Agatha Christie - 1949 - Crooked House Read online

  Agatha Christie

  Crooked House

  Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Author’s Foreword

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-one

  Chapter Twenty-two

  Chapter Twenty-three

  Chapter Twenty-four

  Chapter Twenty-five

  Chapter Twenty-six

  About the Author

  Other Books by Agatha Christie

  Copyright

  About the Publisher

  Author’s Foreword

  This book is one of my own special favourites. I saved it up for years, thinking about it, working it out, saying to myself: “One day, when I’ve plenty of time, and want to really enjoy myself—I’ll begin it!” I should say that of one’s output, five books are work to one that is real pleasure. Crooked House was pure pleasure. I often wonder whether people who read a book can know if it has been hard work or a pleasure to write? Again and again someone says to me: “How you must have enjoyed writing so and so!” This about a book that obstinately refused to come out the way you wished, whose characters are sticky, the plot needlessly involved, and the dialogue stilted—or so you think yourself. But perhaps the author isn’t the best judge of his or her own work. However, practically everybody has liked Crooked House, so I am justified in my own belief that it is one of my best.

  I don’t know what put the Leonides family into my head—they just came. Then, like Topsy “they growed.”

  I feel that I myself was only their scribe.

  One

  I first came to know Sophia Leonides in Egypt towards the end of the war. She held a fairly high administrative post in one of the Foreign Office departments out there. I knew her first in an official capacity, and I soon appreciated the efficiency that had brought her to the position she held, in spite of her youth (she was at that time just twenty-two).

  Besides being extremely easy to look at, she had a clear mind and a dry sense of humour that I found very delightful. We became friends. She was a person whom it was extraordinarily easy to talk to and we enjoyed our dinners and occasional dances very much.

  All this I knew; it was not until I was ordered East at the close of the European war that I knew something else—that I loved Sophia and that I wanted to marry her.

  We were dining at Shepheard’s when I made this discovery. It did not come to me with any shock of surprise, but more as the recognition of a fact with which I had been long familiar. I looked at her with new eyes—but I saw what I had already known for a long time. I liked everything I saw. The dark crisp hair that sprang up proudly from her forehead, the vivid blue eyes, the small square fighting chin, and the straight nose. I liked the well-cut light-grey tailor-made, and the crisp white shirt. She looked refreshingly English and that appealed to me strongly after three years without seeing my native land. Nobody, I thought, could be more English—and even as I was thinking exactly that, I suddenly wondered if, in fact, she was, or indeed could be, as English as she looked. Does the real thing ever have the perfection of a stage performance?

  I realized that much and freely as we had talked together, discussing ideas, our likes and dislikes, the future, our immediate friends and acquaintances—Sophia had never mentioned her home or her family. She knew all about me (she was, as I have indicated, a good listener) but about her I knew nothing. She had, I supposed, the usual background, but she had never talked about it. And until this moment I had never realized the fact.

  Sophia asked me what I was thinking about.

  I replied truthfully: “You.”

  “I see,” she said. And she sounded as though she did see.

  “We may not meet again for a couple of years,” I said. “I don’t know when I shall get back to England. But as soon as I do get back, the first thing I shall do will be to come and see you and ask you to marry me.”

  She took it without batting an eyelash. She sat there, smoking, not looking at me.

  For a moment or two I was nervous that she might not understand.

  “Listen,” I said. “The one thing I’m determined not to do, is to ask you to marry me now. That wouldn’t work out anyway. First you might turn me down, and then I’d go off miserable and probably tie up with some ghastly woman just to restore my vanity. And if you didn’t turn me down what could we do about it? Get married and part at once? Get engaged and settle down to a long waiting period? I couldn’t stand your doing that. You might meet someone else and feel bound to be ‘loyal’ to me. We’ve been living in a queer hectic get-on-with-it-quickly atmosphere. Marriages and love affairs making and breaking all round us. I’d like to feel you’d gone home, free and independent, to look round you and size up the new post-war world and decide what you want out of it. What is between you and me, Sophia, has got to be permanent. I’ve no use for any other kind of marriage.”

  “No more have I,” said Sophia.

  “On the other hand,” I said, “I think I’m entitled to let you know how I—well—how I feel.”

  “But without undue lyrical expression?” murmured Sophia.

  “Darling—don’t you understand? I’ve tried not to say I love you—”

  She stopped me.

  “I do understand, Charles. And I like your funny way of doing things. And you may come and see me when you come back—if you still want to—”

  It was my turn to interrupt.

  “There’s no doubt about that.”

