So Mr Red Breast and I rose together and went about our business. He was digging about in the grass for worms and insects and I had vanquished many a chore by the time Lady Hardcastle rang for her morning coffee.
By ten o’clock she was up and dressed, we had eaten a substantial breakfast and we were sitting together in the dining room with fresh coffee examining the Crime Board. During our first investigation the previous summer, Lady Hardcastle had hit upon the idea of using a large blackboard to help us keep track of all the information relating to the apparent suicide of a man in the woods. She drew sketches of the people involved which she pinned to the board, and then we made notes, attempting to make connections, see patterns and, eventually, solve the mystery. It caused our friend Inspector Sunderland some amusement and he ribbed her mercilessly about it, but he told me privately that he thought it was an excellent idea and that he had begun using something similar with his colleagues in Bristol CID.
At the centre of the board was Lady Hardcastle’s sketch of Spencer Carmichael. Under it we had written, “Grumpy, argumentative, universally disliked.” Around the rest of the board were sketches of other people we had met or knew about. There was Audrey Carmichael, Spencer’s long-suffering and devout widow. His son, Morris, the bullied artist. Their neighbour Noah Lock, in love with the beautiful Audrey. Carmichael’s rival, Dick Alford, with whom he was locked in a perpetual battle of one-upmanship. All of them might have had reason do the old man to death.
Lady Hardcastle was just putting the finishing touches to a sketch of Laurence Dougal.
‘Why Mr Dougal, my lady?’ I asked.
‘Completeness, pet,’ she said, as she handed me the sketch.
I pinned it to the board. ‘But what would be his motive?’
‘Aside from the fact that almost anyone who met Spencer Carmichael would happily have killed him?’ she said.
‘Aside from that, my lady. If that were motive enough there wouldn’t be room on the board for all the people who might have done him in.’
‘Jealousy?’ she suggested.
‘Of what?’
‘Morris Carmichael seems to have a buyer lined up for Top Farm. Maybe Dougal found out about it and killed the old chap in a fit of rage. He said he was having a devil of a job selling his own place.’
‘Poison’s not a weapon for moments of rage, my lady. A blow to the head with a heavy object, a punch to the windpipe, a kitchen knife through the heart – those are the methods an angry man might choose. Poison is slow, it requires planning. Premeditation, as they say.’
‘Hmmm, I think you’re right. But we’ve spoken to him so it’s right that he should be up there. There’s something odd about him, too, but I can’t put my finger on it.’
‘He seemed pleasant enough to me, my lady.’
‘Yes, I know. Ah well, I’m sure it’s nothing,’ she said, gazing at the board. ‘But where are we now? Everyone has a motive, not matter how slender. Several people might have had the means to kill him, though we have no idea what the poison was, nor even if it was poison at all. And almost everyone seems to have had some sort of opportunity to administer the putative poison. Perhaps we should call Inspector Sunderland; the police surgeon must know something by now and a professional detective might have a better idea of how to proceed. Or would it profit us to visit The Hayrick and speak to the landlord there, I wonder?’
‘Townsley, my lady. “Call me Ronnie”.’
‘I say, what a memory you have.’
‘It’s a gift, my lady. And sometimes a curse. I remember, for instance, your aching desire to end our lives in a fiery mass of twisted metal by buying a small red motor car.’
‘Well done, pet, I meant to write that in my notebook, didn’t I.’ She flicked through the pages, looking at the notes she’d made over the past few days. ‘Ah, look, there he is. Ronnie. You’re so clever. Would it help to talk to him, I wonder? You could trot up to The Grange and get Bert.’
‘I could at that. But what would we ask him?’
‘That’s the thing, isn’t it. We could–’
The doorbell prevented me from finding out what it was that we could do. I left her leafing through her notes and went to answer the door.
‘Good morning, Miss Armstrong,’ said Inspector Sunderland with a smile.
‘And good morning to you, Inspector,’ I said, stepping aside. ‘Won’t you come in. We were just talking about you.’
‘Nothing defamatory, I hope,’ he said, stepping inside and removing his bowler hat.
I took the hat and put it on the hall table along with a leather document case he was carrying, then helped him off with his overcoat. ‘No, sir, it’s just that we’re a little stuck and we thought you might be able to help us. Point us in a new direction as it were.’
‘What have you managed so far?’ he asked, picking up the case.
I led him to the dining room and ushered him in. ‘I’ll let Lady Hardcastle explain,’ I said. ‘Inspector Sunderland, my lady.’
‘Oh, I say, what a treat. Do come in and sit down, Inspector,’ she said.
‘Thank you, my lady,’ he said, sitting in one of the dining chairs.
‘The inspector was wondering how we were getting on, my lady,’ I said.
‘Then we must give him chapter and verse, pet. Why don’t I bring him up to date while you make us all a fresh pot of coffee.’
‘Very good, my lady,’ I said with a smile, and went to my kitchen.
It took only a short while to brew a fresh pot of coffee and cut a few slices of the madeira cake I’d made earlier that morning, but by the time I returned with the tray, their discussion had already moved on to other things.
‘…and she bought this awful elephant’s foot umbrella stand,’ Lady Hardcastle was saying. ‘It’s a replica, of course. Looks just like the real thing, and she was so taken with it that I couldn’t bring myself to tell her what I really thought. Ah, there you are, pet, thank you. Come and sit down. I was just telling the inspector about our visit to the junk shop in Chipping Bevington with Gertie and Maude.’
‘Pomphrey’s Bric-a-Brac Emporium, my lady,’ I said, sitting down.
‘That’s the place,’ she said. ‘I was just complimenting her on her memory, Inspector. Pomphrey’s. Yes.’
‘I know of it, my lady,’ said the inspector with a smile. ‘Mr Pomphrey helped us out a few years ago with a case involving smuggled Egyptian mummified cats.’
‘I think I read about that,’ she said. ‘That was you? Well I never.’
‘I have my moments, my lady,’ he said.
I poured the coffee and passed round the cake. When we were all settled, the inspector picked up the leather document case from the floor beside him and opened it. ‘Now that Miss Armstrong is back,’ he said, ‘I can share my own news.’
He took out a manila folder and placed it on the table in front of him. From inside he produced a sheet of paper headed with the badge of the Bristol Police.
‘At long last,’ he said, tapping the paper with his finger, ‘we have the report from the police surgeon. The cause of death was, indeed, poison. And unless Mr Carmichael ingested it by accident, I should say it’s murder.’