I had read it years ago and still remembered the solution. Inspector Neele finally gets the breakthrough he needs once Miss Marple arrives on the scene.This is one of my favorite Miss Marple novels. Crump, or the young maid, Gladys? More deaths make it even more urgent to find the killer. His much younger widow, who doesn’t play golf yet has lots of golf dates with a handsome young man? His son and junior business partner? His daughter, who is in love with a young man with socialist views? Or his estranged son who has just reappeared on the scene from exile in Africa? Or maybe the murderer will be found among the household help, including the secretive housekeeper, Miss Dove, the butler, Crump, the cook, Mrs. What purpose did it serve? Inspector Neele is on the case, and of course he’s interested in finding out who would gain by Fortescue’s death. But the really puzzling thing is the handful of rye that was found in his pocket. It doesn’t take long to determine that he’s been poisoned.

Sing a song of sixpence, a pocket full of rye.Businessman Rex Fortescue is found dead in his office after drinking his morning tea. Not the best, but four stars plus none the less. This last bit is mostly speculation as there is a great lack of evidence, but later she receives confirmation of her ideas.This is another charming story with a confusing set of circumstances which lead to a very good read. While the police are skeptical at first, Miss Marple uses her charms to inveigle her way into the family, uncovers several secrets and delivers the surprising solution to the puzzle. She has read about a portion of the murders that has greatly upset her and so she is determined to become part of the investigation. To his rescue comes kindly, frail Miss Jane Marple. In charge of the case is Inspector Neele and while he starts out on possibly the right path, his footing is taken away when his chief suspect becomes body #2. His second wife, twenty years younger than he, his two sons, one returned from Africa just after the murder, and their wives, and Rex’s daughter Jennifer, are the main cast of likely suspects, along with several family servants. Rex Fortescue is the king of his family and his business, but he ends up at work, dead, poisoned that morning at breakfast.

It goes, “Four and twenty blackbirds baked in a pie.” But Dame Agatha has again taken something familiar from childhood and twisted it to her own dark ends. Here is a delightful but deadly take on the child’s nursery rhyme. A Pocketful Of Rye (1953) (Miss Marple #7) by Agatha Christie.

A pocket full of rye agatha christie