This book is great. I didn't remember anything, only that it was the first book I ever read willingly. I mean, when they forced me in school, as a child, I didn't want to read them, but one day I started by myself, reading something I found in the house. This. After so long I only remembered the title; well, the italian one, which translates "Am I a murderer?" :-/ Now that I've read it again, I find it amazing, a whole investigation based on almost nothing! There's Poirot, which is always a good thing in my opinion, who's having his breakfast in peace when a girl comes to his house with an urgent matter: she says she might have committed murder (!!) then she looks at him, and goes away saying he can't help her, that he's too old, she didn't think he was so old! Well, the book is from 1966 so I suppose Poirot had to be a bit old, actually. Still, this depresses him a little, then he decides that she needed help and he wants to understand why, and what did she mean saying she might have committed murder. I mean, usually you should know such a thing for sure!
With the help of his friend the writer Ariadne Oliver, he finds out who she is, investigates her family: her father returned after many years: he abandoned her when she was five. His new wife, which seems to have been poisoned by the girl, Norma. Her flatmates, two girls (she's the third girl to have taken a room in the apartment, hence the title). Her boyfriend the family doesn't seem to like. Poirot asks Mr Goby to find information for him, and asks the same thing to his friend chief inspector Neele. Half a book goes by, he's full of informations, he managed to keep the girl safe with the help of a psychiatrist, Dr Stillingfleet, and yet he can't get anything out of all that. Two third of the book goes by before Poirot becomes aware that there has been a death. Apparently a woman committed suicide, but to Poirot that's the only possible death Norma could have been referring to, since it happened in her building shortly before she went to see him.
It's such an unusual book, because for all this time there had been nothing that could be related to a crime. Usually these books introduce you to some people until a murder is committed, then the Police is called and Poirot (or another investigator) comes in to solve the mistery. This time, we saw Poirot from page one, but without any crime. Nothing has happened, the police doesn't have any cases, nobody asked for his services, and here again is what I like about crime stories: not just that our hero is more intelligent, but more importantly he's a hero because he cares!! That's what I love about fictional crime stories: there's someone who really cares!! A girl came to his house, looking all scruffy and strange, told him he's too old, and left in a hurry. He had no real reason to help her. He did because he felt she had come to him because she needed help, and was sorry that his older age led her to think he couldn't. He wants to help her.
Now the major spoilers, so be warned!
Having finally found the death he was looking for, Poirot investigates even more, of course. At first, things keep looking confused, it doesn't seem Norma had anything to do with the woman's death, classified as a suicide, but towards the end Norma's boyfriend is killed, with Poirot too late to do anything about it. He knew something bad was gonna happen and had rushed to her apartment, but he arrived too late. Norma was found near the body, with the knife in her hands. She said : yes, I killed him, and then sat quietly waiting for the police. But at this moment Poirot has worked everything out, and is ready for it. He calls Dr. Stillingfleet again, who has come to know Norma and is sure she's not at all crazy and also not a murderer.
They all listen to the doctor, then to Norma, then Poirot reveals everything. The real father was dead, and this man impersonated him to take all his money. With the help of his woman he had a cruel plan. She was drugging Norma posing as her flatmate: change of wig, makeup, ways, and nobody recognized her: she had Norma drugged without her knowing it. Norma was disoriented, she couldn't remember things, she thought she was crazy, she thought the only explanation was that she had done it, but she hadn't. Mary/Francis was the murderer.
At the end, we understand that Dr Stillingfleet and Norma will soon get married, and Mrs Oliver realises that Poirot had set this particular doctor on her hoping just that :-)
Before leaving, Norma apologises to Poirot for having been so rude; she tells him "I told you you were too old to help me. It was rude, and it wasn't true", then she kisses him. An adorable touch, Poirot has always been a romantic :-)
Yes, there's the thing of the strange coincidences happening in this book: finding Norma, finding an important letter: these are mere coincidences. Nobody had any idea where she was, until one day, after following one of her flatmates, Mrs Oliver gets tired and decides she needs something, enters a café and there she is! Personally I'm not bothered by it. It would have been much more strange if it had happened to Poirot, because he doesn't go around much, but quite a few people were in motion in his investigation, and Mrs Oliver didn't like to stay put, so honestly it's not so unbelievable that someone could find her, even Mrs Oliver by mere chance. Fine by me.
ITA : Sono un'assassina?
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