Ridiculous Crime is a production of iHeartRadio.
Elizabeth Dunnon Zaren Burnett.
I got a question for you, my friend. Yes, do you know what's ridiculous?
I know it's ridiculous. No, you don't you know what? How I know it's ridiculous. We got an Instagram fella here Ron.
Do Good, Ron do good, do good.
He's got a phenomenal name. D I U g U I d oh, And I thought I'm going to butcher this name, and that's not fair for this dude. So I looked it up and if I got it wrong, then Ron, oh my god, I'm so sorry, but I think it's do Good. Anyway, he tipped me off to something that you know, Uh, the interns told him this is amazing, this is horrible. And then he told the interns amazingly horrible or horribly amazing.
And I'm glad they can have some fun.
Oh yeah, yeah, he gets us. I need to read you something from a promotional.
What you you know something about me?
I'm all ears, I know so quote. We are committed to supporting Australia's music industry and nightlife. And that sounds good, right, that's what you're part of it. I love the nightlife and providing Assi's with the ultimate KFC experience. It's so exciting to be partnering with such incredible local Aussi talent on what is sure to be a fantastic night out and we cannot wait to open the doors to our
very first night club in Australia. We love to throw a gig, so it's encouraging fans to grab their tickets, unleash their free spirits and embrace the fried side of life.
Producer Dave, can you turn her mic off? Just just turn it down?
I have to ask you, what is preventing you from embracing the fried side of life?
I don't know common sense?
Right, Okay, So KFC is partnering with UH producer Lude l U U d.
E HD LUDINGFC there again.
So apparently it's like some like hibbity hoppity guy. Right, he's a club guy. He has a mullet psh Australian style. So so there they've paired up. So he's not only going to headline the club, he's he's got a mash up. He's collabed for ludes Zinger Sliders, which are the sliders coming to pairs eron.
You get so much joy from this?
I do you have no idea? They're each packed with half of a Zinger filet, and is a zinger a new kind of animal? I don't know. One is smothered in Chili relish and the other in super charge sauce, which I think is just like a four local reduction. And they're gonna I don't know. KFC says they're going to be certified.
Fire, certified fire.
To summarize in conclu there's a KFC night club in Australia.
You hear yourself, I do, I hear you know?
My life is just one string of like Elizabeth, did you hear what you just said? And I go, yeah, I guess yeah I did. I'm sorry.
Well that is certified ridiculous.
It so is.
Do you know what else is ridiculous?
Please share?
Do you have a moment?
My life is a series of moments. Okay, most of them are available to you.
Thank you, you're so generous with your time. I've got a story for you. Did you know that one of the most famous mystery writers ever, forever ever? They once disappeared for eleven days. But not only did she disappear, but many think that she faked her death, and not only that Elizabeth, she may have been attempting to frame her husband for her murder. Oh yes, that famous mystery writer was drummroll, please I get the Christie.
Wow, yeah, buckle up, love her.
This is Ridiculous Crime, a podcast about absurd and outrageous capers, heists and cons. It's always ninety nine percent murder free and one hundred percent ridiculous. Wood Bee, I like it. You're in one, You're on one, and you're writing.
I am all over one.
Let's talk Agatha Christie, Let's undisputed queen of the murder mystery book right totally. Now you know how we're ninety nine percent murder free, one percent murder. I guess Agatha Christie ninety nine percent murder. Oh I know, yeah, I totally flipped it.
Well, because here's the thing. She's kind of got Like the original uh version of murder she wrote, you know where, like if she shows up in town like somebody's gonna you know, get got uh she miss Marple. Yes, Like if she shows up to your country estate for some to do, I'm like, I'm getting out of.
Town by life insurance on all the people I am.
Hopping on a horse and to lose and with Puaro.
Too, same thing. Yeah, he also rides.
With curly mustache coming in. I'm like, curly mustache my way out of it.
Did you have a favorite between Marpo and Puaro.
I think I like Paro really yeah, uh, I don't know. Part of me is the problem that I'm having is I'm having trouble disconnecting the books from the television versions and the movie versions. In the movie so like, I love that the television Puaro with David A Camera's name now the kind of standard PBS. No, it's like Sachet or the most recent one, the one that I love him, and he plays a great Quaro and he's kind of I feel like the basis for this character in the
Mazy Dobbs novel series amazing. Yeah, Maurice, I guess his name is he. I feel like that writer took in spray from Puiro to creative anyway. I like Quoro's very intellectual, larger issue assessment of the crimes instead of the like sneaky you know, I'm going to piece this together and then Aha.
So you're not a big fan of the Columbo style the Murder She wrote style.
I just love murder mysteries.
I know you do, really do. I always thin it's funny about Miss Marple is that she's the one people always overlook and then poiro distracts you with the flamboyance of the mustache and the outrageous Belgian accent and everything. So one you get, you pay attention to the other one you do not.
So she covers they're sleeping on the on the bad baby over there. You know, they they're not attention to her. You know, it's like you. The older you get as a woman, the more invisible do you become.
I've heard this.
Yeah, it's it's great, the opposite effect. There are parts when you think, yeah, is kind of nice to be invisible, but you know it's also demoralizing.
Oh yeah, totally. And so we're social preachers.
The aged Miss Marple. She goes somewhere and people say wild stuff in front of her.
And she's she's just like a raw knife.
And that's why you shouldn't underestimate us, old broads.
That's so true. I always say that now, speaking of a you know, underestimating people, And you mentioned the movie versions. Yeah, Okay, the classic, in my opinion, is The Murder on the Orient Express, not the new one, the nineteen seventies version with everyone in it. Yes, that movie incredible, right, Albert Finnie, his Hercule Parole.
I love Albert.
Unforgettable. Right now, For those who don't know, the plot is, there's the train, the Orient Express, and then there's a surprisingly large number of Americans on it, and there are a bunch of people who work for the same American Charles Limberg, and I won't tell you anymore right now. The cast for that film is this also an insane list of stars in the last mid century? Do you remember how many people are in that movie?
