Five Little Pigs


Five Little Pigs is a work of detective fiction by British writer Agatha Christie, first published in the US by Dodd, Mead and Company in May 1942 under the title Murder in Retrospect and in the UK by the Collins Crime Club in January 1943. The UK first edition carries a copyright date of 1942 and retailed at eight shillings while the US edition was priced at $2.00.
In the book, detective Hercule Poirot investigates five people about a murder committed sixteen years earlier. Caroline Crale died in prison after being convicted of murdering her husband, Amyas Crale, by poisoning him. In her final letter from prison, she claims to be innocent of the murder. Her daughter Carla Lemarchant asks Poirot to investigate this cold case, based on the memories of the people closest to the couple.

Plot summary

Sixteen years after Caroline Crale was convicted of fatally poisoning her husband Amyas, her twenty-one-year-old daughter Carla Lemarchant is given a letter; in it, the late Caroline claims to be innocent of the murder. Carla asks Hercule Poirot to reinvestigate the case; he does, and establishes that, on the day of the murder at the Crales' home, there were five other people present. Poirot dubs these "the five little pigs" – stockbroker Philip Blake, amateur chemist Meredith Blake, Caroline's young half-sister Angela Warren, Angela's governess Cecilia Williams, and Amyas's painting model Elsa Greer. The police investigation found that Amyas had died of coniine poisoning, and Caroline confessed to stealing coniine from Meredith's lab, as she had been contemplating suicide. She had later brought a cold bottle of beer to Amyas, and both the police and the jury assumed she had poisoned the beer because Amyas was openly having an affair with Elsa.
Poirot interviews the five other suspects, noting that none has an obvious motive, and that Caroline's half-sister Angela is the only one who believes Caroline was innocent. He assembles the five, along with Carla and her fiancé, at Meredith Blake's house, and reveals the truth. Caroline was innocent, but chose not to defend herself because she believed Angela had committed the murder. Although Angela had handled the beer bottle, she had added nothing to it before her sister took it to Amyas. Caroline later assumed that her sister had added something to the beer as a prank, accidentally causing Amyas's death. When they were children, Caroline had thrown a paperweight at Angela, blinding her in one eye and scarring her face; Caroline had suffered from guilt ever since, and believed that sacrificing herself for Angela was a way to atone for her sin.
Poirot reveals the murderer was Elsa Greer. She had taken Amyas' promises to marry her seriously, unaware that he was merely lying to keep her from leaving until his "masterpiece" painting was finished. She overheard Amyas reassure Caroline that he was not going to divorce her, felt betrayed, and wanted revenge. She had seen Caroline take the poison from Meredith's lab, so she took it from Caroline's room and put it in a glass of warm beer that she gave Amyas. When Caroline later brought him a cold bottle of beer, he commented that "everything tastes foul today" after drinking it; this remark had shown Poirot that Amyas had taken the nasty-tasting coniine before Caroline brought him the beer.
Poirot's explanation solves the case to the satisfaction of Carla and her fiancé. He plans to present his findings to the police, though he admits the chances of a posthumous pardon for Caroline or a murder conviction for Elsa are slim, due to the lack of physical evidence. As she leaves, Elsa contends that Amyas and Caroline escaped her revenge, and that she, now living an empty life, is the one who really "died".

Characters

  • Hercule Poirot: the Belgian detective.
  • Carla Lemarchant: the daughter of Caroline and Amyas Crale; born Caroline Crale II, she was aged 5 when her father was murdered at their home, Alderbury.
  • John Rattery: fiancé of Carla.
  • Amyas Crale: painter by profession, who liked his paintings and his mistresses but loved his wife most. He was murdered 16 years before the story opens.
  • Caroline Crale: wife of Amyas, half-sister to the younger Angela Warren, of whom she was fiercely protective. She was found guilty of the murder of her husband and died in prison within a year.
  • Sir Montague Depleach: Counsel for the Defence in the original trial.
  • Quentin Fogg, KC: Junior for the Prosecution in the original trial.
  • George Mayhew: son of Caroline's solicitor in the original trial.
  • Edmunds: Managing clerk in Mayhew's firm.
  • Caleb Jonathan: Family solicitor for the Crales.
  • Superintendent Hale: Investigating officer in the original case.
The five people Poirot questions, who he dubs "the five little pigs" after the nursery rhyme This Little Piggy, are:
  • Philip Blake: a stockbroker. He expressed disdain for Caroline, but was actually attracted to her.
  • Meredith Blake: Philip's elder brother, a reclusive one-time amateur herbalist who owns the adjacent property, Handcross Manor. He had at one point hoped to marry Caroline, but after the murder he proposed to Elsa and was rejected.
  • Lady Dittisham, née Elsa Greer: a spoiled society lady, formerly the twenty-year-old mistress to Amyas Crale.
  • Cecilia Williams: the devoted governess.
  • Angela Warren: half-sister of Caroline Crale, a disfigured archaeologist. She was a teenager at the time of the murder.

