Shiomi Komiyama
2/12/00
RLA D
Poirot’s Detective File

I “What has occurred?” Poirot asked.
“You may well ask that. First this snow-this stoppage. And now-”
“And now what?”
“And now a passenger lies dead in this berth-stabbed.”
This was how the crime started on one snowy day in the gorgeous train, the Orient Express. The train was crossing through the land from the South East to Europe. Monsieur Poirot, the detective, had solved a case and was heading home, leaving Syria to Stamboul by Taurus Express, and then to London by Orient Express. On the way to Stamboul in the Taurus Express, when the train stopped for a while in Kenya and Poirot had heard two voices talking behind the traffic van on the platform.
“Mary-”
“Not now. Not now. When it’s all over. When it’s behind us-then-”
It was then then he recognized that the two figures were the passengers from the Taurus Express, a British colonel from India and a young woman who was the governess from Bughdad. Yet at that point, Poirot had not noticed that what he had just heard was going to be important…
I am going to explain this peculiar case that had happened in the Orient Express, and how this great detective Poirot had solved the problem.

II This day Poirot had noticed that something was strange in the Orient Express. They had unusual numbers of passengers from all over the world, and there were no rooms for M. Poirot. The only unoccupied room was No. 16, usually open for extra. M. Bouc, Poirot’s friend and the director of the train, had forced him to use the compartment. Later, M. Bouc advised him to move into his compartment, No. 1, while he moved into the Athens Coach.

The crime started on the next day in the middle of the night. When Poirot was sleeping, he woke up to the sound of cry, almost like a groan. It seemed to come from the room next-door, somewhere from Mr. Ratchett’s. Then a bell rang. Slowly, Poirot peered out from the crack and watched. The conductor came hurriedly to Ratchett’s door and knocked. At the same time, a voice called out from the room:
“Ce n’est rien. Je me suis trompé.” He glanced at his clock. It was 12:37.
Poirot couldn’t sleep at all after that. It was also noisy; he could hear sounds of footsteps, and water running down the tap. Again, he heard the bell which rang repeatedly. Somebody was getting a little impatient. Next he heard the conductor’s footsteps rush toward the room, then a woman’s irritated voice. Soon he realized that the voice belonged to Mrs. Hubbard, a gossipy middle-aged lady.
He peeped out again to call the conductor to get some water for him. He called the conductor, then the conductor hurriedly left Mrs. Hubbard’s room to him. Somehow the train was deadly silent, so he asked why. The train had run into the snowdrift. It would take many hours to get the train started again. Also, the conductor explained him what Mrs. Hubbard was saying.
“Imagine to yourself the time I have had had with her! She insists-but insists-that there is a man in her compartment! Figure to your self, Monsieur. Where would he conceal himself? I argue with her. I point out that it is impossible. And how, I ask, did he get out and leave the door bolted behind him? But she will not listen to reason. As though there were not enough to worry us already. This snow!”
Finally Poirot got his mineral water, and before he got back to his room, he shifted his eyes to the corridor. There he saw a woman in a scarlet kimono walking, her back towards him. Unfortunately, he could not see her face.

* * * * * *

THE CRIME

Next morning, a dead body was found in one of the room, Mr. Ratchett’s. Mr. Ratchett lay on the bed, with many blows on his body which seemed to be made by some kind of blade. Poirot was called by M. Bouc to the room and was told to keep it a secret to the passengers. There waited the Wagon Lit conductor and Dr. Constantine, a Greek doctor.
The dead body was lying on the bed, facing the ceiling. His pajamas were stained with blood. Dr. Constantine explained to him that there were total of twelve blows on his body. Strangely, there were few blows that could only be determined as scratches, as if the murderer was stabbing the body again and again, being driven crazy. Dr. Constantine had certain doubtful points: (1)Firstly, there was one blow that could not be done by a right-handed person, although the others certainly belonged to a right-handed person. (2)Another point was that by observing the amount of blood, he came to the conclusion that he was already dead before he received the blows. Poirot thought for a minute, and came to the theory of two murderers, where one was right-handed and the other was left-handed. Also, Dr. Constantine added that he could assure it had occurred between 12:00 and 2:00. Poirot had heard Ratchett talking to the conductor last night around 12:40, so he determined that the crime had occurred around 12:40 to 2:00. However, while Poirot was searching through the room, he found a few more strange clues:
1. A dented, broken watch, which he found inside Ratchett’s pocket. The hands were stopped at 1:15. Was this the time when the crime had occurred? Or did the murderer do this on purpose?
2. Poirot also found an expensive handkerchief with an initial H sewn on it. Is the murderer a woman?
3. Also a pipe cleaner. Is the murderer a man?

