56. After the Funeral

Air date: 26/03/2006
Published: 1953

After the disappointing Cards on the Table, After the Funeral provides, in many respects, a return to a more classic murder mystery setting and plot.

There's a family; there's a large country house; and there are issues of inheritance. However, the novel doesn't stem from the classic era of whodunnits (between the wars). It was published in 1953 and much of the post-war austerity and, above all, changing of social orders is evident in the book. Enderby Hall, the great Abernethie country pile, is on its last legs, and will now be sold off.

The book opens with the faithful butler Lanscombe and, through his musings, introduces us very quickly to all the key members of the family, gathering after the funeral of Richard Abernethie, eldest son in the family.

Keeping up with all the names is quite a challenge. The novel actually prints a family tree at the beginning, which is not surprising. Basically there are two generations, fragmented by death. Richard had outlived his only son Mortimer; Helen is the widow of brother Leo; the invalid brother Timothy is married to Maude; and the youngest sister, Cora, is herself a widow. In the next generation we have solicitor George; Susan and her husband Gregory; and the theatrical Rosamund and her ambitious husband Michael. None of the cousins' parents are still alive.

Not surprisingly, the TV adaptation simplifies this. For the small screen George is now the son of Helen (so his deceased parents in the book don't, or, rather, didn't exist, as it were!). Susan (who becomes Susannah) is not married (so the mentally unstable Gregory is cropped) - and she is now the sister of Rosamund (removing another set of deceased parents from the family tree).

Post-funeral the family gather with their solicitor Entwhistle. Richard had originally left his estate to Mortimer; but as he is now dead it is to be shared between Timothy, George, Susan and Rosamund, with incomes provided for Helen and Cora. At this point Cora, something of a simpleton, it seems, declares that Richard was murdered.

Shortly after Cora is murdered in her cottage, apparently by an opportunist burglar. She was found by her companion, a Miss Gilchrist. Entwhistle begins investigating each member of the family, before eventually contacting Hercule Poirot for help. However, as with a number of the later Poirot novels, our Belgian sleuth then disappears into the background somewhat.

Susan visits Miss Gilchrist, and they discuss Cora's hobby of painting. A box of wedding cake mysteriously turns up for Miss Gilchrist. She is later ill during the night and is rushed to hospital with what proves to be arsenic poisoning! The assumption being that an attempt was made on her life for what she knew about Cora - or what she knew about what Cora knew...

At this point Poirot steps in. He employs Mr Goby, a rather odd private detective with a reputation for finding out information, to research each member of the family. Goby first appeared in Mystery of the Blue Train, where he was employed not by Poirot, but by Rufus Van Aldin. In addition to After the Funeral, Poirot would turn to his services in Third Girl and Elephants can Remember. He doesn't appear in any of the TV adaptations. The upshot of this section of the novel is all that all of the family are being somewhat economical with the truth and so are all real suspects!

For some reason Poirot then appears to the family in the guise of a Mr Pontalier, supposedly representing an organisation relocating refugees. A big clue comes in Susan's reference to one of Cora's paintings, of Polflexon harbour. The pier, we are told, was blown up in the war (so Cora must have copied a print).

Helen, who has felt for a while there was something wrong on the day of Richard's funeral, realises what it is while looking in the mirror. The following morning she rings Entwhistle, but is violently attacked before she can reveal what she has worked out. Although she suffers severe concussion, she survives.

Poirot meets with the remaining family members and declares that Richard died of natural causes, and dispatches Entwhistle on a mysterious task in London (we later learn it was to do with a painting). He then waits for people to come and see him.

The solution to it all is fascinating. Miss Gilchrist had drugged Cora before taking her place at the funeral. The key here is that no-one had seen her for years as the family had disapproved of her marriage to a French painter. She had introduced the idea that Richard may have been murdered as a smokescreen, before returning home and murdering Cora. She had attempted to kill Helen because Helen had realised the person at the funeral wasn't Cora. She was tilting her head the way Cora used to - but on the wrong side (reason: because Miss Gilchrist had been practising in the mirror!) Motive? Cora had left Miss Gilchrist a collection of apparently worthless paintings she had bought over the years. Miss Gilchrist had realised one of them was a valuable Vermeer, and had covered it up with a picture she had painted of Polflexon harbour from a postcard. She wanted to sell it to fund her one desire: to have a tea-shop.

