Agatha Christie - The Mysterious Mr. Quin

Mr. Satterthwaite regarded her with admiration.

"We must go in to dinner," said the Duchess. "Do come and sit at our table, Mr. Tomlinson, and then you can go on with what you were telling me."

"Quite a decent sort of man," the Duchess pronounced later.

"With quite a decent sort of car," retorted Mr. Satterthwaite.

"Naughty," said the Duchess, and gave him a resounding blow on the knuckles with the dingy black fan she always carried. Mr. Satterthwaite winced with pain.

"Naomi is coming too," said the Duchess. "In her car. That girl wants taking out of herself. She's very selfish. Not exactly self-centred, but totally indifferent to everyone and everything. Don't you agree?"

"I don't think that's possible," said Mr. Satterthwaite, slowly.

"I mean, everyone's interest must go somewhere. There are, of course, the people who revolve round themselves―but I agree with you, she's not one of that kind. She's totally uninterested in herself. And yet she's got a strong character―there must be something. I thought at first it was her art―but it isn't. I've never met anyone so detached from life. That's dangerous."

"Dangerous? What do you mean?"

"Well, you see―it must mean an obsession of some kind, and obsessions are always dangerous."

"Satterthwaite," said the Duchess, "don't be a fool. And listen to me. About tomorrow―――"

Mr. Satterthwaite listened. It was very much his role in life.

They started early the following morning, taking their lunch with them. Naomi, who had been six months in the island, was to be the pioneer. Mr. Satterthwaite went over to her as she sat waiting to start.

"You are sure that―I can't come with you?" he said wistfully.

She shook her head.

"You'll be much more comfortable in the back of the other car. Nicely padded seats and all that. This is a regular old rattle trap. You'd leap in the air going over the bumps."

"And then, of course, the hills."

Naomi laughed.

"Oh, I only said that to rescue you from the dickey. The Duchess could perfectly well afford to have hired a car. She's the meanest woman in England. All the same, the old thing is rather a sport, and I can't help liking her"

"Then I could come with you after all?" said Mr. Satterthwaite eagerly.

She looked at him curiously.

"Why are you so anxious to come with me?"

"Can you ask?" Mr. Satterthwaite made his funny old-fashioned bow.

She smiled, but shook her head.

"That isn't the reason," she said thoughtfully. "It's odd... But you can't come with me―not to-day."

"Another day, perhaps," suggested Mr. Satterthwaite politely.

"Oh, another day!" she laughed suddenly, a very queer laugh, Mr. Satterthwaite thought, "Another day I Well, we'll see."

They started. They drove through the town, and the round the long curve of the bay, winding inland to cross a river and then back to the coast with its hundreds of little sandy coves. And then they began to climb. In and out, round nerve-shattering curves, upwards, ever upwards on the tortuous winding road. The blue bay was far below them, and on the other side of it Ajaccio sparkled in the sun, white, like a fairy city.

In and out, in and out, with a precipice first one side of them, then the other. Mr. Satterthwaite felt slightly giddy, he also felt slightly sick. The road was not very wide. And still they climbed.

It was cold now. The wind came to them straight off the snow peaks. Mr. Satterthwaite turned up his coat collar and buttoned it tightly under his chin.

It was very cold. Across the water, Ajaccio was still bathed in sunlight, but up here thick grey clouds came drifting across the face of the sun. Mr. Satterthwaite ceased to admire the view. He yearned for a steam-heated hotel and a comfortable arm-chair.

Ahead of them Naomi's little two-seater drove steadily forward. Up, still up. They were on top of the world now. On either side of them were lower hills, hills sloping down to valleys. They looked straight across to the snow peaks. And the wind come tearing over them, sharp, like a knife. Suddenly Naomi's car stopped, and she looked back.

"We've arrived," she said. "At the World's End. And I don't think it's an awfully good day for it."

They all got out. They had arrived in a tiny village, with half a dozen stone cottages. An imposing name was printed in letters a foot high.

"Cote Chiaveeri."

Naomi shrugged her shoulders.

"That's its official name, but I prefer to call it the World's End."

She walked on a few steps, and Mr. Satterthwaite joined her. They were beyond the houses now. The road stopped. As Naomi had said, this was the end, the back of beyond, the beginning of nowhere. Behind them the white ribbon of the road, in front of them―nothing. Only far, far below, the sea...

Mr. Satterthwaite drew a deep breath.

"It's an extraordinary place. One feels that anything might happen here, that one might meet―anyone―――"

He stopped, for just in front of them a man was sitting on a. boulder, his face turned to the sea. They had not seen him till this moment, and his appearance had the suddenness of a conjuring trick. He might have sprung from the surrounding landscape.

"I wonder―――" began Mr. Satterthwaite.

But at that minute the stranger turned, and Mr. Satterthwaite saw his face.

"Why, Mr. Quin! How extraordinary! Miss Carlton Smith, I want to introduce my friend Mr. Quin to you. He's the most unusual fellow. You are, you know. You always turn up in the nick of time―――"

He stopped, with the feeling that he had said something awkwardly significant, and yet for the life of him he could not think what it was.

Naomi had shaken hands with Mr. Quin in her usual abrupt style.

"We're here for a picnic," she said. "And it seems to me we shall be pretty well frozen to the bone."

Mr. Satterthwaite shivered.

"Perhaps," he said uncertainly, "we shall find a sheltered spot?"

"Which this isn't," agreed Naomi "Still, it's worth seeing, isn't it?"

"Yes, indeed." Mr. Satterthwaite turned to Mr. Quin. "Miss Carlton Smith calls this place the world's end. Rather a good name, eh?"

Mr. Quin nodded his head slowly several times.

"Yes―a very suggestive name. I suppose one only comes once in one's life to a place like that―a place where one can't go on any longer."

"What do you mean?" asked Naomi sharply.

He turned to her.

"Well, usually, there's a choke, isn't there? To the right or to the left. Forward or back. Here―there's the road behind you and in front of you―nothing."

Naomi stared at him. Suddenly she shivered and began to retrace her steps towards the others. The two men fell in beside her. Mr. Quin continued to talk, but his tone was now easily conversational.

"Is the small car yours, Miss Carlton Smith?"

"Yes."

"You drive yourself? One needs, I think, a good deal of nerve to do that round here. The turns are rather appalling. A moment of inattention, a brake that failed to hold, and― over the edge―down―down―down. It would be―very easily done."

They had now joined the others. Mr. Satterthwaite introduced his friend. He felt a tug at his arm. It was Naomi. She drew him apart from the others.

"Who is he?" she demanded fiercely.

Mr. Satterthwaite gazed at her in astonishment.

"Well, I hardly know. I mean, I have known him for some years now―we have run across each other from time to time, but in the sense of knowing actually―――"

He stopped. These were futilities that he was uttering, and the girl by his side was not listening. She was standing with her head bent down, her hands clenched by her sides.

"He knows things," she said. "He knows things... How does he know?"

Mr. Satterthwaite had no answer. He could only look at her dumbly, unable to comprehend die storm that shook her.