The Kidnapped Prime Minister

Strange that this one is later in Poirot Investigations because when he is approached by the UK government he asks why they are looking for his help because he is “unknown in London.” Unless he simply means in the sense that government agents would have taken notice?

At least in this short story Poirot is assigned two additional helpers, so Hastings lack of understanding is actually due to his (mostly) being uninformed and uninvolved. However, this story really did grab me as being just a giant red herring with the trip to France and the lack on involvement of Hastings. Without constant interjections from Poirot, the reader only has the information provided by Hastings, which is NEVER good. It was harder to believe this way and luckily it was short.