"Quick," cried my companion. "Quick - there is no time to lose -" But he was not destined to finish.
The earth shook and trembled under our feet, there was a terrific roar and the whole mountain seemed to dissolve.
We were flung headlong through the air.
I came to myself at last.
I was in a strange bed and a strange room.
Some one was sitting by the window.
He turned and came and stood by me.
It was Achille Poirot - or, stay, was it - The well-known ironical voice dispelled any doubts I might have had.
"But yes, my friend, it is I.
Brother Achille has gone home again - to the land of myths.
It was I all the time.
It is not only Number Four who can act a part.
Belladona in the eyes, the sacrifice of the moustaches, and a real scar the inflicting of which caused me much pain two months ago - but I could not risk a fake beneath the eagle eyes of Number Four.
And the final touch, your own knowledge and belief that there was such a person as Achille Poirot!
It was invaluable, the assistance you rendered me, half the success of the coup is due to you!
The whole crux of the affair was to make them believe that Hercule Poirot was still at large directing operations.
Otherwise, everything was true, the aniseed, the cordon, etc."
"But why not really send a substitute?"
"And let you go into danger without me by your side?
You have a pretty idea of me there!
Besides, I always had a hope of finding a way out through the countess."
"How on earth did you manage to convince her?
It was a pretty thin story to make her swallow - all that about a dead child."
"The countess has a great deal more perspicacity than you have, my dear Hastings.
She was taken in at first by my disguise; but she soon saw through it.
When she said.
'You are very clever, M. Achille Poirot,' I knew that she had guessed the truth.
It was then or never to play my trump card."
"All that rigmarole about bringing the dead to life?"
"Exactly - but then, you see, I had the child all along."
"What?"
"But yes!
You know my motto - Be prepared.
As soon as I found that the Countess Rossakoff was mixed up with the Big Four, I had every possible inquiry made as to her antecedents.
I learnt that she had had a child who was reported to have been killed, and I also found that there were discrepancies in the story which led me to wonder whether it might not, after all, be alive.
In the end, I succeeded in tracing the boy, and by paying out a big sum I obtained possession of the child's person.
The poor little fellow was nearly dead of starvation.
I placed him in a safe place, with kindly people, and took a snap-shot of him in his new surroundings.
And so, when the time came, I had my little coup de theatre all ready!"
"You are wonderful, Poirot; absolutely wonderful!"
"I was glad to do it, too. For I had admired the countess.
I should have been sorry if she had perished in the explosion."
"I've been half afraid to ask you - what of the Big Four?"
"All the bodies have now been recovered.
That of Number Four was quite unrecognisable, the head blown to pieces.
I wish - I rather wish it had not been so.
I should have liked to be sure - but no more of that.
Look at this."
He handed me a newspaper in which a paragraph was marked.
It reported the death, by suicide, of Li Chang Yen, who had engineered the recent revolution which had failed so disastrously.