One, Two, Buckle my Shoe

It was shortly after his 12:30 appointment that Dr. Morley was found with a bullet through his right temple. The gun was on the floor beside him. The authorities were satisfied that the amiable old dentist had shot himself. Hercules Poirot was not. But who could have murdered him? One of DR. Morley's glamorous patients? His hard-drinking partner? His secretary's disgruntled boyfriend? All Poirot has is a hunch, too many clues, and a killer who will not be satisfied with only one victim.

Murder on the Links

"For God's sake, come!"...The appeal for help arrived too late. Monsieur Renauld lay dead on the golf course just days after Hercules Poirot had received his letter. There was no lack of suspects:Renauld has possessed a plundered fortune, both a wife and a mistress, and an estranged son. But just when police think they have the culprit, the brilliant Belgian detective assures them that all is not as it seems. And the next murder proves him right.

Murder in the Mews

Guy Fawkes Night
A Perfect night for murder, as Inspector Japp remarked to Hercules Poirot. Someone else agreed with him. Next morning, young Mrs Allen was found dead in her mews house. Her murderer had tried to make it look like a suicide.

But he had not reckoned on Hercules Poirot, who solved the murder in the Mews and three more perplexing cases with his usual dazzling brilliance.

'All four tales are admirable entertainment...her solutions are unexpected and satisfying.'
DAILY MAIL

The Labours of Hercules

In appearance Hercules Poirot hardly resembled an ancient Greek hero. Yet - reasoned the detective - like Hercules he had been responsible for ridding society of some of its most unpleasant monsters.

So, in the period before he retired, Poirot made up his mind to accept just twelve more cases: his self-imposed 'Labours'. Each would go down in the annals of crime as a heroic feat of deduction.

'Twelve little masterpieces of detection. Poirot and Agatha Christie at their inimitable best.'
SUNDAY EXPRESS

The Hollow

Hercules Poirot thought the joke in poor taste, not to be expected of his gracious hosts, Lord and Lady Angkatell. At the edge of the swimming pool lay a man in a puddle of red paint, and standing over him, pistol in hand, was a woman feigning hysteria. But Poirot quickly learned it was no charade. The paint was blood, the corpse was real, and a pleasant country weekend had turned into one of the legendary detectives most baffling cases.

Five Little Pigs

Amyas Crale had been famous as a painter...and infamous as a lover. His fiery wife, Caroline, had been jealous as she was devoted. So naturally it was she who was tried and convicted for his murder. Now their daughter, Carla, presents the brilliant Hercules Poirot with the greatest challenge of his career - to clear her mother's name by finding the fatal flaw in what, after sixteen years, appears to be the perfect crime!

Elephants Can Remember

Hercules Poirot stood on the cliff overlooking the rocks below and the sea breaking against them. Here, where he stood, the bodies of a husband and wife had been found. Here, three weeks before that, a woman had walked in her sleep and fallen to death.

Why had these things happened?

'A classic example of the ingenious three-card trick that she has been playing on us for so many years'
SUNDAY EXPRESS

'Splendid...she tells us all we want to know and nothing that is irrelevant'
THE TIMES

Dumb Witness

Miss Arundell was rich. Miss Arundell was elderly. Miss Arundell had two nieces and a nephew, all of whom badly wanted money.
They all spent Easter with her, and during the weekend she had a curious accident. Perhaps it was the fault of her beloved terrier Bob - perhaps it wasn't.
She survived, but her suspicions were aroused. She wrote to Hercules Poirot, but by the time he received the letter - she was dead.

'Agatha Christie at her best'
DAILY MIRROR

'Delightful...a bevy of most excellent human creatures - not to mention the dumb witness himself, little Bob, the wire-haired terrier'
EVENING NEWS

'One of Poirot's most brilliant achievements'
GLASGOW HERALD

Death in the clouds

For the passengers on the noon flight from Paris to Croydon, a routine journey becomes a nightmare. In mid-air a brutal and ingenious murder is committed. One of them must be guilty of it.
But who? Could it be the British businessman who is dangerously close to bankruptcy?

Or is it the writer of detective novels, trying out an idea for his latest book?

Or the countess whose passion for cocaine and gambling has already got her into deep trouble?

None of them is beyond suspicion. Not even Hercules Poirot himself. He must unravel this baffling mystery - if only to clear his own name.

The Clocks

Master sleuth Hercules Poirot has time on his hands, four clocks, all set for 4.13, and all left at the scene of murder.
In the tidy sitting-room Detective Inspector Herdcastle examines the assembled witnesses for clues - a blind lady, a young secretary and an innocent passer-by.
Poirot must find them first...but will he have time?

