MISSING NOVELIST.

Manawatu Standard, Volume XLVII, Issue 9, 8 December 1926, Page 9

MISSING NOVELIST.

STRANGE DISAPPEARANCE. LOST MEMORY THEORY. "LONDON, Dec. 6. Mrs Agatha Christie, the well-known writer of detective serials, is herself the heroine of a countryside mystery. She is aged 35, and is the pretty, popular wife of Colonel Archibald Christie, recently in Australia in connection with the Empire Exhibition. Mrs Christie left her home in Berkshire in a motor car on Friday night, and a gipsy boy found the deserted car in the morning overhanging a chalkpit in a lonely part of the Surrey Downs. Evidently the car had been allowed to run 'down a steep declivity, and it is presumed that the driver wandered over the dreary downlands nearby. The police and 60 searchers dragged the lakes and ponds in the vicinity, including the mysterious “Silent Pool,” which has sinister memories in local legend, and figured in one of the missing writer’s stories. For three days and nights the search has been fruitless, though dogs are employed. It is believed that the disappearance is a case of lost memory.—-A. and N.Z. cable. SEARCH ABANDONED. LETTER IN POLICE HANDS. Received December 8, 12.10 p.m. LONDON, Dec. 7. The Daily News says that the police have taken possession of a letter which Mrs Christie wrote to a friend. The letter was postmarked the day after her (disappearance, and its contents! have not been disclosed. The search for Mrs Chris£i<e has been abandoned. —Sydney Sun cable.