The Mystery of Mrs. Christie

by Marie Benedict

  “It’s hardly as if Lieutenant Christie and I have an understanding between us, Madge. He’s simply become part of my set, that’s all.”

  Even as I said the words, I knew they weren’t true. Over the past several weeks, Lieutenant Christie had taken me at my word to visit as often as he could. He came frequently and sometimes unexpectedly to Torquay, no longer pretending that an official errand brought him to Ashfield as he had on that first visit. In fact, he’d confessed to the embarrassment he suffered in prying my address out of Arthur Griffiths. Despite his many visits, he remained mostly a stranger to me, but I found his differentness—his intensity and determination—strangely intriguing.

  “As your fellow, it seems. At your invitation. It’s not as if he’s bosom chums with the others.” Madge’s voice rose, and then my voice rose accordingly. Perhaps because I knew Madge was right.

  “You don’t know what you are talking about, Madge. He is not my beau,” I yelled.

  “So you keep saying, even though the evidence suggests otherwise.” She paused, then launched into an assault from a different angle. “We don’t know his people, Agatha. Not like we know the Lucys. And if you plan on moving forward with this relationship, you best know that you marry not only a man but his entire clan. I should know,” she said with a dramatic sigh. Her complaints about her in-laws were the stuff of legend.

  We stood from our tea table chairs and faced each other.

  “Girls,” Mummy called out. “That is enough.” This conversation was escalating into a full-scale argument, and no matter Mummy’s feelings toward Archie, she simply couldn’t tolerate that level of division between her daughters.

  Madge and I settled back into our seats, and she reached for another cigarette. Mummy busied herself with her embroidery as if nothing untoward had just occurred. Madge spoke first. “I hear you’ve been putting my old Empire typewriter to good use in your spare time.”

  It seemed that Mummy spared no details in describing my life to Madge. Was there no privacy from my older, bossy sister? I’d hesitated using the typewriter at first, as Madge had created her award-winning essays for Vanity Fair on the device and thought she might still claim it. Mummy assured me otherwise.

  “Among other things,” I answered, still smarting from her sermon about Archie and Reggie.

  “Been doing any reading?” she asked, sensing my coldness and trying to warm me with a familiar, shared topic.

  Madge and I were great readers, and in fact, she had initiated me into the world of detective novels. On cold winter evenings at Ashfield, when I was about seven or eight years old, she began the ritual of reading aloud to me before my bedtime from Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s stories. This practice continued until she became Mrs. James Watts, when I took up the reins myself. The book that lassoed me to the genre was The Leavenworth Case, written by Anna Katharine Green a full ten years before Sir Arthur Conan Doyle published his first Sherlock Holmes. A true conundrum, the book focused on a wealthy merchant who was murdered in his mansion on Fifth Avenue in New York City in a locked room by a pistol that was locked in another room altogether during the time of the murder.

  “Yes,” I answered, my tone still chilly. “I just finished the new book by Gaston Leroux, The Mystery of the Yellow Room.”

  Her eyes brightened, and she moved forward in her chair, closer to me. “I did too. I thought it was quite good. What did you think?”

  Our disagreement forgotten, we launched into an animated discussion of the book’s merits and flaws. I marveled at the complicated crime in which the perpetrator apparently escaped from a locked room, and Madge adored the addition of the floor plans that illustrated the crime scene. But while we both enjoyed the intellectual puzzle the book provided to its readers, we agreed that it was no Sherlock Holmes, who remained our favorite.

  “I’d like to try writing a detective story with your old Empire typewriter.” I spoke aloud the thought that had been running through my mind for some time.

  Eyebrows raised, Madge assumed her typical expression and exhaled a long stream of smoke. She finally said, “I don’t think you can do it, Agatha. They are very difficult to master. I’ve even thought about taking a stab at one myself, but it’s too tricky.”

  Implicit in her statement was, of course, that if she couldn’t manage a detective novel, there was no possible way that her baby sister could do so. I wasn’t going to let her dictate my actions—not with Archie and not with writing.