The window was open, and a cold breeze blew inside. Poirot looked out, and noticed that there were no footprints in the snow. Soon he said that the murderer might have faked that he escaped outside but had forgotten to form the footprints. The murderer was with them on the train. They also found a gun under Ratchett’s pillow.
Also, he found a burnt piece of paper and two or three matches in the ashtray. After asking the conductor to get an old-fashioned woman’s hatbox from one of the passengers, he quickly removed the hats and disclosed round humps of wire netting. Next, taking a small stove and a pair of tongs, he flattened the two humps of wire and wriggled the scrap of paper on to one of them. He clipped the other on top of it and then, holding both pieces with the tongs, held it over the flame of the stove. Gradually, the metal began to glow, and they could see faint traces of letters. It said:
-member little Daisy Armstrong
“Ah!” exclaimed Poirot. “Now I know that the dead man’s real name is Cassetti! It’s the Armstrong Kidnapping Case!”

The Armstrong Case was about little Daisy Armstrong, being kidnapped. She was the three-year old daughter of Colonel Armstrong. Cassetti was arrested as a murderer, but he was released because of some inaccuracy. Afterwards, he had left America and fled to some other places, living on his interests. Colonel Armstrong was an Englishman. He was half American, and his mother was the daughter of W. K. Van der Halt, the Wall Street millionaire. He married the daughter of Linda Arden, the most famous American actress. After paying the enormous sum of 200 thousand dollar, the child’s dead body was discovered. She was dead for at least two weeks. Being shocked, Mrs. Armstrong was expecting another baby, but she gave birth to a dead child, and had died. Mr. Armstrong, suffering from this tragedy, had shot himself. Daisy’s nursery-maid had also thrown herself from a window and had died, because the police had refused to believe her denial and were convinced that she had some relationship with the crime. Later, it was found that she was innocent.

II Evidence:

THE WAGON LIT CONDUCTOR:
*Pierre Michel was a French man, who was working for the company for over fifteen years.
*He said that Ratchett went to bed almost immediately after dinner, and also that his valet and secretary went to his room afterwards. Also, he went to Ratchet’s room around 12:40 after he rang the bell, and when he knocked the door he heard him saying that it was a mistake. He said it in French:
“Ce n’est rien. Je me suis trompé.”
*After that Princess Dragomiroff called him and told him to call her maid.
*Around 1:15, he was sitting at the conductor’s seat. But around 1:00, he went to the next coach, the Athens coach, to speak to his colleague there about the snow. He returned when Mrs. Hubbard rang the bell, and after that he brought Poirot some mineral water. Then, about half an hour later, he made up the bed in MacQueen’s compartment. He proved that Colonel Arbuthnot was with him, and that they had been talking. After that, seeing Colonel Arbuthnot go back to his room, he sat in his seat till morning.
*However, he also remarked that after he settled down, he saw a woman wearing scarlet kimono with dragon patterns pass the corridor. He could not see her face though.
*The last stop was Vincovci, at around 12:00, and he proved that the doors to the platform were usually fastened. But it was not fastened when Poirot checked.

HECTOR MACQUEEN:
*He was a young American secretary of Ratchett.
*He did not smoke pipes. He also said that Ratchett never spoke French.
*He said that he received threatening letters starting from few weeks ago. The first one said:

Thought you’d double-cross us and get away with it, did you? Not on your life. We’re out to GET you, Ratchett, and we WILL get you!

This was the second one:

We’re going to take you for a ride, Ratchett. Some time soon. We’re going to GET you-see?

Somehow, he looked stunned when Poirot talked about the burnt scrap of paper.
*They were seemed to be written by two or more persons, each writing one letter of a word at a time. Also, the letters were printed, and that made it more difficult to identify the handwriting.
*He had met Mrs. Armstrong a few times before, for his father was the attorney who handled the case.
*On the night when the crime occurred, after leaving the dining car, MacQueen read his book and got out on the platform at Belgrade for few minutes. He talked to Mrs. Debenham who was in the compartment next to his, then fell into conversation with Colonel Arbuthnot. Then he went to Mr. Ratchett and took down some notes of letters he wanted written. After that he saw Colonel Arbuthnot, called him to come to his compartment, and discussed about the world politics, the Wall Street crisis, etc. Once they left the train at Vincovci to stretch, but soon hopped back in. They left by the door nearest to their compartment, and he remembered that it was bolted, although he did not replace the bar when they got back. When Colonel Arbuthnot left him, it was already 2:00. He called to the conductor to make up his bed, and slept till morning.
*Poirot asked whether he saw some one pass along the corridor after the train left Vincovci. He saw the conductor once, and also a woman walking towards the other way in scarlet kimono.

