The Mystery of the Blue Train (22 page)
Read The Mystery of the Blue Train Online
Authors: Agatha Christie
“I had some trouble in my inquiries there, but I got what I wantedâevidence that Ada Mason arrived on the morning after the crime and not on the evening of the day before.”
There was a long silence, then the millionaire stretched out a hand to Poirot across the table.
“I guess you know what this means to me, Monsieur Poirot,” he said huskily. “I am sending you round a cheque in the morning, but no cheque in the world will express what I feel about what you have done for me. You are the goods, Monsieur Poirot. Every time, you are the goods.”
Poirot rose to his feet; his chest swelled.
“I am only Hercule Poirot,” he said modestly, “yet, as you say, in my own way I am a big man, even as you also are a big man. I am glad and happy to have been of service to you. Now I go to repair the damages caused by travel. Alas! My excellent Georges is not with me.”
In the lounge of the hotel he encountered a friendâthe venerable Monsieur Papopolous, his daughter Zia beside him.
“I thought you had left Nice, Monsieur Poirot,” murmured the Greek as he took the detective's affectionately proferred hand.
“Business compelled me to return, my dear Monsieur Papopolous.”
“Business?”
“Yes, business. And talking of business, I hope your health is better, my dear friend?”
“Much better. In fact, we are returning to Paris tomorrow.”
“I am enchanted to hear such good news. You have not completely ruined the Greek ex-Minister, I hope.”
“I?”
“I understand you sold him a very wonderful ruby whichâstrictly
entre nous
âis being worn by Mademoiselle Mirelle, the dancer?”
“Yes,” murmured Monsieur Papopolous; “yes, that is so.”
“A ruby not unlike the famous âHeart of Fire.' ”
“It has points of resemblance, certainly,” said the Greek casually.
“You have a wonderful hand with jewels, Monsieur Papopolous. I congratulate you. Mademoiselle Zia, I am desolate that you are returning to Paris so speedily. I had hoped to see some more of you now that my business is accomplished.”
“Would one be indiscreet if one asked what that business was?” asked Monsieur Papopolous.
“Not at all, not at all. I have just succeeded in laying the Marquis by the heels.”
A far-away look came over Monsieur Papopolous' noble countenance.
“The Marquis?” he murmured; “now why does that seem familiar to me? NoâI cannot recall it.”
“You would not, I am sure,” said Poirot. “I refer to a very notable criminal and jewel robber. He has just been arrested for the murder of the English lady, Madame Kettering.”
“Indeed? How interesting these things are!”
A polite exchange of farewells followed, and when Poirot was out of earshot, Monsieur Papopolous turned to his daughter.
“Zia,” he said, with feeling, “that man is the devil!”
“I like him.”
“I like him myself,” admitted Monsieur Papopolous. “But he is the devil, all the same.”
Thirty-six
T
he mimosa was nearly over. The scent of it in the air was faintly unpleasant. There were pink geraniums twining along the balustrade of Lady Tamplin's villa, and masses of carnations below sent up a sweet, heavy perfume. The Mediterranean was at its bluest. Poirot sat on the terrace with Lenox Tamplin. He had just finished telling her the same story that he had told to Van Aldin two days before. Lenox had listened to him with absorbed attention, her brows knitted and her eyes sombre.
When he had finished she said simply:
“And Derek?”
“He was released yesterday.”
“And he has goneâwhere?”
“He left Nice last night.”
“For St. Mary Mead?”
“Yes, for St. Mary Mead.”
There was a pause.
“I was wrong about Katherine,” said Lenox. “I thought she did not care.”
“She is very reserved. She trusts no one.”
“She might have trusted me,” said Lenox, with a shade of bitterness.
“Yes,” said Poirot gravely, “she might have trusted you. But Mademoiselle Katherine has spent a great deal of her life listening, and those who have listened do not find it easy to talk; they keep their sorrows and joys to themselves and tell no one.”
“I was a fool,” said Lenox; “I thought she really cared for Knighton. I ought to have known better. I suppose I thought so becauseâwell, I hoped so.”
Poirot took her hand and gave it a little friendly squeeze. “Courage, Mademoiselle,” he said gently.
Lenox looked very straight out across the sea, and her face, in its ugly rigidity, had for the moment a tragic beauty.
“Oh, well,” she said at last, “it would not have done. I am too young for Derek; he is like a kid that has never grown up. He wants the Madonna touch.”
There was a long silence, then Lenox turned to him quickly and impulsively. “But I
did
help, Monsieur Poirotâat any rate I did help.”
“Yes, Mademoiselle. It was you who gave me the first inkling of the truth when you said that the person who committed the crime need not have been on the train at all. Before that, I could not see how the thing had been done.”
Lenox drew a deep breath.
“I am glad,” she said; “at any rateâthat is something.”
From far behind them there came a long-drawn-out scream of an engine's whistle.
