"Any strong motive?" My father sighed. «"My dear Charles, Aristide Leonides was enormously rich! He had made over a good deal of his money to his family, it is true, but it may be that somebody wanted more."

"But the one that wanted it most would be the present widow. Has her young man any money?"

"No. Poor as a Church mouse." o Something clicked in my brain. I remembered Sophia's quotation. I suddenly remembered the whole verse of the nursery rhyme:

There was a crooked man and he went fc a crooked mile 5:1 He found a crooked sixpence beside a crooked stile He had a crooked cat which caught a crooked mouse And they all lived together in a little crooked house.

I said to Taverner:

"How does she strike you - Mrs. Leonides? What do you think of her?"

He replied slowly:

"It's hard to say - very hard to say.

She's not easy. Very quiet - so you don't know what she's thinking. But she likes living soft - that I'll swear I'm right about.

Puts me in mind, you know, of a cat, a big purring lazy cat… Not that I've anything against cats. Cats are all right…"

He sighed.

"What we want," he said, "is evidence." ||ft1'" '

Yes, I thought, we all wanted evidence that Mrs. Leonides had poisoned her husband. Sophia wanted it, and I wanted it, and Chief Inspector Taverner wanted it.

Then everything in the garden would be lovely!

But Sophia wasn't sure, and I wasn't sure, and I didn't think Chief Inspector Taverner was sure either…

Four

On the following day I went down to Three Gables with Taverner.

My position was a curious one. It was, to say the least of it, quite unorthodox. But the Old Man has never been highly orthodox.

I had a certain standing. I had worked with the Special Branch at the Yard during the early days of the war.