There are a number of changes in the TV adaptation. I've already mentioned the simplifying of the family tree and the omission of Mr Goby's snooping. Poirot is, not surprisingly, called in by Entwhistle much sooner. The whole Mr Pontalier cover is dropped.

Interestingly, the first part of the story - up to the murder of Cora - is told to Poirot in flashback. This is in marked contrast to the handling of some of the short stories, where an original report to Poirot is replaced by Poirot being around when the action happens.

The detail of Richard's will is substantially changed and becomes a significant issue in its own right. With no deceased son in the plot we learn that Richard had originally left everything to George (who is not, it seems, a solicitor, but a general layabout, who drinks a lot). However, on the day of the funeral Entwhistle reveals the estate is to be shared among Timothy, Cora, Rosamund, Susan and Helen, with George cut out! Did they argue? Actually, it's all a red herring. We later learn that George forged the will, cutting himself out to spite Richard, after the latter had revealed that he was in fact his father (having had a fling with his sister-in-law Helen!). The real will is found, bizarrely, in the old family dolls' house where George had hidden it.

Cora was married to an Italian, not a Frenchman, and was divorced, not widowed. Her ex, an art expert, is called in by Poirot to assist in the revealing of the expensive painting (enabling the culling of another book character, the art expert Alexander Guthrie). The painting is now by Rembrandt, rather than Vermeer.

The most incongruous changes concern Susan. Now Susannah, and single (as mentioned above) she is now a zealous mission supporter, raising funds to build a school in Bechuanaland. Her visit to see Cora is complicated by a guilty fling at a local hotel with cousin George! This is not revealed until Poirot's summing up scene.

In a powerful and dramatic twist to Poirot's summing up there are strong signs that Miss Gilchrist is deranged, and is likely to be committed to an institution.

55. Cards on the Table

Air date: 19/03/2006
Published: 1936

What is it that makes a murder mystery outstanding, or disappointing, for us (assuming we are fans of the 'whodunnit?' genre)?

I guess there are a number of factors: setting, plot, characters, motive and manner of death. Even, perhaps, whether the culprit turns out to be the person we were hoping it would be - or the one we had hoped it wouldn't be!

I don't really like Cards on the Table. I wasn't greatly thrilled by the book; and the TV adaptation is worse. I think, at the end of the day, I don't really like the victim or any of the suspects.

The story opens with Hercule Poirot meeting the curious Mr Shaitana at an exhibition. At several points during the story he is described (both by the author and by characters) as 'Mephistophelian', which seems to have become something of an in-word in the book. Shaitana hints at possessing knowledge about people who have got away with murders - and invites Poirot to a party.

We cut straight to the party. Including Poirot there are eight guests, who are quickly divided into two groups of four. There are the 'sleuths': crime authoress Ariadne Oliver makes her debut (both in the Poirot novels and in the TV adaptations); Superintendent Battle; Colonel Race; and Poirot. Battle had previously appeared in The Secret of Chimneys and The Seven Dials Mystery, and would later appear in Murder is Easy and Towards Zero. Colonel Race had featured in The Man in the Brown Suit. He featured twice alongside Poirot, in this story and in Death on the Nile, and would make his final appearance in Sparkling Cyanide.

Then there are four suspects: Dr Roberts, Mrs Lorrimer, Major Despard, and Miss Meredith. The two groups end up playing bridge in separate rooms. Shaitana sits by the fire in the room of the (eventual) suspects. At the end of the evening it is discovered that he has been stabbed with a stiletto.

And so the investigations begin. Part of the issue is looking into the background of the suspects, to find out who had a 'past' that Shaitana could have known about and had hinted about at the party. The other line of enquiry is Poirot's pyschological approach, exploring what each suspect remembered about the room and about the games of bridge! Was the murder planned, or opportunist?

