| “ | I thank you kindly for bringing me here, Inspector. But I don't have any respects to pay. | „ |
| ~ Chapman's most famous quote. |
Nigel Chapman (nee Stanley) is the main antagonist of the Hercule Poirot mystery Hickory Dickory Dock by Agatha Christie, and the subsequent television of the same name in an episode of Agatha Christie's Poirot.
Chapman is a son in an elite family with a refusal to play by the rules and resorting to cheats and crime to make ends meet, and eventually murder to cover it up, even in spite of being sworn to stop or otherwise to face be ousted to the police.
In the film adaptation, he was portrayed by Jonathan Firth.
Biography[]
Nigel Stanley is the son of nobleman Sir Arthur Stanley and a mother who's never named. The young Stanley was embezzling much of his mother's money, and she found out, threatening to cut him off and report his crimes, particularly to his father. To silence her, Stanley poisoned her with an overdose of her sleeping medication, Medinal, which Stanley increased discreetly when the senior Stanley administered it to her. Arthur was horrified by Nigel's actions, but refusing to turn in his own flesh and blood, Arthur chose a different direction: Nigel would never be reported, but Arthur swore to turn a written statement in incriminating Nigel that Nigel personally wrote to the police if ever Nigel committed another crime again. When Arthur died, his lawyer would hold the documents and the ultimatum would still stand. Nigel conceded and returned what could be of the money, the rest of the debt paid by Arthur incentivizing Nigel to work for his success as he hoped from a son his family.
Nigel gained enrollment in a strenuous but prestigious college, with high expectations and sharing designated hostel on Hickory Road with other students and faculty. But Nigel changed his last name to Chapman and refused to stop cheating through life with crime. The newly emerging Chapman had found a smuggling ring working from within the hostel and having several other stations. Diamonds were one of the major goods in question, and in the book alone, the other one was drugs. Students would be provided customized rucksacks with secret compartments where the items would be hidden, transporting the sacks to their next destination and being discreetly paid with the profits. They would have multiple passports, forged ones, as part of their operations for the transactions. The rucksack shop was located just across the road from the hostel. Christina Nicoletis was the director of the hostel chapter, Valerie Hobhouse being one of the traveling students in the movie, but running the final station at her beauty salon as the leader of the ring in the book. In the book, Hobhouse is is Nicoletis' daughter, and in the movie, she sews the stitching of the secret compartments in the rucksacks, whereas Nicoletis' cousin Giorgios is a jeweler responsible for evaluating and distributing the diamonds. Chapman was eager to jump into the operation for a cut, after the previous embezzling scheme within the Stanley household failed.
But the smuggling would also go south as well on Chapman's part. Local kleptomaniac Celia Austin performed her latest theft of a diamond ring the night Chapman performed his own on another one of his rounds. Chapman covertly hides on the property when the police were there for a fully unconnected dispatch, to cut apart the latest rucksack so as to not have its compartment be found. Chapman then snuck back into the hostel and stole light bulbs from the public halls to not be scene. In the book, he also uses his green ink to vandalize the art of Jamaican exchange student Elizabeth Johnston as another distraction before disposing of it. In the film, Celia Austin saw Chapman come out of the other building, but in the book, he knew about his previous surname seemingly from having met him youth and Hobhouse's false passport, putting two and two together. Hobhouse had encouraged Austen to start the kleptomanical thefts to attract the attention of psychology student Colin McNabb, finding her "an interesting case", so Hobhouse gave her the idea for his attention. The ring would then be "found" in Hobhouse's soup to intrigue McNabb even more. Poirot, brought on to consult the thefts, insists he'll call the police himself if the petty thief doesn't step forward. Austin stands up and confesses, avoiding mentioning Hobhouse and professing her love for McNabb, the two of them later getting engaged.
In the book, Chapman had also procured a stethoscope to steal morphine tartrate from the college medical labs, done in a bet to steal three deadly poisons, along with digitalin and hyoscine. In the movie, Colin McNabb stole the stethoscope for the dare. In both stories, the poisons were meant to be flushed down the toilet, but Chapman replaced the morphine and instead flushed stolen boracic powder. Austin denied the thefts of all mentioned items except for the ring and the other menial thefts. But Chapman planned to off her nonetheless for the information she knew. This was accomplished by replacing her nightly powder medicine with the morphine tartrate in question. When she took it, she succumbed to the poison and died, leaving McNabb distraught. Chapman in the movie also diverted the police by leaving the morphine under the floorboards of his room, briefly framing him and leaving him temporarily arrested.
