The Man in the Brown Suit
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| The Man in the Brown Suit | |
 Dust-jacket illustration of the first UK edition |
|
| Author | Agatha Christie |
|---|---|
| Cover artist | Not known |
| Country | United Kingdom |
| Language | English |
| Genre(s) | Crime novel |
| Publisher | Bodley Head |
| Publication date | August 1924 |
| Media type | Print (Hardcover & Paperback) |
| Pages | 312 pp (first edition, hardcover) |
| ISBN | NA |
| Preceded by | Poirot Investigates |
| Followed by | The Road of Dreams |
The Man in the Brown Suit is a work of detective fiction by Agatha Christie and first published in the UK by The Bodley Head in August 1924[1] and in the US by Dodd, Mead and Company later in the same year[2]. The UK edition retailed at seven shillings and sixpence (7/6)[1] and the US edition at $2.00[2].
Contents |
[edit] Plot introduction
Like The Secret Adversary, the novel concentrates less on pure detection and is more a thriller of the period. It follows the adventures of Anne Beddingfeld as she gets involved in a world of diamond thieves, murderers and political intrigue in this tale set in exotic Southern Africa. Colonel Race makes his first appearance in the novel; he later appears in Cards on the Table, Sparkling Cyanide, and Death on the Nile.
[edit] Plot summary
Nadina, a feted "Russian" dancer in Paris receives a visit in her dressing room from a man calling himself Count Sergius Paulovitch. Neither of the pair are Russians; he is English and she is South African and both of them are in the service of a man they call "the Colonel", an international Agent provocateur, crook and organiser of terrorism. After many years of organising his crimes, 'the colonel' is now planning to retire, leaving his agents high and dry, both financially and in terms of the evidence accumulated against them. Nadina though has other plans; many years before, in arranging for the substitution and smuggling of a hundred thousand pounds worth of De Beers diamonds out of South Africa, Nadina kept some of the stones back and now plans to blackmail 'the colonel'. Nadina is being joined tomorrow by her accomplice from South Africa – her husband...
Anne Beddingfield is an English orphan following the recent death of her Professor father. Having lived in a country village all her life she longs for adventure and jumps at the chance when her father's solicitor, Mr. Flemming, suggests she lives with him and his wife in London. Returning from an unsuccessful job interview one day, Anne is on the platform at Hyde Park Corner tube station when a man looks over her shoulder, staggers back in terror at something or someone he sees, and falls onto the live track, dying instantly. A doctor examines the man on the platform once he has been pulled to safety, pronounces him dead and hurriedly leaves, dropping a note on his way. Anne picks up the note which reads "17.1 22 Kilmorden Castle".
The inquest on the dead man (identified as 'L. B. Carton') brings a verdict of suicide. In his pocket was a house agent's order to view a house for let – The Mill House in Marlow – and the next day the newspapers report that a dead woman has been found there – strangled. The house is owned by Sir Eustace Pedler MP, who is on vacation on the French Riviera. The gardener's wife gave the dead woman the keys to the house as she too had a supposed agent's appointment. A few minutes later a young man in a brown suit followed her in and he came out soon afterwards looking shocked.
Anne goes to see an uninterested policeman about the Tube suicide as she has realised after the event that the 'doctor' did not examine the dead man in the same way as she saw doctors working in the war when she was a nurse. She then goes to see Lord Naseby, publisher of the Daily Budget newspaper who agrees to publish anything interesting from the investigations Anne intends to make over the note dropped in the tube station. After fruitless investigations at Mill House, by sheer good chance Anne finds out that Kilmorden Castle is the name of a boat sailing on 17th January 1922 from Southampton to Cape Town and she books a passage on it.
Once on board ship, Anne makes the acquaintance of the other passengers including society lady the Hon. Mrs Suzanne Blair and Colonel Race. Also on board ship is Sir Eustace Pedler himself who has been entrusted by the government to go to South Africa with a confidential document to be given to General Smuts. In addition to his normal secretary, Guy Pagett, there is a second secretary, a young man supposedly supplied by the government who goes by the name of Harry Rayburn.
