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120 he had turned the contents of his plate into a bowl, and he now handed it over to the doctor with injunctions to find out if there were really anything wrong with it.

“In spite of his statement that he was not feeling ill, the doctor noted that the shock of his suspicions had evidently affected him, and that his heart was feeling it. Accordingly he administered an injection—not of a narcotic, but of strychnine.

“That, I think, completes the case—except for the crux of the whole thing—the fact that the uneaten curry, duly analysed, was found to contain enough powdered opium to have killed two men!”

I paused.

“And your conclusions, Hastings?” asked Poirot quietly.

“It’s difficult to say. It might be an accident—the fact that some one attempted to poison him the same night might be merely a coincidence.”

“But you don’t think so? You prefer to believe it—murder!”

“Don’t you?"

“Mon ami, you and I do not reason in the same way. I am not trying to make up my mind between two opposite solutions—murder or