Three Act Tragedy Quotes

“Mr. Satterthwaite looked cheered.

Suddenly an idea struck him. His jaw fell.

"My goodness," he cried, "I've only just realized it! That rascal, with his poisoned cocktail! Anyone might have drunk it! It might have been me!"

"There is an even more terrible possibility that you have not considered," said Poirot.

"Eh?"

"It might have been me," said Hercule Poirot.”
― Agatha Christie, Three Act Tragedy

“One knows so little. When one knows more it is too late.”
― Agatha Christie, Three Act Tragedy

“In all the world there is nothing so curious and so interesting and so beautiful as truth.”
― Agatha Christie, Three Act Tragedy

“It seems dreadful to say so, but there is something attractive to a girl in being told anyone is a bad man. She thinks at once that her love will reform him.”
― Agatha Christie, Three Act Tragedy

“The great merit of being a doctor,” said Sir Bartholomew, “is that you are not obliged to follow your own advice.”
― Agatha Christie, Three Act Tragedy

“Events come to people, not people to events. Why do some people have exciting lives and other people dull ones? Because of their surroundings? Not at all. One man may travel to the ends of the earth and nothing will happen to him. There will be a massacre a week before he arrives, and an earthquake the day after he leaves, and the boat that he nearly took will be shipwrecked. And another man may live at Balham and travel to the City every day, and things will happen to him. He will be mixed up with blackmailing gangs and beautiful girls and motor bandits. There are people with a tendency to shipwrecks--even if they go on a boat on an ornamental lake, something will happen to it.”
― Agatha Christie, Three Act Tragedy

“But yes, exactly that. Think! With thought, all problems can be solved.”
― Agatha Christie, Three Act Tragedy

“I was such a foolish girl - girls are foolish, Mr. Satterthwaite. They are so sure of themselves, so convinced they know best. People write and talk a lot of a ‘woman’s instinct.’ I don’t believe, Mr.Satterthwaite, that there is any such thing. There doesn’t seem to be anything that warns girls against a certain type of man. Nothing in themselves, I mean. Their parents warn them, but that’s no good - one doesn’t believe. It seems dreadful to say so, but there is something attractive to a girl in being told anyone is a bad man. She thinks at once that her love will reform him.”
― Agatha Christie, Three Act Tragedy

“I’m not at all sure that I’m not a little jealous of her… we women are such cats, aren’t we? Scratch, scratch, miauw, miauw, purr, purr…”
― Agatha Christie, Three Act Tragedy

“Charles doesn’t go out of a room—he ‘makes an exit’—”
― Agatha Christie, Three Act Tragedy

“...we all have an exaggerated idea of our own personalities and don't recognize the truth if it's sufficiently brutally portrayed...”
― Agatha Christie, Three Act Tragedy

“There is only one thing to do - think.”
― Agatha Christie, Three Act Tragedy

“It's the Only Thing To Do," he said, obviously speaking in capital letters.”
― Agatha Christie, Three Act Tragedy

“Eve. The Lee family reunion, never a lively affair, is interrupted”
― Agatha Christie, Three Act Tragedy

“Yes, with your talk of crime this morning. You said this man, Hercule Poirot, was a kind of stormy petrel, that where he went crimes followed. No sooner does he arrive than we have a suspiciously sudden death. Of course my thoughts fly to murder at once.”
― Agatha Christie, Three Act Tragedy

“I do wish you happiness, mademoiselle. Not the brief happiness of youth, but the happiness that endures—the happiness that is built upon a rock.”
― Agatha Christie, Three Act Tragedy

“Egg had picked up some of the cards from the table and was looking at them affectionately.

“Master Bun, the baker’s son—I always loved him. And here’s Mrs. Mug, the milkman’s wife. Oh, dear, I suppose that’s me.”

“Why is that funny picture you, mademoiselle?”

“Because of the name.”

Egg laughed at his bewildered face and then began explaining. When she had finished he said:

“Ah, it was that that Sir Charles meant last night. I wondered…Mugg—ah, yes, one says in slang, does one not, you are a mug—a fool? Naturally you would change your name. You would not like to be the Lady Mugg, eh?”

Egg laughed. She said:

“Well, wish me happiness.”

“I do wish you happiness, mademoiselle. Not the brief happiness of youth, but the happiness that endures—the happiness that is built upon a rock.”
― Agatha Christie, Three Act Tragedy

“Only a rose-shaded lamp shed its glow on the figure in the armchair.”
― Agatha Christie, Three Act Tragedy

“A good way behind came Hercule Poirot. He trod softly like a cat.”
― Agatha Christie, Three Act Tragedy

“Mrs. Milray was an immense dumpling of a woman immovably fixed in an armchair conveniently placed so that she could, from the window, observe all that went on in the world outside.”
― Agatha Christie, Three Act Tragedy

“The light from the window caught her pince-nez and made them give off little flashes.”
― Agatha Christie, Three Act Tragedy

“The room into which Sir Charles was shown had walls of a rather drab oatmeal colour with a frieze of laburnum round the top. The curtains were of rose-coloured velvet, there were a lot of photographs and china dogs, the telephone was coyly hidden by a lady with ruffled skirts, there were a great many little tables and some suspicious-looking brasswork from Birmingham via the Far East.”
― Agatha Christie, Three Act Tragedy

“The only thing I can’t make up my mind about is whether it is an insult or a compliment to be considered a potential murderess. On the whole, I think it’s a compliment.”
― Agatha Christie, Three Act Tragedy

“Miss Sutcliffe flashed a pair of mocking eyes as she spoke. She was sitting in a straight-backed chair, her grey hair becomingly arranged”
― Agatha Christie, Three Act Tragedy

“St. John’s House was a new block of extremely expensive flats. There were sumptuous window boxes and uniformed porters of such magnificence that they looked like foreign generals.”
― Agatha Christie, Three Act Tragedy

“You know, Mrs. Dacres is quite my idea of a murderess—so hard and remorseless.” “She’s ever so hard—and she’s got a wicked temper!”
― Agatha Christie, Three Act Tragedy

“After a moment’s hesitation Doris Sims agreed. She was curious and she liked good food.”
― Agatha Christie, Three Act Tragedy

“Yes, poor Sir Bartholomew’s death has been rather a godsend to me. There’s just an off chance, you see, that I might have murdered him. I’ve rather played up to that.”
― Agatha Christie, Three Act Tragedy

“The walls were a shade just off-white—the thick pile carpet was so neutral as to be almost colourless—so was the upholstery. Chromium gleamed here and there,”
― Agatha Christie, Three Act Tragedy

“Which crime—the first or the second?” “There is only one—what you call the first and second murder are only the two halves of the same crime. The second half is simple—the motive—”
― Agatha Christie, Three Act Tragedy