a beautiful day like this, too. My, wasn't yesterday too terrible? I said to Mr Gardener that if the weather was going to continue like that we'd just have to leave. It's the melancholy, you know, with the mist right up around the island. Gives you a kind of ghostly feeling, but then I've always been very susceptible to atmosphere ever since I was a child. Sometimes, you know, I'd feel I just had to scream and scream. And that, of course, was very trying to my parents. But my mother was a lovely woman and she said to my father, "Sinclair, if the child feels like that, we must let her do it. Screaming is her way of expressing herself." And of course, my father agreed. He was devoted to my mother and just did everything she said. They were a perfectly lovely couple, as I'm sure Mr Gardener will agree. They were a very remarkable couple, weren't they, Odell?'

'Yes, darling,' said Mr Gardener.

'And where's your girl this morning, Captain Marshall?'

'Linda? I don't know. I expect she's mooning round the island somewhere.'

'You know, Captain Marshall, that girl looks kind of peaky to me. She needs feeding up and very very sympathetic treatment.'

Kenneth Marshall said curtly:

'Linda's all right.'

He went up to the hotel.

Patrick Redfern did not go into the water. He sat about, frankly looking up towards the hotel. He was beginning to look a shade sulky.

Miss Brewster was brisk and cheerful when she arrived.

The conversation was much as it had been on a previous morning. Gentle yapping from Mrs Gardener and short staccato barks from Miss Brewster.

She remarked at last: 'Beach seems a bit empty. Everyone off on excursions?'

Mrs Gardener said:

'I was saying to Mr Gardener only this morning that we simply must make an excursion to Dartmoor. It's quite near and the associations are all so romantic. And I'd like to see that convict prison - Princetown, isn't it? I think we'd better fix up right away and go there tomorrow, Odell.'

Mr Gardener said:

'Yes, darling.'

Hercule Poirot said to Miss Brewster.

'You are going to bathe, Mademoiselle?'

'Oh I've had my morning dip before breakfast. Somebody nearly brained me with a bottle, too. Chucked it out of one of the hotel windows.'

'Now that's a very dangerous thing to do,' said Mrs Gardener. 'I had a very dear friend who got concussion by a toothpaste tin falling on him in the street - thrown out of a thirty-fifth storey window it was. A most dangerous thing to do. He got very substantial damages.' She began to hunt among her skeins of wool. 'Why, Odell, I don't believe I've got that second shade of purple wool. It's in the second drawer of the bureau in our bedroom or it might be the third.'

'Yes, darling.'

Mr Gardener rose obediently and departed on his search.

Mrs Gardener went on:

'Sometimes, you know, I do think that maybe we're going a little too far nowadays. What with all our great discoveries and all the electrical waves there must be in the atmosphere, I do think it leads to a great deal of mental unrest, and I just feel that maybe the time has come for a new message to humanity. I don't know, M. Poirot, if you've ever interested yourself in the prophecies from the Pyramids.'

'I have not,' said Poirot.

'Well, I do assure you that they're very, very interesting. What with Moscow being exactly a thousand miles due north of - now what was it? - would it be Nineveh? - but anyway you take a circle and it just shows the most surprising things - and one can just see that there must have been special guidance, and that those ancient Egyptians couldn't have thought of what they did all by themselves. And when you've gone into the theory of the numbers and their repetition, why it's all just so clear that I can't see how anyone can doubt the truth of it for a moment.'

Mrs Gardener paused triumphantly but neither Poirot nor Miss Emily Brewster felt moved to argue the point.

Poirot studied his white suede shoes ruefully.

Emily Brewster said:

'You been paddling with your shoes on, M. Poirot?'

Poirot murmured:

'Alas! I was precipitate.'

Emily Brewster lowered her voice. She said:

'Where's our vamp this morning? She's late.'

Mrs Gardener, raising her eyes from her knitting to study Patrick Redfern, murmured:

'He looks just like a thundercloud. Oh dear, I do feel the whole thing is such a pity. I wonder what Captain Marshall thinks about it all. He's such a nice quiet man - very British and unassuming. You just never know what he's thinking about things.'

Patrick Redfern rose and began to pace up and down the beach.

Mrs Gardener murmured:

'Just like a tiger.'

Three pairs of eyes watched his pacing. Their scrutiny seemed to make Patrick Redfern uncomfortable. He looked more than sulky now. He looked in a flaming temper.

In the stillness a faint chime from the mainland came to their ears.

Emily Brewster murmured:

'Wind's from the east again. That's a good sign when you can hear the church clock strike.'

Nobody said any more until Mr Gardener returned with a skein of brilliant magenta wool.

'Why, Odell, what a long time you have been?'

'Sorry darling, but you see it wasn't in your bureau at all. I found it on your wardrobe shelf.'

'Why, isn't that too extraordinary? I could have declared I put it in that bureau drawer. I do think it's fortunate that I've never had to give evidence in a court case. I'd just worry myself to death in case I wasn't remembering a thing just right.'

Mr Gardener said:

'Mrs Gardener is very conscientious.'

V

It was some five minutes later that Patrick Redfern said:

'Going for your row this morning, Miss Brewster? Mind if I come with you?'

Miss Brewster said heartily:

'Delighted.'

'Let's row right round the island,' proposed Redfern.

Miss Brewster consulted her watch.

'Shall we have time? Oh yes, it's not half-past eleven yet. Come on, then, let's start.'

They went down the beach together.

Patrick Redfern took first turn at the oars. He rowed with a powerful stroke. The boat leapt forward.

Emily Brewster said approvingly:

'Good. We'll see if you can keep that up.'

He laughed into her eyes. His spirits had improved.

