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hallowHALLOWE'EN PARTY
Mrs. Ariadne Oliver, famed mysterystory
writer is visiting her friend Judith
Butler in Woodleigh Common. During
her visit she attends a Hallowe'en party
given by the local society leader. On the
evening following the party, Hercule
Poirot receives a visit from Mrs. Oliver
at his London flat. Nearly hysterical
Ariadne tells him that Joyce has been
drowned in a galvanized bucket of
water, her head pushed down among
the bobbing apples. Hercule Poirot sets
out to find the murderer but first he
seeks the aid of his old friend Superintendent
Spence who has surprisingly
retired in Woodleigh Commo
AGATHA CHRISTIE
HALLOWE'EN
PARTY
jj Complete and Unabridged
^w^
Q
ULVERSCROFT
Leicester
First published in Great Britain in 1969 by
William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd.,
London
First Large Print Edition
published August 1987
by arrangement with
William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd.,
London
and
Dodd, Mead & Company, Inc.,
New York
Copyright © 1969 by Agatha Christie
All rights reserved
e^THE
scarborough______
Pl JRL1C LipP^RY British Library CIP Data
BQABP --------------------------
Christie, Agatha
Hallowe'en party.--Large print ed.--
Ulverscroft large print series: mystery
I. Title
823'.912[F] PR6005.H66
ISBN 0-7089-1666-X
Published by IF . A. Thorpe (Publishing) Ltd.
Anstey, Leicestershire
Set by Rowland Phototypesetting Ltd. Bury St. Edmunds, Suffolk
Printed and bound in Great Britain by
T. J. Press (Padstow) Ltd., Padstow, Cornwall
To P. G. Wodehouse
whose books and stories have brightened
my life for many years. Also to show my
pleasure in his having been kind enough
to tell me that he enjoys my books
1
MRS. ARIADNE OLIVER had
gone with the friend with whom
she was staying, Judith Butler, to
help with the preparations for a children's
party which was to take place that same
evening.
At the moment it was a scene of chaotic
activity. Energetic women came in and out
of doors moving chairs, small tables, flower vases, and carrying large quantities
of yellow pumpkins which they disposed
strategically in selected spots.
It was to be a Hallowe'en party for
invited guests of an age group between ten
and seventeen years old.
Mrs. Oliver, removing herself from the
main group, leant against a vacant background
of wall and held up a large yellow pumpkin, looking at it critically--"The
last time I saw one of these," she said, sweeping back her grey hair from her
prominent forehead, "was in the United
States last year--hundreds of them. All
over the house. I've never seen so many
pumpkins. As a matter of fact," she added
thoughtfully, "I've never really known the
difference between a pumpkin and a
vegetable marrow. What's this one?"
"Sorry, dear," said Mrs. Butler, as she
fell over her friend's feet.
Mrs. Oliver pressed herself closer
against the wall.
"My fault," she said. "I'm standing
about and getting in the way. But it was rather remarkable, seeing so many pumpkins
or vegetable marrows, whatever they
are. They were everywhere, in the shops, and in people's houses, with candles or
nightlights inside them or strung up. Very
interesting really. But it wasn't for a
Hallowe'en party, it was Thanksgiving.
Now I've always associated pumpkins with
Hallowe'en and that's the end of October.
Thanksgiving comes much later, doesn't
it? Isn't it November, about the third
week in November? Anyway, here, Hallowe'en is definitely the 31st of
October, isn't it? First Hallowe'en and
then, what comes next? All Souls' Day?
That's when in Paris you go to cemeteries
and put flowers on graves. Not a sad sort
2
of feast. I mean, all the children go too,
and enjoy themselves. You go to flower
markets first and buy lots and lots of lovely
flowers. Flowers never look so lovely as
they do in Paris in the market there."
A lot of busy women were falling over
Mrs. Oliver occasionally, but they were not
listening to her. They were all too busy
with what they were doing.
They consisted for the most part of
mothers, one or two competent spinsters;
there were useful teenagers, boys of
sixteen and seventeen climbing up ladders
or standing on chairs to put decorations,
pumpkins or vegetable marrows or
brightly coloured witchballs at a suitable
elevation; girls from eleven to fifteen hung
about in groups and giggled.
"And after All Souls' Day and
cemeteries," went on Mrs. Oliver,
lowering her bulk on to the arm of a
settee, "you have All Saints' Day. I think
I'm right?"
Nobody responded to this question.
Mrs. Drake, a handsome middle-aged
woman who was giving the party, made a
pronouncement.
