Hercule Poirot Quotes

If you will forgive me for being personal - I do not like your face, M. Ratchett,' Poirot said. ~ Agatha Christie

Sensationalism dies quickly, fear is long-lived. ~ Agatha Christie

I suggest to you that, although you may have endeavored to gloss over the fact to yourself, you did deliberately set about taking your husband from your friend. I suggest that you felt strongly attracted to him at once. But I suggest that there was a moment when you hesitated, when you realized that there was a choice–that you could refrain or go on. I suggest that the initiative rested with you–not with Monsieur Doyle. … You had everything, Madame, that life can offer. Your friend's life was bound up in one person. You knew that, but, though you hesitated, you did not hold your hand. You stretched it out and, like the rich man in the Bible, you took the poor man's one ewe lamb. ~ Agatha Christie

The truth, however ugly in itself, is always curious and beautiful to seekers after it. ~ Agatha Christie

But I don't doubt it will be essentially the same type of crime. The details may be different, but the essentials underlying them will be the same. It's odd, but a criminal gives himself away every time by that. Man is an unoriginal animal," said Hercule Poirot.
"Women," said Mrs. Oliver, " are capable of infinite variation. I should never commit the same type of murder twice running."
"Don't you ever write the same plot twice running?" asked Battle. ~ Agatha Christie

We will sit here and drink coffee, and you shall all three listen to Hercule Poirot while he gives you a lecture on crime. ~ Agatha Christie

You're suggesting the mysterious X. Where do we look for him?'

Poirot said:

'Obviously in a close circle. There were five people, were there not, whocould have been concerned?'

'Five? Let me see. There was the old duffer who messed about with his herb brewing. A dangerous hobby-but an amiable creature. Vague sort of person. Don't see him as X. There was the girl-she might have polished off Caroline, but certainly not Amyas. Then there was the stockbroker-Crale's best friend. That's popular in detective stories, but I don't believe in it in real life. There's no one else-oh yes, the kid sister, but one doesn't seriously consider her. That's four.'

Hercule Poirot said:

'You forget the governess.'

'Yes, that's true. Wretched people, governesses, one never does remember them. I do recall her dimly though. Middle-aged, plain, competent. I suppose a psychologist would say that she had a guilty passion for Crale and therefore killed him. The repressed spinster! It's no good-I just don't believe it. As far as my dim remembrance goes she wasn't the neurotic type.'

'It is a long time ago.'

'Fifteen or sixteen years, I suppose. Yes, quite that. You can't expect my memories of the case to be very acute. ~ Agatha Christie

But it is not everything in life that has its ticket, so much. There are things that are not for sale. ~ Agatha Christie

He dragged me back - just in time. A tree had crashed down on to the side walk, just missing us. Poirot stared at it, pale and upset.
"It was a near thing that! But clumsy, all the same - for I had no suspicion - at least hardly any suspicion. Yes, but for my quick eyes, the eyes of a cat, Hercule Poirot might now be crushed out of existence - a terrible calamity for the world. And you, too, mon ami - though that would not be such a national catastrophe."
"Thank you," I said coldly. ~ Agatha Christie

Hercule Poirot: I am an imbecile. I see only half of the picture.
Miss Lemon: I don't even see that. ~ Agatha Christie

What are you doing, Poirot?"
"I dissect rucksacks. It is very interesting. ~ Agatha Christie

Eh bien, then, you are crazy, or appear crazy or you think you are crazy, and possibly you may be crazy. ~ Agatha Christie

Unless you are good at guessing, it is not much use being a detective. ~ Agatha Christie

Mr. Satterthwaite looked cheered.
Suddenly an idea struck him. His jaw fell.
"My goodness," he cried, "I've only just realized it! That rascal, with his poisoned cocktail! Anyone might have drunk it! It might have been me!"
"There is an even more terrible possibility that you have not considered," said Poirot.
"Eh?"
"It might have been me," said Hercule Poirot. ~ Agatha Christie

What you do not understand is that there are things that cannot be bought. ~ Agatha Christie

