Death On The Nile

“I shall die if I can’t marry him! I shall die! I shall die! I shall die…” 

Jackie’s passionate outburst expresses her excessive love for Simon, which leads her to take part in the murderous plot against Linnet; it also foreshadows her death at the end of the novel and illustrates the novel’s theme of the danger of loving too much. 

“She cares too much, that little one…[i]t is not safe. No, it is not safe.” 

From his very first contact with Jackie, Poirot senses that her fate will be an unhappy one. There is evidently something about Jackie’s behavior with Simon that suggests to Poirot that her love is unhinged in some way. The phrase “that little one” signals Poirot’s sympathy for Jackie and his desire to protect her from the moral danger that surrounds her. 

“Une qui aime et un qui se laisse aimer [one who loves and one who allows himself to be loved].” 

Poirot immediately senses that Jackie loves Simon more than he loves her; this characterization also applies to Simon’s relationship with Linnet, who is passionately in love with Simon. Throughout the novel, Simon leverages women’s love for and attraction to him for his own financial gain. 

“Jackie had told him she was wonderful, and he clearly thought that she was wonderful.” 

Linnet sees Simon through the prism of her own wishful thinking, for we learn later, from Poirot, that Simon’s performance of the role of adoring husband is too exaggerated to be believable. This is yet another instance of Linnet’s blithe egoism: she assumes others adore her because she adores herself. 

“‘Joanna amuses me, but I don’t really like her, and to have her around much gets on my nerves. I’m thankful she isn’t here. I should be quite resigned if I were never to see Joanna again.’” 

Throughout the novel, Mrs. Allerton is concerned about Tim’s relationship with Joanna; although she doesn’t really believe he is in love with Joanna, she does not know how else to make sense of Tim’s strong attachment to his cousin and the secretiveness that seems to surround their meetings and communications. When Tim says categorically that he does not enjoy Joanna’s company, the mystery deepens: is this an impetuous statement, born of a lovers’ quarrel? In fact, Tim is being perfectly frank. He seems to want out of the jewel theft scheme, and yet appears unmotivated or perhaps unable to extricate himself until Poirot forces the issue at the end of the novel. 

“‘What is it, Mother?’

Rosalie was suddenly at her side.

‘Nothing, dear. I was just going up to get a book for Monsieur Poirot.’

‘The Fig Tree? I’ll get it.’

‘You don’t know where it is, dear. I’ll go.’

‘Yes, I do.’

The girl went swiftly across the terrace and into the hotel.

‘Let me congratulate you, Madame, on a very lovely daughter,’ said Poirot, with a bow.

‘Rosalie? Yes, yes–she is good-looking. But she’s very hard, Monsieur Poirot. And no sympathy with illness. She always thinks she knows best. She imagines she knows more about my health than I do myself–’

Poirot signalled to a passing waiter.

‘A liqueur, Madame? A chartreuse? A crème de menthe?’

Mrs. Otterbourne shook her head vigorously.

‘No, no. I am practically a teetotaller. You may have noticed I never drink anything but water–or perhaps lemonade. I cannot bear the taste of spirits.’” 

This passage depicts the tension between Mrs. Otterbourne and Rosalie over the former’s alcoholism. Rosalie knows that her mother is simply trying to find a subterfuge in order to drink secretly, and tries to prevent her from doing so. Mrs. Otterbourne both pretends not to drink at all in order to hide her alcoholism and resents Rosalie’s attempts to keep her from her vice so much that she defames her daughter to other people. The emotional toll this takes on Rosalie is one example of the danger of loving too much: Rosalie sacrifices her own well-being for her mother. 

“Look at the moon up there. You see her very plainly, don’t you? She’s very real. But if the sun were to shine you wouldn’t be able to see her at all. It was rather like that. I was the moon…[w]hen the sun came out, Simon couldn’t see me any more…[h]e was dazzled. He couldn’t see anything but the sun—Linnet.” 

