Смерть на Ниле / Death on the Nile - стр. 29

Poirot shook his head.

‘Not altogether.’

Linnet said again: ‘What do you mean?’

Poirot leant back, folded his arms and spoke in a detached impersonal manner.

‘Ecoutez, Madame. I will recount to you a little history. It is that one day, a month or two ago, I am dining in a restaurant in London. At the table next to me are two people, a man and a girl. They are very happy, so it seems, very much in love. They talk with confidence of the future. It is not that I listen to what is not meant for me – they are quite oblivious of who hears them and who does not. The man’s back is to me, but I can watch the girl’s face. It is very intense. She is in love – heart, soul, and body – and she is not of those who love lightly and often. With her it is clearly the life and the death. They are engaged to be married, these two; that is what I gather; and they talk of where they shall pass the days of their honeymoon. They plan to go to Egypt.’

He paused.

Linnet said sharply:

‘Well?’

Poirot went on.

‘That is a month or two ago, but the girl’s face – I do not forget it. I know that I shall remember if I see it again. And I remember too the man’s voice. And I think you can guess, Madame, when it is I see the one and hear the other again. It is here in Egypt. The man is on his honeymoon, yes – but he is on his honeymoon with another woman.’

Linnet said sharply: ‘What of it? I had already mentioned the facts.’

‘The facts – yes.’

‘Well then?’

Poirot said slowly:

‘The girl in the restaurant mentioned a friend – a friend who she was very positive would not let her down. That friend, I think, was you, Madame.’

Linnet flushed.

‘Yes. I told you we had been friends.’

‘And she trusted you?’

‘Yes.’

She hesitated for a moment, biting her lip impatiently; then, as Poirot did not seem disposed to speak, she broke out:

‘Of course the whole thing was very unfortunate. But these things happen, Monsieur Poirot.’

‘Ah! yes, they happen, Madame.’ He paused. ‘You are of the Church of England, I presume?’

‘Yes.’ Linnet looked slightly bewildered.

‘Then you have heard portions of the Bible read aloud in church. You have heard of King David and of the rich man who had many flocks and herds and the poor man who had one ewe lamb – and of how the rich man took the poor man’s one ewe lamb. That was something that happened, Madame.’

Linnet sat up. Her eyes flashed angrily.

‘I see perfectly what you are driving at, Monsieur Poirot! You think, to put it vulgarly, that I stole my friend’s young man. Looking at the matter sentimentally – which is, I suppose, the way people of your generation cannot help looking at things – that is possibly true. But the real hard truth is different. I don’t deny that Jackie was passionately in love with Simon, but I don’t think you take into account that he may not have been equally devoted to her. He was very fond of her, but I think that even before he met me he was beginning to feel that he had made a mistake. Look at it clearly, Monsieur Poirot. Simon discovers that it is I he loves, not Jackie. What is he to do? Be heroically noble and marry a woman he does not care for – and thereby probably ruin three lives – for it is doubtful whether he could make Jackie happy under those circumstances? If he were actually married to her when he met me I agree that it