Run it by me? Because you mentioned Albert Finnie. I just recently watched Annie. Oh my gosh, such a good movie, and I remember all the lyrics. I'm really proud of myself.
Anyway, go ahead, Okay, we got Ingrid Bergman, Wow, Lauren Bacall, Vanessa Redgrave, Sean Connery, John Gilgood, Anthony Perkins. It's just like a crazy hit list. Yeah yeah, Now, of that that list of actors, you have a favorite, and any one of those jump out for you. For me, it's obviously Ingrid Bergman, she's my favorite.
Uh yeah, I kind of like Sean Connor.
Yeah, I thought you did you play both shots?
No, that's one to take shots. That's all I can do. That's it what I mean. Or I could do like a real impression of him.
Could you do an impression of Sean Connery for us? Would you favorite producer? David and Irick one?
Okay, have about this miss Sean Connory and a little pennies that I hit lighting.
Wow, that I know who's the man now dog? Okay, So La has a three seasons. As I told you, my favorite is a second favorite is Award season. The others are fire season and flood season. So one of those.
Is my favorite.
So yeah, that's true. Actually, now, the forty seventh Oscars Murder on the An Express cleaned house that year because I told you all those stars right. They won for Best Adaptive Screenplay, Best Original Score, Best Costume Design, Best Cinematography, I mean just everything. Now compare that to the recient adaptations.
Now, now that what was the first one he did, Death on the Nile, because that was a stinker.
Yes, that's the one to start. Wonder Woman and the alleged Cannibal, grandson of Armin Hammer exactly. It was so we saw that together and we were just laughing at not at the film, like near the film, at each other what we were saying about them.
It was in the theaters and I went up to the screen and I barred on it. That's what happened.
The murder on the Arin Express version that was a little bit better.
Yeah, that was that was good.
I had a brilliant conceit. The whole setup was a bunch of stars to get together to kill Johnny Depp. I mean it was just like so now so anyway, in both films, Kenneth brodducts version of Hercule Pero. What do you think? I thought delightful.
I thought it was good.
Yeah.
Who's the Venice one?
That was a little bit oh hunting in Venice.
Yeah, they're just not good movies. He puts a lot of people who are not likable in them, like a lot of like in real life, they're unlikable. So I'm walking into it being like I can't believe I want to watch.
This casting agent's not reading the local trades, the news anything.
Yeah, like what Bozo's can I put in here? They're nice to me, They said, yes, and then they're just they're very convoluted in their retellings.
So Agatha Christie writer, we talked about Agatha Christie, you know, basically not filmmaker, but films made of her books. We've talked about creator.
She's a content.
Content Agatha Christie content creator. So what about Agatha Christie cultural phenomenon? Did you know that Agatha Christie has sold more books than almost any other writer you can name. Go ahead and name a writer. They sold a lot of books. John Grisham sold more books in him. Name another one.
Who's the Da Vinci code man?
Oh Dan Brown? Danny Brown, Dan Brown? Right, Danny?
Yeah? What about that?
More than him? God, Stephen King? More than him? Okay, she has a century head start on these writers, Stephen King, John Gris, those guys, like the supermarket fiction writers more than him. Okay, that's not me saying that. By the way, she's such a badass. Guinness Book of World Records. According to Guinness, they say her two billion books she has sold are more than anybody the writer you can name, two billion, two billion. She's the best selling fiction writer of all time.
Go for it.
Billion books sold in English, one billion books sold in one hundred and three other languages. She's killing the game. Now if you include non fiction plays, religious texts, so forth, there's still only two writers who sold more books than her. You name those two writers.
Of non fiction, Well, I mean.
And one's one's not really the writer, one is God, and the other monks.
A non fiction.
I don't Billy Shakespeare.
How is that nonfiction plays?
No, I said, I said, nonfiction plays religious texts, things
No?
that are not necessarily people. That's journalism. Elizabeth plays journalism. It's life drawn done dramatically, rendered dramatically. When we're talking about the big dogs of the printage page, it's basically God, Shakespeare, and Agatha Christie. That's the list, right, And this was true in her lifetime. She was like king of the mountain. Then, for instance, there's this story Agatha Christie on a train by herself. She was not visually distinctive, so people could
miss her. They wouldn't know that they were sitting on a train with Agatha Christie's she and she would say that she was just a housewife. She even said that after she was selling millions of books. Right, anyway, she's
on this train same train carriages her. Two women, they both have Agatha Christie books on their knees, right, And Agatha Christie remembers this moment as she tells it, two women discussing me, both with copies of my paperback editions on their knees, and like I said, they don't recognize her. So they're talking freely about her, unaware that the author is right there listening to them. So the two women they get to talk and they get to a course
to gossiping and they're like, oh, yes, oh. One of the ladies says, I hear she drinks like a fish eo right, And so she's just having to hear this all the time because people don't know she's like this king or queen rather of the crime world, a fiction of books. And still people are like, oh, I wouldn't recognize her. She's walked right past me.
Yeah.
Now, as you can imagine, with this person who is selling so many books and everybody loves her, when she disappears, the Queen of Crime disappears on December sixth, nineteen twenty six. It was a super big deal. All of a sudden, papers are like, wait, what Yeah, Agatha Christie goes missing. It's a real life murder mystery. The time Elizabeth, she was thirty six years old, she'd already published many of her best books, as I told you. And so she's
published her sixth book, The Murder of Roger Ackroyd. And the reason why Agatha Christie had went missing was, in rough terms, we'll just put it, sometimes a girl just needs to get away, that's the true. Right now, she and her husband, Archie Christie had rather recently moved into a grand home, a big i'll put it in your terms, a long daddy Sunningdale, Berkshire, and it was a sort of home that gets a nickname. They called the twelve
bedroom mansion Styles, which was the title of her first book. Yes, they named it after the sidekick from teen Wolf, Yes, exactly. With an amazing amount of oppressions she's saw forward, She's like, you know, Michael J. Fox. I like that kid. He's going to be a hell of an actor. But not him. What's the one next to him? Now? As she learned from that Styles mansion, big house, right, big house can also make you feel more alone?
