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Eleven
“Will you explain to me, Madame, the meaning of the word ‘fey’?”
Mrs. Allerton looked slightly surprised. She and Poirot were toiling1 slowly up to the rockoverlooking the Second Cataract2. Most of the others had gone up on camels, but Poirot had feltthat the motion of the camel was slightly reminiscent of that of a ship. Mrs. Allerton had put it onthe grounds of personal indignity3.
They had arrived at Wadi Halfa the night before. This morning two launches had conveyed allthe party to the Second Cataract, with the exception of Signor Richetti, who had insisted onmaking an excursion of his own to a remote spot called Semna, which, he explained, was ofparamount interest as being the gateway4 of Nubia in the time of Amenemhet III, and where therewas a stele5 recording6 the fact that on entering Egypt Negroes must pay customs duties. Everythinghad been done to discourage this example of individuality, but with no avail. Signor Richetti wasdetermined and had waved aside each objection: (1) that the expedition was not worth making, (2)that the expedition could not be made, owing to the impossibility of getting a car there, (3) that nocar could be obtained to do the trip, (4) that a car would be a prohibitive price. Having scoffed7 at(1), expressed incredulity at (2), offered to find a car himself to (3), and bargained fluently inArabic for (4), Signor Richetti had at last departed—his departure being arranged in a secret andfurtive manner, in case some of the other tourists should take it into their heads to stray from theappointed paths of sightseeing.
“Fey?” Mrs. Allerton put her head on one side as she considered her reply. “Well, it’s a Scotchword, really. It means the kind of exalted8 happiness that comes before disaster. You know—it’stoo good to be true.”
She enlarged on the theme. Poirot listened attentively9.
“I thank you, Madame. I understand now. It is odd that you should have said that yesterday—when Madame Doyle was to escape death so shortly afterwards.”
Mrs. Allerton gave a little shiver.
“It must have been a very near escape. Do you think some of these little black wretches10 rolled itover for fun? It’s the sort of thing boys might do all over the world—not perhaps really meaningany harm.”
“It may be, Madame.”
He changed the subject, talking of Majorca and asking various practical questions from thepoint of view of a possible visit.
Mrs. Allerton had grown to like the little man very much—partly perhaps out of a contradictoryspirit. Tim, she felt, was always trying to make her less friendly to Hercule Poirot, whom hesummarized firmly as “the worst kind of bounder.” But she herself did not call him a bounder; shesupposed it was his somewhat foreign exotic clothing which roused her son’s prejudices. Sheherself found him an intelligent and stimulating12 companion. He was also extremely sympathetic.
She found herself suddenly confiding13 in him her dislike of Joanna Southwood. It eased her to talkof the matter. And after all, why not? He did not know Joanna—would probably never meet her.
Why should she not ease herself of that constantly borne burden of jealous thought?
At the same moment Tim and Rosalie Otterbourne were talking of her. Tim had just been halfjestingly abusing his luck. His rotten health, never bad enough to be really interesting, yet notgood enough for him to have led the life he would have chosen. Very little money, no congenialoccupation.
“A thoroughly14 lukewarm, tame existence,” he finished discontentedly.
“What’s that?”
“Your mother.”
Tim was surprised and pleased.
“Mother? Yes, of course she is quite unique. It’s nice of you to see it.”
“I think she’s marvellous. She looks so lovely—so composed and calm—as though nothingcould ever touch her, and yet—and yet somehow she’s always ready to be funny about thingstoo….”
Rosalie was stammering16 slightly in her earnestness.
Tim felt a rising warmth to the girl. He wished he could return the compliment, but lamentably,Mrs. Otterbourne was his idea of the world’s greatest menace. The inability to respond in kindmade him embarrassed.
Miss Van Schuyler had stayed in the launch. She could not risk the ascent17 either on a camel oron her legs. She had said snappily:
“I’m sorry to have to ask you to stay with me, Miss Bowers18. I intended you to go and Corneliato stay, but girls are so selfish. She rushed off without a word to me. And I actually saw her talkingto that very unpleasant and ill-bred young man, Ferguson. Cornelia has disappointed me sadly.
She has absolutely no social sense.”
Miss Bowers replied in her usual matter-of-fact fashion:
“That’s quite all right, Miss Van Schuyler. It would have been a hot walk up there, and I don’tfancy the look of those saddles on the camels. Fleas19, as likely as not.”
She adjusted her glasses, screwed up her eyes to look at the party descending20 the hill andremarked: “Miss Robson isn’t with that young man anymore. She’s with Dr. Bessner.”
Since she had discovered that Dr. Bessner had a large clinic in Czechoslovakia and a Europeanreputation as a fashionable physician, she was disposed to be gracious to him. Besides she mightneed his professional services before the journey was over.
When the party returned to the Karnak Linnet gave a cry of surprise.
“A telegram for me.”
She snatched it off the board and tore it open.
“Why—I don’t understand—potatoes, beetroots—what does it mean, Simon?”
Simon was just coming to look over her shoulder when a furious voice said: “Excuse me, thattelegram is for me,” and Signor Richetti snatched it rudely from her hand, fixing her with a furiousglare as he did so.
Linnet stared in surprise for a moment, then turned over the envelope.
“Oh, Simon, what a fool I am! It’s Richetti—not Ridgeway—and anyway of course my nameisn’t Ridgeway now. I must apologize.”
She followed the little archaeologist up to the stern of the boat.
“I am so sorry, Signor Richetti. You see my name was Ridgeway before I married, and Ihaven’t been married very long, and so….”
