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"
Exactly," said Poirot dryly. "And that was just what confirmed my suspicion
that it was not. He was shielding Mademoiselle Cynthia."
"
But why should he shield her?"
Because he is in love with her."
"
I laughed.
"There, Poirot, you are quite wrong! I happen to know for a fact that, far
from being in love with her, he positively dislikes her."
"
"
"
"
"
Who told you that, mon ami?"
Cynthia herself."
La pauvre petite! And she was concerned?"
She said that she did not mind at all."
Then she certainly did mind very much," remarked Poirot. "They are like
that--les femmes!"
"
What you say about Lawrence is a great surprise to me," I said.
"But why? It was most obvious. Did not Monsieur Lawrence make the sour
face every time Mademoiselle Cynthia spoke and laughed with his brother?
He had taken it into his long head that Mademoiselle Cynthia was in love
with Monsieur John. When he entered his mother's room, and saw her
obviously poisoned, he jumped to the conclusion that Mademoiselle Cynthia
knew something about the matter. He was nearly driven desperate. First he
crushed the coffee-cup to powder under his feet, remembering that she had
gone up with his mother the night before, and he determined that there
should be no chance of testing its contents. Thenceforward, he strenuously,
and quite uselessly, upheld the theory of 'Death from natural causes'."
"And what about the 'extra coffee-cup'?"
"
I was fairly certain that it was Mrs. Cavendish who had hidden it, but I had
to make sure. Monsieur Lawrence did not know at all what I meant; but, on
reflection, he came to the conclusion that if he could find an extra coffee-cup
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