05x01 - The Adventure of the Egyptian Tomb
Posted: 01/09/23 07:05
- The pyramids of Egypt,
the last surviving of
the seven wonders of the world.
The latest expedition by famous
archaeologist Sir John Willard
may soon reveal more of this
ancient world's mysteries
with the discovery of the tomb
of Egyptian king Men-her-Ra.
No doubt there will be rivalry
between Dr. Fosswell
of the British Museum
and Dr. Schneider
of the Metropolitan Museum
of New York,
but keep it friendly,
eh, chaps?
The local workers
fear of a death curse
laid down on the tomb
over 3,000 years ago.
Hasn't scared off expedition
financier Felix Bleibner.
He's been joined for the opening
by his nephew Rupert
and secretary Nigel Harper,
photographing the occasion.
Smile, Men-her-Ra.
- It's gonna take us some time
to get the seal off intact,
Sir John.
- No, no, no.
Break the seal.
- It'll only take five minutes,
John.
- For God's sake, Mr. Bleibner--
- That seal hasn't been broken
for over 3,000 years.
- Then it's time it was.
Gentlemen,
the burial chamber
of King Men-her-Ra.
- Dr. Ames, quickly.
He's ill.
- Tragedy strikes
in the Valley of the Kings.
Just minutes after
breaking into the ancient tomb
of Egyptian pharaoh Men-her-Ra,
eminent archaeologist
Sir John Willard is struck down
by a fatal heart attack.
Local rumors of an ancient curse
on all those who enter the tomb
have been dismissed
as preposterous.
- Any messages, Miss Lemon?
- No, Mr. Poirot.
No.
Oh, yes.
One.
Lady Willard telephoned.
She wants to consult you.
- Huh.
- I know.
Isn't it awful?
Does seem almost as if
something were avenging itself
for desecrating the tomb.
- Bonjour, mademoiselle.
I am expected.
- Do come in.
- Thank you.
Merci.
- My son has always been against
my calling on your assistance,
Monsieur Poirot.
He thinks I'm listening to all
this silly talk about a curse.
But my husband's death came
as a very great shock to me.
- Yes, of course.
- And now my son wishes
to go out to Egypt
to continue his father's work.
I cannot tell you why,
Monsieur Poirot.
This whole enterprise
has filled me with foreboding.
It's all those Americans,
all those young men from Yale.
Seems they've been trying
to take over the dig
right from the start.
- Mother, really.
Mr. Bleibner put up the money
for the entire show,
and without him,
there wouldn't be any dig.
- Well, I never trusted
Felix Bleibner.
He's just a wealthy dabbler.
I see he's got his nephew up
in there too.
- Rupert's only there
to visit his uncle.
- Excuse me, Lady Willard,
how may I be of service to you?
I imagine that there is no doubt
that the death of your husband
was from the causes
quite natural.
- Well...
- No doubt at all.
I'm so sorry.
It appears we've
wasted your time,
Mr. Poirot.
- I gave him
a thorough examination
before we came out here.
His heart was sound as a bell.
It is weird, though, isn't it?
I mean, just the very instant
the burial chamber was opened?
- Well, I don't care about
any rotten curse.
I'm off to New York on Thursday.
- When's the happy day?
- 14th of next month,
unless Bob saves my life again.
- He really did save
my life once, you know?
- No kidding?
- I can save you
from poor seamanship, Rupert,
but I'm no good
on impending marriages.
- You three were together
at Yale, right?
- God, does that seem
an age ago.
- Who's going to take over
the excavation, do you think?
- Well, that kind of depends
on your uncle.
He is the money.
- Do I get the impression
that Dr. Fosswell
would not be averse?
- Sure, the British Museum
has got to be in the running.
- And what about
the Metropolitan?
- Oh, modesty forbids.
- Isn't it time
you people were in bed?
- Won't you join us, Uncle?
- Oh, no.
I just can't sleep.
Could you have a look
at this thumb in the morning?
- I'll have a look at it right
now if you like, Mr. Bleibner,
before I go to bed.
- It's, um...
that cut I got the other day.
- Okay.
Good night, gentlemen.
- Miss Lemon, if you please,
would you come through
for a moment
with your notepad and pencil?
I want that you send a telegram
to the Assistant Commissioner
Bergman
in the police department
of New York.
Please supply all available
biographical material
on Monsieur Rupert Bleibner,
nephew to the wealthy
Monsieur Felix Bleibner.
Best wishes, Hercule Poirot.
- I could say "biog."
- Comment?
- Instead of "biographical,"
I could say "biog."
- Is that a word, Miss Lemon?
- It sounds efficient.
I heard someone say it
in a picture.
"Give me the biog on
Dutch Schultz, Miss Longfellow."
- "Biographical material"
will do very nicely, thank you,
Miss Lemon.
- Oh.
- What is it, Miss Lemon?
- There's no need for you
to cable
Assistant Commissioner Bergman.
- Why is that, Miss Lemon?
- You can cable
Captain Hastings instead.
- But Captain Hastings,
he is in California, Miss Lemon.
- No, he's on his way back.
He's staying in New York
until Friday.
- Who is it?
- Oh.
It's Arthur Hastings, actually.
- Who?
- Arthur Hastings.
I'm a friend of your uncle's.
Well, more of an acquaintance,
really.
He said I should look you up.
- Uncle Felix?
- Yes.
You went out to Egypt
to visit him recently, I gather.
- How do you know him?
- How?
Oh, well, just as one does,
you know.
Just socially.
How did you find it out there?
Egypt, I mean.
- Hot.
Look, Mr. Hastings,
I guess I'm not feeling
all that sociable today.
- Oh, no, no, no, no, no.
I quite understand.
Good-bye.
- Nice to meet you.
Look in again sometime.
- Thank you.
Yes, I'll have tea and porridge
and bacon and eggs, please.
- Eggs over easy?
- Uh, no.
The other.
- Two eggs, sunny side up.
Canadian bacon?
- Oh, uh, yes.
Thank you.
Good Lord.
- Felix Bleibner is dead?
- He died three days ago.
I'm sorry.
I thought you already knew.
It was horrible,
the most horrible death.
He was blind at the end.
- Where's the doctor, Dr. Ames?
- I'll take you to him.
- Now, mind the legs.
Mind the legs!
- Wouldn't it be better
to wrap it?
- No.
No, no, I don't think so.
It's better they be able
to see what they're moving.
- Oh, Dr. Ames,
can I trouble you for a moment?
This is Sir Guy Willard,
Sir John's son.
- Dr. Ames, how do you do?
- Hello.
- And this is Mr. Harper.
- How do you do?
- And Dr. Schneider.
- Dr. Schneider.
- Hi.
- Sir Guy has come to
take charge of the excavation.
- Dr. Ames, I'm devastated
by the news of Mr. Bleibner.
- It was septicemia.
- Yes, but how did it start?
- A scratch on his thumb.
Nothing we could do
seemed to stop it.