VALET:
*Edward Henry Masterman, was a 39-year-old English man who was Ratchett’s valet for only nine months. He had never been to America, he said. The last time he saw Ratchett was around 9:00. He had done folding, hanging up his clothes, and putting his false teeth in water.
*Usually, Ratchett had a habit of taking the sleeping draught at bedtime, so Masterman had poured it into a glass and put it on top of the toilet table ready for him, as always. However, he never actually saw him drinking it. He asked what time he would like to be called in the morning, then left his compartment.
*After that, he read a book till 10:30 and went to sleep, although he could not because of his toothache. Soon he turned the light on above his head and continued reading, till he found himself doze off about 4:00. He proved that the Italian fellow was snoring through the night.
*He did not smoke pipes.

MRS. CAROLINE MARTHA HUBBARD:
*She was an elderly American woman. She seemed extremely excited that she knew everything about the murderer. As soon as she arrived the room, she screamed that the murderer was right there in her compartment during the night.
*That night, she woke up suddenly, and she knew that there was a man in her compartment in the dark. She had quietly rang the bell to call the conductor, and when he came, she turned on the light at the same time, and there was no one there. After that, she exclaimed angrily, that she explained to the conductor but he did not believe it.
*At first, Poirot and the other two could not believe it either, but when she showed them a small metal button as a clue, M. Bouc exclaimed that it belonged to the conductor’s tunic. Poirot had suggested to her that maybe it fell when he was making her bed, but she refused because she found it on the magazine she had been reading before she fell asleep. She said that she bolted the door between the compartments, and that she asked Mrs. Ohlsson if it was bolted. She said it was. She couldn’t see it by herself because she was in bed, and her sponge-bag was hanging on the door-handle, covering the bar from sight. It was around 10:30 or 45. She came because she did not have aspirin, for she had a headache. Also, Mrs. Hubbard laughed that Mrs. Ohlsson had opened the door of the next compartment, Mr. Ratchett’s, by mistake. Mrs. Ohlsson seemed to be ashamed because Mr. Ratchett laughed at her and said, “You too old.”
*She did not have any scarlet dressing gown. She never saw any woman with scarlet kimono enter Ratchett’s room. Lastly Poirot said, “You have dropped your handkerchief, madame,” and he took out the expensive handkerchief with an initial H. But all she said was, “Well, now, that’s funny, but it’s certainly not mine. Mine are marked C. M. H.”

MRS. GRETA OHLSSON:
*She was a 49-year-old Swedish lady. This woman was a matron in a missionary school near Stamboul and also was a trained nurse.
*She was the last person to see Ratchett alive. According to her, when she opened the door of Ratchett’s room by mistake, he was reading a book. After that she came up to Mrs. Hubbard’s room and asked for aspirin. She also said that the door between Ratchett’s was bolted. Then she went back, took her aspirin and lay down. It was around 10:55. She had a companion, Mrs. Debenham, and she proved that neither of them had gone out during the night. The reason why she could assure about Mrs. Debenham was because she usually slept lightly, and used to wake up at a sound. That day she did not wake up.
*She said that she did not have any scarlet kimono, and said that Mrs. Debenham did not either. She had never been to America.

The Second Interview With The Wagon Lit Conductor:
They decided to ask the conductor again about the button. However, all the buttons were attached on to his tunic. Furthermore, his colleague proved that Michel was there discussing with him about the snow when Mrs. Hubbard’s bell rang. He also added that the conductor from the Bucharest coach had also been there. He stated that he did not meet anyone at all when he ran to answer Mrs. Hubbard’s bell.
From this, they figured that the murderer, while Mrs. Hubbard was ringing her bell (Poirot says that there was enough time for the murderer to escape, because Mrs. Hubbard was closing her eyes in fear for a few minutes) had slipped out to the corridor and had hid inside one of the two toilets or had retreated into his own compartment.

