Murder on the Orient Express (Hercule Poirot 10)

“Pardon, Monsieur le Comte,” began Poirot. “Pray forgive this intrusion. It is that we are making a search of all the baggage on the train. In most cases a mere formality. But it has to be done. M. Bouc suggests that, as you have a diplomatic passport, you might reasonably claim to be exempt from such a search.”

The Count considered for a moment.

“Thank you,” he said. “But I do not think that I care for an exception to be made in my case. I should prefer that our baggage should be examined like that of the other passengers.”

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 washbasin 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 daughter. 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. Mademoiselle?”

She said very quietly:

“Do you think I meant—murder?”

“It is I who am asking you, Mademoiselle.”

She sighed—was lost a minute in thought. Then, as though rousing herself, she said:

“Those words had a meaning, Monsieur, but not one that I can tell you. I can only give you my solemn word of honour that I had never set eyes on this man Ratchett in my life until I saw him on this train.”

“And—you refuse to explain those words?”

“Yes—if you like to put it that way—I refuse. They had to do with—with a task I had undertaken.”

“A task that is now ended?”

“What do you mean?”

“It is ended, is it not?”

“Why should you think so?”

“Listen, Mademoiselle, I will recall to you another incident. There was a delay to the train on the day we were to reach Stamboul. You were very agitated, Mademoiselle. You, so calm, so self-controlled. You lost that calm.”

“I did not want to miss my connection.”

“So you said. But, Mademoiselle, the Orient Express leaves Stamboul every day of the week. Even if you had missed the connection it would only have been a matter of twenty-four hours’ delay.”

Miss Debenham for the first time showed signs of losing her temper.

“You do not seem to realize that one may have friends awaiting one’s arrival in London, and that a day’s delay upsets arrangements and causes a lot of annoyance.”

“Ah, it is like that? There are friends awaiting your arrival? You do not want to cause them inconvenience?”

“Naturally.”

“And yet—it is curious—”

“What is curious?”

“On this train—again we have a delay. And this time a more serious delay, since there is no possibility of sending a telegram to your friends or of getting them on the long—the long—”

“The long distance? The telephone, you mean.”

“Ah, yes, the portmanteau call, as you say in England.”

Mary Debenham smiled a little in spite of herself.

“Trunk call,?

?? she corrected. “Yes, as you say, it is extremely annoying not to be able to get any word through, either by telephone or telegraph.”

“And yet, mademoiselle, this time your manner is quite different. You no longer betray the impatience. You are calm and philosophical.”

Mary Debenham flushed and bit her lip. She no longer felt inclined to smile.

“You do not answer, Mademoiselle?”

“I am sorry. I did not know that there was anything to answer.”

“The explanation of your change of attitude, Mademoiselle.”

“Don’t you think that you are making rather a fuss about nothing, M. Poirot?”

Poirot spread out his hands in an apologetic gesture.

“It is perhaps a fault with us detectives. We expect the behaviour to be always consistent. We do not allow for changes of mood.”

Mary Debenham made no reply.

“You know Colonel Arbuthnot well, Mademoiselle?”

He fancied that she was relieved by the change of subject.

“I met him for the first time on this journey.”

“Have you any reason to suspect that he may have known this man Ratchett?”

She shook her head decisively.

“I am quite sure he didn’t.”

“Why are you sure?”

“By the way he spoke.”

“And yet, Mademoiselle, we found a pipe cleaner on the floor of the dead man’s compartment. And Colonel Arbuthnot is the only man on the train who smokes a pipe?”

He watched her narrowly, but she displayed neither surprise nor emotion, merely said:

“Nonsense. It’s absurd. Colonel Arbuthnot is the last man in the world to be mixed up in a crime—especially a theatrical kind of crime like this.”

It was so much what Poirot himself thought that he found himself on the point of agreeing with her. He said instead:

“I must remind you that you do not know him very well, Mademoiselle.”

She shrugged her shoulders.

“I know the type well enough.”

He said very gently:

“You still refuse to tell me the meaning of those words—‘When it’s behind us?’”

She said coldly:

“I have nothing more to say.”

“It does not matter,” said Hercule Poirot. “I shall find out.”