Welcome to the third installment of our brand new Tale for Our Time, the first of this season's Christmas capers, written by Jefferson Farjeon and published in 1937. You can enjoy Mystery in White episode by episode, night by night, twenty minutes before you lower your lamp. Or, alternatively, do feel free to binge-listen: you can find the earlier installments here. As Larry Durham, a South Carolina member of The Mark Steyn Club, puts it:
Can't wait to lower the lamp and dive into the latest TFOT.
In tonight's episode, having abandoned their snowbound train on Christmas Eve, a not entirely compatible house party adjusts to its new surroundings:
With a ridiculous sensation that he was being heroic, Thomson found his way into the kitchen. So far, he had to admit, he had not done much. He had neither suggested this expedition nor led it. When the attractive blonde had fallen into the ditch he had not been the one to lug her out or to carry her to the house...
Now, however, his imagination became abruptly alive, spurring him to translate it into reality. Often, in his imagination, he came upon a lady aviator who had had a crash, and after lifting her gently from the wreckage, he carried her to a small empty cottage, made her tea, and married her. It was the tea touch here that recalled him to his pedestal... Your David Carringtons searched upper floors looking for people they knew they would not find, but your Robert Thomsons went into the kitchen and made the needed cup of tea...
Members of The Mark Steyn Club can hear Mark read Episode Three simply by clicking here and logging-in.
If you've yet to hear any of our first sixty-seven Tales for Our Time, you can do so by joining The Mark Steyn Club. Or, if you need an extra-special present for someone, why not give your loved one a Gift Membership and start him or her off with over five dozen cracking yarns? And please join Mark tomorrow for another episode of Mystery in White.
