Dr Rendell

In the novel Mrs McGinty's Dead, Dr Rendell is the physician in Broadhinny, married to Sheelagh. Mrs McGinty used to be his claner, and came to his house on Tuesday mornings. Dr Rendell was described as a very cheerful man of forty. He is one of the few people in Broadhinny who knew Hercule Poirot. He asked if Poirot visited Broadhinny just to rest, or there was a criminal in the village. He employed Mrs McGinty because the housekeeper, Mrs Scott, "could not get down on her knees" very well. He was certain James Bentley had murdered Mrs McGinty, and both he and his wife didn't doubt it. He remarked it was an "ordinary sordid crime". Bentley had asked Dr Rendell's advice once or twice, since he was very distressed about his health--he was perhaps "coddled by his mother" when she was still alive.

Both Dr Rendell and his wife read a lot about crime, including fiction and criminology. They also read the Sunday papers like the Sunday Companion. He remembers an article written by Pamela Horsfall about where four women who had taken part in crimes were now. He says that the article was "a lot of hooey", because one of the women mentioned, Janice Courtland, was not the 'tragic innocent' she was stated to be in the article. Dr Rendell had an uncle who was a physician, and attended Mrs Courtland's husband. She actually had manipulated her lover into killing her husband and then left the country as a rich widow to marry someone else. The newspaper did not mention the fact that she later married someone else, but Dr Rendell didn't know the name of the person.

He presented his wife to Poirot, who noticed Mrs Rendell seemed afraid of something.

During a party, Ariadne Oliver gave Poirot a piece of paper in which she had written the name of whom she thought was the killer of Abigail McGinty: he unfolded it and there was Dr Rendell's name on it. Indeed, when someone had attempted to kill Poirot, Dr Rendell was not at home. Mrs Oliver also described him as the typical murderer; "hearty and genial", and "all that"--she also says she would arrest him if she was the head of Scotland Yard. The motive for Mrs McGinty's murder could have been unprofessional conduct, and she possibly knew of it. Dr Rendell attended the party, and was the first guest to leave.

Rendell was on the Medical Register. No one knew about his home background, but there was information about where he trained and practised. His wife came from near Dublin. Poirot thought about Mrs Rendell that she had received anonymous letters, but did not want to talk about the subject of them.

It was later revealed why Mrs Rendell was afraid of something. Superintendent Spence was checking on him, and something "rather odd" came out. Dr Rendell's first wife had died in Leeds, and at the time the police of the city had received a series of anonymous letters stating that he had poisoned her. She had been attended by another doctor who said her death was above board. There seemed to be no evidence of Rendell killing his wife, except one detail: before her death the two had mutually insured their lives in each other's favor. It was indeed Dr Rendell who had attempted to murder Poirot by pushing him under a train.

Portrayals
He was portrayed by Simon Shepherd in the 2008 ITV TV adaptation of the novel. Here Poirot suspects Mrs Rendell and not her husband who tried to push him under a train.

In Mademoiselle Mac Ginty est morte, the France Télévisions adaptation of the novel, the parallel character is a psychoanalyst Leopold Santini.