United States or Cayman Islands ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
In the store that afternoon I said casually to Japp that I had noticed visitors at the door during my dinner hour. The old man looked me frankly enough in the face. 'Yes, it was Mr Hendricks, he said, and explained that the man was a Portuguese trader from Delagoa way, who had a lot of Kaffir stores east of the Lebombo Hills.
"With my poor Emily not yet buried, can you wonder I was anxious that no more lying rumours should be started." "Between you and me, sir," remarked Japp, "I'd sooner have any amount of rumours than be arrested for murder. And I venture to think your poor lady would have felt the same. And, if it hadn't been for Mr. Poirot here, arrested you would have been, as sure as eggs is eggs!"
Then there was my talk with Aitken at Lourenco Marques, and his story of a great wizard in the neighbourhood to whom all Kaffirs made pilgrimages, and the suspicion of a diamond pipe. Last and most important, there was this perpetual spying on myself. It was as clear as daylight that the place held some secret, and I wondered if old Japp knew. I was fool enough one day to ask him about diamonds.
Old Coetzee saved me the trouble of answering, for he broke in with Skellum! Skellum! I asked him his objection to the storekeeper, but he would say nothing beyond that he was too thick with the natives. I fancy at some time Mr Japp had sold him a bad plough. We spoke of hunting, and I heard long tales of exploits away on the Limpopo, in Mashonaland, on the Sabi and in the Lebombo.
Then we can work together. What about some lunch? Shall we have it up here, or go down to the restaurant?" Tuppence expressed a preference for the latter, and Julius bowed to her decision. Oysters had just given place to Sole Colbert when a card was brought to Hersheimmer. "Inspector Japp, C.I.D. Scotland Yard again. Another man this time.
The peril, whatever it was, did not threaten me only, though I and Wardlaw and Japp might be the first to suffer; but I had a terrible feeling that I alone could do something to ward it off, and just what that something was I could not tell. I was horribly afraid, not only of unknown death, but of my impotence to play any manly part.
The standard life of De Quincey; it contains valuable communications from De Quincey's daughters, J. Hogg, Rev. A. H. JAPP. De Quincey Memorials. Being Letters and Other Records, here first published. With Communications from Coleridge, the Wordsworths, Hannah More, Professor Wilson, and others. 2 vols. London: W. Heinemann, 1891. E. T. MASON. Personal Traits of British Authors.
We have to deal with a most clever and unscrupulous man, and we must use any means in our power otherwise he will slip through our fingers. That is why I have been careful to remain in the background. All the discoveries have been made by Japp, and Japp will take all the credit. If I am called upon to give evidence at all" he smiled broadly "it will probably be as a witness for the defence."
He might brag about his knowledge of how to deal with natives, but to my mind his methods were a disgrace to a white man. Zeeta came in for oaths and blows, but there were other Kaffirs whom he treated with a sort of cringing friendliness. A big black fellow would swagger into the shop, and be received by Japp as if he were his long-lost brother.
At first Japp praised my energy, for it left him plenty of leisure to sit indoors and drink. But soon he grew suspicious, for he must have seen that I was in a fair way to oust him altogether. He was very anxious to know if I had seen Colles in Durban, and what the manager had said. 'I have letters, he told me a hundred times, 'from Mr Mackenzie himself praising me up to the skies.
Word Of The Day