Agahta Christie: An autobiography

by Agatha Christie

  It is astonishing how you never really change in your predilections. My nephew Jack, from the days when he went out with a nursemaid, was always obsessed by things ecclesiastical. If he disappeared from sight you could usually find him in a church, gazing admiringly at the altar. If he was given coloured plasticine the things he made were always triptychs, crucifixes, or some kind of ecclesiastical adornment. Roman Catholic churches in particular fascinated him. His tastes never changed, and he read more ecclesiastical history than anyone I have ever known. When he was about thirty, he finally entered the Roman Catholic Church–a great blow to my brother-in-law, who was what I can only describe as the perfect example of a ‘Black Protestant’. He would say, in his gentle voice: ‘I’m not prejudiced, I really am not prejudiced. It’s just that I can’t help noticing that all Roman Catholics are the most terrible liars. It’s not prejudice, it just is so.’

  Grannie was a good example of a Black Protestant too, and got much enjoyment out of the wickedness of the Papists. She would lower her voice and say: ‘All those beautiful girls disappearing into convents–never seen again.’ I am sure she was convinced that all priests selected their mistresses from special convents of beautiful girls.

  The Watts were non-conformist, Methodist I think, which perhaps may have led to this tendency to regard Roman Catholics as representatives of ‘the Scarlet Woman of Babylon’. Where Jack got his passion for the Roman Catholic Church I cannot think. He doesn’t seem to have inherited it from anyone in his family, but it was there, present always from his early years. Everybody took a great interest in religion in my young days. Disputes about it were full and colourful, and sometimes heated. One of my nephew’s friends said to him later in life: ‘I really can’t think, Jack, why you can’t be a cheerful heretic like everyone else, it would be so much more peaceful.’

  The last thing on earth that Jack could ever imagine being was peaceful. As his nursemaid said, on one occasion, when she had spent some time finding him: ‘Why Master Jack wants to go into churches, I can’t imagine. It seems such a funny thing for a child to want to do.’ Personally, I think he must have been a reincarnation of a medieval churchman. He had, as he grew older, what I might call a churchman’s face–not a monk’s face, certainly not a visionary’s–the kind of churchman versed in ecclesiastical practices and able to acquit himself well at the Council of Trent–and to be quite sound on the exact number of angels able to dance on the point of a needle.

  IV

  Bathing was one of the joys of my life, and has remained so almost until my present age; in fact I would still enjoy it as much as ever but for the difficulties attendant on a rheumatic person getting herself into the water, and, even more difficult, out again.

  A great social change came when I was about thirteen. Bathing as I first remember it was strictly segregated. There was a special Ladies’ Bathing-Cove, a small stony beach, to the left of the Bath Saloons. The beach was a steeply sloping one, and on it there were eight bathing machines in the charge of an ancient man, of somewhat irascible temper, whose non-stop job was to let the machine up and down in the water. You entered your bathing machine–a gaily-painted striped affair–saw that both doors were safely bolted, and began to undress with a certain amount of caution, because at any moment the elderly man might decide it was your turn to be let down into the water. At that moment there would be a frantic rocking, and the bathing machine would grind its way slowly over the loose stones, flinging you about from side to side. In fact the action was remarkably similar to that of a Jeep or Land Rover nowadays, when traversing the more rocky parts of the desert.

  The bathing machine would stop as suddenly as it had started. You then proceeded with your undressing and got into your bathing-dress. This was an unaesthetic garment, usually made of dark blue or black alpaca, with numerous skirts, flounces and frills, reaching well down below the knees, and over the elbow. Once fully attired, you unbolted the door on the water side. If the old man had been kind to you, the top step was practically level with the water. You descended and there you were, decorously up to your waist. You then proceeded to swim. There was a raft not too far out, to which you could swim and pull yourself up and sit on it. At low tide it was quite near; at high tide it was quite a good swim, and you had it more or less to yourself. Having bathed as long as you liked, which for my part was a good deal longer than any grown-up accompanying me was inclined to sanction, you were signalled to come back to shore–but as they had difficulty in getting at me once I was safely on the raft, and I anyway proceeded to swim in the opposite direction, I usually managed to prolong it to my own pleasure.

