POSTERN OF FATE Agatha Christie

said. 'Yes of course, I know it's a kind of prestige. It shows that I am a
very valuable dog.' He wagged his tail. Since there seemed nobody to
oppose Hannibal walking in the churchyard with his master, suitably
secured as he was by a stalwart lead, Tommy wandered round,
checking perhaps Tuppence's researches of a former day.
He looked first at a worn stone monument more or less behind a little
side door into the church. It was, he thought, probably one of the
oldest. There were several of them there, most of them bearing dates
in the eighteen-hundreds. There was one, however, that Tommy
looked at longest.
'Odd,' he said, 'damned odd.'
Hannibal looked up at him. He did not understand this piece of
Master's conversation. He saw nothing about the gravestone to
interest a dog. He sat down, looked up at his master enquiringly.
Chapter 5
THE WHITE ELEPHANT SALE
Tuppence was pleasurably surprised to find the brass lamp which she
and Tommy now regarded with such repulsion welcomed with the
utmost warmth.