'I shall probably have a fine crop of blisters by the time we get back.' He threw up his head, tossing back his black hair. 'God, it's a marvellous day! If you do get a real summer's day in England there's nothing to beat it.'

Emily Brewster said gruffly:

'Can't beat England anyway in my opinion. Only place in the world to live in.'

'I'm with you.'

They rounded the point of the bay to the west and rowed under the cliffs. Patrick Redfern looked up.

'Any one on Sunny Ledge this morning? Yes, there's a sunshade. Who is it, I wonder?'

Emily Brewster said:

'It's Miss Darnley, I think. She's got one of those Japanese affairs.'

They rowed up the coast. On their left was the open sea.

Emily Brewster said:

'We ought to have gone the other way round. This way we've got the current against us.'

'There's very little current. I've swum out here and not noticed it. Anyway we couldn't go the other way, the causeway wouldn't be covered.'

'Depends on the tide, of course. But they always say that bathing from Pixy Cove is dangerous if you swim out too far.'

Patrick was rowing vigorously still. At the same time he was scanning the cliffs attentively.

Emily Brewster thought suddenly:

'He's looking for the Marshall woman. That's why he wanted to come with me. She hasn't shown up this morning and he's wondering what she's up to. Probably she's done it on purpose. Just a move in the game - to make him keener.'

They rounded the jutting point of rock to the south of the little bay named Pixy's Cove. It was quite a small cove, with rocks dotted fantastically about the beach. It faced nearly north-west and the cliff overhung it a good deal. It was a favourite place for picnic teas. In the morning, when the sun was off, it was not popular and there was seldom anyone there.

On this occasion, however, there was a figure on the beach.

Patrick Redfern's stroke checked and recovered.

He said in a would-be casual tone:

'Hullo, who's that?'

Miss Brewster said dryly:

'It looks like Mrs Marshall.'

Patrick Redfern said, as though struck by the idea.

'So it does.'

He altered his course, rowing inshore.

Emily Brewster protested.

'We don't want to land here, do we?'

Patrick Redfern said quickly:

'Oh, plenty of time.'

His eyes looked into hers - something in them, a nai??ve pleading look rather like that of an importunate dog, silenced Emily Brewster. She thought to herself:

'Poor boy, he's got it badly. Oh well, it can't be helped. He'll get over it in time.'

The boat was fast approaching the beach.

Arlena Marshall was lying face downwards on the shingle, her arms outstretched. The white float was drawn up nearby.

Something was puzzling Emily Brewster. It was as though she was looking at something she knew quite well but which was in one respect quite wrong.

It was a minute or two before it came to her.

Arlena Marshall's attitude was the attitude of a sun-bather. So had she lain many a time on the beach by the hotel, her bronzed body outstretched and the green cardboard hat protecting her head and neck.

But there was no sun on Pixy's Beach and there would be none for some hours yet. The overhanging cliff protected the beach from the sun in the morning. A vague feeling of apprehension came over Emily Brewster.

The boat grounded on the shingle. Patrick Redfern called:

'Hullo, Arlena.'

And then Emily Brewster's foreboding took definite shape. For the recumbent figure did not move or answer.

Emily saw Patrick Redfern's face change. He jumped out of the boat and she followed him. They dragged the boat ashore then set off up the beach to where that white figure lay so still and unresponsive near the bottom of the cliff.

Patrick Redfern got there first but Emily Brewster was close behind him.

She saw, as one sees in a dream, the bronzed limbs, the white backless bathing-dress - the red curl of hair escaping under the jade-green hat - saw something else too - the curious unnatural angle of the outspread arms. Felt, in that minute, that this body had not lain down but had been thrown...

She heard Patrick's voice - a mere frightened whisper. He knelt down beside that still form - touched the hand - the arm...

He said in a low shuddering whisper:

'My God, she's dead...'

And then, as he lifted the hat a little, peered at the neck:

'Oh, God, she's been strangled...murdered.'

VI

It was one of those moments when time stands still.

With an odd feeling of unreality Emily Brewster heard herself saying:

'We musn't touch anything...Not until the police come.'

Redfern's answer came mechanically.

'No - no - of course not.' And then in a deep agonized whisper. 'Who? Who? Who could have done that to Arlena. She can't have - have been murdered. It can't be true!'

Emily Brewster shook her head, not knowing quite what to answer.

She heard him draw in his breath - heard the low controlled rage in his voice as he said:

'My God, if I get my hands on the foul fiend who did this.'

Emily Brewster shivered. Her imagination pictured a lurking murderer behind one of the boulders. Then she heard her voice saying:

'Whoever did it wouldn't be hanging about. We must get the police. Perhaps - ' she hesitated - 'one of us ought to stay with - with the body.'

Patrick Redfern said:

'I'll stay.'

Emily Brewster drew a little sigh of relief. She was not the kind of woman who would ever admit to feeling fear, but she was secretly thankful not to have to remain on that beach alone with the faint possibility of a homicidal maniac lingering close at hand.

She said:

'Good. I'll be as quick as I can. I'll go in the boat. Can't face that ladder. There's a constable at Leathercombe Bay.'

Patrick Redfern murmured mechanically:

'Yes - yes, whatever you think best.'

As she rowed vigorously away from the shore, Emily Brewster saw Patrick drop down beside the dead woman and bury his head in his hands. There was something so forlorn about his attitude that she felt an unwilling sympathy. He looked like a dog watching by its dead master. Nevertheless her robust common sense was saying to her:

'Best thing that could have happened for him and his wife - and for Marshall and the child - but I don't suppose he can see it that way, poor devil.'

Emily Brewster was a woman who could always rise to an emergency.