'Here is the grand-manner detective story in all its glory'
NEW YORK TIMES

'Superlative Christie...extremely ingenious'
THE BOOKMAN

Cards on the Table

Mr. Shaitana collects snuff-boxes, Egyptian antiquities and murderers. Not convicted murderers('necessarily second rate') but the ones who got away with it. He invites Hercules Poirot round to meet his collection. Before the evening is over the collector is a corpse - stabbed to death by one of his own exhibits...


'The finest murder story of her career...Mrs Christie has never been more ingenious'
DAILY MAIL

'Brilliant'
OBSERVER

Appointment With Death

Into the valley of death...

Ahead, between the towering red cliffs of Petra, Sarah saw a cluster of tents and above them caves, hollowed out of the red rocks. She stared up at one of these which held a sitting figure. An idol? A gigantic squatting image? Her heart gave a sudden lurch of recognition... Gone, now, was the feeling of peace - of escape. Looming above her like an arch priestess of some forgotten cult, like a monstrous swollen female Buddha, was the figure of Mrs Boynton...

'Poirot has surpassed himself! Never before has he been so brilliant, so accurate, so fair and so logical.'
EVENING NEWS

'Twice as brilliant as Death on the Nile, which was entirely brilliant.'
OBSERVER

Death

Poirot dies from inevitable complications of a heart condition at the end of Curtain: Poirot's Last Case. By this point in his life he is wearing a wig and false moustache, and also seems to be afflicted by arthritis.

In the book the Curtain: Poirot's Last Case Hastings finds a manuscript written by Poirot, within the confines of the script is a confession that Poirot has committed murder.

He also states that since he has become something that he has always opposed and fought for he neglects to take his heart medication, which subsequently, causes his death.

With Norton unconscious, Poirot, whose incapacity had been faked (a trick for which he needed a temporary valet who did not know how healthy he was) moved the body back to Norton’s room in his wheelchair. Then, he disguised himself as Norton by removing his own wig, putting on Norton’s dressing-gown and ruffling up his grey hair. Poirot was the only short suspect at the house. With it established that Norton was alive after he left Poirot’s room, Poirot shot him – with perfect and unnecessary symmetry – in the centre of his forehead. He locked the room with a duplicate key that Hastings knew Poirot to possess; both Hastings and the reader would have assumed that the duplicate key was to Poirot's own room, but Poirot had changed rooms before Norton's arrival, and it was to this previous room that he had the key.

Poirot’s last actions were to write the confession and await his death, which he accelerated by moving amyl nitrite phials out of his own reach. His last wish is implicitly that Hastings will marry Elizabeth Cole: a final instance of the inveterate matchmaking that has characterised his entire career.

Retirement

There is a great deal of confusion about Poirot's retirement. Most of the cases covered by Poirot's private detective agency take place before his retirement to grow marrows, at which time he solves The Murder of Roger Ackroyd. It has been said that twelve cases related in The Labours of Hercules (1947) must refer to a different retirement, but the fact that Poirot specifically says that he intends to grow marrows indicates that these stories also take place before Roger Ackroyd, and presumably Poirot closed his agency once he had completed them. Unfortunately, there is specific mention in "The Capture of Cerberus" to the fact that there has been a gap of twenty years between Poirot's previous meeting with Countess Rossakoff and this one. If the Labours precede the events in Roger Ackroyd, then the Roger Ackroyd case must have taken place around twenty years later than it was published, and so must any of the cases that refer to it. One alternative would be that having failed to grow marrows once, Poirot is determined to have another go, but this is specifically denied by Poirot himself. Another alternative would be to suggest that the Preface to the Labours takes place at one date but that the labours are completed over a matter of twenty years. None of the explanations is especially attractive.

In terms of a rudimentary chronology, Poirot speaks of retiring to grow marrows in Chapter 18 of The Big Four (1927), which places that novel out of published order before Roger Ackroyd. He declines to solve a case for the Home Secretary because he is retired in Chapter One of Peril at End House (1932). He is certainly retired at the time of Three Act Tragedy (1935) but he does not enjoy his retirement and comes repeatedly out of it thereafter when his curiosity is engaged. Nevertheless, he continues to employ his secretary, Miss Lemon, at the time of the cases retold in Hickory Dickory Dock and Dead Man's Folly, which take place in the mid-1950s. It is therefore better to assume that Christie provided no authoritative chronology for Poirot's retirement, but assumed that he could either be an active detective, a consulting detective or a retired detective as the needs of the immediate case required.