Oh completely, yeah.
Right, the emptiness of it, the sound of that emptiness, right, And also her husband was often gone. That also really kind of exacerbated the emptyiness.
The house implies that there should be a lot of people, yes.
And a lot of life in it, right, So she grows lonely in response to her success in the big house. Setting all this aside for a moment, Agatha was also dealing with somewhat of a life crisis, right. She was in a dark place. Had died that same year in the spring, and Agatha and her mother they were really close, like super close, and the loss was devastating to her. So she already has her somewhat absent husband and now her mother is gone. Her husband is not there to
help her with the loss. Not only that, he's just shrugged off the loss, like he didn't even attend the funeral. Oh yeah, like he was of no help when she lost like someone. Yeah, right, So she has no mother.
She has a daughter of her own, though, a seven year old daughter, and so that's later that same year, in the summer, Agatha she takes a trip with her daughter to her mother's estate to kind of like show where this is Grandma's place and do all that and like, let's you know, the commune with her spirit the two of them, they chill, they talk about grandmother. You know, they're just vibing out right. Yeah, husband shows up, recently departed mother's estate. He's got big news for them. His
big news is Elizabeth. He's met another woman, a much younger woman named Nancy Neil, and he's in love with Nancy. In fact, he wants a divorce. And because he and Nancy had been carrying on for having an affair of about a year now, her husband was tired of sneaking around pure me, the exercise of hiding what I'm doing from you. So Agatha tells him, nope, I won't grant you a divorce.
Right.
And so even though her hubby archie, he seems to me he's like a total sad sack of a man, she loves him. She wants to keep this guy around. She won't let him go. No.
You know, he comes up and he's like, oh, I want a divorce. I beg nope, and I'm about to make your life miserable.
She actually loves him, so she tries to save their marriage. She works for a while, right, her husband was like, oh, good lord, did you not listen to a single word I just said? I want a divorce.
Nope, nope, didn't listen, So I'm going to.
Agatha said about this. She wrote about this period later in her life. She said that this was quote the beginning of a nervous breakdown. No, right, yeah, so that day at her late mother's estate when he said he wanted to get a divorce and shack up with his mistress, that was the summer.
Right, of course, it's the beginning of a nervous breakdown. I just like that is this most tender point?
Oh yeah, yeah, she losenes her mother and then her husband destroys everything, and yeah, so come winter, Archie, this the sad sack of a husband. He comes back to Agatha and informs it, Look, I can't go on like this. I must be with Nancy. I'm going to go spend the weekend with her.
She's non threatening exactly.
So that afternoon, Agatha she could go out for a drive. Right. She was half out of her head. She's in deep inner feels at this point, right, But she knew she couldn't do anything rash because she's got her daughter with her in the car. So she's like, I'll wait till later. Right. She's also thinking maybe he'll come home and he's just being whatever, you know, peculiar.
I can't you know. When I hear these stories, I'm like, honey, just come over to the jaded side of the fence. You'll get here eventually, but he's join us early and then your life will be much better anyway.
For Seed, she waits for her husband to come home. When Archie doesn't come home that night, around nine forty five pm, she goes up to her daughter's room. She kisses her daughter goodbye, and then she grabs her car keys and she takes off on her drive on her own. I'll leave it to Agatha to tell the story. I just wanted my life to end. All that night, I drove aimlessly about in my mind there was this vague idea of ending everything. I drove automatically downroads I knew
to may Head, where I looked at the river. I thought about jumping in, but realized that I could swim too well to drown. Then back to London again, and then on to Sunningdale. From there I went to Newland's Corner. So she just keeps driving through the dark and the despondency of her blues. Then something happens, Elizabeth, She says, when I reached a point on the road which I thought was near the quarry, I turned the car off down the road, down the hill toward it. I left
the wheel and left the car run. The car struck something with a jerk and pulled up. Suddenly I was flung against the steering wheel and my head hit something. Up to this moment, I was missus Christie. After this moment, she was someone else entirely, literally and figuratively. The crash was the beginning of a two week long disappearance of Agatha Christie. Nice, I'll take a break and after this we'll get into what happens while she's gone. All right, Elizabeth, we're back.
So where were we?
Oh? Right, the English country side?
Yeah? Oh, my heart like telling her story about how she's feeling and she's striving and so despondent, Like I just it's heart wrenched.
She feel her. Yeah, you can relate. You're like, oh, I get your girl. So, Agatha Christie, she crashed her car. Eventually she wakes up behind the wheel. Right, she's not dead, obviously, but she's still in the car. And Agatha she's banged up, she's got blunt trauma wounds to her chest from the crash. She has bruises on her head, like I said, though not dead. So she's like, oh, I need to she probably got a concussion. Probably She's like what do I need to decide what to do? And so she's like,
you know, gathers her wits. Then she climbs out of the crash car. She walks into the English countryside. It's December, so the trees are bare, they're just like skeletal things on the horizon. Right, the air is cold to the skin, right, the crisp wintry night, you get it right, But like a fiend arisen from the ashes. Agatha Christie would write, as I told you up to this moment, I was missus Christie. Right in this moment on she remakes herself.
She's like, I'm gonna go be someone else. Now she's this new woman, reborn right there in that field, and now she needs a new name. Right, So I'll get to that in a second. But the next day a boy is out walking and he finds Agatha Christie's car. It's a Morris Crowley if you're into old cars, And the thing was all left all parked Yankee style, right, it's all cock eyed at the edge of a quarry. It looks like someone tried to like push it into
the car. What's the good place to hide something? Right? The front wheels are dangling off the edge, okay, right? Yeah. The only thing it was that stopped it was it had hit like some bushes right around the edge of the chalk pit. Right. So there are other curious facts though. When the cops came out to investigate, they find that the car's gearshift was in neutral, right, which is strange. The handbrake wasn't engaged, which that tells someone who's you know, investigating.
