Editor's Note
Margery Allingham was often asked to write appropriately seasonal stories for the Christmas numbers of newspapers and magazines. Happy Christmas was originally intended for the Sunday Telegraph and was delivered to the paper on December 11th, 196l. Three days later she had a new idea and on the seventeenth she sent to Fleet Street for publication on Christmas Eve The Snapdragon and the CID (collected in 1969 in The Allingham Case-Book).
Happy Christmas appeared in the Woman's Own Christmas Number in 1962.
The Wisdom of Esdras
Joseph Berrie put down his newspaper, helped himself to a piece of toast and smiled across at his sister Celia, who sat at the head of the breakfast-table.
"Vance is late this morning," he observed, "never in all my life knew such a beggar for his bed hello! Good morning, Vance, come and have some breakfast."
"Morning," returned Bobby Vance as he seated himself.
Celia smiled at him over the tea-things. "Help yourself to an egg," she said, "you'll find one on the side. Did you have a good night?"
"Definitely! Slept like a top, but who's the lady in the lilac dress and the infernally noisy shoes?" Berrie looked up from his egg. "Who's been spinning you yarns?" he said slowly. Vance looked at him wonderingly. "No one," he said at last, "but I don't understand you, who is she?"
Celia laughed. "Well, I suppose you'd call her a ghost," she said, "but I can assure you, she's quite harmless. I've seen her heaps of times and Joe hears her often, but the worst of it is he can't see anything and, in fact, he's just a wee bit skeptical. Aren't you, Joe dear?"
Berrie grunted. "I admit there is something roaming about," he said, "but if it is, as you claim, a ghost, why on earth can't you leave the poor thing alone? She does no harm to anyone."
Celia laughed. "Poor old Joe!" she exclaimed. "Just because he can't see her he hates to talk about her, it's downright pique on his part. Never mind Joe, old boy, you hear her dainty little shoes, don't you?"
Berrie went on with his egg in silence.
Celia turned to Vance. "You know it's funny," she said, "there have been two or three people who have stayed down here, who have been unable to see her, even when they have been in the same room as those who have. You're obviously one of the lucky ones."
Vance looked from one to the other in amazement. "Good lord!" he said at last. "Are you really serious? Or are you kidding me? Do you honestly mean to tell me that the little girl in mauve I met last night, and in my pajamas, is a real genuine ghost?" And then, as he saw on both their faces a similar expression, he added, "I say, how delightful! This is the first time I've ever come up against a real spook. Quite an adventure."
Berrie eyed him inquiringly, almost coldly. "What did she look like?"
"Oh, just a girl in a mauve, fluffy sort of frock, you know, all frilly things down the skirt; and a weird shawl over her shoulders."
Celia looked across at her brother and nodded meaningly.
"You see," Vance continued, warming to his subject as he recalled slowly, one after another, the incidents of his last night's adventure. "You see, I heard someone crying and then the sound of high-heeled shoes clicking on the stairs. So I got out of bed and went to the door. And then I saw her." He said it with what, almost unconsciously, Berrie thought to be unpardonable pride. "I saw her; just at the bottom of the stairs, by that door that leads in to the yard. She had her back to me and her face between her hands. I thought it was you at first," he grinned as he turned to Celia, "and I didn't know what to say; but when she went on crying, I asked her if I could help. She turned and I saw it wasn't you. Well, then-er I was a bit shaken so I started down the stairs after her. She opened the door, I followed and she disappeared."
"Were you frightened," asked Berrie as he finished his toast.
Vance flushed. "My dear fellow," he said simply, "I've just told you, I had no idea she was a ghost. Why should I be frightened?"
There was an awkward pause during which Berrie helped himself to another piece of toast.
Vance broke the silence and in his usually boyish tone remarked, "I say, isn't there any old story about the lady? This place seems fairly new, but yet you'd think ..."
