Agatha Christie's Secret Notebooks

by John Curran

  Mrs McGinty’s Dead 3 March 1952

  At the request of Superintendent Spence, Poirot agrees to reinvestigate the murder of charwoman Mrs McGinty, found battered to death two months earlier. Although James Bentley has been convicted of her murder, someone in Broadhinny is ready to kill again. And yet, they are all very nice people…

  Continuing a pattern set two years earlier by A Murder is Announced, Mrs McGinty’s Dead is decidedly unglamorous, reflecting the post-war adjustment; it is one of Poirot’s rare ventures into the working class. ‘The Adventure of the Clapham Cook’ in 1923 was his earlier experience. The murder of a charwoman, appalling accommodation, an attempt on Poirot’s life and a completely uncharismatic defendant all combine to make Mrs McGinty’s Dead a particularly dark case.

  There are more than 70 pages of notes for this novel. Names, motives, suspects, the earlier cases, the current possibilities all appear in chaotic profusion. As we saw in Chapter 3, the permutations and combinations of the four vitally important early cases and their possible incarnations as current inhabitants of Broadhinny are almost limitless; and all of them are considered.

  On the first page Christie sets out the premise of the novel, leaving only the name of the superintendent to be decided:

  Inspector ? [sic] old friend retiring worried about case just ending at the Old Bailey (or just sentenced sent for trial).

  Not right—evidence all there—motive—opportunity and clues—but all wrong—his duty to get the facts—sent them to Public Prosecutor—there his responsibility ended. He can’t do any more…Can P do something?

  Facts?

  No facts. No-one else with motive—as a matter of fact, they’re all very nice people

  She eventually settled on Superintendent Spence, Poirot’s partner in investigation from his previous case, Taken at the Flood, four years earlier. This was quite a big gap and the cover of the first edition of Mrs McGinty’s Dead is emblazoned—‘Poirot is Back!’

  And over 30 years after her first novel, her powers of invention show no signs of deserting her. She sketches at least seven possible scenarios before settling on the fourth one below. It would seem that the title was already decided, probably because it is the name of a children’s game, albeit not a very well known one. It is quoted and described in Chapter 1 but only the title is utilised and there is no attempt to follow the rest of the verse. This was the one unalterable fact around which she effortlessly wove these ideas, any one of which would have made an acceptable plot. As can be seen, preliminary notes for this case first emerged as early as 1947, five years before the book’s appearance:

  Mrs McGinty’s Dead

  Mrs M is charwoman—middle aged office cleaner—because of something in wastepaper basket—she pieced together letters? Had taken something home

  Morphia in the morning tea—

  Flats! Lawn Road—only super—Mrs M is one of the cleaners

  1947

  A. Mrs McGinty’s Dead

  Start Charwoman found dead in office—Lifted to sofa—later discovered strangled

  Someone goes to break news at her home—real Mrs M is dead 6 months ago—this one is known to other cleaners as her sister in law

  Why?

  Who?

  A woman of 50-60—Hands calloused—feet manicured—good underclothes

  Mrs McGinty’s Dead

  A. Mrs M is a charwoman. When investigated, it is found that she has no past history—she bribed former woman and took her place—her references were forged—17 Norton St. Birmingham—an accommodation address. What was she doing in Eleanor Lee’s office…Evidence for blackmail?

  B. Mrs M is a char—‘does for’ the Remington family—lives in a little house by P.O.—takes a lodger—(James McBride) her savings broken open—Or hit on head—blood on James’s clothes—he tries to burn them in boiler.

  C. Mrs M elderly middle-aged woman—lived with elderly husband James McGinty. Found killed—JM tells very peculiar story—(like Wallace) or is he nephew inherits money. Really young man cultivates her acquaintance—flatters her up—finally kills her in such a way J is bound to be suspected—Why?

  Ideas for HP (Mrs McGinty)

  4 or 5 people in household—one dangerous—P’s only clue—he is pushed at race meeting under horse’s hoof or train etc. by one of them. Mrs McGinty—(housekeeper?) leaves—is sent away—why? Later he finds her—she is dead

  ‘Wallace’ in item C above is a reference to the famous Julia Wallace murder case in Liverpool in 1931. Her husband, whose alibi could never be substantiated, was convicted of her murder but subsequently released. Like Mrs McGinty, Julia Wallace was found in her own sitting room with fatal head injuries.

