"She saw me talking to a strange man?" The girl seemed genuinely astonished. Surely that pure, limpid look could not be anything but genuine.

She shook her head. "Lady Clarke must have made a mistake. I never— Oh!"

The exclamation came suddenly—jerked out of her. A crimson wave flooded her cheeks.

"I remember now! How stupid! I'd forgotten all about it. But it wasn't important. Just one of those men who come round selling stockings—you know, ex-Army people. They're very persistent. I had to get rid of him. I was just crossing the hall when he came to the door. He spoke to me instead of ringing but he was quite a harmless sort of person. I suppose that's why I forgot about him."

Poirot was swaying to and fro, his hands clasped to his head. He muttering to himself with such vehemence that nobody else said anything, but stared at him instead.

"Stockings," he was murmuring. "Stockings . . . stockings . . . stockings . . . ca vient . . . stockings . . . stockings . . . It is the motif—yes . . . three months ago . . . and the other day . . . and now. Bon Dieu, I have it!"

He sat upright and fixed me with an imperious eye. "You remember, Hastings? Andover. The shop. We go upstairs. The bedroom. On a chair. A pair of new silk stockings. And now I know what it was that roused my attention two days ago. It was you, mademoiselle—" He turned on Megan. "You spoke of your mother who wept because she had bought your sister some new stockings on the very day of the murder . . . ."

He looked round on us all. "You see? It is the same motif three times repeated. That cannot be coincidence. When mademoiselle spoke I had the feeling that what she said linked up with something. I know now with what. The words spoken by Mrs. Ascher's next-door neighbour, Mrs. Fowler. About people who were always trying to sell you things—and she mentioned stockings. Tell me, mademoiselle, it is true, is it not, that your mother bought those stockings, not at a shop, but from someone who came to the door?"

"Yes—yes—she did . . . I remember now. She said something about being sorry for these wretched men who go round and try to get or [missing]."

"But what's the connection?" cried Franklin. "That a man came selling stockings proves nothing!"

"I tell you, my friends, it cannot be coincidence. Three crimes—and every time a man selling stockings and spying out the land."

He wheeled round on Thora.

"A vous la parole! Describe this man."

She looked at him blankly. "I can't . . . I don't know how . . . He had glasses, I think . . . and a shabby overcoat . . . ."

"Mieux que fa, mademoiselle."

"He stooped . . . I don't know. I hardly looked at him. He wasn't the sort of man you'd notice—"

Poirot said gravely: "You are quite right, mademoiselle. The whole secret of the murders lies there in your description of the murderer—for without a doubt he is the murderer! 'He wasn't the sort of man you'd notice.' Yes, here is no doubt about it . . . . You have described the murderer!"

Mr. Alexander Bonaparte Cust sat very still. His breakfast lay cold and untasted on his plate. A newspaper was propped up against the teapot and it was this newspaper that Mr. Cust was reading with avid interest.

Suddenly he got up, paced to and fro for a minute, then sank in a chair by the window. He buried his head in his hands with a stilled [missing].

He did not hear the sound of the opening door. His landlady, Mrs. Marbury, stood in the doorway.

"I was wondering, Mr. Cust, if you'd fancy a nice—why, whatever is it? Aren't you feeling well?"

Mr. Cust raised his head from his hands.

"Nothing. It's nothing at all, Mrs. Marbury. I'm not—feeling very well this morning."

Mrs. Marbury inspected the breakfast tray. "So I see. You haven't touched your breakfast. Is it your head troubling you again?"

"No. At least, yes . . . I—I just feel a bit out of sorts."

"Well, I'm sorry, I'm sure. You'll not be going away today then?"

Mr. Cust sprang up abruptly. "No, no. I have to go. It's business. Important. Very important."

His hands were shaking. Seeing him so agitated, Mrs. Marbury tried to soothe him.

"Well, if you must—you must. Going far this time?"

"No. I'm going to"—he hesitated for a minute or two—"Cheltenham—"

There was something so peculiar about the tentative way he said the word that Mrs. Marbury looked at him in surprise.

"Cheltenham's a nice place," she said conversationally. "I went there from Bristol one year. The shops are ever so nice."

"I suppose so—yes."

Mrs. Marbury stooped rather stiffly—for stooping did not suit her figure—to pick up the paper that was lying crumpled on the floor.

"Nothing but this murdering business in the papers nowadays," she said as she glanced at the headlines before putting it back on the table.

"Gives me the creeps, it does. I don't read it. It's like Jack the Ripper all over again."

Mr. Cust's lips moved, but no sound came from them.

"Doncaster—that's the place he's going to do his next murder," said Mrs. Marbury. "And tomorrow! Fairly makes your flesh creep, doesn't it? If I lived in Doncaster and my name began with a D, I'd take the first train away, that I would. I'd run no risks. What did you say, Mr. Cust?"

"Nothing, Mrs. Marbury—nothing."

"It's the races and all. No doubt he thinks he'll get his opportunity there. Hundreds of police, they say, they're drafting in and— Why, Mr. Cust, you do look bad. Hadn't you better have a little drop of something? Really, now, you oughtn't to go travelling today."

Mr. Cust drew himself up. "It is necessary, Mrs. Marbury. I have always been punctual in my—engagements. People must have—must have confidence in you! When I have undertaken to do a thing, I carry it through. It is the only way to get on in—in—business."

"But if you're ill?"

"I am not ill, Mrs. Marbury. Just a little worried over various personal matters. I slept badly. I am really quite all right."

His manner was so firm that Mrs. Marbury gathered up the breakfast things and reluctantly left the room.

Mr. Cust dragged out a suitcase from under the bed and began to pack. Pyjamas, spongebag, spare collar, leather slippers. Then unlocking a cupboard, he transferred a dozen or so flattish cardboard boxes about ten inches by seven from a shelf to the suitcase.

He just glanced at the railway guide on the table and then left the room, suitcase in hand.

Setting it down in the hall, he put on his hat and overcoat. As he did so he sighed deeply, so deeply that the girl who came out from a room at the side looked at him in concern.

"Anything the matter, Mr. Cust?"

"Nothing, Miss Lily."

"You were sighing so!"

Mr. Cust said abruptly: "Are you at all subject to premonitions, Miss Lily? To presentiments?''

"Well, I don't know that I am, really . . . . Of course, there are days when you just feel everything's going wrong, and days when you feel everything's going right."

"Quite," said Mr. Cust. He sighed again.

"Well, goodbye, Miss Lily. Goodbye. I'm sure you've been very kind to me always here."

"Well, don't say goodbye as though you were going away for ever," laughed Lily.

"No, no, of course not."