"Oh yes! There is a story," Celia interposed. "Ages ago, Merley used to be a real old smuggling center. That old barn affair over there in the garden used to be the Old Bell Inn, a sort of general headquarters for all the villains of the neighborhood. They say that she was a girl who found out about the smuggling trade and that eventually she decided to show them up, although her father, or her lover, or someone was in it too. She disappeared mysteriously, killed most probably by these people, and she's haunted the place ever since. It isn't the old inn itself, however, she never goes past our doorway; it's the ground outside, so when they built this cottage it was this place she haunted."
"I say, what a brilliantly exciting sort of lady," said Vance. "I hope I see her again."
Berrie pushed away his plate and got up. "Well, I'm going down to Hughes, to see about that boat. Celia will tell you dozens of creepy stories, if you let her; she's simply shot full of them, but if I were you I'd play tennis instead. It's healthier." He stepped through the French windows and strolled across the garden.
"Ghosts are funny things," Vance remarked. "I used to think they were all bosh till I read those books by old Oliver Lodge. Even then I wasn't quite sure. But now, of course, there's no doubt about it I've seen one."
"Oh, I've believed in ghosts all my life," said Celia. "You see, we've had this cottage for the summer ever since we were kids. She's always been here, of course. Mother could see her, but Dad was like Joe, he could only hear her. I know Mother used to tell how sometimes of an evening she and Dad used to sit in the dining-room with me, when I was a baby, and they would hear the little tap-tap of her shoes coming along the passage. Then the door opened and shut. Mother saw her, so did I, and I would follow her all round the room with my eyes. Dad only saw the door open and shut, but he heard the soft click-click of her heels."
"Must have been nerve-racking for your father, I should think," observed Vance. "There's something beastly about a door working on its own," he added lamely, then in a more serious tone, "You know, I can't think why a ghost ever stays in a place where it was not happy when it wasn't a ghost. And you'd think that when it found all the old places changing, it would-er bunk away as quick as it could."
"Yes, I've thought that, too," said Celia slowly, "but don't you think that if a person has an obsession like she had and then dies suddenly, that obsession remains and keeps them from going any further; and then, perhaps, to them the places they used to know look just the same always. You know, I'm really sorry for our little mauve lady. Wouldn't it be simply splendid if we could help her to remove the obsession and let her go on?"
"Yes, I suppose it would," said Vance getting up. "But how would one do it? By digging up the smuggler's treasures or empty barrels? No, that would be no good because she wouldn't know it." He got up. "Yes, it would be a fine thing to do, but damnably difficult."
"Damnably difficult," echoed Celia.
"Best two out of three?" said Vance suddenly.
"Right!" she answered. "Get the racquets."
That night Bobby Vance went to bed late and exhausted. He thought no more about the lady in lilac, until about two in the morning he distinctly heard a door open and shut, and then the click of high-heeled shoes coming down a passage. Now Vance was wide awake and sitting up. His door opened slowly, then shut. She was in the room. She walked over to his bed and stood looking at him.
Vance put out his hand to touch her. She looked so real in the half-light. She evaded him and walked to the window. She really walked, he could hear her heels on the oilcloth. Suddenly she put her hands to her face and began to cry.
Vance got out of bed and went to her. His sensations were peculiar, he felt overwhelmingly sorry for this poor wraith who seemed to be doomed to eternal disquietude. Even so, he had to know.
> "Can I help you?" he called out. "Isn't there anything I can do?"
She took no notice; she even appeared not to hear. Slowly she moved to the door, opened it and went down the stairs. He followed her into the garden and had almost caught up with her when she vanished.
Mechanically Vance bent down, picked up a stick and stuck it in the ground where she had disappeared, then went back to bed.
When he awoke next morning he found that his mind was still filled with thoughts of her. "It would be a great thing to understand a ghost," he murmured the words as if there was someone listening, then "to understand that deep mystery which men have tried to fathom since the world began." Here was his chance, he knew it; a spirit in distress had come to him for help. If he could but give that help by so doing he would discover the relationship between this world and the next. But how could he help unless she gave him some inkling of what it was that she wanted? He couldn't be expected to know everything and as yet she hadn't given him a lead, had she? A lead? Was that it? Did she mean him to follow her? To follow her? But where to? Well, he had followed her, down the garden, down to the place where she had vanished after his first sighting. Was that the clue she offered? That was the very same spot where she had disappeared a second time. If that was a sign, what next? He could hardly follow where she went, into the earth.
