page_title: Murder on the Orient Express
section_title: Plot
hierarchical_section_title: Murder on the Orient Express / Plot
caption_attribution_description: Paneuropean koridor 10, on a snowy day. In the distance the track split is: left -&gt; towards Tovarnik (and not visible: Otok, Brčko), right (not fully visible) -&gt; Osijek, Vukovar(Borovo Naselje, Dalj)
context_page_description: Murder on the Orient Express is a detective novel by English writer Agatha Christie featuring the Belgian detective Hercule Poirot. It was first published in the United Kingdom by the Collins Crime Club on 1 January 1934. In the United States, it was published on 28 February 1934, under the title of Murder in the Calais Coach, by Dodd, Mead and Company. The UK edition retailed at seven shillings and sixpence and the US edition at $2.
  The elegant train of the 1930s, the Orient Express, is stopped by heavy snowfall. A murder is discovered, and Poirot's trip home to London from the Middle East is interrupted to solve the murder.
  The US title of Murder in the Calais Coach was used to avoid confusion with the 1932 Graham Greene novel Stamboul Train, which had been published in the United States as Orient Express.
context_section_description: After taking the Taurus Express from Aleppo in Syria to Istanbul, private detective Hercule Poirot arrives at the Tokatlian Hotel. There he receives a telegram prompting him to return to London. He instructs the concierge to book him a first-class compartment on the Simplon-route Orient Express service leaving that night. Although the train is fully booked, Poirot obtains a second-class berth through the intervention of a friend and fellow Belgian who is also boarding the train, Monsieur Bouc, a director of the railway, Compagnie Internationale des Wagons-Lits.
  A brash and vulgar American businessman named Ratchett is aboard the train with his personal secretary and translator, Hector McQueen. Once Poirot is recognized as the famous detective, Ratchett approaches him and asks if he will act as his protector as Ratchett has been receiving death threats. Poirot, repulsed by Mr. Ratchett, refuses the case. M. Bouc has taken the last first-class cabin, but arranges to be moved to a separate coach and gives Poirot his space. The first night Poirot sleeps in first class, he observes some strange occurrences. Early in the morning, he is awakened by a cry from Ratchett's compartment next door. The conductor knocks on Ratchett's door, but a voice from inside responds, "Ce n'est rien. Je me suis trompé" (It is nothing. I was mistaken). Poirot has difficulty sleeping because there is a peculiar silence on the train. Mrs. Hubbard rings her bell and tells the conductor there is a man in her room. Poirot rings his bell for water, and the conductor informs him that the train is stuck in a snowbank before he hears a loud thump next door.
  The next morning, the train is still stopped and M. Bouc informs Poirot that Ratchett has been murdered and the murderer is still aboard. Poirot tells M. Bouc he will investigate the case. He first examines Ratchett's body and compartment. He discovers the following: the body has 12 stab wounds, the window had been left open, presumably to trick the investigators into thinking the murderer escaped, even though there are no footprints in the snow, a handkerchief with the initial 'H', a pipe cleaner, a round match different from the matches Ratchett used, and a charred piece of paper with the name 'Armstrong' on it.
  The piece of paper helps Poirot work out who Ratchett really is and why someone would want to murder him. A few years earlier, a man named Cassetti kidnapped a three-year-old, Daisy Armstrong. Cassetti collected a ransom from the wealthy Armstrong family, but killed the child within two hours of kidnapping her. Poirot concludes that 'Ratchett' was actually Cassetti. The voice in Ratchett's compartment could not have been the American's, since Ratchett/Cassetti does not speak French.
  Poirot begins the interviews, starting with the conductor, then Hector McQueen. Poirot knows that McQueen is involved with the case because he knows about the Armstrong note. Hector is surprised that Poirot found it because he thought it had been destroyed. Poirot then interviews Masterman and Mrs. Hubbard, who claims that the murderer was in her cabin. All of the passengers give Poirot suitable alibis during their interviews, although a few suspicious elements are brought to light: several passengers observed a woman in a red kimono walking down the hallway on the night of the murder, but no one admits to owning a red kimono. Mrs. Hubbard tells Poirot she had Greta Ohlsson lock the communicating door between her compartment and Ratchett's. Hildegarde Schmidt bumped into a stranger wearing a Wagons-Lits uniform blazer.
  Poirot checks all of the passengers' luggage, during which he is surprised by several things: the label on Countess Andrenyi's luggage is wet, a Wagons-Lits uniform is found in Hildegarde Schmidt's bag, and the red kimono is found in his own luggage.
  Following the luggage check, Poirot, Dr. Constantine, and M. Bouc review the facts of the case and develop a list of questions. With the evidence and questions in mind, Poirot sits and thinks about the case, going into a trance-like state. When he surfac
caption: The railway station passenger terminal in Vinkovci, Croatia
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