  “There’s always a doubt about everything, Charles. There may always be some incalculable factor that upsets the applecart. For one thing, you don’t know much about me, do you?”

  “I don’t even know where you live in England.”

  “I live at Swinly Dean.”

  I nodded at the mention of the well-known outer suburb of London which boasts three excellent golf courses for the city financier.

  She added softly in a musing voice: “In a little crooked house….”

  I must have looked slightly startled, for she seemed amused, and explained by elaborating the quotation. “‘And they all lived together in a little crooked house.’ That’s us. Not really such a little house either. But definitely crooked—running to gables and half timbering!”

  “Are you one of a large family? Brothers and sisters?”

  “One brother, one sister, a mother, a father, an uncle, an aunt by marriage, a grandfather, a great-aunt, and a step-grandmother.”

  “Good gracious!” I exclaimed, slightly overwhelmed.

  She laughed.

  “Of course we don’t normally all live together. The war and blitzes have brought that about—but I don’t know”—she frowned reflectively—“perhaps spiritually the family has always lived together—under my grandfather’s eye and protection. He’s rather a Person, my grandfather. He’s over eighty, about four-foot ten, and everybody else looks rather dim beside him.”

  “He sounds interesting,” I said.

  “He is interesting. He’s a Greek from Smyrna. Aristide Leonides.” She added, with a twinkle, “He’s extremely rich.”

  “Will anybody be rich after this is over?”

  “My grandfather will,” said Sophia with assurance. “No soak-the-rich tactics would have any effect on him. He’d just soak the soakers.

  “I wonder,” she added, “if you’ll like him?”

  “Do you?” I asked.

  “Better than anyone in the world,” said Sophia.

  Two

  It was over two years before I returned to England. They were not easy years. I wrote to Sophia and heard from her fairly frequently. Her letters, like mine, were not love letters. They were letters written to each other by close friends—they dealt with ideas and thoughts and with comments on the daily trend of life. Yet I know that as far as I was concerned, and I believed as far as Sophia was concerned too, our feelings for each other grew and strengthened.

  I returned to England on a soft grey day in September. The leaves on the trees were golden in the evening light. There were playful gusts of wind. From the airfield I sent a telegram to Sophia.

  “Just arrived back. Will you dine this evening Mario’s nine o’clock Charles.”

  A couple of hours later I was sitting reading the Times; and scanning the Births, Marriages and Deaths column my eye was caught by the name Leonides:

  On Sept. 19th, at Three Gables, Swinly Dean, Aristide Leonides, beloved husband of Brenda Leonides, in his eighty-eighth year. Deeply regretted.

  There was another announcement immediately below:

  Leonides—Suddenly, at his residence, Three Gables, Swinly Dean, Aristide Leonides. Deeply mourned by his loving children and grandchildren. Flowers to St. Eldred’s Church, Swinly Dean.

  I found the two announcements rather curious. There seemed to have been some faulty staff work resulting in overlapping. But my main preoc
cupation was Sophia. I hastily sent her a second telegram:

  “Just seen news of your grandfather’s death. Very sorry. Let me know when I can see you. Charles.”

  A telegram from Sophia reached me at six o’clock at my father’s house. It said:

  “Will be at Mario’s nine o’clock. Sophia.”

  The thought of meeting Sophia again made me both nervous and excited. The time crept by with maddening slowness. I was at Mario’s waiting twenty minutes too early. Sophia herself was only five minutes late.

  It is always a shock to meet again someone whom you have not seen for a long time but who has been very much present in your mind during that period. When at last Sophia came through the swing doors our meeting seemed completely unreal. She was wearing black, and that, in some curious way, startled me. Most other women were wearing black, but I got it into my head that it was definitely mourning—and it surprised me that Sophia should be the kind of person who did wear black—even for a near relative.

  We had cocktails—then went and found our table. We talked rather fast and feverishly—asking after old friends of the Cairo days. It was artificial conversation, but it tided us over the first awkwardness. I expressed commiseration for her grandfather’s death and Sophia said quietly that it had been “very sudden.” Then we started off again reminiscing. I began to feel, uneasily, that something was the matter—something, I mean, other than the first natural awkwardness of meeting again. There was something wrong, definitely wrong, with Sophia herself. Was she, perhaps, going to tell me that she had found some other man whom she cared for more than she did for me? That her feeling for me had been “all a mistake?”

  Somehow I didn’t think it was that—I didn’t know what it was. Meanwhile we continued our artificial talk.

