efore proceeding to carry out your plan, you make one last attempt to stir your husband into action. You tell him of your intention to marry Jefferson Cope. Though your husband is terribly upset, he does not react as you had hoped so you are forced to put your plan of murder into action. You return to the camp, exchanging a pleasant natural word with Lady Westholme and Miss Pierce as you pass. You go up to where your mother-in-law is sitting. You have the syringe with the drug in it ready. It is easy to seize her wrist and-proficient as you are with your nurse's training-force home the plunger. It is done before your mother-in-law realizes what you are doing. From far down the valley the others only see you talking to her, bending over her. Then, deliberately, you go and fetch a chair and sit there, apparently engaged in an amicable conversation for some minutes. Death must have been almost instantaneous. It is a dead woman to whom you sit talking, but who shall guess that? Then you put away the chair and go down to the marquee where you find your husband reading a book. And you are careful not to leave that marquee! Mrs. Boynton's death, you are sure, will be put down to heart trouble. (It will, indeed, be due to heart trouble.) In only one thing have your plans gone astray. You cannot return the syringe to Dr. Gerard's tent because the doctor is in there shivering with malaria-and although you do not know it, he has already missed the syringe. That, Madame, was the flaw in an otherwise perfect crime."

There was silence-a moment's dead silence-then Lennox Boynton sprang to his feet.

"No!" he shouted. "That's a damned lie. Nadine did nothing. She couldn't have done anything. My mother-my mother was already dead."

"Ah!" Poirot's eyes came gently around to him. "So, after all, it was you who killed her, M. Boynton?"

Again a moment's pause-then Lennox dropped back into his chair and raised trembling hands to his face.

"Yes-that's right-I killed her."

"You took the digitoxin from Dr. Gerard's tent?"

"Yes."

"When?"

"As-as-you said-in the morning."

"And the syringe?"

"The syringe? Yes."

"Why did you kill her?"

"Can you ask?"

"I am asking, M. Boynton!"

"But you know my wife was leaving me-with Cope-"

"Yes, but you only learned that in the afternoon!"

Lennox stared at him.

"Of course. When we were out-"

"But you took the poison and the syringe in the morning-before you knew?"

"Why the hell do you badger me with questions?" He paused and passed a shaking hand across his forehead. "What does it matter, anyway?"

"It matters a great deal. I advise you, M. Lennox Boynton, to tell me the truth."

"The truth?" Lennox stared at him.

Nadine suddenly turned abruptly in her chair and gazed into her husband's face.

"That is what I said-the truth."

"By God, I will," said Lennox suddenly. "But I don't know whether you will believe me." He drew a deep breath. "That afternoon, when I left Nadine, I was absolutely all to pieces. I'd never dreamed she'd go from me to someone else. I was-I was nearly mad! I felt as though I was drunk or recovering from a bad illness."

Poirot nodded. He said: "I noted Lady Westholme's description of your gait when you passed her. That is why I knew your wife was not speaking the truth when she said she told you after you were both back at the camp. Continue, M. Boynton."

"I hardly knew what I was doing… But as I got near, my brain seemed to clear. It flashed over me that I had only myself to blame! I'd been a miserable worm! I ought to have defied my stepmother and cleared out years ago. And it came to me that it mightn't be too late even now. There she was, the old devil, sitting up like an obscene idol against the red cliffs. I went right up to have it out with her. I meant to tell her just what I thought and to announce that I was clearing out. I had a wild idea I might get away at once that evening-clear out with Nadine and get as far as Ma'an anyway that night."

"Oh, Lennox-my dear-" It was a long soft sigh.

He went on: "And then, my God-you could have struck me down with a touch! She was dead. Sitting there-dead… I-I didn't know what to do. I was dumb-dazed. Everything I was going to shout out at her bottled up inside me-turning to lead-I can't explain… Stone-that's what it felt like-being turned to stone. I did something mechanically. I picked up her wristwatch (it was lying in her lap) and put it around her wrist-her horrid, limp, dead wrist…"

He shuddered.

"God! It was awful! Then I stumbled down, went into the marquee. I ought to have called someone, I suppose but I couldn't. I just sat there, turning the pages-waiting…"

He stopped.

