Agatha Christie - The Girl in the Train - An Agatha Christie Short Story

And then, all of a sudden, things began to happen with bewildering rapidity.

A girl happened first. She wrenched open the door and jumped in, rousing Mr Rowland from something perilously near a nap, exclaiming as she did so: ‘Oh! hide me – oh! please hide me.’

George was essentially a man of action – his not to reason why, his but to do and die, etc. There is only one place to hide in a railway carriage – under the seat. In seven seconds the girl was bestowed there, and George’s suit-case, negligently standing on end, covered her retreat. None too soon. An infuriated face appeared at the carriage window.

‘My niece! You have her here. I want my niece.’

George, a little breathless, was reclining in the corner, deep in the sporting column of the evening paper, one-thirty edition. He laid it aside with the air of a man recalling himself from far away.

‘I beg your pardon, sir?’ he said politely.

‘My niece – what have you done with her?’

Acting on the policy that attack is always better than defence, George leaped into action.

‘What the devil do you mean?’ he cried, with a very creditable imitation of his own uncle’s manner.

The other paused a minute, taken aback by this sudden fierceness. He was a fat man, still panting a little as though he had run some way. His hair was cut en brosse , and he had a moustache of the Hohenzollern persuasion. His accents were decidedly guttural, and the stiffness of his carriage denoted that he was more at home in uniform than out of it. George had the true-born Briton’s prejudice against foreigners – and an especial distaste for German-looking foreigners.

Текст предоставлен ООО «ЛитРес».

Прочитайте эту книгу целиком, купив полную легальную версию на ЛитРес.

Безопасно оплатить книгу можно банковской картой Visa, MasterCard, Maestro, со счета мобильного телефона, с платежного терминала, в салоне МТС или Связной, через PayPal, WebMoney, Яндекс.Деньги, QIWI Кошелек, бонусными картами или другим удобным Вам способом.