No seaside town in the south of England is, I think, as attractive as St Loo. It is well named the Queen of Watering Places and reminds one forcibly of the Riviera. The Cornish coast is to my mind every bit as fascinating as that of the south of France.
I remarked as much to my friend, Hercule Poirot.
‘So it said on our menu in the restaurant car yesterday, mon ami. Your remark is not original.’
‘But don’t you agree?’
He was smiling to himself and did not at once answer my question. I repeated it.
‘A thousand pardons, Hastings. My thoughts were wandering. Wandering indeed to that part of the world you mentioned just now.’
‘The south of France?’
‘Yes. I was thinking of that last winter that I spent there and of the events which occurred.’
I remembered. A murder had been committed on the Blue Train, and the mystery—a complicated and baffling one—had been solved by Poirot with his usual unerring acumen.
‘How I wish I had been with you,’ I said with deep regret.
‘I too,’ said Poirot. ‘Your experience would have been invaluable to me.’
I looked at him sideways. As a result of long habit, I distrust his compliments, but he appeared perfectly serious. And after all, why not? I have a very long experience of the methods he employs.
‘What I particularly missed was your vivid imagination, Hastings,’ he went on dreamily. ‘One needs a certain amount of light relief. My valet, Georges, an admirable man with whom I sometimes permitted myself to discuss a point, has no imagination whatever.’
This remark seemed to me quite irrelevant.
‘Tell me, Poirot,’ I said. ‘Are you never tempted to renew your activities? This passive life—’
‘Suits me admirably, my friend. To sit in the sun—what could be more charming? To step from your pedestal at the zenith of your fame—what could be a grander gesture? They say of me: “That is Hercule Poirot!—The great—the unique!—There was never any one like him, there never will be!” Eh bien—I am satisfied. I ask no more. I am modest.’
I should not myself have used the word modest. It seemed to me that my little friend’s egotism had certainly not declined with his years. He leaned back in his chair, caressing his moustache and almost purring with self-satisfaction.
We were sitting on one of the terraces of the Majestic Hotel. It is the biggest hotel in St Loo and stands in its own grounds on a headland overlooking the sea. The gardens of the hotel lay below us freely interspersed with palm trees. The sea was of a deep and lovely blue, the sky clear and the sun shining with all the single-hearted fervour an August sun should (but in England so often does not) have. There was a vigorous humming of bees, a pleasant sound—and altogether nothing could have been more ideal.
We had only arrived last night, and this was the first morning of what we proposed should be a week’s stay. If only these weather conditions continued, we should indeed have a perfect holiday.
I picked up the morning paper which had fallen from my hand and resumed my perusal of the morning’s news. The political situation seemed unsatisfactory, but uninteresting, there was trouble in China, there was a long account of a rumoured City swindle, but on the whole there was no news of a very thrilling order.
‘Curious thing this parrot disease,’ I remarked, as I turned the sheet.
‘Very curious.’
‘Two more deaths at Leeds, I see.’
‘Most regrettable.’
I turned a page.
‘Still no news of that flying fellow, Seton, in his round-the-world flight. Pretty plucky, these fellows. That amphibian machine of his, the Albatross, must be a great invention. Too bad if he’s gone west. Not that they’ve given up hope yet. He may have made one of the Pacific islands.’
‘The Solomon islanders are still cannibals, are they not?’ inquired Poirot pleasantly.
‘Must be a fine fellow. That sort of thing makes one feel it’s a good thing to be an Englishman after all.’
‘It consoles for the defeats at Wimbledon,’ said Poirot.
‘I—I didn’t mean,’ I began.
My friend waved my attempted apology aside gracefully.
‘Me,’ he announced. ‘I am not amphibian, like the machine of the poor Captain Seton, but I am cosmopolitan. And for the English I have always had, as you know, a great admiration. The thorough way, for instance, in which they read the daily paper.’
My attention had strayed to political news.
‘They seem to be giving the Home Secretary a pretty bad time of it,’ I remarked with a chuckle.
‘The poor man. He has his troubles, that one. Ah! yes. So much so that he seeks for help in the most improbable quarters.’
I stared at him.
With a slight smile, Poirot drew from his pocket his morning’s correspondence, neatly secured by a rubber band. From this he selected one letter which he tossed across to me.
‘It must have missed us yesterday,’ he said.
I read the letter with a pleasurable feeling of excitement.
‘But, Poirot,’ I cried. ‘This is most flattering!’
‘You think so, my friend?’
‘He speaks in the warmest terms of your ability.’
‘He is right,’ said Poirot, modestly averting his eyes.
‘He begs you to investigate this matter for him—puts it as a personal favour.’
‘Quite so. It is unneccessary to repeat all this to me. You understand, my dear Hastings. I have read the letter myself.’
‘It’s too bad,’ I cried. ‘This will put an end to our holiday.’
‘No, no, calmez vous—there is no question of that.’
‘But the Home Secretary says the matter is urgent.’
‘He may be right—or again he may not. These politicians, they are easily excited. I have seen myself, in the Chambre des Deputés in Paris—’
‘Yes, yes, but Poirot, surely we ought to be making arrangements? The express to London has gone—it leaves at twelve o’clock. The next—’
‘Calm yourself, Hastings, calm yourself, I pray of you! Always the excitement, the agitation. We are not going to London today—nor yet tomorrow.’
‘But this summons—’
‘Does not concern me. I do not belong to your police force, Hastings. I am asked to undertake a case as a private investigator. I refuse.’
‘You refuse?’
‘Certainly. I write with perfect politeness, tender my regrets, my apologies, explain that I am completely desolated—but what will you? I have retired—I am finished.’
‘You are not finished,’ I exclaimed warmly.
Poirot patted my knee.
‘There speaks the good friend—the faithful dog. And you have reason, too. The grey cells, they still function—the order, the method—it is still there. But when I have retired, my friend, I have retired! It is finished! I am not a stage favourite who gives the world a dozen