Chapman is later present for revelation of the dare but pretends to be oblivious about the morphine in Austin's medicine paper. Hobhouse also admits to replacing the diamond with zircon "to pay off gambling debts" and, in an actual confession in the book, encouraging Austin into the kleptomanical thefts. Nicoletis becomes much more edgy when she realizes Chapman is the killer and never signed onto murder as part of the smuggling operations. Chapman kills her too the next night, in the book by realizing what she knows and spiking her brandy, in the movie when she confronts him in the evening and threatens to report to the police, leading her to be stabbed in her heart. It's at this point the smuggling operation is revealed by Poirot's intuition, but in the movie, it's officially confirmed when American student Sally Finch is revealed to be an informant for Customs agent John Casterman, who abducts Poirot off the road to reveal the whole thing at his office. Poirot had also purchased and cut up a ruck sack to reveal its hidden compartment by its design for the smuggling.
In the book, fellow student Patricia Lane knew about Nigel's second passport and found out about the lie regard Arthur and his mother from Nigel himself when he told her why. She also wanted to keep the morphine safe, so she replaced the baking soda with it, but Nigel had them placed it with the boracic powder, which West African student Akibombo took and got indigestion from. In the movie, Lane visits an ailing Stanley, whom she admires, with no awareness of Nigel or the poisoning at all, goes through his scrapbook while he sleeps, and finds Nigel in a family photo. Nigel planned to murder her next, but needing an alibi, he intimidated and blackmailed Hobhouse into being his accomplice. Chapman killed Lane with a paperweight in a sock by striking her head once with it. He left her and the weapon at the scene, and in the movie, a red hair to frame student Leonard Bateson, who worked at the hospital Arthur was dying at. Pretending "concern about" Lane, Chapman rushes immediately to Poirot and the Inspector in charge of the case, Sharpe in the book and Japp in the movie. At that moment, Hobhouse calls disguised as Lane in a false voice to give to make it seem like he has an alibi. When the two investigators hear her, she hangs up the phone and leaves. They then rush over and find her dead, with Chapman pretending to "be in shock and grief".
Around that time, Arthur also passed away from natural causes, with the lawyer prepared with the written confession. At this point, the smuggling operation is figured out, and in both versions, the central port station of the entire operation is raided, the parties involved arrested there. At that point, Poirot rounds up the usual suspects and reveals everything according in the order it happened and came to light: Austin's thefts, Finch's informant work, Hobhouse's encouragement of Austin, and the frame jobs on McNabb and Bateson, depending on the version. The thefts done by Chapman are singled out after eliminating Austen's thefts, and when bringing up the incriminating evidence, circumstantial and more clinching, Poirot reveals Chapman as the murderer. When Chapman scoffs and mentions the "alibi", Poirot fingers Hobhouse as the voice on the phone. Sickened and grief-stricken, in the book, because she reveals Nicoletis is her mother, Hobhouse admits he's right despite Chapman trying to shut her up. She offers to give a statement, and the lawyer comes and serves the written confession.
In the movie, Chapman tries to escape at the moment of a distraction where everyone's gathered, nearly getting hit by a train in the process. In cuffs, Chapman is taken to Arthur's funeral, where the confession is presented. In both versions, Chapman's demanded by the inspector in charge to pay his respects. Chapman says coldly "I don't have any respects to pay". Chapman is then taken into custody and incarcerated for all direct and affiliated crimes accordingly.
Victims[]
- Mrs. Stanley (deliberately overdosed on Medinal)
- Celia Austin (poisoned with morphine tartrate)
- Christina Nicoletis (poisoned her brandy in the book, stabbed her heart in the movie)
- Colin McNabb (planted the morphine in his room to frame him)
- Patricia Lane (beaten over her head with a paper weight in a sock)
- Valerie Hobhouse (blackmailed and threatened into abetting Lane's murder)
- Leonard Bateson (framed for Lane's murder by planting his hair under her fingernail)