Anne wants to change cabins as she was to be put in Cabin 13 and she is superstitious and is strenuously opposed in this move by both Pagett and a clerical gentleman named Rev. Chichester who are suspiciously eager to claim Cabin 17 for themselves, leaving Anne to wonder if the '17' on the dropped note refers to the cabin number, not the date, and the '1' means 1.00am or pm. At 1.00am on the morning of the 22nd a young man staggers into her cabin having been stabbed. Anne hides the man while she answers a stewardess's enquiry as to whether everything is alright. After she has gone Anne is able to dress the man's slight wound but the man is not in the least bit grateful and leaves after an altercation with her. The next day Anne's cabin is ransacked while she is out. She resolves to investigate the people she is suspicious of, starting with the Rev. Chichester who becomes alarmed when he inadvertently drops a piece of paper on deck which is picked up and returned to him by Pedler. Anne also finds out that Pagett becomes agitated when anyone asks him about some time he spent in Florence recently. In addition, she becomes suspicious of Colonel Race when he converses with her on the subject of her father's work and makes some elementary mistakes despite claiming to have known him well.
Sir Eustace keeps a diary whilst on his trip and in it he recounts how he managed to read the words on the note dropped by Chichester: it stated, "Don't try to play a lone hand or it will be the worse for you". Pedler also confides his observations of Pagett's suspicious actions to the diary.
One evening on ship, the talk turns to the De Beers diamond fields of Kimberley and Colonel Race recounts a story of the theft of a hundred thousand pounds worth of diamonds some years before, supposedly by the son of the South African gold magnate, John Eardsley and his friend Lucas. They claimed to have found another source of diamonds at the same time that a theft took place from De Beers. John and his friend were arrested but John's father, Sir Laurence, disowned his son. John Eardsley was killed in the war and his father's huge fortune passed to a next of kin who he hardly knew. Lucas was posted as "missing in action". Harry Rayburn walks into the cabin as the story is being told, overhears it, looks sickly and leaves. Race reveals he himself is the fortunate next of kin.
The next day, Anne finds out that there are no stewardesses on night duty on the ship and is therefore puzzled who the woman was on the night she helped the stabbed man. She decided to confide in Suzanne. Harry Rayburn was the stabbed man - he and Anne had not met on ship previously - and Suzanne helps her realises the mysterious stewardess was the Rev. Chichester in disguise. They examine the piece of paper Anne obtained in the underground station and realise that a flaw in the paper adds a dot where there shouldn't be one and that it could therefore be referring to cabin 71 – Suzanne's cabin. She was given it when the booked passenger failed to turn up. This was a Mrs Grey but that was a pseudonym for the Russian dancer Nadina. Race has told Suzanne of his suspicions of Nadina and her links to 'the Colonel'. Anne and Suzanne speculate that Nadina was the dead woman in the Mill House. Anne suddenly connects her memory of finding a roll of unexposed films in the Mill House with a canister of returned films that were dropped into Suzanne's cabin on night of the 22nd by a steward. They look in the canister and find uncut diamonds. They speculate that Harry Rayburn is the "Man in the Brown Suit".
In investigating further, Anne presses the steward who left the films in cabin 71 for information and finds out that he was paid to do so by a man whose description matches that of the man who died in the underground station. She also traps Pagett into a conversation on Florence and his conversation reveals he knows next to nothing about the city, despite claiming to have been there recently. Anne makes an "innocent" comment that she thought she once saw him in Marlow and the man flees from her company. Suzanne and Anne make plans to keep an eye on their suspects once they arrive in Cape Town and go on their onward journeys – Suzanne has been invited along with Race to accompany Pedler to Rhodesia. Anne confesses to her that she has fallen for Harry.
That night Anne is attacked as she walks the deck of the ship. Harry Rayburn saves her but the attacker gets away. Searching further Anne and Harry find Pagett unconscious. Anne amazes Harry with her knowledge of events in Marlow, at Hyde Park Corner station and suggests that Harry may be Lucas and the "Man in the Brown Suit". They again part on bad terms.