"You won't believe that-you can't. Why didn't I call someone? Tell Nadine? I don't know."

Dr. Gerard cleared his throat. "Your statement is perfectly plausible, M. Boynton," he said. "You were in a bad nervous condition. Two severe shocks administered in rapid succession would be quite enough to put you in the condition you have described It is the Weissenhalter reaction-best exemplified in the case of a bird that has dashed its head against a window. Even after its recovery it refrains instinctively from all action-giving itself time to readjust the nerve centers. I do not express myself well in English, but what I mean is this: You could not have acted any other way. Any decisive action of any kind would have been quite impossible for you! You passed through a period of mental paralysis."

He turned to Poirot. "I assure you, my friend, that is so!"

"Oh, I do not doubt it," said Poirot. "There was a little fact I had already noted-the fact that M. Boynton had replaced his mother's wristwatch. That was capable of two explanations-it might have been a cover for the actual deed, or it might have been observed and misinterpreted by young Mrs. Boynton. She returned only five minutes after her husband. She must therefore have seen that action. When she got up to her mother-in-law and found her dead, with the mark of a hypodermic syringe on her wrist, she would naturally jump to the conclusion that her husband had committed the deed-that her announcement of her decision to leave him had produced a reaction in him different from that for which she had hoped. Briefly. Nadine Boynton believed that she had inspired her husband to commit murder."

He looked at Nadine. "That is so, Madame?"

She bowed her head. Then she asked: "Did you really suspect me, M. Poirot?"

"I thought you were a possibility, Madame."

She leaned forward. "And now? What really happened, M. Poirot?"

17

"What really happened?" Poirot repeated.

He reached behind him, drew forward a chair and sat down. His manner was now friendly-informal. "It is a question, is it not? For the digitoxin was taken, the syringe was missing. There was the mark of a hypodermic on Mrs. Boynton's wrist."

"It is true that in a few days' time we shall know definitely-the autopsy will tell us-whether Mrs. Boynton died of an overdose of digitalis or not. But then it may be too late! It would be better to reach the truth tonight-while the murderer is here under our hand."

Nadine raised her head sharply. "You mean that you still believe that one of us here in this room-" Her voice died away.

Poirot was slowly nodding to himself. "The truth-that is what I promised Colonel Carbury. And so, having cleared our path we are back again where I was earlier in the day, writing down a list of printed facts and being faced straight away with two glaring inconsistencies."

Colonel Carbury spoke for the first time.

"Suppose, now, we hear what they are?" he suggested.

Poirot said with dignity: "I am about to tell you. We will take once more those first two facts on my list. Mrs. Boynton was taking a mixture of digitalis and Dr. Gerard missed a hypodermic syringe. Take those facts and set them against the undeniable fact with which I was immediately confronted: that the Boynton family showed unmistakably guilty reactions. It would seem therefore certain that one of the Boynton family must have committed the crime! And yet those two facts I mentioned were all against that theory. For, see you, to take a concentrated solution of digitalis-that, yes, it is a clever idea, because Mrs. Boynton was already taking the drug. But what would a member of her family do then? Ah, ma foi! There was only one sensible thing to do. Put the poison into her bottle of medicine! That is what anyone-anyone with a grain of sense and who had access to the medicine-would certainly do!"

"Sooner or later Mrs. Boynton takes a dose and dies-and even if the digitoxin is discovered in the bottle it may be set down as a mistake of the chemist who made it up. Certainly nothing can be proved!"

"Why, then, the theft of the hypodermic needle?"

"There can be only two explanations of that. Either Dr. Gerard overlooked the syringe and it was never stolen, or else the syringe was taken because the murderer had not got access to the medicine-that is to say, the murderer was not a member of the Boynton family. The two first facts point overwhelmingly to an outsider as having committed the crime!"

"I saw that but I was puzzled, as I say, by the strong evidences of guilt displayed by the Boynton family. Was it possible that, in spite of that consciousness of guilt, the Bovntons were innocent? I set out to prove, not the guilt, but the innocence of those people!"