  “Nevertheless, I should like to try.” I stood firm.

  “You are capable of undertaking whatever you set your mind to, Agatha,” Mummy chimed in offhandedly as she stitched away. It was a familiar refrain, but the frequency of its repetition didn’t diminish Mummy’s intent.

  “Well, I’ll bet you couldn’t do it properly,” Madge scoffed and then permitted herself a deep laugh. “I mean, how could you write an unsolvable mystery, the very core of a detective novel? You are positively transparent.”

  Oh, I couldn’t write a detective story, could I? I thought to myself. I seethed at Madge’s patronizing words and condescension, but I also took them as a challenge. While Madge hadn’t technically laid down a bet—according to Miller family betting rules, terms must be set—I took it as a firm wager regardless. In that moment, Madge ignited a spark in me, and I vowed to keep it alive until I could fan it into a flame. The bet was on.

  Chapter Eight

  Day One after the Disappearance

  Saturday, December 4, 1926

  Styles, Sunningdale, England

  Archie closes the door of his study behind him. Leaning against its sturdy four-panel door, he inhales slowly and deeply in an effort to moderate his breathing. He must remain calm. He cannot allow his nerves and latent anger to seep through his exterior of concern.

  A soft knock interrupts his efforts. It doesn’t bear the authoritative rap of a policeman, but still, who else could it be? He smooths his hair and his suit jacket and pulls opens the notoriously creaky door.

  He stares out into the hallway, ready to receive whichever policeman wants to pummel him with more questions. But the hallway is empty. At least so he thinks until Charlotte comes into view.

  “Sorry, sir, she insisted,” she apologizes, wrapping her arm around her small charge and proffering her to him.

  It’s little Rosalind. Archie glances down at his seven-year-old daughter. Beneath her heavy dark bangs, her bright-blue eyes, so like his own, stare up at him.

  Incomprehensible to him now was his previously held sentiment that he did not want a child. When Agatha became pregnant, he had no suitable employment and did not want to share his wife’s affections with a baby. But when Rosalind came into the world and he saw himself in his daughter’s face and stolid temperament, he could not imagine a world without her.

  He escorts his daughter into his study, leaving Charlotte in the hallway, and closes the door behind them. Rosalind settles into the armchair near the fireplace, her feet dangling above the oak floor and crimson-hued Turkish rug. She appears tiny and vulnerable, and a typical child of seven years of age would cry in this situation, but not his daughter. Instead, she faces the turmoil outside the study door with placid curiosity, and he loves her all the more for it.

  Archie takes the armchair across from her, and for a moment, he relives his interview with the police officer. Shaking off the lingering despair from that exchange, he turns to his dark-haired daughter, her usually pale cheeks flushed with color, whether from the warmth of the fire or the trouble brewing in Styles, he can’t say for certain.

  “You wanted to talk, Rosalind?” he asks.

  “Yes, Papa,” she answers in an even voice.

  “Do you have a question?”

  “Yes.” Her brow furrows, and suddenly she looks much older than seven. “The house is full of police, and I’m wondering what’s happening.”

  “H
as Charlotte said anything to you about it?” he asks, trying to keep his tone as even as hers. Although he’d cautioned the secretary and governess to keep Rosalind in the dark, he knows the child is perceptive and has likely made her own assessment, perhaps even made insistent inquiries of Charlotte. Still, he doesn’t want to contradict outright any account Charlotte has offered.

  “No, not a word. And, Papa, I’ve asked.”

  If the situation weren’t so dire, he’d chuckle at the thought of his persistent daughter.

  “Well, Rosalind, the police are here to help with your mother,” he answers with the most benign response he can fashion.

  Her eyebrows raise quizzically as she processes this unusual, rather vague explanation. “To help with Mama?”

  “Yes, my dear.”

  “Is she ill?”

  “No. Not that we know, anyway.”

  Rosalind’s nose scrunches up as she contemplates another possibility. “Well then, is she in some sort of trouble? Is that why the police are here?”

  “No, not at all. They are looking for your mother.”