Dr. Ames amputated his left arm
last week, but--
- Amputated?
Why was I not informed?
- Well, I--we weren't aware
you were involved.
- Well, I am involved.
The British Museum have agreed
that I should take over
the excavation.
- But surely Mr. Bleibner's
death changes the situation.
- Well, indeed it does,
Dr. Schneider.
I suggest we carry on as we are
until the wishes of
Mr. Bleibner's estate are known.
In the meantime,
perhaps you'd be good enough
to show me to my quarters,
Dr. Fosswell.
Gentlemen.
- Mr. Bleibner?
Mr. Bleibner?
- Switchboard.
- Give me the police.
- Yes, sir.
- It came as a big surprise
to everyone?
- Absolutely.
No one can understand it.
They just see no Earthly reason
why he should
have k*lled himself.
He was only 30.
- His health, it was good?
- Fit as a flea, it appears.
Something of a sportsman too,
as a matter of fact.
Played football at school,
held some sort of local record
for the 100 yards, good golfer.
Played off scratch.
- You playing the good golf
is no reason not
to commit su1c1de, Hastings.
- You just don't
understand golf, Poirot.
- What was his livelihood?
- Well, up until
about six months ago,
he'd been in Hawaii
learning the hotel business.
- Did he have
any problems emotionable?
- Oh, girls, you mean.
Good Lord, no.
He was all set to marry this
absolute corker Melanie Wise.
Then he goes and sh**t himself.
Mind you,
the first time I saw him,
he did seem very,
well, abstracted.
I mean, it was halfway through
the afternoon,
and he was still in his pajamas.
Looked as if he hadn't
washed for a week too.
Oh, and he was wearing
white gloves.
- White gloves?
- Yes, you know,
white cotton gloves.
- Did he have any problems
over money?
- None at all
as far as I could tell.
Even less
when Old Bleibner died.
The Bleibner millions
came to him.
I say, that's a point.
I wonder who
will get the money now.
Oh, he left a note, you know.
- No, Hastings.
I did not know.
- I made a copy of it.
"There is no point in going on.
"I am a leper, an outcast.
"It's better that I should
end my life now
"than bring misery
to the people I love.
Rupert Bleibner."
- I didn't think you looked too
well at breakfast, Schneider.
Does it hurt here?
- A little.
- If I move your arm like this,
does that hurt?
- No...but there's
a sort of dull ache, though,
around my shoulders
and neck all the time.
- Do you have
any trouble swallowing?
- Well, as a matter of fact,
I do.
It started a few days ago.
How'd you know that?
- Hassan.
- Oh, Dr. Ames. Yes?
- I'm going to drive to Cairo
to the British hospital.
I've got to persuade them
to give me some antitoxic serum.
- When will you be back, sir?
- Well, by Friday, I hope,
if I drive day and night.
- Be careful, sir.
- Oh, and, Hassan,
try and get through to Cairo
by telephone.
Let them know I'm on my way.
Thank you.
- It goes on, Monsieur Poirot.
First my husband.
Then Mr. Bleibner.
Then his nephew.
- Try to continue, Lady Willard.
- Suppose there is some truth
in all this talk about a curse.
- Tell me what has happened.
- Mr. Schneider
of the Metropolitan Museum
of New York,
he's very ill with tetanus.
My son just sent me
this telegram.
I'm sorry.
You must think it very silly
and superstitious.
- No, no, no.
Not at all, Lady Willard.
I also believe in the force
of superstition.
It is one of the greatest forces
that the world has ever known.
And you wish that Poirot
should protect your son
against these forces.
- Is it possible?
- But first I must allow
to do their work
the little gray cells.
- You're not pushing it,
are you?
- Of course I'm not pushing it.
What's it writing?
- I can't see.
I can't make it out.
Seems to have stopped.
- Let's see what it's written.
- Can't make it out.
- Yes.
There's a C.
That's an L.
- Well, it's not very clear.
- It's definitely trying
to say something, though.
- Perhaps it's
not writing in English.
Looks like Arabic or something.
I say.
- What?
- Suppose it's King Men-her-Ra
trying to get through?
- Miss Le--
Hastings, what means this
with the planchette?
- Oh, we're just fooling around.
It's interesting, though.
We think this could be
from King Men-her-Ra.
- Hastings, please,
pull yourself together.
We have business
to which we must attend.
Tomorrow we fly to Cairo.
- Cairo?
- In Egypt, Hastings.
- I know.
- And then
to the Valley of the Kings.
- His jaw is broken.
- Broken?
- The muscles contract so
violently, it breaks the bones.
- God.
Is there anything we can do?
- He's not responding
to the serum.
- You must be Monsieur Poirot.
- What is left of him, yes.
- I'm Leonard Fosswell,
British Museum.
- Ah, Monsieur Fosswell.
- We got Lady Willard's cable.
I'm sorry.
This isn't a good time.
Now let me show you
to your tent.
Won't mind sharing, will you?
- No, not at all.
I'm Arthur Hastings, by the way.
- Yes, Lady Willard
said you'd be coming.
Hassan will assign one of
the fellahin to look after you,
to get you hot water and so on.
- Oh, this looks fine.
Tell me, Dr. Fosswell...
Why is this not a good time?
- It's Dr. Schneider.
- He has the malady, yes?
- He's--
- Cannot stand
much more of this.
- He's not responding?
- No.
He, uh,
seems to be getting worse.
Oh, God.
- Who is it?
- That detective
my mother's so keen on.
- Sir Guy.
- Uh...
uh...he's dead.
- And you are quite sure,
are you not, Dr. Ames,
that the death of Monsieur
Schneider was caused by tetanus?
- Sure.
- It could not have been,
for instance,
a case of
the strychnine poisoning?
- Strychnine?
- No, Monsieur Poirot.
There's been no suggestion
of anything like that.
This was a clear case
of tetanus.
- Did you inject antiserum?
- Of course we did.
Every conceivable thing
that could be done was done.
- But Monsieur Bleibner now,
he died of something
completely different?
- Mr. Bleibner had a scratch
on his thumb.
It became poisoned,
and septicemia set in.
It sounds pretty much the same
to a layman, I imagine,
but the two things
are entirely different.
- You must ask us any questions
you need to, Monsieur Poirot.
We're all dumbfounded
by this series of disasters.
But it isn't any--
Can?t be anything
but coincidence.
- I see.
And you are determined, Sir Guy,
to continue
with this excavation?
- Monsieur Poirot,
no matter what happens,
my father's work is going on.
- I see.
Alors, ?videmment,
we must find out exactly
what is the position here.
- Alabaster perfume box.
Height, 7 1/2 inches.
Depth, 5 1/4 inches.
Sniff.
Ah, jasmine.
- 3,000-year-old jasmine.
- How long have you been
interested in Egyptology,
Monsieur Harper?
- Oh, ever since
I started working
as Mr. Bleibner's secretary.
I was in his college almost.
- You were at Yale
with Rupert Bleibner.
