Murder On The Orient Express By Agatha Christie

Author: Agatha Christie

Genre: Crime Fiction

Synopsis

The story began with Hercule Poirot, the famous Belgian detective, solves the case of theft at the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. He was soon summoned to London for another case and he successfully boarded The Orient Express. There were 16 passengers onboard including Poirot and Bouc. The passengers were introduced as:

Edward Rachett : An unscrupulous business man (actually Cassetti, kidnaper of Daisy Armstrong)

Caroline Hubbard: A fellow passenger whose compartment is next to Rachett (actually Linda Arden, famous actress and grandmother of Daisy Armstrong)

Princess Natalia Dragomiroff: An ugly looking Russian princess (Daisy’s godmother)

Edward Henry Masterman: Rachett’s valet

Hector MacQueen: Rachett’s personal secretary (truly in collusion with the Armstrong’s)

Greta Ohlsson: A Swedish lady (Daisy Armstrong’s nurse)

Antonio Foscanelli: A big menacing Italian man (Armstrong’s chauffer)

Hildegrade Schmidt: Princess Dragomiroff’s maid (Armstrong’s cook)

Greghard Hardman: An American Professor (well-known detective)

Mary Debenham: A calm and cool lady from Baghdad (Daisy’s governess)

Dr. Arbuthnot: An English man (friend of Colonel Armstrong)

Countess Andrenyi: A quite young, dark-haired and beautiful lady (sister of Sonia Armstrong)

Count Rudolph Andrenyi: Husband of Countess Andrenyi and a quite defensive man.

Bouc: Director of the Compagnie Wagon Lits

Pirre Michel: Conductor of the Orient Express (brother of French nurse,Sussane who committed suicide)

Rachett offered Poirot to be his bodyguard as he was receiving threat letters, to which Poirot disagreed. That night Poirot heard some noises from Rachett’s room, to check he came out of his compartment and saw someone running down the hallway wearing a kimono. The next day Rachett was found murdered with 12 stabs, all over his body. On M.Bouc’s request, Poirot agreed to investigate the case. The next day, Mrs. Hubbard was stabbed on her back, but was saved.

During investigation Poirot discovered that the man who was muddered, his real identity was John Cassetti, he had kidnapped Daisy Armstrong, daughter of Colonel Armstrong and Sonia Armstrong. He killed Daisy even after receiving the demanded ransom. Her mother couldn’t take this and died giving birth to a still born baby. Losing all hopes, Colonel Armstrong committed suicide. The family’s maid, Sussane was held guilty for the kidnapping and so she killed herself by jumping from the window. Later she was acquitted. At last, after going through all the hurdles, Poirot solved the case and gathered everyone to tell what actually happened that night and why.

Poirot explained, that the crime was committed by all the passengers together as all of them either directly or indirectly linked to the Armstrong case. Mrs. Hubbard planned Cassetti’s murder and all the other passengers stabbed him one by one. The lady in was Mary Debenham and Dr. Arbuthnot had stabbed Mrs. Hubbard on her directions. On revealing the truth Mrs. Hubbard grabs Poirot’s gun and attempts to commit suicide, but the gun was unloaded. Poirot realized that none of them were criminals at heart so he decided to tell his first conclusion that the murderer disguised as a conductor boarded the train, stabbed Cassetti several times and fled away, to the Yugoslavian police.