This is a story that takes place behind closed doors, as Agatha Christie loved to do. It’s Christmas and the patriarch, Simeon Lee, wants to gather all his family together. Two unexpected guests, his granddaughter and his best friend’s son, are also invited. But on Christmas Eve, Simeon Lee is found dead in his room, his throat slit in a pool of blood. Obviously, everyone has a good reason for killing Simeon Lee, who was not a very pleasant character. A true picture of what Christmas can be like with families reunited and a perfect Agatha Christie murder mystery that kept me guessing almost to the end.
“Hilda said slowly:
“I know enough of life to know that you can never judge any case on its outside merits. To all seeming, Simeon Lee was entirely to blame and his wife was abominably treated. At the same time, I honestly believe that there is a kind of meekness, a predisposition to martyrdom which does arouse the worst instincts in men of a certain type. Simeon Lee would have admired, I think, spirit and force of character. He was merely irritated by patience and tears.”