PRINCESS NATALIA DRAGOMIROFF:
*She was an old, ugly but rich Russian princess. She did not have a scarlet kimono. She was extremely quiet, and her voice was deep and steady.
*She had retired to bed immediately after dinner, reading until 11:00. She could not sleep for awhile because she suffered from rheumatic pains, so at about 12:45 she rang for her maid, Hildegarde Schmidt. She told her to massage and read aloud, until she became sleepy. She could not recall the time exactly when the maid left her. It may have been half an hour later (1:15), or even later. Hildegarde Schimidt was her maid for almost fifteen years, and she trusted her very much.
*This old lady had been to America many times, and Sonia Armstrong had been her friend. Actually, she and Linda Arden, Sonia’s mother, had been best friends for a long time. She talked extremely calmly and in a fluent way, but Poirot had noticed her hesitation when he asked what Sonia Armstrong’s sister’s name was. She only said:
“I honestly cannot tell you, Monsieur. I have lost touch with the younger generation. I believe she married an Englishman some years ago and went to England, but at the moment I cannot recollect the name.”

COUNT AND COUNTESS ANDRENYI:
*There was no doubt that they were both handsome and beautiful. They were a fine-looking Hungarian couple. Count lived in Washington for a year, but the Countess had not been there. At that time, they were not married yet. After dinner, they sat in Count’s compartment for a while, and played piquet together. Around 11:00, Countess retired to her compartment, and both slept soundly until morning. Countess always took a sleeping draught when traveling by train. So that night she took her usual dose of trional.
*Count used cigarettes but not pipes.
*They both had diplomatic passports, but there was a spot of grease on Countess’s passport. She was 20 years old, and her maiden name was Goldenberg. She did not have a scarlet kimono, but a corn-colored chiffon.

COLONEL ARBUTHNOT:
*He was an English colonel in India for more than 30 years and was about to leave the country. When Poirot asked him that if he had some relationship with Miss Debenham, he protested that they had not met before.
*He said that at 1:15, he was discussing deeply with Mr. MacQueen. When the train stopped at Vincovci, they got out. They stopped discussing at 1:45, then went to bed.
*Colonel Arbuthnot was the only one who smoked pipes.
*He said that while talking, he saw a woman with red gown walk pass the corridor and also smelt a fruity scent. It was after Vincovci.
*He hadn’t been to America, but had known Mr. John Armstrong. He got the V.C. Also, he claimed that he saw a man peer out from the crack of the door. The compartment was No. 16, the very end.

MR. CYRUS BETHMAN HARDMAN:
*He was a 41-year-old American salesman for typewriting ribbons. However, he was actually a detective from McNeil’s Detective Agency in New York, hired by Ratchett.
*Ratchett told Mr. Hardmen to ride in the compartment alongside his. The only berth he could get was berth No. 16. Ratchett had described what the person looked like-it was a small, dark man with a womanish voice. This description applied to no one on the train.
*He got to sleep in the daytime and stayed awake on the watch at night, peering out from the crack of the door. Nothing happened on the night crime had occurred. No stranger passed.
*He did not smoke pipes.

MR. ANTONIO FOSCARELLI:
*He was a middle-aged Italian-American agent for Ford motor cars.
*He had been to America but never saw the Armstrong family. That night, he came back from dinner, and noticed that Masterman was gone, probably to attend to his master, Ratchett. He came back, and started to read a book. So Antonio also got up to the upper berth, and started to smoke (he only smokes cigars) and read. In a minute he was sleeping. Whenever he woke up he heard Masterman groan, because of the toothache. He said that Masterman did not leave the carriage at all during the night.

MISS DEBENHAM:
*She was a young English governess who was 26 years old. Her gown was not scarlet but mauve.
*Around 5:00, she woke up, and saw a tall, slender woman with scarlet kimono. However, she was sleeping for the rest of the night.

HILDEGARDE SCHMIDT:
*She was a German lady’s-maid of Princess Dragomiroff.
*She did not have any scarlet gown.
*She slept fast after dinner, until her mistress called her. She could not remember the time. She said that she massaged her and read a book to her aloud. Sometime later, her mistress started to doze off, so she retired to her compartment. She did not know when it was, but she knew that she spent in her mistress’s compartment for about 30 minutes.
*While she was going back to her room, she saw no one but the conductor. He was coming out of the room two or three doors from Princess Dragomirrof’s. He nearly ran into her, apologized, and passed on down the corridor towards the dining-car. A bell began ringing, but he did not seem to answer it. Also, she remarked that he was a different conductor she never saw, but not Michel. M.Bouc lead her to the other three conductors, but said that none of these was the man she saw during the night. The one she saw was small and dark. He had a little moustache. His voice when he said “Pardon” was weak, like a woman’s.
*She had not been to America before. Furthermore, the handkerchief with an initial H did not belong to her.

