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"But surely Miss Howard had a him"

"Yes, but Miss Howard did not know of the paper's existence In accordance with their prearranged plan, she never spoke to Alfred Inglethorp They were supposed to be deadly enemies, and until John Cavendish was safely convicted they neither of the Of course I had a watch kept on Mr Inglethorp, hoping that sooner or later he would lead -place But he was too clever to take any chances The paper was safe where it was; since no one had thought of looking there in the first week, it was not likely they would do so afterwards But for your lucky re him to justice"

"I understand that now; but when did you first begin to suspect Miss Howard?"

"When I discovered that she had told a lie at the inquest about the letter she had received frolethorp"

"Why, as there to lie about?"

"You saw that letter? Do you recall its general appearance?"

"Yes--lethorp wrote a very distinctive hand, and left large clear spaces between her words But if you look at the date at the top of the letter you will notice that 'July 17th' is quite different in this respect Do you see what I mean?"

"No," I confessed, "I don't"

"You do not see that that letter was not written on the 17th, but on the 7th--the day after Miss Howard's departure? The '1' ritten in before the '7' to turn it into the '17th'"

"But why?"

"That is exactly what I asked myself Why does Miss Howard suppress the letter written on the 17th, and produce this faked one instead? Because she did not wish to show the letter of the 17th Why, again? And at once a suspicion dawned inthat it ise to beware of people ere not telling you the truth"

"And yet," I cried indignantly, "after that, you gave me two reasons why Miss Howard could not have coood reasons too," replied Poirot "For a long ti-block to nificant fact: that she and Alfred Inglethorp were cousins She could not have coainst that did not debar her fro an accomplice And, then, there was that rather over-vehement hatred of hers! It concealed a very opposite emotion There was, undoubtedly, a tie of passion between theed their infamous plot--that he should marry this rich, but rather foolish old lady, induce her to ain their ends by a very cleverly conceived crione as they planned, they would probably have left England, and lived together on their poor victim's money