The Mysterious Affair at Styles

Late that night, Hastings is awakened by Lawrence Cavendish. Lawrence, who is holding a candle, tells Hastings that Emily Inglethorp is incredibly sick but seems to have locked herself in her bedroom. Hastings jumps out of bed and follows Lawrence toward Mrs. Inglethorp’s bedroom, from which they can hear her struggling in agony. John is by the door, too, along with several servants, and the entire house is slowly coming to life with excitement and worry. Before trying to break down the door, Hastings and the others go to Cynthia’s room, which shares a wall with Mrs. Inglethorp’s. There’s a door leading between the two rooms, but it’s always bolted shut—still, they must check. They find Mary Cavendish already in Cynthia’s room shaking her awake. When they try the door, though, they find it locked.

Hastings, John, and Lawrence break down Mrs. Inglethorp’s door. They find her writhing on the bed, her back arched in terrible convulsions. As Hastings turns to tell Lawrence that he’ll leave to get out of the way, he is struck by Lawrence’s facial expression—the man is completely pale, as if he has just seen a ghost. He’s staring at the wall behind Hastings’s head, as if something terrible is there. But when Hastings looks himself, he sees nothing out of the ordinary: just the trinkets on the mantelpiece and the ashes of the fire Mrs. Inglethorp had burning in the fireplace earlier that night.

Mrs. Inglethorp’s convulsions subside for a moment, but then they get even worse. John and Mary try to give her brandy, but it doesn’t help. Dr. Bauerstein rushes into the room right as Mrs. Inglethorp’s entire body arches on the bed, with her shoulders and feet on the mattress and the middle of her body pushed into the air. “Alfred—Alfred—,” she says, but she dies before finishing the sentence.

Hastings realizes it’s actually early in the morning, not the middle of the night. Dr. Bauerstein had been walking past Styles when he saw a car rushing out to fetch Mrs. Inglethorp’s doctor, Mr. Wilkins. He now confers with Mr. Wilkins, who arrived shortly after Mrs. Inglethorp’s death. He explains to Wilkins that the convulsions he witnessed were very extreme—so extreme that he wishes Wilkins had been there himself to see them. The two doctors then ask everyone to leave them to speak privately for a moment.

While the doctors confer in private, Hastings can hardly control himself. He’s quite excited by these events, especially since he suspects foul play. Judging by Dr. Bauerstein’s reaction, he strongly believes Mrs. Inglethorp was poisoned.

As everyone waits for the doctors to finish, they realize Alfred Inglethorp isn’t present. Nobody knows where he is, and John notes that he’s nowhere to be found in the entire house. The doctors then reemerge and inform John that they won’t be able to furnish a death certificate before an official autopsy is performed. In fact, Bauerstein says that, due to the circumstances surrounding Mrs. Inglethorp’s death, there will most likely have to be an official inquest. John begrudgingly agrees and then takes the keys to Mrs. Inglethorp’s bedroom from Dr. Bauerstein, who advises him to keep the room locked until the inquest takes place.

Hastings takes John and Lawrence aside. He knows John is going to be wary of attracting publicity, since he tends to be an optimist who would rather focus on positive things. Lawrence, however, has a more nervous disposition, so Hastings thinks he will see the importance of investigating the murder before things progress too far. He asks the brothers if he can bring in Hercule Poirot to investigate, explaining that it’s important to get a jumpstart on a case before there’s too much attention surrounding it.

To Hastings’s surprise, Lawrence immediately pushes against this idea, saying that Dr. Bauerstein is inventing things—he only suspects poisoning, Lawrence believes, because he himself specializes in poison and is obsessed with it. But his brother disagrees and gives Hastings permission to bring in Poirot, though he doesn’t think the case will be hard to crack: Alfred Inglethorp, he believes, is clearly to blame. Before Hastings goes to fetch Poirot, he stops in the house’s library, where he finds a book about the effects of strychnine poisoning.