Agatha Christie's Secret Notebooks

The A.B.C. Murders • Dead Man’s Folly • ‘Manx Gold’ • The Mirror Crack’d from Side to Side • A Murder is Announced • One, Two, Buckle my Shoe • Peril at End House • ‘Strange Jest’ • Why Didn’t They Ask Evans?

‘Shattering the complacency’—this is the dramatic impact of a game going wrong in three Christie titles; while two others are actual games, one intellectual and one physical. The deadliest game of the three titles is The A.B.C. Murders, while the other two, Dead Man’s Folly and A Murder is Announced, feature actual games that go wrong due to the intervention of a real murder. ‘Strange Jest’ and ‘Manx Gold’ are intellectual puzzles played by characters with a tangible prize at the end. The latter was an actual game played in the Isle of Man in 1930, while the former concerns the interpretation of a will. And the game played by Clarissa in Spider’s Web proves to be more dangerous than even she realises. In Christie’s overall output the concept of the game-going-wrong is not a major motif, but the dramatic impact of the scene in the drawing-room at Little Paddocks in A Murder is Announced cannot be denied.

Cousins Juan and Fenella race to find a treasure as they match wits with their dead uncle—and a killer.

A full history of this story can be found in the 1997 collection While the Light Lasts, thanks to sterling detective work by its editor Tony Medawar. Briefly, the chairman of a tourism committee in the Isle of Man approached Christie, in late 1929, with a view to her creating a treasure hunt on the island to boost tourist numbers. After a visit in April 1930 she wrote ‘Manx Gold’, for a fee of £65 (approx. £1,300 today), and it was published in five instalments, complete with clues, in the Manchester Daily Dispatch, in the third week of May of that year, and in a booklet distributed throughout the island. The ‘treasure’ was four snuffboxes hidden in separate locations around the island. (It is at an exhibition of snuffboxes that Hercule Poirot meets Mr Shaitana in Cards on the Table.)

Notebook 59 has 20 pages of notes for this unusual commission. Unfortunately those pages contain some of the most indecipherable notes of any of the Notebooks, including much crossing out, doodling and rough diagrams. The story is a minor entry in her literary output, remarkable mainly for the uniqueness of its creation and for the number of ideas that were to resurface in a book four years later. A snapshot and a dying man’s last words as well as a villainous doctor are all features of Why Didn’t They Ask Evans?. And, indeed, Juan and Fenella, a couple joining forces to elucidate a mystery, could be seen as forerunners of Bobby Jones and Lady Frances Derwent from the same novel. (Oddly, Juan and Fenella are both fiancés and first cousins.) The invisible ink idea first surfaced in Motive Vs. Opportunity two years earlier and as minor plot element in Chapter 20 of The Secret Adversary.

The notes accurately reflect the story as it appeared. There were however some name changes—Ronald and Celia become Juan and Fenella and Robert becomes Ewan—while the cliff fall and cuff-link clue were eventually discarded:

Story

Ronald and Celia—first cousins—letter from deceased uncle. Her annoyance about uncle—they arrive—the housekeeper—4 snuff boxes missing. Letter left—with doggerel rhyme—call at lawyers. Then they start off—get it—on their return—meet the others—Dr Crook [Crookall was the name of the chairman of the Tourism Committee!] MacRae—Alan—Robert Bagshawe…doesn’t like his smile. They decide to pool with others. Next day—the clues—housekeeper goes to get them—stolen—she admits that they asked her and she refused—a cuff link—it was Robert.

They dash out—find R in grounds—dying—murdered—hit on head or in hospital—has fallen over cliff. They lean near him—may be conscious at end—opens eyes says ‘D’ye ken—?’—dies

The ‘doggerel rhyme’ referred to above appears in Notebook 59 in two forms, the one that actually appeared and the following, an earlier unused draft:

4 points of the compass so there be, South and West North and East

A double S—No East for me Fare forth and show how clever you be.

Two of the other clues also appear:

Excuse verbosity—I am all at sixes and sevens and Words brought out by heat of fire

Another point of interest in this Notebook is a rough drawing of the clue that falls out of the map of the island—a cross, a circle and a pointing arrow down to the detail of the little lines on one side of the circle, as noticed by Fenella.

A series of letters to Hercule Poirot challenges him to a deadly game. Despite these forewarnings, the letter-writer manages to kill Alice Ascher in Andover, Betty Barnard in Bexhill, and Sir Carmichael Clarke in Churston. As the entire country watches, can Poirot prevent the D murder?

Thanks to Notebook 13, we have an exact date for the writing of this novel. There, during a 15-page travel account, we read the following, although unfortunately there are no further references in the travelogue to the progress of the novel:

Tuesday November 6th [1934] Started The A.B.C. Murders.