Vance stiffened. But could he not follow? Perhaps, perhaps, that was it! He could dig. He could dig, and find? He cursed. Damn it all, what did it matter what he found. He would have a shot at it. "Good heavens! There's the gong. Where did I put my shaving-soap?"
After breakfast he went round the outhouses, found a spade and fork. He began to dig; he dug all day, and he found nothing. He was disgusted and fed up when Berrie came along.
"My dear fellow!" he expostulated, "You mustn't do this sort of thing. You'll go off your head, you know, and you'll spoil my garden. You'll have to fill that hole up again, too, or you'll be having someone falling in and breaking his neck."
"I'm awfully sorry, Berrie," said Vance. "I am an ass. I'll come in now and fill this up tomorrow morning; no one will come by before then."
"All right! But stick a plank over it. There isn't one? Oh, well! Never mind, come on in." Vance decided to go to bed early to sleep off his disappointment and his disgust with himself.
About half-eleven he woke up and recalled the conversation he had had with Celia the day before. It would be a great thing to help a ghost, and by helping to Find Out, Celia would think him very kind, Berry would think him a clever fellow and, dash it all, Berrie would be right. If only there were some way of talking to a ghost! If only there were some way of knowing. He sat upright in bed. There it was again, a door opening and shutting and the click-click-click of high-heeled shoes. She was there again, standing by the window crying. If only he could help her; if only he could talk to her, if only he could understand her.
Vance sprang out of bed. "Can't I do anything for you? Oh, do let me help you!" he implored.
She turned to him, gave him one sorrowful look and went to the door. Again he followed her to the garden. Yes, she was going to the same place as before, he would follow her. He would follow her, even to ... He was following her then he slipped, and as he fell he remembered.
Joe Berrie and the Rev John Weymouth were sitting together on the little verandah in front of Merley Rectory.
Berry had been talking, but now as he mused he flicked his cigarette ash among the brilliant flowers of a red geranium which stood in a pot near his chair.
The Rev John Weymouth waited for more, but Berrie went on flicking his cigarette ash. At last the old rector spoke himself. "So next day you found him dead in the hole he had dug the day before," he observed.
"Yes," said Berrie shortly. He paused then went on suddenly, "You know, what beats me is how an athletic chap like Vance could manage to break his neck in a rotten little hole like that."
"A very sad story," remarked the rector.
"Yes," said Berrie, "and you know, Weymouth, it's a dashed funny thing but now," and unconsciously he lowered his voice, "now there's two of 'em." He met the rector's incredulous stare with steady eyes. "Oh! I know I can't see 'em, but by Jupiter I can hear them and Celia, poor girl, she went back to London after the second night," he paused again. "She liked Vance, you know."
"Ah!" said the old man, "It's ill work meddling with spirits. Even so they which dwell upon the earth may understand nothing but that which is upon the earth and He that dwelleth above the Heavens may only understand the things which are above the height of the Heavens," he quoted softly.
Berrie got up suddenly and giving the geranium a sudden and vicious kick, strolled slowly into the house.
Editor's Note
This story, in so many ways eccentric to Margery Allingham's work, was written early in her career, by all the evidence late in 1924.
It has never before been published.
The Curious Affair in Nut Row
"Always take notice of a woman," Divisional Detective Chief Inspector Luke spoke the words, casting a shameless glance at the pretty girl who had come in with Mr Campion. That evening he was in tremendous, not to say outrageous, form as he sat there on the narrow table in the upstairs private bar of the Platelayer's Arms looking like some magnificent black tomcat in his tight sharp clothes.
It was one of those raw spring nights when the noise of the traffic sounds unnaturally close and there is a warning blast of freezing air whenever the outside door is opened. The rush hour was at its height and it was as yet just a little too early to go home, undoubtedly the right time for storytelling.
