Modismos en novelas de Agatha Christie

Uno de los atractivos de leer a Agatha Christie es la gran cantidad de modismos y verbos frasales que encontramos en las páginas de sus novelas. Comparto hoy con vosotros unos cuantos modismos sacados de dos de mis novelas favoritas: The Body in the Library, con Miss Marple y Five Little Pigs, con Hercule Poirot. El ejercicio que os propongo es completar los modismos correctamente y tratar de encontrar el equivalente más próximo en español.

The Body in the Library

1.- The Colonel says he doesn't know her from .........
2.- No good crying over spilt ..........The girl's dead - strangled.
3.- Jefferson wasted no time in beating about the ..........
4.- But Time, as my dear mother used to say, is a great .........
5.- But you'll admit, sir, that the two things would fit in very prettily together.  Kill two birds with one ...........
6.- I should say the widow found it difficult to make both ends.......and send her son to a good school.
7.- It's like wanting to wipe the slate .......and start again.
 8.- It sounds to me the kind of village domestic problem that is right up Miss Marple's ..............
9.- They're saying, one and all, that there's no smoke without .........
10.- She was the apple of his ........ He adored her.

Five Little Pigs

11.- Old Mayhew could have told you more than I can. But there - he's joined the great ...........
12.- It was Elsa who had insisted on spilling the ........
13.- I'm on good .......with my neighbours.
14.- He warned her what kind of man he was - but she would not take warning. She rushed on her Fate. And to a man like Crale women were fair ..........
15.- Oh, damn it all, man, you can't flog a dead ......... It's all over and done with years ago.
16.- Why the devil couldn't she hold her tongue? Now the fat's in the .......
17.- She was really amazing. I've got to hand it ........her.
18.- She wasn't prepared to take this lying ..........But like a fool I thought that she had made up her mind to accept the inevitable - or else she posibly thought that if she carried on exactly as usual  Amyas might change his mind.
19.- In looks I can't hold a ......to this Elsa child, and I know it. 
20.- Hercule Poirot hastened to pour oil on troubled ........

CLAVE

1.- Adam - not know somebody from Adam (no conocer a alguien de nada).
2.- milk - it's no good crying over spilt milk (agua pasada no mueve molino/a lo hecho, pecho).
3.- bush - to beat about the bush (andarse con rodeos).
4.- healer - time is a great healer ( el tiempo todo lo cura).
5.- stone - to kill two birds with one stone (matar dos pájaros de un tiro).
6.- meet - to make both ends meet (conseguir llegar a fin de mes/conseguir que alcance el dinero).
7.- clean - to wipe the slate clean (hacer borrón y cuenta nueva).
8.- street - to be right up somebody's street (ser la especialidad de alguien/de lo que más sabe).
9.- fire - there's no smoke without fire (cuando el río suena, agua lleva).
10.- eye - to be the apple of somebody's eye (ser el ojito derecho de alguien/la niña de sus ojos).
11.- majority - to join the great majority (unirse a la gran mayoría/morir).
12.- beans - to spill the beans (descubrir el pastel/irse de la lengua).
13.- terms - to be on good terms with somebody (llevarse bien con alguien).
14.- game - to be fair game (ser presa fácil).
15.- horse - to flog a dead horse (malgastar saliva/machacar en hierro frío/hablar con la pared).
16.- fire - the fat is in the fire (se va a armar la gorda).
17.- to - to have (got) to hand it to somebody [tener que reconocer (un mérito) a alguien].
18.- down - to take something lying down (aceptar algo sin rechistar).
19.- candle - can't hold a candle to somebody (no llegarle a alguien a la suela del zapato).
20.- waters - to pour oil on troubled waters (calmar los ánimos).