and smiled regretfully. "Our marriage has been in turmoil lately, if I have to be honest."Kogoro nodded, then looked down. “Conan, you… CONAN ?!” The boy was gone. "Like a sack of fleas, that snot boy! Well, if I can get my hands on him ...!"
Meanwhile, Conan stood behind the desk and looked into the drawers. He opened the second from above and looked inside. * Aha, if that's not interesting ... * After he had pushed the drawer back, he was about to go back to Kogoro and the suspect when he suddenly noticed something on the floor. He bent down and whether it was up. * A piece of orange peel? And still looks relatively fresh ... *
"So you say you wanted to ask your husband if he would like some tea and that is why you came into the study," repeated Kogoro, making careful notes of everything.
Conan took the chance and snuck past him. He went to Fraulein Himo, who was now standing a little apart on her own. "Are you sorry?"
She looked at him and leaned down a little."What is it, my little one?"
"Who eats oranges in this house?"
"Oh, that was just Mr. Atoyama. Ms. Atoyama and Yaichi are allergic to the citrus acid and I don't have the patience to peel them."
Conan put on his cutest child smile. "Oh, did Mr. Atoyama eat oranges today?"
She nodded. "Yes, he used to eat two pieces a day. I brought them to him in his study around half past twelve."
"Just the oranges?"
"You're curious," she stated, a little amused. "No, he always insisted on a plate and a teaspoon."
* A teaspoon? How do you eat oranges with a spoon? * "What did he use the spoon for?"
"Unfortunately I don't know," she replied. "In any case, it was always unused when he put the plate with the bowls and the spoon in the kitchen below."
*Hm? Funny ... * "Thank you very much," he whistled and dashed out of the room.
Miss Himo looked after him in surprise."What is now?"
~~~~~

Conan came panting downstairs in the kitchen. Finding the kitchen in such a huge house was damn hard and also quite exhausting. He went to the counter and saw the plate there. * As I suspected. * Then he marched to the garbage can and opened it. * Orange scraps, as expected. *
Now the only thing missing was the spoon. He took another look at the counter, but didn't see it. Nor was it lying on the table or the floor. He looked around the kitchen but couldn't find it. * The puzzle is slowly coming together. I just have to figure out what the victim used the spoon for. *
He left the kitchen and climbed the stairs to the first floor.
When he got to the office, Takagi was standing with Kogoro and Megure and said: "We have information about the current status of the company. Although business is rather mediocre at the moment, the company situation is anything but critical.""Which would weaken Mr. Atoyama's motive," added Kogoro, looking around the room one more time. His gaze caught on something on the desk. He went over and picked up the brown bottle. "Nasal drops. Did Mr. Atoyama Senior have a cold by any chance?"
"Yes, my father caught a mild flu," Yaichi confirmed.
Suddenly Kogoro clenched his fist in the palm of his hand and announced, "I have solved the case."
Conan saw all the pelts swim away again. If Kogoro actually solved the case based on the facts he had so far, then his conclusions would be wrong, wrong, most wrong.
Everyone had already turned to Kogoro and was looking at him intently. He just raised his arm with a smile and then pointed to Miss Himo. "You are the murderer, Miss Himo!"
The young woman held her breath and looked at him in horror.
"If I am correct in my assumption, you took care of washing Mr. Atoyama's dirty handkerchiefs and returning them fresh," said Kogoro."It was therefore extremely easy for you to put potassium cyanide on one of the handkerchiefs before you gave it to him. You took advantage of the fact that Mr. Atoyama had a cold to put your plan into practice. No one else had the opportunity to contact them Handkerchiefs as they passed straight from yours into his hands. "
"No, it wasn't me!" She screamed desperately.
Conan stood directly in front of Kogoro, with his back to the others, and used his anesthetic chronometer to numb Kogoro. He stumbled back a little and landed in an old leather armchair. Then Conan managed to cleverly hide behind the piece of furniture so that no one could see him adjusting the voice transposer.
"Ah, here we go again!" Announced Megure happily. "He'll explain everything in a moment."
Conan began to say, "As I just said, at least that is the case for a layperson."
"What do you mean by that, Mr. Mori?"asked the inspector, confused by the inconsistency in the detective's statements.
"I mean to say that it should look as if Miss Himo is the perpetrator. As you have seen, this suspicion comes up very quickly. However, there is something that exonerates her."
"What should it be?"
