the exhumation proceedings.

Now that the findings of the autopsy

had leaked out, excitement had reached

fever heat.

Poirot had been at the inn for about

an hour and had just finished a hearty

lunch of steak and kidney pudding washed

down by beer when word was brought to

him that a lady was waiting to see him.

It was Nurse Harrison. Her face was

white and haggard.

She came straight to Poirot.

"Is this true? Is this really true, M.

Poirot ?"

He put her gently into a chair.

"Yes. More than sufficient arsenic to

cause death has been found."

Nurse Harrison cried:

"I never thought — I never for one

moment thought — " and burst into tears.

90

Poirot said gently:

"The truth had to come out, you know."

She sobbed.

"Will they hang him ?"

Poirot said:

"A lot has to be proved still. Opportunity

--access to poison --the vehicle in

which it was administered."

"But supposing, M. Poirot, that he

had nothing to do with it --nothing at all."

"In that case," Poirot shrugged his

shoulders, "he will be acquitted."

Nurse Harrison said slowly:

"There is something --something that,

I suppose, I ought to have told you before

--but I didn't think that there was really

anything in it. It was just queer."

"I knew there was something," said

Poirot. "You had better tell it to me now."

"It isn't much. It's just that one day

when I went down to the dispensary for

something, Jean Moncrieffe was doing

something rather --odd."

"Yes ?"

"It sounds so silly. It's only that she

was filling up her powder compact--a

pink enamel one --"

"Yes ?"

9i

if "But she wasn't filling it up with

powder --with face powder, I mean. She

was tipping something into it from one of

the bottles out of the poison cupboard.

When she saw me she started and shut up

the compact and whipped it into her bag - and put back the bottle quickly into the cupboard so that I couldn't see what it

was. I daresay it doesn't mean anything - but now that I know that Mrs. Oldfield really was poisoned --" She broke off.

Poirot said: "You will excuse me?"

He went out and telephoned to Detective

Sergeant Grey of the Berkshire Police.

Hercule Poirot came back and he and

Nurse Harrison sat in silence.

Poirot was seeing the face of a girl with

red hair and hearing a clear hard voice say:

cc! don't agree." Jean Moncrieffe had not

wanted an autopsy. She had given a

plausible enough excuse, but the fact

remained. A competent girl --efficient - resolute. In love with a man who was tied to a complaining invalid wife, who might

easily live for years since, according to

Nurse Harrison, she had very little the

matter with her.

Hercule Poirot sighed.

92

Nurse Harrison said:

"What are you thinking of?"

Poirot answered:

"The pity of things. . . ."

Nurse Harrison said:

cc! don't believe for a minute he knew