  There was of course no such thing as sunbathing on the beach. Once you left the water you got into your bathing machine, you were drawn up with the same suddenness with which you had been let down, and finally emerged, blue in the face, shivering all over, with hands and cheeks died away to a state of numbness. This, I may say, never did me any harm, and I was as warm as toast again in about three-quarters of an hour. I then sat on the beach and ate a bun while I listened to exhortations on my bad conduct in not having come out sooner. Grannie, who always had a fine series of cautionary tales, would explain to me how Mrs Fox’s little boy (‘such a lovely creature’) had gone to his death of pneumonia, entirely from disobeying his elders and staying in the sea too long. Partaking of my currant bun or whatever refreshment I was having, I would reply dutifully, ‘No, Grannie, I won’t stay in as long next time. But actually, Grannie, the water was really warm.’

  ‘Really warm, was it indeed? Then why are you shivering from head to foot? Why are your fingers so blue?’

  The advantage of being accompanied by a grown-up person, especially Grannie, was that we would go home in a cab from the Strand, instead of having to walk a mile and a half. The Torbay Yacht Club was stationed on Beacon Terrace, just above the Ladies’ Bathing-Cove. Although the beach was properly invisible from the Club windows, the sea around the raft was not, and, according to my father, a good many of the gentlemen spent their time with opera glasses enjoying the sight of female figures displayed in what they hopefully thought of as almost a state of nudity! I don’t think we can have been sexually very appealing in those shapeless garments.

  The Gentlemen’s Bathing-Cove was situated further along the coast. There the gentlemen, in their scanty triangles, could disport themselves as much as they pleased, with no female eye able to observe them from any point whatever. However, times were changing: mixed bathing was being introduced all over England.

  The first thing mixed bathing entailed was wearing far more clothing than before. Even French ladies had always bathed in stockings, so that no sinful bare legs could be observed. I have no doubt that, with natural French chic, they managed to cover themselves from their necks to their wrists, and with lovely thin silk stockings outlining their beautiful legs, looked far more sinfully alluring than if they had worn a good old short-skirted British bathing dress of frilled alpaca. I really don’t know why legs were considered so improper: throughout Dickens there are screams when any lady thinks that her ankles have been observed. The very word was considered daring. One of the first nursery axioms was always uttered if you mentioned those pieces of your anatomy: ‘Remember, the Queen of Spain has no legs.’ What does she have instead, Nursie ?’ Limbs, dear, that is what we call them; arms and legs are limbs.’

  All the same, I think it would sound odd to say: ‘I’ve got a spot coming on one of my limbs, just below the knee.’

  Which reminds me of a friend of my nephew’s, who described an experience of her own as a little girl. She had been told that her godfather was coming to see her. Having not heard of such a personage before, she had been thrilled by the notion. That night, at about one a.m., after waking and considering the matter for some time, she spoke into the darkness:

  ‘Nanny, I’ve got a godfather.’

  ‘Urmrp.’ Some indescribable sound answered her.

  ‘Nanny,’ a little louder, ‘I’ve
got a godfather.’

  ‘Yes, dear, yes, very nice.’

  ‘But, Nanny, I’ve got a’–fortissimo–‘GODFATHER.’

  ‘Yes, yes, turn over, dear, and go to sleep.’

  ‘But, Nanny’–molto fortissimo–‘I HAVE GOT A GODFATHER!’ ‘Well, rub it, dearie, rub it!’

  Bathing-dresses continued to be very pure practically up to the time I was first married. Though mixed bathing was accepted by then, it was still regarded as dubious by the older ladies and more conservative families. But progress was too strong, even for my mother. We often took to the sea on such beaches as were given over to the mingling of the sexes. It was allowed first on Tor Abbey Sands and Corbin’s Head Beach, which were more or less main town beaches. We did not bathe there–anyway–the beaches were supposed to be too crowded. Then mixed bathing was allowed on the more aristocratic Meadfoot Beach. This was another good twenty minutes away, and therefore made your walk to bathe rather a long one, practically two miles. However, Meadfoot Beach was much more attractive than the Ladies’ Bathing-Cove: bigger, wider, with an accessible rock a good way out to which you could swim if you were a strong swimmer. The Ladies’ Bathing-Cove remained sacred to segregation, and the men were left in peace in their dashing triangles.