In time, it seems, all of the suspects have a murderous past! Dr Roberts killed a Mr Craddock and his wife (to cover up an affair with Mrs Craddock); Mrs Lorrimer killed a husband; Miss Meredith poisoned an elderly woman she had been serving as a companion; and Major Despard shot dead a Professor Luxmore while on an expedition (although he may have been intending to wound the professor, to stop him falling into dangerous water!). Miss Meredith and the friend she lives with, Rhoda Dawes, are both smitten by the dashing Despard. Poirot sets a clever trap with silk stockings to prove that Miss Meredith is a thief - and the finger seems to be pointing to her. But then Mrs Lorrimer confesses! Poirot doesn't believe her, and it transpires she believed Miss Meredith killed Shaitana and wants to protect her. Reason? She has a fatal illness with not much life expectancy, and wants to give the younger girl the chance of a future. Soon after she apparently commits suicide, but not before writing to each of the suspects, confessing (again) that she did it and apologising to them all.

However, we continue to believe Miss Meredith is the likely murderer. As the net closes in on her she takes Rhoda rowing and pushes her in. Both girls end up in the water, but Rhoda is saved, by Despard (who else?). Meredith perishes. Presumably she had tried to kill her friend to stop her revealing her murderous past.

In a final twist, though, Poirot reveals it was Dr Roberts who had killed Shaitana. He had also finished off Mrs Lorrimer. But a final twist when you don't care much for any of the suspects is less of a twist than it might have been.

The TV adaptation manages to add considerably more sleaze to the plot. There are a couple of character changes. Colonel Race has become Colonel Hughes (I believe because James Fox, who had already played Race in Death on the Nile, was unavailable); Superintendent Battle is replaced by a Superintendent Wheeler.

The storyline up to the murder follows the book closely, while investigations are, inevitably, truncated a little for the 100-minute production. But, inexplicably, Mrs Lorrimer is now the mother of Ann Meredith. Meredith wasn't responsible for the poisoning of old Mrs Benson; it was in fact Rhoda, who didn't want her friend to be caught for stealing. Mrs Lorrimer doesn't commit suicide (and doesn't have a fatal illness). Major Despard shot Professor Luxmore because the latter had been experimenting with psychodelic drugs and had attacked his own wife. Despard had shot him to save her. In the final boat scene the drama is reversed: Rhoda pushes Meredith in, and it is Rhoda who perishes. Despard saves Meredith and they look likely to become an item, having both been vindicated by the story change. Rhoda isn't smitten by Despard. The reason for her possessive attitude to Meredith isn't altogether clear. Shaitana drugged himself on the evening of the party (prior to being stabbed). Poirot tells us he was tired of life, knew someone would murder him, and wanted to experience it painlessly!

Utterly gratuitously, it transpires that Dr Roberts was involved in a homosexual relationship with Mr Craddock (rather than having an affair with Mrs Craddock). He didn't kill Craddock (in fact he continues to play bridge with him!), but he did infect Mrs Craddock's innoculations before she went to Egypt (where she met Shaitana and, before dying, expressed desire for revenge on the doctor). Bizarrely, Superintendent Wheeler becomes an additional suspect late in the day, due to some incriminating photos Shaitana had taken of him (we are not told exactly the nature of these, but it is clear they are of a dubious sexual nature). Poirot retrieves the photos, gives them to the Superintendent at the end and then belittles him somewhat. Such sordidness is out of place in Poirot. And on this occasion it only served to make a poor story even worse.

54. The Mystery of the Blue Train

Air date: 01/01/2006
Published: 1928

The Mystery of the Blue Train is one Agatha Christie's earliest Poirot novels, even though its adaptation only appeared in the final era of the long-running TV series.

Those who had followed all the TV programmes over the years might have had a feeling of deja vu when first watching it. That's because the novel itself was originally an expansion of the short story The Plymouth Express. Like many of Christie's short stories, the latter first appeared in the magazine The Sketch. It was eventually published in book form as part of Poirot's Early Cases, in 1974. On television The Plymouth Express featured as part of Series Three back in 1991.

The novel is also notorious for the well-documented view of the author herself - that it was the worst Poirot novel she had written. In keeping with our Belgian hero's interest in psychology it is tempting to suggest that this view says more about Christie and the difficult circumstances in life that she was going through at the time the novel was completed. Although, in my opinion, overly long - the conclusion could have been reached much quicker - I think there are other candidates for the 'worst Poirot'.

