Evil Under The Sun

The novel opens at the Jolly Roger Hotel, an exclusive resort on Smugglers' Island off Leathercombe Bay in Devon, England. The famous Belgian detective Hercule Poirot is vacationing there among a varied group of guests. On the bathing beach terrace, Poirot observes that sunbathers resemble anonymous bodies on slabs, stripped of individuality, and remarks that evil exists everywhere under the sun. This observation about indistinguishable bodies will prove central to understanding the murder.

The arrival of Arlena Marshall on the beach creates immediate tension. A strikingly beautiful former actress with flaming auburn hair and a jade-green Chinese hat, Arlena commands every male gaze except that of her husband, Captain Kenneth Marshall. Patrick Redfern, a handsome young married man, abandons his course to join Arlena as if drawn by magnetism. His wife, Christine Redfern, a fair and quiet former school games mistress, abruptly leaves for the hotel. Emily Brewster, a gruff and athletic fellow guest, declares Arlena "evil," while the Reverend Stephen Lane calls such women a menace.

Rosamund Darnley, a celebrated London dressmaker, confides in Poirot. She and Kenneth grew up as neighbors but have not seen each other in about fifteen years. She describes his first wife, Ruth, who was tried for murder in the notorious Martingdale case but acquitted when her husband was proved to have died from his own habit of consuming arsenic. Ruth died giving birth to their daughter, Linda. Kenneth then married Arlena, whose scandalous past includes a notorious divorce case and a large fortune left to her by an elderly admirer, Sir Roger Erskine. Rosamund calls Arlena a gold-digger now targeting Patrick, whose wife Christine stands little chance against her.

Linda Marshall, Kenneth's sixteen-year-old daughter, is deeply unhappy. She resents Arlena for the way her presence diminishes the household, particularly her father. A dark wave of hatred rises in Linda: she wishes Arlena dead. Meanwhile, Christine and Patrick quarrel privately; Christine accuses Patrick of engineering their trip because of Arlena and begs him to leave. He refuses. Rosamund asks Kenneth why he does not divorce Arlena. He refuses on principle, and Rosamund realizes his view amounts to "till death do us part" (31).

The morning of August 25th dawns bright and cloudless. Linda whispers to her mirror, "I'll do it" (41), slips out early, and purchases candles from a village shop. Poirot arrives on the beach at ten o'clock and finds Arlena alone, preparing to paddle out on her float. She asks him not to tell anyone he has seen her, then heads toward Pixy Cove. Both Kenneth and Patrick soon arrive looking for Arlena. Patrick grows agitated; Kenneth swims, then goes to his room to type business letters. Emily Brewster mentions that a bottle was thrown from a hotel window earlier and nearly hit her while bathing. Eventually, Patrick joins Emily on her morning rowing excursion.

As they row past Pixy Cove, they spot a figure lying face down on the shingle: a bronzed body in a white bathing dress, the jade-green hat covering the head and neck. Patrick approaches and discovers that Arlena has been strangled. Emily rows off for the police.

Inspector Colgate and Colonel Weston, the Chief Constable, lead the investigation. Kenneth Marshall provides an alibi: he typed complex business letters in his room from roughly ten minutes to eleven until ten minutes to twelve, then played tennis. Christine, in her interview, lets slip the word "blackmail" and reveals she overheard Arlena being threatened by an unidentified man three nights earlier. In Linda's room, Poirot finds melted candle wax, burnt hair, a pin, and a hidden book on witchcraft and sorcery. He recognizes that Linda performed a wax-figure ritual intended to cause Arlena's death.

Rosamund volunteers that at about twenty past eleven she looked into Kenneth's room and saw him typing. The chambermaid, Gladys Narracott, confirms she heard typing until five minutes to eleven. Together with the letters' complexity, Kenneth's alibi appears airtight. Gladys also reports a mystery: bath water was heard running through the waste pipe around noon, though no guest admits to having bathed. In Pixy's Cave, investigators discover a tin box filled with heroin, opening a drug-smuggling line of inquiry.

Poirot studies past strangulation cases and identifies a crucial parallel. In the unsolved murder of Alice Corrigan in Surrey, the husband, Edward Corrigan, had an airtight alibi, and the body was discovered by a hiker who happened to be a games mistress. Poirot realizes the same method is at work in both cases: juggling time so the body appears to be discovered before the murder actually occurs.

Poirot organizes a day trip to Dartmoor. Linda stays behind with a headache. During the outing, Poirot tests Christine at a narrow plank bridge: Emily Brewster, who genuinely fears heights, becomes dizzy, but Christine, who has claimed the same fear, crosses without difficulty. Upon returning, the group discovers Linda has taken six of Christine's sleeping tablets. Her note to Poirot reads: "I think this is the best way out. Ask Father to try and forgive me. I killed Arlena" (176). Poirot believes Linda wrote the confession either out of guilt over her witchcraft ritual or to shield her father.

Poirot builds cases against Kenneth and Rosamund before pivoting dramatically. The true murderer, he declares, is Patrick Redfern. The "body" that Patrick and Emily found on the beach was not Arlena but Christine, lying face down with artificially tanned skin, wearing a duplicate white bathing suit and a copy of the jade-green hat with a false red curl pinned beneath the brim. When Emily rowed off for the police, Christine sprang up, cut the hat apart with scissors, climbed the ladder to the hotel, took a quick bath to wash off the suntan (the mysterious noon bath water), and changed into her tennis dress. Meanwhile, Patrick called Arlena out of the cave where she had been hiding and strangled her.

Poirot reveals that Patrick and Christine are actually Edward Corrigan and Christine Deverill, the same couple from the Alice Corrigan murder. That morning, Christine had set Linda's wristwatch twenty minutes ahead to create a false alibi, and her "overheard" blackmail conversation was fabricated to explain Arlena's depleted fortune, most of which Patrick had swindled. The bottle of artificial suntan that nearly hit Emily was thrown from Christine's window after she applied it to her skin. At Poirot's accusation, Patrick lunges at the detective, confirming his guilt.

Linda survives. Poirot assures her that wishing someone dead and killing them are fundamentally different, and that her ritual discharged her hatred harmlessly. Kenneth and Rosamund confess they each suspected the other of the murder. Kenneth explains he stayed married to Arlena out of pity and duty. Rosamund asks if he will propose now or wait six months; he asks her to live in the country with him, and she accepts, confessing she has wanted exactly that all her life.