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weeks before the murder, for no apparent reason, he will be noticeable. It would be better, would it not, if the stranger were to be a negligible personality, engaged in some harmless sport like fishing?”
    “Or watching birds,” I agreed. “Yes, but that's just what I was saying.”
    “On the other hand,” said Poirot, “it might be better still if the murderer were already a prominent personality - that is to say, he might be the butcher. That would have the further advantage that no one notices bloodstains on a butcher!”
    “You're just being ridiculous. Everyone would know if the butcher had quarrelled with the baker.”
    “Not if the butcher had become a butcher simply in order to have a chance of murdering the baker. One must always look one step behind, my friend.”
    I looked at him closely, trying to decide if a hint lay concealed in those words. If they meant anything definite, they would seem to point to Colonel Luttrell. Had he deliberately opened a guest house in order to have an opportunity of murdering one of the guests?
    Poirot very gently shook his head. He said:
    “It is not from my face that you will get the answer.”
    “You really are a maddening fellow, Poirot,” I said with a sigh. “Anyway, Norton isn't my only suspect. What about this fellow Allerton?”
    Poirot, his face still impassive, inquired:
    “You do not like him?”
    “No, I don't.”
    “Ah. What you call the nasty bit of goods. That is right, is it not?”
    “Definitely. Don't you think so?”
    “Certainly. He is a man,” said Poirot slowly, “very attractive to women.”
    I made an exclamation of contempt.
    “How women can be so foolish. What do they see in a fellow like that?”
    “Who can say? But it is always so. The mauvais sujet - always women are attracted to him.”
    “But why?”
    Poirot shrugged his shoulders.
    “They see something, perhaps, that we do not.”
    “But what?”
    “Danger, possibly... Everyone, my friend, demands a spice of danger in their lives. Some get it vicariously - as in bullfights. Some read about it. Some find it at the cinema. But I am sure of this - too much safety is abhorrent to the nature of a human being. Men find danger in many ways - women are reduced to finding their danger mostly in affairs of sex. That is why, perhaps, they welcome the hint of the tiger - the sheathed claws - the treacherous spring. The excellent fellow who will make a good and kind husband - they pass him by.”
    I considered this gloomily in silence for some minutes. Then I reverted to the previous theme.
    “You know, Poirot,” I said. “It will be easy enough really for me to find out who X is. I've only got to poke about and find who was acquainted with all the people. I mean the people of your five cases.”
    I brought this out triumphantly, but Poirot merely gave me a look of scorn.
    "I have not demanded your presence here, Hastings, in order to watch you clumsily and laboriously following the way I have already trodden. And let me tell you it is not quite so simple as you think. Four of those cases took place in this county. The people assembled under this roof are not a collection of strangers who have arrived here independently. This is not a hotel in the usual sense of the word. The Luttrells come from this part of the world; they were badly off and bought this place and started it as a venture. The people who come here are their friends, or friends recommended by their friends. Sir William persuaded the Franklins to come. They in turn suggested it to Norton, and, I believe, to Miss Cole - and so on. Which is to say that there is a very fair chance of a certain person who is known to one of these people being known to all of these people. It is also open to X to lure wherever the facts are best known. Take the case of the labourer Riggs. The village where that tragedy occurred is not far from the house of Boyd Carrington's uncle. Mrs Franklin's people, also, lived near. The inn in the village