The sun and moon analogy is one of the first clear giveaways that Jackie and Simon are working together, since Simon repeats nearly the same statement to Poirot later. The moon is associated with darkness, the emotions, and the feminine; over the course of the novel, Poirot often sees Jackie in the darkness, where she is either plotting Linnet’s murder or indulging in her own negative emotions. While Linnet is characterized as an emasculating woman, Jackie is portrayed as typically feminine. 

“Do not open your heart to evil…[b]ecause—if you do—evil will come…[y]es, very surely evil will come…[i]t will enter in and make its home within you, and after a while it will no longer be possible to drive it out.” 

Poirot’s advice to Jackie expresses the central theme of the novel, and Jackie loses herself to evil, just as Poirot predicts. Other characters who have already allowed evil to make a home within them include Pennington, Simon, and Richetti, while those who are tempted to open their hearts to evil, but eventually cast it out, include Tim and Rosalie. 

“‘But I’m afraid—yes, afraid sometimes—it all goes red—I want to hurt her—to stick a knife into her, to put my dear little pistol close against her head and then—just press with my finger—Oh!’

The exclamation startled him.

‘What is it, Mademoiselle!’

She turned her head and was staring into the shadows.

‘Someone—standing over there. He’s gone now.’

Hercule Poirot looked round sharply.

The place seemed quite deserted.

‘There seems no one here but ourselves, Mademoiselle.’” 

This is Jackie’s key performance, in which she describes the way Linnet will be killed. This scene reveals Jackie’s cunning and the cynicism of Jackie and Simon’s plan: Jackie describes the way that she and Simon are in fact planning to kill Linnet and pretends to have seen an eavesdropper so that Poirot will believe, when Linnet is murdered, that some other person must have attempted to frame Jackie. However, Poirot is not deceived; he knows that nobody has overheard their conversation. 

“‘She’s hot-blooded—and she’s got an ungovernable temper. I shouldn’t be surprised at her doing anything while she was in a white-hot rage. But this spying business—’ He shook his head.

‘It is more subtle—yes! It is intelligent!’” 

Here, Simon attempts to portray Jackie as impulsive and passionate because that is the narrative that best fits the performance they are planning: Jackie is planning to “shoot” Simon while supposedly in a fit of passion and rage. However, Simon blunders by calling attention to another aspect of Jackie’s character, which Poirot readily notices. In reality, Jackie is not only hot-blooded, but also subtle, intelligent, and strategically minded. 

“‘You see, a man doesn’t want to feel that a woman cares more for him than he does for her...[h]e doesn’t want to feel owned, body and soul. It’s the damned possessive attitude! This man is mine—he belongs to me! That’s the sort of thing I can’t stick—no man could stick! He wants to get away—to get free. He wants to own his woman; he doesn’t want her to own him.’” 

Simon blunders again, describing his true feelings for Linnet, who behaves toward him in a possessive way; in fact, it is Jackie, not Linnet, whom he feels he “owns.”

“Poirot said: ‘And it is like that that you felt with Mademoiselle Jacqueline?

‘Eh?’ Simon stared and then admitted: ‘Er—yes—well, yes, as a matter of fact I did…and then I met Linnet, and she just swept me off my feet...[i]t was all so amazing. Everyone kowtowing to her—and then her singling out a poor chump like me.’

His tone held boyish awe and astonishment.

‘I see,’ said Poirot. He nodded thoughtfully. ‘Yes—I see.’” 

Poirot sees that Simon’s account of his romance with Linnet is inconsistent with his claim to hate possessive women. “She just swept me off my feet” and “her singling out a poor chump like me” describe the power dynamic of Simon and Linnet’s relationship: Linnet is fully in charge, and relates to Simon as a benevolent ruler might relate to a favorite vassal. 

“‘Why not say it–to me? I am one of those who hear many things. If, as you say, you boil inside–like the jam–eh bien, let the scum come to the surface, and then one can take it off with a spoon, so.’