  All of the clues that appear in the book feature in Notebook 43—the bottle of ink and the letter, the newspaper cutting with its all-important mistake, the coffee cup, the sugar-cutter and Maureen Summerhayes’s very daring remark during the party:

  Inkstain on the dead woman’s finger. Bought bottle of ink that afternoon at PO—no letter found. Newspaper—Daily Newshound or Evening Paper

  Sugar cutter—Judge and wife brought them back—Vicarage sale of work

  Real clue Robin

  E. Kane changed her name to Hope—Evelyn Hope—girl—but not girl—boy. Robin’s ‘mother’ is not his mother—he got her name by deed poll—she was paid to give her name to him—later he kills her—does not want her to tell about past story

  Robin’s method for second murder—has coffee cup with dregs and lipstick

  The slip in paper—child not yet born—therefore sex not—known

  Don’t like being adopted, do you? (A remark by Maureen Summerhayes at party)

  And then she considers suspects…

  Now consider each likely household

  1. Married couple in late thirties—very vague—like R and A [Rosalind and Anthony, Christie’s daughter and son-in-law]—do market gardening—(he is son—or she is daughter of X) [possibly the Summerhayeses]

  2. Invalid woman with son—son is artist—or does painted furniture or a writer—(detective stories?) [Mrs Upward and Robin]

  3. Vaughans—unstable husband (banker or solicitor) quiet self-effacing wife—children?—one (son) hers by former marriage?

  4. Rich woman wife very flashy—2 young men—live together—(one is son of X) has told stupid rich girl he is son of Russian Grand Duke

  Not all of the previous cases which provide the motivation for a killer trying to conceal a criminal past appear in the Notebook as they do in the novel:

  Edith Kane [Eva Kane/Evelyn Hope]

  Went out that day—he poisoned Wife—a lot of gup in paper—all about that innocent child—betrayed—she and her child—the child born later—a daughter—the little daughter who never knew her father’s name. The new life for Edith Kane—went to Australia—or S. Africa—a new life in a new world.

  She went—yes—but she came back 25 years ago

  Janice Remington—acquitted of killing her husband or her lover like Madeleine Smith [Janice Courtland]

  Little Lily Waterbrook—took chopper to aunt—detained—only fifteen—released later—Harris? [Lily Gamboll]

  Greenwood Case—daughter—changed name—her evidence saved father—thirtyish

  Newspaper suspects—Age now

  55 Eva Kane (? changed name to Hope—went abroad—had s[on] or d[aughter]

  45 Janice Crale—or The Tragic Wife—husband died of morphia—or bath—lover did it—unpleasant man—perverse—took drugs [Janice Courtland]

  30 Lily Gamboll—killed aunt

  The reference to ‘Madeleine Smith’ above relates to the case of a woman tried for poisoning her lover Emile L’Engelier in Glasgow in 1857. The verdict against Smith was ‘Not Proven’; in reality, it amounted to an acquittal. Like the Wallace case above, it is still the focus of keen speculation.

  Appearing together on just one page of Notebook 43, the following would have been added when the plot was well advanced. With the e
xception of Point B, all these occur in Chapters 13 and 14:

  Points to be worked in

  A. Mrs Upward sees photo—familiar

  B. Mrs Rendell came down to see Mrs Upward that night—couldn’t make her hear

  C. Maureen talks about being adopted

  D. Mrs O sums up Maureen’s age and appearance

  E. Mrs Rendell asks P about anonymous letters—untrue

  F. Poirot told by Mrs O—it was Dr Rendell

  In particular, Point C is the main clue that incriminates the killer—although few readers will notice it, so subtly is it inserted. And Point A sets up the second murder in Broadhinny as Mrs Upward plays a very dangerous game with Poirot.

