Poirot Bk3: Poirot Investigates (9/11)

The disappearance of Mr Davenheim

Mystery:
Mr Davenheim-> a great financier and an owner of his bank- Davenheim Bank
-> Disappeared after returning home to take an envelope containing some document to meet his client Mr Lowen
-> was a man with balding head and thick beard
-> No one has seen Mr Davenheim and his body wasn't found.
-> His jacket was found in a lake quite a distance from his house
-> His automobile was still left in the garage, if he had taken another mode of transport, surely he would be seen by some people.
-> Mr Lowen had come to Mr Davenheim's house looking for Mr Davenheim after the first day of Mr Davenheim's disappearance.
-> The safe containing the precious jewel was broken in, and it was discovered after Mr Lowen came to the house.

Abnormal behaviour of Mr Davenheim before disappearance:
-> Mr Davenheim had not shared the same room as his wife since 3 months ago.
-> Mr Davenheim was physically less affectionate towards his wife
-> However, Mr Davenheim always brought precious jewels for his wife from business trip

Suspects:
1) Mr Davenheim ran away unnoticed-> Hardly the case because Mr Davenheim was a well known finanical figure.
2) Billy Kellert-> a thug
- had in possession of Mr Davenheim's seal gold ring and tried to pawn it.
- had assaulted a police officer and went to jail for 3 months.- saw a man with big moustache and dark complexion coming along the road to the village, throwing a small object over the hedge
- the description of the man fits Mr Lowen.
- went over and found Mr Davenheim's ring
-> seems to be more a thief than an apparent murderer
-> was out of the prison recently and could not possibly make up a fake story which has a perfecting fitting description of Mr Lowen
-> nevertheless Billy Kellert was a baddie.

3) Mr Lowen, Mr Davenheim's business client who was supposed to meet Mr Davenheim.
- However Mr Lowen claimed that he did not managed to meet Mr Davenheim at all.
- Was testified by Billy Kellert to have seen him on the day of disappearance of Mr Davenheim near his house.
- Was in the room whereby he could have broken the safe to steal the Jewels
- However, the sound of the breaking of the safe would definitly be heard and alerted.

4) Madame Davenheim-> wife of Mr Davenheim
- The story, of Mr Lowen breaking open the Safe to steal the jewellery unnoticed while she was also in the house, was not convincing.

Leads:
- Davenhiem Bank met with financial difficult and had to wind down.