The Harlequin Tea Set
A Short Story
by Agatha Christie
Copyright
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Copyright © 2011 Agatha Christie Ltd.
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EPub Edition © 2011 ISBN: 9780007452194
Version: 2017-04-18
Contents
Copyright
The Harlequin Tea Set
The Harlequin Tea Set
‘The Harlequin Tea Set’ was first published in Winter’s Crimes by Macmillan in 1971. It was the last of Agatha Christie’s short stories to be published, 48 years after ‘The Affair at the Victory Ball’ first appeared in The Sketch in 1923.
Mr Satterthwaite clucked twice in vexation. Whether right in his assumption or not, he was more and more convinced that cars nowadays broke down far more frequently than they used to do. The only cars he trusted were old friends who had survived the test of time. They had their little idiosyncrasies, but you knew about those, provided for them, fulfilled their wants before the demand became too acute. But new cars! Full of new gadgets, different kinds of windows, an instrument panel newly and differently arranged, handsome in its glistening wood but being unfamiliar, your groping hand hovered uneasily over fog lights, windscreen wipers, the choke, etcetera. All these things with knobs in a place you didn’t expect them. And when your gleaming new purchase failed in performance, your local garage uttered the intensely irritating words: ‘Teething troubles. Splendid car, sir, these roadsters Super Superbos. All the latest accessories. But bound to have their teething troubles, you know. Ha, ha.’ Just as though a car was a baby.
But Mr Satterthwaite, being now of an advanced age, was strongly of the opinion that a new car ought to be fully adult. Tested, inspected, and its teething troubles already dealt with before it came into its purchaser’s possession.
Mr Satterthwaite was on his way to pay a weekend visit to friends in the country. His new car had already, on the way from London, given certain symptoms of discomfort, and was now drawn up in a garage waiting for the diagnosis, and how long it would take before he could resume progress towards his destination. His chauffeur was in consultation with a mechanic. Mr Satterthwaite sat, striving for patience. He had assured his hosts, on the telephone the night before, that he would be arriving in good time for tea. He would reach Doverton Kingsbourne, he assured them, well before four o’clock.
He clucked again in irritation and tried to turn his thoughts to something pleasant. It was no good sitting here in a state of acute irritation, frequently consulting his wristwatch, clucking once more and giving, he had to realize, a very good imitation of a hen pleased with its prowess in laying an egg.
Yes. Something pleasant. Yes, now hadn’t there been something – something he had noticed as they were driving along. Not very long ago. Something that he had seen through the window which had pleased and excited him. But before he had had time to think about it, the car’s misbehaviour had become more pronounced and a rapid visit to the nearest service station had been inevitable.
What was it that he had seen? On the left – no, on the right. Yes, on the right as they drove slowly through the village street. Next door to a post office. Yes, he was quite sure of that. Next door to a post office because the sight of the post office had given him the idea of telephoning to the Addisons to break the news that he might be slightly late in his arrival. The post office. A village post office. And next to it – yes, definitely, next to it, next door or if not next door the door after. Something that had stirred old memories, and he had wanted – just what was it that he had wanted? Oh dear, it would come to him presently. It was mixed up with a colour. Several colours. Yes, a colour or colours. Or a word. Some definite word that had stirred memories, thoughts, pleasures gone by, excitement, recalling something that had been vivid and alive. Something in which he himself had not only seen but observed. No, he had done more. He had taken part. Taken part in what, and why, and where? All sorts of places. The answer came quickly at the last thought. All sorts of places.
On an island? In Corsica? At Monte Carlo watching the croupier spinning his roulette wheel? A house in the country? All sorts of places. And he had been there, and someone else. Yes, someone else. It all tied up with that. He was getting there at last. If he could just … He was interrupted at that moment by the chauffeur coming to the window with the garage mechanic in tow behind him.
‘Won’t be long now, sir,’ the chauffeur assured Mr Satterthwaite cheerfully. ‘Matter of ten minutes or so. Not more.’
‘Nothing seriously wrong,’ said the mechanic, in a low, hoarse, country voice. ‘Teething troubles, as you might say.’
Mr Satterthwaite did not cluck this time. He gnashed his own teeth. A phrase he had often read in books and which in old age he seemed to have got into the habit of doing himself, due, perhaps, to the slight looseness of his upper plate. Really, teething trouble! Toothache. Teeth gnashing. False teeth. One’s whole life centred, he thought, about teeth.
‘Doverton Kingsbourne’s only a few miles away,’ said the chauffeur, ‘and they’ve a taxi here. You could go on in that, sir, and I’d bring the car along later as soon as it’s fixed up.’
‘No!’ said Mr Satterthwaite.
He said the word explosively and both the chauffeur and the mechanic looked startled. Mr Satterthwaite’s eyes were sparkling. His voice was clear and decisive. Memory had come to him.
‘I propose,’ he said, ‘to walk along the road we have just come by. When the car is ready, you will pick me up there. The Harlequin Cafe, I think it is called.’
‘It’s not very much of a place, sir,’ the mechanic advised.
‘That is where I shall be,’ said Mr Satterthwaite, speaking with a kind of regal autocracy.
He walked off briskly. The two men stared after him. ‘Don’t know what’s got into him,’ said the chauffeur. ‘Never seen him like that before.’
The village of Kingsbourne Ducis did not live up to the old world grandeur of its name. It was a smallish village consisting of one street. A few houses. Shops that were dotted rather unevenly, sometimes betraying the fact that they were houses which had been turned into shops or that they were shops which now existed as houses without any industrial intentions.
It was not particularly old world or beautiful. It was just simple and rather unobtrusive. Perhaps that was why, thought Mr Satterthwaite, that a dash of brilliant colour had caught his eye. Ah, here he was at the post office. The post office was a simply functioning post office with