"Has anything been stolen from him?"
"No."
"Ah! Who did the flannel trousers belong to?"
"Mr. McNabb. Very old they were, and anyone else would say they were done for, but Mr. McNabb is very attached to his old clothes and he never throws anything away."
"So we have come to the things that it would seem were not worth stealing-old flannel trousers, electric light bulbs, boracic powder, bath salts-a cookery book. They may be important, more likely they are not. The boracie was probably removed by error, someone may have removed a dead bulb and intended to replace it, but forgot-the cookery book may have been borrowed and not returned. Some charwoman may have taken away the trousers."
"We employ two very reliable cleaning women. I'm sure they would neither of them have done such a thing without asking first."
"You may be right. Then there is the evening shoe, one of a new pair, I understand? Who do they belong to?"
"Sally Finch. She's an American girl studying over here on a Fulbright scholarship."
"Are you sure that the shoe has not simply been mislaid? I cannot conceive what use one shoe could be to anyone."
"It wasn't mislaid, Mr. Poirot. We all had a terrific hunt. You see Miss Finch was going out to a party in what she calls 'formal dress'-evening dress and the shoes were really vital-they were her only good ones."
"It caused her inconvenience-and annoyanceyes... yes, I wonder. Perhaps there is something there..." He was silent for a moment or two and then went on.
"And there are two more items-a rucksack cut to pieces and a silk scarf in the same state. Here we have something that is neither vanity, nor profit-instead we have something that is deliberately vindictive. Who did the rucksack belong to?"
"Nearly all the students have rucksacks-they all hitchhike a lot, you know. And a great many of the rucksacks are the same-bought at the same place, so it's hard to identify one from the other. But it seems fairly certain that this one belonged to Leonard Bateson or Colin McNabb."
"And the silk scarf that was also cut about. To whom did that belong?"
"To Valerie Hobhouse. She had it as a Christmas present-it was emerald green and really good quality."
"Miss Hobhouse… I see." Poirot closed his eyes. What he perceived mentally was a kaleidoscope, no more, no less.
Pieces of cut up scarves and rucksacks, cookery books, lipsticks, bath salts; names and thumb nail sketches of odd students. Nowhere was there cohesion or form. Unrelated incidents and people whirled round in space. But Poirot knew quite well that somehow and somewhere there must be a pattern.
