‘And how is one to get at the right things?’

‘Simply, as I said just now, by conversation. By talking! By discussing a certain happening, or a certain person, or a certain day, over and over again, extra details are bound to arise.’

‘What kind of details?’

‘Naturally that I do not know or I should not want to find out. But enough time has passed now for ordinary things to reassume their value. It is against all mathematical laws that in three cases of murder there is no single fact nor sentence with a bearing on the case. Some trivial happening, some trivial remark there must be which would be a pointer! It is looking for the needle in the haystack, I grant—but in the haystack there is a needle—of that I am convinced!’

It seemed to me extremely vague and hazy.

‘You do not see it? Your wits are not so sharp as those of a mere servant girl.’

He tossed me over a letter. It was neatly written in a sloping board-school hand.

‘Dear Sir,—I hope you will forgive the liberty I take in writing to you. I have been thinking a lot since these awful two murders like poor auntie’s. It seems as though we’re all in the sameboat, as it were. I saw the young lady’s picture in the paper, the young lady, I mean, that is the sister of the young lady that was killed at Bexhill. I made so bold as to write to her and tell her I was coming to London to get a place and asked if I could come to her or her mother as I said two heads might be better than one and I would not want much wages, but only to find out who this awful fiend is and perhaps we might get at it better if we could say what we knew something might come of it.

‘The young lady wrote very nicely and said as how she worked in an office and lived in a hostel, but she suggested I might write to you and she said she’d been thinking something of the same kind as I had. And she said we were in the same trouble and we ought to stand together. So I am writing, sir, to say I am coming to London and this is my address.

‘Hoping I am not troubling you, Yours respectfully,

‘Mary Drower.’

‘Mary Drower,’ said Poirot, ‘is a very intelligent girl.’

He picked up another letter.

‘Read this.’

It was a line from Franklin Clarke, saying that he was coming to London and would call upon Poirot the following day if not inconvenient.

‘Do not despair, mon ami,’ said Poirot. ‘Action is about to begin.’

Chapter 18

Poirot Makes a Speech

Franklin Clarke arrived at three o’clock on the following afternoon and came straight to the point without beating about the bush.

‘M. Poirot,’ he said, ‘I’m not satisfied.’

‘No, Mr Clarke?’

‘I’ve no doubt that Crome is a very efficient officer, but, frankly, he puts my back up. That air of his of knowing best! I hinted something of what I had in mind to your friend here when he was down at Churston, but I’ve had all my brother’s affairs to settle up and I haven’t been free until now. My idea is, M. Poirot, that we oughtn’t to let the grass grow under our feet—’