  Ordeal by Innocence 3 November 1958

  Jacko Argyle died in prison while serving a sentence for the murder of his stepmother. His assertion that he had an alibi for the fatal night was never substantiated—until now. Arthur Calgary arrives at the family home and confirms Jacko’s alibi. This means that the real killer is still living among the family and is ready to kill again.

  Notebook 28 contains all of the notes for this novel, amounting to almost 40 pages. On 1 October 1957 Agatha Christie wrote to Edmund Cork, asking him to check on the legal situation if person A were to be tried and convicted of the murder of his stepmother despite his claim that he was with person B at the crucial time of the killing. Person B is never found and A dies in prison six months into his incarceration. Then B, who has been abroad for a year, turns up and approaches the police to confirm A’s story and provide the alibi. Christie wanted clarification on the situation with regard to a ‘free pardon’ and the possible reopening of the case. She assured Cork that an early reply would enable her to get to work ‘industriously on this projected new book’. The date ‘Oct 6th’ appears on page 20 of Notebook 28, confirming that the novel was planned and written the year before publication.

  ‘This is easily the best non-branded [Poirot or Marple] Christie we have had for some time…The Innocent [as it was then called] is close to achieving a successful blend of the classical detective story and the modern conception of a crime novel.’ This was the enthusiastic verdict on 1 May 1958 when Collins received the latest Christie. The reader considered that it could benefit from cutting and mentioned that Agatha Christie proposed to do that. His other reservation was about the title and he suggested some alternatives—‘Viper’s Point’, ‘A Serpent’s Tooth’, ‘The Burden of Innocence’ and, prophetically, ‘Cat among the Pigeons’. Although no one knew it at the time, this was to be the title of the following year’s book.

  The short story ‘Sing a Song of Sixpence’ (see Chapter 4), collected in The Listerdale Mystery, contains distinct similarities to this novel. As in the short story, an outside investigator arrives at the home of the murder victim, whose relatives are mutually suspicious, and discovers that the killer is a young man with an emotional connection to the elderly family retainer. Change the ‘son’ of the short story to ‘lover’ and the similarities to Kirsten Lindstrom and Jacko in Ordeal by Innocence, where Arthur Calgary arrives at the Argyle household, are striking. Although the story first appeared in December 1929, almost 30 years earlier, the parallels to Ordeal by Innocence are too many to be mere coincidence—the outsider detective, the elderly matriarch bludgeoned to death for money, the gnawing suspicion and distrust, the eventual disclosure of an unsuspected emotional and criminal partnership.

  Ordeal by Innocence remains one of the best of the latter-day Christies. It is a crime novel, as distinct from a classical detective story, with deeply held convictions about truth and justice, guilt and innocence. It is marred only by the inclusion, in the last 20 pages, of two perfunctory crimes, a successful and an attempted murder. Coming, as they do, so near the end of the novel, they do not convince either as an illustration of the killer’s panic or

  With her customary ingenuity, Agatha Christie resolved the thorny question of legal justice and moral justice. When Ordeal by Innocence was written, many aspects of life were more clear cut than they have subsequently become. If a character in a Christie novel were unmasked as a murderer, the reader could be sure that he or she would pay the ultimate price. With the death in prison of Jacko while serving a sentence for a crime he did not commit, Christie could be accused of a disservice to both natural and legal justice. Fifteen years earlier in Five Little Pigs, Caroline Crale is wrongly convicted, but it is with her own collusion in expiation for an earlier misdemeanour. Again, she dies in prison. And in Mrs McGinty’s Dead (1952) the unsympathetic James Bentley is also wrongly convicted but is saved by Poirot before his execution. But in Ordeal by Innocence Jacko is finally shown to have been morally responsible, even if his was not the hand that struck the fatal blow.

  as a suspense-building exercise; the Notebooks, however, give some insight into the inclusion of these murders.

  The opening of the novel follows exactly the earliest jottings in Notebook 28, even to the amount of the fare paid to the boatman. The ferry used by Arthur Calgary is the one that still runs to this day at the end of Greenway Road just past the imposing gates of Dame Agatha’s summer residence.

