Agatha Christie's home open for tours

LONDON, Feb. 24 (UPI) -- England's National Trust has announced plans to open Greenway, the rural Devonshire home of the late mystery author Agatha Christie, to the public.

The Times of London said the drawing room at Greenway was where Christie entertained guests by reading to them from her latest manuscripts and inviting them to guess who the killer was.

On display at the house, which has undergone a $7.8 million restoration and is set to be opened to the public this weekend, are objects such as a brass-studded trunk that concealed the corpse of a murder victim and was inspected by Detective Hercule Poirot in Christie's short story "The Mystery of the Baghdad Chest," and a china Pierrot clown ornament that appeared in "Marvellous Mr. Quinn."

The house itself, which was given to the National Trust by Christie's family, was the setting for "Dead Man's Folly," another Poirot mystery that was adapted for the big screen and starred Peter Ustinov.

Visitors will not only be able to visit the house, but also will have the opportunity to rent part of it for holidays, The Times said.

Christie died in 1976 at the age of 85.