"I'm not calling this a Hallowe'en party,
although of course it is one really. I'm
calling it the Eleven Plus party. It's that
sort of age group. Mostly people who are
leaving The Elms and going on to other
schools."
"But that's not very accurate, Rowena, is it?" said Miss Whittaker, resetting her
pince-nez on her nose disapprovingly.
Miss Whittaker as a local schoolteacher
was always firm on accuracy.
"Because we've abolished the elevenplus
some time ago."
Mrs. Oliver rose from the settee apologetically.
"I haven't been making myself
useful. I've just been sitting here saying
silly things about pumpkins and vegetable
marrows"--And resting my feet, she
thought, with a slight pang of conscience, but without sufficient feeling of guilt to say
it aloud.
"Now what can I do next?" she asked, and added, "What lovely apples!"
Someone had just brought a large bowl
of apples into the room. Mrs. Oliver was
partial to apples.
"Lovely red ones," she added.
"They're not really very good," said
Rowena Drake. "But they look nice and
4
parti
fied. That's for bobbing for apples.
They're rather soft apples, so people will
be able to get their teeth into them better.
Take them into the library, will you,
Beatrice? Bobbing for apples always makes
a mess with the water slopping over, but
that doesn't matter with the library carpet, it's so old. Oh! thank you, Joyce."
Joyce, a sturdy thirteen-year-old, seized
the bowl of apples. Two rolled off it and
stopped, as though arrested by a witch's
wand, at Mrs. Oliver's feet.
"You like apples, don't you?" said
Joyce. "I read you did, or perhaps I heard
it on the telly. You're the one who writes
murder stories, aren't you?"
"Yes," said Mrs. Oliver.
"We ought to have made you do something
connected with murders. Have a
murder at the party to-night and make
people solve it."
"No, thank you," said Mrs. Oliver.
"Never again."
"What do you mean, never again?"
"Well, I did once, and it didn't turn out
much of a success," said Mrs. Oliver.
"But you've written lots of books," said
Joyce, "you make a lot of money out of
them, don't you?"
"In a way.," said Mrs. Oliver, her
thoughts flying to the Inland Revenue.
"And you've got a detective who's a
Finn."
Mrs. Oliver admitted the fact. A small
stolid boy not yet, Mrs. Oliver would have
thought, arrived at the seniority of the
eleven-plus, said sternly, "Why a Finn?"
"I've often wondered," said Mrs. Oliver
truthfully.
Mrs. Hargreaves, the organist's wife,
came into the room breathing heavily, and
bearing a large green plastic pail.
"What about this," she said, "for the
apple bobbing? Kind of gay, I thought."
Miss Lee, the doctor's dispenser, said,
"Galvanised bucket's better. Won't tip
over so easily. Where are you going to
have it, Mrs. Drake?"
"I thought the bobbing for apples had
better be in the library. The carpet's old
there and a lot of water always gets spilt,
anyway."
"All right. We'll take 'em along.
Rowena, here's another basket of apples."
"Let me help," said Mrs. Oliver.
6
She picked up the two apples at her feet.
Almost without noticing what she was
doing, she sank her teeth into one of them
and began to crunch it. Mrs. Drake
abstracted the second apple from her
firmly and restored it to the basket. A buzz
of conversation broke out.
"Yes, but where are we going to have
the Snapdragon?"
"You ought to have the Snapdragon in
the library, it's much the darkest room."
"No, we're going to have that in the
dining-room."
"We'll have to put something on the
table first."
"There's a green baize cloth to put on
that and then the rubber sheet over it."
"What about the looking-glasses? Shall
we really see our husbands in them?"
Surreptitiously removing her shoes and
still quietly champing at her apple, Mrs.
Oliver lowered herself once more on to the
settee and surveyed the room full of people
critically. She was thinking in her
authoress's mind: "Now, if I was going to
make a book about all these people, how
should I do it? They're nice people, I
should think, on the whole, but who
knows?"
In a way, she felt, it was rather fascinating
not to know anything about them.
They all lived in Woodleigh Common, some of them had c
faint tags attached to
them in her memory because of what
Judith had told her. Miss Johnson--something
to do with the church, not the vicar's
sister. Oh no, it was the organist's sister,
of course. Rowena Drake, who seemed to
run things in Woodleigh Common. The
puffing woman who had brought in the
pail, a particularly hideous plastic pail. But
then Mrs. Oliver had never been fond of
plastic things. And then the children, the
teenage girls and boys.
So far they were really only names to
Mrs. Oliver. There was a Nan and a
Beatrice and a Cathie, a Diana and a
Joyce, who was boastful and asked questions.
