Murder on the Orient Express by Agatha Christie Read Free Book Online

French.
    “Qu’est-ce qu’il y a?” he began laboriously. “Pourquoi-?”
    With a vigorous gesture Poirot motioned him to the seat in the corner. He took it and began once more.
    “Pourquoi-?” Then checking himself and relapsing into his own tongue: “What’s up on the train? Has anything happened?”
    He looked from one man to another.
    Poirot nodded. “Exactly. Something has happened. Prepare yourself for a shock.Your employer, M. Ratchett, is dead !”
    MacQueen’s mouth pursed itself into a whistle. Except that his eyes grew a shade brighter, he showed no signs of shock or distress.
    “So they got him after all,” he said.
    “What exactly do you mean by that phrase, Mr. MacQueen?”
    MacQueen hesitated.
    “You are assuming,” said Poirot, “that M. Ratchett was murdered?”
    “Wasn’t he?” This time MacQueen did show surprise. “Why, yes,” he said slowly. “That’s just what I did think. Do you mean he just died in his sleep? Why, the old man was as tough as-as tough-“
    He stopped, at a loss for a simile.
    “No, no,” said Poirot. “Your assumption was quite right. M. Ratchett was murdered. Stabbed. But I should like to know why you were so sure itwas murder, and not just-death.”
    MacQueen hesitated. “I must get this clear,” he said. “Who exactly are you? And where do you come in?”
    “I represent the Compagnie Internationale des Wagons Lits.” Poirot paused, then added, “I am a detective. My name is Hercule Poirot.”
    If he expected an effect he did not get one. MacQueen said merely, “Oh! yes?” and waited for him to go on.
    “You know the name perhaps?”
    “Why, it does seem kind of familiar. Only I always thought it was a woman’s dressmaker.”
    Hercule Poirot looked at him with distaste. “It is incredible!” he said.
    “What’s incredible?”
    “Nothing. Let us advance with the matter in hand. I want you to tell me, M. MacQueen, all that you know about the dead man. You were not related to him?”
    “No. I am-was-his secretary.”
    “For how long have you held that post?”
    “Just over a year.”
    “Please give me all the information you can.”
    “Well, I met Mr. Ratchett just over a year ago when I was in Persia-“
    Poirot interrupted.
    “What were you doing there?’
    “I had come over from New York to look into an oil concession. I don’t suppose you want to hear all about that. My friends and I had been let in rather badly over it. Mr. Ratchett was in the same hotel. He had just had a row with his secretary. He offered me the job and I took it. I was at a loose end and glad to find a well-paid job ready made, as it were.”
    “And since then?”
    “We’ve travelled about. Mr. Ratchett wanted to see the world. He was hampered by knowing no languages. I acted more as a courier than as a secretary. It was a pleasant life.”
    “Now tell me as much as you can about your employer.”
    The young man shrugged his shoulders. A perplexed expression passed over his face.
    “That’s not so easy.”
    “What was his full name?”
    “Samuel Edward Ratchett.”
    “He was an American citizen?”
    “Yes.”
    “What part of America did he come from?”
    “I don’t know.”
    “Well, tell me what you do know.”
    “The actual truth is, Mr. Poirot, that I know nothing at all! Mr. Ratchett never spoke of himself or of his life in America.”
    “Why do you think that was?”
    “I don’t know. I imagined that he might be ashamed of his beginnings. Some men are.”
    “Does that strike you as a satisfactory solution?”
    “Frankly, it doesn’t.”
    “Has he any relatives?”
    “He never mentioned any.”
    Poirot pressed the point.
    “You must have formedsome theory, Mr. MacQueen.”
    “Well, Yes, I did. For one thing, I don’t believe Ratchett was his real name. I think he left America definitely in order to escape someone or something. I think he was successful-until a few weeks ago.”
    “And then?”
    “He began to get letters-threatening