- Yes, I was there
on a Hendrickson
exchange scholarship.
Ames was with us too.
All Yalies, you see.
Class of '27.
- That is most interesting.
There are four people involved
in this expedition
who have known each other
for some considerable time.
With Dr. Ames, Rupert Bleibner,
yourself all together
at the college,
and of course the uncle
of Rupert Bleibner.
- That's right.
- Two of them are now dead.
- Are you trying
to give me the creeps?
- Tell me about Monsieur Rupert.
- I really don't understand
him doing what he did.
- When he first arrived here,
he was in good health?
Yes, I don't think he'd had
a day's real illness
his entire life.
Terrible hypochondriac, though.
Always got a lot
of little aches and pains
he was always worrying about.
- But when last you saw him,
he was not suffering?
- No, can't remember anything
in particular.
Oh, well, yes, he had
a little eczema on his hand
he was making
a great to-do about.
- Master, I must speak with you.
- Oh. Right.
Good evening.
- I served my lord Sir John,
and now I serve his son.
- Yes, quite.
- You are a wise one, they say.
- Well, you know.
- And learned in dealing
with evil spirits.
I beg of you,
let the young master
depart from here.
There is evil
in the air around us.
- Well, uh,
it's not really up to me.
You see--
- We have had four deaths,
all totally dissimilar.
One heart failure,
one poisoning,
one tetanus,
and one su1c1de.
- Exactly.
- Is there nothing which might
link together these four?
- Something they have in common?
No.
- I'm sorry, Mr. Poirot.
I don't quite understand this.
- Then, Monsieur Harper, let me
make myself perfectly clear.
Was there any act committed
by these men, these victims,
which might seem
to denote some disrespect
to the spirit
of Men-her-Ra?
- Good grief, man.
That is all rot,
as well you know.
- You're talking
through your hat.
- You do not believe that such
a thing is possible?
- No, I do not.
We're men of science, and I
believe what science teaches.
- Indeed.
Was there no science then
in ancient Egypt?
Oh, no, no, no, no, please,
do not answer, but tell me this,
the native workmen,
what do they think?
- Well, if the white folk
lose their heads,
then the natives
aren't gonna be far behind.
Yes.
Yes, I'll admit
they're getting scared,
but they've
got no cause to be.
- Excuse me, I'm--
- Ames, are you all right?
- Good heavens.
- Hassan.
Help me get him to his tent.
- Would a brandy help?
- No, I don't think so.
We'll get him to bed.
- Good Lord.
Poor fellow.
- Tell me when you want
another photograph.
- Not yet.
- Did you know, Monsieur Poirot,
that a wreath of flowers
from the funeral ceremony
was still lying
on the antechamber floor
when my father opened the tomb?
- Oh.
It is amazing, is it not,
Hastings?
- Absolutely.
- How is Dr. Ames today?
- He's still not well.
He got up today.
To tell the truth,
I'm rather worried about him.
- I think we're ready.
- Lift away then.
- Tie off.
Good God.
- He has lain here
in perfect silence
since 1,000 years
before Troy was besieged.
Rome rose and fell.
Wars and catastrophes
changed the face of the Earth.
But still, this king, he waited.
Forgotten by all those people
we read about.
Dr. Fosswell?
- Come.
- What a moment,
Dr. Fosswell, eh?
- What?
- Well, to have had
the privilege
of merely standing by
as the lid of the sarcophagus,
it was opened.
- Oh, yes.
Yes, I'm just writing it out.
- Ah, you write the reports for
the expedition, n'est-ce pas?
- For the expedition?
No, no, no, no, no.
By no means.
I daily report for the eyes
of Sir Andrew Caens only.
- Ah.
May I?
- Please.
- Thank you.
Now, Sir Andrew Caens,
he is the keeper of antiquities
at the British museum,
n'est-ce pas?
- Quite.
The others can do their own
reports, though frankly...
Well, no matter.
- And Monsieur Schneider,
when he was alive,
he would have made the reports
for the Metropolitan Museum.
- I suppose so, yes.
I mean, I don't want
to speak ill of the dead,
but it does just show
the quality
of their scholarship,
doesn't it?
When the Metropolitan
have to send out
somebody like Schneider.
Poor fellow.
The BM would never
have sent anyone
but their most senior
archaeologist.
- And the future keeper
of the antiquities perhaps.
- What?
Oh, well,
I don't know about that.
Of course, Sir Andrew is due
for retirement in two years.
And if I make a fair fist
at this, well...
- Oh, you're in bed.
- This is a work most
interesting, Hastings.
Listen to this.
"May your knives
not get hold of me.
"May my hands
not touch the poison.
"May I not fall
into your slaughterhouse,
"for I know your names,
and my heart is with Osiris."
- Look here, Poirot,
are you feeling all right?
- Perfectly, Hastings.
- I mean, you've had a lot
of sun these last few days.
You're not used to it like I am.
- I am perfectly well.
Thank you, Hastings.
Hastings, what is the matter
with Miss Lemon?
- Miss Lemon?
Nothing, as far as I know.
- Come, Hastings.
Do not do the shilly-shally
with me.
Yourself play with her
on the planchette.
- Well, I think it's her cat.
You know, the one she used
to call Catherine the Great
because it liked sleeping
in the fireplace.
- That cat, it died, did it not?
- Well, exactly.
She's fearfully cut up about it.
I think she's trying
to get in touch with it.
- Oh.
- I mean, I think it's--
- Hastings, look!
- Good God.
- "Deliver me from that god
whose face is that of a hound
"but whose skin
is that of a man,
"who liveth upon the damned,
"digesting human hearts,
voiding filth.
One seeth him not."
- Hastings, what are you doing?
- Well, I'm having my siesta.
- No, no, no, no, Hastings.
Get up.
We have work to do.
Come.
Whose tent is this, Hastings?
- Uh, Dr. Ames'.
- You must remain here on guard,
my friend,
while I make the search.
- Search?
Oh, no.
Poirot.
Well, well, well.
- I beg your pardon?
- Feeling a bit better, are you,
Dr. Ames?
- Are you waiting for me?
- No, no.
No. No.
I was waiting for Poirot,
actually.
You haven't seen him at all,
have you?
Poirot?
- Can I come past?
- What?
- I want to go to my tent.
- Oh, this is your tent, is it?
Uh, I didn't realize that.
They're very good, these tents,
aren't they?
- Please, Captain Hastings.
- Poirot,
you really are the limit.
- My God, Hastings.
The sand, it gets everywhere.
- Ames must think
I'm a complete idiot.
Plenty of sand in Belgium,
isn't there?
- Not in Brussels, Hastings.
Hello, Miss Lemon,
can you hear me?
- Yes, I found
Mr. Bleibner's solicitor.
I spoke to him.
- One moment, if you please,
Miss Lemon.
Hello?
Now you said he read
to you the will?
Bon, what did it say?
Yes. Yes.
Cigarette case, Miss Lemon?