I don't like Joyce much, thought
Mrs. Oliver. A girl called Arm, who
looked tall and superior. There were two
adolescent boys who appeared to have just
got used to trying out different hair styles, with rather unfortunate results.
8
^ smallish boy^ entered in some
condition of shynesss. "Mummy sent th^iese mirrors to see if
they'd do," he said ; in a slightly breathless
voice,
^ts. Drake took them from him. "^hank you so irouch. Eddy," she said. "They're just ordinary looking hand- "^"ors," said the ^iri called Arm. "Shall
we r^lly see our fuflture husbands' faces in
them>»
"Some of you maiy and some may not," said Judith Butler.
"^id you ever sese your husband's face
whe^ you went to a party--I mean this
kin^ of a party?" ^Of course she diidn't," said Joyce. ^he might hav»e," said the superior Beatdce. "E.S.P. they call it. Extra
sens^iy perception,'" she added in the tone
°^ ^ne pleased with being thoroughly
conv^sant with the; terms of the times.
^ read one of yonir books," said Arm to Mrs. Oliver. "The JDying Goldfish. It was
quit^ good," she said kindly.
^ didn't like titiat one," said Joyce. ^ere wasn't enouigh blood in it. I like "^ders to have lotfs of blood."
Hr.
9
"A bit messy," said Mrs. Oliver, "don't
you think?"
"But exciting," said Joyce.
"Not necessarily," said Mrs. Oliver.
"I saw a murder once," said Joyce.
"Don't be silly, Joyce," said Miss Whittaker,
the schoolteacher.
"I did," said Joyce.
"Did you really," asked Cathie, gazing
at Joyce with wide eyes, "really and truly
see a murder?"
"Of course she didn't," said Mrs.
Drake. "Don't say silly things, Joyce."
"I did see a murder," said Joyce. "I did.
I did. I did."
A seventeen-year-old boy poised on a
ladder looked down interestedly.
"What kind of a murder?" he asked.
"I don't believe it," said Beatrice.
"Of course not," said Cathie's mother.
"She's just making it up."
"I'm not. I saw it."
"Why didn't you go to the police about
it?" asked Cathie.
"Because I didn't know it was a murder
when I saw it. It wasn't really till a long
time afterwards, I mean, that I began to
know that it was a murder. Something that
10
somebody said only about a month or two
ago suddenly made me think: Of course, that was a murder I saw."
"You see," said Arm, "she's makin
g it
all up. It's nonsense."
"When did it happen?" asked Beatrice.
"Years ago," said Joyce. "I was quite
young at the time," she added.
"Who murdered who?" said Beatrice.
"I shan't tell any of you," said Joyce.
"You're all so horrid about it."
Miss Lee came in with another kind of ^bucket. Conversation shifted to a comparison
of buckets or plastic pails as most suitable for the sport of bobbing for
sapples. The majority of the helpers
irepaired to the library for an appraisal on
tthe spot. Some of the younger members, lit may be said, were anxious to demongstrate,
by a rehearsal of the difficulties and Utheir own accomplishment in the sport.
lHair got wet, water got spilt, towels were
ssent for to mop it up. In the end it was
odecided that a galvanised bucket was prefeerable
to the more meretricious charms of
aa plastic pail which overturned rather too
eeasily.
Mrs. Oliver, setting down a bowl of
11
apples which she had carried in to
replenish the store required for tomorrow, once more helped herself to one.
"I read in the paper that you were fond
of eating apples," the accusing voice of Arm or Susan--she was not quite sure
which--spoke to her."
"It's my besetting sin," said Mrs.
Oliver.
"It would be more fun if it was
melons," objected one of the boys.
"They're so juicy. Think of the mess it
would make," he said, surveying the
carpet with pleasurable anticipation.
Mrs. Oliver, feeling a little guilty at the
public arraignment of greediness, left the
room in search of a particular apartment, the geography of which is usually fairly
easily identified. She went up the staircase
and, turning the corner on the half
landing, cannoned into a pair, a girl and a
boy, clasped in each other's arms and
leaning against the door which Mrs. Oliver
felt fairly certain was the door to the room
to which she herself was anxious to gain
access. The couple paid no attention to
her. They sighed and they snuggled. Mrs.
Oliver wondered how old they were. The
12
boy was fifteen, perhaps, the girl little
more than twelve, although the development
of her chest seemed certainly on the
mature side.
Apple Trees was a house of fair size. It
had, she thought, several agreeable nooks
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