I have no pity for myself either. So let it be Veronal. But I wish Hercule Poirot had never retired from work and come here to grow vegetable marrows. ~ Agatha Christie

I am all that there is of the most real. ~ Agatha Christie

Hercule Poirot addressed himself to the task of keeping his moustaches out of the soup. ~ Agatha Christie

You belong to the League of Nations?'
'I belong to the world, Madame,' said Poirot dramatically. ~ Agatha Christie

The dog hunts rabbits. Hercule Poirot hunts murderers. ~ Agatha Christie

Trains are relentless things, aren't they, Monsieur Poirot? People are murdered and die, but they go on just the same. I am talking nonsense, but you know what I mean."
"Yes, yes, I know. Life is like a train, Mademoiselle. It goes on. And it is a good thing that that is so."
"Why?"
"Because the train gets to its journey's end at last, and there is a proverb about that in your language, Mademoiselle."
"'Journey's end in lovers meeting.'" Lenox laughed. "That is not going to be true for me."
"Yes
yes, it is true. You are young, younger than you yourself know. Trust the train, Mademoiselle, for it is le bon Dieu who drives it."
The whistle of the engine came again.
"Trust the train, Mademoiselle," murmured Poirot again. "And trust Hercule Poirot. He knows. ~ Agatha Christie

You tell your lies and you think nobody knows. But there are two people who know. Yes- two people. One is le bon Dieu - and the other is Hercule Poirot ~ Agatha Christie

But then, how do you know?"
"Because I am Hercule Poirot I do not need to be told. ~ Agatha Christie

I like to inquire into everything. Hercule Poirot is a good dog. The good dog follows the scent, and if, regrettably, there is no scent to follow, he noses around - seeking always something that is not very nice. ~ Agatha Christie

And then?"
"And then," said Poirot. "We will talk! Je vous assure, Hastings - there is nothing so dangerous for anyone who has something to hide as conversation! Speech, so a wise old Frenchman said to me once, is an invention of man's to prevent him from thinking. It is also an infallible means of discovering that which he wishes to hide. A human being, Hastings, cannot resist the opportunity to reveal himself and express his personality which conversation gives him. Every time he will give himself away."
"What do you expect Cust to tell you?"
Hercule Poirot smiled.
"A lie," he said. "And by it, I shall know the truth! ~ Agatha Christie

In fact the marriage has been arranged by heaven and Hercule Poirot. All I have to do is to compound a felony. ~ Agatha Christie

Hercule Poirot was sitting at the breakfast table. At his right hand was a steaming cup ~ Agatha Christie

The two words expressed volumes. ~ Agatha Christie

But Aunt Maureen makes smashing omelettes." Julia Upjohn.
"She makes smashing omelettes." Poirot's voice was happy. He sighed.
"Then Hercule Poirot has not lived in vain, he said. It was I who taught your Aunt Maureen to make an omelette. ~ Agatha Christie

If you've lost, you've lost. ~ Agatha Christie

He was a man of whom nearly everybody was a little afraid. Why this last was so can hardly be stated in definite words. There was a feeling, perhaps, that he knew a little too much about everybody. And there was a feeling, too, that his sense of humor was a curious one. ~ Agatha Christie

But when you say crazy, that describes very well what the general appearance may be to ordinary, everyday people. ~ Agatha Christie

Hercule Poirot stared hard at Superintendent Sugden's moustache. Its luxuriance seemed to fascinate him. ~ Agatha Christie

My remarks are, as always, apt, sound, and to the point. (Hercule Poirot) ~ Agatha Christie

There comes a point in most cases - and by no means only those in which Hercule Poirot has involved himself - when one starts to feel that it would be a greater comfort, and actually no less effective, to talk only to oneself and dispense with all attempts to communicate with the outside world. ~ Sophie Hannah

There was only one thing about his own appearance which really pleased Hercule Poirot, and that was the profusion of his moustaches, and the way they responded to grooming and treatment and trimming. They were magnificent. He knew of nobody else who had any moustache half as good. ~ Agatha Christie

