II

Poirot had abandoned his trophy, the wig. He had gone to Norma, andtaken her hand gently in his.

“Your ordeal is over, my child. The victim will not be sacrificed. You areneither mad, nor have you killed anyone. There are two cruel and heart-less creatures who plotted against you, with cunningly administereddrugs, with lies, doing their best to drive you either to suicide or to beliefin your own guilt and madness.”

Norma was staring with horror at the other plotter.

“My father. My father? He could think of doing that to me. His daughter.

My father who loved me—”

“Not your father, mon enfant—a man who came here after your father’sdeath, to impersonate him and lay hands on an enormous fortune. Onlyone person was likely to recognise him—or rather to recognise that thisman was not Andrew Restarick—the woman who had been Andrew Re-starick’s mistress fifteen years ago.”