Pedler confides in his diary, once in Cape Town, that Pagett told him the next day that he followed Rayburn round the ship when he was suspicious that he was having a secret meeting in the middle of the night. Pedler's attention is taken by the fact that his letter to General Smuts is in fact a blank piece of paper and Pagett suggests that Rayburn may have substituted it. He further suggests that Harry is the "Man in the Brown Suit", annoying Pedler who states that he is going to leave Pagett in the Cape when he goes to Rhodesia in his private train and he wants to take Anne as his secretary for the trip.
Anne is warned by Rayburn that she is meddling in things she doesn't understand but he admits to being the "Man in the Brown Suit". His warning to Anne bears fruit when she is lured to a house at Muizenberg where she is held and imprisoned in the attic by a bearded Dutchman who tells her that she will tell everything she knows tomorrow when they question her. Anne manages to escape her bonds. She explores the house and overhears the Rev. Chichester speaking with the Dutchman about "the colonel" wanting to question her tomorrow. Anne retreats back to her attic prison as there are too many people about but the next day she manages to escape the house and make her way back to Cape Town. There she finds out that the news has got out that Harry is wanted as the "Man in the Brown Suit" but has gone missing. Pedler is even more annoyed at the way the attention about this inconveniences him and again offers Anne the role of his secretary on the train trip to Rhodesia. She refuses as she wants to keep an eye on Pagett but the next morning Anne realises that she is being followed by someone who she later sees talking to Pagett and then speaking to a policeman. Anne thinks she is being set up. She races for the station and manages to get onto the train before being caught and is then reunited with Race, Suzanne and Pedler who has had employed for him a mannish secretary by Pagett who goes by the name of Miss Pettigrew.
In Bulawayo, Anne receives a note, supposedly from Harry, which lures her out to the Palm Gully, a ravine crossed by a rope bridge near their hotel. There she is pursued by a sinister figure, and running, falls into darkness...
Almost a month later, Anne awakens in a hut on an island in the Zambezi with Harry Rayburn. He rescued her and a native woman has been tending to her ever since. She has a badly knocked head and a wrenched arm. She fell because the stones which marked the dark path down into the ravine had been moved – causing her to step over the edge. Anne stays some time on the island, her and Harry falling in love. Anne correctly guesses that Harry Rayburn is Harry Lucas. Harry tells her of the diamond discovery he and John Eardsley made years earlier. They were quickly duped by a young woman called Anita Grünberg who substituted their diamonds for ones stolen from De Beers. John's father managed to get the charge dropped but disowned his son. They both enlisted in the war and John was killed. Harry as listed as missing in action and used this to disappear, coming to Africa under the name of Harry Parker. Some time later he came across a man – Carton - and recognised him from the incident with Anita Grünberg. Under threats he confessed that Grünberg – Nadina by another name – was in the employ of "the Colonel" and had the evidence which would clear Harry and his dead friend, this evidence being the substituted diamonds from years earlier. He followed Carton to London and there came across Nadina again although as Harry was in disguise, neither of them recognised him. Following Carton into the tube station, Carton did, with a shock, finally recognise Harry and fell back onto the line. Harry followed Nadina to the Mill House and found her there already dead. He realised that she hadn't had the diamonds on her, not did Carton and that they were probably still on the Kilmorden Castle. Anne confirms they were and were handed to Suzanne in her cabin on the night of the 22nd.
Harry's island is attacked that night by a party led by the red-bearded Dutchman but the two manage to escape and Anne plans to return to Pedler's party where she can keep an eye on developments. They exchange codes to be used in order that neither can be duped again. In the meantime, Pedler's diary has detailed the hue and cry which erupted when Anne disappeared. Some time later, Sir Eustace is at Johannesburg when Suzanne sends him a telegram stating that Anne has turned up safe and sound. He is similarly amazed to bump into Colonel Race who tells him of Harry's true identity and that he saw Miss Pettigrew going into a curio shop which he knows is connected with "the Colonel's" organisation.
