Masaryk University Faculty of Arts Department of English and American Studies

3.2The Plot

When after the initial investigation the police have no prime suspect, Charles agrees to help his father and Chief Inspector Taverner, who is in charge, with the case and becomes a guest in the house. Each member of the family had a motive and an opportunity, none of them have an alibi, and the police are clueless. Aristide Leonides died a very wealthy man and, according to his will, all the members of the family inherit a lot of money. The situation gets complicated when a new will turns up, where Aristide wishes to leave all his money to Sophia.

Meanwhile, Charles investigates by talking to the family members. The most talkative one is Josephine, who claims that she knows who the murderer is. She is very well informed about other things going on in the house as well (for example she knows about the affair between Brenda and Laurence and knows where their love letters are hidden) and boasts about her knowledge. It does not take a long time until she is hit on the head by someone in an attempt of murder. She survives and while she is in the hospital, the police arrest Brenda Leonides and Laurence Brown, because they find the love letters and decide there is a case.

When Josephine comes home from the hospital, Brenda and Laurence are already gone and the whole family think that the case is over. However, not long after Josephine’s return, someone poisons her cocoa, Nannie drinks it instead of her and dies, and the family realise that the killer is still among them. Charles is afraid for Josephine’s life and tries to persuade her to tell him what she knows, but she refuses. Later, Edith de Haviland takes Josephine out in a car and they both die in an accident.

After Edith’s death, Charles discovers two letters which she wrote. One of them is addressed to Chief Inspector Taverner, where Edith confesses to the murders of Aristide Leonides and Nannie. The second one is intended only for Charles and it is revealed that the real killer is Josephine. She killed her grandfather just because he did not want to pay for her ballet lessons.

3.3Josephine

Throughout the whole novel, Josephine pretends to be playing detective. This may result from her feeling like an outcast and preferring to be on her own. She frequently listens behind closed doors and writes everything she learns in her diary. Even though Nannie criticises her for her actions (“‘Don’t do that,’ I’d say, ‘you’ll get lead poisoning’[…]” (Crooked House 226)), Josephine continues to spy on people, because it makes her feel superior to others and she can show how clever she is. She seems to like Charles and informs him about what she has found out. Therefore, Charles has an impression of Josephine as a strange child who finds out about everything that goes on in the house. “Josephine isn’t quite the ordinary child. She knows a good deal about people,” (Crooked House 278) he says towards the ending of the novel. This is repeated throughout the entire novel, not only by Charles, but also by other characters. Laurence Brown, the tutor, describes her as “a very intelligent child, but difficult.” (Crooked House 92). Brenda Leonides says about Josephine: “Sometimes I think that child isn’t right in her head. She has horrible sneaky ways and she looks queer… She gives me the shivers sometimes.” (Crooked House 99).

When Charles first meets Josephine, the two talk about a play where her mother played the biblical figure Jezebel. Josephine’s cruel nature unravels there when she says: “I mean, Jezebel wasn’t wicked like she is in the Bible. […] That made it dull. Still, the end was alright. They threw her out of the window. Only no dogs came and ate her. I think that was a pity, don’t you? I like the part about the dogs eating her best.” (Crooked House 110). This may also show certain hostility towards her mother, who played Jezebel. Josephine is able to hate a person for most trivial reasons, so it is quite possible that she bears a secret hatred of her mother who calls her a changeling, as mentioned above. After all, it is written in her diary that her only reason for murdering her grandfather is that he would not pay for her ballet lessons, a motive which, according to Charles, is “pitifully childish and inadequate” (Crooked House 299).

In spite of her being the ugly, selfish and strange child in the family, Josephine seems to be loved by most of the household. When she is injured and goes to the hospital, her mother (who does not seem to love anyone more than herself and dramatic scenes) expresses regret that she called Josephine a changeling, and the grief on the part of her sister (her voice breaks when she is explaining to the police how she found Josephine) and Nannie (who is found crying in the kitchen) is deep and clear.