- I think it was just a joke,
Mr. Poirot.
- I see.
Go on if you please.
Thank you, Miss Lemon.
Au revoir.
What? What?
You want some what?
All right,
but only if you're good.
- I have half a mind
to volunteer to stay,
you know, Poirot.
- What for, Hastings?
- Take up this archaeology.
Can't you feel the fascination?
Desert life,
probing into the heart
of vanished civilization.
- Thank you, Hassan.
On the table next to my bed,
if you please.
Thank you.
- Wish we were getting somewhere
with this case, though.
Sometimes I think it's not
a case at all,
just three natural deaths
and one su1c1de.
What do you think, Poirot?
You don't seem to have
any theories at all.
Do you?
- Oh, my God.
Poirot!
Dr. Ames!
It's Poirot.
Quick.
It's Poirot.
He's ill, dead, I don't know.
It's the chamomile tea.
Don't let Hassan leave the camp.
- There's still a pulse.
- What's going on?
- It's Poirot.
He's collapsed.
- Do you smell anything?
- Almonds.
- Cyanide.
- Which, fortunately,
I did not drink.
Thank you, Hastings.
While my good friend Captain
Hastings was calling for help,
I took the opportunity
of pouring the contents
from that glass...
into this little bottle.
And this little bottle will go
to the analytical chemist.
The first death need not come
into our calculations
except for one thing.
The quite natural death
of your father, Sir Guy,
was what gave
to our m*rder*r his idea.
The more deaths that occurred,
the more everyone would talk
about the curse of Men-her-Ra,
but the less everyone
would ask the proper questions.
- I'm afraid we thought you
were just as superstitious
as the rest.
- But that was my intention.
You see, I wanted
to lull the m*rder*r
into a false sense
of security until I was ready.
And in that, I was successful.
The m*rder*r thought
that one more little nudge
would send Hastings and myself
scurrying off back to England.
- Good God.
- He thought that
a cheap trick might do it.
Mais non.
I had to make him act,
and I have now done something
that has so alarmed him
that he feels he must now add me
to his roll of victims.
What is it that I have done that
has so alarmed our m*rder*r,
flushed him out,
and made him try to poison me?
Let us go back
to the first m*rder,
that of Monsieur Felix Bleibner.
- Isn't it time
you people were in bed?
- Won't you join us, Uncle?
- I asked myself
who would want
to m*rder
Monsieur Felix Bleibner.
Alors, he was a man
who was very rich,
therefore, my first assumption
would be his heir and nephew,
Monsieur Rupert Bleibner.
Mais non.
Monsieur Rupert Bleibner
committed a su1c1de
even before he heard
of the death of his uncle,
and so my next question was,
why should
Monsieur Rupert Bleibner wish
to take his own life?
Alors, he was a man who
was young, happy, successful.
He had no thought of death.
He had not even
made a proper will.
- I could never
understand him doing it.
- And yet, Dr. Fosswell, he told
to us the reasons quite plainly
and precisely in a note
that he left,
so plainly indeed
that we thought
we was speaking metaphorically.
He wrote, did he not...
- "I am a leper and an outcast.
"It's better
that I should end my life now
than bring misery
to the people I love."
- On the threshold of marriage
and a life that was happy
and successful,
Monsieur Rupert Bleibner
believed that he was doomed.
He believed he had leprosy.
During his last days, he even
took to wearing the white gloves
to hide the first unsightly
signs of the disease.
- But why should he think
he had leprosy?
- Because, Hastings,
it was told to him that he had,
and he had every good reason
to believe it.
For some time,
he had been living in Hawaii
where the disease,
it is endemic.
And while in Hawaii,
he would have come across
chaulmoogra oil.
Now, he may not have heard
of the more modern dr*gs
that have now superseded it,
but he would definitely have
come across chaulmoogra oil.
- What is this chaulmoogra oil?
- Chaulmoogra oil, Hastings,
was once the only treatment
for leprosy.
But in this case, it was used
merely as the window dressing
to convince Rupert Bleibner
of his condition.
- But how do you know that?
- I know that, Hastings,
because I have stolen
some chaulmoogra oil
from the m*rder*r.
Hercule Poirot
has discovered his secret.
- What secret?
What is all this?
Monsieur Rupert Bleibner
went to Dr. Ames
with a mild case of eczema,
and Dr. Ames
diagnosed leprosy.
And pauvre
Monsieur Rupert Bleibner
saw no way out but death.
- This is nonsense.
I mean, why would
I want Rupert to k*ll himself?
He was my friend.
We were at college together.
- In the possession
of the lawyers
of Monsieur Rupert Bleibner
is a sheet of paper.
It is old. It is creased.
Probably written on
while at college
during some fit
of a drunken merriment,
but the handwriting is that
of Monsieur Rupert Bleibner.
It reads as follows.
"This is the last will and
testament of Rupert Bleibner.
"I leave my cigarette case
which he admires so much
"and all
of which I die possessed
"to my good friend
Robert Ames
who once saved my life
from drowning."
You see, Dr. Ames,
you knew that on the death
of Monsieur Felix Bleibner,
his fortune in entirety
would go to his heir and nephew,
Monsieur Rupert Bleibner,
but were Monsieur
Rupert Bleibner to die...
- All right.
Now, keep back, all of you.
Get off.
Let me go!
- You have already three deaths
on your head, Dr. Ames.
Is that not enough?
- But Dr. Ames
did not k*ll my husband.
- No, Lady Willard.
The death of your husband
Sir John
was from the causes
quite natural.
You see, the only deaths
that interested Dr. Ames
were those
of Monsieur Felix Bleibner,
who perished from septicemia
introduced into his cut hand
by Dr. Ames himself,
and Monsieur Rupert Bleibner,
who Dr. Ames drove to su1c1de
by convincing him
that he suffers
from the leprosy.
- And Dr. Schneider.
- Indeed.
Dr. Ames injected
poor Henry Schneider
with tetanus bacillus
merely to lend strength
to the curse of Men-her-Ra.
- I think you've been
wonderfully clever.
- Good-bye, sir.
- Sir Guy.
- I return to the Valley
of the Kings tomorrow.
- This time with my blessing.
- Bonjour.
- Yes, well then.
- Au revoir.
Miss Lemon, would you
come through for a moment?
Miss Lemon, in addition
to serving this case
that has been most difficult,
Hastings and I,
we have brought you back
a little gift
from the very tomb
of King Men-her-Ra.
- From the tomb?
- Oui.
Voil?.
It is the very likeness
of the favorite cat
of King Men-her-Ra
buried with him in his tomb
to keep him company
on his long journey.
- Oh, he's beautiful.
- Go to bed this evening
with him in your hand
and Catherine the Great
will visit you during the night.
- Oh, Mr. Poirot, thank you.
- I don't know how you can
tell her such guff, Poirot.
- No, no, no, no, no, Hastings.
It is not a guff.
It is, as I said
at the beginning of this case
to Lady Willard,
the power of superstition.
