The Body in the Librarah

The Body in the Librarah

by Agony Chrisper

 Chapter One

Scene: Dining room at Threshold Manor. Colonel Wellington Ambrose (Rtd) is about to crack open his breakfast egg.

Door swings wildly open and in rushes a maid.

Maid: Oh, Sir, Sir….There’s a body in the library.

Ambrose: What’s that you say? A body in the librarah? Don’t be silly, girl. There are books and bound copies of Country Life in the librarah. Not bodies.

Maid: But, sir, I saw it with my own eyes.  

 

Ambrose rings for the butler, a stout man with a stoical bearing.

Ambrose: See here, Webster, this silly girl says there’s a body in the librarah. Go take a look, my good man. A body, indeed!

Webster returns.

Webster: I’m sorry to report sir, but there is a body in the library.

Dolly Ambrose has entered as Webster was speaking.

Dolly: What’s Webster talking about—a body in the library?

Ambrose: Apparently so. You didn’t order one from Harrods by any chance, my dear?

Dolly: You know, Welly, that Harrods cut off our credit two years ago. I think you should call your golfing partner, the Chief Constable. It’s probably a police matter.

Ambrose: Righto. And you should send the chauffeur for your friend Jane Maypole—the one who solves all the crimes around here.

Dolly: You dismissed the chauffeur last month, Welly.

Ambrose: Then have her take a taxi.

An hour or so later.

Chief Constable: Because the body was clad in a silvery evening gown and open-toed, high-heeled shoes, the crime scene team have speculated that the body is that of a woman. 

Ambrose: A woman. Now that is a turn-up. Anything else you can tell me, Dexter?

Chief Constable: The money’s on foul play.

They are interrupted by a small, spidery woman in a flowery housedress, holding a brown handbag with both hands.

Woman: Indeed, Chief Constable. And I fear much worse is to come.

Dolly: May I introduce you to Jane Maypole, Dexter?

Chief Constable: How do you do, Miss Maypole. Your crime-solving exploits have preceded you. But why do you say that much worse is to come?

Jane: It reminds me of the time that Eleanor Bushville, the butcher’s daughter ran away from St. Runnymede with the seed salesman. She, too, had fingernails like the woman in the library—all bitten to the nub. Oh yes, that was a terrible event.

Enter a Detective.

Detective: Our first breakthrough, Chief Constable. One of the constables recognized the dress from a poster at the Hotel de la Mer—you know, at Beachhurst. It was advertising the arrival of a Lily Deshea as a dance instructor.

Chief Constable: Good work, Simmons. Now we know who the victim is.

Jane: Oh, but, Chief Constable, we don’t. Her fingernails.

***

Chapter Sixteen

One Week Later

Scene: A sunlit room at the Hotel de la Mer

Dolly: So, Jane, it really was about the fingernails.

Jane: Yes. A ballroom dance instructress would never chew her fingernails like that. That’s why I suspected a switch of bodies.

Ambrose: That is quite remarkable. 

Dolly: And it was all about getting old Mr. Robinson’s inheritance? With Lily Deshea out of the way, the daughter-in-law would inherit?

Ambrose: But why put the body in my librarah?

Jane: Now, that was the tricky part. But I remembered a school play in St. Runnymede which involved the switch of characters. That was what gave me the final clue.

Dolly: You are amazing, Jane. You and St. Runnymede!

The End

*

Obviously inspired by the television adaptation of Agatha Christie's The Body in the Library starring Joan Hickson as Miss Marple, with Moray Watson as the Colonel. I recommend the show--but I especially hope that you get to see the first twenty minutes or so, which, if not falling on the floor hilarious, are a wonderful send-up of the British county upper class and are certainly giggle worthy.