Murder on the Orient Express recap

Returning urgently to London, Hercule Poirot boards the Simplon Orient Express at Istanbul and finds it inexplicably full for the time of year. Among the passengers is an American named Ratchett, who offers Poirot money to protect him from enemies and is refused. That night the train is stopped by a snowdrift in the Balkans, and in the morning Ratchett is found stabbed a dozen times behind a locked door. A charred scrap of paper identifies him as Cassetti, the man who kidnapped and murdered the child Daisy Armstrong in America and escaped punishment on a technicality. Investigating for the sleeping-car company, Poirot finds the evidence absurdly abundant and contradictory: wounds struck with different hands and force, a scarlet kimono, a conductor's uniform, a stopped watch, and an alibi for every passenger. He eventually establishes that all of them are connected to the Armstrong household, and that twelve of them stabbed the man once each, as a jury and executioners. Poirot offers two explanations and allows the innocuous one, an outside assassin, to be given to the police.

Hercule Poirot leaves Syria after a case and travels by the Taurus Express towards Istanbul, sharing the journey with an English governess, Mary Debenham, and Colonel Arbuthnot, an army officer coming from India. A telegram at Istanbul recalls him to London at once, and his friend Monsieur Bouc, a director of the sleeping-car company, secures him a berth on the Simplon Orient Express although the coach is unaccountably full for the time of year. The passengers include the American Ratchett, his secretary MacQueen and his valet Masterman, the talkative Mrs Hubbard, an aged Russian princess and her maid, a Hungarian count and countess, a Swedish nurse, an Italian-American car salesman, an American commercial traveller, and Debenham and Arbuthnot. Ratchett tells Poirot that he has received threatening letters and offers a large fee for protection; Poirot declines. In the night Poirot is woken repeatedly by bells, a cry from the next compartment, a woman in a scarlet kimono in the corridor, and the sensation of the train coming to a stand. By morning the express is buried in a snowdrift somewhere in Yugoslavia, and Ratchett is found dead in his locked compartment, stabbed many times over.

With the train stranded and no police able to reach it, Monsieur Bouc asks Poirot to investigate, assisted by Dr Constantine, a Greek doctor travelling in the same coach. The medical evidence is strange from the start: twelve wounds, some shallow and some deep, some apparently struck left-handed and some right-handed, and at least a few inflicted after death. A woman's handkerchief embroidered with the letter H and a pipe cleaner are found in the compartment; the window is open although there are no tracks in the snow outside; and a watch in the dead man's pyjama pocket is smashed and stopped at a quarter past one. Among the burnt papers in the ashtray Poirot recovers a charred fragment reading that someone should remember little Daisy Armstrong. The name identifies the dead man as Cassetti, who kidnapped and killed the Armstrongs' three-year-old daughter in America and escaped conviction on a technical point. The crime destroyed the whole household: Daisy's mother died in childbirth from the shock, her father shot himself, and a French nursemaid suspected by the police threw herself from a window and was afterwards proved innocent.

Poirot interviews the passengers in turn in the restaurant car. The conductor, Pierre Michel, accounts for his night in the corridor. MacQueen admits disliking his employer and knew nothing of his real name. Mrs Hubbard insists that a man was in her compartment in the dark and that the communicating door to Ratchett's compartment was unbolted. The Swedish nurse and the valet supply each other with alibis, as do others in convenient pairs, so that nearly every passenger is vouched for by somebody. Princess Dragomiroff answers with contemptuous frankness and mentions that she was a friend of the Armstrong family, and that Mrs Armstrong's mother was the American actress Linda Arden. The Andrenyis, travelling on a diplomatic passport, say very little. Colonel Arbuthnot denies smoking anything but a pipe and refuses to gossip about Miss Debenham. A button from a sleeping-car conductor's uniform is found in Mrs Hubbard's compartment, and a small dark man with a womanish voice, in such a uniform, begins to appear in several accounts.

