"No," he said, echoing her words, "it wouldn't work."

She slipped the ring off her finger and held it out to him.

She would always love Edward and Edward would always love Henrietta and life was just plain unadulterated hell…

She said, with a little catch in her voice:

"It's a lovely ring, Edward."

"I wish you'd keep it. Midge. I'd like you to have it."

She shook her head.

"I couldn't do that."

He said, with a faint humorous twist of the lips:

"I shan't give it to anyone else, you know."

It was all quite friendly. He didn't know -he would never know-just what she was feeling… Heaven on a plate-and the plate was broken and Heaven had slipped between her fingers or had, perhaps, never been there.

That afternoon, Poirot received his third visitor.

He had been visited by Henrietta Savernake and by Veronica Cray. This time it was Lady Angkatell. She came floating up the path with her usual appearance of insubstantiality.

He opened the door and she stood smiling at him.

"I have come to see you," she announced.

So might a fairy confer a favour on a mere mortal.

"I am enchanted, Madame."

He led the way into the sitting room. She sat down on the sofa and once more, she smiled.

Hercule Poirot thought: "She is old-her hair is grey-there are lines in her face. Yet she has magic-she will always have magic

"

±\^

Lady Angkatell said softly:

"I want you to do something for me."

"Yes, Madame?"

"To begin with, I must talk to you-about John Christow."

"About Dr. Christow?"

"Yes. It seems to me that the only thing to do is to put a full stop to the whole thing.

You understand what I mean, don't you?"

"I am not sure that I do know what you mean. Lady Angkatell."

She gave him her lovely dazzling smile again and she put one long white hand on his sleeve.

"Dear M. Poirot, you know perfectly. The police will have to hunt about for the owner of those finger-prints and they won't find him and in the end they'll have to let the whole thing drop. But I'm afraid, you know, that you won't let it drop."

"No, I shall not let it drop," said Hercule Poirot.

"That is just what I thought… And that is why I came. It's the truth you want, isn't it?"

"Certainly I want the truth."

"I see I haven't explained myself very well. I'm trying to find out just why you won't let things drop. It isn't because of your prestige-or because you want to hang a murderer (such an unpleasant kind of death, I've always thought-so medieval). It's just, I think, that you want to know. You do see what I mean, don't you? If you were to know the truth-if you were to be told the truth, I think-I think perhaps that might satisfy you? Would it satisfy you, M. Poirot?"

"You are offering to tell me the truth,

Lady Angkatell?"

She nodded:

"You yourself know the truth, then?"

Her eyes opened very wide.

"Oh, yes, I've known for a long time. I'd like to tell you. And then we could agree that-well, that it was all over and done with."

She smiled at him.

"Is it a bargain, M. Poirot?"

It was quite an effort for Hercule Poirot to say:

"No, Madame, it is not a bargain."

He wanted-he wanted, very badly, to let the whole thing drop… simply because Lucy Angkatell asked him to do so.

Lady Angkatell sat very still for a moment.

Then she raised her eyebrows.

"I wonder," she said… "I wonder if you really know what you are doing?"