It is a power
that that is very great indeed.
the last surviving of
the seven wonders of the world.
The latest expedition by famous
archaeologist Sir John Willard
may soon reveal more of this
ancient world's mysteries
with the discovery of the tomb
of Egyptian king Men-her-Ra.
No doubt there will be rivalry
between Dr. Fosswell
of the British Museum
and Dr. Schneider
of the Metropolitan Museum
of New York,
but keep it friendly,
eh, chaps?
The local workers
fear of a death curse
laid down on the tomb
over 3,000 years ago.
Hasn't scared off expedition
financier Felix Bleibner.
He's been joined for the opening
by his nephew Rupert
and secretary Nigel Harper,
photographing the occasion.
Smile, Men-her-Ra.
- It's gonna take us some time
to get the seal off intact,
Sir John.
- No, no, no.
Break the seal.
- It'll only take five minutes,
John.
- For God's sake, Mr. Bleibner--
- That seal hasn't been broken
for over 3,000 years.
- Then it's time it was.
Gentlemen,
the burial chamber
of King Men-her-Ra.
- Dr. Ames, quickly.
He's ill.
- Tragedy strikes
in the Valley of the Kings.
Just minutes after
breaking into the ancient tomb
of Egyptian pharaoh Men-her-Ra,
eminent archaeologist
Sir John Willard is struck down
by a fatal heart attack.
Local rumors of an ancient curse
on all those who enter the tomb
have been dismissed
as preposterous.
- Any messages, Miss Lemon?
- No, Mr. Poirot.
No.
Oh, yes.
One.
Lady Willard telephoned.
She wants to consult you.
- Huh.
- I know.
Isn't it awful?
Does seem almost as if
something were avenging itself
for desecrating the tomb.
- Bonjour, mademoiselle.
I am expected.
- Do come in.
- Thank you.
Merci.
- My son has always been against
my calling on your assistance,
Monsieur Poirot.
He thinks I'm listening to all
this silly talk about a curse.
But my husband's death came
as a very great shock to me.
- Yes, of course.
- And now my son wishes
to go out to Egypt
to continue his father's work.
I cannot tell you why,
Monsieur Poirot.
This whole enterprise
has filled me with foreboding.
It's all those Americans,
all those young men from Yale.
Seems they've been trying
to take over the dig
right from the start.
- Mother, really.
Mr. Bleibner put up the money
for the entire show,
and without him,
there wouldn't be any dig.
- Well, I never trusted
Felix Bleibner.
He's just a wealthy dabbler.
I see he's got his nephew up
in there too.
- Rupert's only there
to visit his uncle.
- Excuse me, Lady Willard,
how may I be of service to you?
I imagine that there is no doubt
that the death of your husband
was from the causes
quite natural.
- Well...
- No doubt at all.
I'm so sorry.
It appears we've
wasted your time,
Mr. Poirot.
- I gave him
a thorough examination
before we came out here.
His heart was sound as a bell.
It is weird, though, isn't it?
I mean, just the very instant
the burial chamber was opened?
- Well, I don't care about
any rotten curse.
I'm off to New York on Thursday.
- When's the happy day?
- 14th of next month,
unless Bob saves my life again.
- He really did save
my life once, you know?
- No kidding?
- I can save you
from poor seamanship, Rupert,
but I'm no good
on impending marriages.
- You three were together
at Yale, right?
- God, does that seem
an age ago.
- Who's going to take over
the excavation, do you think?
- Well, that kind of depends
on your uncle.
He is the money.
- Do I get the impression
that Dr. Fosswell
would not be averse?
- Sure, the British Museum
has got to be in the running.
- And what about
the Metropolitan?
- Oh, modesty forbids.
- Isn't it time
you people were in bed?
- Won't you join us, Uncle?
- Oh, no.
I just can't sleep.
Could you have a look
at this thumb in the morning?
- I'll have a look at it right
now if you like, Mr. Bleibner,
before I go to bed.
- It's, um...
that cut I got the other day.
- Okay.
Good night, gentlemen.
- Miss Lemon, if you please,
would you come through
for a moment
with your notepad and pencil?
I want that you send a telegram
to the Assistant Commissioner
Bergman
in the police department
of New York.
Please supply all available
biographical material
on Monsieur Rupert Bleibner,
nephew to the wealthy
Monsieur Felix Bleibner.
Best wishes, Hercule Poirot.
- I could say "biog."
- Comment?
- Instead of "biographical,"
I could say "biog."
- Is that a word, Miss Lemon?
- It sounds efficient.
I heard someone say it
in a picture.
"Give me the biog on
Dutch Schultz, Miss Longfellow."
- "Biographical material"
will do very nicely, thank you,
Miss Lemon.
- Oh.
- What is it, Miss Lemon?
- There's no need for you
to cable
Assistant Commissioner Bergman.
- Why is that, Miss Lemon?
- You can cable
Captain Hastings instead.
- But Captain Hastings,
he is in California, Miss Lemon.
- No, he's on his way back.
He's staying in New York
until Friday.
- Who is it?
- Oh.
It's Arthur Hastings, actually.
- Who?
- Arthur Hastings.
I'm a friend of your uncle's.
Well, more of an acquaintance,
really.
He said I should look you up.
- Uncle Felix?
- Yes.
You went out to Egypt
to visit him recently, I gather.
- How do you know him?
- How?
Oh, well, just as one does,
you know.
Just socially.
How did you find it out there?
Egypt, I mean.
- Hot.
Look, Mr. Hastings,
I guess I'm not feeling
all that sociable today.
- Oh, no, no, no, no, no.
I quite understand.
Good-bye.
- Nice to meet you.
Look in again sometime.
- Thank you.
Yes, I'll have tea and porridge
and bacon and eggs, please.
- Eggs over easy?
- Uh, no.
The other.
- Two eggs, sunny side up.
Canadian bacon?
- Oh, uh, yes.
Thank you.
Good Lord.
- Felix Bleibner is dead?
- He died three days ago.
I'm sorry.
I thought you already knew.
It was horrible,
the most horrible death.
He was blind at the end.
- Where's the doctor, Dr. Ames?
- I'll take you to him.
- Now, mind the legs.
Mind the legs!
- Wouldn't it be better
to wrap it?
- No.
No, no, I don't think so.
It's better they be able
to see what they're moving.
- Oh, Dr. Ames,
can I trouble you for a moment?
This is Sir Guy Willard,
Sir John's son.
- Dr. Ames, how do you do?
- Hello.
- And this is Mr. Harper.
- How do you do?
- And Dr. Schneider.
- Dr. Schneider.
- Hi.
- Sir Guy has come to
take charge of the excavation.
- Dr. Ames, I'm devastated
by the news of Mr. Bleibner.
- It was septicemia.
- Yes, but how did it start?
- A scratch on his thumb.
Nothing we could do
seemed to stop it.
Dr. Ames amputated his left arm
last week, but--
- Amputated?
