Free A is for Arsenic by Kathryn Harkup Page A

extravagant lifestyle. But the income was not enough to pay for the nights out in clubs or the payments to the young men that shared her bed. When one of Marie’s friends became ill with a dizzy spell she offered to nurse her. Perhaps unsurprisingly, her friend’s health deteriorated, and she died a few weeks later. Marie continued to poison friends to obtain money; when she ran out of friends, she turned to the customers in her shop. Apparently she would drop digitalis into cups of tea in a back room and offer them to the ladies picking out dresses in the shop. After they died, she would take any ready cash and valuables that they had on them.
    Rumours had already started about Marie, and anonymous letters had even been sent to the police suggesting that she might have been involved in the deaths of two elderly women. An investigation was started, but it was evidence brought forward by a (surviving) female friend of Marie’s that motivated the police to look deeper into the case. The friend had been complaining to Marie about her husband, and how she wished the no-good rascal dead. Marie helpfully offered her friend a powder that would dispatch the man, leaving no trace. After thinking over her options for a few days, the woman went to the police.
    Marie was arrested and the bodies of her husband, her lover, her friends and her customers were exhumed. Traces of digitalis were found in the bodies, though no suspicion of foul play had arisen at the time of their deaths. Marie was put on trial in 1936 for the murder of ten people, though it is believed she may have killed twice as many. The jury returned a verdict of guilty and she was sentenced to life imprisonment, there being no death penalty in Belgium at the time. She died in prison during the Second World War. Apparently she revelled in the details of her victims’ demise, describing one victim as ‘dying beautifully, lying flat on her back’.
    Dame Agatha and digitalis
    In Appointment with Death Mrs Boynton and her family take a trip to the deserted city of Petra. Mrs Boynton is a monster of a woman; there is no shortage of people who would be happy to see her dead. Mrs Boynton also has a heart condition for which she is taking digitalis medication, in the form of a solution added to water. Her medical condition and treatment provide an excellent opportunity for her killer to cover their tracks. An overdose of digitalis results in failure of the heart to contract properly, ultimately leading to cardiac arrest. Dr Gerard, who is also on the expedition to Petra, correctly points out that ‘A large dose of digitoxin thrown suddenly on the circulation by intravenous injection would cause sudden death by quick palsy of the heart. It has been estimated that 4mg might prove fatal to an adult man.’
    There was a plentiful supply of digitalis, despite the fact that the death occurred in an isolated part of the world surrounded by desert, where foxgloves would not grow. The killer had no need to find a local pharmacy and fake a prescription, nor to search for foxglove plants with which they could make their own lethal preparations. The poison could have been obtained from Mrs Boynton’s own medication, or from a supply of digitoxin in Dr Gerard’s medical bag.
    Mrs Boynton’s death could have been due to natural causes, or accidental poisoning. When her body is found, Dr Gerard first assumes that her death was due to the exhausting journey to Petra, combined with the hot weather, with this all being too much for her heart. Her death could also have been due to a mistake made by the dispenser when making up her prescription of digitalis medicine (Christie of course knew such blunders were possible from her dealings with Mr P.; see page here ). In Mrs Boynton’s case we will never know if the dispenser made an error, as the bottle containing her medication was inadvertently broken when her body was moved.
    Mrs Boynton dies while the rest of the party are away from the