The remaining interviews add more contradictions than clarity. Hardman admits that he is not a typewriter-ribbon salesman but a private detective, hired by Ratchett himself to watch for the small dark man. Foscarelli talks freely and reveals that he has lived long in America. Mary Debenham is questioned about a remark Poirot overheard on the Taurus Express and declines to explain it. Hildegarde Schmidt gives her evidence in obvious fear. Poirot then examines the passengers' luggage. The murder weapon, a cheap dagger, is found in Mrs Hubbard's sponge bag; a conductor's uniform tunic with a button missing turns up in the German maid's case; and the scarlet kimono is discovered folded neatly in Poirot's own suitcase, put there by somebody who wanted him to understand that he was being played with. Every alibi holds and every piece of physical evidence contradicts another.

Poirot sits back and thinks. He draws up a list of the suspicious points and puts ten questions to Bouc and Constantine, among them why the watch was smashed at a time that suits nobody, why so much evidence should point in so many directions at once, and why a coach full of strangers of every nationality should be travelling together in the dead of winter. He notices a grease spot smeared across the Christian name on the Hungarian diplomatic passport, and reasons that the initial beneath it has been altered from an H, the same letter as on the handkerchief. He extracts from Princess Dragomiroff the fact that the Armstrongs' surviving relative, Mrs Armstrong's younger sister, was named Helena. Poirot begins to test the passengers' stated identities against the household of the Armstrong tragedy, and finds that the connections multiply rather than stop.

Poirot assembles everyone and shows that every passenger in the coach belonged to the Armstrong household or its circle. Mrs Hubbard is Linda Arden, the dead child's grandmother; the Countess Andrenyi is Daisy's aunt, her passport altered by her husband to conceal it; Mary Debenham was the governess and Greta Ohlsson the child's nurse; Princess Dragomiroff was godmother to Daisy's mother; Hildegarde Schmidt was the family's cook and Masterman the colonel's soldier servant; Foscarelli was their chauffeur; Arbuthnot was Armstrong's friend in the war; MacQueen was the son of the prosecuting attorney; Hardman was in love with the nursemaid who killed herself; and Pierre Michel, the conductor, was her father. Twelve of them stabbed Ratchett once each in the darkened compartment, so that no one could know which blow killed him, a jury carrying out the sentence the law had failed to pass. The contradictory clues, the mysterious woman in the kimono and the stranger in uniform were manufactured to support a story about an outsider who boarded and vanished. Poirot offers Monsieur Bouc and Dr Constantine two solutions: that outsider, or the truth. They accept the first, and Poirot declares his part in the case finished as the line is cleared and the train moves on.

Poirot works out that every passenger in the Istanbul to Calais coach is connected to the Armstrong household. Mrs Hubbard is the actress Linda Arden, Daisy Armstrong's grandmother; the Countess Andrenyi is Daisy's aunt, and her husband altered her passport to hide it; Mary Debenham was the child's governess and Greta Ohlsson her nurse; Princess Dragomiroff was godmother to Daisy's mother; Hildegarde Schmidt was the family's cook and Masterman Colonel Armstrong's soldier servant; Foscarelli was their chauffeur; Colonel Arbuthnot was Armstrong's friend from the war; MacQueen was the son of the district attorney who prosecuted the case; Hardman was a detective in love with the accused nursemaid; and Pierre Michel, the conductor, was her father. Twelve of them stabbed Ratchett once each, in the dark, so that none could know whose blow was fatal, a jury carrying out the sentence the courts never delivered. The confusing evidence, the varying wounds, the smashed watch, the woman in the scarlet kimono and the stranger in a conductor's uniform were all planted to support a story about an outsider. Poirot lays two solutions before Monsieur Bouc and Dr Constantine: an unknown assassin who boarded at the stop and left again, or the truth. They choose the first, and Poirot says that having offered his solutions he takes his leave of the case. The snowplough clears the line and the train goes on with the Yugoslav police to be given the convenient explanation.