Hercule Poirot's Casebook

HERCULE POIROT'S CASEBOOK

Agatha Christie is known throughout the world

as the Queen of Crime. Her seventy-six detective

novels and books of stories have been translated

into every major language, and her sales are

calculated

in tens of millions.

She began writing at the end of the First

World War, when she created Hercule Poirot,

the little Belgian detective with the egg-shaped

head and the passion for order - the most

popular sleuth in fiction since Sherlock Holmes.

Poirot, Miss Marple and her other detectives

have appeared in films, radio programmes,

television films and stage plays based on her

books.

Agatha Christie also wrote six romantic novels

under the pseudonym Mary Westmacott, several

plays and a book of poems; as well, she assisted

her archaeologist.husband Sir Max Mallowan on

many expeditions to the Middle East. She was

awarded the DBE in 1971.

Postern of Fate was the last book she wrote

before her death in 1976, but since its

publication two books Agatha Christie wrote in

the 1940s have appeared: Curtain: Poirot's Last

Case and Sleeping Murder, the last Miss Marple

book.

Agatha Christie's Autobiography was

published by Fontana in 1978.

Available in Fontana by the same author

The ABC Murders

At Bertram's Hotel

The Body in the Library

By the Pricking of My Thumbs

The Clocks

Dead Man's Folly

Death Comes as the End

Destination Unknown

Elephants Can Remember

Endless Night

Evil Under the Sun

Hallowe'en Party

Hickory Dickory Dock

The Hollow

The Labours of Hercules

Lord Edgware Dies

The Moving Finger

The Murder of Roger Ackroyd

Murder in Mesopotamia

Murder is Easy

The Mysterious Mr Quin

The Mystery of the Blue Train

One, Two, Buckle My Shoe

Parker Pyne Investigates

Partners in Crime

A Pocket Full of Rye

Postern of Fate

Sad Cypress

Sleeping Murder

Taken at the Flood

And Then There Were None

The Thirteen Problems

Three Act Tragedy

and many others

AGATHA CHRISTIE

Hercule Poirot's

Casebook

FONTANA/CoIIins

This collection first published by Fontana Paperbacks 1989

This collection © Agatha Christie 1989

'The Incredible Theft', 'Murder in the Mews' and 'Triangle at Rhodes'

were first published in Murder in the Mews, 1937; 'The Dream' and 'Four

and Twenty Blackbirds' were first published in The Adventures of the

Christmas Pudding, 1960; and 'Problem at Sea', 'The Third-floor Flat',

'The Adventure of Johnnie Waverly', 'The King of Clubs' and 'The

Adventure of the Clapham Cook' were first published in Poirot's Early

Cases, 1947.

Printed and bound in Great Britain by

William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd, Glasgow

This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall

not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired

out or otherwise circulated without the publisher's prior

consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in

which it is published and without a similar condition

including this condition being imposed on the subsequent

purchaser.

CONTENTS

The Incredible Theft

Murder in the Mews

Triangle at Rhodes

The Dream

Four and Twenty Blackbirds

Problem at Sea

The Third-floor Flat

The Adventure of Johnnie Waverly

The King of Clubs

The Adventure of the Clapham Cook

THE

INCREDIBLE THEFT

CHAPTERI

As the butler handed round the souffle, Lord Mayfield leaned

confidentially towards his neighbour on the right, Lady Julia

Carrington. Known as a perfect host, Lord Mayfield took

trouble to live up to his reputation. Although unmarried, he

was always charming to women.

Lady Julia Carrington was a woman of forty, tall, dark and

vivacious. She was very thin, but still beautiful. Her hands and

feet in particular were exquisite. Her manner was abrupt and

restless, that of a woman who lived on her nerves.

About opposite to her at the round table sat her husband, Air

Marshal Sir George Carrington. His career had begun in the

Navy, and he still retained the bluff breeziness of the ex-Naval

man. He was laughing and chaffing the beautiful Mrs

Vanderlyn, who was sitting on the other side of her host.

Mrs Vanderlyn was an extremely good-looking blonde. Her

voice held a soupcon of American accent, just enough to be

pleasant without undue exaggeration.

On the other side of Sir George Carrington sat Mrs Macatta,

M.P. Mrs Macatta was a great authority on Housing and

Infant Welfare. She barked out short sentences .rather than

spoke them, and was generally of somewhat alarming aspect. It

was perhaps natural that the Air Marshal would fred his right-hand

neighbour the pleasanter to talk to.

Mrs Macatta, who always talked shop wherever she was,

barked out short spates of information on her special subjects

to her left-hand neighbour, yomag Reggie Carrington.

Reggie Carrington was twenty-one, and completely uninter-ested

in Housing, Infant Welfare, and indeed any political

7

subject. He said at intervals, 'How frightful!' and 'I absolutely

agree with you,' and his mind was clearly elsewhere. Mr

Carlile, Lord Mayfield's private secretary, sat between young

Reggie and his mother. A pale young man with pince-nez and

an air of intelligent reserve, he talked little, but was always

ready to fling himself into any conversational breach. Noticing