Murder on the Orient Express - Agatha Christie [56]
He turned to his wife.
‘You do not object, I hope, Elena?’
‘Not at all,’ said the Countess without hesitation.
A rapid and somewhat perfunctory search followed. Poirot seemed to be trying to mask an embarrassment in making various small pointless remarks, such as:
‘Here is a label all wet on your suitcase, Madame,’ as he lifted down a blue morocco case with initials on it and a coronet.
The Countess did not reply to this observation. She seemed, indeed, rather bored by the whole proceeding, remaining curled up in her corner, staring dreamily out through the window whilst the men searched her luggage in the compartment next door.
Poirot finished his search by opening the little cupboard above the wash-basin and taking a rapid glance at its contents—a sponge, face cream, powder and a small bottle labelled trional.
Then, with polite remarks on either side, the search party withdrew.
Mrs Hubbard’s compartment, that of the dead man, and Poirot’s own came next.
They now came to the second-class carriages. The first one, Nos. 10, 11, was occupied by Mary Debenham, who was reading a book, and Greta Ohlsson, who was fast asleep but woke with a start at their entrance.
Poirot repeated his formula. The Swedish lady seemed agitated, Mary Debenham calmly indifferent.
Poirot addressed himself to the Swedish lady.
‘If you permit, Mademoiselle, we will examine your baggage first, and then perhaps you would be so good as to see how the American lady is getting on. We have moved her into one of the carriages in the next coach, but she is still very upset as the result of her discovery. I have ordered coffee to be sent to her, but I think she is of those to whom someone to talk to is a necessity of the first water.’
The good lady was instantly sympathetic. She would go immediately. It must have been indeed a terrible shock to the nerves, and already the poor lady was upset by the journey and leaving her daugher. Ah, yes, certainly she would go at once—her case was not locked—and she would take with her some sal ammoniac.
She bustled off. Her possessions were soon examined. They were meagre in the extreme. She had evidently not noticed the missing wires from the hat box.
Miss Debenham had put her book down. She was watching Poirot. When he asked her, she handed over her keys. Then, as he lifted down a case and opened it, she said:
‘Why did you send her away, M. Poirot?’
‘I, Mademoiselle? Why, to minister to the American lady.’
‘An excellent pretext—but a pretext all the same.’
‘I don’t understand you, Mademoiselle.’
‘I think you understand me very well.’
She smiled.
‘You wanted to get me alone. Wasn’t that it?’
‘You are putting words into my mouth, Mademoiselle.’
‘And ideas into your head? No, I don’t think so. The ideas are already there. That is right, isn’t it?’
‘Mademoiselle, we have a proverb—’
‘Que s’excuse s’accuse; is that what you were going to say? You must give me the credit for a certain amount of observation and common sense. For some reason or other you have got it into your head that I know something about this sordid business—this murder of a man I never saw before.’
‘You are imagining things, Mademoiselle.’
‘No, I am not imagining things at all. But it seems to me that a lot of time is wasted by not speaking the truth—by beating about the bush instead of coming straight out with things.’
‘And you do not like the waste of time. No, you like to come straight to the point. You like the direct method. Eh bien, I will give it to you, the direct method. I will ask you the meaning of certain words that I overheard on the journey from Syria. I had got out of the train to do what the English call “stretch the legs” at the station of Konya. Your voice and the Colonel’s, Mademoiselle, they came to me out of the night. You said to him, “Not now. Not now. When it’s all over. When it’s behind us.” What did you mean by those words.