“What a number of bond robberies there have been lately!” I observed
one morning, laying aside the newspaper. “Poirot, let us forsake
the science of detection, and take to crime instead!”
“You are on the—how do you say it?—get-rich-quick tack, eh, _mon
ami_?”
“Well, look at this last _coup_, the million dollars’ worth of
Liberty Bonds which the London and Scottish Bank were sending to
New York, and which disappeared in such a remarkable manner on
board the _Olympia_.”
“If it were not for the _mal de mer_, and the difficulty of
practising the so excellent method of Laverguier for a longer time
than the few hours of crossing the channel, I should delight to
voyage myself on one of these big liners,” murmured Poirot dreamily.
“Yes, indeed,” I said enthusiastically. “Some of them must be
perfect palaces; the swimming-baths, the lounges, the restaurant,
the palm courts—really, it must be hard to believe that one is on
the sea.”
“Me, I always know when I am on the sea,” said Poirot sadly. “And
all those bagatelles that you enumerate, they say nothing to me;
but, my friend, consider for a moment the geniuses that travel as
it were incognito! On board these floating palaces, as you so
justly call them, one would meet the élite, the _haute noblesse_
of the criminal world!”