Crime Writers and Other Animals (9 page)

Carlton Rutherford did not mind at all. No doubt the agent had received the first ‘ball-park figure' from which the forthcoming book auction would start, and was anxious to tell his author without delay.

‘. . . but something's come up,' the agent continued, in a voice which suggested he might be the bearer of less pleasing news.

‘Oh? What?' asked Carlton Rutherford, instantly alert.

‘Something which I'm afraid may rather put the kibosh on our scheme, old boy.'

‘What!'

‘Apparently Bartlett Mears wrote his own memoirs. Did you know that?'

‘No, I didn't. But that needn't worry us. By the time they've been edited and got ready for publication, my book will have been out a long time and we'll have cleaned up.'

‘No, I'm afraid we won't.'

‘Why not?'

‘Bartlett Mears'
Memoirs
have been all ready for publication for the last three years. His publishers can have them on the bookstalls in a couple of months if they want to.'

‘But how? I mean, if they're ready, why haven't they been published before?'

‘They were all set up – pre-publicity about to start – announcement in the
Bookseller
about to be made – when suddenly they had to be withdrawn.'

‘But why?'

‘Libel risk, old boy. Most of the people in the book were either dead or unlikely to sue, but there was one who held out. They tried sending her the manuscript to read, but that only made her even more determined to sue.'

‘Who was it?' asked Carlton Rutherford weakly, knowing all too well the name that Dashiel Loukes was about to pronounce.

‘Mariana Lestrange,' the agent replied. ‘But, of course, now she's dead, there's nothing to stop them publishing as soon as they want . . .'

The agent went on for a while, explaining why this news invalidated the chances for their book, but Carlton Rutherford heard no more. He felt a sudden stab of pain in his chest, then his breath seemed to be sucked painfully out of his body until, moments after, blackness descended.

He collapsed, still holding the telephone, and died on the pile of newspaper tributes to his great rival, Bartlett Mears.

The death of Carlton Rutherford did not merit any newspaper obituaries. Memories of any promise contained in
Neither One Thing Nor The Other
had long been swamped by recollections of the subsequent turgid annals of Bob Grantham. There wasn't a lot to say about a novelist who hadn't published a book since the sixties.

The British edition of Bartlett Mears'
Memoirs
was published with great éclat in the autumn of 1992. It shot straight to the top of the
Sunday Times
bestseller list, and stayed there for many weeks. The American and foreign language editions looked set fair to repeat this success.

Part of the appeal of the book was that it was extremely scurrilous. The author made no attempt to whitewash himself, and indeed his account of his own life was infinitely more offensive than anything contained in the forgotten manuscript of Carlton Rutherford. There was lots of dirt, which was why the book proved so phenomenally popular.

The public, as they always do, loved a rogue.

Incidentally, there was no mention in Bartlett Mears'
Memoirs
of Carlton Rutherford. The famous author had been completely unaware even of the existence of his rival.

SIMON BRETT WRITES
:

A few years back, I bought an old desk at an auction and, when I got it home, found that the drawers had not been emptied by its previous owner. He, from the papers I found there, I deduced to have been an academic of some kind. In a miscellaneous pile of documents, I came across the following essay. It seems to have been submitted as part of his doctoral thesis by an American postgraduate student named Osbert Mint. Keen that the fruits of his scholarship should be made available to as wide a readership as possible, I have made strenuous efforts to trace Mr Mint. These efforts have proved – regrettably – to be unsuccessful, and the essay is therefore printed here for the first time without its owner's permission.

There is a popular misconception in academic circles that the works of Agatha Christie are simply popular
jeux d'esprit
which have no connection with the mainstream of English literature. This attitude both belittles the quality of the author's work and also underestimates the wide reading and research which went into the creation of her most famous character. Hercule Poirot did not spring fully formed into life on page 34 of his first adventure,
The Mysterious Affair at Styles
. His genesis was part of a much longer creative process and must be seen as the culmination of eleven centuries of English literary history.

Though Agatha Christie was properly reticent about the breadth of her reading, it is clear to the informed student of her works that they reflect a much broader and deeper literary frame of reference than is usually admitted to this particular author. My essay will trace the pattern of references to other literary sources of which the author herself was sometimes no more than subliminally aware.

Though there were clearly classical influences on Agatha Christie's work – most obviously in the collection
The Labours of Hercules
– they are not within the province of this study, particularly since the subject has been expertly covered by other scholars.
¹
It is my intention to trace only the English language sources for the creation of Hercule Poirot.