One thing that is consistent about Poirot's retirement is that his fame declines during it, so that in the later novels he is often disappointed when characters (especially younger characters) do not recognise either him or his name:

"I should, perhaps, Madame, tell you a little more about myself. I am Hercule Poirot."
The revelation left Mrs Summerhayes unmoved.
"What a lovely name," she said kindly. "Greek, isn't it?"

Career as a private detective

"I had called in at my friend Poirot's rooms to find him sadly overworked. So much had he become the rage that every rich woman who had mislaid a bracelet or lost a pet kitten rushed to secure the services of the great Hercule Poirot."

During the first world war, Poirot left Belgium for Britain as a refugee. It was here, on 16 July 1916, that he again met his lifelong friend, Captain Arthur Hastings, and solved the first of his cases to be published: The Mysterious Affair at Styles. After that case Poirot apparently came to the attention of the British secret service, and undertook cases for the British government, including foiling the attempted abduction of the Prime Minister.

After the war Poirot became a free agent and began undertaking civilian cases. He moved into what became both his home and work address, 56B Whitehaven Mansions, Sandhurst Square,London W1. It was chosen by Poirot for its symmetry. His first case was "The Affair at the Victory Ball", which saw Poirot enter the high society and begin his career as a private detective.

Between the first and second world wars, Poirot traveled all over Europe and the Middle East investigating crimes and murders. Most of his cases happened during this period and he was at the height of his powers at this point in his life. The Murder On the Links saw the Belgian pit his grey cells against a French murderer. In the Middle East he solved The Murder on the Orient Express (though the bulk of the story takes places in the territory of the former-Yugoslavia), the Death on the Nile, and the Murder in Mesopotamia with ease and even survived An Appointment with Death. However he did not travel to the Americas or Australia, probably due to his sea sickness.

"It is this villainous sea that troubles me! The mal de mer – it is horrible suffering!"

It was during this time he met the Countess Vera Rossakoff, a glamorous jewel thief. The history of the Countess is, like Poirot's, steeped in mystery. She claims to have been a member of the Russian Aristocracy during the Russian Revolution and suffered greatly as a result, but how much of that story is true is an open question. Even Poirot acknowledges that Rossakoff has told several wildy varying accounts of her early life. Poirot later became smitten with the woman and allowed her to escape justice.

"It is the misfortune of small, precise men always to hanker after large and flamboyant women. Poirot had never been able to rid himself of the fatal fascination that the Countess held for him."

Although letting the Countess escape may be morally questionable, this tendency to take the law into his own hands is far from unique. During the case of "The Nemean Lion", he sides with the criminal, Miss Amy Carnaby, and prevents her from having to face justice by blackmailing his client Sir Joseph Hoggins, who himself was plotting murder and was unwise enough to let Poirot discover this. Poirot even sent Miss Carnaby two hundred pounds as a final payoff before her dog kidnapping campaign came to an end. When dealing with The Murder of Roger Ackroyd he allows the murderer to escape justice through suicide and then ensures the truth was never known in order to spare the feelings of the murderer's relatives. In "The Augean Stables" he helps the government to cover up vast corruption, even though it might be considered more honest to let the truth come out.

After his cases in the Middle East, Poirot returned to Britain. Apart from some of the so-called "Labours of Hercules" (see next section) he very rarely traveled abroad during his later career.

Poirot's Poirot’s police years

"Gustave was not a policeman. I have dealt with policemen all my life and I know. He could pass as a detective to an outsider but not to a man who was a policeman himself." — Hercule Poirot in "The Erymanthian Boar" (1940).

As an adult, Poirot joined the Belgian police force. Very little mention is made in Christie's work about this part of his life, but in "The Nemean Lion" (1939) Poirot himself refers to a Belgian case of his in which "a wealthy soap manufacturer poisoned his wife in order to be free to marry his secretary". We do not know whether this case resulted in a successful prosecution or not; moreover, Poirot is not above lying in order to produce a particular effect in the person to whom he is speaking, so this evidence is not reliable.

Inspector Japp gives some insight into Poirot's career with the Belgian police when introducing him to a colleague:

"You've heard me speak of Mr Poirot? It was in 1904 he and I worked together – the Abercrombie forgery case – you remember he was run down in Brussels. Ah, those were the days Moosier. Then, do you remember "Baron" Altara? There was a pretty rogue for you! He eluded the clutches of half the police in Europe. But we nailed him in Antwerp – thanks to Mr. Poirot here."

