Just Finished Reading: A Pocket Full of Rye by Agatha Christie (FP: 1953) [249pp] 

The cry for help stunned the whole office. Rex Fortescue seemed to be having a heart attack or a stroke. The confusion lasted a few minutes before anyone called for an ambulance and by then it was too late – Rex was pronounced dead soon after reaching the nearest hospital. His last words: It was the tea. When Inspector Neele of Scotland Yard arrived, it was already a mystery. Other people had drunk tea in the office that morning and where none the worse for it. The preliminary toxicology report just added to the strange circumstances of Rex’s death. Apparently the victim had ingested an amount of Taxine – a substance found in the berries and leaves of Yew trees. But what really confused the Inspector was the contents of the victim's pocket – flakes of rye, a lot of them. For the life of him he couldn’t see why anyone would fill their pocket with rye. What, if anything, had it to do with the murder? As soon as the investigation started the suspect list seemed to expand and contract whenever a new piece of evidence was uncovered. Then the prime suspect died under suspicious circumstances and Neele admitted he was out of his depth and needed help. Fortunately for him the Fortescue residence had a recent visitor, a sweet older woman who had seen the details of the crime in her local paper and wanted, in her own small way, to help. Her name – Miss Marple. 

This was my 7th Miss Marple outing and I really enjoyed it – despite this time getting neither the motive nor the murderer correct, not even close! As usual Christie throws in both credible suspects and reasonable evidence like so much confetti. The ‘trick’ is to be on the ball enough to see what sticks and what falls by the wayside. As always I had theories, lots of theories but as they were felled one after the other, I finally decided to give up guessing and just enjoy the ride. The plot, as always, was very simple. Rich man dies in very suspicious circumstances and there are a significant number of people who could have ‘done it’ and an equal number who might have prospered from it in one way of another. As always looking at simple means, method and opportunity doesn’t really help much here. Usually, the motivational triad of greed, lust or revenge helps eliminate *some* of the suspects but that didn’t help much either. I was honestly stumped this time. 

As often with classics, I did like picking up on some interesting social/historical details. The first one that jumped out at me was the mention of ‘black-market stockings’ and later black-market butter. Published in 1953 I’m guessing that this was actually being written in 1951-52, which meant that wartime rationing was still in effect (ending in 1954). The other thing that jumped out was the confusion in the office of who to call for medical help as the National Health Service had only just come into effect in 1948 and was presumably still very much ‘bedding in’ at that point. One final point was a nod to the characters recognising that they were now living in the Nuclear Age which had all sorts of implications. 

As I said several times above, I really enjoyed this classic crime novel and am already looking forward to Miss Marple’s next triumph which I hope to get to before the end of the year. Oh, one last thing... As in some of her other novels Miss Marple does arrive rather late in this one – on page 105 to be precise! That alone made me laugh out loud as my ever-present expectation was finally relieved. Highly recommended for all mystery fans.  

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