A Murder Is Announced_ A Miss Marple Mystery - Agatha Christie [0]
A Murder Is Announced
A Miss Marple Mystery
To Ralph and Anne Newman
at whose house I first tasted
“Delicious Death!”
Contents
Cover
Title Page
Dedication
1.
A Murder Is Announced
2.
Breakfast at Little Paddocks
3.
At 6:30 p.m.
4.
The Royal Spa Hotel
5.
Miss Blacklock and Miss Bunner
6.
Julia, Mitzi and Patrick
7.
Among Those Present
8.
Enter Miss Marple
9.
Concerning a Door
10.
Pip and Emma
11.
Miss Marple Comes to Tea
12.
Morning Activities in Chipping Cleghorn
13.
Morning Activities in Chipping Cleghorn (continued)
14.
Excursion into the Past
15.
Delicious Death
16.
Inspector Craddock Returns
17.
The Album
18.
The Letters
19.
Reconstruction of the Crime
20.
Miss Marple Is Missing
21.
Three Women
22.
The Truth
23.
Evening at the Vicarage
Epilogue
About the Author
Other Books by Agatha Christie
Credits
Copyright
About the Publisher
One
A MURDER IS ANNOUNCED
I
Between 7:30 and 8:30 every morning except Sundays, Johnnie Butt made the round of the village of Chipping Cleghorn on his bicycle, whistling vociferously through his teeth, and alighting at each house or cottage to shove through the letterbox such morning papers as had been ordered by the occupants of the house in question from Mr. Totman, stationer, of the High Street. Thus, at Colonel and Mrs. Easterbrook’s he delivered The Times and the Daily Graphic; at Mrs. Swettenham’s he left The Times and the Daily Worker; at Miss Hinchcliffe and Miss Murgatroyd’s he left the Daily Telegraph and the New Chronicle; at Miss Blacklock’s he left the Telegraph, The Times and the Daily Mail.
At all these houses, and indeed at practically every house in Chipping Cleghorn, he delivered every Friday a copy of the North Benham News and Chipping Cleghorn Gazette, known locally simply as “the Gazette.”
Thus, on Friday mornings, after a hurried glance at the headlines in the daily paper
(International situation critical! U.N.O. meets today! Bloodhounds seek blonde typist’s killer! Three collieries idle. Twenty-three die of food poisoning in Seaside Hotel, etc.)
most of the inhabitants of Chipping Cleghorn eagerly opened the Gazette and plunged into the local news. After a cursory glance at Correspondence (in which the passionate hates and feuds of rural life found full play) nine out of ten subscribers then turned to the PERSONAL column. Here were grouped together higgledy-piggledy articles for Sale or Wanted, frenzied appeals for Domestic Help, innumerable insertions regarding dogs, announcements concerning poultry and garden equipment; and various other items of an interesting nature to those living in the small community of Chipping Cleghorn.
This particular Friday, October 29th—was no exception to the rule—
II
Mrs. Swettenham, pushing back the pretty little grey curls from her forehead, opened The Times, looked with a lacklustre eye at the left-hand centre page, decided that, as usual, if there was any exciting news The Times had succeeded in camouflaging it in an impeccable manner; took a look at the Births, Marriages and Deaths, particularly the latter; then, her duty done, she put aside The Times and eagerly seized the Chipping Cleghorn Gazette.
When her son Edmund entered the room a moment later, she was already deep in the Personal Column.
“Good morning, dear,” said Mrs. Swettenham. “The Smedleys are selling their Daimler. 1935—that’s rather a long time ago, isn’t it?”
Her son grunted, poured himself out a cup of coffee, helped himself to a couple of kippers, sat down at the table and opened the Daily Worker which he propped up against the toast rack.
“Bull mastiff puppies,” read out Mrs. Swettenham. “I really don’t know how people manage to feed big dogs nowadays—I really don’t … H’m, Selina Lawrence is advertising for a cook again. I could tell her it’s just a waste of time advertising in these days. She hasn’t put her address, only a box number—that’s quite fatal—I could have told her so—servants simply insist on knowing where they are going. They like a good address