Agatha Christie - While the light lasts

He began painting with furious energy. The fierce joy of creation possessed him.

He represented the Princess surrounded by her court, reclining on a divan. A riot of Eastern color pervaded the picture. The Princess wore a marvelous gown of strange-colored embroideries; her golden hair fell round her, and on her head was a heavy jeweled circlet. Her maidens surrounded her, and Princes knelt at her feet bearing rich gifts. The whole scene was one of luxury and richness.

But the face of the Princess was turned away; she was oblivious of the laughter and mirth around her. Her gaze was fixed on a dark and shadowy corner where stood a seemingly incongruous object: a little grey stone idol with its head buried in its hand in a quaint abandonment of despair.

Was it so incongruous? The eyes of the young Princess rested on it with a strange sympathy, as though a dawning sense of her own isolation drew her glance irresistibly. They were akin, these two. The world was at her feet - yet she was alone: a Lonely Princess looking at a lonely little god.

All London talked of this picture, and Greta wrote a few hurried words of congratulation from Yorkshire, and Tom Hurley's wife besought Frank Oliver to "come for a weekend and meet a really delightful girl, a great admirer of your work.

" Frank Oliver laughed once sardonically, and threw the letter into the fire. Success had come - but what was the use of it? He only wanted one thing - that little lonely lady who had gone out of his life forever.

It was Ascot Cup Day, and the policeman on duty in a certain section of the British Museum rubbed his eyes and wondered if he were dreaming, for one does not expect to see there an Ascot vision, in a lace frock and a marvelous hat, a veritable nymph as imagined by a Parisian genius. The policeman stared in rapturous admiration.

The lonely god was not perhaps so surprised. He may have been in his way a powerful little god; at any rate, here was one worshipper brought back to the fold.

The Little Lonely Lady was staring up at him, and her lips moved in a rapid whisper.

"Dear little god, oh! dear little god, please help me! Oh, please do help me!"

Perhaps the little god was flattered. Perhaps, if he was indeed the ferocious, unappeasable deity Frank Oliver had imagined him, the long weary years and the march of civilization had softened his cold, stone heart. Perhaps the Lonely Lady had been right all along and he was really a kind little god. Perhaps it was merely a coincidence. However that may be, it was at that very moment that Frank Oliver walked slowly and sadly through the door of the Assyrian room.

He raised his head and saw the Parisian nymph.

In another moment his arm was round her, and she was stammering out rapid, broken words.

"I was so lonely - you know, you must have read that story I wrote; you couldn't have painted that picture unless you had, and unless you had understood. The Princess was I; I had everything, and yet I was lonely beyond words. One day I was going to a fortuneteller's, and I borrowed my maid's clothes. I came in here on the way and saw you looking at the little god. That's how it all began. I pretended - oh! it was hateful of me, and I went on pretending, and afterwards I didn't dare confess that I had told you such dreadful lies. I thought you would be disgusted at the way I had deceived you. I couldn't bear for you to find out, so I went away. Then I wrote that story, and yesterday I saw your picture. It was your picture, wasn't it?"

Only the gods really know the word "ingratitude."

It is to be presumed that the lonely little god knew the black ingratitude of human nature. As a divinity he had unique opportunities of observing it, yet in the hour of trial, he who had had sacrifices innumerable offered to him, made sacrifice in his turn. He sacrificed his only two worshippers in a strange land, and it showed him to be a great little god in his way, since he sacrificed all that he had.

Through the chinks in his fingers he watched them go, hand in hand, without a backward glance, two happy people who had found heaven and had no need of him any longer.

What was he, after all, but a very lonely little god in a strange land?

"Manx Gold" is no ordinary detective story; indeed, it is probably unique. The detectives are conventional enough, but although they are confronted with a particularly brutal murder, the murderer's identity is not their main concern. They are more interested in unraveling a series of clues to the whereabouts of hidden treasure, a treasure whose existence is not confined to the printed page. Clearly, some explanation is required...

In the winter of 1929, Alderman Arthur B. Crookall had an idea. Crookall was the chairman of the "June Effort," a committee responsible for boosting tourism to the Isle of Man, a small island off the northwest coast of England. His idea was that there should be a treasure hunt, inspired by the many legends of Manx smugglers and their long-forgotten hoards of booty.

There would be "real" treasure, hidden about the island, and clues to its location concealed in the framework of a detective story. Some reservations were expressed by members of the committee, but eventually planning began for the "Isle of Man Treasure Hunt Scheme," to take place at the start of the holiday season and run at the same time as a number of other annual events, such as the "Crowning of the Rose Queen" and the midnight yacht race.

But Crookall had to find someone to write the story on which the hunt would be based. Who better than Agatha Christie? Perhaps surprisingly, and for a fee of only sixty pounds, Christie accepted this, her most unusual commission. She visited the Isle of Man at the end of April 1930, staying as the guest of the lieutenant governor, before returning to Devon, where her daughter was ill. During her visit, Christie and Crookall spent several days discussing the treasure hunt, and visited various sites in order to decide where the treasure should be hidden and how the clues should be composed.

The resulting story, "Manx Gold," was published in five installments towards the end of May in the Daily Dispatch, a Manchester newspaper. A quarter of a million copies of the story also were distributed in booklet form to guesthouses and hotels across the island. The five clues were published separately, and as the date on which the first was due to appear in the Dispatch drew nearer, the June Effort Committee appealed to everyone to "cooperate in order to obtain as much publicity as possible" for the hunt. More tourists meant more tourist revenue, and the hunt was also drawn to the attention of several hundred "Homecomers" who had emigrated from the island to the United States and were due to return as honored guests in June. In the words of the publicity at the time, it was "an opportunity for all Amateur Detectives to test their skill!"

In the story, Juan Faraker and Fenella Mylecharane set out to find four chests of treasure, which have been hidden on the island by their eccentric Uncle Myles. To compete with Juan and Fenella, the reader was advised - like them - to equip himself with "several excellent maps, various guidebooks descriptive of the island, a book on folklore and a book on the history of the island."

The solutions to the clues are given at the end of the story.