He stretched out his hand and pointed to it, didn't he?"
"Yes, but he didn't touch the grapefruit."
"He didn't need to. While you automatically looked where his finger was pointin', his other hand did the trick. It dropped strychnine into white sugar in the sugar-bowl.
"Mrs. Propper, d'ye see, had put only a very little sugar on. Mrs. Fane likes the stuff sweet. She added sugar mixed with strychnine to it; and saved her own life by puttin' an overdose on the fruit. That's all. Hubert, who was popular in the kitchen, had a dozen opportunities to clean out the sugar-bowl later.
"He didn't even bother to be subtle about it. For he never even expected strychnine to be thought of, once he'd planted that rusty pin in the bedroom. The one thing that realty surprised him, later, was when we told him it wasn't tetanus but strychnine.
"An ass, Hubert, in a way. For it was suspected. And his victim didn't die.
"I'll pass over his state of mind that same Thursday night, when you saw him walkin' past the window and slapping his hands together like a wild man. He had to let himself go in some way. I'll pass over, to save embarrassment, the other thing he did that night. I mean the play he made at a certain gal, in the lane behind here: the thing he'd been burnin' to do for so long. The thing he wanted to do so much that it had got him involved in murder to begin with."
Courtney, on the arm of Ann's chair, glanced down at her. Her hands were clasped together, and she regarded them without expression.
'That was Hubert, then?" she asked.
"It was, my wench," said H.M., "and I think you knew it. Courtney scared him away, or there might have been real trouble. Pleasant gentleman, Hubert. Dear old gentleman."