The Labours of Hercules is a short story collection written by Agatha Christie and first published in the US by Dodd, Mead and Company in 1947[1][2] and in the UK by Collins Crime Club in September of the same year.

The talk turns to Poirot's intention to retire after completing a few cases of interest and personal appeal and Burton laughingly refers to the twelve labours of Hercules.

Miss Lemon, Poirot's secretary, finds the first of the labours in a letter from a bluff outspoken businessman, Sir Joseph Hoggin, whose wife's Pekingese dog has been kidnapped.

Miss Carnaby feels guilty for her crime but excuses it on the basis of the way they are treated by their employers – only the other day Lady Hoggin accused her of tampering with her tonic as it tasted unpleasant.

Poirot makes the rounds of the village, insinuating that he is connected with the Home Office and thereby generating much hypocritical murmurs of sympathy for the doctor and, more importantly, names of who said what and when.

Nurse Harrison tells a story of overhearing Jean and the doctor talking about the imminent death of his wife in which it was clear that this was an event that both of them were impatiently awaiting.

While being interviewed, Beatrice slyly denies overhearing any conversation but tells him of several suspicious stories of Jean making medicine or a pot of tea for Mrs Oldfield which the nurse poured away or changed before the patient could take them.

He observed the nurse's positive reaction when he told her of a possible exhumation and then had her followed by George who witnessed the buying of the compact and the laying of the trap for Jean.

He also speaks with the owner of Grasslawn, Sir George Sanderfield, who remembers Marie, with some unease, but does not recall a maid on the first occasion of Madame Samoushenka's visit to his house, and thinks Poirot is mistaken.

Poirot speaks to his contact in the theatre world who tells him the dancer has gone to Vagray Les Alpes in Switzerland, suffering from tuberculosis, and that her maid was an Italian from Pisa.

Marrascaud, a Parisian gangster, has fled from his homeland after the killing of Salley, a bookmaker, and is believed from information received to be having a rendezvous with members of his gang at Rochers Neiges.

There is a friendly American tourist called Mr Schwartz, a beautiful but melancholy woman, a distinguished-looking man reading a book in German and three criminal types playing cards.

Talking to the manager and then to Schwartz again, Poirot learns that the beautiful woman is a Madame Grandier, who comes each year on the anniversary of her husband's death in the area, and that the distinguished-looking man is Dr Lutz, a Jewish refugee from the Nazis in Vienna.

We learn that during his first night in the hotel, Poirot did not drink his coffee, as he suspected it was drugged, and actually witnessed Gustave entering his room, rifling his pockets, and finding the note from Lementeuil.

Poirot visits Percy Perry, the seedy editor of The X-Ray News who he has heard has previously accepted sums of money for not printing stories.

Soon afterward, along with the stories about Hammett, another series of news reports start to appear in the press which hint at various sex scandals regarding Ferrier's wife, Dagmar.

Poirot used sex as the force of nature, first blackening Mrs Ferrier's name and then clearing her in a public fashion, resulting in a wave of sympathy which also reflected well on her father and destroyed The X-Ray News.

All seems to go well and the next day Harold sees Mrs Rice speaking with a police officer and she tells him that the death has been declared as being from natural causes and that they are all in the clear.

Poirot learns that Hugh's mother died when he was ten years old in a boating accident when she was out with the Admiral, and that she was previously engaged to Frobisher before he went off to India with the British Army.

Poirot questions the Admiral who has aged immensely since these incidents started and who feels that breaking the engagement is best for everyone, remarking that there will be no more Chandlers at Lyde Manor after he and his son have died.

The atropine was mixed into Hugh's shaving cream so that it could be absorbed through his skin, causing hallucinations and intense thirst, and the culprit killed the animals and planted evidence to frame him.

A group of unemployed men were paid to carry out a demonstration in the gallery which, once it was cleared by the police, was found to have been a diversion to enable the picture to be cut out of its frame.

Simpson knows the picture is being transported to France where it will be bought by a millionaire collector and he wants Poirot to assist as he thinks he will be better at dealing with an unscrupulous rich man than the police will be.

The only other people in the carriage seemed clear of suspicion – two middle-aged spinsters, two French commercial travellers from Lyon, a young man called James Elliot and his flashy wife, and an American lady about whom very little is known.

Miss Burshaw met a girl in London whom she had never seen before, and who then totally changed her appearance in the toilette on the train, discarding the schoolgirl hat and shoes through the window and transforming herself into the flashy wife of James Elliot.

The Scotland Yard detective finds out that Andersen is a German chemist, expelled from a university there by the Nazis because he had a Jewish mother and that there is nothing suspicious about the deaths of the women whose names have been supplied by Miss Carnaby.

As if to prove her assertion correct, soon afterwards Mr Cole accosts Miss Carnaby with tales of his strange visions which involve virgin sacrifices, Jehovah and even Odin.

Power paid a sum equal to thirty thousand pounds to buy it at auction in 1929, but on the night of the sale the goblet and other items were stolen from the home of the seller, the Marchese di San Veratrino.

The Labours of Hercules consists of twelve Poirot cases, neatly constructed but inevitably lacking the criss-cross of red-herring trails that make our arteries pulse over the full distance.

[5] Robert Barnard, in A Talent to Deceive: An Appreciation of Agatha Christie, wrote: Probably the best single short-story collection, because more varied in its problems and lighter in its touch than usual.