A rough sketch (and even rougher handwriting!) of a clue in the search for Manx Gold, from Notebook 59.

Featuring a hugely imaginative concept—an alphabetical series both of murder victims and locations, chosen apparently at random—that was carried off with consummate skill and daring, The A.B.C. Murders was destined to become one of the top three Christie titles. And it is now forgotten that it was one of the earliest versions of the ‘serial killer’ idea that is now a staple of both the bookshelf and the screen. When this book was written the phrase did not even exist and is yet another example of Christie anticipating, without even realising it, motifs that were to dominate crime fiction in later years. (The other major anticipation was Death Comes as the End, set in Ancient Egypt and foreshadowing another current trend for crime novels set in various eras of the past.)

It is therefore a disappointment that there are only 15 pages of surviving notes for The A.B.C. Murders, scattered over three Notebooks. I suspect that there were earlier and rougher notes that have not survived, because the book’s intricate premise needed detailed planning and the notes we have are relatively straightforward and organised.

Due to the elaborate plot and large cast of characters, the characterisation is slighter than usual. Dealing as it does with three separate murder investigations involving three sets of suspects, the attention to character drawing has to be somewhat perfunctory. The only people who are delineated in any detail are those who form part of Poirot’s band of investigators.

The earliest jotting would seem to be Notebook 66. It appears as item E on a list that includes the plot outlines for ‘Problem at Sea’, ‘The Dream’, Death in the Clouds, Dumb Witness and Sad Cypress, and also includes the rudimentary germ of what was to become, almost 20 years later, A Pocket Full of Rye:

Series of murders—P gets letter from apparent maniac. First—an old woman in Yorkshire—Second—a business man—Third—a girl (tripper?)—Fourth—Sir McClintock Marsh (who isn’t killed—but escapes)—Fifth—Muriel Lavery

Analysis of his house party—one person knows girl but has absolute cast iron alibi.

Idea of book is to prove alibi false but really Sir MM—murdered second v third victim for reasons of his own—1st and 2nd camouflage—idea being to fasten guilt on cast iron alibi man

It is interesting to note several points of similarity, even in this early jotting, with the finished novel. These include the retention of the idea of the ‘old woman’ as the first victim. The novel’s second victim is a young girl—‘tripper?’—at a seaside resort, reflecting the potential third victim. The device of two earlier murders as camouflage for a third—‘for reasons of his own’—is retained. And the owner of the ‘castiron alibi’ would seem to be the forerunner of Alexander Bonaparte Cust, although a cast-iron alibi is not a feature of his defence.

In contrast, the most surprising divergence from the finished novel is the unmasking of the fourth supposed ‘victim’ of the maniac as the killer. This ‘victim as killer’ idea is not an original concept; already used to great effect by Christie in Peril at End House, it would be used again, to equally surprising effect, in One, Two, Buckle my Shoe, A Murder is Announced and The Mirror Crack ‘d from Side to Side. Why she abandoned it here we can never know, as it was by no means an overworked plot device in her output.

The reference to ‘his house party’ is also puzzling. There is no house party setting in The A.B.C. Murders, although the idea does have echoes of the analysis of Sir Bartholomew Strange’s fatal house party in Three Act Tragedy. And, of course, there is no mention of the alphabetical sequence, which is the whole raison d’être of the novel. If the fifth victim is Muriel Lavery then the sequence is certainly not alphabetical.

Notebook 20 also has a brief outline of the plot and by now the alphabetical sequence has been established. The details of the significant ‘C’ murder have moved nearer to those in the novel. But there are still major differences, especially at the end of the note:

Aberystwyth—old woman Mrs. Ames—husband suspected

Bexhill—Janet Taylor Blythe

Cottersmarch—Sir Morton Carmichael Clarke—also a very wealthy man—his brother Rudolph—anxious to help—Janet Taylor’s friend or sister also keen

Doncaster—James Don—killed in a cinema

P. gets a telegram—E.—sends it himself—man is released—R[udolph] says this must be another murder

Much of the detail of the first four murders here is retained. The A murder features an old lady whose husband is suspected; the location, however, is different (this may be because Andover is easier to spell and/or pronounce than Aberystwyth!). The B murder is the same location although the victim’s name is different. Note the change to a B initial, although Barnard is the surname eventually chosen. The C murder has the same set-up—a wealthy Sir Morton Clarke (note that the name as it appears in the book, Carmichael, is, interestingly, deleted here). The brother and sister of two of the victims are anxious to help, an idea pursued in Poirot’s band of helpers. The D murder does take place in Doncaster and in a cinema, although in the novel it is actually a victim with the surname initial E.

A major surprise, however, and one that is, unfortunately, left unexplained, is the reference to the E murder. I would hazard a guess that in sending an ABC letter to himself Poirot was stage-managing the release from prison of a suspect (possibly Alexander Bonaparte Cust) he knows to be innocent. He could also have been forcing the killer’s hand, thereby precipitating a more dramatic unmasking in the last chapter.

