The young man did so, then he asked in a calmer voice:
“What does it mean? I—I didn’t kill her, did I?”
What Poirot answered I do not know, for at that minute I heard the postman’s knock and automatically I left the room.
What I took out of the letter box banished all my interest in Donald Fraser’s extraordinary revelations.
I raced back into the sitting room.
“Poirot,” I cried. “It’s come. The fourth letter.”
He sprang up, seized it from me, caught up his paper knife and slit it open. He spread it out on the table.
The three of us read it together.
Still no success? Fie! Fie! What are you and the police doing? Well, well, isn’t this fun? And where shall we go next for honey?
Poor Mr. Poirot. I’m quite sorry for you.
If at first you don’t succeed, try, try, try again.
We’ve a long way to go still.
Tipperary? No—that comes farther on. Letter T.
The next little incident will take place at Doncaster on September 11th.
So long.
A B C.
Twenty-one
DESCRIPTION OF A MURDERER
It was at this moment, I think, that what Poirot called the human element began to fade out of the picture again. It was as though, the mind being unable to stand unadulterated horror, we had had an interval of normal human interests.
We had, one and all, felt the impossibility of doing anything until the fourth letter should come revealing the projected scene of the D murder. That atmosphere of waiting had brought a release of tension.
But now, with the printed words jeering from the white stiff paper, the hunt was up once more.
Insp
ector Crome had come round from the Yard, and while he was still there, Franklin Clarke and Megan Barnard came in.
The girl explained that she, too, had come up from Bexhill.
“I wanted to ask Mr. Clarke something.”
She seemed rather anxious to excuse and explain her procedure. I just noted the fact without attaching much importance to it.
The letter naturally filled my mind to the exclusion of all else.
Crome was not, I think, any too pleased to see the various participants in the drama. He became extremely official and noncommittal.
“I’ll take this with me, M. Poirot. If you care to take a copy of it—”
“No, no, it is not necessary.”