Funny / One, Two, Buckle My Shoe

• Poirot often states that he is "afraid", though that's more often an expression of being afraid something unpleasant will happen to somebody else, or afraid that he has made a mistake or is wrong about something. But as this novel opens, we see Poirot gripped with genuine fear and trepidation, for he is about to go to...the dentist.
• The pageboy at the dental office mangling everybody's names.
• The description of Poirot spying on one of Alistair Blunt's gardeners, his egg-shaped head slowly appearing over a garden wall like the rising Moon, and then slowly sinking out of sight, is quite funny to visualize.