"I would like to ask you to look in the second drawer from the top of the desk."
Takagi went to the desk and opened the compartment. "There are tissue handkerchiefs in here."
"Please get them out and put one of them on the desk. Then put the poisoned handkerchief next to it!"
Takagi did so and added the plastic bag with the handkerchief to it.
"What do you notice when you compare the handkerchiefs with each other?"
The superintendent looked at them, then saw what Conan was talking about. "The fresh handkerchief is ironed flat and put into a rectangle and the other has a few creases here and there and is folded into a square.""That's right. That makes me realize that the poisoned handkerchief was not brought by Miss Himo."
"But she might as well have tried to divert suspicion by folding this one differently," Megure interjected.
"That's unlikely," Conan contradicted in Kogoro's voice. "She couldn't have risked Mr. Atoyama suspecting that this handkerchief was so different from the others."
"Yes, but where else would the handkerchief have come from?"
"The answer to that is very simple. Some people always have the same penknife in their pocket and others handle it that way with a handkerchief. The poisoned handkerchief was in his pocket before he used it. That is why it is so wrinkled. I am sure that you will be able to find traces of the poison in one of the two trouser pockets. "
"So we can exclude Miss Himo from the group of suspects," said Megure."Only Mr. and Mrs. Atoyama remain."
"Now we come to Mr. Atoyama Junior. He's not the killer either."
"And what makes you so sure? He could have gotten the handkerchief just as easily as Ms. Atoyama."
"That's true, but if he had really committed the murder, he would have turned the matter around in such a way that Fraulein Himo would not be suspected.
Yaichi looked down and blushed when Miss Himo looked over at him in amazement. "Nothing escapes a great master detective like you, does he?"
“I could tell from the way you hugged her when Inspector Megure questioned the suspects. And I also assume that you called me in about Miss Himo. You probably already knew that the company was not in trouble. I should find out the reason for your father's strange behavior as soon as possible, as you feared that if he continued to bully Miss Himo, she would quit and leave the house of her own accord. ""You're right, that's exactly how it was," he sighed.
"But if Mr. Atoyama and Miss Himo are not the culprit, then ..." Megure and everyone else turned to Mrs. Atoyama in astonishment.
"Mother?" Asked Yaichi Atoyama in disbelief.
"Oh, nonsense, it wasn't me!" She contradicted vigorously. "You don't have proof!"
"Oh, yes! Several even." Conan paused and then began: "Let's start with the act. Inspector Takagi, if you look around on the floor, you should see a piece of orange peel."
Takagi bent down and picked up the bowl. He dutifully handed it to Megure.
"Now let me reconstruct the sequence of events. Mr. Atoyama Senior ate two oranges every day, which he had Miss Himo bring along with a plate for the bowls and a teaspoon."
"A teaspoon?" Repeated Megure unsuspectingly. "Why a teaspoon?"
"The answer to that is very easy. He used to pierce the orange peel with the handle of the spoon so that he could peel it off better.Ms. Atoyama had attached the poison to the inner fold of the handkerchief, knowing that he would always pull the used end of the spoon through this fold to clean it. If he then stabbed the bowl with the poisoned spoon, he automatically caught some pulp, which he then ate. So the poison could get into his body. "
"You are forgetting something", Megure intervened, "The victim wiped the spoon with the handkerchief after her testimony,afterhe had peeled the orange."
"I mentioned at the beginning that he ate two oranges. He wiped the spoon before stabbing the second one with it."
"Ah, I see what you're getting at."
"That doesn't make me a murderer!" Shouted Ms. Atoyama.
"You're right, but I'll clear everything up in a moment. Mr. Atoyama always brought the plate with the orange peel and the spoon down into the kitchen himself when it was done. However, if you look into the kitchen garbage can, you will." Find orange peel and almost a whole peeled orange in the trash. "Inspector Megure directed one of the officers to go into the kitchen and see.
Conan continued, "That leads me to the conclusion that he didn't have enough time to finish the second orange. Because he died during that hangman's meal!"
Megure and a few others listened. "But if that's really what you say, how did the orange get into the trash can from up here?"
"By first getting rid of them by Mrs. Atoyama, then going back upstairs to the study and then screaming. Inspector Megure, would you please look at Mrs. Atoyama's right-hand man?"
Megure walked over to her and took her right hand to take a closer look. "Your fingers are all red!"
"Yes, of course. That's because her skin is allergic to citrus acid. She will have