The story opens with some shady dealings in back streets of Paris, and then cuts to Rufus Van Aldin, wealthy American businessman, presenting his daughter Ruth with a much sought after ruby. Van Aldin is keen for her to get a divorce from her husband Derek Kettering. We are introduced to the Comte de la Roche, a somewhat dodgy character who Ruth has been having a relationship with; Major Knighton, who is Van Aldin's secretary; and Mirelle, exotic dancer and lover of Derek. In parallel to this group of people, we meet Katherine Grey, who has just inherited money from an elderly lady she had served as companion to; and her somewhat down at heel relatives, Lady Tamplin, her daughter Lenox, and (fourth) husband, 'Chubby', who all spend much of their time in the south of France. Reference is made, early on, to St Mary Mead in Kent - later made famous as the home of Miss Marple!

The key action takes place en route to Nice. Ruth and Katherine meet on the train, and then Poirot and Katherine meet. Derek is also on the train. After various comings and goings, Ruth is found murdered in her cabin. Her maid, Ada Mason, apparently got off at Paris, on the instruction of her mistress. The famous ruby jewel is also missing.

Van Aldin employs Poirot to investigate and he aids the local French police. He has with him, for the first time, his valet George. At one point we learn that George accepted the role after hearing that Poirot had been received at Buckingham Palace! George would go on to appear in eleven more Poirot novels (he also appears in a handful of short stories). He features in eight TV adaptations.

The Comte de la Roche and Derek Kettering both come into the frame as the most obvious suspects, and Mirelle tries to implicate the latter after he jilts her. However, Poirot eventually deduces that Major Knighton is none other than the infamous jewel thief known as the Marquis, and that he was aided in the crime by the maid, Mason.

The TV adaptation condensed or omitted much of the detail of the investigative period of the novel. There were also a number of changes to key details in the story. The Comte and Lady Tamplin's crew are all on the train as it journeys to the south of France. Ruth asks Katherine to swap cabins, so she can be nearer to the Comte. This briefly introduces the possibility (a red herring) that Katherine was the intended victim. Mirelle has a much smaller part, and is now Van Aldin's love interest, rather than Derek Kettering's. When Knighton starts to fall for Katherine, Mason attacks her during the night. Lenox jumps on her and bites her neck before she flees - leaving a bruise that Poirot is later able to reveal in his closing summary. In a more dramatic finale, Knighton initially tries to do a runner - with Katherine as hostage - but eventually commits suicide by stepping into an oncoming train. The decidedly gormless Chubby becomes Corky on TV and finds the jewel when it is thrown from the train. George is omitted: we would have to wait until the adaptation of After the Funeral (later in the same series) for his TV debut.

Visually the production sees much more of the narrow depth-of-field (blurring of background) close-focus photography that became fashionable in the 2000s, and would become a familiar feature of the last few series of Poirot.

Interlude "Poirot and Me"

Chapter 14 of David Suchet's book is a fascinating - and very significant - one.

He comments at length on the new style of Poirot productions that emerged from 2003 onwards. None of his 'team' were present any longer - and neither was long-time producer and friend Brian Eastman. The iconic opening credits were also dropped.

Suchet himself took on an unpaid role as associate producer, which meant he began to have more influence on the filming.

He reports on Agatha Christie's comments, in her autobiography, about The Hollow being more of a novel than a detective story, with Poirot's presence being somewhat out of place. Christie made similar comments about Sad Cypress. Both were among the next four stories filmed.

It was also a busy period away from the Poirot moustache for Suchet. He starred in a very different crime production, NCS: Manhunt, the drama Murder in Mind, and, perhaps most notably, in an adaptation of Trollope's Victorian tale of greed and fortune, The Way We Live Now. In America he appeared in Live from Baghdad and the movie The In-Laws, with Michael Douglas.

53. The Hollow

Air Date: 26/04/2004
Published: 1946

The Hollow is, on the whole, a rather sad tale.

While it may sound strange to say so, whodunnits very often aren't. In real life, of course, murder is shocking, distressing, disturbing and, yes, sad. But in the fictional world of the whodunnit things are generally different. I doubt, for example, anyone has ever felt remorse for poor Dr Black during a game of Cluedo.

And while written whodunnits have considerably more content than a board game, the fact is that we as readers (or viewers) are with the detective, or the amateur sleuth, trying to unravel clues. It is, at the end of the day, entertainment.

That's not to say that your average whodunnit is slapstick; it's just to recognise that the abiding feeling at the end of it all is not usually sadness. And yet The Hollow is a sad story.