“That is that damned Blue Train,” said Lenox. “Trains are relentless things, aren't they, Monsieur Poirot? People are murdered and die, but they go on just the same. I am talking nonsense, but you know what I mean.”
“Yes, yes, I know. Life is like a train, Mademoiselle. It goes on. And it is a good thing that that is so.”
“Why?”
“Because the train gets to its journey's end at last, and there is a proverb about that in your language, Mademoiselle.”
“ âJourneys end in lovers meeting.' ” Lenox laughed. “That is not going to be true for me.”
“Yesâyes, it is true. You are young, younger than you yourself know. Trust the train, Mademoiselle, for it is
le bon Dieu
who drives it.”
The whistle of the engine came again.
“Trust the train, Mademoiselle,” murmured Poirot again. “And trust Hercule Poirotâ
He knows.
”
Agatha Christie is the most widely published author of all time and in any language, outsold only by the Bible and Shakespeare. Her books have sold more than a billion copies in English and another billion in a hundred foreign languages. She is the author of eighty crime novels and short-story collections, nineteen plays, two memoirs, and six novels written under the name Mary Westmacott.
She first tried her hand at detective fiction while working in a hospital dispensary during World War I, creating the now legendary
Hercule
Poirot with her debut novel
The Mysterious Affair at Styles.
With
The Murder in the Vicarage,
published in 1930, she introduced another beloved sleuth, Miss Jane Marple. Additional series characters include the husband-and-wife crime-fighting team of Tommy and Tuppence Beresford, private investigator Parker Pyne, and Scotland Yard detectives Superintendent Battle and Inspector Japp.
Many of Christie's novels and short stories were adapted into plays, films, and television series.
The Mousetrap,
her most famous play of all, opened in 1952 and is the longest-running play in history. Among her best-known film adaptations are
Murder on the Orient Express
(1974) and
Death on the Nile
(1978), with Albert Finney and Peter Ustinov playing Hercule Poirot, respectively. On the small screen Poirot has been most memorably portrayed by David Suchet, and Miss Marple by Joan Hickson and
subsequently
Geraldine McEwan and Julia McKenzie.
Christie was first married to Archibald Christie and then to archaeologist Sir Max Mallowan, whom she accompanied on expeditions to countries that would also serve as the settings for many of her novels. In 1971 she achieved one of Britain's highest honors when she was made a Dame of the British Empire. She died in 1976 at the age of eighty-five. Her one hundred and twentieth anniversary was celebrated around the world in 2010.
Visit
www.AuthorTracker.com
for exclusive information on your favorite HarperCollins authors.
www.AgathaChristie.com
The Agatha Christie Collection
The Man in the Brown Suit
The Secret of Chimneys
The Seven Dials Mystery
The Mysterious Mr. Quin
The Sittaford Mystery
Parker Pyne Investigates
Why Didn't They Ask Evans?
Murder Is Easy
The Regatta Mystery and Other Stories
And Then There Were None
Towards Zero
Death Comes as the End
Sparkling Cyanide
The Witness for the Prosecution and Other Stories
Crooked House
Three Blind Mice and Other Stories
They Came to Baghdad
Destination Unknown
Ordeal by Innocence
Double Sin and Other Stories
The Pale Horse
Star over Bethlehem: Poems and Holiday Stories
Endless Night
Passenger to Frankfurt
The Golden Ball and Other Stories
The Mousetrap and Other Plays
The Harlequin Tea Set
The Hercule Poirot Mysteries
The Mysterious Affair at Styles
The Murder on the Links
Poirot Investigates
The Murder of Roger Ackroyd
The Big Four
The Mystery of the Blue Train
Peril at End House
Lord Edgware Dies
Murder on the Orient Express
Three Act Tragedy
Death in the Clouds
The A.B.C. Murders
Murder in Mesopotamia
Cards on the Table
Murder in the Mews
Dumb Witness
Death on the Nile
Appointment with Death
Hercule Poirot's Christmas
Sad Cypress
One, Two, Buckle My Shoe
Evil Under the Sun
Five Little Pigs
The Hollow
The Labors of Hercules
Taken at the Flood
The Under Dog and Other Stories
Mrs. McGinty's Dead
After the Funeral
Hickory Dickory Dock
Dead Man's Folly
Cat Among the Pigeons
The Clocks
Third Girl
Hallowe'en Party
Elephants Can Remember
Curtain: Poirot's Last Case
The Miss Marple Mysteries
The Murder at the Vicarage
The Body in the Library
The Moving Finger
A Murder Is Announced
They Do It with Mirrors
A Pocket Full of Rye
4:50 from Paddington
The Mirror Crack'd from Side to Side
A Caribbean Mystery
At Bertram's Hotel
Nemesis
Sleeping Murder
Miss Marple: The Complete
Short Stories
The Tommy and
Tuppence Mysteries
The Secret Adversary
Partners in Crime
N or M?
By the Pricking of My Thumbs
Postern of Fate
Memoirs
An Autobiography
Come, Tell Me How You Live