Notebook 66, some 50 pages after the first reference, again takes up the novel beginning with possible locations for the murders. It goes on to consider two theories, both of which contain some elements—the existence of a ‘real’ victim, with an avaricious legatee, in a sequence of ‘camouflage’ victims—that Christie eventually adopted. Finally, it lists the questions that Poirot asks his five helpers in Chapter 32 of the novel:

A.B.C. Murder

Poirot gets letter To Aberystwyth

Brixham or Bexhill

Cheadle or Croydon

Dartmouth Daneshill

Theory A

Intended victim Sir Lucas Oscar Dane—It causes a stir—his fortune goes to his brother Lewis Dane

Theory B

Intended victim Janet King

3rd victim is Sir Oscar Dane—but he is only stabbed—not fatally injured—her will leaves everything to her cousin Vera who is the nurse attending Oscar—Vera and Oscar are attracted to each other

P asks a question of all of them

Megan—a passion for truth—want the truth?—NO—You may not want the truth but you can give a truthful answer!

Thora—would you have married Sir C if his wife had died

F[ranklin] Do you remember the news in the paper the day you landed or [a question about] Ascot hats

J. Have you got a young man?

D[onald] When did you take your holiday

Only one of the possible locations, Bexhill, was actually used in the book. She rejected nearby Dartmouth and both of the C suggestions, eventually settling on somewhere else she did know well, Churston, as the scene of the C murder. It is still possible to get the train, like Poirot and Hastings, to Churston and walk from there to Greenway House, although at this point, 1934, Christie did not yet own the house.

Theory A was the eventual choice as the main plot, although Theory B had some interesting possibilities. Sir Oscar Dane faking an attack on himself in order to kill another victim and inherit, through marriage, a fortune from her is a very Christiean concept and would, no doubt, have produced a surprise ending. It does have more than an echo, from two years earlier, of Peril at End House (where Nick Buckley fakes attacks on herself in order to kill her cousin and inherit a fortune) and this is possibly the reason for its rejection.

The biggest surprise at this point is that the victims are not chosen alphabetically despite the fact that a few pages earlier Christie is listing Brixham/Cheadle/Dartmouth. The third ‘victim’ is Dane and the fourth is King. While some connection between the victims would have been necessary, the alphabetical sequence was inspired. And like many inspirations it is brilliantly simple. Sadly, we will never know who or what inspired it. Perhaps Christie remembered Why Didn’t They Ask Evans?, published in September 1934, two months before she began The A.B.C. Murders, where an open ABC Guide is mentioned in Chapter 24 and used as a clue to a character’s whereabouts?

Finally, the five questions of Chapter 32 all appear in the Notebook as they appear in the book, apart from a different initial (‘J’) for the Mary Drower question and the substitution of the shorter and subtler ‘Ascot hat’ one for the Franklin Clark.

One of the main themes of Chapter 32 and 35, that of a murderer hunted like a fox, is captured in a last cryptic note:

Bit about the fox

When wealthy Uncle Mathew dies and leaves very little in his will, his legatees approach Miss Marple in an attempt to uncover the whereabouts of his missing fortune.

The Miss Marple short story ‘Strange Jest’ was first published in the USA in November 1941 but did not appear in the UK until almost three years later. It is a slight non-crime story built around a single device, the interpretation of clues to a missing fortune. Its brevity, a mere ten pages, confirms its similarity to a rebus or literary acrostic.

The interpretation of a will appears in a few Christie short stories. Poirot deals with ‘The Case of the Missing Will’, Tommy and Tuppence tackle ‘The Clergyman’s Daughter’/‘The Red House’ and ‘Strange Jest’ is one of the Miss Marple versions, the other being ‘Motive Vs. Opportunity’ in The Thirteen Problems.

A page in Notebook 62 headed ‘Short Marple Stories’ goes on to list ideas that eventually appeared as ‘The Case of the Perfect Maid’, ‘The Case of the Caretaker’, ‘Tape-Measure Murder’, The Moving Finger and, oddly, Endless Night. There are also some unused ideas, including two that appear again and again, the twins and the chambermaid (see ‘The House of Dreams’, page 303). Some pages later, there are three pages of notes on ‘Strange Jest’ including a full outline of the plot:

Found on love letters from abroad—cryptogram in letter? No—stamps on it.

