“Marry me, Cynthia.”
Unwittingly, I had hit upon a sovereign remedy for her tears. She sat up at once, drew her hand away, and said, with some asperity:
“Don’t be silly!”
I was a little annoyed.
“I’m not being silly. I am asking you to do me the honour of becoming my wife.”
To my intense surprise, Cynthia burst out laughing, and called me a “funny dear.”
“It’s perfectly sweet of you,” she said, “but you know you don’t want to!”
“Yes, I do. I’ve got—”
“Never mind what you’ve got. You don’t really want to—and I don’t either.”
I heard Poirot chuckle softly beside me.
“How did you know?” I whispered.
“Listen.”
“I should say”—the doctor was continuing—“that I would have been considerably surprised at any other result.”
“Why?”
“Simply because strychnine has an unusually bitter taste. It can be detected in a solution of