The first unarguable influence on Agatha Christie's writings can be found in one of the Digressions in
Beowulf
. The killing in Hrothgar's meadhall described in the ensuing passage was clearly the origin of the many Country House murders which were to feature in Hercule Poirot's investigations. (The language of the extract has been modernized to render it accessible to the general reader. Those fluent in Anglo-Saxon may prefer to consult the original text.)

Though it might be fanciful to assert that this passage heralds the arrival of Hercule Poirot on the literary scene, it is clear that the Digression prepares the way for the development of the whodunnit form, and particularly of the private detective, ‘the righteous unraveller', whose task it will be to solve the murder.
²

Granting that the
Beowulf
reference, though tantalizingly close to unambiguity, cannot be unequivocally accepted as a primary source for Hercule Poirot, the directness of the next reference brooks no denial. It is indeed remarkable – and perhaps a comment on the tunnel vision of many in academic life – that no previous scholars have looked for the Belgian detective's literary antecedents in the most obvious of sources, the Medieval Mystery Play. The very word ‘Mystery' could not provide a much heavier clue, and I am bold to assert that Agatha Christie's inspiration to write mysteries featuring Hercule Poirot sprang directly from her reading of the following extract from the Harrogate
Third Shepherd's Play
in the Hull Cycle (‘as it hath been divers time acted by the Guild of Chandlers and Gardners upon the Feast of Corpus Christie'):

The three Shepherds wake to find the fourth Shepherd, Mak, lying still beside them.

1
Shep
. Now by good Saint Loy – and eke by Saint Beth, Why ye lie here, boy, so barren of breath?

2
Shep
. Aye, why curl up coy, so still on the earth?

3
Shep
. Oh, gone be our joy – for that stillness be death! He is dead!

1
Shep
. Now deep is my dole, for lost is his life!

2
Shep
. And taken his soul – how sad be this strife!

3
Shep
. His purse it be stole. We must go tell his wife.

1
Shep
. In his back there's a hole! It was made by a knife! How he bled!

2
Shep
. Someone foully hath played, some forsaken swine This murder hath made – by evil design!

3
Shep
. At whose door be it laid? Who's the cause of the crime?

1
Shep
. Let's see whose be the blade? By the rood, it be mine!

2
Shep
. So then thou must be blamed!

1
Shep
. Nay, by our lakin's grace! I slept right through the night!

3
Shep
. Then why scratched be thy face? Why these signs of a fight?

2
Shep
. Why be blood in this place? On thy sleeve it be bright.

1
Shep
. Now, by Saint Boniface! What ye think be not right! I've been framed!
Oh, would one come, that could prove me guilt-free!

2
Shep
. Soft, now what be this hum? And this light that I see?
An angel appears to them.

3
Shep
. 'Tis an angel! Be dumb! Nay, drop to thy knee!
Angel
Nay, look not so glum! I am come to ye three,
As the scripture foretells.

2
Shep
. How his bald head doth shine! Like an egg it be round!

2
Shep
. His moustache be so fine, I am nigh to a swound!

1
Shep
. Show this guilt be not mine! Let the killer be found!

Angel
Aye, that villain malign I will catch and confound – With my little grey cells!'
³

The next unarguable literary reference which Agatha Christie must have responded to is found in John Skelton's
Speke, Parrot
. This poem is generally agreed to be made up of material from different dates and there are considerable textual differences between manuscript versions. The most telling one, from the point of view of this study, was found only as recently as 1893 in the Brestimont Collection. It is actually entitled
Speke, Porot
and contains the following significant variants of the first three stanzas:

The evidence in this extract is conclusive, and it can therefore be definitively stated that Agatha Christie's source for the character of Hercule Poirot was
Speke, Parrot
.

But the author's debts to English literature do not stop with John Skelton. In her development of the character of Poirot, she was clearly influenced by her reading of Sir Philip Sidney's
Astrophel and Stella
, and particularly of the following sonnet:

There are so many other examples of literature from the Tudor and Stuart period which influenced Agatha Christie that it would be invidious to mention any of them.
⁵
I will therefore move next to the Augustan Age and another undeniable source-work for the expansion of the character of Hercule Poirot, Alexander Pope's
Essay on Detection
. Almost every line of this surprisingly underrated poem is relevant to the subject in hand, but I will limit myself to the following short extract: