Elephants Can Remember - Agatha Christie [0]
Elephants
Can Remember
To Molly Myers
in return for many kindnesses
Contents
Cover
Title Page
Chapter 1 - A Literary Luncheon
Chapter 2 - First Mention of Elephants
Book 1 - Elephants
Chapter 3 - Great Aunt Alice’s Guide to Knowledge
Chapter 4 - Celia
Chapter 5 - Old Sins Have Long Shadows
Chapter 6 - An Old Friend Remembers
Chapter 7 - Back to the Nursery
Chapter 8 - Mrs Oliver at Work
Chapter 9 - Results of Elephantine Research
Chapter 10 - Desmond 163
Book 2 - Long Shadows
Chapter 11 - Superintendent Garroway and Poirot Compare Notes
Chapter 12 - Celia Meets Hercule Poirot
Chapter 13 - Mrs Burton-Cox
Chapter 14 - Dr Willoughby
Chapter 15 - Eugene and Rosentelle, Hair Stylists and Beauticians
Chapter 16 - Mr Goby Reports
Chapter 17 - Poirot Announces Departure
Chapter 18 - Interlude
Chapter 19 - Maddy and Zélie
Chapter 20 - Court of Enquiry
E-Book Extras
The Poirots
Essay by Charles Osborne
About Agatha Christie
The Agatha Christie Collection
Copyright
About the Publisher
Chapter 1
A Literary Luncheon
Mrs Oliver looked at herself in the glass. She gave a brief, sideways look towards the clock on the mantel-piece, which she had some idea was twenty minutes slow. Then she resumed her study of her coiffure. The trouble with Mrs Oliver was – and she admitted it freely – that her styles of hairdressing were always being changed. She had tried almost everything in turn. A severe pompadour at one time, then a wind-swept style where you brushed back your locks to display an intellectual brow, at least she hoped the brow was intellectual. She had tried tightly arranged curls, she had tried a kind of artistic disarray. She had to admit that it did not matter very much today what her type of hairdressing was, because today she was going to do what she very seldom did, wear a hat.
On the top shelf of Mrs Oliver’s wardrobe there reposed four hats. One was definitely allotted to weddings. When you went to a wedding, a hat was a ‘must’. But even then Mrs Oliver kept two. One, in a round bandbox, was of feathers. It fitted closely to the head and stood up very well to sudden squalls of rain if they should overtake one unexpectedly as one passed from a car to the interior of the sacred edifice, or as so often now a days, a registrar’s office.
The other, and more elaborate, hat was definitely for attending a wedding held on a Saturday afternoon in summer. It had flowers and chiffon and a covering of yellow net attached with mimosa.
The other two hats on the shelf were of a more all-purpose character. One was what Mrs Oliver called her ‘country house hat’, made of tan felt suitable for wearing with tweeds of almost any pattern, with a becoming brim that you could turn up or turn down.
Mrs Oliver had a cashmere pullover for warmth and a thin pullover for hot days, either of which was suitable in colour to go with this. However, though the pullovers were frequently worn, the hat was practically never worn. Because, really, why put on a hat just to go to the country and have a meal with your friends?
The fourth hat was the most expensive of the lot and it had extraordinarily durable advantages about it. Possibly, Mrs Oliver sometimes thought, because it was so expensive. It consisted of a kind of turban of various layers of contrasting velvets, all of rather becoming pastel shades which would go with anything.
Mrs Oliver paused in doubt and then called for assistance.
‘Maria,’ she said, then louder, ‘Maria. Come here a minute.’
Maria came. She was used to being asked to give advice on what Mrs Oliver was thinking of wearing.
‘Going to wear your lovely smart hat, are you?’ said Maria.
‘Yes,’ said Mrs Oliver. ‘I wanted to know whether you think it looks best this way or the other way round.’
Maria stood back and took a look.
‘Well, that’s back to front you’re wearing it now, isn’t it?’
‘Yes, I know,’ said Mrs Oliver. ‘I know that quite well. But I thought somehow it looked better that way.’
‘Oh, why