Visiting the house on the pretence of buying it, Poirot discovers a nail covered with varnish at the top of the stairs, deducing a string had been tied to it. Seeking to investigate Miss Arundell's belief that someone wanted to murder her, Poirot, accompanied by Captain Hastings, notes that under her previous will, her nephew and nieces - Charles Arundell, Theresa Arundell and Bella Tanios - would have inherited. While recovering from her earlier fall, a new will she made bequeaths her vast fortune and home to her companion, Miss Minnie Lawson. When Poirot receives the letter, he learns she has already died her doctor, Dr Grainger, states her death was from chronic liver problems. However, her family and household believe she actually fell by accident, after tripping over a ball left by her fox terrier Bob. Plot summary Įmily Arundell, a wealthy spinster, writes to Hercule Poirot in the belief she has been the victim of attempted murder after a fall in her home in Berkshire.
A review in 1990 found this novel to be not very interesting, with obvious clues. The Scotsman felt the author deserved "full marks" for this novel. The author does "this sort of thing so superlatively well", while The Times in London questioned one of the actions by the murderer: "who would use hammer and nails and varnish in the middle of the night" near an open bedroom door? In the New York Times, this novel was not considered Mrs Christie's best, but "she has produced a much-better-than-average thriller nevertheless", which is a view shared by "Torquemada" ( Edward Powys Mathers), who called this "the least of all the Poirot books" and then concluded "Still, better a bad Christie than a good average." By contrast, Mary Dell considered this novel to be Mrs Christie at her best. Reviews of this novel at publication in 1937 were generally positive, though several pointed out what they considered to be plot weaknesses. It is the last book to feature the character of Hastings until the final Poirot novel, 1975's Curtain: Poirot's Last Case, which he also narrates. The book features the Belgian detective Hercule Poirot and is narrated by his friend Arthur Hastings. The UK edition retailed at seven shillings and sixpence (7/6) and the US edition at $2.00. Dumb Witness is a detective fiction novel by British writer Agatha Christie, first published in the UK by the Collins Crime Club on 5 July 1937 and in the US by Dodd, Mead and Company later in the same year under the title of Poirot Loses a Client.
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