Agatha Christie: Murder in the Making: More Stories and Secrets From Her Notebooks (40 page)

The opening of the book is almost exactly as sketched below:

Notes for Nov. 1972 and Plans

Opening suggestion for a book

Tuppence says ‘What a load of books we have.’ Starts looking at books – takes some out – looks at them – laughs – finds a letter in book shoved behind shelf. Seems to indicate a murder

This is followed by speculation about the title, with ‘Doom’s Caravan’ and a variation ‘Death’s Caravan’ leading the field and heading the following page; and by the quotation that actually appears in the book:

Book T
[ommy]
and T
[uppence]
Title?

Doom’s Caravan?

Swallow’s Nest

Postern of Fate?

Doom’s Caravan

Pass not beneath, O Caravan, or pass not singing

Have you not heard

That silence where the birds are dead yet

Something pipeth like a bird?

Pass not beneath, O Caravan, Doom’s Caravan

Death’s Caravan

In the early pages of Notebook 3 Christie considers various ideas, some of which were discarded – a homicidal spinster aunt, a woman doctor – and some adopted – the census entries, hidden papers, Regent’s Park. At this stage Mary is still a German spy.

Points

Death – accidental? – of Alexander. Horseradish picked by mistake was foxglove leaves

Digitalin – Death from Heart –

Who picked them? Who cooked them (a) Cook (b) Girl helping (c) Woman doctor? Goes round garden with one of the children. Aunt or perhaps mother of illegitimate child – who grown up as her nephew – in army or navy. Mary Robinson (governess) German girl, very beautiful, is German spy – takes plans to London – Regent’s Park – Queen Mary’s garden. Tommy by reason of some of his contacts (in N or M) – Census entries – who was in the house those 2 (?) dates

Spinster Aunt – she poisons German Mary R

Simon a school friend staying there – Recognises M.R. – pointed out to him as a woman by an Army god father or an older friend – or a foreign officer an
[Australian]
who in 1921 or thereabouts has a cottage a place like Dittisham
[a village near Agatha Christie’s Devon home]
– (Reason – papers might be hidden there)

A list of characters from Notebook 7 includes a Miss Price-Ridley, who is surely a relative of Mrs Price Ridley, Miss Marple’s neighbour in St Mary Mead; a character bearing this name does make a brief appearance in
Postern of Fate.
This is the sort of irritating mistake that an editor should have spotted.

Points Doom’s Caravan

People

Dorothy called Dodo – Miss Little – big woman – nicknamed The Parish Pump

Griffin – old – full of memories

Miss Price Ridley

Mrs Lupton – supports herself on 2 sticks – remembers the Parkinsons,
[the]
Somers – also Chattertons

Place called Hallquay
[Book I, Chapter 5]

And, inexplicably, in the middle of Book III, Chapter 7, after a discussion of their adventures in
The Secret Adversary
and
N or M?
, we find Tommy and Tuppence having the following conversation. The version below, from Notebook 7, is reproduced almost exactly in the novel:

Swallow’s Nest said Tuppence ‘That’s what the house was once called.’

‘Why shouldn’t we call it that again’

‘Good idea’, said Tuppence

Birds flew from the roof over their heads

Swallows flying south, said Tommy. ‘Won’t they ever come back?’

‘Yes they’ll come back next winter through the Postern of fate’, said Lionel

This is followed by brief mention of Isaac’s death, the most casual murder in the entire Christie canon. The sang-froid with which his murder is greeted is rivalled only by the casual attitude to, not to mention the implausibility of, the shooting of Tuppence.

Isaacs Death

Inquest – after inquest – Isaac’s household – a niece or wife – Nellie – a lodger who has not been there very long – 2 lodgers perhaps. Mention by Nellie of Cambridge or an envelope on which Cambridge has been written – Boat Race that day – a bet made
[Book II, Chapter 4]

An extract from Notebook 7 and the plotting for
Postern of Fate
. Note the legibility of the handwriting.

In Notebook 28 Christie considers some scenarios for the opening chapter, eventually settling on C below. The reference to Harrison Homes is to the real-life charity, providing accommodation for the independent-minded elderly, with which she was closely involved:

Large numbers of books – Tuppence is going to sort them out – take some to hospital? Or Harrison Homes – some old lady knows something

A. Is there something in a book – 2 pages stuck together B. or is there some letters or print which spell out words – a message

C. Such a sentence as ‘Mary Robinson did not die naturally. It was one of us – I think I know which one.’

This is followed by a careful working out of the code found by Tuppence in her copy of R.L. Stevenson’s
The Black Arrow
. The extract is from Chapter 5 of that novel and although it starts out accurately, judicious editing has been done to avoid writing out the entire extract. Eventually, isolated words only are used and sense and logic are lost, a sentiment echoed by Tommy when Tuppence shows him her discovery. Note, however, the change of the name from Robinson here to Jordan in the published version; and the incorrect spelling of ‘naturally’ as ‘naturaly’ in the code even though it appears correctly in the body of the note. Very little of this working out appears in the published novel.