  Arthur Calgary—Crossing ferry—begins

  The ferry came to a grinding halt against the shelving pebbles—A.C. paid fourpence and stepped ashore

  Well, this was it—he could still, he supposed, turn back etc

  An early page of Notebook 28 gets straight to the crime. This remains largely the same except for the detail of a poker instead of a sandbag. At this stage the character Jacko that appears in the book is still appearing in the Notebook as Albert:

  Violent quarrel between Albert and Mrs A—he attacks her—she is nearly dead—K. sends him off to obtain an alibi. At 8 o’clock—with her again and kills her or he sticks her with a knife—she gets up—tells about him.

  Possible course of real events—

  Albert—determined to get money out of Mrs. Argyle makes up to Lindstrom—wants her to marry him—she agrees—Mrs. A—won’t help—Leo won’t help—he works on her—the sandbag from under the door—at 8.15 a form she does not understand—Mrs A bends over it—K socks her

  The family members underwent name changes but are still recognisable, while Mr Argyle, Kirsten and Maureen are substantially the same as the finished novel. The calculation of Tina’s age shows that these notes were written in 1958:

  Tina half-caste girl—(5 in 1940—23 now) married to local postman? Builder’s mason? farmer

  Linda—married to a man since paralysed—she lives there [Mary]

  Johnnie—a job in Plymouth comes over quite often

  Albert—bad lot—unstable hanged convicted of murder of Mrs. Argyll [Jacko]

  Mr Argyll—a scholar

  Mr Argyle—(or Mr Randolph) Randolph Argyle? Ambrose Randolph?

  Thin—ethereal—surrounded by books

  Kirsten?

  Her homely face—pancake flat—nose surrounded by bleached permanent w hair

  How much better a nun’s coif and wimple?—not a contemplative lay sister—the kind who inspected you through a grille before admitting you to the visitor’s parlour—or Mother Superior’s presence

  Calgary goes and sees—Maureen—(married to him?)—Silly common little girl—but shrewd—went to family when he was arrested—they didn’t know she he was married.

  Mary—Tenement in New York—hatred of it all—mother out in street—car passed—Mrs A—adoption—then hotel life—nursery growing up—plans for her—meeting with Philip—no background—goes off marries him—he sets up in business—Fails—then polio—Mrs. Argyle—wants them there—he is quite ready to go—goes into hospital—Mary goes to stay at Sunny Point

  The two subsequent victims are also considered. As the notes below show, however, the original intention was that either Philip or Tina would be the victim:

  Who is killed? Philip poisoned—doesn’t wake up or Tina stabbed—she walks from Kirsty to Mickey—collapses

  The poisoning of P
hilip was discarded in favour of stabbing. In view of the urgency of the killer’s situation, this was a more expedient course and one easily within the capability of the character in question. And a possible reason for inclusion of the unsuccessful attempt on Tina is that it provides a witness in the absence of any other proof of guilt. For those readers who doubt the medical possibility of the attempted murder of Tina, who continues to walk despite having been stabbed, there are two editions of the British Medical Journal, dated 28 January and 18 February 1956, among Christie’s papers with pages dealing with just this type of event. And both articles are marked. A careful reading of a very daring Chapter 22 should be enough to dispose of any accusations of cheating.

  There were also a few ideas that never got further than Notebook 28:

  Forged will—forged in favour of real murderer—but forged very badly? Or forged badly in favour of Albert.

  Husband dislikes wife and hated the children. Wanted to marry someone? Or had son of his own.

  She was going to alter will in favour of a foundation for orphans—which cut out husband.

  And, finally, two intriguing ideas, both actually variations on the same theme…

  Or was Albert her [i.e. Mrs Argyle’s] son

  Is Kirsten Albert’s real mother?

  Both of these would have worked and would, moreover, have made psychological sense. The former would have made a profoundly affecting scenario; the latter would perhaps have been more effective as a motivation for Kirsten (as it did for her counterpart in ‘Sing a Song of Sixpence’) than the one actually used. However, the possibilities of unacknowledged parenthood as a plot device and a motivation are fully explored in Hercule Poirot’s Christmas, Sad Cypress, Mrs McGinty’s Dead and ‘Dead Man’s Mirror’ among others, so perhaps it was simply a case of avoiding repetition.