But Richetti was obviously “not amused.” Queen Victoria at her most disapproving23 could nothave looked more grim. “Names should be read carefully. It is inexcusable to be careless in thesematters.”
Linnet bit her lip and her colour rose. She was not accustomed to have her apologies received inthis fashion. She turned away and, rejoining Simon, said angrily, “These Italians are reallyinsupportable.”
“Never mind, darling; let’s go and look at that big ivory crocodile you liked.”
Poirot, watching them walk up the landing stage, heard a sharp indrawn breath. He turned to seeJacqueline de Bellefort at his side. Her hands were clenched25 on the rail. The expression on herface, as she turned it towards him, quite startled him. It was no longer gay or malicious26. Shelooked devoured27 by some inner consuming fire.
“They don’t care anymore.” The words came low and fast. “They’ve got beyond me. I can’treach them…They don’t mind if I’m here or not…I can’t—I can’t hurt them anymore….”
Her hands on the rail trembled.
“Mademoiselle—”
She broke in: “Oh, it’s too late now—too late for warnings…You were right. I ought not tohave come. Not on this journey. What did you call it? A journey of the soul? I can’t go back; I’vegot to go on. And I’m going on. They shan’t be happy together; they shan’t. I’d kill himsooner….”
She turned abruptly away. Poirot, staring after her, felt a hand on his shoulder.
“Your girl friend seems a trifle upset, Monsieur Poirot.” Poirot turned. He stared in surprise,seeing an old acquaintance.
“Colonel Race.”
The tall bronzed man smiled.
“Bit of a surprise, eh?”
Hercule Poirot had come across Colonel Race a year previously28 in London. They had beenfellow guests at a very strange dinner party—a dinner party that had ended in death for thatstrange man, their host.
Poirot knew that Race was a man of unadvertised goings and comings. He was usually to befound in one of the outposts of Empire where trouble was brewing29.
“So you are here at Wadi Halfa,” he remarked thoughtfully.
“I am here on this boat.”
“You mean?”
“That I am making the return journey with you to Shellal.”
“That is very interesting. Shall we, perhaps, have a little drink?”
They went into the observation saloon, now quite empty. Poirot ordered a whisky for theColonel and a double orangeade full of sugar for himself.
“So you make the return journey with us,” said Poirot as he sipped31. “You would go faster,would you not, on the Government steamer, which travels by night as well as day?”
“You’re right on the spot as usual, Monsieur Poirot,” he said pleasantly.
“It is, then, the passengers?”
“One of the passengers.”
“Now which one, I wonder?” Hercule Poirot asked of the ornate ceiling.
“Unfortunately I don’t know myself,” said Race ruefully.
Poirot looked interested.
Race said: “There’s no need to be mysterious to you. We’ve had a good deal of trouble out here—one way and another. It isn’t the people who ostensibly lead the rioters that we’re after. It’s themen who very cleverly put the match to the gunpowder33. There were three of them. One’s dead.
One’s in prison. I want the third man—a man with five or six cold-blooded murders to his credit.
He’s one of the cleverest paid agitators34 that ever existed…He’s on this boat. I know that from apassage in a letter that passed through our hands. Decoded35 it said: ‘X will be on the Karnak tripseventh to thirteenth.’ It didn’t say under what name X would be passing.”
“Have you any description of him?”
“No. American, Irish, and French descent. Bit of a mongrel. That doesn’t help us much. Haveyou got any ideas?”
“An idea—it is all very well,” said Poirot meditatively36.
Such was the understanding between them that Race pressed him no further. He knew HerculePoirot did not ever speak unless he was sure.
Poirot rubbed his nose and said unhappily: “There passes itself something on this boat thatcauses me much inquietude.”
Race looked at him inquiringly.
“Figure to yourself,” said Poirot, “a person A who has grievously wronged a person B. Theperson B desires the revenge. The person B makes the threats.”
“A and B being both on this boat?”
Poirot nodded. “Precisely.”
“And B, I gather, being a woman?”
“Exactly.”
Race lit a cigarette.
“I shouldn’t worry. People who go about talking of what they are going to do don’t usually doit.”
“And particularly is that the case with les femmes, you would say! Yes, that is true.”
But he still did not look happy.
“Anything else?” asked Race.
“Yes, there is something. Yesterday the person A had a very near escape from death, the kind ofdeath that might very conveniently be called an accident.”
“Engineered by B?”
“No, that is just the point. B could have had nothing to do with it.”
“Then it was an accident.”
“I suppose so—but I don’t like such accidents.”
“You’re quite sure B could have had no hand in it?”
“Absolutely.”
“Oh, well, coincidences do happen. Who is A, by the way? A particularly disagreeable person?”
“On the contrary. A is a charming, rich, and beautiful young lady.”
Race grinned.
“Sounds quite like a novelette.”
“Peut-être. But I tell you, I am not happy, my friend. If I am right, and after all I am constantlyin the habit of being right”—Race smiled into his moustache at this typical utterance—“then thereis matter for grave inquietude. And now, you come to add yet another complication. You tell methat there is a man on the Karnak who kills.”
“He doesn’t usually kill charming young ladies.”
Poirot shook his head in a dissatisfied manner.
“I am afraid, my friend,” he said. “I am afraid…Today, I advised this lady, Madame Doyle, togo with her husband to Khartoum, not to return on this boat. But they would not agree. I pray toHeaven that we may arrive at Shellal without catastrophe37.”
“Aren’t you taking rather a gloomy view?”
Poirot shook his head.
“I am afraid,” he said simply. “Yes, I, Hercule Poirot, I’m afraid….”
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