Death on the Nile / Смерть на Ниле. Агата КристиЧитать онлайн книгу.
usual motives, Monsieur Poirot?”
“Most frequent – money. Then there is revenge.”
“Monsieur Poirot!”
Then she took a lighter tone.
“After this conversation, Monsieur Poirot, I shall wonder that there is anyone left alive!”
She got up.
“We must be getting back. We have to start immediately after lunch.”
When they reached the landing stage they found the young man in the polo jumper just taking his place in the boat. Poirot addressed a polite remark to the stranger.[149]
“There are very wonderful things to be seen in Egypt, are there not?”
The young man was now smoking a pipe. He removed it from his mouth and remarked briefly, in astonishingly good accents, “They make me sick[150].”
Mrs Allerton put on her pincenez and looked at him with interest.
“Indeed? And why is that?” Poirot asked.
“Take the Pyramids. Great blocks of useless masonry, put up to keep a despotic king. Think of the people who worked hard to build them and died doing it. It makes me sick to think of the suffering and torture they represent.”
Mrs Allerton said cheerfully, “You'd rather have no Pyramids, no Parthenon[151], no beautiful temples – just the satisfaction of knowing that people got three meals a day and died in their beds.”
The young man directed his grin in her direction.
“I'd rather see a well fed worker than any so-called work of art. What matters is the future – not the past.[152]”
The young man told everybody exactly what he thought of the capitalist system. When the tirade was over they had arrived at the hotel landing stage.
In the hall of the hotel Poirot met Jacqueline de Bellefort. She was dressed in riding clothes[153]. She gave him an ironical little bow. “I'm going donkey riding. Do you recommend the native villages, Monsieur Poirot?”
“Is that your excursion today, Mademoiselle? Well, they are picturesque – but do not spend large sums of money.”
“No, I am not so easy to deceive as that.” With a little nod she passed out into the brilliant sunshine.
After lunch the hotel bus took the passengers for the Second Cataract to the station where they were to catch the daily express[154] from Cairo on to Shellal – a ten-minute run.
The Allertons, Poirot, and the young man in the dirty flannel trousers were the passengers. Mrs Otterbourne and her daughter would join the steamer at Shellal.
The train from Cairo to Luxor was about twenty minutes late. However, it arrived at last, and the usual scenes of wild activity occurred. Native porters taking suitcases out of the train collided with other porters putting them in. The compartment in which Poirot found himself was occupied by an elderly lady with a very wrinkled face, a good many diamonds and an expression of contempt for the majority of mankind.
She gave Poirot an aristocratic glare and retired behind the pages of an American magazine. A big rather clumsy young woman of under thirty was sitting opposite her. She had eager brown eyes, untidy hair, and an air of willingness to please[155]. At intervals the old lady looked over the top of the magazine and gave her orders. In ten minutes' time they came to rest on the jetty where the S.S. Karnak[156] was awaiting them.
The Otterbournes were already on board. The passengers were shown their accommodation. Since the boat was not full, most of the passengers had accommodation on the promenade deck. The forward part of this deck was occupied by a glass-enclosed observation saloon, where the passengers could sit and watch the river before them. On the deck below were a smoking-room and a small drawing-room and on the deck below that, the dining-saloon.
Having left his things in the cabin, Poirot came out on the deck again to watch the process of departure. He joined Rosalie Otterbourne, who was leaning over the side.
“So now we journey into Nubia[157]. You are pleased, Mademoiselle?”
The girl drew a deep breath.
“Yes. I feel that one's really getting away from things at last.[158]”
She made a gesture with her hand. Here and there were houses abandoned and ruined as a result of the damming up of the waters. The whole scene had a melancholy, almost sinister charm.
“Away from people,” said Rosalie Otterbourne.
Then she suddenly stiffened as she exclaimed: “Why, here are Mrs Doyle and her husband! I'd no idea they were coming on this trip!”
Linnet had just emerged from a cabin half way down the deck. Simon was behind her. Poirot was almost startled by the look of her – so radiant, so assured. Simon Doyle, too, was a transformed being. He was grinning from ear to ear and looking like a happy schoolboy.
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