“I will tell you something as to the good Major Blunt,” interrupted Poirot. “It is my business to make inquiries. I make them. Eh bien ⁠—that legacy of which he speaks, I have discovered that the amount of it was close upon twenty thousand pounds. What do you think of that?”

I was so taken aback that I could hardly speak.

“It’s impossible,” I said at last. “A well-known man like Hector Blunt.”

Poirot shrugged his shoulders.

“Who knows? At least he is a man with big ideas. I confess that I hardly see him as a blackmailer, but there is another possibility that you have not even considered.”

“What is that?”