Reunited with Suzanne, Anne is told that the diamonds are with luggage sent on with Sir Eustace. She also receives telegram from Harry telling her to meet him but it is not in their code. Pagett turns up at Kimberley on the way to Johannesburg to meet Sir Eustace. Anne accosts him and accuses him of being in Marlow. Pagett tells her two interesting facts which change everything...
Anne turns up for the false meeting with Harry and again bumps into Chichester, alias Miss Pettigrew. She boldly asks to be taken to Sir Eustace and her request is promptly carried out as the man is already in the building she has been led to – Sir Eustace is "the Colonel"! The 'facts' that Pagett told her were that he, Pagett, is married with children and his family is in Marlow. He was there visiting them when he should have been in Florence and saw Pedler who he thought was still on the Riviera – Anne has realised from this that Pedler killed Nadina and therefore what his true identity is. Pedler confesses the truth – he sent Pagett off to Florence in order that he wouldn't know that he'd left the Riviera but because Pagett used the break to visit his family, his alibi was broken (and that was the reason Pagett knew next to nothing of Florence or Italy and became evasive when asked). At the falls, it was Chichester, in truth a man called Arthur Minx, who lured Anne down the wrong path on Pedler's orders.
Pedler forces Anne to write a note to Harry to lure him to the curio shop which she does but she does not include their code in it. Harry turns up and Pedler is exultant – until Anne pulls out a pistol that she bought with her and they capture Pedler, albeit they are in a house full of his thugs. Harry tells Pedler that he was followed out the curio shop and he and Race have been working together altered by Suzanne as to Anne's movements. Race turns up with reinforcements and Pedler tries to bluff matters out but Minx has gone over to their side and tells him of his visit to Nadina in Paris in the disguise of Count Sergius Paulovitch. Shortly after that, Harry recruited Minx over to their side. They have all the evidence they need against Pedler and arrest him.
The next day, while recovering on a farm on the veld, Anne is told that Sir Eustace managed to escape his guard. Anne is somewhat pleased, having grown a certain fondness for the man's charms. Race tells her that Harry is in fact John Eardsley, not Lucas, and therefore the heir to the fortune. John however has found his happiness with Anne and they marry and live on the island in the Zambezi with Race continuing to manage the estate of John's inheritance.
[edit] Characters in "The Man in the Brown Suit"
- Anne Beddingfield, orphaned daughter of Professor Beddingfield, famous archaeologist
- John Eardsley, son of Sir Laurence Eardsley, the South African mining magnate, alias Harry Rayburn
- Colonel Johnny Race, a distant cousin of Sir Laurence Eardsley
- The Hon. Mrs Suzanne Blair, a society lady
- Sir Eustace Pedler, MP, alias 'The Colonel', a criminal mastermind.
- Guy Pagett, Sir Eustace Pedler's secretary
- Anita Grünberg, alias Nadina, alias Mrs de Castina – one-time agent of 'The Colonel'
- Arthur Minks, alias the Rev. Edward Chichester alias Miss Pettigrew, alias Count Sergius Paulovitch - an agent of 'The Colonel'
- Harry Lucas, friend of John Eardsley, killed in the war.
- Mr Flemming, solicitor, and his wife: Anne's landlords after her father's death
- L. B. Carton, husband of Anita Grünberg and victim at Hyde Park Tube Station.
- Inspector Meadows of Scotland Yard
- Lord Naseby, Owner of the Daily Budget and Anne's employer
- A red-bearded Dutchman, an agent of 'The Colonel'
- Mrs Caroline James, wife of the gardener at The Mill House.