Old Uncle Henry—died—had money but hid it somewhere—Gold? Diamonds? Bonds? Last words—taps his eye—(glass eye like Arsene Lupin). They look through desk—secret drawer found by furniture expert—love letters from Sierra Leone signed Betty Martin

The idea of unrecognised and valuable stamps on an envelope appears again in Spider’s Web nearly 15 years later. The main clue in the story, the phrase ‘all my eye and Betty Martin’, is exactly the same as the main clue in ‘The Four Suspects’ in The Thirteen Problems. The reference to Arsène Lupin is to the crime story ‘The Crystal Stopper’ featuring the French detective, by Maurice Leblanc.

Also of note is the glass eye idea itself. Christie decided not to use it in this story, instead adopting the idea of Uncle Henry (Mathew in the published version) tapping his eye. But it is entirely possible that the glass eye, which formed a key plot device in A Caribbean Mystery, almost 25 years later, has its origins here.

An advertisement in the local paper announcing a murder brings many of the inhabitants of Chipping Cleghorn to Little Paddocks, the home of Miss Blacklock, where the ensuing game of Murder turns deadly. Miss Marple, who is visiting the local vicar, investigates a triple killing.

A Murder is Announced was Agatha Christie’s fiftieth title (although a 1939 US collection, The Regatta Mystery, had to be included in order to reach this significant number) and the occasion of a major launch and celebration party in London’s Savoy Hotel in June 1950. She happily posed for photographs with Sir William Collins beside a cake iced with the jacket design. Other guests included fellow crime writer Ngaio Marsh and the actress Barbara Mullen, then appearing in the West End as Miss Marple in The Murder at the Vicarage.

A Murder is Announced remains one of the best detective novels Christie ever wrote. It qualifies effortlessly for the Top Ten and it is easily the best of the Marple titles. The last of the ingeniously constructed, daringly clued and perfectly paced detective novels and a wonderful half-century title, it shares a major plot device with both ‘The Companion’ in The Thirteen Problems and ‘The House at Shiraz’ (see Chapter 8) in Parker Pyne Investigates. Although we do not have extensive notes for this title—just ten pages in total—we do have interesting ideas that were toyed with before settling on the final plot. The following reference, in Notebook 35, is idea J in an alphabetical list, dated 1947:

J. A Murder has been (combine with H)

People going to meet in a Country house Or at a dinner party in London Like [Ten Little] Niggers—each of them thinking beforehand—about 6 people—they all have motive for killing a certain man—that is why they are asked—victim turns up last—host and hostess (a Mrs North)—it is often let—for parties or a London house—street numbers repainted

A death has been arranged and will take place on Monday Feb 6th at 20 Ennerly Park Gardens—friends accept this, the only intimation—no flowers by request

As we shall see, the setting changed a few times before arriving at Chipping Cleghorn, as did the wording of the invitation. And in the finished novel we do indeed meet a group of people going to a house in the country, but not all of them have a motive for murder and the reason for their invitation is very different. ‘Mrs North’ is possibly Christie’s friend Dorothy North (the dedicatee of One, Two, Buckle my Shoe). The reference ‘combine with H’ is to an earlier jotting about a plot, never pursued, involving a divorced mother of two daughters whose first husband inherits a fortune. The children are Primrose and Lavender and the subsequent murders were to involve flowers left by the bodies; hence the ‘no flowers by request’ instruction.

In Notebook 31 we can see the plot that we know taking shape. These notes are inserted on four pages in the middle of extended notes for They Came to Baghdad dated, some pages earlier, ‘May 24th’. This is, presumably, 1948; on 8 October 1948 Edmund Cork, Christie’s UK agent, wrote assuring her American agent that, although she had not written a word that year, she was shortly to start on a Miss Marple story. In fact she worked on it in 1949.

Argument I, below, is the plot with which we are familiar although some fine-tuning was necessary—Harry (Patrick Simmons in the novel) is not the victim nor is he in possession of knowledge dangerous to Miss Blacklock. Apart from other name changes, as indicated, this is the plot as it finally appeared.

The really interesting passage, however, is Argument II. Here we are presented with a totally different plot and murderer with Letitia as victim rather than perpetrator:

A M[urder] has been arranged

Letitia Bailey at breakfast reading out [Letitia Blacklock]

Amy Batter—someone calls her Lottie [Dora Bunner]

young man Harry Clegg—son or nephew of old school friend? [Patrick Simmons]

Phillipa Hedges lodger [Phillipa Haymes]

Col and Mrs Standish [Col. and Mrs Easterbrook]

‘Hinch’ and ‘Potts’ [Hinchcliffe and Murgatroyd]

Edmund Darley and his mother [Edmund and Mrs. Swettenham]

Mitzi—maid?