In the book's opening chapters we are introduced to various members of the quirky Angkatell family circle: Sir Henry and his absent-minded wife Lucy; cousins Midge, Henrietta, Edward and David; and Dr John Christow and his seemingly dull-witted, clumsy wife, Gerda. Christow, a Harley Street GP with a passion for medical research, is having a fling with Henrietta, a sculptress. Dull and boring Edward, who lives at the family's older country pile, is lovesick for Henrietta.

The family gather for a weekend houseparty. Hercule Poirot is staying at a nearby cottage for the weekend and has been invited for Sunday lunch. However, on the Saturday evening the actress Veronica Cray, an old flame of Christow's, turns up, ostensibly in search of a box of matches, but evidently to reacquaint herself with Christow. An evening of passion follows after he walks her home. The next day she sends him a note summonsing him to her rented cottage, but they argue and Christow realises he is now well and truly over his former lover. However, on the way back to the family home he is shot by the swimming pool.

It is at this point that Poirot turns up for Sunday lunch - to be greeted by what appears a staged scene, with a dead body, Gerda standing over her husband holding a gun, and others looking generally shocked and stunned. The gun ends up in the pool (ruining any potential fingerprints) and Gerda claims she had arrived to find her husband shot. In panic she had picked up the gun.

Poirot rather slips in and out of the story (a feature of Christie's post-war novels), with much of the questioning of suspects being handled by Inspector Grange. A turning point comes when it is revealed that the gun in the swimming pool wasn't the weapon that fired the bullet that killed Christow! The actual murder weapon is later found in a hedge by Poirot's cottage.

Edward and Midge get engaged; then break it off (Midge realises he still holds a candle for Henrietta). Edward later tries to commit suicide, which brings them back together again.

In the penultimate chapter all is revealed. It was Gerda. She had gone out on the Saturday night and seen her husband and Veronica in the pavilion by the pool and, realising that her idealised marriage was a lie, had decided to kill him. The carrying of two guns had been a deliberate ploy to cover her tracks. Henrietta had taken the lead in covering up for her, as she believed this was John's dying wish. The fact that the second gun was in a holster proves to be a factor in the unravelling of the subterfuge.

As I have so often found myself commenting on in these reflections, the TV adaptation is remarkably faithful to much of the book's detail. David the academic one is omitted (not surprisingly: he contributes little to the essential elements of the story) and the gun is found buried in one Henrietta's statues at her flat in London. Some of the details are significantly abbreviated. Edward and Midge do get engaged; they don't break it off and Edward doesn't try to take his own life. Poirot comes into the action slightly earlier (he is invited to the Saturday evening dinner, and so is there when Veronica makes her dramatic entrance). He is, obviously, far more central to the whole investigative process. The holster is also discovered much earlier, but little is made of its significance until later.

Dr John Christow is, in many ways, set up as the classic victim (several people have motives to kill him), but it is the character of Gerda, who turns out to be the murderer, that perhaps gives the storyline its considerable pathos. In both book and adaptation she takes her own life when her crime is uncovered.

52. Death on the Nile

Air date: 12/04/2004
Published: 1937

A strong case can be made for claiming that Murder on the Orient Express is Agatha Christie's most famous Hercule Poirot novel. But if so, Death on the Nile is one of perhaps two or three stories that aren't far behind.

Christie produced a stage play version, which has probably helped cement this story of greed and money - set in the context of what seems to be a love triangle - in many people's consciousness. I've seen it in the theatre - and recall watching a delightful outdoor theatre production many years ago.

In 1978 it was the first story to be adapted during the Peter Ustinov years: a big screen version that boasted a strong cast, including the likes of David Niven, Mia Farrow, a veteran Bette Davis and Maggie Smith.

The story opens introducing us to Linnet Ridgeway, an incredibly wealthy young woman who generally gets her own way, and her friend Joanna Southwood (whose significance for one of the red herrings only becomes apparent later in the story). Then we meet Jackie de Bellefort, another friend, whose fiance Simon Doyle has recently lost his job. In a series of clever sticatto sections we are quickly introduced to the Allertons, Tim and his mother (who are related to Joanna); Miss Marie Van Schuyler from America, her nurse, Miss Bowers, and cousin Cornelia; Andrew Pennington, also in America; Mrs Otterbourne and her daughter Rosalie; and Jim Fanthorp, a lawyer in London. In the middle of all this we learn that Linnet has married Simon Doyle...

