“Why, this is a golf course,” I cried.
Bex nodded.
“The limits are not completed yet,” he explained. “It is hoped to be able to open them sometime next month. It was some of the men working on them who discovered the body early this morning.”
I gave a gasp. A little to my left, where for the moment I had overlooked it, was a long narrow pit, and by it, face downwards, was the body of a man! For a moment, my heart gave a terrible leap, and I had a wild fancy that the tragedy had been duplicated. But the commissary dispelled my illusion by moving forward with a sharp exclamation of annoyance:
“What have my police been about? They had strict orders to allow no one near the place without proper credentials!”
The man on the ground turned his head over his shoulder.
“But I have proper credentials,” he remarked, and rose slowly to his feet.
“My dear M. Giraud,” cried the commissary. “I had no idea that you had arrived, even. The examining magistrate has been awaiting you with the utmost impatience.”
As he spoke, I was scanning the new-comer with the keenest curiosity. The famous detective from the Paris Sûreté was familiar to me by name, and I was extremely interested to see him in the flesh. He was very tall, perhaps about thirty years of age, with auburn hair and moustache, and a military carriage. There was a trace of arrogance in his manner which showed that he was fully alive to his own importance. Bex introduced us, presenting Poirot as a colleague. A flicker of interest came into the detective’s eye.
“I know you by name, M. Poirot,” he said. “You cut quite a figure in the old days, didn’t you? But methods are very different now.”