[edit] Literary significance and reception
The Times Literary Supplement reviewed the novel in its issue of September 25, 1924. The review appreciated the "thriller-cum-adventure" style of the book and concluded "The author sets so many questions to the reader in her story, questions which will almost certainly be answered wrongly, that no one is likely to nod over it, and even the most experienced reader of romances will fail to steer an unerring course and reach the harbour of solution through the quicksands and shoals of blood, diamonds, secret service, impersonation, kidnapping, and violence with which the mystery is guarded."[3]
The unnamed reviewer in The Observer of September 7, 1924 said that, "Miss Christie has done one bold and one regrettable thing in this book. She has dispensed with Hercule Poirot, her own particular Sherlock Holmes, to whose presence and bonhomie and infallibility the success of her previous books has been mainly due." After comparing Poirot with Harry Rayburn, the reviewer continued by saying that the book, "will be something of a disappointment to those who remember The Mysterious Affair at Styles. It is an excellent and ingenious complexity, in its way, but it might have been written by quite a number of the busy climbers of who now throng this particular slope of Parnassus. One almost suspects that Miss Christie contemplates exchanging the mantle of Conan Doyle for that of Miss Dell; a hazardous manoeuvre, for the two authoresses are very different in tastes and sympathies." The reviewer went on to say that, "The plan of the book is rather confused. There is a prologue which does not link itself up with the rest of the story for quite a long time; and the idea of giving alternate passages from the diaries of the heroine and of Sir Eustace Pedler is not altogether justified by the glimpses it gives of that entertaining but disreputable character. One of the points on which some readers will have doubts is as to the plausibility of the villain: assuredly he is a novel type in that role. The book, like all Miss Christie's work is written with spirit and humour."[4]
Robert Barnard: "Written during and about a drip to Southern Africa, this opens attractively with the heroine and her archeologist father (Agatha's interest in the subject was obviously pre-Max), and has some pleasant interludes with the diary of the baddie. But it degenerates into the usual stuff of her thrillers, and the plot would probably not bear close examination, if anyone were to take the trouble."[5]
[edit] References to actual history, geography and current science
The book has some parallels to incidents and settings of a round-the-world work trip taken by Christie with her first husband Archie Christie and headed by his old teacher from Clifton College, Major E. A. Belcher, to promote the forthcoming 1924 British Empire Exhibition. The tour lasted from January 20 to December 1, 1922 (It was on the tour that Christie wrote the short stories which would form all of Poirot Investigates (1924) and most of the contents of Poirot's Early Cases (published in 1974)[6].) Dining with Belcher before the trip, he had suggested setting a mystery novel in his home, the Mill House at Dorney, naming the book The Mystery of the Mill House and insisted on being in it as well. He is the inspiration for the central character Sir Eustace Pedler, having been given a title at Archie's suggestion[7], and the Mill House also makes an appearance, albeit transposed to Marlow.
[edit] Film, TV or theatrical adaptations
The book was adapted by Alan Shayne Productions in association with Warner Brothers Television as TV movie in 1988. The adaptation is set in a more contemporary era than the 1920's and many details are changed as a result.
Adapator: Carla Jean Wagner
Director: Alan Grint
Cast:
Stephanie Zimbalist played Anne Beddingfield
Rue McClanahan played Suzy Blair
Tony Randall played Rev. Edward Chichester
Edward Woodward played Sir Eustace Pedler
Ken Howard played Gordon Race
Nickolas Grace played Guy Underhill
Simon Dutton played Harry Lucas
María Casal played Anita
Federico Luciano played Leo Carton
Rose McVeigh played Valerie
Jorge Bosso played Businessman
José Canalejas played First Arab
Tibi Costa played Second Arab(as Tiby Costa)
Robert Case played Ship's Captain
James Duggan played Steward
Gabriel Edu played Shop Clerk
Bill Holden played John Eardsley
Charly Mahdy played First Taxi driver
Aldo Sambrell played Second Taxi driver
Alito Rodgers played Third Taxi driver
Antonio Ross played a Concierge
Elias Mayali played a Policeman
Jack Taylor played s Police inspector
Claudio Vicente played a Pianist
[edit] Publication history
- 1924, John Lane (The Bodley Head), August 1924, Hardcover, 312 pp
- 1924, Dodd Mead and Company (New York), 1924, Hardcover, 275 pp
- 1949, Dell Books (New York), 1949, Paperback, (Dell number 319 [mapback]), 223 pp
- 1953, Pan Books, 1953, Paperback, (Pan number 250), 190 pp
- 1958, Pan Books, 1958, Paperback, (Great Pan G176)
- 1978, Panther Books (London), 1978, 192 pp, ISBN 0-58-604516-3
- 1984, Ulverscroft Large Print Edition, Hardcover, ISBN 0-70-891125-0
- 1988, Fontana Books (Imprint of HarperCollins), 1988, Paperback, 240 pp, ISBN 0-00-617475-2
- 2007, Facsimile of 1924 UK first edition (HarperCollins), November 5, 2007, Hardcover, 312 pp, ISBN 0-00-726518-2
Following completion in late 1923 [8]The Man in the Brown Suit was first serialised in the London Evening News under the title Anne the Adventurous. It ran in fifty instalments from Thursday, November 29, 1923 to Monday, January 28, 1924. There were slight amendments to the text, either to make sense of the openings of an instalment (e.g. changing "She then..." to "Anne then..."), or omitting small sentences or words. The main change was in the chapter division. The published book has thirty-six chapters whereas the serialisation has only twenty-eight[9].
