"Drive on, don't turn round or I'll blow your head off!"

Involuntarily he half turned to see the gaping muzzle of an automatic, and in his agitation put his foot on the brake. The car skidded from one side of the road to the other, half turned and recovered.

"Drive on, I am telling you," said a metallic voice. "When you reach the Portsmouth Road turn and bear toward Weybridge. If you attempt to stop I will shoot you. Is that clear?"

Joe Stackett's teeth were chattering. He could not articulate the "yes." All that he could do was to nod. He went on nodding for half a mile before he realized what he was doing.

No further word came from the interior of the car until they pa.s.sed the race-course; then unexpectedly the voice gave a new direction: "Turn left toward Leatherhead."

The driver obeyed.

They came to a stretch of common. Stackett, who knew the country well, realized the complete isolation of the spot.

"Slow down, pull in to the left.... There is no dip there. You can switch on your lights."

The car slid and b.u.mped over the uneven ground, the wheels crunched through beds of bracken....

"Stop."

The door behind him opened. The man got out. He jerked open the driver's door.

"Step down," he said. "Turn out your lights first. Have you got a gun?"

"Gun? Why the h.e.l.l should I have a gun?" stammered the car thief.

He was focused all the time in a ring of light from a very bright electric torch which the pa.s.senger had turned upon him.

"You are an act of Providence."

Stackett could not see the face of the speaker. He saw only the gun in the hand, for the stranger kept this well in the light.

"Look inside the car."

Stackett looked and almost collapsed. There was a figure huddled in one corner of the seat-the figure of a man. He saw something else-a bicycle jammed into the car, one wheel touching the roof, the other on the floor. He saw the man's white face.... Dead! A slim, rather short man, with dark hair and a dark moustache, a foreigner. There was a little red hole in his temple.

"Pull him out," commanded the voice sharply.

Stackett shrank back, but a powerful hand pushed him toward the car.

"Pull him out!"

With his face moist with cold perspiration, the car thief obeyed; put his hands under the armpits of the inanimate figure, dragged him out and laid him on the bracken.

"He's dead," he whimpered.

"Completely," said the other.

Suddenly he switched off his electric torch. Far away came a gleam of light on the road, coming swiftly toward them. It was a car moving towards Esher. It pa.s.sed.

"I saw you coming just after I had got the body into the car. There wasn't time to get back to the house. I'd hoped you were just an ordinary pedestrian. When I saw you get into the car I guessed pretty well your vocation. What is your name?"

"Joseph Stackett."

"Stackett?"

The light flashed on his face again. "How wonderful! Do you remember the Exeter a.s.sizes? The old woman you killed with a hammer? I defended you!"

Joe's eyes were wide open. He stared past the light at the dim grey thing that was a face.

"Mr. Lenton?" he said hoa.r.s.ely. "Good G.o.d, sir!"

"You murdered her in cold blood for a few paltry shillings, and you would have been dead now, Stackett, if I hadn't found a flaw in the evidence. You expected to die, didn't you? You remember how we used to talk in Exeter Gaol about the trap that would not work when they tried to hang a murderer, and the ghoulish satisfaction you had that you would stand on the same trap?"

Joe Stackett grinned uncomfortably.

"And I meant it, sir," he said, "but you can't try a man twice--"

Then his eyes dropped to the figure at his feet, the dapper little man with a black moustache, with a red hole in his temple.

Lenton leant over the dead man, took out a pocket-case from the inside of the jacket and at his leisure detached ten notes.

"Put these in your pocket."

He obeyed, wondering what service would be required of him, wondered more why the pocket-book with its precious notes was returned to the dead man's pocket.

Lenton looked back along the road. Snow was falling now, real snow. It came down in small particles, falling so thickly that it seemed that a fog lay on the land.

"You fit into this perfectly ... a man unfit to live. There is fate in this meeting."

"I don't know what you mean by fate."

Joe Stackett grew bold: he had to deal with a lawyer and a gentleman who, in a criminal sense, was his inferior. The money obviously had been given to him to keep his mouth shut.

"What have you been doing, Mr. Lenton? That's bad, ain't it? This fellow's dead and--"

He must have seen the pencil of flame that came from the other's hand. He could have felt nothing, for he was dead before he sprawled over the body on the ground.

Mr. Archibald Lenton examined the revolver by the light of his lamp, opened the breech and closed it again. Stooping, he laid it near the hand of the little man with the black moustache and, lifting the body of Joe Stackett, he dragged it toward the car and let it drop. Bending down, he clasped the still warm hands about the b.u.t.t of another pistol. Then, at his leisure, he took the bicycle from the interior of the car and carried it back to the road. It was already white and fine snow was falling in sheets.

