Agatha Christie's Poirot Episode Guide - inaf iasf bologna

Agatha Christie’s Poirot Episode Guide
but is unimaginative and has no new ideas. But Miss Bulstrode is also considering Miss Rich,
who is young and has lots of ideas but less experience. She is not considering Miss Chadwick,
whom she thinks is too old (although others may assume Miss Chadwick is the second most
likely candidate). But all these deliberations are cut short when Miss Springer is shot dead in
the Sports Pavilion late at night, and Miss Johnson and Miss Chadwick discover her body.
Following the murder, Inspector Kelsey interviews everyone and Adam Goodman reveals his
true identity to Miss Bulstrode. Meanwhile, Jennifer Sutcliffe, an expert tennis player, complains
that her racquet feels unbalanced (it must have been warped in the Ramat heat), and she writes
to her mother asking for a new one. She swaps tennis racquets with Julia Upjohn, who prefers
Jennifer’s racquet because it has been refurbished recently. Later a strange woman arrives and
gives Jennifer a new racquet, saying it’s a gift from her aunt Gina. The woman takes the old racquet
(actually Julia’s), ostensibly to return it to Aunt Gina for restringing. Later, Julia points out
that this is impossible because Aunt Gina knows that Jennifer’s racquet had been refurbished
and restrung recently, so she would not assume the problem is in the strings. Sure enough, Aunt
Gina writes to say that she has not sent a new racquet.
During a weekend when many of the girls are at home with their parents, Shaista is apparently
kidnapped by a chauffeur posing as the one sent by her uncle to take her home. That night there
is a repetition of murder when Miss Chadwick is disturbed by torch light in the Sports Pavilion
and Miss Vansittart is found dead there, having been apparently coshed. Many of the girls go
home, but the resourceful Julia, who has been pondering the exchange of the racquets, takes
her (really Jennifer’s) racquet back to her room and discovers the gems in the hollowed-out
handle. She hears someone at the door who quietly turns the knob and attempts to enter. But
Julia has pushed furniture against the door to prevent a murderer from entering. The next day
Julia flees the school to tell her story to Hercule Poirot, whom she has heard of through a friend
of her mother. The police start to focus on the newcomer, Miss Blanche, but in fact she is not
the murderer. Instead, she knows who the murderer is, and makes an attempt at blackmail
that backfires when she is also killed. With the school struggling to survive the scandal of two
murders, the denouement has arrived.
Poirot reviews what the reader already knows, and then explains that Princess Shaista was
an impostor: the real Shaista had been kidnapped earlier in Switzerland, and the apparent abduction
was actually the imposter’s escape from the school. She was the representative of one
group of interests who, crucially, did not know where the gems had been concealed. The murderer,
however, did know where the jewels were concealed and must have been in Ramat to see
Bob Rawlinson hide them. Most of the teachers could not have been there — the exception was
Eileen Rich, who was apparently sick at the time but was in fact in Ramat. Jennifer had even
recognised her, although she remembered the woman she had seen as a fatter woman. (It later
transpires that Miss Rich had been in Ramat for the delivery of an illegitimate child that was
stillborn.)
Just as it seems that Miss Rich is the murderer, Mrs. Upjohn enters the room having been
recalled from her holiday in Anatolia and identifies by face the woman she had seen through
Mrs Bulstrode’s window: Ann Shapland, who is well known in intelligence circles as a ruthless
espionage agent and a mercenary. It was Shapland who had had the room next to Bob Rawlinson
at the start of the book. Ann Shapland draws a pistol and Miss Bulstrode steps in front of Mrs.
Sutcliffe; Miss Chadwick does the same to protect Miss Bulstrode, and is fatally wounded.
It is revealed that Ann Shapland murdered Miss Springer, who caught her while she was
searching the Sports Pavilion for the jewels. She also murdered Miss Blanche, who knew her
secret and tried to blackmail her. But she did not kill Miss Vansittart, and had a perfect alibi
for that night. Miss Vansittart was actually killed by Miss Chadwick, in an unpremedited fit
of passion. Miss Chadwick had found Miss Vansittart in the Sports Pavilion the second night,
kneeling in front of Shaista’s locker, apparently snooping. Miss Chadwick disliked Miss Vansittart
and did not consider her a suitable successor for Meadowbank. Miss Chadwick was carrying a
sandbag for protection, and here was Miss Vansittart in a perfect position to be coshed from
behind. Barely conscious of her actions, she kills her. But she feels immediate remorse, and
later throws herself in front of a bullet to save Miss Bulustrode. As Miss Chadwick lays dying,
she confesses that she imagined the removal of the widely presumed successor would make Miss
Bulstrode change her mind about retiring.
So the first and third murders are linked by the same murderer, while the second and third
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