  “Why on earth would the police do that? Has she gone missing?” The smallest hint of worry surfaces in her tone, and Archie wants to make sure the escalation stops at this level.

  How to phrase this without causing alarm? Archie settles on a harmless description that adheres somewhat to the facts. “It seems as though Mama decided not to go to Yorkshire this weekend, where she was expected. And while I’m certain she simply changed her plans at the last moment and forgot to tell us, the police want to make sure. They are very thorough fellows. Undoubtedly, she’s traipsed off somewhere to do her writing. As she has done frequently in the past.”

  “Ah,” she says, the furrow in her brow softening. This was an explanation that made sense. Agatha had felt the compulsion to escape Styles to write before, leaving Rosalind in Charlotte’s excellent care and, to a lesser extent, his. “That’s all?”

  “That’s all, Rosalind,” he answers with a nod.

  “Good,” she pronounces, a satisfied set to her features. As she rises, smoothing the folds of the pressed navy pinafore in which Charlotte had thoughtfully dressed her, Archie feels an almost physical pang of emotion, reminding him that he will never, ever let his child go.

  Chapter Nine

  The Manuscript

  December 31, 1912

  Ashfield, Torquay, England

  “Must this Lieutenant Christie accompany you and your friends tonight?” Mummy asked as I took my leave. “After all, New Year’s Eve is for close friends and family, not for new acquaintances. If”—she paused—“he is in fact only a new social acquaintance, as you’ve maintained.”

  Was Mummy testing me? As I’d suspected from my conversation with Madge, Mummy wasn’t keen on this burgeoning connection, and our November discussion had opened the floodgates. At first, I chalked it up to the fact that “the young man” or “this Lieutenant Christie,” as she called him, was nearly as impoverished as myself. But then she began making barbs about his callow nature, his underdeveloped sensitivity, and his overly handsome face; I couldn’t understand the source of these remarks, aside from his obvious attractiveness, of course. I knew she wanted me to stay the course with the gentle, kind Reggie, whom she believed would made me very happy indeed, but did that desire really justify the negative remarks?

  “Mummy, he’s already been invited. In fact, he’ll be meeting us at the ballroom. It’s far too late for any changes in plans,” I said as I slipped into my coat.

  “He didn’t even have the courtesy of fetching you for the party,” she tsked, her voice quiet but audible enough for me to hear her disappointment. “It’s hardly gentlemanly behavior.”

  “Mummy, the party is much closer to his barracks than to Ashfield. He wanted to come and get me, but I insisted that I meet him there,” I said, apologizing for him. No matter what happened in the future, I didn’t want her disliking Archie any more than she already did. And nothing had more significance to Mummy than a man acting like a gentleman and a woman acting her part as a lady in turn.

  As we exchanged embraces and farewells, wishing each other an early happy new year, I thought about how different Madge and I were. Unlike my sister, who’d been very strategic in her marriage, I intended to marry for love, and I wasn’t certain that I loved Reggie. My clever older sister, with her claim to authorship fame and her strong, captivating manner, had an abundance of suitors when it came time for her to choose. She had selected the reserved James Watts, who was, unsurprisingly, wealthier than all her other beaus as well as the heir to Abney Hall. While I sensed she admired and rather liked Jimmy, who was a fine fellow and quite kind to me, I often wondered if she felt the deep grip of passionate love for him that I believed necessary for marriage. It was that sort of love I was determined to find. I had noticed that since I met Archie, I’d been putting Reggie’s letters away in a drawer, always intending to read them at a less busy time but never retrieving them, instead of racing to my bedroom to read them alone as I had before. This behavior didn’t seem a hallmark of love. By contrast, I found myself thinking about Archie almost constantly, and I had been daydreaming about ringing in the new year with him for weeks.

  The grandfather clock on the far side of the ballroom showed fifteen minutes to midnight. We should have been ebullient, getting ready to cheer in the first chimes of 1913 at the New Year Ball. Instead, while my friends did the one-step to “Scott Joplin’s New Rag” on the dance floor, Archie and I sat silently on a bench.