The events

Argument I

L[etitia] is Deus ex Machina—Sister ‘Charlotte’ is really her……Sister ‘consumptive’ acting I[n] P[lace]

Clue

1 Belle gives this away

2 Called Lotty by Amy instead of Letty

[therefore] L. has to remove—Harry? He knows by snapshot—(seen it in album?)—(tie up with disappearance of album?)—(or blank space in it) later—ostensibly photos of P and E—or their mother—Phillipa is ‘Pip’ Recognised by L. who is however quite beneficent towards her and advances theory that H. is Pip. L. shoots Pip H—Later poisoning—Amy dies instead of her—Circle narrows to look for Emma or Emma’s husband—or Phillipa’s husband (missing)—Point anonymous letter from ‘Pip’ (written by L) sent to Belle.

3rd excitement is the danger to someone who has found out something (Phillipa?) her boy friend (love interest?) Edmund or Edmund’s rather mysterious friend

Argument II

Mitzi is prime mover—she is ‘Emma’—Shot young man is her husband—this comes out later—she sticks to it—Harry and Phillipa arranged ambush together—second murder is Letitia—(Mitzi very ill?) Poisoning Mitzi suspected—persecuted Polish Girl—sulky—persecution complex—then she nearly dies—Does Leticia make new will?

How Harry and Phillipa arranging the ambush was to work is not elaborated unless it was intended to be part of the game. We shall never know.

In an undated note to Collins, Christie draws attention to the galley proofs and the correct spellings of ‘Lotty’ and ‘enquiries’, reminding them of the importance of ensuring that they are printed incorrectly sometimes—‘Plot depends on this’. There is just a single reference to this in the Notebooks; in Notebook 30 the following appears as an

Idea

inquire enquire—both in same letter (part of it forgery)

When she incorporated this into A Murder is Announced we can see how she used it in a much cleverer way than merely as a forgery. By including the different spellings, on almost

consecutive pages in Chapter 18, in documents supposedly written by the same character, she defies her readers to spot the anomaly and, thereby, a major indication of the killer’s identity. It remains one of her most daring clues. The use of both forms in the same letter might have been a bit too daring and the approach she adopts is much more subtle.

Although the Notebooks are short on detail for A Murder is Announced, we are fortunate to have the actual typescript—one of the few known to exist—with copious handwritten notes. An inserted handwritten page toys with changes to the name of the village—‘Chipping Burton? Chipping Wentworth?’—instead of the original Chipping Barnet, the name of the Inspector—‘Cary? Craddock?’—instead of the original Hudson and the name of the victim—‘Wiener?’—instead of the original Rene Duchamps. The original wording of the advertisement was also amended from ‘A Murder has been arranged and will take place on Friday Oct. 13th at Little Paddocks at 6.p.m. Friends please accept this, the only intimation.’ And the title on this typescript is the slightly more cumbersome A Murder has been Arranged. Puzzlingly, the name ‘Laetitia’ appears throughout and every example has been amended, by hand, to plain, and accurate, ‘Miss (Blacklock)’, leading to the assumption that this switch was a late inspiration despite its appearance in the notes—‘Sister "Charlotte" is really her’—as above. Christie would have considered it utterly unfair to refer to ‘Laetitia’ if, in fact, the character is actually Charlotte; hence the amendment to the accurate but ambiguous Miss Blacklock.

The only jarring note in this otherwise near-perfect detective novel is the unlikely denouement in the kitchen of Little Paddocks when Miss Marple practises her hitherto unknown gift for ventriloquism. A feature common to almost all of the Marple titles is the dramatic closing chapter. Like A Murder is Announced, The Body in the Library, The Moving Finger, They Do It with Mirrors, Four-Fifty from Paddington, A Caribbean Mystery, At Bertram’s Hotel, Nemesis and Sleeping Murder all culminate in a theatrical action sequence where the killer incriminates him or herself, usually in a misguided attempt at another murder. In most cases this is because the case that Miss Marple outlines is somewhat short on verification and largely dependent on her intuition, which, however unerring, is not the same as legal proof. Oddly, in A Murder is Announced, above all her other cases, proof is abundant and there are numerous clues to complement Miss Marple’s gifted insight. As Robert Barnard has pointed out in his masterly study of Dame Agatha, A Talent to Deceive, Miss Marple’s reputation as a Great Detective is not improved by her emergence from a broom cupboard at the climax of the novel. This short twopage scene could have been easily amended to omit this embarrassment.

When she discovers a murdered body in her drawing room shortly before her diplomat husband is due home with an important politician, Clarissa devises a plan to fool the police. She enlists the help of three houseguests, unaware that the murderer is closer to home than she thinks.

There are 20 pages of notes for Spider’s Web, all contained in Notebook 12. The character of Clarissa, written specifically at the request of the actress Margaret Lockwood, is Christie’s finest comedy creation. The play itself is a comedy thriller with sufficient of both to make it a winning combination. It is also a successful blend of whodunit and will-they-get-away-with-it; a surprise killer is unmasked in the closing minutes, maintaining Christie’s reputation for shock revelations, and there are numerous unexpected twists in the subsidiary plot. The will-they-get-away-with-it scenario was not a regular feature of Christie’s output but it is also a feature, to a greater or lesser degree, in her next three plays—The Unexpected Guest, Verdict and The Rats.

