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November 4 - November 8, 2024
catholic
The first thing made him feel a fool—” Poirot nodded. “You are right. It offended his male dignity.” “But now—if you look at it a certain way, it’s she who’s made a fool of herself. Everyone’s down on her, and so—” “He can be generously forgiving,” finished Mrs. Allerton. “What children men are!”
Schuyler did.” “Miss Van Schuyler?” “Yes. She can’t help it, you know, but she does—er—take things. Especially jewellery. That’s really why I’m always with her. It’s not her health at all; it’s this little idiosyncrasy.
aft
is not likely to advertise the fact.” “Ah, these pearls!” Poirot held them up against the light once more. He stuck out his tongue and licked them; he even gingerly tried one of them between his teeth.
Erewhon
Pepys’
signet
triptych,
He noted that amongst them there were no letters from Joanna Southwood.
“Zut!”
“On ne prend pas les mouches avec le vinaigre.”
appurtenances
Race stared. “Devil take this case,” he muttered. “I thought we’d got her cleared of suspicion, and now—Does every girl on this blinking boat carry around pearl-handled toy pistols?”
insensate
parsimonious
He saw Rosalie Otterbourne smile at him for the first time—a shy welcoming smile—a little uncertain in its lines, as of one who does a new and unfamiliar thing.
“Les chiffons d’aujourd’hui,”
consternation—show
septicæmia.”
Jacqueline turned and walked gropingly, blinded by tears, towards her cabin. A hand below her elbow steadied and guided her. She looked up through the tears to find Poirot by her side. She leaned on him a little and he guided her through the cabin door.
done. One cannot take back the accomplished action. It is too late to regret.” She cried out more vehemently: “I shall have killed him! And I love him so . . . I love him so.” Poirot sighed. “Too much. . . .” It had been his thought long ago in the restaurant of M. Blondin. It was his thought again now.
They know too much, you see, of the possibilities that may arise.
Le roi est mort—vive le roi!
He’s just sorry for me—awfully sorry for me, because he knows how terrible it is for me to know I’ve hurt him so badly.” “Ah, well,” said Poirot. “The pure pity, it is a very lofty sentiment.”
“La vie est vaine. Un peu d’amour, Un peu de haine, Et puis bonjour. La vie est brève. Un peu d’espoir, Un peu de rêve, Et puis bonsoir.”
“You wouldn’t say so unless you were sure. Can’t say I’ve any real light, myself. I’ve suspicions, of course. . . .” Poirot stopped. He laid an impressive hand on Race’s arm. “You are a great man, mon Colonel . . . You do not say: ‘Tell me. What is it that you think?’ You know that if I could speak now I would.
Race made a slight grimace. “I’m used to that. It often seems to me that’s all detective work is, wiping out your false starts and beginning again.”
They conceive a certain theory, and everything has to fit into that theory. If one little fact will not fit it, they throw it aside. But it is always the facts that will not fit in that are significant.
gibbered
suffused
stern
that girl must have had a terrible life.” “She did, Madame. She is very proud and she was very loyal.” “Yes, I like that—loyalty, I mean. It’s out of fashion nowadays. She’s an odd character, that girl—proud, reserved, stubborn, and terribly warm-hearted underneath, I fancy.”
Rolling in money, of course, but he became a communist when he was at Oxford.”
Then I found a signet ring with a coat of arms on it.
The best subtle layering
O.E.
defalcations.
summarily
cad!
urbanity.
consternation,
posthaste
A man will confess, more or less, to attempted murder, but you won’t get him to confess to the real thing.”
Race looked at him with the respect one able man gives to another.
“You will consent to my little arrangement, yes?” Poirot pleaded. “It is irregular—I know it is irregular, yes—but I have a high regard for human happiness.”
Race grinned suddenly. “It’s all right by me,” he said. “I’m not a damned policeman, thank God!
All the same, it is ridiculous, nicht wahr? One minute you shoot a man; the next you are in hysterics in case he may not be doing well.”
sardonically,
This was no spontaneous crime committed on the spur of the moment. It was, on the contrary, very carefully planned and accurately timed, with all the details meticulously worked out beforehand,
caboodle
