Elephants Can Remember

What I've got to do is-I've got to get in touch with some elephants." "I do not know yet if I quite see what you mean," said Hercule Poirot. "Who are you classifying as elephants? You sound as though you were going for information to the zoo." "Well, it's not exactly like that," said Mrs. Oliver. "Not elephants, as elephants, but the way people up to a point would resemble elephants. There are some people who do remember. In fact, one does remember queer things. I mean, there are a lot of things that I remember very well. They happened-I remember a birthday party I had when I was five, and a pink cake-a lovely pink cake. It had a sugar bird on it. And I remember the day my canary flew away and I cried. And I remember another day when I went into a field and there was a bull there and somebody said it would gore me, and I was terrified and wanted to run out of the field.

Well, I remember that quite well. It was a Tuesday, too. I don't know why I should remember it was a Tuesday, but it was a Tuesday. And I remember a wonderful picnic with blackberries. I remember getting pricked terribly, but getting more blackberries than anyone else. It was wonderful! By that time I was nine, I think. But one needn't go back as far as that. I mean, I've been to hundreds of weddings in my life, but when I look back on a wedding there are only two that I remember particularly. One where I was a bridesmaid. It took place in the New Forest, I remember, and I can't remember who was there actually. I think it was a cousin of mine getting married. I didn't know her very well, but she wanted a good many bridesmaids and, well, I came in handy, I suppose.

But I know another wedding. That was a friend of mine in the Navy. He was nearly drowned in a submarine, and then he was saved again, and then the girl he was engaged to, her people didn't want her to marry him, but then he did marry her after that and I was one other bridesmaids at the marriage.

Well, I mean, there's always things you do remember." "I see your point," said Poirot. "I find it interesting. So you will go a la recherche des elephants'?" "That's right. I'd have to get the date right." "There," said Poirot, "I hope I may be able to help you." "And then I'll think of people I knew about at that time, people that I may have known who also knew the same friends that I did, who probably knew General What-not. People who may have known them abroad, but whom I also knew although I mayn't have seen them for a good many years. You can look up people, you know, that you haven't seen for a long time. Because people are always quite pleased to see someone coming up out of the past, even if they can't remember very much about you. And then you naturally will talk about the things that were happening at that date, that you remember about." "Very interesting," said Poirot. "I think you are very well equipped for what you propose to do. People who knew the Ravenscrofts either well or not very well; people who lived in the same part of the world where the thing happened or who might have been staying there. More difficult, but I think one could get at it. And so, somehow or other one would try different things. Start a little talk going about what happened, what they think happened, what anyone else has ever told you about what might have happened. About any love affairs the husband or wife had, about any money that somebody might have inherited. I think you could scratch up a lot of things." "Oh, dear," said Mrs. Oliver, "I'm afraid really I'm just a nosey-parker." "You've been given an assignment," said Poirot, "not by someone you like, not by someone you wish to oblige, but someone you entirely dislike. That does not matter. You are still on a quest-a quest of knowledge. You take your own path. It is the path of the elephants. The elephants may remember. Bow voyage," said Poirot.

"I beg your pardon," said Mrs. Oliver.

"I'm sending you forth on your voyage of discovery," said Poirot. "A la recherche des elephants." "I expect I'm mad," said Mrs. Oliver sadly. She brushed her hands through her hair again so that she looked like the old picture books of Struwelpeter. "I was just thinking of starting a story about a golden retriever. But it wasn't going well. I couldn't get started, if you know what I mean." "All right, abandon the golden retriever. Concern yourself only with elephants."

Book One Elephants

Chapter III. Great Aunt Alices Guide To Knowledge

"Can you find my address book for me, Miss Livingstone?" "It's on your desk, Mrs. Oliver. In the left-hand corner." "I don't mean that one," said Mrs. Oliver. "That's the one I'm using now. I mean my last one. The one I had last year, or perhaps the one before that again." "Has it been thrown away, perhaps?" suggested Miss Livingstone.