It looks like someone was trying to roll the car, push the car, right. But Agatha Christie, she couldn't be strong enough to push a car all a cliff into a quarry, right, So what was her plan? Maybe she's just gonna roll it down a hill. Yeah, we don't know.
It's inconclusive, right. What we do know is that Agatha Christie walked to a railway station and then, as she put it, he's strange the railway authority they had did not recall me as I was covered with mud and I had speared blood on my face from a cut on my hand.
Wait, that's why they didn't recall her. Is everyone walking around buddy and bloody? Because like in.
Nineteen twenties in England, I don't know. Can you tell me? Maybe she got in with the union busters. I don't know Elizabeth, but they didn't recognize her. Right. So there she is at King's Cross train station, one of my favorites. I've been to that one so many times. Right, So she purchases herself a ticket to a resort spa in a town called Harrowgate. I may be pronouncing that Harrowgate up in Surrey. At the station, she grabs a taxi cab.
When she gets up to Harrowgate and she asked the driver to take her out to the Hydropathic Hotel.
That sounds awesome.
Then that sounds awesome. It's a resort spa. Right, Agata walks in. She's a lone, no luggage. She tells the front desk that she'd recently arrived from South Africa and her name, wait for it, Teresa Neil.
I was hoping for Agatha v. Stallion.
Now now miss Regina Corntower. It comes and making up a new name. She picked the last name of her mistress, Nancy Neil. She became Teresa Neil.
Oh wow, there's a lot of what's like psychological.
What's your take on that name choice? You know?
And I don't know. I'm guessing that the Neil gal is younger, Yes, yes, yeah? And so oh.
Is she framing her husband? Is she taking on the identity in some strange pathology?
Yeah, I would say it's that. I mean, I don't know.
No one can know, no one either way. The resort spa manager. He escorts the new missus Neil upstairs and to as Agatha put it, a good room on the first floor, fitted with hot and cold water because remember nineteen So you don't promised to cold water in Oh yeah, real nice. Right. So she's made it, she's made her break. She's in the hotel, she's got a new name, a new self. So what does she do next? What does she do now that she's an anonymous and a lone
formerly famous person. Well to answer that, Elizabeth, I'd like you to close your eyes as a club and picture it. It's early December nineteen twenty six. There is a piano plane. You know the tune. It's the recent hit song, Yes we have no Bananas. You, Elizabeth, are currently not at a speakeasy in New York or a slanky private music club in London. Nope, you're at a health spa and resort in the English countryside, and you are a patient at the resort, that's what they call the guests at
this spa. And you are a wealthy Glasswegian woman of a certain age who's come to this spot to get her humor's balanced to like the ancient Greeks.
Ah, that's great.
So that's what your latest doctor told you. Your health requires some time at a spa, so you found this spa to convalesce. Now that you've been here for a few weeks, you're feeling much better, and you've come to enjoy the night times. For Dressed in one of your favorite moomoos, you come downstairs, drawn by the sound of the music. Tonight there's a soiree of sorts. They're in the downstairs ballroom. Guests are dancing, some seated at tables
that encircle the dance floor. They're drinking punch. Others are drinking healthy cocktails like gin and carrot juice. That's so healthy, Hey man, what are you talking about one of the new patients. A single middle aged woman is behind the keys of the piano. She's playing that light and airy pop song, Yes we have no bananas, as she sort of half sings the lyrics, the bouncy words, dance right along with the patients.
Yes we have no bananas. We have no bananas today. Our eggs are delicious, but they act suspicious. They look like they passed away. If you try some of our spinish, we'll tell you you're finish. But yes, we have no bananas. We have no bananas today.
And with that, all the relaxation I've gained at the spaws gone.
The woman behind the keys, missus Neil, as she calls herself.
Oh man, she's really bitch, chaps.
Up from the piano. Another patient takes over for her. Missus Neil spins and pirouettes onto the dance floor, all gayety and joy. You spoke with Missus Neil earlier today at lunch. You recognize her. She remember she told you she's from South Africa. That's right, and sadly she lost a son not too long ago. Yet the loss of her son doesn't show up in her glowing smile as she dances towards you. You find that Missus Neil is rather good at the Charleston. It's the dance craze at
the moment on both sides of the Atlantic. She even shows you how to move your hands and knees in that jazzy way, the coordinated knock knees dance step of the Charleston. You laugh as you attempt at talk talk talk. You're a quick study, and with not much time you're doing the Charleston better than Missus Neil. She's not as good a dancer as you are. After a few turns on the dance floor, Missus Neil is winded, so she returns to the piano. She warbles out a few more tunes.
You lean on the piano with another patient. When either of you recognize a song, you sing along, but Missus Neil seems to prefer the upbeat jazzy tunes, so you don't recognize many of them. You sip from your gin and carrot juice. This is the life. You'd have no reason to believe that you've just spent the night carrying on and carousing with Agatha Christie, the most famous woman in the world, who isn't a Queen.
Elizabeth man if I if I could still drink booze. I loved gin. You love carrot juice, and I love carrot juice.
You got this gin and juice carrots?
That sounds kind of good. Blood orange juice.
Dress it up, yeah, put a fur coat on it. I like that. Okay, so good. Well, other than dancing, carrying on and sipping on your gin and juice, did.
You did you know how to do the Charleston when you were a kid?
Of course I was one of those kids.
Think I was raised like my grandparents helped raise me, and I think that's why I talked to propaganda poster. But yeah, like totally did the Charleston as a kid.
Yeah, it was a great dance. What's up at that?
But let's start teaching kids with Charleston?
I think we should. So other than dancing, you know, carousing and hanging out with Agatha Christie and shaking your knees. So, yes, we have no bananas. What else did Agatha Christie get up to while she was on her break?
Cocaine? No, surprisingly, you're telling a story.
I have no cocaine in the story. Can you believe it? And also it's like surprising how much cocaine shows up when I hate cocaine. Here's cocaine again, and.
Two of us are like, it's disgusting.