The action takes place in Egypt, where Hercule Poirot happens to be on vacation. The tension mounts as we discover Jackie 'stalking' Linnet and Doyle on their honeymoon, seemingly bitter that her former friend stole her fiance from her. We meet three more characters, Dr Bessner, Guido Richetti and Mr Ferguson, a somewhat strange cynic with apparent communist leanings (who turns out to be of landed gentry stock!).

The famous central scene takes place during the Nile cruise section of the vacation, and sees a drunken Jackie shoot Doyle in the leg in the ship's saloon. She is taken to a cabin by Fanthorp and Cornelia, before being attended to by Miss Bowers. Doyle is removed to Dr Bessner's cabin for treatment. The following morning Linnet is found dead, having been shot in the head while asleep. Her expensive pearls are also missing.The previous night's scene seems to put both Doyle and Jackie out of the picture.

Linnet's maid, Louise, is later found stabbed in her room, seemingly because she was trying to blackmail the murderer. Still later Mrs Otterbourne, an extravagant writer of sensual novels, is shot just as she is about to reveal Louise's killer.

Poirot is joined part way through by his old friend Colonel Race, who is investigating another matter, and they begin interviewing the suspects.

By my reckoning Death on the Nile is Christie's longest Poirot tale. There are a lot of characters, and a lot of red herrings. Poirot eventually unravels them all, of course. Tim Allerton is running a jewellery theft scam with the aforementioned Joanna, which involves stealing expensive jewels and replacing them with fakes. Richetti is the man Colonel Race was after. Pennington conveniently bumped into Linnet and Doyle on holiday because he needed her signature to some documents to cover up mismanagement of her money. Fanthorp was investigating Pennington. Mrs Otterbourne drinks (her novels are no longer selling) and the splash that some people heard on the fateful night was her daughter dumping her stash of booze in the river. Mrs Van Schuyler is a kleptomaniac who stole Linnet's pearls (except she didn't exactly: she stole the fake pearls after Allerton had done a swap).

As for the small matter of the murders: Jackie and Doyle set it all up. She didn't shoot him in the leg; he pretended she had done. When she dropped the gun he picked it up (while she was being led away) and ran and shot his wife. He then returned to the saloon and proceeded to shoot himself in the leg. The aim was to inherit Linnet's fortune. Perfect crime, perfect alibis for them both. Except it wasn't. Louise had seen him, and so had to be bumped off, by Jackie. Mrs Otterbourne saw Jackie go into Louise's cabin, so she had to go, too. In the finale, Jackie (who had two guns) shoots Doyle and herself. It seems Poirot had an idea she would.

Given all this detail the TV adaptation does an admirable job in adhering to most of the plotline. A few characters don't make the cut, of course. Ironically, two of them were involved in the story's central scene. Miss Bowers is left out (Cornelia does the night shift looking after Jackie) and so is Fanthorp (his involvement in the saloon scene being taken by Ferguson). Richetti is also omitted, which makes Colonel Race's decision to accompany Poirot on the boat trip less obvious.

For the second time in three episodes we suffered the gratutious interpolation of implied homosexuality. In Five Little Pigs Philip Blake is presented as being attracted to Amyas Crale, whereas in Christie's original he was attracted to Crale's wife Caroline. This actually put a totally different slant on the scene where Caroline had visited him in his room.

Now in Death on the Nile there is at least the suggestion that Allerton is a homosexual. In the original he and Rosalie Otterbourne become an item towards the end of the story. This resolves some of the side issues nicely, with Allerton returning the pearls, and Rosalie promised some happiness after enduring so much from her mother. Unfortunately, for TV she shows him some affection, to which he replies: "Barking up the wrong tree, I'm afraid." At that point his mother calls him from her cabin. I have heard the opinion that maybe he is having a relationship with the woman who may, or may not be his mother! This is a possible inference, but I think less likely. If we are meant to conclude he is homosexual - and this is the second such plot change in the same group of episodes - one might almost think someone on the production team had an 'agenda'...

51. Sad Cypress

Air date: 26/12/2003
Published: 1940

For the second consecutive episode of Agatha Chrisie's Poirot we meet an innocent woman arrested and tried for murder. However, while Caroline Crale had perished many years earlier, Hercule Poirot was in a position to save Elinor Carlisle. And that, in a nutshell, is what Sad Cypress is all about.

