Jennie stood up and went to stand where Nancy had stood. She too looked unsurprised to be asked. In a shaking voice, she said. “I loved Patrick Ive as much as Nancy did. But he did not reciprocate my love. To him, I was no more than a loyal servant. It was I who started the wicked rumors about him. I told an unforgivable lie. I was jealous because he loved Nancy and not me. Although I did not kill him with my own hands, I believe that, in slandering him as I did, I caused his death. I and three others: Harriet Sippel, Richard Negus and Ida Gransbury, the three people who were murdered at this hotel. All four of us later came to regret what we had done. We regretted it profoundly. And so we made a plan to put things right.”

I watched the astonished faces of the Bloxham Hotel staff as Jennie described the same plan that she had described to Poirot and me at Samuel Kidd’s house, as well as how and why it went wrong. Louisa Wallace squealed in horror at the part about framing Nancy Ducane for the three murders and making sure she hanged. “Arranging for an innocent woman to be put to death for three murders she didn’t commit is not righting a wrong!” St. John Wallace called out. “That is depravity!”

Nobody disagreed with him, at least not out loud. Fee Spring, I noticed, did not look as shocked as most people did. She seemed to be listening intently.

“I never wanted to frame Nancy,” said Jennie. “Never! You may believe that or not, as you wish.”

“Mr. Negus,” said Poirot. “Mr. Henry Negus—do you think it likely that your brother Richard would make such a plan as you have heard?”

Henry Negus stood up. “I would not like to say, Monsieur Poirot. The Richard I knew would not have dreamed of killing anyone, of course, but the Richard who came to live with me in Devon sixteen years ago was not the Richard I knew. Oh, the physicality of him was the same, but he was not the same man on the inside. I’m afraid to say that I never got to know the man that he had become. I cannot, therefore, comment on how likely he was to behave in a particular way.”

“Thank you, Mr. Negus. And thank you, Miss Hobbs,” Poirot added with a marked absence of enthusiasm. “You may now sit down.”