One never quite allows for the moron in our midst.

At the small table, sitting very upright, was one of the ugliest old ladies he had ever seen. It was an ugliness of distinction - it fascinated rather than repelled.

Curious things, habits. People themselves never knew they had them.

I've a theory that one can always get anything one wants if one will pay the price. And do you know what the price is, nine times out of ten? Compromise.

I'm going to marry him. And if he thinks he can get divorced and married every two or three years in the approved Hollywood fashion, well, he never made a bigger mistake in his life. He's going to marry and stick to me.

Trains are wonderful.... To travel by train is to see nature and human beings, towns and churches and rivers, in fact, to see life.

Vous eprouves trop d'emotion, Hastings, It affects your hands and your wits. Is that a way to fold a coat? And regard what you have done to my pyjamas. If the hairwash breaks what will befall them?' 'Good heavens, Poirot,' I cried, 'this is a matter of life and death. What does it matter what happens to our clothes?' 'You have no sense of proportion Hastings. We cannot catch a train earlier than the time that it leaves, and to ruin one's clothes will not be the least helpful in preventing a murder.