He made a gesture of dropping something into the Nile.

‘Then, it has gone.’” 

Poirot becomes a kind of father confessor to Rosalie, who vents the thoughts she is most ashamed of to him. Rosalie expects him to respond with shock or disapproval, but instead he encourages her, in a good-humored way, to air her negative feelings, which he likens to an unwholesome substance. Poirot understands that feelings of resentment, envy, and even hatred are normal; however, allowing them to fester as Jackie has allows evil to “come in,” so he encourages Rosalie not to allow such feelings to fester. 

“‘I hope I’m not butting in, but you must let me say how much I admire your businesslike capacity. In my profession–er–I am a lawyer–I find ladies sadly unbusinesslike. Never to sign a document unless you read it through is admirable–altogether admirable.’” 

Here, Fanthorp’s intervention in Linnet and Pennington’s exchange characterizes Linnet as an unconventional woman. While most women are “sadly unbusinesslike,” Linnet is extremely clear-headed in matters of business. This is one of several moments in the novel that portray Linnet as having masculine characteristics.

“‘What could I have seen or heard? I was on the deck below. My cabin, it was on the other side of the boat, even. It is impossible that I should have heard anything. Naturally if I had been unable to sleep, if I had mounted the stairs, then perhaps I might have seen the assassin, this monster, enter or leave Madame’s cabin, but as it is—’

She threw out her hands appealingly to Simon. ‘Monsieur, I implore you—you see how it is? What can I say?’

‘My good girl,’ said Simon harshly, ‘don’t be a fool. Nobody thinks you saw or heard anything. You’ll be quite all right. I’ll look after you. Nobody’s accusing you of anything.’

Louise murmured, ‘Monsieur is very good,’ and dropped her eyelids modestly.” 

This exchange between Simon, Linnet’s murderer, and Louise, the witness to the murder, takes place right before Poirot and Race’s eyes. On a first reading, Louise’s statement is odd, but its oddness could be attributed to Louise’s shaken emotional state after the murder of her employer. Simon’s response might easily be interpreted as an attempt to reassure a panicked Louise; only later, once Louise turns up dead, does Poirot understand the full import of this conversation. 

“Poirot examined it carefully; then he said quietly: ‘Yes–that is it. There is the ornamental work on it–and the initials J.B. It is an article de luxe, a very feminine production, but it is none the less a lethal weapon.’” 

Jackie’s gun, because of its small size and delicate appearance, represents her rather dangerous sort of femininity, which is given to dark passions. The pearl handle also suggests the moon, another symbol for the feminine with which Jackie identifies. 

“‘So that’s your dirty game, is it?’ he demanded wrathfully. ‘Put it on to a poor devil like Fleetwood, who can’t defend himself, who’s got no money to hire lawyers. But I tell you this–if you try and saddle Fleetwood with this business you’ll have me to deal with.’

‘And who exactly are you?’ asked Poirot sweetly.

Mr. Ferguson got rather red.

‘I can stick by my friends anyway,’ he said gruffly.” 

Ferguson, the Oxford communist, poses as a member of the working classes, wearing tattered clothing for others to see (although he continues to wear refined, high-quality undergarments that betray his true class origin). Here, in passionately defending the ship’s engineer, Fleetwood, against a perceived injustice, he accidentally reveals that he has the means to hire lawyers and mount a defense. His statement about sticking by his friends supports Race’s view of Ferguson as essentially likeable. 

“Andrew Pennington displayed all the conventional reactions of grief and shock. He was, as usual, carefully dressed. He had changed into a black tie. His long clean-shaven face bore a bewildered expression.” 

