The Vintage Mysteries for the Holidays. Эдгар Аллан По

can distinguish between a demi and a duchess. There now, I believe I’ve shocked you again! You’ve been dug out of the backwoods, you have. Not that I mind that. We could do with a few more of your sort. I just hate a fellow who gets fresh. It makes me mad.”

      She shook her head vigorously.

      “What are you like when you’re mad?” I inquired with a smile.

      “A regular little devil! Don’t care what I say, or what I do, either! I nearly did a chap in once. Yes, really. He’d have deserved it too. Italian blood I’ve got. I shall get into trouble one of these days.”

      “Well,” I begged, “don’t get mad with me.”

      “I shan’t. I like you—did the first moment I set eyes on you. But you looked so disapproving that I never thought we should make friends.”

      “Well, we have. Tell me something about yourself.”

      “I’m an actress. No—not the kind you’re thinking of, lunching at the Savoy covered with jewellery, and with their photograph in every paper saying how much they love Madame So and So’s face cream. I’ve been on the boards since I was a kid of six—tumbling.”

      “I beg your pardon,” I said puzzled.

      “Haven’t you seen child acrobats?”

      “Oh, I understand.”

      “I’m American born, but I’ve spent most of my life in England. We got a new show now—”

      “We?”

      “My sister and I. Sort of song and dance, and a bit of patter, and a dash of the old business thrown in. It’s quite a new idea, and it hits them every time. There’s to be money in it—”

      My new acquaintance leaned forward, and discoursed volubly, a great many of her terms being quite unintelligible to me. Yet I found myself evincing an increasing interest in her. She seemed such a curious mixture of child and woman. Though perfectly worldly-wise, and able, as she expressed it, to take care of herself, there was yet something curiously ingenuous in her single-minded attitude towards life, and her whole-hearted determination to “make good.” This glimpse of a world unknown to me was not without its charm, and I enjoyed seeing her vivid little face light up as she talked.

      We passed through Amiens. The name awakened many memories. My companion seemed to have an intuitive knowledge of what was in my mind.

      “Thinking of the War?”

      I nodded.

      “You were through it, I suppose?”

      “Pretty well. I was wounded once, and after the Somme they invalided me out altogether. I had a half fledged Army job for a bit. I’m a sort of private secretary now to an M. P.”

      “My! That’s brainy!”

      “No, it isn’t. There’s really awfully little to do. Usually a couple of hours every day sees me through. It’s dull work too. In fact, I don’t know what I should do if I hadn’t got something to fall back upon.”

      “Don’t say you collect bugs!”

      “No. I share rooms with a very interesting man. He’s a Belgian—an ex-detective. He’s set up as a private detective in London, and he’s doing extraordinarily well. He’s really a very marvellous little man. Time and again he has proved to be right where the official police have failed.”

      My companion listened with widening eyes.

      “Isn’t that interesting, now? I just adore crime. I go to all the mysteries on the movies. And when there’s a murder on I just devour the papers.”

      “Do you remember the Styles Case?” I asked.

      “Let me see, was that the old lady who was poisoned? Somewhere down in Essex?”

      I nodded.

      “That was Poirot’s first big case. Undoubtedly, but for him, the murderer would have escaped scot-free. It was a most wonderful bit of detective work.”

      Warming to my subject, I ran over the heads of the affair, working up to the triumphant and unexpected denouement. The girl listened spellbound. In fact, we were so absorbed that the train drew into Calais station before we realized it.

      “My goodness gracious me!” cried my companion. “Where’s my powder-puff?”

      She proceeded to bedaub her face liberally, and then applied a stick of lip salve to her lips, observing the effect in a small pocket glass, and betraying not the faintest sign of self-consciousness.

      “I say,” I hesitated. “I dare say it’s cheek on my part, but why do all that sort of thing?”

      The girl paused in her operations, and stared at me with undisguised surprise.

      “It isn’t as though you weren’t so pretty that you can afford to do without it,” I said stammeringly.

      “My dear boy! I’ve got to do it. All the girls do. Think I want to look like a little frump up from the country?” She took one last look in the mirror, smiled approval, and put it and her vanity-box away in her bag. “That’s better. Keeping up appearances is a bit of a fag, I grant, but if a girl respects herself it’s up to her not to let herself get slack.”

      To this essentially moral sentiment, I had no reply. A point of view makes a great difference.

      I secured a couple of porters, and we alighted on the platform. My companion held out her hand.

      “Good-bye, and I’ll mind my language better in future.”

      “Oh, but surely you’ll let me look after you on the boat?”

      “Mayn’t be on the boat. I’ve got to see whether that sister of mine got aboard after all anywhere. But thanks all the same.”

      “Oh, but we’re going to meet again, surely? I—” I hesitated. “I want to meet your sister.”

      We both laughed.

      “That’s real nice of you. I’ll tell her what you say. But I don’t fancy we’ll meet again. You’ve been very good to me on the journey, especially after I cheeked you as I did. But what your face expressed first thing is quite true. I’m not your kind. And that brings trouble—I know that well enough. …”

      Her face changed. For the moment all the light-hearted gaiety died out of it. It looked angry—revengeful. …

      “So good-bye,” she finished, in a lighter tone.

      “Aren’t you even going to tell me your name?” I cried, as she turned away.

      She looked over her shoulder. A dimple appeared in each cheek. She was like a lovely picture by Greuze.

      “Cinderella,” she said, and laughed.

      But little did I think when and how I should see Cinderella again.

      2. An Appeal for Help

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      It was five minutes past nine when I entered our joint sitting-room for breakfast on the following morning.

      My friend Poirot, exact to the minute as usual, was just tapping the shell of his second egg.

      He beamed upon me as I entered.

      “You have slept well, yes? You have recovered from the crossing so terrible? It is a marvel, almost you are exact this morning. Pardon, but your tie is not symmetrical. Permit that I rearrange him.”

      Elsewhere, I have described Hercule Poirot. An extraordinary little man! Height, five feet four inches, egg-shaped head carried a little to one side, eyes that shone green when he was excited, stiff military