"That is where we stand now. The murder was committed by an outsider-that is, by someone who was not sufficiently intimate with Mrs. Boynton to enter her tent or to handle her medicine bottle."

He paused.

"There are three people in this room who are, technically, outsiders, but who have a definite connection with the case."

"M. Cope whom we will consider first, has been closely associated with the Boynton family for some time. Can we discover motive and opportunity on his part? It seems not. Mrs. Boynton's death has affected him adversely-since it has brought about the frustration of certain hopes. Unless M. Cope's motive was an almost fanatical desire to benefit others, we can find no reason for his desiring Mrs. Boynton's death. Unless, of course, there is a motive about which we are entirely in the dark. We do not know exactly what M. Cope's dealings with the Boynton family have been."

Mr. Cope said, with dignity: "This seems to me a little far-fetched, M. Poirot. You must remember, I had absolutely no opportunity for committing this deed, and in any case. I hold very strong views as to the sanctity of human life."

"Your position certainly seems impeccable," said Poirot with gravity. "In a work of fiction you would be strongly suspected on that account."

He turned a little in his chair. "We now come to Miss King. Miss King had a certain amount of motive and she had the necessary medical knowledge and is a person of character and determination, but since she left the camp before three-thirty with the others and did not return to it until six o'clock, it seems difficult to see where she could have had an opportunity."

"Next we must consider Dr. Gerard. Now, here we must take into account the actual time that the murder was committed. According to M. Lennox Boynton's last statement, his mother was dead at four thirty-five. According to Lady Westholme and Miss Pierce she was alive at four-fifteen, when they started on their walk. That leaves exactly twenty minutes unaccounted for. Now, as these two ladies walked away from the camp Dr. Gerard passed them going to it. There is no one to say what Dr. Gerard's movements were when he reached the camp because the two ladies' backs were towards it. They were walking away from it. Therefore it is perfectly possible for Dr. Gerard to have committed the crime. Being a doctor, he could easily counterfeit the appearance of malaria. There is, I should say, a possible motive. Dr. Gerard might have wished to save a certain person whose reason (perhaps more vital a loss than a loss of life) was in danger and he may have considered the sacrifice of an old and worn out life worth it!"

"Your ideas," said Dr. Gerard, "are fantastic!" He smiled amiably.

Without taking any notice, Poirot went on. "But if so, why did Gerard call attention to the possibility of foul play? It is quite certain that, but for his statement to Colonel Carbury, Mrs. Boynton's death would have been put down to natural causes. It was Dr. Gerard who first pointed out the possibility of murder. That, my friends," said Poirot, "does not make common sense!"

"Doesn't seem to," said Colonel Carbury gruffly. He looked curiously at Poirot.

"There is one more possibility," said Poirot. "Mrs. Lennox Boynton just now negated strongly the possibility of her young sister-in-law being guilty. The force of her objection lay in the fact that she knew her mother-in-law to be dead at the time. But remember this: Ginevra Boynton was at the camp all the afternoon. And there was a moment-a moment when Lady Westholme and Miss Pierce were walking away from the camp and before Dr. Gerard had returned to it…"

Ginevra stirred. She leaned forward, staring into Poirot's face with a strange, innocent, puzzled stare. "I did it? You think I did it?" Then suddenly, with a movement of swift, incomparable beauty, she was up from her chair and had flung herself across the room and down on her knees beside Dr. Gerard, clinging to him, gazing up passionately into his face.

"No! No! Don't let them say it! They're making the walls close around me again! It's not true! I never did anything! They are my enemies-they want to put me in prison-to shut me up. You must help me! You must help me!"

"There, there, my child." Gently the doctor patted her head. Then he addressed Poirot. "What you say is nonsense-absurd."

"Delusions of persecution?" murmured Poirot.

"Yes-but she could never have done it that way. She would have done it, you must perceive, dramatically-a dagger, something flamboyant, spectacular-never this cool, calm logic! I tell you, my friends, it is so. This was a reasoned crime-a sane crime."

Poirot smiled. Unexpectedly he bowed. "Je suis entierement de votre avis," he said smoothly.