MURDER ON THE ORIENT EXPRESS
MURDER ON THE ORIENT EXPRESS
Agatha Christie is the world’s best known mystery writer. Her books have sold over a billion copies in the English language and another billion in 44 foreign languages. She is the most widely published author of all time in any language, outsold only by the Bible and Shakespeare.
Her writing career spanned more than half a century, during which she wrote 79 novels and short story collections, as well as 14 plays, one of which, The Mousetrap, is the longest-running play in history. Two of the characters she created, the brilliant little Belgian Hercule Poirot and the irrepressible and relentless Miss Marple, went on to become world-famous detectives. Both have been widely dramatized in feature films and made-for-TV movies.
Agatha Christie also wrote six romantic novels under the pseudonym Mary Westmacott. As well, she wrote four nonfiction books including an autobiography and an entertaining account of the many expeditions she shared with her archaeologist husband Sir Max Mallowan.
Agatha Christie died in 1976.
HarperPaperbacks
by Agatha Christie
MURDER ON THE ORIENT EXPRESS
THE SEVEN DIALS MYSTERY
POSTERN OF FATE
CROOKED HOUSE
ORDEAL BY INNOCENCE
THE CLOCKS
Coming Soon
THE MURDER OF ROGER ACKROYD
CAT AMONG THE PIGEONS
POIROT INVESTIGATES
THE MIRROR CRACK’D
ENDLESS NIGHT
BY THE PRICKING OF MY THUMBS
MURDER WITH MIRRORS
FUNERALS ARE FATAL
NEMESIS DEAD MAN’S FOLLY
DEATH COMES AS THE END
DESTINATION UNKNOWN
MRS. McGINTY’S DEAD
A CARIBBEAN MYSTERY
DEATH ON THE NILE
PASSENGER TO FRANKFURT
THE MOUSETRAP AND OTHER PLAYS
MURDER IS EASY
4:50 FROM PADDINGTON
AT BERTRAMS HOTEL
SPARKLING CYANIDE
THE PALE HORSE
HICKORY DICKORY DOCK
SLEEPING MURDER
THE BODY IN THE LIBRARY
THIRD GIRL
HERCULE POIROT’S CHRISTMAS
CURTAIN
AGATHA
CHRISTIE
Murder on
the Orient
Express
CONTENTS
PART I
THE FACTS
1
AN IMPORTANT PASSENGER ON THE TAURUS EXPRESS
2
THE TOKATLIAN HOTEL
3
POIROT REFUSES A CASE
4
A CRY IN THE NIGHT
5
THE CRIME
6
A WOMAN
7
THE BODY
8
THE ARMSTRONG KIDNAPPING CASE
PART II
THE EVIDENCE
1
THE EVIDENCE OF THE WAGON LIT CONDUCTOR
2
THE EVIDENCE OF THE SECRETARY
3
THE EVIDENCE OF THE VALET
4
THE EVIDENCE OF THE AMERICAN LADY
5
THE EVIDENCE OF THE SWEDISH LADY
6
THE EVIDENCE OF THE RUSSIAN PRINCESS
7
THE EVIDENCE OF COUNT AND COUNTESS ANDRENYI
8
THE EVIDENCE OF COLONEL ARBUTHNOT
9
THE EVIDENCE OF MR. HARDMAN
10
THE EVIDENCE OF THE ITALIAN
11
THE EVIDENCE OF MISS DEBENHAM
12
THE EVIDENCE OF THE GERMAN LADY’S-MAID
13
SUMMARY OF THE PASSENGERS’ EVIDENCE
14
THE EVIDENCE OF THE WEAPON
15
THE EVIDENCE OF THE PASSENGERS’ LUGGAGE
PART III
HERCULE POIROT SITS BACK AND THINKS
1
WHICH OF THEM?
2
TEN QUESTIONS
3
CERTAIN SUGGESTIVE POINTS
4
THE GREASE SPOT ON A HUNGARIAN PASSPORT
5
THE CHRISTIAN NAME OF PRINCESS DRAGOMIROFF
6
A SECOND INTERVIEW WITH COLONEL ARBUTHNOT
7
THE IDENTITY OF MARY DEBENHAM
8
FURTHER SURPRISING REVELATIONS
9
POIROT PROPOUNDS TWO SOLUTIONS
PART I
THE FACTS
1
AN IMPORTANT PASSENGER ON THE TAURUS EXPRESS
It was five o’clock on a winter’s morning in Syria. Alongside the platform at Aleppo stood the train grandly designated in railway guides as the Taurus Express. It consisted of a kitchen and dining-car, a sleeping-car and two local coaches.
By the step leading up into the sleeping-car stood a young French lieutenant, resplendent in uniform conversing, with a small man muffled up to the ears of whom nothing was visible but a pink-tipped nose and the two points of an upward-curled moustache.
It was freezingly cold, and this job of seeing off a distinguished stranger was not one to be envied, but Lieutenant Dubosc performed his part manfully. Graceful phrases fell from his lips in polished French. Not that he knew what it was all about. There had been rumours, of course, as there always were in such cases. The General’s—his General’s—temper had grown worse and worse. And then there had come this Belgian stranger—all the way from England, it seemed. There had been a week—a week of curious tensity. And then certain things had happened. A very distinguished officer had committed suicide, another had suddenly resigned, anxious faces had suddenly lost their anxiety, certain military precautions were relaxed. And the General, Lieutenant Dubosc’s own particular General, had suddenly looked ten years younger.