  As far as I remember, the men were not particularly anxious to avail themselves of the joys of mixed bathing; they stuck rigidly to their own private preserve. Such of them as arrived at Meadfoot were usually embarrassed by the sight of their sisters’ friends in what they still considered a state of near nudity.

  It was at first the rule that I should wear stockings when I bathed. I don’t know how French girls kept their stockings on: I was quite unable to do so. Three or four vigorous kicks when swimming, and my stockings were dangling a long way beyond my toes; they were either sucked off altogether or else wrapped round my ankles like fetters by the time I emerged. I think that the French girls one saw bathing in fashion-plates owed their smartness to the fact that they never actually swam, only walked gently into the sea and out again to parade the beach.

  A pathetic tale was told of the Council Meeting at which the question of mixed bathing came up for final approval. A very old Councillor, a vehement opponent, finally defeated, quavered out his last plea:

  ‘And all I say is, Mr Mayor, if this ‘ere mixed bathing is carried through, that there will be decent partitions in the bathing machines, ’owever low.’

  With Madge bringing down Jack every summer to Torquay, we bathed practically every day. Even if it rained or blew a gale, it seems to me that we still bathed. In fact, on a rough day I enjoyed the sea even more.

  Very soon there came the great innovation of trams. One could catch a tram at the bottom of Burton Road and be taken down to the harbour, and from there it was only about twenty minutes’ walk to Meadfoot. When Jack was about five, he started to complain. ‘What about taking a cab from the tram to the beach?’ ‘Certainly not,’ said my sister, horrified. ‘We’ve come down all this way in a tram, haven’t we? Now we walk to the beach.’

  My nephew would sigh and say under his breath, ‘Mum on the stingy side again!’

  In retaliation, as we walked up the hill, which was, bordered on either side with Italianate villas, my nephew, who, at that age, never stopped talking for a moment, would proceed with a kind of Gregorian chant of his own, which consisted of repeating the names of all the houses we passed: ‘Lanka, Pentreave, The Elms, Villa Marguerita, Hartly St. George.’ As time went on, he added the names of such occupants as he knew, starting with ‘Lanka, Dr G. Wreford; Pentreave, Dr Quick;

  Villa Marguerita, Madam Cavallen; The Laurels, don’t know,’ and so on. Finally, infuriated, Madge or I would tell him to shut up.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because we want to talk to each other, and we can’t talk to each other if you are talking the whole time and interrupting us.’

  ‘Oh, very well.’ Jack lapsed into silence. His lips were moving, however, and one could just hear in faint breath: ‘Lanka, Pentreave, The Priory, Torbay Hall…’ Madge and I would look at each other and try to think of something to say.

  Jack and I nearly drowned ourselves one summer. It was a rough day; we had not gone as far as Meadfoot, but instead to the Ladies’ Bathing-Cove, where Jack was not yet old enough to cause a tremor in female breasts. He could not swim at that time, or only a few strokes, so I was in the habit of taking him out to the raft on my back. On this particular morning we started off as usual, but it was a curious kind of sea–a sort of mixed swell and chop–and, with the additional weight on my shoulders, I found it almost impossible to keep my mouth and nose above water. I was swimming, but I couldn’t get any breath into myself. The tide was not far out, so that the raft was quite close, but I was making little progress, and was only able to get a breath about every third stroke.