Christie is careful not to say that Pennington was actually experiencing feelings of grief and shock; by saying that he “displayed” the “conventional reactions” she indicates that Pennington is merely playing a role, and that he is skilled enough to do so in a way that would convince most people. The detail about his having changed into a black tie gives him away, however: a truly shocked and grieving person would likely not have had the presence of mind to change his tie, but because Pennington’s main focus is on presenting an appearance of grief, such things are very much on his mind. His bewildered expression is probably genuine: he has already attempted to kill Linnet and is likely surprised that someone else has done the job for him.

“They passed on to Ferguson’s cabin. There was a sprinkling of communistic literature, a good many snapshots, Samuel Butler’s Erewhon and a cheap edition of Pepys’ Diary. His personal possessions were not many. Most of what outer clothing there was was torn and dirty; the underclothing, on the other hand, was of really good quality. The handkerchiefs were expensive linen ones. ‘Some interesting discrepancies,’ murmured Poirot.” 

While the communist literature and torn, dirty clothing in Ferguson’s cabin is consistent with the image the young man projects, the underclothing and linen handkerchiefs suggest that his background is rather more refined than he lets on. Similarly, his choice of Erewhon and Pepys’ Diary suggest that he is well-educated; while both works are of political interest, neither is specifically communistic, and both suggest a more well-rounded and subtle (or perhaps simply more traditional and mainstream) understanding of politics and history than Ferguson normally voices. 

“‘La vie est vaine.

Un peu d’amour,

Un peu de haine,

Et puis bonjour.

La vie est brève.

Un peu d’espoir,

Un peu de rêve,

Et puis bonsoir.’” 

This brief poem has been attributed to Alfred de Musset. A rough translation runs: “Life is vain. / a little love, / a little hate, / and then good day. / Life is brief. / A little hope, / a little dream, / and then good night.” Poirot appears to be warning Jackie and foreshadowing her death; perhaps he chooses to address her in French, a language they share, in order to emphasize the privacy of this exchange and to appeal to her supposedly hot-blooded Latin nature. 

“Cornelia said: ‘She loves him terribly, you see.’

‘Ach! but it is not sensible, that. If you loved a man, would you try and shoot him? No, you are sensible.’

‘I don’t like things that go off with bangs anyway,’ said Cornelia.

‘Naturally you do not. You are very feminine.’” 

This is one of several passages in which Dr. Bessner compliments Cornelia, and these sorts of passages provide subtle hints that Bessner and Cornelia are falling in love. The passage also calls attention to the notions of femininity in Christie’s text; Bessner characterizes Cornelia’s dislike of guns and her figure as feminine, while Simon and Fanthorp characterize Linnet’s business acumen and possessiveness as unfeminine. 

“She added: ‘I suppose the stewardess is in attendance to see I don’t hang myself or swallow a miraculous capsule of prussic acid as people always do in books. You needn’t be afraid! I shan’t do that. It will be easier for Simon if I’m standing by.’” 

Jackie reveals that the primary reason she is not planning to kill herself is in order to make things easier for Simon. This remark gives us insight into Poirot’s motivation for allowing Jackie to keep the second gun; he has said several times that Jackie’s excessive love for Simon is dangerous, and he understands that her eventual trial and execution will be extraordinarily difficult and painful. Perhaps he wants her to stop making sacrifices for Simon, and to spare herself this agony. 

“‘She prefers that pompous old bore to me?’

‘Undoubtedly.’

‘The girl’s mad,’ declared Ferguson.

Poirot’s eyes twinkled. ‘She is a woman of an original mind,’ he said. ‘It is probably the first time you have met one.’”

Ferguson, for all his claims to radical thinking, fails to appreciate Cornelia’s genuinely-liberated approach to relationships. He appears to think that, because she values reliability and is not upset that some people are more fortunate than she, Cornelia is somehow misguided. However, Cornelia chooses to marry Dr. Bessner because he has a number of qualities she finds attractive and can offer her a homelife that is both stable and intellectually fulfilling. Poirot’s remark suggests that Ferguson is either inexperienced with or not very perceptive about women.