More Clues:
A small dark man with a womanish voice
A woman with a scarlet kimono
Mr. Ratchett cannot speak French. Then to whom did the voice the Wagon Lit conductor heard belong?
“C’est ne rien. Je me suis trompé”

OTHER EVIDENCE
*Weapon:
When Poirot, M. Bouc and Dr. Constantine were discussing about the crime, Mrs. Hubbard burst in with shrill cries. She screamed that she found a great knife covered with blood in her sponge-bag, which she had been hanging on the door-handle. She fainted at once.
They went inside Mrs. Hubbard’s compartment, and they saw a large-checked rubber sponge-bag. Below it, on the floor, there was a straight-bladed dagger-which had probably fallen from Mrs. Hubbard’s hand-stained with patches looked like rust. About a foot above the handle was the door bolt. It was bolted, so Poirot drew it back and tried to open, but the door did not. They realized that it was locked from the other side too.

*Passenger’s Luggage:
Because they found the weapon from Mrs. Hubbard’s belongings, they decided to check the passenger’s luggage.
Mr. Hardman: His two luggage’s were soon examined and passed.
Colonel Arbuthnot: Two heavy leather suitcases. Found a packet of pipe-cleaners, and these corresponded exactly with the one found on the floor of the dead man’s compartment.
Princess Dragomiroff: Her maid always carried the keys. Soon examined and passed.
Count and Countess Andrenyi: Luggage examined and passed.
Mrs. Hubbard: The weapon
Mary Debenham: Passed. (However, when Poirot asked what she was talking about to Colonel in the station of Konya, she refused to answer, and said that it was private.)
Greta Ohlsson: Passed.
Hildegarde Schmidt: Inside the suitcase they found a hastily rolled-up brown wagon lit uniform. She insisted that she did not notice.
MacQueen: Passed.

After checking the luggage, Poirot retired to his compartment, and opened his luggage. Neatly folded on the top of the case was a thin scarlet silk kimono embroidered with dragons.

Supposition:
They made up a supposition:
(1)- that the crime was committed, as M. Bouc said, at 1:15. This was supported by the evidence of the watch, by the evidence of Mrs. Hubbard, and by the evidence of the German woman, Hildegarde Schmidt. It agrees with the evidence of Dr. Constantine.
(2)- that the crime was committed later, and that the evidence of the watch was deliberately faked to mislead.
(3)- that the crime was committed earlier, and evidence faked for the same reason above.

III Poirot Sits Back and Thinks:

He started to recognize that the crime was planned to look like an outside job. But the accident, running into the snowdrift, changed everything. If it had not occurred, then he would run into the toilet after the assassin, and place the uniform there to make it as if he had escaped from the toilet window. After organizing the information, he sat back and thought of many suppositions. He decided to ask some more questions to the passengers.