Why was I not informed?
- Well, I--we weren't aware
you were involved.
- Well, I am involved.
The British Museum have agreed
that I should take over
the excavation.
- But surely Mr. Bleibner's
death changes the situation.
- Well, indeed it does,
Dr. Schneider.
I suggest we carry on as we are
until the wishes of
Mr. Bleibner's estate are known.
In the meantime,
perhaps you'd be good enough
to show me to my quarters,
Dr. Fosswell.
Gentlemen.
- Mr. Bleibner?
Mr. Bleibner?
- Switchboard.
- Give me the police.
- Yes, sir.
- It came as a big surprise
to everyone?
- Absolutely.
No one can understand it.
They just see no Earthly reason
why he should
have k*lled himself.
He was only 30.
- His health, it was good?
- Fit as a flea, it appears.
Something of a sportsman too,
as a matter of fact.
Played football at school,
held some sort of local record
for the 100 yards, good golfer.
Played off scratch.
- You playing the good golf
is no reason not
to commit su1c1de, Hastings.
- You just don't
understand golf, Poirot.
- What was his livelihood?
- Well, up until
about six months ago,
he'd been in Hawaii
learning the hotel business.
- Did he have
any problems emotionable?
- Oh, girls, you mean.
Good Lord, no.
He was all set to marry this
absolute corker Melanie Wise.
Then he goes and sh**t himself.
Mind you,
the first time I saw him,
he did seem very,
well, abstracted.
I mean, it was halfway through
the afternoon,
and he was still in his pajamas.
Looked as if he hadn't
washed for a week too.
Oh, and he was wearing
white gloves.
- White gloves?
- Yes, you know,
white cotton gloves.
- Did he have any problems
over money?
- None at all
as far as I could tell.
Even less
when Old Bleibner died.
The Bleibner millions
came to him.
I say, that's a point.
I wonder who
will get the money now.
Oh, he left a note, you know.
- No, Hastings.
I did not know.
- I made a copy of it.
"There is no point in going on.
"I am a leper, an outcast.
"It's better that I should
end my life now
"than bring misery
to the people I love.
Rupert Bleibner."
- I didn't think you looked too
well at breakfast, Schneider.
Does it hurt here?
- A little.
- If I move your arm like this,
does that hurt?
- No...but there's
a sort of dull ache, though,
around my shoulders
and neck all the time.
- Do you have
any trouble swallowing?
- Well, as a matter of fact,
I do.
It started a few days ago.
How'd you know that?
- Hassan.
- Oh, Dr. Ames. Yes?
- I'm going to drive to Cairo
to the British hospital.
I've got to persuade them
to give me some antitoxic serum.
- When will you be back, sir?
- Well, by Friday, I hope,
if I drive day and night.
- Be careful, sir.
- Oh, and, Hassan,
try and get through to Cairo
by telephone.
Let them know I'm on my way.
Thank you.
- It goes on, Monsieur Poirot.
First my husband.
Then Mr. Bleibner.
Then his nephew.
- Try to continue, Lady Willard.
- Suppose there is some truth
in all this talk about a curse.
- Tell me what has happened.
- Mr. Schneider
of the Metropolitan Museum
of New York,
he's very ill with tetanus.
My son just sent me
this telegram.
I'm sorry.
You must think it very silly
and superstitious.
- No, no, no.
Not at all, Lady Willard.
I also believe in the force
of superstition.
It is one of the greatest forces
that the world has ever known.
And you wish that Poirot
should protect your son
against these forces.
- Is it possible?
- But first I must allow
to do their work
the little gray cells.
- You're not pushing it,
are you?
- Of course I'm not pushing it.
What's it writing?
- I can't see.
I can't make it out.
Seems to have stopped.
- Let's see what it's written.
- Can't make it out.
- Yes.
There's a C.
That's an L.
- Well, it's not very clear.
- It's definitely trying
to say something, though.
- Perhaps it's
not writing in English.
Looks like Arabic or something.
I say.
- What?
- Suppose it's King Men-her-Ra
trying to get through?
- Miss Le--
Hastings, what means this
with the planchette?
- Oh, we're just fooling around.
It's interesting, though.
We think this could be
from King Men-her-Ra.
- Hastings, please,
pull yourself together.
We have business
to which we must attend.
Tomorrow we fly to Cairo.
- Cairo?
- In Egypt, Hastings.
- I know.
- And then
to the Valley of the Kings.
- His jaw is broken.
- Broken?
- The muscles contract so
violently, it breaks the bones.
- God.
Is there anything we can do?
- He's not responding
to the serum.
- You must be Monsieur Poirot.
- What is left of him, yes.
- I'm Leonard Fosswell,
British Museum.
- Ah, Monsieur Fosswell.
- We got Lady Willard's cable.
I'm sorry.
This isn't a good time.
Now let me show you
to your tent.
Won't mind sharing, will you?
- No, not at all.
I'm Arthur Hastings, by the way.
- Yes, Lady Willard
said you'd be coming.
Hassan will assign one of
the fellahin to look after you,
to get you hot water and so on.
- Oh, this looks fine.
Tell me, Dr. Fosswell...
Why is this not a good time?
- It's Dr. Schneider.
- He has the malady, yes?
- He's--
- Cannot stand
much more of this.
- He's not responding?
- No.
He, uh,
seems to be getting worse.
Oh, God.
- Who is it?
- That detective
my mother's so keen on.
- Sir Guy.
- Uh...
uh...he's dead.
- And you are quite sure,
are you not, Dr. Ames,
that the death of Monsieur
Schneider was caused by tetanus?
- Sure.
- It could not have been,
for instance,
a case of
the strychnine poisoning?
- Strychnine?
- No, Monsieur Poirot.
There's been no suggestion
of anything like that.
This was a clear case
of tetanus.
- Did you inject antiserum?
- Of course we did.
Every conceivable thing
that could be done was done.
- But Monsieur Bleibner now,
he died of something
completely different?
- Mr. Bleibner had a scratch
on his thumb.
It became poisoned,
and septicemia set in.
It sounds pretty much the same
to a layman, I imagine,
but the two things
are entirely different.
- You must ask us any questions
you need to, Monsieur Poirot.
We're all dumbfounded
by this series of disasters.
But it isn't any--
Can?t be anything
but coincidence.
- I see.
And you are determined, Sir Guy,
to continue
with this excavation?
- Monsieur Poirot,
no matter what happens,
my father's work is going on.
- I see.
Alors, ?videmment,
we must find out exactly
what is the position here.
- Alabaster perfume box.
Height, 7 1/2 inches.
Depth, 5 1/4 inches.
Sniff.
Ah, jasmine.
- 3,000-year-old jasmine.
- How long have you been
interested in Egyptology,
Monsieur Harper?
- Oh, ever since
I started working
as Mr. Bleibner's secretary.
I was in his college almost.
- You were at Yale
with Rupert Bleibner.
- Yes, I was there
on a Hendrickson
exchange scholarship.