Mr. Lenton went on and reached his home two hours later, when the bells of the local Anglo-Catholic church were ringing musically.

There was a cable waiting for him from his wife: A Happy Christmas to you, darling.

He was ridiculously pleased that she had remembered to send the wire-he was very fond of his wife.

A CHRISTMAS TRAGEDY.

Agatha Christie.

IT WILL SURPRISE NO ONE TO SAY that Agatha Christie is the most popular writer of detective fiction who ever lived (her sales in all languages are reported to have surpa.s.sed four billion copies). Her remarkably proficient first book, The Mysterious Affair at Styles (1920), is generally and rightfully given credit as the landmark volume that initiated what has been called the Golden Age of mystery fiction. This era, bracketed by the two World Wars, saw the rise of the fair play puzzle story and the series detective, whether an official member of the police department, a private detective, or an amateur sleuth, and it was Christie who towered above all others, outselling, outproducing, and outliving the rest. "A Christmas Tragedy" was first collected in The Thirteen Problems (London, Collins, 1932).

A Christmas Tragedy.

AGATHA CHRISTIE.

"I HAVE A COMPLAINT TO MAKE," said Sir Henry c.l.i.thering.

His eyes twinkled gently as he looked round at the a.s.sembled company. Colonel Bantry, his legs stretched out, was frowning at the mantelpiece as though it were a delinquent soldier on parade, his wife was surrept.i.tiously glancing at a catalogue of bulbs which had come by the late post, Dr. Lloyd was gazing with frank admiration at Jane Helier, and that beautiful young actress herself was thoughtfully regarding her pink polished nails. Only that elderly spinster lady, Miss Marple, was sitting bolt upright, and her faded blue eyes met Sir Henry's with an answering twinkle.

"A complaint?" she murmured.

"A very serious complaint. We are a company of six, three representatives of each s.e.x, and I protest on behalf of the down-trodden males. We have had three stories told tonight-and told by the three men! I protest that the ladies have not done their fair share."

"Oh!" said Mrs. Bantry with indignation. "I'm sure we have. We've listened with the most intelligent appreciation. We've displayed the true womanly att.i.tude-not wishing to thrust ourselves into the limelight!"

"It's an excellent excuse," said Sir Henry; "but it won't do. And there's a very good precedent in the Arabian Nights! So, forward, Scheherazade."

"Meaning me?" said Mrs. Bantry. "But I don't know anything to tell. I've never been surrounded by blood or mystery."

"I don't absolutely insist upon blood," said Sir Henry. "But I'm sure one of you three ladies has got a pet mystery. Come now, Miss Marple-the 'Curious Coincidence of the Charwoman' or the 'Mystery of the Mothers' Meeting.' Don't disappoint me in St. Mary Mead."

Miss Marple shook her head.

"Nothing that would interest you, Sir Henry. We have our little mysteries, of course-there was that gill of picked shrimps that disappeared so incomprehensibly; but that wouldn't interest you because it all turned out to be so trivial, though throwing a considerable light on human nature."

"You have taught me to dote on human nature," said Sir Henry solemnly.

"What about you, Miss Helier?" asked Colonel Bantry. "You must have had some interesting experiences."

"Yes, indeed," said Dr. Lloyd.

"Me?" said Jane. "You mean-you want me to tell you something that happened to me?"

"Or to one of your friends," amended Sir Henry.

"Oh!" said Jane vaguely. "I don't think anything has ever happened to me-I mean not that kind of thing. Flowers, of course, and queer messages-but that's just men, isn't it? I don't think"-she paused and appeared lost in thought.

"I see we shall have to have that epic of the shrimps," said Sir Henry. "Now then, Miss Marple."

"You're so fond of your joke, Sir Henry. The shrimps are only nonsense; but now I come to think of it, I do remember one incident-at least not exactly an incident, something very much more serious-a tragedy. And I was, in a way, mixed up in it; and for what I did, I have never had any regrets-no, no regrets at all. But it didn't happen in St. Mary Mead."

"That disappoints me," said Sir Henry. "But I will endeavour to bear up. I knew we should not rely upon you in vain."

He settled himself in the att.i.tude of a listener. Miss Marple grew slightly pink.

"I hope I shall be able to tell it properly," she said anxiously. "I fear I am very inclined to become rambling. One wanders from the point-altogether without knowing that one is doing so. And it is so hard to remember each fact in its proper order. You must all bear with me if I tell my story badly. It happened a very long time ago now.

"As I say it was not connected with St. Mary Mead. As a matter of fact, it had to do with a Hydro-"

"Do you mean a seaplane?" asked Jane with wide eyes.