* The Grease Spot on A Hungarian Passport:
He observed the grease spot of Countess Andrenyi. It was nearly on top of her name, Elena, almost covering up the “E”. What if her real name was Helena, and that she had dropped the grease on purpose to cover the “H”, to avoid from the suspicion? He asked the lady once more, to test his supposition. After few arguments, she had finally admitted that she did it. Furthermore, she confessed that she was the sister of Mrs. Armstrong, the young daughter of Linda Arden. Though the handkerchief was not hers. When Poirot questioned her more, she also said that when she was young, she had a governess. She described her as a big, old, red-haired English woman. Her name was Miss Freebody. He also found out that Princess Dragomiroff was screening her. They knew each other well. She said earnestly that she did not know anyone else on the train at all.
As they investigated further, they realized that the handkerchief belonged to Pricess Drogomiroff. Her Christian name was Natalia. And H, was pronounced as N in Russian. She also admitted that she lied about Helena, saying that she married an Englishman, because she didn’t want her to get suspected.
By this time, M. Bouc and Dr. Constantine was extremely sure that Countess Andrenyi was the murderer, because they found out that she was from the Armstrong family. But they never knew that they are going to be surprised as the further truth became uncovered.
Now they asked Miss Debenham. Once again, Poirot asked her what the conversation which she exchanged with Arbuthnot meant in Konya station. It was:
“Mary-” “Not now. Not now. When it’s all over. When it’s behind us-then-”
Suddenly she burst into tears after insisting that it was a private matter. After all, she said that she was the governess of Countess Andrenyi, the sister of Mrs. Armstrong. Poirot had already suspected earlier that she was Helena’s governess, because every word Helena said as a description of her governess was totally opposite from Mary Debenham. Also, Mary and Arbuthnot were acting as if they had first met in the train, when they actually loved each other. Since Colonel Arbuthnot was often calling Miss Debenham “Mary”, Poirot knew this from earlier as well.
M. Bouc and Dr. Constantine got shocked as Poirot started to gracefully uncover the truths or the passengers. All of them were lying! On top of that, all of them were in the Armstrong household!!! First of all, Antonio Foscarelli accepted that he was a driver of the Armstrong family when Poirot forced him to answer. Then Greta Ohlsson, the Swedish lady, came crying and admitted by herself that she was Daisy’s nurse. Next it was Masterman, and he also said that he was Colonel Armstrong’s valet. M. Bouc and Dr. Constantine were in total panic, and Poirot was the only one who was at ease. Poirot wondered: What about Hildegarde Schmidt? She must be a cook, because she explained that she loved cooking when interviewed…Also, why did Count Andrenyi have his handkerchief in his right pocket? That was because he was left-handed!
This was how he solved the problem.

IV. The Crime Solved:

2 Solutions:
Poirot gave 2 solutions to the anxious passengers. Mr. Ratchett was last seen to be alive at 12:37 last night when he spoke to the Wagon Lit conductor through the door. A watch was found in his pajama pocket, and it had stopped at 1:15. Dr. Constantine also proved that the time of death was between 12:00 to 2:00 in the morning. At half an hour after midnight, the train ran into a snowdrift, so after that time it was impossible for anyone to leave the train. Mr. Hardman, the detective of the New York agency, said that there was no one that passed the compartment No. 16 last night. Therefore, they came to the conclusion that the murderer came from outside into the Stamboul-Calais coach. Mr. Ratchett had given the description of the man to Mr. Hardman, and no one applies to the passengers on the train. Here is the theory:

(1)- The enemy, which Mr. Ratchett feared, joined the train at Belgrade or somewhere else at Vincovci by the door left open by Colonel Arbuthnot and Mr. MacQueen, who had taken a walk to the platform. He wore a Wagon Lit conductor’s uniform over his clothes. Mr. Ratchett was taking a sleeping draught, so he could not defend himself. Now this man stabbed him and left the compartment through the communicating door leading to Mrs. Hubbard’s compartment. He put the weapon into Mrs. Hubbard’s sponge-bag, and without knowing, he lost a button of his uniform. Then he slipped out of the compartment and along the corridor, dressed in ordinary clothes, and left the train just before it started off-by the door near the dining-car. The watch, it was just an error made by Mr. Ratchett, when he had forgotten to put his watch back an hour. His watch was in Eastern European time, which is one hour ahead of Central European time. It was 12:15 when Mr. Ratchett was stabbed-not 1:15. The voice the conductor heard from Mr. Ratchett’s compartment, around 12:37, might have been a third person, one who had gone in to speak to Ratchett and found him dead. He rang the bell to call the conductor, then, because he was afraid of being accused of the crime, he spoke pretending to be Ratchett. Everyone had lied about the time because they wanted to avoid being accused.