"It was listening to a woman who could hardly speak, bless her, save to say 'yeth', which got me my first real promotion." As he spoke slowly Luke crossed his eyes, blew out his cheeks into dumplings and favored us with a simper that was both innocent and arch, so that his voluble young woman appeared before us. "She worked in a tobacconist just behind the old St Mary's Road Police Station. We called her Mossy and she looked it soft, you know, and green she lived only for the movies and thought I ought to be a film-star. I used to go round and talk to her when old George Misery Bull, the CID sergeant there in those days, got both of us crying with the dreariness of life."
Luke gave us a fleeting glimpse of a sad, fat man with a forehead like a bloodhound's and, with a fluid hand, he sketched for us a large and pendulous stomach.
Luke went on cheerfully. "It was a long winter that year and that brought out the lunatics. The cold does, you know. At the end of September they start getting a grievance, by Guy Fawkes' Night they start writing to The Times, after Christmas they're coming to the police. I'm not kidding. You want to watch out if you feel it coming on. Our particular headache that winter was Burbury Square. You know it?"
Mr Campion's knowledge of London was phenomenal. "The Society of Marine Research," he murmured immediately.
"That's the place." Luke shot him a swift, respectful glance. "On the north side; great tall houses, all dust, stairs and appalling improvements. George called it Nut Row. It wasn't residential except for one or two hideouts in the attics." Luke bent his head smartly sideways as if to avoid an imaginary sloping ceiling and so vivid was his pantomime that several of his listeners bent their heads with him.
"At the time I'm talking about there was only one old fellow actually living in the entire block. He was up under the roof in the house next door to the Society of Marine Whatnot. Quite a snug little place he had there but it was a fine old houseful; on the floor below were the offices of a vegetarian magazine; under them a postage-stamp exchange and on the ground floor and in the basement a gaggle of old ladies sorted bundles for the Solomon Islanders every afternoon except Saturdays. Next door this Marine outfit had the whole building; they held meetings, gave lectures, and conducted a private war with their rivals over in Victoria, the Guild of Aquatic Science."
Luke glanced round his audience, his brows two circumflex accents. "They were all a bit funny," he said ser
iously. "Even the Society, which is really quite well-known and just the ticket, seemed to be going over the edge. They'd got hold of a prehistoric fish which had landed them with a lot of publicity. It was older than the coelacanth that's the one without the lungs, isn't it? Well, this one hadn't got a stomach either. Just solid fish all the way through or something of the sort." He was not exactly depicting the unfortunate beast but a fleeting expression of acute introspection did suggest the unhappy brute.
"It was alive, too," he continued, the words pouring out of him as always they did when he was excited. "I saw it myself. Some Chinaman had got hold of it while he was doing his laundry in some sort of river they've got out there. It had been flown back at great expense and the Society was trying to keep it alive in a specially heated and suitably polluted tank. They didn't exactly put it on show but they'd let you have a dekko if you were interested and ready to subscribe.
"I knew about it because Sir Bernard Walfish, who was the President of the Society, had a row with Sir Thingummy Something who was the head of the Guild at Victoria. Sir Thingummy wanted to dissect the thing in the cause of science and it came to raised eyebrows on both sides. I was sent down to explain to Sir Bernard why the Metropolitan Police didn't feel his pet needed a police guard, unless he felt like paying for one. That's how I knew about the place and why the address wasn't new to me when we had complaints from Mr Theodore Hooky, the old boy in the roof next door."
"The man who lived over the vegetarian magazine," Mr Campion explained for those who were not paying full attention.
"That's right. In fact, we didn't know he was there at all until he telephoned one morning and, when we listened to him, we thought he couldn't be all there. Then, just about lunch-time, he called in at the station and we knew damned well he wasn't." Luke paused, glanced sharply behind him, and came back to his audience wearing an expression in which belligerence and suspicion were blended horrifically.
The Return of Mr Campion Page 17
