A Pocket Full of Rye by Agatha Christie

it with the tongs, adding another piece of wood and a little coal.
    Gladys went out into the kitchen where Mrs Crump raised a red and wrathful face from the kitchen table where she was mixing pastry in a large bowl.
    “The library bell's been ringing and ringing. Time you took in the tea, my girl.”
    “All right, all right, Mrs Crump.”
    “What I'll say to Crump tonight,” muttered Mrs Crump. “I'll tell him off.”
    Gladys went on into the pantry. She had not cut any sandwiches. Well, she jolly well wasn't going to cut sandwiches. They'd got plenty to eat without that, hadn't they? Two cakes, biscuits and scones and honey. Fresh black market farm butter. Plenty without her bothering to cut tomato or foie gras sandwiches. She'd got other things to think about. Fair temper Mrs Crump was in, all because Mr Crump had gone out this afternoon. Well, it was his day out, wasn't it? Quite right of him, Gladys thought. Mrs Crump called out from the kitchen:
    “The kettle's boiling its head off. Aren't you ever going to make that tea?”
    “Coming.”
    She jerked some tea without measuring it into the big silver pot, carried it into the kitchen and poured the boiling water on it. She added the teapot and the kettle to the big silver tray and carried the whole thing through to the library where she set it on the small table near the sofa. She went back hurriedly for the other tray with the eatables on it. She carried the latter as far as the hall when the sudden jarring noise of the grandfather clock preparing itself to strike made her jump.
    In the library, Adele Fortescue said querulously, to Mary Dove.
    “Where is everybody this afternoon?”
    “I really don't know, Mrs Fortescue. Miss Fortescue came in some time ago. I think Mrs Percival's writing letters in her room.”
    Adele said pettishly, “Writing letters, writing letters. That woman never stops writing letters. She's like all people of her class. She takes an absolute delight in death and misfortune. Ghoulish, that's what I call it. Absolutely ghoulish.”
    Mary murmured tactfully, “I'll tell her that tea is ready.”
    Going towards the door she drew back a little in the doorway as Elaine Fortescue came into the room. Elaine said:
    “It's cold,” and dropped down by the fireplace, rubbing her hands before the blaze.
    Mary stood for a moment in the hall. A large tray with cakes on it was standing on one of the hall chests. Since it was getting dark in the hall, Mary switched on the light. As she did so she thought she heard Jennifer Fortescue walking along the passage upstairs. Nobody, however, came down the stairs and Mary went up the staircase and along the corridor.
    Percival Fortescue and his wife occupied a self-contained suite in one wing of the house. Mary tapped on the sitting-room door. Mrs Percival liked you to tap on doors, a fact which always roused Crump's scorn of her. Her voice said briskly:
    “Come in.”
    Mary opened the door and murmured:
    “Tea is just coming in, Mrs Percival.”
    She was rather surprised to see Jennifer Fortescue with her outdoor clothes on. She was just divesting herself of a long camel-hair coat.
    “I didn't know you'd been out,” said Mary.
    Mrs Percival sounded slightly out of breath.
    “Oh, I was just in the garden, that's all. Just getting a little air. Really, though, it was too cold. I shall be glad to get down to the fire. The central heating here isn't as good as it might be. Somebody must speak to the gardeners about it, Miss Dove.”
    “I'll do so,” Mary promised.
    Jennifer Fortescue dropped her coat on a chair and followed Mary out of the room. She went down the Stairs ahead of Mary, who drew back a little to give her precedence. In the hall, rather to Mary's surprise, she noticed the tray of eatables was still there. She was about to go out to the pantry and call to Gladys when Adele Fortescue appeared in the door of the library, saying in an irritable voice:
    “Aren't we ever going to have anything to