Appointment With Death (Hercule Poirot 19)

But she prayed with all her heart that that courage would not fail…

The sun was setting when Sarah came once more in sight of the camp. As she came nearer in the dim light she could make out the grim figure of Mrs Boynton still sitting in the mouth of the cave. Sarah shivered a little at the sight of that grim, motionless figure…

She hurried past on the path below and came into the lighted marquee.

Lady Westholme was sitting knitting a navy-blue jumper, a skein of wool hung round her neck. Miss Pierce was embroidering a table-mat with anaemic blue forget-me-nots, and being instructed on the proper reform of the Divorce Laws.

The servants came in and out preparing for the evening meal. The Boyntons were at the far end of the marquee in deck-chairs reading. Mahmoud appeared, fat and dignified, and was plaintively reproachful. Very nice after-tea ramble had been arranged to take place, but everyone absent from camp…The programme was now entirely thrown out…Very instructive visit to Nabataen architecture.

Sarah said hastily that they had all enjoyed themselves very much.

She went off to her tent to wash for supper. On the way back she paused by Dr Gerard’s tent, calling in a low voice: ‘Dr Gerard.’

There was no answer. She lifted the flap and looked in. The doctor was lying motionless on his bed. Sarah withdrew noiselessly, hoping he was asleep.

A servant came to her and pointed to the marquee. Evidently supper was ready. She strolled down again. Everyone else was assembled there round the table with the exception of Dr Gerard and Mrs Boynton. A servant was dispatched to tell the old lady dinner was ready. Then there was a sudden commotion outside. Two frightened servants rushed in and spoke excitedly to the dragoman in Arabic.

Mahmoud looked round him in a flustered manner and went outside. On an impulse Sarah joined him.

‘What’s the matter?’ she asked.

Mahmoud replied: ‘The old lady. Abdul says she is ill—cannot move.’

‘I’ll come and see.’

Sarah quickened her step. Following Mahmoud, she climbed the rock and walked along until she came to the squat figure in the chair, touched the puffy hand, felt for the pulse, bent over her…

When she straightened herself she was paler.

She retraced her steps back to the marquee. In the doorway she paused a minute looking at the group at the far end of the table. Her voice when she spoke sounded to herself brusque and unnatural.

‘I’m so sorry,’ she said. She forced herself to address the head of the family, Lennox. ‘Your mother is dead, Mr Boynton.’

And curiously, as though from a great distance, she watched the faces of five people to whom that announcement meant freedom…

Part II

Chapter 1

Colonel Carbury smiled across the table at his guest and raised his glass. ‘Well, here’s to crime!’

Hercule Poirot’s eyes twinkled in acknowledgement of the aptness of the toast.

He had come to Amman with a letter of introduction to Colonel Carbury from Colonel Race.

Carbury had been interested to see this world-famous person to whose gifts his old friend and ally in the Intelligence had paid such unstinting tribute.

‘As neat a bit of psychological deduction as you’ll ever find!’ Race had written of the solution of the Shaitana murder.

‘We must show you all we can of the neighbourhood,’ said Carbury, twisting a somewhat ragged brindled moustache. He was an untidy stocky man of medium height with a semibald head and vague, mild, blue eyes. He did not look in the least like a soldier. He did not look even particularly alert. He was not in the least one’s idea of a disciplinarian. Yet in Transjordania he was a power.

‘There’s Jerash,’ he said. ‘Care about that sort of thing?’

‘I am interested in everything!’

‘Yes,’ said Carbury. ‘That’s the only way to react to life.’ He paused.

‘Tell me, d’you ever find your own special job has a way of following you round?’