- When the prime minister is kidnapped right before an important international arms summit, Poirot has just 32--and a quarter--hours to find the prime minister.
- The British Prime Minister's car is attacked by a band of thugs. He manages to escape with minor injuries but a few days later he is kidnapped. The British government are desperate for the PM to be found quickly - he is due to attend an important conference. Upon the recommendation of Chief Inspector Japp, they call in Hercule Poirot.—grantss
- En route to the train station to attend a disarmament conference in Paris, the Prime Minister's car is attacked by what the press describe as ruffians. The PM is slightly injured and does make it across the Channel to French soil, but never arrives in Paris. Poirot is called in by senior government officials as it appears the Prime Minister has been kidnapped. He soon comes to the conclusion however that the evidence from the first attack doesn't quite add up and all is not what it seems.—garykmcd
- The Prime Minister is in danger. After a failed assassination attempt that left him with a wound on his head--the bullet just grazed him--the next day on his way to a summit in France, his car is hijacked and the Prime Minister is kidnapped. With just a bit over 32 hours until the arms summit where the Prime Minister is the only person who could develop a consensus to keep Germany from rearming, Inspector Japp tells the heads of state that Poirot is the man who can find the missing Prime Minister if anyone can. Poirot then vexes the leaders when he continues to focus not on the failed assassination attempt instead of the kidnapping. Time is running out--will they find the Prime Minister dead, or alive?—Spirit
- Towards the end of the First World War, Hastings calls on Poirot in his rooms to discuss the sensational news of the day - the attempted assassination of the Prime Minister, David MacAdam (Henry Moxon). They are interrupted by two visitors: Lord Estair (Patrick Godfrey), Leader of the House of Commons and Bernard Dodge (Ronald Hines), a member of the War Cabinet. They enlist Poirot to help with a national crisis - the Prime Minister has been kidnapped. He was on his way to a secret peace conference to be held the next day at Versailles. The conference was organized to unite Europe against Germany rearming & PM MacAdam was the key unifying voice who could sway the vote against Germany. His absence could mean that Germany is allowed to rearm.
He arrived in Boulogne-Sur-Mer where he was met by what was thought to be his official car, but it was a substitute. The real car was found in a side road with its driver bound and gagged. As they tell Poirot the details, news reaches them by special courier that the bogus car has been found abandoned and containing Captain Daniels (David Horovitch), the Prime Minister's secretary, chloroformed and gagged. His employer is still missing.
Poirot wants to know the full details of the shooting that took place earlier in England. It occurred on the way back from Windsor Castle when, accompanied by Daniels and the chauffeur, Murphy, the car took a side road and was surrounded by masked men. Murphy stopped and one man shot at the P.M., but only grazing his cheek. Murphy drove off, leaving the would-be murderers behind. The P.M. stopped off at a small cottage hospital to have his wound bandaged and then went straight on to Charing Cross Station to get the Dover train. Upon inspection of the car that was shot at, Poirot finds no bullet holes & no blood inside the car. Murphy the driver has also disappeared, his car being found outside a Soho restaurant frequented by suspected German agents.
As Poirot packs to leave for France he voices his suspicions of both Daniels and Murphy and wonders why the shooting by masked men took place before the kidnap. Poirot goes over the Channel with various detectives involved in the case, among them Japp. Once in Boulogne he refuses to join in the search but sits in his hotel room and thinks for several hours
Abruptly, he returns to Britain where he begins a tour of cottage hospitals to the west of London in an official car. Poirot interrogates Daniels & finds that Daniel cannot recollect the name of the hospital he took the PM to, when he was shot. He claims that he was attending to the PM & instructed to the driver to take them to the nearest hospital. Poirot also finds the photo of Daniel's ex-wife on his desk, whom he had divorced & humiliated publicly a few years earlier. Poirot calls on Mrs Daniels (Lisa Harrow) & finds her exuding hate for her husband. Poirot instructs Hastings to follow Mrs Daniels in case she ventures out. Poirot visits Daniels next day & subtly hints that he knows the location of the kidnapped PM. Mrs Daniels receives a call shortly after & she leaves, with Hastings in her tow. She sees Hastings following her & manages to give him a slip.
Poirot explains that Mrs Daniels is the duchess of Ireland & her father was an ardent supporter of Irish independence. He was stopped by British politicians & his career & reputation destroyed. Since then, Mrs Daniels was looking for an opportunity to hurt England to return the favor. She convinced Daniels to her cause & they plotted for several years until the perfect opportunity came along, the rearming of Germany & a sympathetic driver who would help them in kidnapping the PM. Poirot remembers that a mansion belonging to Mrs Daniel's father was burnt down not far from where Hastings lost her.
They call at a house in Hampstead; the police raid it and recover both Murphy and the Prime Minister. The villain was Daniels who kidnapped PM with the help of Murphy in the shooting, taking to London substitutes with the "P.M.'s" face disguised by bandages from a shooting that had never occurred; Poirot's search of the cottage hospitals proved that no one's face was bandaged up that day. Investigation was misdirected to France when the real P.M. had never left the country. Mrs Daniels commits suicide & Daniels is arrested along with Murphy.
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