Perhaps this is enough evidence to suggest that Poirot's police career was a successful one.

In the short story The Chocolate Box (1923) Poirot provides Captain Arthur Hastings with an account of what he considers to be his only failure. Poirot admits that he has failed to solve a crime "innumerable" times:

"I have been called in too late. Very often another, working towards the same goal, has arrived there first. Twice I have been struck down with illness just as I was on the point of success."

Nevertheless, he regards the case in "The Chocolate Box", which took place in 1893, as his only actual failure of detection. Again, however, it must be stressed that Poirot is not reliable as a narrator of his personal history and there is no evidence that Christie sketched it out in any depth.

It was also in this period that Poirot shot a man who was firing from a roof onto the public below.

Poirot has retired from the Belgian police force by the time that he meets Hastings in 1916 on the case retold in The Mysterious Affair at Styles.

It should be noted that Poirot is a French-speaking Belgian, i.e. a Walloon; but there can hardly be found any occasion where he refers to himself as such, or is so referred to by others. At the time of writing, at least of the earlier books where the character was defined, non-Belgians such as Agatha Christie were far less aware than nowadays of the deep linguistic divide in Belgian society.

Poirot's Family and childhood

It is difficult to draw any concrete conclusions about Poirot's family due to the fact that Poirot often supplies false or misleading information about himself or his background in order to assist him in obtaining information relevant to a particular case. In chapter 21 of The Murder of Roger Ackroyd, for example, we learn that he has been talking about a mentally disabled nephew: this proves to be a ruse so that he can find out about homes for the mentally unfit … but that does not mean that Poirot does not have such a nephew. In Dumb Witness, he regales us with stories of his elderly invalid mother as a pretence to investigate the local nurses. In The Big Four Hastings believes that he meets Achille Poirot who (in an apparent parody of Mycroft Holmes) is evidently his smarter brother. On this occasion, Achille is almost certainly Poirot himself in disguise (Poirot speaks in Chapter 18 of having sent Achille "back to the land of myths"), but this does not conclusively demonstrate that Poirot does not have a brother, or even a brother called Achille. Any evidence regarding Poirot for which Poirot himself is the source is therefore most unreliable.

Poirot was apparently born in Spa, Belgium and, based on the conjecture that he was thirty at the time of his retirement from the Belgian police force at the time of the outbreak of the First World War, it is suggested that he was born in the mid 1880s. This is all extremely vague, as Poirot is thought to be an old man in his dotage even in the early Poirot novels, and in An Autobiography Christie admitted that she already imagined him to be an old man in 1920. (At the time, of course, she had no idea she would be going on writing Poirot books for many decades to come.) Much of the suggested dating for Poirot's age is therefore post-rationalisation on the part of those attempting to make sense of his extraordinarily long career.

Poirot is a Roman Catholic by birth, and retains a strong sense of Catholic morality later in life. Not much is known of Poirot’s childhood other than he once claimed in Three Act Tragedy to have been from a large family with little wealth. In Taken at the Flood, he further claimed to have been raised and educated by nuns, raising the possibility that he (and any siblings) were orphaned.

Georges

Georges (we are never told his last name) is a classic English valet and first entered Poirot’s employ in 1923 and didn’t leave his side until the 1970s, shortly before Poirot’s death. A competent, matter-of-fact man with an extensive knowledge of the English aristocracy and absolutely no imagination, Georges provides a steady contrast to Hastings.

Chief Inspector Japp

Japp is an Inspector from Scotland Yard and appears in many of the stories, trying to solve the cases Poirot is working on. Japp is an outward going, loud and sometimes inconsiderate man by nature and his relationship with the bourgeois Belgian is one of the stranger aspects of Poirot’s world. He first met Poirot in Belgium, 1904, during the Abercrombie Forgery and later that year joined forces again to hunt down a criminal known as Baron Altara. They also meet in England where Poirot often helps Japp solve a case and lets him take the credit in return for special favours. These favours usually entail being supplied with cases that would interest him.

Miss Lemon

Poirot's secretary, Miss Lemon, has few human weaknesses and the only two mistakes she is ever recorded making is a typing error during the events of Hickory Dickory Dock and the mis-mailing of an electric bill. Poirot described her as being "Unbelievably ugly and incredibly efficient. Anything that she mentioned as worth consideration usually was worth consideration." She is an expert on nearly everything and plans to create the perfect filing system. Interesting enough is the fact that she once worked for the government agent-turned-philanthropist, Parker Pyne. Whether this was during one of Poirot’s numerous retirements or before she entered his employ is unknown.