  I was frustrated. Sullen since the evening began, Archie had become almost morose as the clock ticked closer to midnight. Whenever I ventured a topic of conversation, even something as welcoming to him as sport, his responses were random, as if I’d asked him an entirely different question. Even when Nan ventured a discussion with Archie, he answered in monosyllables. In the two and a half months that I’d known him, I’d become accustomed to his occasional bouts of quiet introspection, but this behavior was entirely new. Had I done something wrong? Was he not the man I’d believed him to be?

  “That Whistling Rag” started to play. When Archie didn’t invite me to dance, I took the bold liberty of asking, “Shall we?”

  “I don’t think so,” he answered without even meeting my eye.

  I had reached the limit of my patience. “Whatever is wrong, Archie? You have not been yourself tonight.” Mummy would be humiliated by my whining tone, as it went quite against her admonitions to remain constant and cheerful in the company of a gentleman.

  His eyes registered surprise at my unladylike outburst, but he answered calmly enough. “I got my orders from the Royal Flying Corps today.”

  I was confused. Why wouldn’t this news have made him elated? He’d been waiting to become a member of the flying corps for months.

  When I did not respond, he said, “I have to leave for Salisbury Plain in two days’ time.”

  I finally understood; his departure was looming rather faster than he’d hoped. Was his sadness at his separation from me? My heart fluttered at the thought of making someone pine.

  “I’ll be sorry to see you go, Archie,” I said.

  “Will you?” He met my eyes for the first time that evening, searching for something inside them. My statement had sparked him into life, it seemed.

  “Of course. I’ve enjoyed our time together these past few months,” I answered, feeling my cheeks burn. This was rather an understatement, but as Mummy had instructed me, a girl could only say so much without going too far.

  He took my hands in his and blurted out, “You’ve got to marry me, Agatha. You simply must.”

  My mouth dropped open in shock. Admittedly, I felt something for Archie—something almost indescribable—that I hadn’t felt for Reggie or Wilfred Pirie or Bolton Fletcher, other serious suitors before Reggie who were, of course, family friends. But in m
y world, monumental decisions were not based upon such short acquaintances but on long family history, as Madge had made abundantly clear in our little chat, a sentiment with which Mummy clearly agreed.

  He continued, his vivid blue eyes staring into mine. “I have known since I first saw you at the ball at Chudleigh that I must have you.”

  An unfamiliar sensation, almost like longing, surged through me. It was time for the truth. But how could I tell him about Reggie now? I’d been musing over the topic for several weeks as our visits grew more frequent and very nearly had crossed the breach, only to lose my courage at the last second. I worried that if he knew about Reggie, Archie would accuse me of stringing him along when there was no future in our relationship. But that simply wasn’t the case. Reggie had given me leave to see other fellows, although he couldn’t have foreseen the arrival of someone like Archie. Nor could I.

  “Oh, Archie, that’s simply impossible. You see…” I inhaled deeply, then took the plunge. “You see, I’m engaged to someone else.”

  I explained about Reggie and our families and our loose engagement, assuming that Archie would be furious. Or at the very least hurt. Instead, he waved his hand dismissively. “You will just have to break it off. After all, you didn’t know what would happen between us when you agreed to the engagement. If that’s even what you can call it.”

  “I couldn’t possibly do that.” An image of Reggie’s kind face alongside his equally benevolent sisters flashed through my mind, and I felt sick. I would be disappointing not only Reggie but the network of Torquay families to which we belonged. Not to mention Mummy.

  “Of course you can. If I had been engaged to someone when I met you, I would have broken it off immediately,” he said flippantly.

  “I can’t. Our families are old, dear friends. The Lucys are lovely people—”

  “No.” He cut off my excuses, and I realized he’d never belonged to a community—maybe not even to a family—the way that I did. But then he drew me close, and all thoughts of anything but him vanished. “If you truly loved this Reggie, wouldn’t you have married him straightaway? The way that I want to marry you.”