    Literary significance and reception

Author and critic Maurice Willson Disher's review in The Times Literary Supplement of 16 January 1943 concluded, "No crime enthusiast will object that the story of how the painter died has to be told many times, for this, even if it creates an interest which is more problem than plot, demonstrates the author's uncanny skill. The answer to the riddle is brilliant."
Maurice Richardson reviewed the novel in the 10 January 1943 issue of The Observer, writing: "Despite only five suspects, Mrs Christie, as usual, puts a ring through the reader's nose and leads him to one of her smashing last-minute showdowns. This is well up to the standard of her middle Poirot period. No more need be said."
J D Beresford in The Guardian's 20 January 1943 review, wrote: "...Christie never fails us, and her Five Little Pigs presents a very pretty problem for the ingenious reader". He concluded that the clue as to who had committed the crime was "completely satisfying".
Robert Barnard has strong praise for this novel and its plot. He remarked that it was "The-murder-in-the-past plot on its first and best appearance – accept no later substitutes. Presentation more intricate than usual, characterization more subtle." His judgment was that "All in all, it is a beautifully tailored book, rich and satisfying. The present writer would be willing to chance his arm and say that this is the best Christie of all."
Charles Osborne praised this novel, saying that "The solution of the mystery in Five Little Pigs is not only immediately convincing but satisfying as well, and even moving in its inevitability and its bleakness."

Adaptations

1960 play

In 1960, Christie adapted the book into a play, Go Back for Murder, but edited Poirot out of the story. His function in the story is filled by a young lawyer, Justin Fogg, son of the lawyer who led Caroline Crale's defence. During the course of the play, it is revealed that Carla's fiancé is an obnoxious American who is strongly against her revisiting the case, and in the end, she leaves him for Fogg. Go Back for Murder previewed in Edinburgh, Scotland. It later came to London's Duchess Theatre on 23 March 1960, but it lasted for only thirty-seven performances.
Go Back for Murder was included in the 1978 Christie play collection, The Mousetrap and Other Plays.

Television

  • 2003: Five Little Pigs – Episode 1, Series 9, of Agatha Christie's Poirot, starring David Suchet as Poirot. There were many changes to the story. Caroline was executed, instead of being sentenced to life in prison and then dying a year later. Philip has a romantic infatuation with Amyas, rather than Caroline, the root of his dislike for Caroline. Carla's name was changed to Lucy and she has no fiancé. She does not fear she has hereditary criminal tendencies; she merely wishes to prove her mother innocent. After Poirot exposes Elsa, Lucy threatens her with a pistol; Elsa dares her to shoot, but Poirot persuades her to leave Elsa to face justice.
  • 2011: Cinq petits cochons – Episode 7, Series 1, of Les Petits Meurtres d'Agatha Christie, a French television series. The setting is changed to France, Poirot is omitted, and the case is solved by Émile Lampion, a police detective turned private investigator, and his former boss, Chief Inspector Larosière. The plot is once again adapted very loosely. The character of Philip Blake is omitted. Caroline is alive and exonerated at the end. The identification of the "five little pigs" with the suspects is omitted, but the rhyme appears in the Carla character's childhood memories of her father.

    Radio

Five Little Pigs was adapted for radio and broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in 1994, featuring John Moffatt as Poirot.

Publication history

The novel was first serialized in the US in Collier's Weekly in ten installments from 20 September to 22 November 1941 as Murder in Retrospect with illustrations by Mario Cooper.