I enrage myself with an imbecile. I say, 'I would like to kick him.' Instead I kick the table. I say, 'This table, it is the imbecile, I kick him so. ~ Agatha Christie

Ah, but life is like that! It does not permit you to arrange and order it as you will. It will not permit you to escape emotion, to live by the intellect and by reason! You cannot say, 'I will feel so much and no more.' Life, Mr. Welman, whatever else it is, is not reasonable. [Hercule Poirot] ~ Agatha Christie

Fellow has the wrong clothes and all that. French chap-or Belgian. Queer fellow, but he's got the goods all right. ~ Agatha Christie

Mon ami,' said Poirot with dignity, 'when I commit a murder it will not be with the arrow poison of the South American Indians. ~ Agatha Christie

It is the sex angle that sells stories, that makes news. give people scandal allied to sex and it appeals far more than any mere political chicanery or fraud. (Hercule Poirot) ~ Agatha Christie

Doctors, I find, have a very materialistic outlook. The spiritual seems to be strangely hidden from them. They pin their faith on Science - but what I say is... what is Science - what can it do?"
There seemed, to Hercule Poirot, to be no answer to the question other than a meticulous and painstaking description embracing Pasteur, Lister, Humphrey Davy's safety lamp - the convenience of electricity in the home and several hundred other kindred items. But that, naturally, was not the answer Mrs Lionel Cloade wanted. ~ Agatha Christie

Hercule Poirot's methods are his own. Order and method, and 'the little gray cells'. ~ Agatha Christie

Your idea of a woman is someone who gets on a chair and shrieks if she sees a mouse. That's all prehistoric. ~ Agatha Christie

It is romantic, yes,' agreed Hercule Poirot. 'It is peaceful. The sun shines. The sea is blue. But you forget, Miss Brewster, there is evil everywhere under the sun'. ~ Agatha Christie

wanted to know." "It's better not to know. It's better never to know. Better to leave things as they are. Not push and pry and poke." "You want beauty," said Hercule Poirot. "Beauty at any price. For me, it is truth I want. Always truth." Michael ~ Agatha Christie

Ah, but my dear sir, the why must never be obvious. That is the whole point. ~ Agatha Christie

I find most of the human race extraordinarily repulsive. They probably reciprocate this feeling. ~ Agatha Christie

Rest assured," said Hercule Poirot. "I am the best! ~ Agatha Christie

I mean, imagine how some unfortunate Master Criminal would feel, on coming down to do a murder at the old Grange, if he found that not only was Sherlock Holmes putting in the weekend there, but Hercule Poirot, as well." ~ Bertram "Bertie" Wooster ~ P.G. Wodehouse

In case, I would prefer to say, that some circumstances should strike me in a different light to the one in which it struck you. Human reactions vary and so does human experience.

~Hercule Poirot ~ Agatha Christie

You might start a new religion yourself, with the creed: 'There is no one so clever as Hercule Poirot, Amen, D. C. Repeat ad lib.'! ~ Agatha Christie

In conversation, points arise! If a human being converses much, it is impossible for him to avoid the truth! (Hercule Poirot) ~ Agatha Christie

One must always proceed with method. I made an error of judgment asking you that question. Toeach man his own knowledge. You could tell me the details of the patient's physical appearance- nothing there would escape you. If I wanted information about the papers on the desk, Mr. Raymond would have noticed anything there was to see. To find out about the fire, I must ask the man whose business is to observe such things. - Detective Hercule Poirot to Doctor Sheppard ~ Agatha Christie

There are more important things than finding the murderer. And justice is a fine word, but it is sometimes difficult to say exactly what one means by it. In my opinion, the important thing is to clear the innocent. - Hercule Poirot ~ Agatha Christie

Like so many of the other books I read, it never seemed to me like a book, but like a place I had lived in, had visited and would visit again, just as all the people in them, every blessed one – Anne of Green Gables, Heidi, Jay Gatsby, Elizabeth Bennet, Scarlet O'Hara, Dill and Scout, Miss Marple, and Hercule Poirot – were more real than the real people I knew. ~ Anna Quindlen

