The A B C Murders / Убийство по алфавиту. Книга для чтения на английском языке

Nobody came, so I went out again. That’s all, and you can put it in your pipe and smoke it.’

�You didn’t see the body fallen down behind the counter?’

�No, no more would you have done—unless you was looking for it, maybe.’

�Was there a railway guide lying about?’

�Yes, there was—face downwards. It crossed my mind like that the old woman might have had to go off sudden by train and forgot to lock shop up.’

�Perhaps you picked up the railway guide or moved it along the counter?’

�Didn’t touch the b— thing.

�And you did not see anyone leaving the shop before you yourself got there?’

�Didn’t see any such thing. What I say is, why pitch on me[112 - why pitch on me – что вы привязались] —?’

Poirot rose.

�Nobody is pitching upon you—yet. Bonsoir[113 - Bonsoir (фр.) – До свидания], monsieur.’

He left the man with his mouth open and I followed him.

In the street he consulted his watch.

�With great haste, my friend, we might manage to catch the 7.02. Let us despatch ourselves quickly.’

Chapter 8

The Second Letter

�Well?’ I demanded eagerly.

We were seated in a first-class carriage which we had to ourselves. The train, an express, had just drawn out of Andover.

�The crime,’ said Poirot, �was committed by a man of medium height with red hair and a cast in the left eye. He limps slightly on the right foot and has a mole just below the shoulder-blade.

�Poirot?’ I cried.

For the moment I was completely taken in. Then the twinkle in my friend’s eye undeceived me.

�Poirot!’ I said again, this time in reproach.

�Mon ami, what will you? You fix upon me a look of doglike devotion and demand of me a pronouncement a la Sherlock Holmes! Now for the truth—I do not know what the murderer looks like, nor where he lives, nor how to set hands upon him.’

�If only he had left some clue,’ I murmured.

�Yes, the clue—it is always the clue that attracts you. Alas that he did not smoke the cigarette and leave the ash, and then step in it with a shoe that has nails of a curious pattern. No—he is not so obliging. But at least, my friend, you have the railway guide. The ABC, that is a clue for you!’

�Do you think he left it by mistake then?’

�Of course not. He left it on purpose. The fingerprints tell us that.