"You wouldn't know, dear," said Mrs. Bantry, and explained. Her husband added his quota: "Beastly places-absolutely beastly! Got to get up early and drink filthy-tasting water. Lot of old women sitting about. Ill-natured t.i.ttle tattle. G.o.d, when I think-"

"Now, Arthur," said Mrs. Bantry placidly. "You know it did you all the good in the world."

"Lot of old women sitting round talking scandal," grunted Colonel Bantry.

"That, I am afraid, is true," said Miss Marple. "I myself-"

"My dear Miss Marple," cried the colonel, horrified. "I didn't mean for one moment-"

With pink cheeks and a little gesture of the hand, Miss Marple stopped him.

"But it is true, Colonel Bantry. Only I should like to say this. Let me recollect my thoughts. Yes. Talking scandal, as you say-well it is done a good deal. And people are very down on it-especially young people. My nephew, who writes books-and very clever ones, I believe-has said some most scathing things about taking people's characters away without any kind of proof-and how wicked it is, and all that. But what I say is that none of these young people ever stop to think. They really don't examine the facts. Surely the whole crux of the matter is this. How often is t.i.ttle tattle, as you call it, true! And I think if, as I say, they really examined the facts they would find that it was true nine times out of ten! That's really just what makes people so annoyed about it."

"The inspired guess," said Sir Henry.

"No, not that, not that at all! It's really a matter of practice and experience. An Egyptologist, so I've heard, if you show him one of those curious little beetles, can tell you by the look and the feel of the thing what date BC it is, or if it's a Birmingham imitation. And he can't always give a definite rule for doing so. He just knows. His life has been spent handling such things.

"And that's what I'm trying to say (very badly, I know). What my nephew calls 'superfluous women' have a lot of time on their hands, and their chief interest is usually people. And so, you see, they get to be what one might call experts. Now young people nowadays-they talk very freely about things that weren't mentioned in my young days, but on the other hand their minds are terribly innocent. They believe in everyone and everything. And if one tries to warn them, ever so gently, they tell one that one has a Victorian mind-and that, they say, is like a sink."

"After all," said Sir Henry, "what is wrong with a sink?"

"Exactly," said Miss Marple eagerly. "It's the most necessary thing in any house; but, of course, not romantic. Now I must confess that I have my feelings, like everyone else, and I have sometimes been cruelly hurt by unthinking remarks. I know gentlemen are not interested in domestic matters, but I must just mention my maid Ethel-a very good-looking girl and obliging in every way. Now I realized as soon as I saw her that she was the same type as Annie Webb and poor Mrs. Bruitt's girl. If the opportunity arose mine and thine would mean nothing to her. So I let her go at the month and I gave her a written reference saying she was honest and sober, but privately I warned old Mrs. Edwards against taking her; and my nephew, Raymond, was exceedingly angry and said he had never heard of anything so wicked-yes, wicked. Well, she went to Lady Ashton, whom I felt no obligation to warn-and what happened? All the lace cut off her underclothes and two diamond brooches taken-and the girl departed in the middle of the night and never heard of since!"

Miss Marple paused, drew a long breath, and then went on.

"You'll be saying this has nothing to do with what went on at Keston Spa Hydro-but it has in a way. It explains why I felt no doubt in my mind the first moment I saw the Sanders together that he meant to do away with her."

"Eh?" said Sir Henry, leaning forward.

Miss Marple turned a placid face to him.

"As I say, Sir Henry, I felt no doubt in my own mind. Mr. Sanders was a big, good-looking, florid-faced man, very hearty in his manner and popular with all. And n.o.body could have been pleasanter to his wife than he was. But I knew! He meant to make away with her."

"My dear Miss Marple-"

"Yes, I know. That's what my nephew Raymond West, would say. He'd tell me I hadn't a shadow of proof. But I remember Walter Hones, who kept the Green Man. Walking home with his wife one night she fell into the river-and he collected the insurance money! And one or two other people that are walking about scot free to this day-one indeed in our own cla.s.s of life. Went to Switzerland for a summer holiday climbing with his wife. I warned her not to go-the poor dear didn't get angry with me as she might have done-she only laughed. It seemed to her funny that a queer old thing like me should say such things about her Harry. Well, well, there was an accident-and Harry is married to another woman now. But what could I do? I knew, but there was no proof."

"Oh! Miss Marple," cried Mrs. Bantry. "You don't really mean-"

"My dear, these things are very common-very common indeed. And gentlemen are especially tempted, being so much the stronger. So easy if a thing looks like an accident. As I say, I knew at once with the Sanders. It was on a tram. It was full inside and I had had to go on top. We all three got up to get off and Mr. Sanders lost his balance and fell right against his wife, sending her headfirst down the stairs. Fortunately the conductor was a very strong young man and caught her."