Chapter 20 – J.
It was all so sudden that for a moment no one knew what had happened.
Then, with a violent exclamation¹, Poirot ran to the window. Challenger was with him.
A moment later they reappeared, carrying with them the limp body of a man. As they lowered him carefully into a big leather armchair and his face came into view, I uttered a cry.
'The face-the face at the window...'
It was the man I had seen looking in on us the previous evening. I recognized him at once. I realized that when I had said he was hardly human I had exaggerated as Poirot had accused me of doing.
Yet there was something about his face that justified² my impression. It was a lost face-the face of one removed from ordinary humanity.
White, weak, depraved-it seemed a mere³ mask-as though the spirit within had fled long ago.
Down the side of it there trickled⁴ a stream of blood.
Frederica came slowly forward till she stood by the chair.
Poirot intercepted⁵ her.
'You are hurt, Madame?'
She shook her head.
'The bullet grazed my shoulder-that is all.'
She put him aside with a gentle hand and bent⁶ down.
The man's eyes opened and he saw her looking down at him.
'I've done for you this time, I hope,' he said in a low vicious snarl⁷, and then, his voice changing suddenly till it sounded like a child's, 'Oh! Freddie, I didn't mean it. I didn't mean it. You've always been so decent to me...'
'It's all right-'
She knelt down beside him.
'I didn't mean-'
His head dropped. The sentence was never finished.
Frederica looked up at Poirot.
'Yes, Madame, he is dead,' he said, gently.
She rose slowly from her knees and stood looking down at him. With one hand she touched his forehead-pitifully, it seemed. Then she sighed and turned to the rest of us.
'He was my husband,' she said, quietly.
'J.,' I murmured.
Poirot caught my remark, and nodded a quick

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