The first page of notes is headed:

Act III Spiders Web Laura Finds a Body?

Christie adopts her usual method of assigning letters to the various plot points that follow but, despite the heading, not all refer to Act III. Some of them, as marked, appear in Act II, Scene ii, leading to the suspicion that the acts were rearranged (perhaps in the course of the play’s production) and Act III originally included the previous scene. There are no surprises in the notes and no unexpected plot developments; those that remain reflect accurately the course of the play. With the exception of Sir Rowland Delahaye, who appears in the notes as Sir M, even the names remain the same. I assume that the disappearance of notes for the earlier acts is another casualty of the years.

Points

A. Miss Peake is on spare room bed

B. Miss Peake appears—‘the body’s disappeared’—she winks

C. Sir M says—‘never grown up’ [Act I]

D. Inspector and Sir M—Latter puts forward idea of narcotics [Act II, Scene ii]

E. Inspector suggests he had actually found something in desk [Act II, Scene ii]

F. Clarissa (to Sir M) did one of you move it? No—all herded together in dining room

G. CI. asks Sir M (or Hugo) name of antique dealers

H. The book—Sir M says ‘What’s the Inspector consulting—Who’s Who’ [Act II, Scene ii]

I. Sir M. says story about friend and stamps or envelope with autographs

J. Clarissa asks Elgin about references [Act II, Scene ii]

K. Pippa comes in—terrible yawns—hungry

L. Clarissa accuses Miss Peake of being Mrs. Brown

The main preoccupation for the scenes involving Pippa was the presence or absence, in retrospect for obvious reasons, of Jeremy. These scenes appear in Act I.

The Pippa bits

Recipe book candles, Can you eat it? Present (Sir M Jeremy? Clarissa?)

Priest’s Hole—Place to put a body. Present Jeremy and ? ? ? [sic]

The autographs—Pippa shows them—puts them away in shell-box

Then bit about stamps—Present not Jeremy—others ad lib

One of the interesting items among Christie’s papers is a suggested screen treatment, dated 1956, for a possible film version of this play. It is not entirely certain that it is by Christie herself but it looks ‘unofficial’, i.e. as if done by someone not directly involved in the subsequent 1960 film. It sketches out the events that have taken place prior to the start of the play—Clarissa meeting Henry, Miranda desperate for drugs, the subsequent divorce and remarriage and Pippa’s acceptance of Clarissa; it also includes the sale of a stamped envelope to Mr Sellon…

Mrs Oliver organises a Murder Hunt in the grounds of Nasse House. When the ‘body’ turns out to be only too real, Hercule Poirot is on hand to discover who killed schoolgirl Marlene Tucker and what happened to Lady Folliat.

Although it was published in November 1956, Dead Man’s Folly had a complicated two-year genesis. In November 1954 Christie’s agent wrote to the Diocesan Board of Finance in Exeter explaining that his client would like to see stained glass windows in the chancel of Churston Ferrers Church (Christie’s local church) and was willing to pay for them by assigning the rights of a story to a fund set up for that purpose. The Diocesan Board and the local church were both very happy with the arrangement and in a letter of 3 December 1954 Hughes Massie confirmed ‘Mrs Mallowan’s intentions to assign the magazine rights of a long short story to be entitled The Greenshore Folly’ to such a fund. The amount involved was reckoned to be in the region of £1,000 (£18,000 in today’s value).

By March 1955 the Diocesan Board was getting restive and wondering about the progress of the sale. But for the first time in 35 years, much to everyone’s embarrassment, it proved impossible to sell the story. The problem was its length; it was a long novella, which was a difficult length, neither a novel nor a short story, for the magazine market. By mid-July 1955, the decision was made to withdraw the story from sale, as ‘Agatha thinks [it] is packed with good material which she can use for her next full length novel’. As a compromise, it was agreed that she would write another short story for the Church, also to be called, for legal reasons, ‘The Greenshore Folly’, ‘though it will probably be published under some other title’. So, the original and rejected novella ‘The Greenshore Folly’ was elaborated into Dead Man’s Folly and Christie wrote the shorter and similarly titled ‘Greenshaw’s Folly’ to swell the coffers of the Church authorities. ‘Greenshaw’s Folly’ was first published in 1956 and was collected in The Adventure of the Christmas Pudding in 1960.

