The Murder at The Hollow
The HollowThis flow traces how a country-house weekend becomes a staged murder and then an intricate struggle to recover the truth.
increasing
Bearing strength in each event
decreasing
Weekend Gathering

A Difficult Weekend
Social Arrangement
Lucy Angkatell anticipates trouble among the guests gathered at The Hollow. Her fragmented hospitality conceals an accurate sense that old desires and resentments will collide.
Hidden Pressure
John Christow, Gerda Christow, Henrietta Savernake, Edward Angkatell, Midge Hardcastle, and David Angkatell arrive carrying incompatible histories. The weekend is already morally unstable before violence appears.
Veronica's Entrance

The Actress Arrives
Dramatic Interruption
Veronica Cray enters through the French windows of The Hollow under the pretext of borrowing matches. Her theatrical appearance immediately revives John Christow's buried past.
Emotional Reversal
John follows her to the swimming pool, believing he must finally confront the old obsession. The domestic gathering becomes a stage for a private crisis.
The Fatal Shot

The Body by the Pool
Sudden Violence
John Christow returns from rejecting Veronica Cray and sits beside the pool. A hidden assailant shoots him before he can identify the attacker.
Misleading Image
Gerda Christow appears holding a revolver while Henrietta Savernake and the others arrive. The scene seems obvious precisely because it has been arranged to be believed.
The False Weapon

A Displaced Revolver
Broken Evidence
Henrietta Savernake drops Gerda's revolver into the pool, destroying possible fingerprints. Inspector Grange later discovers that this weapon did not fire the fatal bullet.
Expanding Mystery
The apparent confession collapses, but the investigation does not become clearer. Instead, every fact begins to point away from the people who seem most visibly implicated.
The Truth Preserved

A Merciful Concealment
Final Revelation
Hercule Poirot learns that Gerda Christow killed John and that Henrietta protected her at John's request. The apparent confusion was a collective effort to prevent Gerda's arrest.
Unresolved Justice
Poirot chooses a compassionate account of Gerda's death while preserving the truth for Terence Christow. The mystery ends not with public punishment but with painful moral responsibility.
Friday morning
Saturday evening
Sunday just before one o'clock
Sunday afternoon
Near the ending