.... she was like a flower.
And suddenly, for a vivid minute, Hercule Poirot had a new conception of
the dead girl. In that halting rustic voice the girl Mary lived and bloomed
again. "She was like a flower."
There was suddenly a poignant sense of loss, of something exquisite
destroyed. In his mind phrase after phrase succeeded each other. Peter
Lord's "She was a nice kid." Nurse Hopkins's "She could have gone on the
films any time." Mrs. Bishop's venomous "No patience with her airs and
graces." And now last, putting to shame, laying aside those other views,
the quiet, wondering, "She was like a flower. ~ Agatha Christie

The critical scene of the mystery is when the detective enters. The action shifts to Sherlock's sitting room. The little Belgian man with the waxed moustache appears in the lobby of the grand hotel. The gentle old woman with a bag of knitting comes to visit her niece when the poison pen letters start going around the village. The private detective comes back to the office after a night of drinking and finds the woman with the cigarette and the veiled hat this is when things will change. ~ Maureen Johnson

You have a great advantage as a writer, Monsieur,' said Poirot. 'You can relieve your feelings by expedient of the printed word. You have the power of the pen over your enemies. ~ Agatha Christie

I don't know why dogs always go for postmen, I'm sure," continued our guide.
"It's a matter of reasoning," said Poirot. "The dog, he argues from reason. He is intelligent; he makes his deductions according to his point of view. There are people who may enter a house and there are people who may not - that a dog soon learns. Eh bien, who is the person who most persistently tries to gain admission, rattling on the door twice or three times a day - and who is never by any chance admitted? The postman. Clearly, then, an undesirable guest from the point of view of the master of the house. He is always sent about his business, but he persistently returns and tries again. Then a dog's duty is clear, to aid in driving this undesirable man away, and to bite him if possible. A most reasonable proceeding. ~ Agatha Christie

After lunch Poirot begged me to accompany him home. I consented rather stiffly.
"You are annoyed, is it not so?" he asked anxiously, as we walked through the park.
"Not at all," I said coldly.
"That is well. That lifts a great load from my mind."
This was not quite what I had intended. I had hoped that he would have observed the stiffness of my manner. Still, the fervour of his words went towards the appeasing of my just displeasure. I thawed. ~ Agatha Christie

I like to see an angry Englishman," said Poirot. "They are very amusing. The more emotional they feel the less command they have of language. ~ Agatha Christie

A large fierce-looking dog whom Poirot suspected of having mange growled from his position on a moderately comfortable fourth chair. ~ Agatha Christie

There is at Christmas time a great deal of hypocrisy, honourable hypocrisy, hypocrisy undertaken pour le bon motif, c'est entendu, but nevertheless hypocrisy! ~ Agatha Christie

That is what I mean. A bath! The receptacle of porcelain, one turns the taps and fills it, one gets in, one gets out and ghoosh - ghoosh - ghoosh, the water goes down the waste pipe!"
"M. Poirot are you quite mad?"
"No, I am extremely sane. ~ Agatha Christie

Only by losing everything can you fear nothing. ~ Ken Poirot

True love is built on free will and free choice, not control and manipulation. ~ Ken Poirot

No one understands betrayal like the one who has been betrayed. ~ Ken Poirot

I think you are wise. You haven't got what it takes for this job. You are like Rosemary's father. He couldn't understand Lenin's dictum: 'Away with softness.'"
I thought of Hercule Poirot's words.
"I'm content," I said, "to be human ... "
We sat there in silence, each of use convinced that the other's point of view was wrong. ~ Agatha Christie

What are you going to do?'
'I am going to visit these five people-and from each one I am going to get his or her own story.'
Superintendent Hale sighed with a deep melancholy.
He said: 'Man, you're nuts! None of their stories are going to agree! Don't you grasp that elementary fact? No two people remember a thing in the same order anyway. And after all this time! Why, you'll hear five accounts of five separate murders!'
'That,' said Poirot, 'is what I am counting upon. It will be very instructive. ~ Agatha Christie