Notes relating to Dead Man’s Folly are contained in Notebooks 45 and 47. As a result of its history, it is difficult to tell from the Notebooks whether the notes refer to the novella or the novel version, but it seems likely that Notebook 47 is the original novella and Notebook 45 the elaborated version—Notebook 47 is a discussion of basic points, which would not have been necessary if the story had already been written. In 15 pages Christie sketched the entire plot of ‘The Greenshore Folly’ so when it came to expanding it, she had only to elaborate actual scenes—the plot was already entire from the novella version.

Notebook 47 outlines the basic situation and sketches some ideas, all of which, with minor changes—garden fete rather than ‘Conservation Fete’, Girl Guide victim rather than Boy Scout—were to be included in the story:

Mrs Oliver summons Poirot—she is at Greenway—professional job—arranging a Treasure Hunt or a Murder Hunt for the Conservation Fete, which is to be held there

‘Body’ to be boy scout in boat house—key of which has to be found by ‘clues’

or a real body is buried where tree uprooted and where Folly is to go

Some ideas

Hiker (girl?) from hostel

Next door—really Lady Bannerman [Stubbs]

It is significant that, right from the start, the story was to be set at Greenway. Perhaps because this was a personal project, written for her place of personal worship, Christie was anxious to retain a local flavour. Although she had used Greenway before for Five Little Pigs and would use the ferry at the bottom of the garden in a few years’ time in Ordeal by Innocence, Dead Man’s Folly represents an extended and detailed use of her beloved Greenway. Apart from the house itself, and its history as told by Mrs Folliat, also featured in the story are the Gate Lodge, Ferry Cottage, the Boathouse, the Battery, the Tennis Court and the Youth Hostel next door; and the internal geography of the house reflects reality even down to Poirot’s bedroom and the bathroom across the corridor. The magnolia tree near the front door where Mrs Folliat and Hattie stand to talk, the winding drive ending at the big iron gates, the winding and steep path connecting the Battery and the Boathouse—all these exist to this day.

The notes that follow, all from Notebook 47, form the basis of Dead Man’s Folly. Christie decided on a version of B below as the motivation and nobody called Lestrade features in either version:

Who wants to kill who

A. Wife wants to kill rich P Lestrade has lover—both poor

B. Young wife recognised by someone who knows she is married already—blackmail?

C. P Lestrade—has a first wife who is not dead—(in S. America?)—it is wife’s sister who recognises him

Czech girl at hostel? P mentions meeting a hostel girl ‘trespassing’—angry colloquy between them seen (but not heard) by someone—he decides to kill her

D. Mrs Folliat—a little balmy—or young Folliat at hostel?

Mrs Folliat of original family who built it—now belongs to Sir George Stubbs with beautiful young wife—Chilean girl?—Italian mother—Creole?—Rich sugar people—girl is feeble minded. Spread about that Sir G made his money in Army Contracts—really Sir C (a pauper) is planning to kill wife and inherit her money

The references to ‘Greenshore’ in the following extract would seem to confirm that Notebook 47 contains the original notes for the novella:

Does Sir George marry Hattie Deloran—she is mentally defective—he buys place ‘Greenshore’ and comes here with his wife—the night a folly has been prepared—she is buried. The Folly goes up the next day—another Lady Dennison [Stubbs] takes her place—servants see nothing—they go out for a stroll—other girl comes back (from boathouse). Then for a year Sir George and Lady Dennison are well known for guests. Then the time comes for Lady D to disappear—she goes up and down to London—doubles part with pretending to be a student

Sally Legge remains in the novel; the reason for the change of first name from Peggy was highlighted by Christie herself below. Definitely a good idea!

Points to be decided

A. Who first chosen for victim? Peggy Legge? Something about Old Peg Leg

B. What did Maureen [Marlene] know or do—heard grandfather talk about body and Sir George really being James? Or

Does she snoop? Intending to snoop on events? Really sees

Lady S change into hiker?

Or

See Sir George and his partner together?

What does Maureen write on Comic

Mrs O’s clue?

Boat house?

House boat?

Maureen’s scribble on the comic—G[eorge] S[tubbs] goes with a girl from the YHA

The following extracts, from Notebook 45, have page references, presumably to the proofs of ‘The Greenshore Folly’. The accompanying remarks are reminders to Christie herself, as she expands the original story. She also experiments with the details of Mrs Oliver’s Murder Hunt and clarifies, for herself, the timetable of the fatal afternoon:

P.119—Elaborate Mrs F’s remembering

P.21—A much elaborated scene in the drawing room at tea

P.24 Go on to Legges after ‘Hattie’

Recast order of next events

P.38 elaborate breakfast party—

P.47 Perhaps an interview with Michael Weyman at tennis Pavilion

Clear up point about Fortune teller’s tent

p.61 much more detail after discovery of body

Mrs Oliver’s plan

The Weapons

Revolver

Knife

Clothes Line

Footprint (in concrete)

Rose Gladioli or Bulb catalogue? Marked?