  Suddenly I realised that I could not make it. At any moment now I was going to choke. ‘Jack,’ I gasped, ‘get off and swim to the raft. You’re nearer that than the shore.’ ‘Why?’ said Jack. ‘I don’t want to.’ ‘Please–do–’ I bubbled. My head went under. Fortunately, though Jack clung to me at first, he got shaken off and was able therefore to proceed under his own steam. We were quite near the raft by then, and he reached it with no difficulty. By that time I was past noticing what anyone was doing. The only feeling in my mind was a great sense of indignation. I had always been told that when you were drowning the whole of your past life came before you, and I had also been told that you heard beautiful music when you were dying. There was no beautiful music, and I couldn’t think about anything in my past life; in fact I could think of nothing at all but how I was going to get some breath into my lungs. Everything went black and–and–and the next thing I knew was violent bruises and pains as I was flung roughly into a boat. The old Sea-Horse, crotchety and useless as we had always thought him, had had enough sense to notice that somebody was drowning and had come out in the boat allowed him for the purpose. Having thrown me into the boat, he took a few more strokes to the raft and grabbed Jack, who resisted loudly saying, ‘I don’t want to go in yet. I’ve only just got here. I want to play on the raft. I won’t come in!’ The assorted boatload reached the shore, and my sister came down the beach laughing heartily and saying, ‘What were you doing? What’s all this fuss?’

  ‘Your sister nearly drowned herself,’ said the old man crossly: ‘Go on, take this child of yours. We’ll lay her out flat, and we’ll see if she needs a bit of punching.’

  I suppose they gave me a bit of punching, though I don’t think I had quite lost consciousness.

  ‘I can’t see how you knew she was drowning. Why didn’t she shout for help?’

  ‘I keeps an eye. Once you goes down you can’t shout–water’s comin’ in.’

  We both thought highly of the old Sea-Horse after that.

  The outside world impinged much less than it had in my father’s time. I had my friends and my mother had one or two close friends whom she saw, but there was little social interchange. For one thing mother was very badly off; she had no money to spare for social entertainments, or indeed for paying cab fares to go to luncheons or dinners. She had never been a great walker, and now, with her heart attacks, she got out little, as it was impossible in Torquay to go anywhere without going up or down hill almost immediately. I had bathing in the summer, roller-skating in the winter and masses of books to read. There, of course, I was constantly making new discoveries. Mother read me Dickens aloud at this point and we both enjoyed it.

  Reading aloud started with Sir Walter Scott. One of my favourites was The Talisman. I also read Marmion and The Lady of the Lake, but I think that both mother and I were highly pleased when we passed from Sir Walter Scott to Dickens. Mother, impatient as always, did not hesitate to skip when it suited her fancy. ‘All these descriptions,’ she would say at various points in Sir Walter Scott. ‘Of course they are very good, and literary, but one can have too many of them.’ I think she also cheated by missing
out a certain amount of sob-stuff in Dickens, particularly the bits about Little Nell.

  Our first Dickens was Nicholas Nickleby, and my favourite character was the old gentleman who courted Mrs Nickleby by throwing vegetable marrows over the wall. Can this be one of the reasons why I made Hercule Poirot retire to grow vegetable marrows? Who can say? My favourite Dickens of all was Bleak House, and still is.

  Occasionally we would try Thackeray for a change. We got through Vanity Fair all right, but we stuck on The Newcombes–‘We ought to like it,’ said my mother, ‘everyone says it is his best.’ My sister’s favourite had been Esmond, but that too we found diffuse and difficult; indeed I have never been able to appreciate Thackeray as I should.

  For my own reading, the works of Alexandre Dumas in French now entranced me. The Three Musketeers, Twenty Years After, and best of all, The Count of Monte Christo. My favourite was the first volume, Le Château d’If, but although the other five volumes occasionally had me slightly bewildered the whole colourful pageant of the story was entrancing. I also had a romatic attachment to Maurice Hewlett: The Forest Lovers, The Queen’s Quair, and Richard Yea-and-Nay. Very good historical novels they are, too.

  Occasionally my mother would have a sudden idea. I remember one day when I was picking up suitable windfalls from the apple-tree, she arrived like a whirlwind from the house. ‘Quickly,’ she said, ‘we are going to Exeter.’

  ‘Going to Exeter,’ I said surprised. ‘Why?’

  ‘Because Sir Henry Irving is playing there, in Becket. He may not live much longer, and you must see him. A great actor. We’ve just time to catch the train. I have booked a room at the hotel.’

  We duly went to Exeter, and it was indeed a wonderful performance of Becket which I have never forgotten.