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I shot a quick glance at Mary She was very pale, but s

"I proceeded to reason on that assumption Mrs Cavendish is in herfor solethorp awakens and is seized with an alar the bed table, and then pulls desperately at the bell Mrs Cavendish, startled, drops her candle, scattering the grease on the carpet She picks it up, and retreats quickly to Made the door behind her She hurries out into the passage, for the servants must not find her where she is But it is too late! Already footsteps are echoing along the gallery which connects the tings What can she do? Quick as thought, she hurries back to the young girl's roo her awake The hastily aroused household co at Mrs Inglethorp's door It occurs to nobody that Mrs Cavendish has not arrived with the rest, but--and this is significant--I can find no one who saw her co" He looked at Mary Cavendish "Aht, ht I would dothese facts, I would have done so But it did not seeuilt or innocence"

"In a sense, that is correct, madame But it cleared my mind of many misconceptions, and left nificance"

"The will!" cried Lawrence "Then it was you, Mary, who destroyed the will?"

She shook her head, and Poirot shook his also

"No," he said quietly "There is only one person who could possibly have destroyed that will--Mrs Inglethorp herself!"

"Impossible!" I exclaimed "She had only made it out that very afternoon!"

"Nevertheless, lethorp Because, in no other way can you account for the fact that, on one of the hottest days of the year, Mrs Inglethorp ordered a fire to be lighted in her rooasp What idiots we had been never to think of that fire as being incongruous! Poirot was continuing: "The terees in the shade Yet Mrs Inglethorp ordered a fire! Why? Because she wished to destroy so, and could think of no other way You will remember that, in consequence of the War economics practiced at Styles, no waste paper was throay There was therefore noa thick docuhted in Mrs Inglethorp's room, I leaped to the conclusion that it was to destroy some important docurate was no surprise to me I did not, of course, know at the time that the will in question had only been made this afternoon, and I will adrievous error I calethorp's determination to destroy her will arose as a direct consequence of the quarrel she had that afternoon, and that therefore the quarrel took place after, and not before theof the will