Let's talk about let's talk about how stupid it is, so silly, and what terrible decisions you make and one of the things you will sacrifice for if anyway, there's no cocaine in this story. But I did think you'd appreciate this Elizabeth, what she did decide to do.
Yes, she slept in, Oh god, bless super late.
She slept in late. And then she took breakfast in bed. Yes, she lazed about. She just let Agatha be Agatha every day, breakfast in bed.
We'll hire her at slots, and I'm heart.
She also, you're kind of girl. She she read a lot. The resources spot had a library, and the librarian helped her find mysteries to read, because Agatha wasn't just a writer, she was also a reader.
She's painting herself by reading through her old stuff like crap I should, and she's.
Making to have dog airing the pages.
Or like I nailed it on that one.
The other thing that she was reading a lot of was the newspapers covering crew with disappearance. So she's just sitting there reading them, hoping nobody recognize that, right, and of course they don't. So in her bedchambers though, she did keep a frame picture of her daughter on her bedside table because she did still think about her. She wasn't planning on disappearing from her entire life. She was
just kind of taking a break. She'd not forgotten about her, right And so, as I told you, she arrived alone with no luggage. She had no clothes, so homegirl needed to go shopping. So that was the other thing she did, like day two, she went out and bought herself some luggage, a whole new wardrobe because there's going to be a
new miss thing. She's got all sorts of sundryes. As she put it, she bought a new hat, a coat, evening shoes, books, magazines, pencil and fruit and various toilet requisites. So she bought herself with femine napkins.
Right, you know, she got like you know, rose water for her skin. Oh that kind of tilt requis toilet trees.
I thought requisites was like a British euphemism for like, you.
Know, yeah, what you require a woman would require. So she probably got like powders and skinry, you know.
And I've seen that written on old machines. I think it's the funniest term.
They used to have it where apparently like it was before my time, like I don't know, have some contraptions.
Attached one into another.
Exactly like a parachute.
Anyway, So that night, the second night she goes down, she shows up for dinner. She's all decked out in her new.
Duds, big pat on.
She also had a very tipey scarf that she had picked up. I like a good scarf, I know you do, so I bring that up right. So she's out there obviously got her new friends. They're noticing the scarf right well, one of the employees she noticed the scarf, and she's like, oh right, like everyone's just taking now taking notice of this, like creature come alive. Right. So, as I told you, the second night act of the Christie, she's chilling with
her new friends. She played billiards. She was apparently pretty good, but she could rack them right. So she played piano again, saying more popular tunes with the jazz as if she's just doing sets. At this point, she's like she got a big, like one of those whiskey glass of the dollars and on top of her piano. Anyway, the resorts Spat had an entertainment director, as I told you, kind of like a cruise ship. Will just imagine that her
name was Miss Corbett. She was the one who started to really take notice of the new patient and she noticed the beautiful scarf. She also noticed that there was a price tag still attached, so she's like feeling sorry for her, But I don't think she's recognizing that this is like the behavior of someone on the lamb, right, She's like thinking, oh, she forgot only go get some
scissors or whatever. So on the next few days, other guests they start to have their suspicions about this new person, missus.
Neil mini pearl hat with the teg zach.
So you see by now at this point the London press is going crazy. Right, they discovered that ACTAA Christie's missing. It's front page new.
The quarries exactly there.
They've got police everywhere. But finally they publish a portrait of her on the front page. So now, because you don't they don't really have photography dominating newspapers in.
The nineteen twenty sketchy exactly.
So they finally get an image of her. Right. So now back at the health spot resort, these newspapers are arriving each day. Now they got one with her face on it. She doesn't care. She's still reading the newspaper. That ain't me. I don't know who that lady is.
I would be telling people, you guys, look, I look just like Agatha Christie wild yeah, exactly, get ahead of it, get.
Two steps ahead that just now the hotel.
Manage, because I keep tripping forward.
Well, I wasn't going to bring that part up. I'm respectful. Now. The hotel manager, his wife would come down around I know, I don't know, pick him up for work. I don't know how, but she'd come around. And so she was there and she's like noticing this person. Apparently she's a reader. She reads the news. That's Agatha Christie, right. So she, as the hotel manager remembered, when she had been here about days. My wife said to me, I believe that
lady is missus Christie. So the hotel manager what does he do? He dismisses his wife's suspicions. He's like, oh you what are you talking about? That's flat out absurd. Why would Agatha Christie be in Surrey? So anyway, meanwhile, there's about three hundred constables out searching Hill and Dale for her, right, just anywhere they can. But they begin to have their doubts that she's alive because like, after forty eight hours, you know how it goes. Oh, first
forty eight man, this is still still true in nineteen twenties. Man, you're gonna find her. Then he gets his seventy two hours, they're like, should we tell the husband? Yeah, so the Bobby's as I said, they start to believe she's dead. Right, So four days after she went missing, in three days of searching, the police call off the hunt to find Agatha Christie. They're like, so much for that, you're kidding,
Guardian to the cops. Agatha Christie's brother in law had received a letter apparently from Agatha, so she informed him that she was at a resort SPA in Surrey, quote for rest and treatment. Now our girl, Agatha like Dracula, she's dead and loving it, right, So she seemed to hang it out.
She sends it a letter to her brother.
Brother in law.
Was not on another end, okay, and does he give this to the cops or does he keep it hush hush on the QT.
He does for a second, then he gives it to the cops.
Oh okay, So then they're like, oh, she's not dead.
Well, I'll get to that in a second, because there's a reason why he gets brought to the cops. But at this point she's unaware. She's still swanning.
Around, probably like how long does it take to get someone declared?
Exactly? Because he's doing well with the books, you know. So at this point though, missus Neil is going around, and she would say later on, I was very happy and contented, right, she doesn't realize things are like, you know, the walls are closing in. At the other end of the spectrum, as her husband, Archie, he was beside himself with worry. Of course, it was not his missing wife that he was worried about. He was concerned for Archie. He was writing about all these news reporters circling about
the story, you know, following anybody asking questions. He was rather certain that they would discover that he'd been having a year long affair with his mister me look bad. And he was a colonel, so he had all that British look, not that kind of colonel. So at first Archie's in Fideli. He gets overlooked, right, he's golden. No one susses it out. Then he decides, you know, what the hell, I'll make a colossal mistake on my own.
