Agatha Christie - Crooked House

CROOKED HOUSE

Agatha Christie

Chapter 1

I first came to know Sophia Leonides in Egypt towards the end of thewar. She held a fairly high administrative post in one of the ForeignOffice departments out there. I knew her first in an official capacity,and I soon appreciated the efficiency that had brought her to theposition she held, in spite of her youth (she was at that time justtwenty-two).

Besides being extremely easy to look at, she had a clear mind and adry sense of humour that I found very delightful. We became friends.She was a person whom it was extraordinarily easy to talk to and weenjoyed our dinners and occasional dances very much.

All this I knew; it was not until I was ordered East at the close of theEuropean war that I knew something else - that I loved Sophia and thatI wanted to marry her.

We were dining at Shepheard's when I made this discovery. It did notcome to me with any shock of surprise, but more as the recognition ofa fact with which I had been long familiar. I looked at her with new eyes

-but I saw what I had already known for a long time. I liked everything Isaw. The dark crisp hair that sprang up proudly from her forehead, thevivid blue eyes, the small square fighting chin, and the straight nose.

I liked the well cut light grey tailor-made, and the crisp white shirt. Shelooked refreshingly English and that appealed to me strongly afterthree years without seeing my native land. Nobody, I thought, could bemore English - and even as I was thinking exactly that, I suddenlywondered if, in fact, she was, or indeed could be, as English as shelooked. Does the real thing ever have the perfection of a stageperformance?

I realised that much and freely as we had talked together, discussingideas, our likes and dislikes, the future, our immediate friends andacquaintances - Sophia had never mentioned her home or her family.

She knew all about me (she was, as I have indicated, a good listener)but about her I knew nothing. She had, I supposed, the usualbackground, but she had never talked about it. And until this moment Ihad never realised the fact.

Sophia asked me what I was thinking about.

I replied truthfully: "You."

"I see," she said. And she sounded as though she did see.

"We may not meet again for a couple of years," I said. "I don't knowwhen I shall get back to England. But as soon as I do get back, the firstthing I shall do will be to come and see you and ask you to marry me."

She took it without batting an eyelash. She sat there, smoking, notlooking at me. For a moment or two I was nervous that she might notunderstand.

"Listen," I said. "The one thing I'm determined not to do, is to ask youto marry me now. That wouldn't work out anyway. First you might turnme down, and then I'd go off miserable and probably tie up with someghastly woman just to restore my vanity. And if you didn't turn medown what could we do about it? Get married and part at once? Getengaged and settle down to a long waiting period. I couldn't stand yourdoing that. You might meet someone else and feel bound to be 'loyal' tome. We've been living in a queer hectic get-on-with-it-quicklyatmosphere. Marriages and love affairs making and breaking all roundus. I'd like to feel you'd gone home, free and independent, to lookround you and size up the new post-war world and decide what youwant out of it. What is between you and me, Sophia, has got to bepermanent. I've no use for any other kind of marriage."

"No more have I," said Sophia.

"On the other hand," I said, "I think I I'm entitled to let you know how I -well - how I feel."

"But without undue lyrical expression?" murmured Sophia.

"Darling - don't you understand? I've tried not to say I love you -"

She stopped me.

"I do understand, Charles. And I like your funny way of doing things.And you may come and see me when you come back - if you still wantto -"

It was my turn to interrupt.

"There's no doubt about that."

"There's always a doubt about everything, Charles. There may alwaysbe some incalculable factor that upsets the apple cart. For one thing,you don't know much about me, do you?"

"I don't even know where you live in England."

"I live at Swinly Dean."

I nodded at the mention of the well-known outer suburb of Londonwhich boasts three excellent golf courses for the city financier.

She added softly in a musing voice: "In a little crooked house..."

I must have looked slightly startled, for she seemed amused, andexplained by elaborating the quotation "'And they all lived together in alittle crooked house.' That's us. Not really such a little house either.But definitely crooked - running to gables and half-timbering!"

"Are you one of a large family? Brothers and sisters?"

"One brother, one sister, a mother, a father, an uncle, an aunt bymarriage, a grandfather, a great aunt and a step grandmother."

"Good gracious!" I exclaimed, slightly overwhelmed.

She laughed.

"Of course we don't normally all live together. The war and blitzeshave brought that about - but I don't know -" she frowned reflectively -

"perhaps spiritually the family has always lived together - under mygrandfather's eye and protection. He's rather a person, mygrandfather. He's over eighty, about four foot ten, and everybody elselooks rather dim beside him."

"He sounds interesting," I said.

"He is interesting. He's a Greek from Smyrna. Aristide Leonides." Sheadded, with a twinkle, "He's extremely rich."

"Will anybody be rich after this is over?"

"My grandfather will," said Sophia with assurance. "No soak-the-richtactics would have any effect on him. He'd just soak the soakers.

"I wonder," she added, "if you'll like him?"

"Do you?" I asked.

"Better than anyone in the world," said Sophia.

Chapter 2

It was over two years before I returned to England. They were not easyyears. I wrote to Sophia and heard from her fairly frequently. Herletters, like mine, were not love letters. They were letters written toeach other by close friends - they dealt with ideas and thoughts andwith comments on the daily trend of life. Yet I know that as far as I wasconcerned, and I believed as far as Sophia was concerned too, ourfeeling for each other grew and strengthened.

I returned to England on a soft grey day in September. The leaves onthe trees were golden in the evening light. There were playful gusts ofwind. From the airfield I sent a telegram to Sophia.

"Just arrived back. Will you dine this evening Mario's nine o'clock.Charles."

A couple of hours later I was sitting reading the Times; and scanningthe Births Marriages and Death column my eye was caught by thename Leonides:

On Sept. 19th, at Three Gables, Swinly Dean, Aristide Leonides,beloved husband of Brenda Leonides, in his eighty-fifth year. Deeplyregretted.

There was another announcement immediately below:

Leonides. Suddenly, at his residence Three Gables, Swinly Dean,