Father Lavigny!
With a sun helmet, sun glasses, black beard and a monks long woollen robe, a stranger could pass in without the servants realising that a stranger had entered.
Was that Miss Johnsons meaning?
Or had she gone further?
Did she realize that Father Lavignys whole personality was a disguise?
That he was someone other than he pretended to be? Knowing what I did know about Father Lavigny, I was inclined to call the mystery solved.
Raoul Menier was the murderer.
He had killed Mrs Leidner to silence her before she could give him away.
Now another person lets him see that she has penetrated his secret.
She, too, must be removed.
And so everything is explained!
The second murder.
Father Lavignys flight minus robe and beard. (He and his friend are doubtless careering through Syria with excellent passports as two commercial travellers.) His action in placing the blood-stained quern under Miss Johnsons bed.
As I say, I was almost satisfied but not quite.
For the perfect solution must explain everything and this does not do so.
It does not explain, for instance, why Miss Johnson should say the window, as she was dying.
It does not explain her fit of weeping over the letter.
It does not explain her mental attitude on the roof her incredulous horror and her refusal to tell Nurse Leatheran what it was thatshe now suspected or knew.
It was a solution that fitted the outer facts, but it did not satisfy the psychological requirements.
And then, as I stood on the roof, going over in my mind those three points: the letters, the roof, the window, I saw just as Miss Johnson had seen!
And this time what I saw explained everything!
Chapter 28.
Journeys End
Poirot looked round.
Every eye was now fixed upon him.
There had been a certain relaxation a slackening of tension. Now the tension suddenly returned.
There was something comingsomething
Poirots voice, quiet and unimpassioned, went on: The letters, the roof, the windowYes, everything was explained everything fell into place.
I said just now that three men had alibis for the time of the crime.
Two of those alibis I have shown to be worthless.
I saw now my great my amazing mistake.
The third alibi was worthless too.
Not only could Dr Leidner have committed the murder but I was convinced that he had committed it.
There was a silence, a bewildered, uncomprehending silence.
Dr Leidner said nothing.
He seemed lost in his far-away world still.
David Emmott, however, stirred uneasily and spoke.
I dont know what you mean to imply, M. Poirot.
I told you that Dr Leidner never left the roof until at least a quarter to three.
That is the absolute truth.
I swear it solemnly.
I am not lying.
And it would have been quite impossible for him to have done so without my seeing him.
Poirot nodded.
Oh, I believe you.Dr Leidner did not leave the roof.
That is an undisputed fact.
But what I saw and what Miss Johnson had seen was that Dr Leidner could murder his wife from the roof without leaving it.
We all stared.
The window, cried Poirot.
Her window!