Shoe

Snap shot

Who? Victim

Why? Weapon

How? Motive

Where? Time

When Place

Scheme of afternoon—

4 pm P[eggy] L[egge] leaves tent

4.5 pm H [attie] tells Miss B to take tea

4.10 pm H goes into tent—out of back into hut—dresses as girl—goes to boat house

4.20 Calls to Marlene—strangles her then back and arrives as herself Italian girl—talks to young man with turtles [turtle-shirted competitor]

4.30 leaves with Dutch girl and pack on back or with turtle—Dutch girl goes to Dartmouth—Italian girl to Plymouth

Exhibit D: True Crime in the Notebooks

Agatha Christie wrote on two true-life murder cases, both of them very similar to her own fiction. ‘The Tragic Family of Croydon’ in the Sunday Chronicle of 11 August 1929 is an article about the then current and still unsolved Croydon poisoning case in which three members of the Sidney family were murdered, almost certainly by a member of their own household, in the space of a few months; and in October 1968 a short article by Christie appeared in the Sunday Times about the Charles Bravo murder, another domestic poisoning drama. And apart from fictional crime and its practitioners, Christie also refers in the Notebooks to a few real-life murder cases. Some are very well known but others are quite obscure:

Lizzie Borden

In Notebooks 5, 17 and 35 the infamous Lizzie Borden is mentioned during the plotting of Elephants Can Remember, They Do it with Mirrors and Five Little Pigs respectively. In 1892 in Fall River, Massachusetts, Mr and Mrs Andrew Borden were brutally murdered in their own home. Although their daughter Lizzie was tried for the murders, she was acquitted and to this day her guilt or innocence is a matter of intense speculation. In each case, as can be seen, it is the possibility of using a set-up similar to the Borden case—a domestic crime with the killer, in all likelihood, a member of the family—that attracts Christie:

Or Lizzie Borden family—father and mother killed—2 daughters—devoted sister in law—boy (nephew)—Harriet Irish maid

ambitious woman—rich (really a Lizzie Borden) married to 3rd husband

If not guilty who was? 4 (or 5) other people in house (a little like Bordens?)

Constance Kent

Notebooks 5 and 6, during the plotting of Elephants Can Remember and Nemesis respectively, refer to this notorious case. Constance Kent served 20 years for the murder of her three-year-old half-brother on 13 June 1860. She was released in 1885.

Constance Kent type of story—girl Emma—adored governess—mother dies. Governess who had apparently adored Emma now turns against her

Case of Constance Kent—had governess she adored—mother died. Governess married Father. She had a little boy—Constance very fond of him—he is found in earth closet—killed

Crippen and Le Neve

In Notebook 43 Eva Crane from Mrs McGinty’s Dead is compared to Ethel Le Neve, the partner of the notorious Dr Crippen. The reference to Crippen himself, in Notebook 56, appears during the planning of an unwritten book based on the discovery of a body some years after the commission of the crime. Crippen was hanged in 1910 for the murder of his wife Cora, whose body was discovered, buried in the cellar of their home—although recent forensic developments have cast some doubt on this verdict.

Janice [Eva in the book] Crane—former Ethel Le Neve—husband—Crane a bloodless lawyer whom she adores

Murder discovered afterwards—(5 years) (2 years) like Crippen?

Charles Bravo

In Notebooks 27 and 36, during the plotting of Third Girl and By the Pricking of my Thumbs, there is reference to this still unsolved murder. In April 1876, four months after marrying Florence Ricardo, Charles Bravo died an agonising death from antimony poisoning. A subsequent Coroner’s inquest found that there was insufficient evidence to identify his murderer. Again, Christie was using the basic situation as a starting point:

Arthur (innocent husband)—Katrina—suspicious, passionate for money—looks after old boy—she has boy friend…chemical research—or doctor—Bravo framework

The Bravo idea—would entail woman (widow) having affair with a doctor. She gives up liaison—he goes back to wife—she marries again

Finally, in Notebook 2, and notes for A Caribbean Mystery, some unused dialogue between Miss Marple and Major Palgrave, who is discussing his own story of a murderer he knew, lists four murderers from high-profile British murder cases:

No, No—it’s a pattern all right—Smith—Armstrong—Buck—Haig[h]—chap gets away with the first one and thinks he’s OK because he’s so clever

Joseph Smith, who drowned three ‘wives’, is the infamous ‘Brides in the Bath’ murderer who was hanged in August 1915. Major Herbert Rowse Armstrong was convicted in May 1922 for the murder of his wife although his original arrest was for the attempted murder of a professional rival. In September 1935 Dr Buck Ruxton murdered his wife and housemaid and dismembered the bodies; his conviction owed much to the groundbreaking forensic evidence. John Haigh, the acid-bath murderer, was convicted for the murder of six people and hanged in 1949.