There's no reason why women shouldn't behave like rational beings," Simon asserted stolidly.
Poirot said drily: "Quite frequently they do. That is even more upsetting! ~ Agatha Christie

True beauty is a warm heart, a kind soul, and an attentive ear. ~ Ken Poirot

I'm never going to believe a Poirot mystery again. Never. All those witnesses going, "Yes, I remember it was 3:06 p.m. exactly, because I glanced at the clock as I reached for the sugar tongs, and Lady Favisham was quite clearly sitting on the right-hand side of the fireplace."
Bollocks. They have no idea where Lady Favisham was, they just don't want to admit it in front of Poirot. I'm amazed he gets anywhere. ~ Sophie Kinsella

The best meals are those prepared by loving hands. ~ Ken Poirot

But seriously Poirot, what a hobby! Compare that to
" his voice sank to an appreciative purr
"an easy chair in front of a wood fire in a long low room lined with books
must be a long room
not a square one. Books all round one. A glass of port
and a book open in your hand. Time rolls back as you read. ~ Agatha Christie

Who are you? You don't belong to the police?' 'I am better than the police,' said Poirot. He said it without conscious arrogance. It was, to him, a simple statement of fact. ~ Agatha Christie

By Jove, Poirot,' I exclaimed, 'did you see that young goddess?' Poirot ~ Agatha Christie

Poirot closed his eyes. What he perceived mentally was a kaleidoscope, no more, no less. Pieces of cut-up scarves and rucksacks, cookery books, lipsticks, bath salts; names and thumbnail sketches of odd students. Nowhere was there cohesion or form. Unrelated incidents and people whirled round in space. But Poirot knew quite well that somehow and somewhere there must be a pattern ... The question was where to start ... ~ Agatha Christie

Mademoiselle, I beseech you, do not do what you are doing." "Leave dear Linnet alone, you mean!" "It is deeper than that. Do not open your heart to evil." Her lips fell apart; a look of bewilderment came into her eyes. Poirot went on gravely: "Because - if you do - evil will come ... Yes, very surely evil will come ... It will enter in and make its home within you, and after a little while it will no longer be possible to drive it out. ~ Agatha Christie

What would Poirot do? Poirot wouldn't flap around in a panic. He'd stay calm and use his little grey cells and recall some tiny, vital detail which would be the clue to everything. ~ Sophie Kinsella

Let me tell you this, Hastings. She would never forgive me if I let Alfred Inglethorp, her husband, be arrested now - when a word from me could save him! ~ Agatha Christie

Poirot and I behaved in the customary fashion of people being shown over houses. We stood stock still, looking a little ill at ease, murmuring remarks such as: "Very nice." "A very pleasant room." "The morning-room, you say? ~ Agatha Christie

These blondes, sir, they're responsible for a lot of trouble. ~ Agatha Christie

...you can always agree on one thing. You can shake hands, smile, and say, 'Yes...we will have to agree to disagree. ~ Ken Poirot

At all events, let us examine the position from the point of view of murder, not suicide."
"Oh, all right. If you are on the scene, it probably would be murder!"
For a moment Poirot smiled. "I hardly like that remark. ~ Agatha Christie

I may," said Poirot in a completely unconvinced tone, "be wrong."
Morton smiled. "But that doesn't often happen to you?"
"No. Though I will admit - yes, I am forced to admit - that it has happened to me."
"I must say I'm glad to hear it! To be always right must be sometimes monotonous."
"I do not find it so," Poirot assured him. ~ Agatha Christie

Poirot smoothed his mustache, as if he imagined that laughing might have shaken it out of shape. ~ Sophie Hannah

A loose tile; Poirot could not sleep in a room with such a thing. ~ Sophie Hannah

I was tired of this silly joking about my 'speaking countenance'. I could keep a secret as well as anyone. Poirot had always persisted in the humiliating belief that I am a transparent character and that anyone can read what is passing in my mind. ~ Agatha Christie