The Hound of Death and Other Stories is a collection of twelve short stories by British writer Agatha Christie, first published in the United Kingdom in October 1933. Unusually, the collection was not published by Christie's regular publishers, William Collins & Sons, but by Odhams Press, and was not available to purchase in shops (see Publication of book collection below). This was the first time that a Christie book had been published in the UK but not in the US, although all of the stories contained within it appeared in later US collections (see US book appearances of stories below). Unusually, most of these are tales of fate and the supernatural, with comparatively little detective content. This collection is most notable for the first appearance in a book of Christie's short story "The Witness for the Prosecution". The author subsequently wrote an award-winning play based on this story which has been adapted for the 1957 film and twice for television.
List of stories "The Hound of Death" "The Red Signal" "The Fourth Man" "The Gypsy" "The Lamp" "Wireless" "The Witness for the Prosecution" "The Mystery of the Blue Jar" "The Strange Case of Sir Arthur Carmichael" "The Call of Wings" "The Last Séance" "SOS"
Plot summaries
The Hound of Death William P. Ryan, an American journalist, is having lunch with a friend called Anstruther when he hears that the latter is about to visit his sister in Folbridge, Cornwall, at her house called "Treane". Ryan has heard of the place, and tells a story from the recent First World War when he heard of a German attempt to take over a convent during the Rape of Belgium. As soon as the soldiers entered the building it blew up, killing them all. It was proven that the soldiers had no high explosives on them, and speaking with the locals afterwards Ryan was told of one of the nuns having miraculous powers: she brought down a lightning bolt from heaven that destroyed the convent and killed the Germans. All that was left of the building were two walls, one of which had a powder mark in the shape of a giant hound. This scared the local peasants who avoided the area after dark. The nun in question survived and went with other refugees to "Treane" in Cornwall, and Anstruther confirms that his sister did take in some Belgians at the time. In Cornwall, Anstruther finds out from his sister that the nun, Marie Angelique, is still in the area. She has constant hallucinations and is being studied by a local, new, young doctor by the name of Rose, who intends to write a monograph on her condition. Anstruther meets Rose and persuades him to let him meet the young nun. She is boarding with the local district nurse. She talks of her dreams, but when Anstruther tells her of the story he heard from Ryan, she is shocked to realise that what she thought was a dream was true – that of unleashing the "Hound of Death" on the Germans as they approached the altar. She rambles on about the "City of Circles" and the "People of the Crystal", and when they have left her, Rose tells Anstruther that he has heard her mention crystals before, and on a previous occasion he produced a crystal and showed it to her to test her reaction. She gasped, "Then the faith still lives!" The next day, the young nun tells Anstruther that she feels that the crystal is a symbol of faith, possibly a second Christ, and the faith has endured for many centuries. Rose tries a word association test in which Marie Angelique makes references to signs. There are seven signs, each with its color and symbol. The sixth sign is death and destruction, its symbol the hound. Anstruther starts to feel uneasy about Rose's interest in the case, suspecting something more than purely medical motives. Some time later, Anstruther receives a letter from the nun in which she voices her fears of Rose and says that the doctor is trying to obtain her powers by progressing to the sixth sign. The same day he hears from his sister that both Rose and the nun are dead. A landslide swept away the cliffside cottage they were in, and the debris on the beach is in the shape of a giant hound. He also hears that Rose's rich uncle died the same night, struck by lightning. The uncle's will had left everything to Rose. Anstruther later comes into possession of Rose's notes, which detail his attempts to become a superman with "the Power of Death" in his hands. Anstruther suspects that Rose obtained the Power of Death, killed his uncle for money, but unable to control the power properly, unleashed the Hound of Death.
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