In her 1977 Autobiography Christie makes a slight mistake with the name of the serialisation and refers to it as Anna the Adventuress (possibly confusing it with the 1904 book of the same name by E. Phillips Oppenheim). Irrespective of this mistake, the change from her preferred title was not of her choosing and the newspaper's choice was one that she considered to be "as silly a title as I have ever heard". She raised no objections however as the Evening News were paying her £500 for the serial rights which she and her family considered an enormous sum[10]. At Archie's suggestion, she used the money to purchase a grey, bottle-nosed Morris Cowley. She later stated that acquiring her own car ranked with dining at Buckingham Palace as one of the two most exciting incidents in her life.[11]
Christie was less pleased with the dustjacket of the book, complaining to the Bodley Head that the illustration by the un-named artist looked as if the incident at the Tube Station depicted was set in "mediaeval times" when she wanted something "more clear, definite and modern". [12] The Bodley Head were anxious to sign a new contract with Christie, now recognising her potential, but she wanted to move on, feeling that "they had not treated a young author fairly".[13]
The US serialisation was in the Blue Book magazine in three instalments from September (Volume 39, Issue 5) to November 1924 (Volume 40, Issue 1) with each issue containing an uncredited illustration.
[edit] Book dedication
Christie's dedication in the book reads:
"To E.A.B. In memory of a journey, some Lion stories and a request that I should some day write the Mystery of the Mill House".
E.A.B. is Major E. A. Belcher (see Allusions to actual history, geography and current science above).
[edit] Dustjacket blurb
The dustjacket front flap of the first edition carried no specially written blurb. Instead both the front and back flap carried adverts for other Bodley Head novels.
[edit] Comic strip adaptation
The Man in the Brown Suit was released by HarperCollins as a comic strip adaptation on December 3, 2007, adapted by Hughot and illustrated by Bairi. ISBN 0-00-725062-2
[edit] References
- ^ a b The English Catalogue of Books. Vol XI (A-L: January 1921 – December 1925). Kraus Reprint Corporation, Millwood, New York, 1979 (page 309)
- ^ a b American Tribute to Agatha Christie
- ^ The Times Literary Supplement September 25, 1924 (Page 598)
- ^ The Observer September 7, 1924 (Page 5)
- ^ Barnard, Robert. A Talent to Deceive – an appreciation of Agatha Christie - Revised edition (Page 196). Fontana Books, 1990. ISBN 0006374743
- ^ Morgan, Janet. Agatha Christie, A Biography. (Page 108). Collins, 1984 ISBN 0-00-216330-6
- ^ Christie, Agatha. An Autobiography. (Pages 310-311). Collins, 1977 ISBN 0-00-216012-9
- ^ Morgan. (Page 109).
- ^ Holdings at the British Library (Newspapers - Colindale). Shelfmark: NPL LON LD23
- ^ Christie. Autobiography (Page 319).
- ^ Christie. Autobiography (Pages 320-321).
- ^ Morgan. (Pages 110-111).
- ^ Christie. Autobiography (Page 318).
[edit] External links
- The Man in the Brown Suit at the official Agatha Christie website
- The Man in the Brown Suit at the Internet Movie Database