Both the original novel and the TV adaptation open in the middle of the court proceedings, with the accused almost in a dream, detached from all that is going on around her. We then jump back to the beginning of events that led to the murder of Mary Gerrard.

Elinor receives an anonymous letter, warning that someone is out to cheat her out of her aunt's estate. She and Roddy Welman - her fiance (and her cousin by marriage) - go to visit Aunt Laura, who has suffered a stroke and is bed bound. She is cared for by Nurse O'Brien and Nurse Hopkins. Mary Gerrard, daughter of the groundsman, is also in attendance. Aunt Laura likes her and has paid for expensive education. We quickly learn that Mary's aunt is, or was, a nurse in New Zealand and that there is something in Aunt Laura's past that is a bit of a mystery. Laura dies, apparently after a second stroke. As she died intestate Elinor receives everything. In the meantime Roddy has taken a shine to Mary and, as a consequence, Elinor calls the engagement off.

The central sequence of events occurs when Elinor is clearing her aunt's possessions. Nurse Hopkins is helping Mary clear stuff at the nearby lodge where her father - who has also recently died - lived. Elinor makes fish paste sandwiches for them all. Nurse Hopkins make tea for herself and Mary. While Elinor and the nurse are upstairs Mary dies - of what is later discovered to be morphone hydrochloride poisoning. Elinor is arrested; the assumption being that the sandwiches were poisoned, and the motive apparently being her jealousy and anger at Mary breaking up her engagement to Roddy.

At this point the local GP, Dr Peter Lord, calls in Poirot to save the day. It is apparent very quickly that he is fond of Elinor. In the middle part of the novel Poirot, in typical fashion, interviews all the key characters in turn. It emerges that Mary was, in fact, the illegitimate daughter of Laura, and had been adopted by old man Gerrard and his wife.

Interestingly, Poirot's deductions are played out not in the usual manner, confronting all the key characters, but in the court scene. Nurse Hopkins was, it turns out, Mary's aunt from New Zealand. She had pursuaded Mary to make a will leaving everything to her aunt. As the illegitimate daughter of Laura Mary, as the true next of kin, would have inherited everything, rather than Elinor. Nurse Hopkins, therefore, murdered her for the money. She did so by poisoning not the sandwiches but the tea. She then injected herself with apomorphine hydrochloride - a powerful emetic, which enabled her to vomit up the poison she had also drunk in the tea! Elinor had seen her in the kitchen with a scratch on her arm. The nurse had claimed this was from a rose thorn - but it emerges that the variety of rose growing outside the kitchen doesn't have thorns! She had also poisoned Laura, to ensure she died intestate. Two witnesses - one flown from New Zealand, no less - testify that Nurse Hopkins is, in fact, Mary Riley. We never find out what happens to her (she has abruptly left the court), but assume she is eventually arrested. In the aftermath of an acquittal Dr Lord is persuaded by Poirot that he would make a better match for Elinor than Roddy.

The TV adaptation made rather more changes to the plot than normal, although it stuck to the central facts of the case. Poirot is called in much earlier: after the arrival of the letter, rather than after the murder of Mary. He therefore meets Mary when visiting the scene.

The biggest change, however, concerns the finale. For TV we return to the court case and Elinor is found guilty. This makes for a more theatrical 'race against time' to find the true culprit before Elinor is hanged.

Poirot lays a trap for Nurse Hopkins who tries to pull the 'poison in the tea' trick (followed by the "I'll inject myself to vomit it up again" trick!), but Poirot has switched his teacup for one with a rose in it containing something else (water, perhaps, or one of his 'infusions'?). He fakes starting to suffer the effects of poison before 'recovering' and unmasking the murderer.

The original ending seemed rather rushed, particularly given the witnesses Poirot is able to produce from nowhere to testify in court to the true identity of Nurse Hopkins. Perhaps this accounts for the very different ending for TV.

Curiously at one point Poirot, back in London, buys a newspaper. The billboard headline announces the death of Gershwin. The newspaper is dated September 16th, 1937. Unfortunately, George Gershwin died on July 11th of that year. Surely news travelled quicker than that in the 1930s?