He decides to speak with reporters from which paper, the Daily Mail, all the papers, the Daily Mail.
Captain good decisions there, keep the streak going.
To the tabloid reporters. They do their due diligence, Elizabeth. They ask him about his side piece, They're like, hey, what's up in missus Neal. Archie wheels about in his mind trying to decide what he's going to say. Right, he doesn't know he's grasping for an excuse. So he while he's thinking, he sort of just half attacks the reporters out of instinct. Right, I told you he's a colonel.
He's like attack, So he says, and I quote, it is absolutely untrue to suggest there was anything in the nature of a row or a tiff between my wife and myself on Friday morning. I strongly depreciate introducing any tittle tattoo into this matter.
Quit your tittle tattle.
At tabloid reporters. That's their job, is tittletable.
Right.
So, in his panic of self defense, the husband he throws his wife fully under the bus. He's like, he raises the prospect that maybe his wife missing on purpose. Maybe she planned and designed this, you know, carried out her own disappearance. He's like, ask Agatha when you find her.
Well, they were still locking women up for being exactly hysterical.
Yeah, so Archie Christie told the Daily Mail reporters, quote, my wife had discussed the possibility of disappearing at will. Engineering a disappearance had been running through her mind, probably for the purpose of work. Personally, I feel that is what happened. Right. So back to the constables on the search for the missing mystery writer. They aren't entirely convinced of the letter to the brother in law. They're like, isn't that something that a husband is trying to hide
a murder would do? Like, oh, yeah, my brother, he got a letter from my wife saying she's fine, it's cool, it's cool, don't worry about it, because he bets. We know, whenever a woman, married woman goes missing, who's the first suspect?
Yeah, the husband rightfully, the husband.
Right exactly. So December tenth rolls around. We're now about a week after she first went missing. The police now they decide to bring out the dogs because Archie, he's one hell of a suspect. He just oozes with the foul scent of guilt. So they're like, we may be able to find a body. So they bring out the dogs. The dogs, the hounds. They bring out. They can't find it.
They just start barking and whining. Nothing. Right, So the London Times reported that the constables quote are now said to be of the opinion that it is a case of suicide. Oh yeah. So the public though, still hungering to find what happened to this famous writer. So the papers continue to cover the story with constant front page updates. By the next week, the story begins to shift. And after this break, Elizabeth, I'll tell you how the story shifted.
Yeah, all right, Elizabeth, we're back as I was telling you, stories were shifting.
Yeah, people were looking for dead bodies. Yeah, were not dead because they were dancing in and exactly just being their best Agatha. So at this point on Tuesday, they basically we're a week into her being gone, an editorial gets published. Once again, the Daily Mail steps into it. The writer for the Daily Mail, they argue that if the rumors are indeed true, and the letter to the brother in law is accurate, and Agatha Christie is indeed alive, then this is a terrible hoax to pull on the
people who loved and supported her. The writer he basically called it, to quote, a heartless, practical joke. So this point, we're December twelfth, Okay, just give you a date night, nine days after she's disappeared. The next day, the cops still at it. They're still looking for something. Agatha Christie's still laying low. People's suspicions ratcheted up. Everyone that the spa is like, I'm pretty sure that dying crush, right, Yeah, she's still running with it. And however, the cops at
this point they're no longer convinced she's dead. They've at least caught up to the idea. You know what, she may not be dead. They now believe she's on the run somewhere. They're like, we don't know where, but we think she's on the run. So they what do they do for clues? Elizabeth? They turned to her books. They're like, why don't we start reading her books for clues? So
they read the manuscript of her newest novel. They're like, let's see what that is about, right, because it's just about to come out, but it hasn't come out yet. And the book is called the Blue Train. They're like, the Blue Train to wear She's on the train now. I may not be doing a really good job of covering, like how big this search was for Agatha Christie. So for just for give you some numbers and some scale. This marked the first time that a plane was ever
used in England to search for a missing person. Oh, there were so many people out looking on the grounds that they put the number right between ten and fifteen thousand individuals. It's people, just locals out there looking like I've got my dog in a cane and a walking stead,
let's go see if you can find him. As I mentioned dogs, they had trained animals as in and I quote six trained bloodhounds, a crate looad of of Aarradale terriers, many retrievers and Alsatian police dogs and even the services of common mongrels.
Wait, that sounds like the greatest group of dogs.
It sounds like your next birthday party.
Sounds like my dream back.
So the hunt drags on despite all the dogs and all the locals looking cops they pull out their latest theory. They go, okay, we're gonna ask for the public for help. The bobbies they now believe that Acta Christie is on the run and she may be hiding out in London. Not only that, but she was quote likely disguised and probably in mail attire. Oh so now are supposed to be going up to men who don't have a sloth th goo, are you act at the Christy? Give them
the once over? So the cops they all mentioned that there may or may not be a sealed envelope with the specific instruction that it should only be opened on the event that her body was discovered. So now they're ratcheting up the stakes. So basically the Daily Mail and the police are competing for who can come up with the craziest theory.
Didn't finish the manuscript of this book.
To help in this case. Forgot the spiritualist because this is the highest spiritualism time they come rushing in psychics of all they come by the score. They stepped forward. In one news story there was in London Times. The psychic reported that I get the Christie was indeed alive and well and would be found very soon, which turned out to be correct. But the psychic really had a fifty to fifty chancel on that one. So I mean, like what to be given them? Like, oh, she's you alive or dead?
This is such a fantastic I say, that is it. It's an interesting it's the most interesting period of time for me in like not necessarily just European but mostly British English culture of the time between the wars. Yes, completely the mindset of it, and there's like this identity but yet they know that they've like they're doing things not knowing what's about to happen. Yes, well, oh man, I love.
