"Bon Dieu!" said Poirot, with alarm. "You have not ajready destroyed-was He broke off in relief as Mr. Endicott slowly shook his head in negation.

"We never act in haste," he said reprovingly. "I have to make full enquiries-to satisfy myself absolutely' He paused. "This matter," he said severely, "is highly confidential. Even to you, Poirot' He shook his head.

"And if I show you good cause why you should speak?" "That- is- up to you. I cannot conceive how you can possibly know anything at all that is relevant to the matter we are discussing." "I do not know coms I have to guess. If I guess correctly-was "HigWy unlikely," said Mr. Endicott with a wave of his hand.

Poirot drew a deep breath.

"Very well then. It is in my mind that your instructions are as follows. In the event of Sir Arthur's death, you are to trace his son, Nigel, to ascertain where he is living and how he is living and particularly whether he is or has been engaged in any criminal activity whatsoever." This time Mr. Endicott's impregnable legal calm was really shattered. He uttered an exclamation such as few had ever heard from his Eps.

"Since you appear to be in full possession of the facts," he said, "I'll tell you anything you want to know. I gather you've come across young Nigel in the course of your professional activities. What's the young devil been up to?" "I think the story goes as follows. After he left home he changed his name, telling anyone who was interested that he had to do so as a condition of a legacy. He then fell in with some people who were ranning a smuggling racketrugs and jewels. I think it was due to him that the racket assumed its final form-an exceedingly clever one involving the using of innocent bona fide students. The whole thing was operated by two people, Nigel Chapman, as he now called himself, and a young woman called Valerie Hobhouse who, I think, originally introduced him to the smuggling trade. It was a small private concern and they worked it on a commission basis-but it was immensely profitable.

The goods had to be of small bulk, but thousands of pounds' worth of gems and narcotics occupy a very small space. Everything went well until one of those unforeseen chances occurred. A police officer came one day to a students' hostel to make inquiries in connection with a murder near Cambridge. I think you know the reason why that particular piece of information should cause Nigel to panic. He thought the police were after him.

He removed certain electric light bulbs so that the light should be dim and he also, in a panic, took a certain racksack out into the back yard, hacked it to pieces and threw it behind the boiler since he feared traces of narcotic might be found in its false bottom.

"His panic was quite unfounded-the police had merely come to ask questions about a certain Eurasian student-but one of the girls living in the Hostel had happened to look out of her window and had seen. him destroying the rucksack. That did not immediately sign her death warrant. Instead, a clever scheme was,thought up by which she herself was induced to commit certain foolish actions which would place her in a very invidious position. But they carried that scheme too far. I was called in. I advised going to the police. The girl lost her head and confessed. She confessed, that is, to the things that she had done. But she went, I think, to Nigel, and urged him to confess also to the rucksack business and to spilling ink over a fellow student's work. Neither Nigel nor his accomplice could consider attention being called to the rucksack-their whole plan of campaign would be ruined.

Moreover Celia, the girl in question, had another dangerous piece of knowledge which she revealed, as it happened, the night I dined there. She knew who Nigel really was." "But surely-was Mr. Endicott frowned.

"Nigel had moved from one world to another. Any former friends he met might know that he now called himself Chapman, but they knew nothing of what he was doing.

In the Hostel nobody knew that his real name was Stanley-but Celia suddenly revealed that she knew him in both capacities. She also knew that Valerie Hobhouse, on one occasion at least, had travelled abroad on a false passport. She knew too much. The next evening she went out to meet him by appointment somewhere. He gave her a drink of coffee and in it was morphia. She died in her sleep with everything arranged to look like suicide." Mr. Endicott stirred. An expression of deep distress crossed his face. He murmured something under his breath.

"But that was not the end," said Poirot. "The woman who owned the chain of hosters and students' clubs died soon after in suspicious circumstances and then, finally, there came the last most cruel and heartless crime. Patricia Lane, a girl who was devoted to Nigel and of whom he himself was really fond, meddled unwittingly in his all airs, and moreover insisted that he should be reconciled to his father before the latter died. He told her a string of lies, but rearised that her obstinacy might urge her actually to write a second letter after the first was destroyed. I think, my friend, that you can tell me why, from his point of view, that would have been such a fatal thing to happen." Mr. Endicott rose. He went across the room to a safe, unlocked it, and came back with a long envelope in his hand. It had a broken red seal on the back of it. He drew out two enclosures and laid them before Poirot.

Dear Endicott. You will open this after I am dead. I wish you to trace my son Nigel and find out If he has been guilty of any criminal actions whatsoever.

"The facts I am about to tell you are known to me only. Nigel has always been profoundly unsatisfactory in his character. He has twice been guilty of forging my name to a cheque. On each occasion I acknowledged the signature as mine, but warned him that I would not do so again. On the third occasion it was his mother's name he forged. She charged him with it. He begged her to keep silence.

She refused. She and I had discussed him, and she made it clear she was going to tell me. It was then that, in handing her her evening sleeping mixture, he administered an overdose. Before it took effect, however, she had come to my room and told me all about matters. When, the next morning, she was found dead, I knew who had done it.

"I accused Nigel and told him that I intended to make a clean breast of all the facts to the police. He pleaded desperately with me. What would you have done, Endicott? I have no illusions about my son, I know him for what he is, one of those dangerous misfits who have neither conscience nor pity.

I had no cause to save him. But it was the thought of my beloved wife that swayed me. Would she wish me to execute justice? I thought that I knew the answer-she would have wanted her son saved from the scaffold. She would have shrunk, as I shrank, from dragging down our name. But there was another consideration.

I firmly believe that once a killer, always a killer. There might be, in the future, other victims. I made a bargain with my son, and whether I did right or wrong, I do not know. He was to write out a confession of his crime which I should keep. He was comto leave my house and never return, but make a new are for hijnself. I would give him a second chance. Money belonging to his mother would come to him automatically. He had had a good education. He had every chance of making good.

"But-if he were convicted of any criminal activity whatsoever the confession he had left with me should go to the police. I safeguarded myself by explaining that my own death would not solve the problem.

"You are my oldest friend. I am placing a bur den on your shoulders, but I ask it in the name of a dead woman who was also your friend. Find Nigel. If his record is clean destroy this letter and the enclosed confession. If not-then justice must be done.