  Then, quite suddenly, as the waiter placed coffee on the table and retired bowing, everything swung into focus. Here were Sophia and I sitting together as so often before at a small table in a restaurant. The years of our separation might never have been.

  “Sophia,” I said.

  And immediately she said, “Charles!”

  I drew a deep breath of relief.

  “Thank goodness that’s over,” I said. “What’s been the matter with us?”

  “Probably my fault. I was stupid.”

  “But it’s all right now?”

  “Yes, it’s all right now.”

  We smiled at each other.

  “Darling!” I said. And then: “How soon will you marry me?”

  Her smile died. The something, whatever it was, was back.

  “I don’t know,” she said. “I’m not sure, Charles, that I can ever marry you.”

  “But, Sophia! Why not? Is it because you feel I’m a stranger? Do you want time to get used to me again? Is there someone else? No—” I broke off. “I’m a fool. It’s none of those things.”

  “No, it isn’t.” She shook her head. I waited. She said in a low voice:

  “It’s my grandfather’s death.”

  “Your grandfather’s death? But why? What earthly difference can that make? You don’t mean—surely you can’t imagine—is it money? Hasn’t he left any? But surely, dearest—”

  “It isn’t money.” She gave a fleeting smile. “I think you’d be quite willing to ‘take me in my shift,’ as the old saying goes. And grandfather never lost any money in his life.”

  “Then what is it?”

  “It’s just his death—you see, I think, Charles, that he didn’t just—die. I think he may have been—killed….”

  I stared at her.

  “But—what a fantastic idea. What made you think of it?”

  “I didn’t think of it. The doctor was queer to begin with. He wouldn’t sign a certificate. They’re going to have a post-mortem. It’s quite clear that they suspect something is wrong.”

  I didn’t dispute that with her. Sophia had plenty of brains; any conclusions she had drawn could be relied upon.

  Instead I said earnestly:

  “Their suspicions may be quite unjustified. But putting that aside, supposing that they are justified, how does that affect you and me?”

  “It might under certain circumstances. You’re in the Diplomatic Service. They’re rather particular about wives. No—please don’t say all the things that you’re bursting to say. You’re bound to say them—and I believe you really think them—and theoretically I quite agree with them. But I’m proud—I’m devilishly proud. I want our marriage to be a good thing for everyone—I don’t want to represent one-half of a sacrifice for love! And, as I say, it may be all right….”

  “You mean the doctor—may have made a mistake?”

  “Even if he hasn’t made a mistake, it won’t matter—so long as the right person killed him.”

  “What do you mean, Sophia?”

  “It was a beastly thing to say. But, after all, one might as well be honest.”

  She forestalled my next words.

  “No, Charles, I’m not going to say any more. I’ve probably said too much already. But I was determined to come and meet you tonight—to see you myself and make you understand. We can’t settle anything until this is cleared up.”

  “At least tell me about it.”

  She shook her head.

  “I don’t want to.”

  “But—Sophia—”

  “No, Charles. I don’t want you to see us from my angle. I want you to see us unbiased from the outside point of view.”

  “And how am I to do that?”

  She looked at me, a queer light in her brilliant blue eyes.

  “You’ll get that from your father,” she said.

  I had told Sophia in Cairo that my father was Assistant Commissioner of Scotland Yard. He still held that office. At her words, I felt a cold weight settling down on me.

  “It’s as bad as that, then?”

  “I think so. Do you see a man sitting at a table by the door all alone—rather a nice looking stolid ex-Army type?”

  “Yes.”

  “He was on Swinly Dean platform this evening when I got into the train.”

  “You mean he’s followed you here?”

  “Yes. I think we’re all—how does one put it?—under observation. They more or less hinted that we’d all better not leave the house. But I was determined to see you.” Her small square chin shot out pugnaciously. “I got out of the bathroom window and shinned down the water-pipe.”

  “Darling!”

  “But the police are very efficient. And of course there was the telegram I sent you. Well—never mind—we’re here—together … But from now on, we’ve both got to play a lone hand.”

  She paused and then added:

  “Unfortunately—there’s no doubt—about our loving each other.”

  “No doubt at all,” I said. “And don’t say unfortunately. You and I have survived a world war, we’ve had plenty of near escapes from sudden death—and I don’t see why the sudden death of just one old man—how old was he, by the way?”

  “Eighty-seven.”

  “Of course. It was in the Times. If you ask me, he just died of old age, and any self-respecting GP would accept the fact.”

  “If you’d known my grandfather,” said Sophia, “you’d have been surprised at his dying of anything!”