It so so okay, remember once again I told you the author of Sherlock Holmes. Yeah, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. He was big in a spiritualism to the show. Oh my god, that the friend to the show. He got his own gear and once he heard his peer in the mystery game was missing, he's like, oh, threw on the deer stalker hat and he was like, grab my wife's crystal ball, let's do this. Right. So somehow, Sir Arthur, He's like, I need to get some personal property. So
he gets a hold of Agatha Christie's personal property. He gets his hand on one of Agatha Christie's gloves. Don't ask me how. He takes the glove to a spiritualist. The psychic did the routine and then she declared Agatha Christie is alive.
Uh huh.
And not only that, but she'll be found soon.
She is mad.
Both times pistols the spiritusts were correct. She would be found very soon. So the next day, December fourteenth, the police announced they found new evidence, not Agatha Christie, but new evidence. They found new clues, namely quote a bottle labeled poison, lead and opium, some fragments of a torn up postcard, a woman's fur lined coat, a box of face powder, the end of a loaf of bread, a cardboard box, and two children's books.
Where did they find these things?
This sounds like the you're giving away your next birthday party.
Fish hooks, gum drops. Where did they find her car? I believe Oh I thought it was just like in the world.
Yeah no, this is he says. They walked around. We think this could be hers that's my coat. Well it's now a clue.
I'm taking your coat in the end of the loaf of your breath.
And the rest of this whiskey. Okay. Not only that, the detectives they also declare that they believe missus Christy had left her home on purpose with no intention of returning. So now they're trying to refine their announcements. The police they also continue to investigate the husband because they're not entirely certain about old arch Right. One of Archie's colleagues
at this time, he was quoted in a paper. He said he was in a terribly nervous state and told me the police had followed him and we're now waiting outside. They think I murdered my wife, he said. So he's like going around screaming to his friends that they think you. People were like, yeah, well, you know, Archie, you act a certain way exactly. Anyway, all as all these theories and suspicions start to come to a had two underemployed musicians,
that's right, two under musicians. They cracked the case because they worked at the resorts Spa and they saw her all the time. That's Agatha Christie. So they when they confirmed that Archie was indeed no murder by coming forward and going, yeah, you can find her right here. The cops show up, the newspaper reporters show up, and they're like, oh, yeah, that's Agatha Christie. So the next day, December fifteenth, aga Christie is discovered to be alive and indeed at a
hotel resorts spa. All the newspapers they start printing everything they can about this, and the interesting point is that they find out that she's been staying out of the name of her husband's mistress. So now the story gets so now that Agatha.
So it's only the last name, it's not the first thing, Teresa.
Neil and yeah, exactly kind of exactly. So once she's found, what does Agatha Christie do? What does she say? How does she what does she tell? The public has all these questions? How does she explain her sudden abrupt absence from her own life?
Elizabeth, I'm going to guess the car accident.
That's a good but but what does she say? What do you think she grabbed? She like, was there a deer.
End forever and I didn't know who I was?
Okay, that's good to stick to simple. Yeah, well, she would be proud to know that she did what any good fabricator of stories would do.
Oh yeah, she lied, good for her.
Yeah, I got to Chrissy told the detectives that she did indeed hit her head in the car crash. She bruised her dome and was temporarily knocked unconscious, so she had no memory of the past eleven days. Okay, so she's covered the whole time, right. The cops say they were. They were like, but you don't have a bruise on your forehead, and she's like, oh, it's been two weeks.
What are you doing?
Exactly?
I was.
I was psychically murdered by my husband.
He broke back exactly. So there's the question of her transient amnesia. Is that and that's hard. You can't see that, you can't detect it, So they have to take her word for it, or possibly the word of doctors. Right. So meanwhile there's her sad sack half a man husband, Archie. He arrives at the hotel resort spot to pick up his wife and bring her home. What do you think happens?
She can't get in the car.
He was met by a stony silence. That's a quote. And then he eventually he's like, you know, we can get you out of this. So he sticks to her story and he says, oh yes, he tells all the gathered reporters, so she doesn't have to talk to him that quote. She does not know who she is. She just suffered from the most complete loss of memory, like even my mistress.
Right, he's hoping.
So the couple they employ an act of subterfuge to escape the resort, spa and the press. They use a pair of decoys that go out dressed as the couple. They got the front door and the meanwhile the couple they escape through the side door. Right, So now she's able to get home. They take the train and they get to London. There's all these people waiting for her. She's like, oh, dear lord, she's a writer, right, so
she's introverted. This is not what she wants. You want to get away, and now everything's closing in on her and they all have faces right, right, So the press also is keen to crucify Agatha Christie because of what they now believe is a presumed hoax. Because one, there's the costly distraction for all the people and the police, the volunteers, but also Agatha Christie had a new book coming out, so they assume this is all publicity, so
they rail against her. So in her defense, Agatha Christie, she calls in doctors to examine her and prove that she's had in a legitimate medical episode. The doctors they interviewer at her sister's house. Agatha confesses to the doctors everything, and by everything, I mean she had no clear memory of anything. So she was like, I don't know anything,
and they're like, oh, that sounds legit to us. So she says, only thing that she has is some hazy memory of that she went by missus Neil, but she doesn't know why she gave that name, and even though that is her husband's mistress, and so they're like, okay, good to us. The doctors listened to Agatha Christie, the examined her, and then they announced their findings. The doctors both of them agree missus Christie has had about of amnesia. So the story goes, this didn't end the cries of
hoax and fraud. Elizabeth, we got tabloids on her exactly so months after she was found safe and mostly sound, an MP in Parliament decides to go and rail against her and like drum up some business for himself. He's from your old stomping grounds, Glasgow, Govind, I say that right, huh okay Glasgow, Govin, not.
S Glasgow, glass Glasgow.
Glasgow, Glasgow, Glasgow.
Glas Go glads go there you go.
