Dumb Witness

Yep, another Hercule Poirot mystery (in case it can't be told, I love them).

Hercule gets a letter from a woman dated 2 months prior, asking for his help because things don't feel right. She had recently taken a fall, and grown suspicious of her nieces/nephew. That had also lead to a change in the will...

Hercule & Captain Hastings go to investigate, learning that she had passed away over a month ago. Her will had caused a lot of troubles... as she had given nothing to her family and everything to the lady that lived with her. The family was considering going to court over the will.

Hercule, as always, wants to know what happened once he gets involved. Was she killed? Everyone had a motive... they needed money.

There's the niece who married a Greek guy, and wanted money so that she could send her kids to a nice school in England. There was her husband, a doctor that had quickly burnt through all the money she had gotten from her parents.

There's the other niece, who always wants the best of everything and has run through most of the money she got. She's in love with a guy who needs money to start up his own practice.

There's the nephew, who was the first to ask her (the now dead woman) for money, and who (she suspected) had already stolen some money from her.

Others close by included the lady she lived with (who had nothing to gain from the 1st will), the servant & cook and the doctor that was treating her.

Hercule was quickly on the case. Who tried to kill her with the fall? Had her death been natural, or was their even more foul play? And as is always the worry... will there be more deaths?

I much preferred this to Five Little Pigs, even though again, there's very little to help you try & figure it out. Like Five Little Pigs, it's mostly just Q&A; very little of the action or the questioning of many people (only 6 or so here). Maybe my expectations are too high... hoping for another classic like The Murder Of Roger Ackroyd... something that I'm not likely to find.