ld attach to him. This
attitude of his gave me furiously to think, and I was slowly forced to
the conclusion that Alfred Inglethorp wanted to be arrested. Eh bien!
from that moment, I was equally determined that he should not be
arrested."

"Wait a minute. I don't see why he wished to be arrested?"

"Because, mon ami, it is the law of your country that a man once
acquitted can never be tried again for the same offence. Aha! but it was
clever--his idea! Assuredly, he is a man of method. See here, he knew
that in his position he was bound to be suspected, so he conceived the
exceedingly clever idea of preparing a lot of manufactured evidence
against himself. He wished to be arrested. He would then produce his
irreproachable alibi--and, hey presto, he was safe for life!"

"But I still don't see how he managed to prove his alibi, and yet go to
the chemist's shop?"

Poirot stared at me in surprise.

"Is it possible? My poor friend! You have not yet realized that it was
Miss Howard who went to the chemist's shop?"

"Miss Howard?"

"But, certainly. Who else? It was most easy for her. She is of a
good height, her voice is deep and manly; moreover, remember, she and
Inglethorp are cousins, and there is a distinct resemblance between
them, especially in their gait and bearing. It was simplicity itself.
They are a clever pair!"

"I am still a little fogged as to how exactly the bromide business was
done," I remarked.

"Bon! I will reconstruct for you as far as possible. I am inclined to
think that Miss Howard was the master mind in that affair. You remember
her once mentioning that her father was a doctor? Possibly she dispensed
his medicines for him, or she may have taken the idea from one of the
many books lying about when Mademoiselle Cynthia was studying for her
exam. Anyway, she was familiar with the fact that the addition of a
bromide to a mixture containing strychnine would cause the precipitation
of the latter. Probably the idea came to her quite suddenly. Mrs.
Inglethorp had a box of bromide powders, which she occasionally took
at night. What could be easier than quietly to dissolve one or more of
those powders in Mrs. Inglethorp's large sized bottle of medicine when
it came from Coot's? The risk is practically nil. The tragedy will not
take place until nearly a fortnight later. If anyone has seen either of
them touching the medicine, they will have forgotten it by that time.
Miss Howard will have engineered h