Agatha Christie's Secret Notebooks

Of the three plays in Rule of Three, Afternoon at the Seaside is the most unlikely for Agatha Christie to have written. It has been compared to a saucy seaside English postcard, set as it is entirely on a beach and involving, at one stage, a female character changing into her swimsuit onstage. The plot, for Christie, is slight and the humour is at times forced. It is definitely Christie on autopilot—but there is one surprise, representing a new variation on an old Christie theme. Ironically the notes for it are extensive, extending to almost 40 pages, albeit with a lot of repetition. There is much speculation about the naming both of the families (the aptly named Mr and Mrs Sour, described as ‘whiners’, become Mr and Mrs Crum) and the beach huts:

 Sea View (Mon Repos) Wee Nook

Mrs. Montressor Mr Wills Mrs Wills Genevieve Batat

At the Seaside

 Iniskillen Bide a Wee Mon Repos

Mr Sour Wilkinson Arlette

Child Mr Robbins Incognita

Mrs Sour Mrs. Robbins Yvonne

(Whiners) Wilkinson

But further into the notes there are flashes of the Queen of Crime in the unmasking, not of the villain, but of the policeman—or to be strictly accurate, the policewoman:

Read in paper—robbery at Aga Khan—emeralds/sapphires—

Beach

Mon Desir

Policewoman Alice Jones acting as vamp

Young man and his girl quarrel—another young man and they bring down deck chairs—

Some ideas are reminiscent of the Christie of old, even for this short, untypical effort. And, obviously, her ability to spin variations on a theme has not deserted her. The ‘switch of trousers’ idea has distinct echoes of ‘The Rajah’s Emerald’ from The Listerdale Mystery:

Does detective arrive—search the huts? Find emeralds?

Or does old Grubb find it in bucket?

Or child kick pile of sand—Grubb picks out emeralds

God bless my soul

Reasonable possible ideas

Or switch of trousers—Percy gets in the wrong ones

Somers (weakly and gentlemanly—really cat burglar)

Or counterfeit money

Or put into wrong hut

Does Percy get hit with beach ball

Or blackmail

  The Patient

Mrs Wingfield is paralysed as a result of a fall from the balcony of her home. Her doctor has found a way to communicate with her and is about to do so in the presence of her family. But someone doesn’t want her to tell the truth of that fateful afternoon.

It is a shame that so few Christie fans are familiar with The Patient, as, in many ways, it is the essence of Christie—a closed setting, a limited family circle of suspects, a crafty distribution of suspicion; and all in 40 minutes. It also contains one of her most artfully concealed clues. Unlike the other two plays in this trilogy, it is a pure whodunit with a stunning curtain line. Yes, it is contrived (an immobilised patient communicating via a once-for-Yes-twice-for-No light switch) but so are many other detective plots, including some of her own best titles. Notes for the play appear in Notebooks 22 and 24:

The Patient

Nursing Home—Doctor and Nurse (Patient there? Or wheeled in later)

Is latter the one who has established communication—

Sales talk by Inspector—jewellery disappeared

Mrs. X badly injured—paralysed—unable to communicate—ingenious nurse pressure of fingers—apparatus with red bulb—Patient wheeled in—

Patient wheeled in—nurse by her (Bond) or interne

Questions spelled out Murder

Mirror

Bathroom

Saw someone Yes

Someone you knew Yes

Is that person in the room now Yes

Spell out the name A—B

B- Yes

Collapse reported by nurse? interne?—

Take off the mask—I know well enough who you are Curtain falls—My God—you!

Alternative end—gloves—coated in phosphorescent paint—hold up your hands—Lights out—Guilty Hands!

Even at this late stage in her theatrical career Christie was experimenting, as the last two notes above show. Incredibly, she wanted the curtain to fall, or the lights to black out, before the murderer was unmasked. This, if it had been allowed to continue, would have been the ultimate Christie twist— though the shock was to be somewhat mitigated by a recording of her own voice asking the audience whom they thought the killer was.

A sketch and notes for The Patient from Notebook 64. Note the reference to ‘S. O.S.’ the short story from The Hound of Death that, like The Patient, also features an unusual method of communication.

Not surprisingly, however, the idea was not a winner. It was abandoned after a flurry of telegrams to the author, who was abroad during the pre-London tryout in Aberdeen. With a track record of glittering theatrical success behind her, it does seem a very odd concept to have introduced; it would be like reading one of her novels and finding the last chapter missing.

Fiddlers Three 3 August 1972

It is very important that businessman Jonathan Panhacker should live until Wednesday 18th as he has made a financial arrangement with his son, Henry, to inherit ?100,000 on that date. When he unexpectedly dies, the Fiddlers Three conspire to make sure he is still ‘alive’ for a few more days.

This is the last play written by Agatha Christie and the only one not to receive a West End run. After a glorious and record-breaking playwriting career, this last work was a sad curtain call. Her previous dramatic offering, Rule of Three (see above), was not particularly well received and it was ten years before she again felt tempted to try a script. Fiddlers Three is a two-act comedy thriller but, unfortunately, it has not enough of either to be a successful blend and falls between two uneasy extremes. It has a complicated history. In its first incarnation, Fiddlers Five, it premiered on 7 June 1971; the following year on 3 August a revamped version was presented as Fiddlers