Josephine’s character is an evil, selfish one. In her, the worst characteristics of the Leonides family were combined.

She had had an authoritarian ruthlessness of her grandmother’s family, and the ruthless egoism of Magda, seeing only her point of view. She had also presumably suffered, sensitive like Philip, from the stigma of being the unattractive – the changeling child – of the family. Finally, in her very marrow had run the essential crooked strain of old Leonides. She had been Leonides’ grandchild, she had resembled him in brain and cunning – but where his love had gone outwards to family and friends, hers had turned inward to herself. (Crooked House 297).

This description of her character implies an intelligent but also very cunning personality. Josephine’s selfishness is so big that not only does she want to have everything her way, she also does not hesitate to get rid of any obstacles that would be in her way. The only person who knew her true character was her grandfather. “[He] had realised what none of the rest of the family had realised, that Josephine might be a source of danger to others and to herself. He had kept her from school life because he was afraid of what she might do.” (Crooked House 297). Josephine, however, wanted to go to school and to have her ballet lessons, so the only possibility she saw was to murder her grandfather. Her diary entry about her decision to kill him is very clear about the motive. “Grandfather wouldn’t let me do bally dancing so I made up my mind I would kill him. Then we should move to London and live and mother wouldn’t mind me doing bally.” (Crooked House 299). Neither does she hesitate to murder Nannie because she simply hates her. Concerning the motive for Nannie’s murder, Josephine writes this in her diary: “I hate Nannie… […] She says I am only a little girl. She says I show off. She’s making mother send me abroad… I’m going to kill her too […]” (Crooked House 300). Other reasons for killing Nannie might be Josephine’s fear that Nannie would suspect her because of her experience with children (“I think that Nannie knew, had always known, that Josephine was not normal.” (Crooked House 297).) or the fact that after she returned from the hospital, Brenda and Laurence had been arrested and the case was over, which dissatisfied Josephine who was hungry for attention.

In spite of her motives being very childish, the cold-bloodedness with which her crimes were planned and also her attempt to make someone else the scapegoat make Josephine a very unchildlike character. Even though there are several cases of child murderers, such as the one of Constance Kent, who is referenced in the novel (Crooked House 145), a child murdering adults is a particularly shocking image. Charles Hayward’s father says this about child murderers:

A child, you know, translates desire into action without compunction. A child is angry with its kitten, says “I’ll kill you,” and hits it on the head with a hammer – and then breaks its heart because the kitten doesn’t come alive again! Lots of kids try to take a baby out of a pram and “drown it”, because it usurps attention – or interferes with their pleasures. (Crooked House 144-145).

Josephine kills because of hatred, just like a “regular” child murderer, but when it comes to the “heart-breaking” part of the process, she does not feel that way at all. On the contrary, she is very satisfied with herself. The only moment when she acts like a child her age is towards the end of the novel, when Edith de Haviland wants to take her out in a car. “As Josephine looked mutinous, Edith added: ‘We’ll go into Longbridge and have an ice cream soda.’ Josephine’s eyes brightened and she said: ‘Two.’” (Crooked House 282). This may be Christie’s attempt to make Josephine seem more like a child and therefore make the discovery of her guilt even more horrifying, or to show Josephine’s selfishness and greediness one more time.

Although Josephine is the killer, Christie manages to make the reader think that she is just an unpleasant child, who likes to play detective and know everything about everyone, but who is harmless. This may largely be because of the common perception of children as pure, innocent beings. Charles Hayward made the same mistake, because “[He] had never considered her because she was a child. But children have committed murders, and this particular murder had been well within a child’s compass.” (Crooked House 295). When Charles’s father talked about characteristics which murderers have in common, he said that most murderers are vain and they want to talk. (Crooked House 146). Josephine was the only character who fitted this description. “Her vanity, her persistent self-importance, her delight in talking, her reiteration on how clever she was, and how stupid the police were.” (Crooked House 295). But because she was a child, and only because she was a child, she was never considered a suspect. In Josephine, Christie created a character who was pure evil and beyond repair.