Agatha Christie - Halloween Party: A Hercule Poirot Mystery (Hercule Poirot Mysteries)

Hallowe'en Party

Agatha Christie

Chapter 1

Mrs Ariadne Oliver had gone with the friend with whom she wasstaying, Judith Butler, to help with the preparations for a children'sparty which was to take place that same evening.

At the moment it was a scene of chaotic activity. Energetic womencame in and out of doors moving chairs, small tables, flower vases,and carrying large quantities of yellow pumpkins which they disposedstrategically in selected spots.

It was to be a Hallowe'en party for invited guests of an age groupbetween ten and seventeen years old.

Mrs Oliver, removing herself from the main group, leant against avacant background of wall and held up a large yellow pumpkin, lookingat it critically.

"The last time I saw one of these," she said, sweeping back her greyhair from her prominent forehead, "was in the United States last year -hundreds of them. All over the house. I've never seen so manypumpkins. As a matter of fact," she added thoughtfully, "I've neverreally known the difference between a pumpkin and a vegetablemarrow. What's this one?"

"Sorry, dear," said Mrs Butler, as she fell over her friend's feet. MrsOliver pressed herself closer against the wall.

"My fault," she said. "I'm standing about and getting in the way. But itwas rather remarkable, seeing so many pumpkins or vegetablemarrows, whatever they are. They were everywhere, in the shops, andin people's houses, with candles or night lights inside them or strungup. Very interesting really. But it wasn't for a Hallowe'en party, it wasThanksgiving. Now I've always associated pumpkins with Hallowe'enand that's the end of October. Thanksgiving comes much later, doesn'tit? Isn't it November, about the third week in November? Anyway,here, Hallowe'en is definitely the 31st of October, isn't it? FirstHallowe'en and then, what comes next? All Souls' Day? That's when inParis you go to cemeteries and put flowers on graves. Not a sad sort offeast. I mean, all the children go too, and enjoy themselves. You go toflower markets first and buy lots and lots of lovely flowers. Flowersnever look so lovely as they do in Paris in the market there."

A lot of busy women were falling over Mrs Oliver occasionally, but theywere not listening to her. They were all too busy with what they weredoing.

They consisted for the most part of mothers, one or two competentspinsters; there were useful teenagers, boys of sixteen and seventeenclimbing up ladders or standing on chairs to put decorations,pumpkins or vegetable marrows or brightly coloured witch balls at asuitable elevation; girls from eleven to fifteen hung about in groupsand giggled.

"And after All Souls' Day and cemeteries," went on Mrs Oliver,lowering her bulk on to the arm of a settee, "you have All Saints' Day. Ithink I'm right?"

Nobody responded to this question.

Mrs Drake, a handsome middle-aged woman who was giving the party,

made a pronouncement.

"I'm not calling this a Hallowe'en party, although of course it is onereally. I'm calling it the Eleven Plus party. It's that sort of age group.Mostly people who are leaving The Elms and going on to otherschools."

"But that's not very accurate, Rowena, is it?" said Miss Whittaker,resetting her pince-nez on her nose disapprovingly.

Miss Whittaker as a local schoolteacher was always firm on accuracy.

"Because we've abolished the eleven plus some time ago." Mrs Oliverrose from the settee apologetically.

"I haven't been making myself useful. I've just been sitting here sayingsilly things about pumpkins and vegetable marrows -" And resting myfeet, she thought, with a slight pang of conscience, but withoutsufficient feeling of guilt to say it aloud.

"Now what can I do next?" she asked, and added, "What lovelyapples!"

Someone had just brought a large bowl of apples into the room. MrsOliver was partial to apples.

"Lovely red ones," she added.

"They're not really very good," said Rowena Drake. "But they look niceand partified. That's for bobbing for apples. They're rather soft apples,so people will be able to get their teeth into them better. Take theminto the library, will you, Beatrice? Bobbing for apples always makes amess with the water slopping over, but that doesn't matter with thelibrary carpet, it's so old. Oh! thank you, Joyce."

Joyce, a sturdy thirteen-year-old, seized the bowl of apples. Two rolledoff it and stopped, as though arrested by a witch's wand, at MrsOliver's feet.

"You like apples, don't you?" said Joyce. "I read you did, or perhaps Iheard it on the telly. You're the one who writes murder stories, aren'tyou?"

"Yes," said Mrs Oliver.

"We ought to have made you do something connected with murders.Have a murder at the party tonight and make people solve it."

"No, thank you," said Mrs Oliver. "Never again."

"What do you mean, never again?"

"Well, I did once, and it didn't turn out much of a success," said MrsOliver.

"But you've written lots of books," said Joyce, "you make a lot ofmoney out of them, don't you?"

"In a way," said Mrs Oliver, her thoughts flying to the Inland Revenue.

"And you've got a detective who's a Finn."

Mrs Oliver admitted the fact. A small stolid boy not yet, Mrs Oliverwould have thought, arrived at the seniority of the eleven-plus, saidsternly, "Why a Finn?"

"I've often wondered," said Mrs Oliver truthfully.

Mrs Hargreaves, the organist's wife, came into the room breathingheavily, and bearing a large green plastic pail.

"What about this," she said, "for the apple bobbing? Kind of gay, Ithought."

Miss Lee, the doctor's dispenser, said, "Galvanised bucket's better.Won't tip over so easily. Where are you going to have it, Mrs Drake?"

"I thought the bobbing for apples had better be in the library. Thecarpet's old there and a lot of water always gets spilt, anyway."

"All right. We'll take 'em along. Rowena, here's another basket ofapples."

"Let me help," said Mrs Oliver.

She picked up the two apples at her feet.

Almost without noticing what she was doing, she sank her teeth intoone of them and began to crunch it. Mrs Drake abstracted the secondapple from her firmly and restored it to the basket. A buzz ofconversation broke out.

"Yes, but where are we going to have the Snapdragon?"

"You ought to have the Snapdragon in the library, it's much the darkestroom."

"No, we're going to have that in the dining-room."

"We'll have to put something on the table first."

"There's a green baize cloth to put on that and then the rubber sheetover it."

"What about the looking-glasses? Shall we really see our husbands inthem?"

Surreptitiously removing her shoes and still quietly chomping at herapple, Mrs Oliver lowered herself once more on to the settee andsurveyed the room full of people critically. She was thinking in herauthoress's mind: "Now, if I was going to make a book about all these