Death on the Nile (Hercule Poirot 17)

One

I

“Linnet Ridgeway!”

“That’s her!” said Mr. Burnaby, the landlord of the Three Crowns.

He nudged his companion.

The two men stared with round bucolic eyes and slightly open mouths.

A big scarlet Rolls-Royce had just stopped in front of the local post office.

A girl jumped out, a girl without a hat and wearing a frock that looked (but only looked) simple. A girl with golden hair and straight autocratic features—a girl with a lovely shape—a girl such as was seldom seen in Malton-under-Wode.

With a quick imperative step she passed into the post office.

“That’s her!” said Mr. Burnaby again. And he went on in a low awed voice: “Millions she’s got…Going to spend thousands on the place. Swimming pools there’s going to be, and Italian gardens and a ballroom and half of the house pulled down and rebuilt….”

“She’ll bring money into the town,” said his friend. He was a lean, seedy-looking man. His tone was envious and grudging.

Mr. Burnaby agreed.

“Yes, it’s a great thing for Malton-under-Wode. A great thing it is.”

Mr. Burnaby was complacent about it.

“Wake us all up proper,” he added.

“Bit of difference from Sir George,” said the other.

“Ah, it was the ’orses did for him,” said Mr. Burnaby indulgently. “Never ’ad no luck.”

“What did he get for the place?”

“A cool sixty thousand, so I’ve heard.”

The lean man whistled.

Mr. Burnaby went on triumphantly: “And they say she’ll have spent another sixty thousand before she’s finished!”

“Wicked!” said the lean man. “Where’d she get all that money from?”

“America, so I’ve heard. Her mother was the only daughter of one of those millionaire blokes. Quite like the pictures, isn’t it?”

The girl came out of the post office and climbed into the car.

As she drove off, the lean man followed her with his eyes. He muttered:

“It seems all wrong to me—her looking like that. Money and looks—it’s too much! If a girl’s as rich as that she’s no right to be a good-looker as well. And she is a good-looker…Got everything, that girl has. Doesn’t seem fair….”

II

Extract from the Social column of the Daily Blague.

Among those supping at Chez Ma Tante I noticed beautiful Linnet Ridgeway. She was with the Hon. Joanna Southwood, Lord Windlesham and Mr. Toby Bryce. Miss Ridgeway, as everyone knows, is the daughter of Melhuish Ridgeway, who married Anna Hartz. She inherits from her grandfather, Leopold Hartz, an immense fortune. The lovely Linnet is the sensation of the moment and it is rumoured that an engagement may be announced shortly. Certainly Lord Windlesham seemed very épris!!

III

The Hon. Joanna Southwood said:

“Darling, I think it’s going to be all perfectly marvellous!”

She was sitting in Linnet Ridgeway’s bedroom at Wode Hall.

From the window the eye passed over the gardens to open country with blue shadows of woodlands.

“It’s rather perfect, isn’t it?” said Linnet.

She leaned her arms on the window sill. Her face was eager, alive, dynamic. Beside her, Joanna Southwood seemed, somehow, a little dim—a tall thin young woman of twenty-seven, with a long clever face and freakishly plucked eyebrows.

“And you’ve done so much in the time! Did you have lots of architects and things?”

“Three.”

“What are architects like? I don’t think I’ve ever seen any.”

“They were all right. I found them rather unpractical sometimes.”

“Darling, you soon put that right! You are the most practical creature!”