“Yes,” said Negus. “It was a very different Richard that arrived at my house from the one I had last encountered. He was so withdrawn and dour. It was as if he had built a wall around himself. He never left the house—saw no one, wrote to no one, received no letters. All he did was read books and stare into space. He refused to accompany us to church and would not relent even to please my wife. One day, after he had been with us for about a year, I found a Bible outside his door, on the landing floor. It had been in a drawer in the bedroom we had given him. I tried to put it back there, but Richard made it clear that he wished to banish it from the room. I must confess that after that incident, I asked my wife whether . . . well, whether we ought to ask him to find a home elsewhere. It was rather disconcerting to have him around. But Clara—that’s my wife—she wouldn’t hear of it. ‘Family’s family,’ she said. ‘We’re all Richard has. You don’t turn family out onto the street.’ She was quite right, of course.”

“You referred to your brother spending money excessively?” I said.

“Yes. He and I were both left very comfortably off.” Henry Negus shook his head. “The idea that my responsible older brother Richard would tear through his fortune with no care for the future . . . and yet that’s what he did. He seemed intent on converting what our father had left him into liquor and pouring it down his throat. He was heading for penury and serious illness, I feared. Some nights I lay awake worrying about the terrible end that might lie in store for him. Not murder, though. I never thought for a moment that Richard would be murdered, though perhaps I should have wondered.”

Poirot looked up, instantly alert. “Why would you wonder such a thing, monsieur? Most of us assume that our relations will not be murdered. It is a reasonable assumption in almost all cases.”

Henry Negus thought for a while before answering. Finally he said, “It would be fanciful to say that Richard seemed to know that he would be murdered, for who can know? But from the day that he moved into my home, he had the morose, doom-laden comportment of a man whose life had already ended. That is the only way I can describe it.”

“You say, however, that he, ah, perked up in the months preceding his death?”

“Yes. My wife noticed it too. She wanted me to ask him about it—women always do, don’t they?—but I knew Richard well enough to know he would not welcome the intrusion.”

“He seemed happier?” Poirot asked.