Teresa Reviews “The Mystery of the Spanish Chest” (1991)

Fidelity to text: 2 1/2 sword canes

Despite the title, most of the story came from the 1932 short story “The Mystery of the Bagdad Chest,” with elements from the 1960 rewrite novella The Mystery of the Spanish Chest, plus plot twists dreamed up by scriptwriter Anthony Horowitz.

Quality of movie on its own: 4 sword canes

If you’re paying attention, you’ll figure out who the murderer must be by the halfway point. But there’s lots to love, other than the cypher who is Marguerite Clayton.

Read more of Teresa’s Agatha Christie movie reviews at Peschel Press.

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This episode opens with a terrific, sepia-toned event. Two fencers in full Heidelberg dueling regalia face off inside a little chalk box keeping them toe-to-toe. The point of the exercise — if you’re not familiar with German/Austrian university student dueling — is to prove your courage and ability to bear pain by acquiring facial scars. Plenty of upper-class young men in Germany and Austria (virtually every university student there was upper-class) were members of dueling societies and regularly dueled. They wore eye protection, a nose-guard, and a high leather collar to limit the scars to the face where they could be seen. Because most duelers were right-handed, the scars tend to mark the left side of the face. There are records of young men who became important politicians and business titans who earned multiple scars. Even today, you’ll see the scars on some German politicians and industrial magnates. They’re a subtle class marker; not nearly as common as they once were, but still there.

After the duel, color returns and we’re off to the opera to see Rigoletto. Poirot tells Hastings that he isn’t that interested in opera (Hastings is bored stiff) but he is interested in the psychology of murder.

Why did the script add a reference to Rigoletto that didn’t exist in either text? I believe it’s to better combine the two short stories this episode is based on. The 1932 version was narrated by Hastings and it’s short: 7 1/2 pages. Then, in 1960, Agatha rewrote the short piece into a novella The Mystery of the Spanish Chest. Hastings is long gone (ranching in Argentina) so Poirot is coping with the hyper-efficient Miss Lemon who does not suffer from Hastings’ flights of fancy. A major addition in the novella was Poirot working out that the murderer’s methods was similar to Iago’s in Othello. Iago was a false counselor to Othello, urging the Moor to unwarranted jealousy towards his beautiful wife, Desdemona.

What does that have to do with Rigoletto? Not as much as it should have, other than Rigoletto also involves false counselors, deception, and lies. A quick synopsis: The court jester Rigoletto encourages his master the duke to behave as badly as possible. They’re cursed by a courtier the duke ruins. Rigoletto’s beautiful daughter, Gilda, falls in love with the duke (he’s lying to her) and the opera ends in blood, death, and much lyrically beautiful singing. But it’s more important to know that, by being at the opera in a private box, Poirot and Hastings are seen by Lady Chatterton from her private box across the theater.

Lady Chatterton tracks down Poirot and asks a favor. She has this lovely young friend, Marguerite Clayton. Every man loves her although she came across to me as a boring cypher. Poirot and Hastings observe Mrs. Clayton at the intermission being squired about by a man not her husband. That was Major Rich, recent widower and longtime friend. Mr. Clayton was nowhere to be seen. According to Lady Chatterton, he was off glowering and plotting murder against his much younger, much livelier wife.

The question I kept asking was why did Marguerite marry Edward Clayton? No reason was ever given (like money or status) yet we’re constantly told that Marguerite could have had any man she wanted. Instead, she chose an unpleasant, older grouch, who, according to Lady Chatterton, is abusive to her.

Let me be clear: We never see one moment of Edward Clayton’s supposedly violent nature onscreen.

He’s stiff and surly with Marguerite, but not violent. But Lady Chatterton ropes Poirot into attending Major Rich’s cocktail party where he can observe the Claytons in action and, presumably, save Marguerite from her husband.

The party is a hoot to watch. Poirot dances a very credible Charleston with Lady Chatterton! He also meets Colonel Curtiss, who stoutly defends Marguerite as the epitome of womanly virtue. Colonel Curtiss also sneers at jazz because it’s music enjoyed by second-rate people and written by an inferior race. (I know people talk like that but it’s clumsy scriptwriting. You shouldn’t telegraph who your suspects are or you should use a stereotype to confound expectations at the story’s climax. No such luck here.) Despite Colonel Curtiss, everyone has a lovely time at the party, other than Edward Clayton. He didn’t show up, called away unexpectedly to Scotland. Thus, Poirot cannot evaluate Clayton as a wife-beater and potential murderer.

In the morning, Chief Inspector Japp calls on Poirot and informs him he’s a witness at a murder. What murder? Why the murder of Edward Clayton in Major Rich’s flat the evening before . Rich’s manservant discovered the body inside the Spanish chest, sitting in the corner of the room behind a screen.

There’s nothing minimal about a Spanish chest. They’re ornate, heavy, and lavishly decorated with plenty of wood overlays, leather straps, and brass hardware. They’re built to store bedding so it’s large enough for a man to hide in and spy on his wife if she’s canoodling with another man at a party.

Poirot swings into action, Hastings at his side. Miss Lemon is nowhere to be seen; like the first version of the story, she’s in Frinton visiting her sister. While they’re investigating, Marguerite visits Major Rich in jail, weeps and wails, and then returns home. She tries to commit suicide but luckily for her, Poirot and Hastings show up and rescue her from her folly.

The script telegraphing its distaste for Colonel Curtiss was the weakest part of the episode, but how they treated Marguerite was a close second.

I have no idea why she was so wonderful, why men fell at her feet, why Lady Chatterton believed she was at risk of being murdered by her husband. Her suicide attempt felt like a clumsy plot point written to illustrate her delicate sensibilities. There was no reason for her to do it. Marguerite wasn’t a happy wife but with her husband dead through no fault of her own — she’s the innocent victim here! — she’s free and probably rich. She had no kids to worry about, she’s young and lovely, she inherits everything; she’s much better off than she was at the beginning of the story.

The climax was suitably dramatic but again, poorly thought out. Poirot would have called in the police as backup when he faced down the murderer. It’s still a very good episode and well worth watching.