II
‘Problems,’ said Tuppence, as she went down the hill and along OrchardRoad. Going along there, she wondered as she’d done before if there’dever been an orchard¹ attached to any of the houses. It seemed unlikelynowadays.
Mrs Barber² received her with great pleasure. She brought forward somevery delicious-looking éclairs.
‘What lovely things,’ said Tuppence. ‘Did you get them at Betterby’s?’
Betterby’s was the local confectionery shop.
‘Oh no, my aunt made them. She’s wonderful, you know. She does won-derful things.’ ‘E
‘?clairs are very difficult things to make,’ said Tuppence. ‘I could neversucceed with them.’
‘Well, you have to get a particular kind of flour. I believe that’s thesecret of it.’
The ladies drank coffee and talked about the difficulties of certain kindsof home cookery.
‘Miss Bolland was talking about you the other day, Mrs Beresford.’
‘Oh?’ said Tuppence. ‘Really? Bolland?’
‘She lives next to the vicarage. Her family has lived here a long time. Shewas telling us how she’d come and stayed here when she was a child. Sheused to look forward to it. She said, because there were such wonderfulgooseberries in the garden. And greengage trees too. Now that’s a thingyou practically⁴ never see nowadays, not real greengages. Something elsecalled gage³ plums or something, but they’re not a bit the same to taste.’
The ladies talked about things in the fruit line which did not taste likethe things used to, which they remembered from their childhood.
‘My great-uncle had greengage trees,’ said Tuppence.
‘Oh yes. Is that the one who was a canon at Anchester? Canon Hender-son used to live there, with his sister, I believe. Very sad it was. She waseating seed cake one day, you know, and one of the seeds got the wrongway. Something like that and she choked and she choked and she chokedand she died of it. Oh dear, that’s very sad, isn’t it?’ said Mrs Barber. ‘Verysad indeed. One of my cousins died choking,’ she said. ‘A piece of mutton.
It’s very easy to do, I believe, and there are people who die of

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