Alastair Blunt, James Japp and others in “Unfinished Business”

I wish I could make you understand, Monsieur Poirot, about my meeting with Rebecca and my marriage. Gerda understood, didn't you, old girl? We could have married again after Rebecca's death, but, do you know, we'd come to rather enjoy all the secrecy. She's an actress through and through. She would have found it very dull being just one character. Well, I've killed three people, so presumably I ought to hang. But haven't I done something for England? I have held it firm. I have kept it solvent. I have kept it free from dictators. I am necessary to the continuing peace and well-being of this nation.

James Japp

Is he saying what I think he's saying?

What about me? He was gonna let me hang.

Hercule Poirot

Précisément. Monsieur Blunt, with his usual efficiency, had provided for himself a second line of defense. If things went wrong, you, Monsieur Carter, you were to be the scapegoat. You see, by now, Monsieur Blunt knows of Monsieur Morley's opinion regarding you, and so he arranges for you to be engaged in a most mysterious fashion as a gardener. And how easy for Helen Montressor to fire a shot vaguely in your direction, drop the pistol at your feet, where you are bound to pick it up? You are caught red-handed, and of course nobody is going to believe your story, your ridiculous story about being employed by the secret service. No. As far as Monsieur Blunt is concerned, you can end your short life on the gallows.

I don't waste pity on people like him.

Hercule Poirot

Eh bien, Monsieur Blunt. That is where you and I, we do not see alike, for to me, the lives of those three people are just as important as your own life. [starts to leave but stops and faces Blunt] Monsieur Blunt, you talk of the continued peace of this nation, hein? Oh, yes, that is very good. But Poirot is not concerned with nations. Poirot is concerned with private individuals, who have the right not to have taken from them their lives.