Fact1: body have been thrown off train near grounds of Ackenthorpe Hall, Fact2: Marple copes with difficult employer Luther Ackenthorpe and searches for missing corpse Wheedling way into job as housemaid there, Fact3: family fortune go to long-suffering attentive daughter Emma Harold and Albert and Alexander, Fact4: Edmund was killed in war, Fact5: young acquaintance of Marple in is sent to pose as house-keeper at suspect location original story
Output: While traveling by rail, Miss Marple witnesses the strangling of a young woman in the carriage of an overtaking train. The local police can find no evidence to support her story, so she conducts her own investigation and, with the aid of her close friend Jim Stringer Stringer Davis, comes to the conclusion that the body must have been thrown off the train near the grounds of Ackenthorpe Hall, which adjoins the railway line. Wheedling her way into a job as housemaid there, Marple copes with her difficult employer, Luther Ackenthorpe James Robertson Justice, and searches for the missing corpse. She eventually finds it concealed in a stable, much to the chagrin of Police Inspector Craddock Bud Tingwell. Miss Marple has Mr. Stringer uncover the details of Ackenthorpes will: The family fortune will go to his longsuffering, attentive daughter Emma, sons Cedric, Harold and Albert, and grandson Alexander. A fourth son, Edmund, was killed in the war. Also, Dr. Quimper Arthur Kennedy, Ackenthorpes physician, and Emma are secretly in love. Gardener Hillman and parttime servant Mrs. Kidder Joan Hickson round out the establishment and suspects. Alexander finds the first clue, a musical compact which plays Frere Jacques, near where the body must have landed. When Emma reveals that she recently received a letter from a French woman named Martine, who claimed that she had married Edmund shortly before he died and is therefore an heir, the identity of the dead woman and the motive for the crime seems clear. Arsenic in the curry duck prepared by Miss Marple sickens all who eat it, but only Albert succumbs. Then Harold dies by his own shotgun. The police are unsure if it was suicide by a remorseful murderer or the third victim. Miss Marple, however, is not deceived, and sets a trap, using the compact as bait. Dr. Quimper is revealed to be the villain. The dead woman was not Martine at all, but his wife. Quimper feared that the compact, a gift to his wife, could be traced to him. He intended to dispose of the other heirs and marry Emma. He administered a second, fatal dose of arsenic while supposedly attending to Albert. In Christies original story, elderly Elspeth McGillicuddy witnessed the murder, not her friend Miss Marple, who was introduced later. Also, in the original story, a young acquaintance of Marple is sent to pose as a housekeeper at the suspect location, not Marple herself. As with most of her portrayals of Miss Marple, Rutherfords interpretation was quite different from Christies languid, passive depiction. The tone of the novel also was changed somewhat; instead of Christies trademark suspense and underlying darkness, the film relied heavily on light, even whimsical comedy of manners. The name of the manor house where Marple conducts her inquiries was called Rutherford Hall in the novel, and was changed to Ackenthorpe Hall in the film to avoid comparison with the leading actresss surname. Crackenthorpe, the family name in the novel, was shortened to Ackenthorpe.