Ames was with us too.
All Yalies, you see.
Class of '27.
- That is most interesting.
There are four people involved
in this expedition
who have known each other
for some considerable time.
With Dr. Ames, Rupert Bleibner,
yourself all together
at the college,
and of course the uncle
of Rupert Bleibner.
- That's right.
- Two of them are now dead.
- Are you trying
to give me the creeps?
- Tell me about Monsieur Rupert.
- I really don't understand
him doing what he did.
- When he first arrived here,
he was in good health?
Yes, I don't think he'd had
a day's real illness
his entire life.
Terrible hypochondriac, though.
Always got a lot
of little aches and pains
he was always worrying about.
- But when last you saw him,
he was not suffering?
- No, can't remember anything
in particular.
Oh, well, yes, he had
a little eczema on his hand
he was making
a great to-do about.
- Master, I must speak with you.
- Oh. Right.
Good evening.
- I served my lord Sir John,
and now I serve his son.
- Yes, quite.
- You are a wise one, they say.
- Well, you know.
- And learned in dealing
with evil spirits.
I beg of you,
let the young master
depart from here.
There is evil
in the air around us.
- Well, uh,
it's not really up to me.
You see--
- We have had four deaths,
all totally dissimilar.
One heart failure,
one poisoning,
one tetanus,
and one su1c1de.
- Exactly.
- Is there nothing which might
link together these four?
- Something they have in common?
No.
- I'm sorry, Mr. Poirot.
I don't quite understand this.
- Then, Monsieur Harper, let me
make myself perfectly clear.
Was there any act committed
by these men, these victims,
which might seem
to denote some disrespect
to the spirit
of Men-her-Ra?
- Good grief, man.
That is all rot,
as well you know.
- You're talking
through your hat.
- You do not believe that such
a thing is possible?
- No, I do not.
We're men of science, and I
believe what science teaches.
- Indeed.
Was there no science then
in ancient Egypt?
Oh, no, no, no, no, please,
do not answer, but tell me this,
the native workmen,
what do they think?
- Well, if the white folk
lose their heads,
then the natives
aren't gonna be far behind.
Yes.
Yes, I'll admit
they're getting scared,
but they've
got no cause to be.
- Excuse me, I'm--
- Ames, are you all right?
- Good heavens.
- Hassan.
Help me get him to his tent.
- Would a brandy help?
- No, I don't think so.
We'll get him to bed.
- Good Lord.
Poor fellow.
- Tell me when you want
another photograph.
- Not yet.
- Did you know, Monsieur Poirot,
that a wreath of flowers
from the funeral ceremony
was still lying
on the antechamber floor
when my father opened the tomb?
- Oh.
It is amazing, is it not,
Hastings?
- Absolutely.
- How is Dr. Ames today?
- He's still not well.
He got up today.
To tell the truth,
I'm rather worried about him.
- I think we're ready.
- Lift away then.
- Tie off.
Good God.
- He has lain here
in perfect silence
since 1,000 years
before Troy was besieged.
Rome rose and fell.
Wars and catastrophes
changed the face of the Earth.
But still, this king, he waited.
Forgotten by all those people
we read about.
Dr. Fosswell?
- Come.
- What a moment,
Dr. Fosswell, eh?
- What?
- Well, to have had
the privilege
of merely standing by
as the lid of the sarcophagus,
it was opened.
- Oh, yes.
Yes, I'm just writing it out.
- Ah, you write the reports for
the expedition, n'est-ce pas?
- For the expedition?
No, no, no, no, no.
By no means.
I daily report for the eyes
of Sir Andrew Caens only.
- Ah.
May I?
- Please.
- Thank you.
Now, Sir Andrew Caens,
he is the keeper of antiquities
at the British museum,
n'est-ce pas?
- Quite.
The others can do their own
reports, though frankly...
Well, no matter.
- And Monsieur Schneider,
when he was alive,
he would have made the reports
for the Metropolitan Museum.
- I suppose so, yes.
I mean, I don't want
to speak ill of the dead,
but it does just show
the quality
of their scholarship,
doesn't it?
When the Metropolitan
have to send out
somebody like Schneider.
Poor fellow.
The BM would never
have sent anyone
but their most senior
archaeologist.
- And the future keeper
of the antiquities perhaps.
- What?
Oh, well,
I don't know about that.
Of course, Sir Andrew is due
for retirement in two years.
And if I make a fair fist
at this, well...
- Oh, you're in bed.
- This is a work most
interesting, Hastings.
Listen to this.
"May your knives
not get hold of me.
"May my hands
not touch the poison.
"May I not fall
into your slaughterhouse,
"for I know your names,
and my heart is with Osiris."
- Look here, Poirot,
are you feeling all right?
- Perfectly, Hastings.
- I mean, you've had a lot
of sun these last few days.
You're not used to it like I am.
- I am perfectly well.
Thank you, Hastings.
Hastings, what is the matter
with Miss Lemon?
- Miss Lemon?
Nothing, as far as I know.
- Come, Hastings.
Do not do the shilly-shally
with me.
Yourself play with her
on the planchette.
- Well, I think it's her cat.
You know, the one she used
to call Catherine the Great
because it liked sleeping
in the fireplace.
- That cat, it died, did it not?
- Well, exactly.
She's fearfully cut up about it.
I think she's trying
to get in touch with it.
- Oh.
- I mean, I think it's--
- Hastings, look!
- Good God.
- "Deliver me from that god
whose face is that of a hound
"but whose skin
is that of a man,
"who liveth upon the damned,
"digesting human hearts,
voiding filth.
One seeth him not."
- Hastings, what are you doing?
- Well, I'm having my siesta.
- No, no, no, no, Hastings.
Get up.
We have work to do.
Come.
Whose tent is this, Hastings?
- Uh, Dr. Ames'.
- You must remain here on guard,
my friend,
while I make the search.
- Search?
Oh, no.
Poirot.
Well, well, well.
- I beg your pardon?
- Feeling a bit better, are you,
Dr. Ames?
- Are you waiting for me?
- No, no.
No. No.
I was waiting for Poirot,
actually.
You haven't seen him at all,
have you?
Poirot?
- Can I come past?
- What?
- I want to go to my tent.
- Oh, this is your tent, is it?
Uh, I didn't realize that.
They're very good, these tents,
aren't they?
- Please, Captain Hastings.
- Poirot,
you really are the limit.
- My God, Hastings.
The sand, it gets everywhere.
- Ames must think
I'm a complete idiot.
Plenty of sand in Belgium,
isn't there?
- Not in Brussels, Hastings.
Hello, Miss Lemon,
can you hear me?
- Yes, I found
Mr. Bleibner's solicitor.
I spoke to him.
- One moment, if you please,
Miss Lemon.
Hello?
Now you said he read
to you the will?
Bon, what did it say?
Yes. Yes.
Cigarette case, Miss Lemon?
- I think it was just a joke,
Mr. Poirot.
- I see.