(2)- Poirot gave another supposition. Numerous people from all classes and nationalities came to use this train this day. This was quite a peculiar sight. So he leaned back and shut his eyes, and began to think. Take first the evidence of Mr. MacQueen. The interview with him made rather a curious remark. Poirot had described to him about the note mentioning the Armstrong case, then he suddenly became restless, and said, ‘But surely-’ and then paused and went on, ‘I mean-that was rather careless of the old man.’ Supposing what he had meant to say was ‘But surely that was burnt!’ This shows that MacQueen knew of the note and of its destruction-that he was either the murderer or an accomplice of the murderer. Then the valet. He said that Ratchett always takes a sleeping draught. But did he take one last night? The gun under his pillow shows that Ratchett intended to be alert that night, because he knew that the enemy would come (from the threatening letter). So the draught must have been given without his noticing, obviously by MacQueen or the valet, Masterman.
Next, it was Mr. Hardman. Poirot noticed that his detective story was absurd. The most effective way to protect Ratchett was to pass the night actually in his compartment, or in some place where he could watch the door. Same thing with Mrs. Hubbard, when she said that her sponge-bag was covering the bolt of the communicating door. Her compartment was No. 3, and in the even numbers such as No. 2, 4, and 12, the bolt was directly under the handle of the door. But in odd numbers, such as her compartment, the bolt was well above the handle and could not be covered by the sponge-bag.
Also, he noticed the watch inside the pajama’s pocket, a surely uncomfortable place to keep a watch, especially while sleeping. So he felt sure that the watch had been deliberately placed in the pocket-therefore, the crime was not committed at 1:15. Then was it committed earlier, about 12:37? Around the same time, Poirot had heard the loud cry while sleeping, but if Ratchett had been heavily drugged, he could not have cried out. If he could, he would have been making some struggle to defend himself, but there was no sign of any. So he came to the conclusion that the whole incident at 12:37 was played for him. But he was successfully tricked, and spectacled the woman with red kimono. The woman could be acted by any tall, slender woman, especially by Miss. Debenham or Countess Andrenyi.
In his opinion, Ratchett was killed later, after 1:15, around 2 o’clock. He explained that when he remembered that a jury is composed of twelve people-there were twelve passengers-Ratchett was stabbed twelve times, the whole thing was explained. From ‘a woman wearing scarlet kimono’ to ‘small dark man with a womanish voice’-these description was meant to confuse them, since they could apply both to a man or a woman. If the threatening letter mentioning the Armstrong case was not found, there was no reason the passengers on the train could be suspected.
He also suspected that Pierre Michel was definitely one of the twelve. However, he did not seem to have any relationships with the Armstrong family. Then he remembered that the dead nursery-maid had been French. Supposing that he was the father of the poor nursery-maid? For Colonel Arbuthnot, he decided as the best friend of Mr. Armstrong. Hildegarde Schmidt, he thought, must have been from the household, especially the cook. All the others have accepted, except those. However, there remains Mr. Hardman and Mrs. Hubbard. Mr. Hardman seems difficult to identify, so Poirot could only imagine him as the lover of the French nursery-maid. He could gain confidence when Hardman spoke of her, because Poirot did not miss the sudden tears in his eyes. Finally it was Mrs. Hubbard. She played the most important role in the drama. This person definitely was going to get suspected, because of occupying the compartment communicating with Ratchett’s. So she played the perfectly natural, innocent American fond mother, the most difficult role to think of. Then Poirot remembered that there was an artist connected with the Armstrong family: it was Linda Arden, the actress and Mrs. Armstrong’s mother.

Finally, Mrs. Hubbard and others gave up and admitted the crime, although Poirot decided to let M. Bouc and Dr. Constantine decide which theory was correct. M. Bouc, with some hesitation, said that he would choose the first theory as the correct one. Poirot seemed quite satisfied with it, so he retired from the case…and this was how the crime was solved.

This story was written by Agatha Christie, who was also called the “Queen of Crime.” It is largely connected to the “Armstrong Kidnapping Case”, when the beloved daughter Daisy was kidnapped from famous Colonel Armstrong and his wife, and was found dead after paying a large sum of money. This was based on the Lindbergh Kidnapping Case, which had actually occurred during the 1900s. Colonel Lindbergh was a famous pilot who was the first man to fly across the Atlantic Ocean, from New York to Paris alone. At that time, planes could not fly for so long, and it took a big risk to do it. The kidnapper seemed to get caught, and he was sentenced for death. However, this case still has lots of mysteries which are not yet solved today. Some says that he was not the kidnapper. By writing this book, I think that Agatha Christie wanted to find the truth of this case and lead people to satisfaction. Or maybe, because this case has become the talk of the current society, she might have thought that it was a good idea to use for her mystery novels.
This novel is my favorite, and is the best one I’ve ever read. Especially, I like the storyline and how the mysteries get solved one by one. The murderer is totally unpredictable for most people, because most of us would think of only one target. No one would think that all the twelve of them had committed the crime. Also, there were many interesting clues and events that challenged me to solve it before the novel told me. I noticed that mystery books can be fun, and I would like to read more of Agatha Christie’s from now on.