– such a strange sort of man – tall and dark, like a lost soul. The sun was setting, and the light of it through the trees made him look like a kind of Harlequin." In The Shadow on the Glass, the ill-fated Captain Allenson states that Mr and Mrs Scott are "doing the turtle dove stunt", thereby referring to the bird as a symbol of love. The name of house in the story – Greenway's House – is possibly derived from the name of Christie's future home, Greenway House, on the banks on the River Dart in Devon. Although Christie did not purchase the house until 1938, she had been aware of its existence since childhood. The Arlecchino restaurant features in both The Sign in the Sky and The Face of Helen as a place where Quin states he often goes. The word "Arlecchino" is Italian for "Harlequin". In The Face of Helen, Quin states that there are reasons why he is attracted to the opera Pagliacci. This opera (whose name translates in Italian as "Clowns") depicts a group of performers of the Commedia dell'arte in which Harlequin is one of the chief characters. The opera is also referenced in Swan Song, the final story in the 1934 collection The Listerdale Mystery. In The Bird with the Broken Wing, one of the songs that Mabelle Annesley plays and sings is The Swan by Edvard Grieg (En Svane from Op. 25 [No. 2] Six poems by Henrik Ibsen). In Harlequin's Lane, the lyrics of the "old Irish ballad" that Molly Stanwell sings are in fact from Christie's own poem Dark Sheila, first printed in the Poetry Today issue for May/June 1919 and later reprinted in her collections The Road of Dreams (1925) and Poems (1973). In Harlequin's Lane, Satterthwaith says to Quin, "Bring me the two most beautiful things in the city, said God. You know how it goes, eh?" He refers to the Happy Prince of Oscar Wilde in which God gives this order to an angel. References to actual history, geography and current science In The Dead Harlequin, the character of Aspasia Glen is an early attempt by Christie to portray the acclaimed American monologist Ruth Draper (1884–1956). She re-used and enlarged upon the idea in her 1933 novel Lord Edgware Dies with the character of Carlotta Adams. The story The Man from the Sea was written in