Go on if you please.
Thank you, Miss Lemon.
Au revoir.
What? What?
You want some what?
All right,
but only if you're good.
- I have half a mind
to volunteer to stay,
you know, Poirot.
- What for, Hastings?
- Take up this archaeology.
Can't you feel the fascination?
Desert life,
probing into the heart
of vanished civilization.
- Thank you, Hassan.
On the table next to my bed,
if you please.
Thank you.
- Wish we were getting somewhere
with this case, though.
Sometimes I think it's not
a case at all,
just three natural deaths
and one su1c1de.
What do you think, Poirot?
You don't seem to have
any theories at all.
Do you?
- Oh, my God.
Poirot!
Dr. Ames!
It's Poirot.
Quick.
It's Poirot.
He's ill, dead, I don't know.
It's the chamomile tea.
Don't let Hassan leave the camp.
- There's still a pulse.
- What's going on?
- It's Poirot.
He's collapsed.
- Do you smell anything?
- Almonds.
- Cyanide.
- Which, fortunately,
I did not drink.
Thank you, Hastings.
While my good friend Captain
Hastings was calling for help,
I took the opportunity
of pouring the contents
from that glass...
into this little bottle.
And this little bottle will go
to the analytical chemist.
The first death need not come
into our calculations
except for one thing.
The quite natural death
of your father, Sir Guy,
was what gave
to our m*rder*r his idea.
The more deaths that occurred,
the more everyone would talk
about the curse of Men-her-Ra,
but the less everyone
would ask the proper questions.
- I'm afraid we thought you
were just as superstitious
as the rest.
- But that was my intention.
You see, I wanted
to lull the m*rder*r
into a false sense
of security until I was ready.
And in that, I was successful.
The m*rder*r thought
that one more little nudge
would send Hastings and myself
scurrying off back to England.
- Good God.
- He thought that
a cheap trick might do it.
Mais non.
I had to make him act,
and I have now done something
that has so alarmed him
that he feels he must now add me
to his roll of victims.
What is it that I have done that
has so alarmed our m*rder*r,
flushed him out,
and made him try to poison me?
Let us go back
to the first m*rder,
that of Monsieur Felix Bleibner.
- Isn't it time
you people were in bed?
- Won't you join us, Uncle?
- I asked myself
who would want
to m*rder
Monsieur Felix Bleibner.
Alors, he was a man
who was very rich,
therefore, my first assumption
would be his heir and nephew,
Monsieur Rupert Bleibner.
Mais non.
Monsieur Rupert Bleibner
committed a su1c1de
even before he heard
of the death of his uncle,
and so my next question was,
why should
Monsieur Rupert Bleibner wish
to take his own life?
Alors, he was a man who
was young, happy, successful.
He had no thought of death.
He had not even
made a proper will.
- I could never
understand him doing it.
- And yet, Dr. Fosswell, he told
to us the reasons quite plainly
and precisely in a note
that he left,
so plainly indeed
that we thought
we was speaking metaphorically.
He wrote, did he not...
- "I am a leper and an outcast.
"It's better
that I should end my life now
than bring misery
to the people I love."
- On the threshold of marriage
and a life that was happy
and successful,
Monsieur Rupert Bleibner
believed that he was doomed.
He believed he had leprosy.
During his last days, he even
took to wearing the white gloves
to hide the first unsightly
signs of the disease.
- But why should he think
he had leprosy?
- Because, Hastings,
it was told to him that he had,
and he had every good reason
to believe it.
For some time,
he had been living in Hawaii
where the disease,
it is endemic.
And while in Hawaii,
he would have come across
chaulmoogra oil.
Now, he may not have heard
of the more modern dr*gs
that have now superseded it,
but he would definitely have
come across chaulmoogra oil.
- What is this chaulmoogra oil?
- Chaulmoogra oil, Hastings,
was once the only treatment
for leprosy.
But in this case, it was used
merely as the window dressing
to convince Rupert Bleibner
of his condition.
- But how do you know that?
- I know that, Hastings,
because I have stolen
some chaulmoogra oil
from the m*rder*r.
Hercule Poirot
has discovered his secret.
- What secret?
What is all this?
Monsieur Rupert Bleibner
went to Dr. Ames
with a mild case of eczema,
and Dr. Ames
diagnosed leprosy.
And pauvre
Monsieur Rupert Bleibner
saw no way out but death.
- This is nonsense.
I mean, why would
I want Rupert to k*ll himself?
He was my friend.
We were at college together.
- In the possession
of the lawyers
of Monsieur Rupert Bleibner
is a sheet of paper.
It is old. It is creased.
Probably written on
while at college
during some fit
of a drunken merriment,
but the handwriting is that
of Monsieur Rupert Bleibner.
It reads as follows.
"This is the last will and
testament of Rupert Bleibner.
"I leave my cigarette case
which he admires so much
"and all
of which I die possessed
"to my good friend
Robert Ames
who once saved my life
from drowning."
You see, Dr. Ames,
you knew that on the death
of Monsieur Felix Bleibner,
his fortune in entirety
would go to his heir and nephew,
Monsieur Rupert Bleibner,
but were Monsieur
Rupert Bleibner to die...
- All right.
Now, keep back, all of you.
Get off.
Let me go!
- You have already three deaths
on your head, Dr. Ames.
Is that not enough?
- But Dr. Ames
did not k*ll my husband.
- No, Lady Willard.
The death of your husband
Sir John
was from the causes
quite natural.
You see, the only deaths
that interested Dr. Ames
were those
of Monsieur Felix Bleibner,
who perished from septicemia
introduced into his cut hand
by Dr. Ames himself,
and Monsieur Rupert Bleibner,
who Dr. Ames drove to su1c1de
by convincing him
that he suffers
from the leprosy.
- And Dr. Schneider.
- Indeed.
Dr. Ames injected
poor Henry Schneider
with tetanus bacillus
merely to lend strength
to the curse of Men-her-Ra.
- I think you've been
wonderfully clever.
- Good-bye, sir.
- Sir Guy.
- I return to the Valley
of the Kings tomorrow.
- This time with my blessing.
- Bonjour.
- Yes, well then.
- Au revoir.
Miss Lemon, would you
come through for a moment?
Miss Lemon, in addition
to serving this case
that has been most difficult,
Hastings and I,
we have brought you back
a little gift
from the very tomb
of King Men-her-Ra.
- From the tomb?
- Oui.
Voil?.
It is the very likeness
of the favorite cat
of King Men-her-Ra
buried with him in his tomb
to keep him company
on his long journey.
- Oh, he's beautiful.
- Go to bed this evening
with him in your hand
and Catherine the Great
will visit you during the night.
- Oh, Mr. Poirot, thank you.
- I don't know how you can
tell her such guff, Poirot.
- No, no, no, no, no, Hastings.
It is not a guff.
It is, as I said
at the beginning of this case
to Lady Willard,
the power of superstition.
It is a power
that that is very great indeed.