Magpie Murders

‘Physostigmine. It’s actually a cure for belladonna poisoning and I’d had to get some in for Henrietta Osborne, the vicar’s wife. She’d managed to step on a clump of deadly nightshade in Dingle Dell and as I’m sure you’ll know, Mr Pünd, atropine is an active ingredient in that particular plant. Physostigmine is effective in small doses but a larger amount can quite easily kill you.’

‘And you say it was taken.’

‘I didn’t say that. If I had any reason to believe that, I would have gone straight to the police. No. It could have been misplaced. We have a lot of medicines here and although we’re very careful, it has happened before. Or it could be that Mrs Weaver, who cleans here, had dropped and broken it. She’s not a dishonest woman but it would be just like her to clean up the mess and say nothing about it.’ Dr Redwing frowned. ‘I mentioned it to Mary Blakiston though. If someone in the village had made off with it for some reason, she’d have certainly been able to find out. She was a bit like you, in a way. A detective. She had a way of rooting things out of people. And in fact she did tell me she had one or two ideas.’

‘And a few days after this incident, she was dead.’

‘Two days, Mr Pünd. Exactly two days.’ There was a sudden silence as the significance – unspoken – hung in the air. Dr Redwing was looking increasingly uncomfortable. ‘I’m sure her death had nothing to do with it,’ she continued. ‘It was an accident. And it’s not as if Sir Magnus was poisoned. He was struck down with a sword!’

‘On the day that the physostigmine was removed, can you recall who came to the surgery?’ Pünd asked.

‘Yes. I went back to the appointment book to check. As I just said, three people came in that morning. Mrs Osborne I’ve already mentioned. Johnny Whitehead has an antique shop in the village square. He had quite a nasty cut on his hand, which had gone septic. And Clarissa Pye – she’s Sir Magnus’s sister – looked in with a stomach upset. There was nothing very much the matter with her to be honest with you. She lives on her own and she’s a bit of a hypochondriac. Really she just likes to have a chat. I don’t think this missing bottle had anything to do with what happened but it’s been on my conscience and I suppose it’s best if you’re aware of all the facts.’ She glanced at her watch. ‘Is there anything else?’ she asked. ‘I don’t mean to be rude but I have to be on my rounds.’

‘You have been most helpful, Dr Redwing.’ Pünd got to his feet and seemed to notice the oil painting for the first time. ‘Who is the boy?’ he asked.

‘Actually, it’s my son – Sebastian. That was painted just a few days before his fifteenth birthday. He’s in London now. We don’t see a great deal of him.’

‘It’s very good,’ Fraser said with real enthusiasm.

The doctor was pleased. ‘My husband, Arthur, painted it. I think he’s a quite exceptional artist and it’s one of my greatest regrets that his talent hasn’t been recognised. He’s painted me a couple of times and he did a quite lovely portrait of Lady Pye—’ She broke off. Fraser was surprised how agitated she had suddenly become. ‘You haven’t asked me anything about Sir Magnus Pye,’ she said.

‘Is there something you wish to tell me?’

‘Yes.’ She paused as if challenging herself to continue. When she spoke again, her voice was cold and controlled. ‘Sir Magnus Pye was a selfish, uncaring and egotistical man. Those new houses of his would have ruined a perfectly attractive corner of the village but that’s not the end of it. He never did anything kind for anyone. Did you notice the toys in the waiting room? Lady Pye gave them to us, but as a result of it she’d expect us to bow and touch our forelock every time she came near. Inherited wealth will be the ruin of this country. Mr Pünd. That’s the truth of it. They were an unpleasant couple and if you ask me, you’re going to have your work cut out.’ She took one last look at the portrait. ‘The fact is, that half the village will have been glad to see him dead and if you’re looking for suspects, well, they might as well form a line.’





4

Everyone knew Brent, the groundsman at Pye Hall, but at the same time no one knew him at all. When he walked through the village or took his usual seat at the Ferryman, people might say ‘There’s old Brent’, but they had no idea how old he was and even his name was something of a mystery. Was it his first name or his last name? There were a few who might remember his father. He had been ‘Brent’ too and had done the same job – in fact the two of them had worked together for a while, old Brent and young Brent, pushing out the wheelbarrow and digging the soil. His parents had died. Nobody was quite sure how or when but it had happened in another part of the country – in Devonshire, some people said. A car accident. So young Brent had become old Brent and now lived in the pocket-sized cottage where he had been born, on Daphne Road. It was part of a terrace but his neighbours had never been invited in. The curtains were always drawn.

Somewhere in the church, it might have been possible to find a record of a birth, in May 1917, of one Neville John Brent. There must have been a time when he was Neville: at school or as a Local Defence Volunteer (his status as a farm worker had excluded him from fighting in the war). But he was a man without a shadow – or perhaps a shadow without a man. He was both as prominent and as unremarkable as the weather vane on the steeple of St Botolph’s. The only reason anyone would have noticed it would have been if they had woken up one day to find out it wasn’t there.

Atticus Pünd and James Fraser had tracked him down in the grounds of Pye Hall where he was carrying on his work, weeding and deadheading, as if nothing unusual had occurred. Pünd had prevailed upon him to stop for half an hour and the three of them were sitting together in the rose garden, surrounded by a thousand blooms. Brent had rolled a cigarette with hands so grubby that the whole thing would surely taste of dirt once he lit it. He came across as a boy-man, sullen and uncomfortable, shifting awkwardly in clothes that were too large for him, his curly hair flopping over his forehead. Fraser felt uncomfortable sitting next to him. Brent had a strange, slightly unsavoury quality; a sense of some secret that he was refusing to share.

‘How well did you know Mary Blakiston?’ Pünd had begun with the first death although it occurred to Fraser that the groundsman had been a principal witness at both events. Indeed, he might have been the last person to see both the housekeeper and her employer alive.

‘I didn’t know her. She didn’t want to know me.’ Brent seemed offended by the question. ‘She used to boss me about. Do this, do that. Even had me up in her place moving the furniture, fixing the damp. Not that she had any right. I worked for Sir Magnus, not her. That’s what I used to tell her. I’m not surprised someone pushed her down those stairs, the way she carried on. Always meddling. I’m sure she got up quite a few peoples’ noses.’ He sniffed loudly. ‘I won’t speak ill of the dead but she was a right busybody and no mistake.’

‘You assume she was pushed? The police are of the opinion that it was an accident, that she fell.’

‘That’s not for me to say, sir. Accident? Someone done her in? I wouldn’t be surprised either way.’

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