Agatha Christie citations

Page 8

“Les affaires - les affaires"-M. Bauc”

“One forgets how human murderers are.”

““Is he then an unhappy man?”
Poirot said:
“So unhappy that he has forgotten what happiness means. So unhappy that he does not know he is unhappy.”
The nun said softly:
“Ah, a rich man…””

“The old, you must remember, though considered incapable of action, have nevertheless a good fund of experience on which to draw.”

“I have the little idea, my friend, that this is a crime very carefully planned and staged. It is a far-sighted, long-headed crime. It is not — how shall I express it? — a Latin crime. It is a crime that shows traces of a cool, resourceful, deliberate brain — I think an Anglo-Saxon brain.”

“He is like a cat. And all cats are thieves.”

““You do well. Method and order, they are everything,” replied Poirot.”

“Mrs. Oliver in her own opinion was famous for her intuition. One intuition succeeded another with remarkable rapidity, and Mrs. Oliver always claimed the right to justify the particular intuition which turned out to be right!”

“In my end is my beginning — that's what people are always saying. But what does it mean? And just where does my story begin? I must try and think…”

“On the seat opposite him was an American tourist. The pattern of his clothes, of his overcoat, the grip he carried, down to his hopeful friendliness and his naïve absorption in the scenery, even the guidebook in his hand, all gave him away and proclaimed him a small town American seeing Europe for the first time. In another minute or so, Poirot judged, he would break into speech. His wistful dog-like expression could not be mistaken.”

“Oh, dear, it's quite true what Dr. Reilly said. How does one stop writing? If I could find a really good telling phrase… Like the one M. Poirot used. In the name of Allah, the Merciful, the Compassionate… Something like that.”

“These little things are very significant.”

“Flattery, in Tuppence’s opinion, should always be laid on with a trowel where a man is concerned.”

“Truth of it is,’ said Commander Haydock, steering rather erratically round a one-way island and narrowly missing collision with a large van, ‘when the beggars are right, one remembers it, and when they’re wrong you forget it.”

“John, forgive me… for what I can't help doing.”

“An Englishman thinks first of his work — his job, he calls it — and then of his sport, and last — a good way last — of his wife.”

“It was a very British and utterly unconvincing performance.”

“It would be difficult Bland thought, to forget Hercule Poirot, and this not entirely for complimentary reasons.”

“I can imagine anything! That's the trouble with me. I can imagine things now — this minute. I could even make them sound all right, but of course none of them would be true.”

“Précisément! The body — the cage — is everything of the most respectable — but through the bars, the wild animal looks out.”

“"I saw a particular personage and I threatened him — yes, Mademoiselle, I, Hercule Poirot, threatened him."
"With the police?"
"No," said Poirot drily, "With the Press — a much more deadly weapon."”

“Tout de même, it is not necessary that he should be killed on the Orient Express. There are other places.”

“Men are foolish, are they not, Mademoiselle? To eat, to drink, to breathe the good air, it is a very pleasant thing, Mademoiselle. One is foolish to leave all that simply because one has no money — or because the heart aches. L´amour, it causes many fatalities, does it not?”

“Exactly! It is absurd — improbable — it cannot be. So I myself have said. And yet, my friend, there it is! one cannot escape from the facts.”

“Yes, my friend,’ he said. ‘It is so easy to be an American — here in Paris! A nasal voice — the chewing gum — the little goatee — the horned-rimmed spectacles — all the appurtenances of the stage American…”

“Let us think only of the good days that are to come.”

“It’s so dreadfully easy — killing people… And you begin to feel that it doesn’t matter… That it’s only you that matters! It’s dangerous — that.”

“The intense interest aroused in the public by what was known at the time as “The Styles Case” has now somewhat subsided. Nevertheless, in view of the world-wide notoriety which attended it, I have been asked, both by my friend Poirot and the family themselves, to write an account of the whole story. This, we trust, will effectually silence the sensational rumours which still persist.”

“Ah, my friend, one may live in a big house and yet have no comfort.”

“It merely confirmed in him his long-held belief that you should never believe anything anyone said without first checking it. Suspect everybody, had been for many years, if not his whole life, one of his first axioms.”