In the novel Mrs McGinty's Dead, Laura Upward (née Hargraves) is the mother of Robin Upward, with whom she lived in a house named Laburnums. Mrs McGinty used to be her cleaner.
She was an extremely wealthy woman, who was the widowed wife of a wealthy manufacturer from the North Country. Her son was born some time after Mr Upward's death. She was described as a very secretive woman by Hercule Poirot.
Mrs Upward was described as being a "vigorous-looking woman of sixty-odd, with iron-grey hair and a determined chin". She read some of Ariadne Oliver's novels, and stated that they were "enormous solace" to her.
[Spoilers ahead][]
She is strangled with a silk scarf when her son was in a Cullenquay repertory theatre with Ariadne Oliver. At that time, she had called three women: Eve Carpenter, Sheelagh Rendell and Deirdre Henderson. A cup with traces of lipstick on it was found near Mrs Upward's dead body.
It is later revealed that Robin is her adopted son and the son of a murderer. She would have abandoned him is she knew this, so she had to be killed. Her real son had died of tuberculosis, and she adopted Robin after his death. No one knew of this apart from some friends of Robin Upward like Michael West and Cecil Leech.
Maude Williams believed Laura Upward was Eva Kane, the woman who had murdered Miss Williams' mother, so she went to Laburnums to confront Mrs Upward and perhaps to kill her. When she saw that she had been strangled, Maude realised that her theory was wrong.
Portrayals[]
Mrs Upward was portrayed by Siân Phillips (who appeared onscreen as Siân Philips) in the ITV TV adaptation which made part of the TV series Agatha Christie's Poirot.
In Madmoiselle Mac Ginty est morte, the France Televisions and Escazal Films adaptation of the novel, the parallel character is called Louise Doutremont who similarly was killed by her adopted son Michael.