The Black Arrow R. L. Stevenson

M
atch
a
m could not
r
estrain a little cr
y
and even Dick sta
r
ted with surprise and dr
o
pped the windac from his fingers
b
ut to the fellows on the lawn th
i
s shaft was a
n
expected
s
ignal. They were all af
o
ot together tighte
n
ing loosening swor
d
and dagger in the sheaths. Ellis hel
d
up his ha
n
d, the white
o
f his eyes shone – le
t
. . . . . . . the men of the Black Arrow ha
d
all d
i
sappear
e
d and the cauldro
n
a
nd
t
he r
u
ined house bu
r
ning
al
one to testif
y
. . . . Not
i
n
t
ime to
wa
rn the
s
e
one
fr
o
m (
f
rom)
u
pper quarter
s I
have
th
ese
I
a
n
d stri
k
ing
I
will / Duc
k
worth a
n
d Sim
o
n red
w
ith / Is the arro
w
hurry ellis w
hi
stle / Spa
c
e t
h
eir h
o
use a
n
d d
e
ad

MARY/ROBINSON/DID/NOT/DIE/NATURALY/IT/WAS/ONE/OF//US/I/THINK/I/KNOW/WHICH/ONE

It is touching to imagine the 83-year-old Queen of Crime carefully copying and underlining her code; and to remember that it was the last ingenious idea she was to devise.

UNUSED IDEAS: SIX

The final Unused Idea is a very special and surprising one . . .

THE EXPERIMENT

The following notes all appear in lists of ideas for both short stories and novels. The first is Idea E on an ‘A to J’ list dated January 1935, which includes the original ideas for ‘Problem at Sea’,
Sad Cypress
and
They Do It with Mirrors
.

The Experiment Mortimer – How does murder affect the character?

The following item is the first idea on a short list that includes
A Pocket Full of Rye
and
They Do It with Mirrors
, indicating a late 1940s date:

Mortimer – his plans – first killing and so on – his character gradually changes

This next jotting appears a few pages ahead of the notes for
Curtain
and a page of corrections for
The Body in the Library
, indicating a time-frame a decade earlier:

Man (or woman) who experiments in murder (goes queer)

And the final short note is probably slightly earlier, as it appears alongside notes for
The Moving Finger
and
Sparkling Cyanide
:

Mortimer – experimental murder

Although these four jottings were all written during her most productive and inventive period, it was not until the final year of her creative life that Christie elaborated on this plot. Perhaps she had been doing what she wrote of in her
Autobiography
, ‘looking vaguely through a pile of old notebooks and [finding] something scribbled down’; or perhaps the inspiration resurfaced from somewhere in her subconscious. The idea, as evidenced by its four Notebook appearances, was obviously one that attracted her and one that she had never tackled in any way in her published work; yet, at the time of the early notes, it would have been almost impossible for her to have attempted it with Collins Crime Club waiting for her annual ‘whodunit’. It was not until the twilight of her career that she (and they) felt comfortable publishing titles like
The Pale Horse
, a murder-to-order thriller with supernatural overtones, and
Endless Night
, a psychological suspense story with a dark secret. And this idea would have fitted into the same category.

In Notebook 7 Christie began developing the idea. Here Mortimer has disappeared, to be replaced first by Jeremy and later by Edmund:

Jeremy – discusses with friends – murders

What difference would it make to one’s character if one had killed someone?

Depends what the motive had been – Hatred? Revenge? Gain? Jealousy?

No – No motive – for no reason just an interesting experiment. The object of the crime – oneself – would one be the same person – or would one be different. To find out one would have to commit homicide – observing all the time oneself – one’s feelings, keeping notes.

Needed a victim – carefully selected but definitely not anyone that one wished dead in any way. ‘I have killed – now am I the same person I was? Or am I different – do I feel – fear? regret? pleasure? (surely not!)

People to imagine and
[in]
vent

The victim

Various suggestions. A woman who has cancer or a heart condition. It can suggest itself as a mercy killing.

The killer

Man? Woman? Possibly woman get excited, she too decides to try the experiment also. Man (Jeremy) does not realise what she is doing

Afterwards J finds he is excited, nervous – doctor or nurse is suspicious. J begins to lay clues of who the culprit may be and some reason why. J begins to feel he might do another murder – Lay the clues

Edmund (Harmsworth) Murdock debates with friends – Murder – How would it feel to be a
[killer?]

Girl or woman – tells about shoplifting or stealing – or falsifying accounts.

Edmund and Lancelot go away debating

Points to be safe – victim – man or woman

Who should be obliterated – (‘unfit to live’) (no motive no advantage to be gained) (Someone must gain and profit)

Feelings of operation must be closely studied – will X’s character alter (no one must share knowledge)

From Notebook 7 this is one of the last pages Agatha Christie wrote when she was too frail to develop this fascinating sketch into one final Christie for Christmas.

By any standard
Postern of Fate
, the last book that Agatha Christie wrote, is a sad end to a wonderful career. Amazingly, the notes above are for the novel to appear in 1974. The page in the Notebook immediately preceding them is unequivocally dated 7 November 1973, just after the publication of
Postern of Fate
. As can be seen, this outline is far superior, both in concept and approach; even the notes read better than those for
Postern of Fate
. Here, at the age of 83, Christie was experimenting with a novel totally different from any she had written before. Sounding somewhat similar to Meyer Levin’s
Compulsion
(1956), which, in turn, was based on the infamous Leopold and Loeb true-life murder case, where two college students murdered a small boy solely as an experiment, this would have been a radical departure. It seems remarkable that after the previous half-dozen weak novels Christie should be even planning something like this. Whether she had the ability, at this stage, to carry off such a demanding concept is debatable but these notes confirm, once again, that it was her powers of development, and not her powers of imagination, that were waning.

And lest there be any lingering doubt, the devious hand of the Queen of Crime is very evident in the last phrase, with its final – absolutely final – Christie twist:

Someone at original conversation might be (although not suspected) actually involved – possibly even (guilty) final surprise? Or has planned the whole thing