A Fruitful Sunday: An Agatha Christie Short Story. Агата Кристи

       A Fruitful Sunday

      ‘A Fruitful Sunday’ was first published in the Daily Mail, 11 August 1928.

      ‘Well, really, I call this too delightful,’ said Miss Dorothy Pratt for the fourth time. ‘How I wish the old cat could see me now. She and her Janes!’

      The ‘old cat’ thus scathingly alluded to was Miss Pratt’s highly estimable employer, Mrs Mackenzie Jones, who had strong views upon the Christian names suitable for parlourmaids and had repudiated Dorothy in favour of Miss Pratt’s despised second name of Jane.

      Miss Pratt’s companion did not reply at once – for the best of reasons. When you have just purchased a Baby Austin, fourth hand, for the sum of twenty pounds, and are taking it out for the second time only, your whole attention is necessarily focused on the difficult task of using both hands and feet as the emergencies of the moment dictate.

      ‘Er – ah!’ said Mr Edward Palgrove and negotiated a crisis with a horrible grinding sound that would have set a true motorist’s teeth on edge.

      ‘Well, you don’t talk to a girl much,’ complained Dorothy.

      Mr Palgrove was saved from having to respond as at that moment he was roundly and soundly cursed by the driver of a motor omnibus.

      ‘Well, of all the impudence,’ said Miss Pratt, tossing her head.

      ‘I only wish he had this foot-brake,’ said her swain bitterly.

      ‘Is there anything wrong with it?’

      ‘You can put your foot on it till kingdom comes,’ said Mr Palgrove. ‘But nothing happens.’

      ‘Oh, well, Ted, you can’t expect everything for twenty pounds. After all, here we are, in a real car, on Sunday afternoon going out of town the same as everybody else.’

      More grinding and crashing sounds.

      ‘Ah,’ said Ted, flushed with triumph. ‘That was a better change.’

      ‘You do drive something beautiful,’ said Dorothy admiringly.

      Emboldened by feminine appreciation, Mr Palgrove attempted a dash across Hammersmith Broadway, and was severely spoken to by a policeman.

      ‘Well, I never,’ said Dorothy, as they proceeded towards Hammersmith Bridge in a chastened fashion. ‘I don’t know what the police are coming to. You’d think they’d be a bit more civil spoken seeing the way they’ve been shown up lately.’

      ‘Anyway, I didn’t want to go along this road,’ said Edward sadly. ‘I wanted to go down the Great West Road and do a bust.’

      ‘And be caught in a trap as likely as not,’ said Dorothy. ‘That’s what happened to the master the other day. Five pounds and costs.’

      ‘The police aren’t so dusty after all,’ said Edward generously. ‘They pitch into the rich all right. No favour. It makes me mad to think of these swells who can walk into a place and buy a couple of Rolls-Royces without turning a hair. There’s no sense in it. I’m as good as they are.’

      ‘And the jewellery,’ said Dorothy, sighing. ‘Those shops in Bond Street. Diamonds and pearls and I don’t know what! And me with a string of Woolworth pearls.’