Govin, Here you go, MP mister Neil McLean McLean. He put forth a question to the Home Secretary and he said, the number of the Metropolitan Police specially detailed for the search of missus Agatha Christie. The time occupied and the total cost including the wages of the office are so detailed, or like, basically there was a price to the Crown that was impossible to pay it. So he goes saying that we need to have an investigation into this, right,
So he's just trying to drum up business for himself. Anyway. The reasons for all the suspicions in the hubbub was at Agatha Christie. As I told you, had the new book out, so everyone assumed it was a capitalistic play. But also if you recall the front pages splashed on newspapers across the globe, we're also portraying her husband as a lying, cheating, no good, sad sack excuse of the man once it came out about the mistress, So now that starts being well, maybe she was trying to get it.
Now the debate is, was she trying to get away from him? So, well, what about the mistress? We haven't talked about her at all? Yeah, what is she dealing now that she's the scapegoat for all of this and people are either she knows he's mare exactly, she'd be well aware the mistress. In the wake of the scandal, her parents, her poor British parents, they were shook, scandalized, embarrassed. So they to protect their daughter and their good name, they sent Nancy on a trip around the world. They
did ten month long trip around the world. She got a reward for this, so, I mean, you're going to be scandalized. That's the way to do it, really, I mean, this is a free trip around the world, no internet, nothing anyway. This, however, was not the end of their illicit love story, because in March of nineteen twenty eight, fifteen months after she disappeared, Agatha Christie sued her husband for divorce. Two years after that, her ex husband married again,
can you guess who we married? His new bride, Nancy new Oh yeah, she came back around the world, came back from her trip, and she's like, I still love him, and so Agatha Christie though Elizabeth, she also got remarried in nineteen thirty. Her new husband far more her speed. He was an archaeologist from the British Museum.
Oh that's cool.
So he's a thief, a professional thief. For their honeymoon, the new couple went down to the Holy Land, where her husband conducted an excavation. Yeah, there you go. I'm just saying, is she got to her happy place. She had a husband. It was dusty and been interesting. Like her, she's like, oh I love this, and she got rid of the old sad sack Colonel Archi.
Yeah, and then the Neil lady needs to realize that how it starts is how it ends. So he's probably gonna have a wandering eye.
Yes. Now, later on, you remember I said that there were the rumors of murder. Yeah, yeah, like well, it would have been claimed by some, including a nineteen seventy nine movie called Agatha, which, apparently people who like Agatha Christie say, is a terrible movie. Anyway, that her disappearance in the car crash at the query, all of it was designed to frame her husband for her disappearance and her subsequent murder, that she was going to off herself
and blame him. Many folks like to say that Agatha Christie never spoke about her disappearance. I'll say, oh, we don't know why she did it. Well, that's not exactly true if you dig deep enough that she did talk about it, just once right in an interview with the tabloid newspaper once again the Daily Mail heading that story conducted in nineteen twenty eight, so it's two years after the incidents, ill fresh and not like twenty years later.
So she explained how the afternoon she disappeared, and after her husband told her he wanted a divorce and he walked out, she'd first taken a driver with her daughter, and then she debated what to do next and take it away. Agatha, there came into my mind the thought of driving into it. However, as my daughter was with me in the car, I dismissed the idea at once, and driving into it is the quarry, sure? And then she said that night I felt terribly miserable I felt
that I could go on no longer. I left home that night in a state of high nervous strain with the intention of doing something desperate. So that night, without her daughter in the car, is when she acted on the impulse, and it may not have been the best plan. I admit that anybody would see that, but it certainly was irresponsible leaving her daughter alone. But thanks to her eleven day walk about, Agatha Christie became a liberated woman. So I assumed she left her daughter in good hands.
We don't know exactly the details. My point is, sometimes all one needs is to get away to get some perspective. Right here. Her disappearance also helped catapult her into a new level of fame, because, much like the Mona Lisa, after it was a stolen, it became the most famous painting the world, exactly after she stole herself, she became the most famous woman in the world who wasn't a queen. So there you go. So, Elizabeth, what's our ridiculous takeaway here?
You know what, sometimes you need to stop and have some me time exactly, and also don't debase yourself and chase something that is not good for you.
Good point my ridiculous takeaway once again, thank you for asking a little bit.
Thank you for asking.
You can't spell crime without me. Sometimes you need a little me time, and crime is how you get there. So that's all I got for you.
Excellent.
Yeah, you're in the mood for a talk bag.
I love talking about.
Dave hit It.
Oh my god.
I went, Hey everybody, it's me Elizabeth Sutton. I'd just like to say that I'm really enjoying the show. I've been listening in for a long time and I'm down. Is I Heart app just like a send us talkback? Hey there, what's their ridiculous takeaway?
Hello?
This is eyes Undernett. I've been voking on my German accent obviously, and I wouldn't say it's cut in bettle, but it's quoting different. Keep it up. Yeah, alrighte you.
I enjoyed the talk all right. As always, people, you can find us online Ridiculous Crime, Twitter, Instagram, We have a website. It's Ridiculous Crime dot com. Uh that's where you can find merch and stuff. And also, as you can tell, we do love your talkbacks, so please leave us one. Go on the iHeart app. You can figure out how to do it there, and also if you're an old school you can email us if you want a Ridiculous Crime at gmail dot com. As always start
the email Dear Elizabeth, Okay, thanks for listening. We'll catch you next crime. Ridiculous Crime is hosted by Elizabeth Dutton and Zaron Burnette, produced and edited by her Quel Prowhile, Rose Mustache wax salesman Dave Houston. Research is by Marissa. I'm totally team Agatha Brown and Andrea is anyone team Archie song sharpened here. Our theme song is by Thomas I'm Team Amnesia, Lee and Travis. I'm team Yes we have no Bananas Dutton. The host wardrobe provided by Brought
Me five hundred. Executive producers are Ben you know I once had amnesia, but I forget when Bowlin and Noel what is amnesia? Brown?
Reds QUI say it one more times crime.
Ridiculous Crime is a production of iHeartRadio four more podcasts. My Heart Radio visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.