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Main characters: Hercule Poirot
Carla Lemarchant
Philip Blake
Meredith Blake
Lady Dittisham = Elsa Greer
Cecilia Williams
Angela Warren
A young woman, Carla Lemarchant, comes to England to ask Hercule Poirot to investigate a murder that took place sixteen years ago. Her father, Amyas Crale, had been poisoned, and her mother, Caroline Crale, was tried and convicted for the murder and died in prison. But she wrote a letter to Carla telling her that she was not guilty and Carla had got that letter when she turned twenty-one. But now she is engaged to be married and wants her husband to know that she is not the daughter of a murderess.
That's why she asks Poirot to roll up the case again and to find the real murderer. Poirot starts his investigations at the Counsel for the Defence and the Prosecution. There he is getting information about the lifestyle of Amyas Crale. Hercule gets to know that Mr. Crale was an excellent painter, who had some affairs with young girls, which Mrs. Crale disliked very much. The stormy affairs blew over very fast, but there were rows all right between the couple. But he always came back to her in the end.
The detective also asks the solicitors and the Police Superintendent. Everybody tells him that it was unbelievable for them that Mrs. Crale could poison her husband, but who else could it be and for what motive?
After visiting all the other persons who had been in to the crime he gets more information about the case.
Philip Blake, for example, didn't like Mrs. Crale and so he thinks that she was the murderer.
Meredith Blake, his brother, feels guilty, because the poison was from his chemistry lab, where someone had stolen it the day before the crime.
Lady Dittisham, whose name was Elsa Greer sixteen years ago, loved Amyas Crale and wanted to marry him. Mrs. Crale knew that Elsa was her husbands mistress and so Lady Dittisham thinks that she had killed him, because she would never give him up to Mrs. Greer.
Cecilia Williams, the governess of Mrs. Crales younger sister, had always admired Mrs. Crale, because she knew about the affairs and didn't say anything about it. She loved the strong woman.
Angela Warren, cannot believe that her sister, Mrs. Crale was the murderess. She was always so friendly and helpful towards her.
Hercule Poirot asks everyone to write a short summary of the events and to give them to him. All of the summaries sound alike, but each one is written from a personal point of view.
Poirot visits each author of the summaries, as he wants to ask them some additional questions. On that occasion he invites them to the place of the crime in order to reveal the solution of the case. It comes to the typical reconstruction of the case, where all the persons , including Carla Lemarchant with her fiancée, gather in one room, where Hercule starts:
Elsa Greer was just a victim of Mr. Crale's egoism, because he never loved her. He told his wife about that the day he was murdered. By coincidence Elsa Greer could hear everything; that is why she poisoned her lover. Mrs. Crale didn't know this and accused her sister of the murder, especially that one day before the murder witnessed an argument between her husband and Angela.
Now that the case is solved Carla Lemarchant and her boyfriend can get married.
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