Mrs Bradley

Mrs Bradley is the woman convicted of murdering her husband, Derek Bradley, after discovering his affair. Her case appears in Arthur Hastings’s reading of a set of criminal cases and prompts him to recall a newspaper account he had read at the time.

Identity and Background

Mrs Bradley is identified through her marriage to Derek Bradley. The evidence gives no further biographical details, but establishes that she discovered her husband’s intrigue with a girl and threatened to kill him.

The Bradley Case

Derek Bradley died after potassium cyanide was put in his beer. Mrs Bradley was arrested and tried for murder. During cross-examination she broke down, and the court convicted her; she was hanged. The account presents the affair, her threat, the poisoning, and the trial outcome as the defining sequence of her story, without supplying further detail about the circumstances of the poisoning or her defense.

Recollection and Narrative Role

Reading the cases, Arthur Hastings recognizes the Bradley case and says he remembers reading about it at the time. He recalls Mrs Bradley as very good-looking, then asks Hercule Poirot to explain why the case has been included. This brief recognition links a publicized murder and trial to the wider discussion Poirot is presenting, while Mrs Bradley herself remains a figure known through the record of the case rather than through direct speech or action in the present scene.