‘And did anything odd happen the week before? Did anyone come into the kitchen?’
‘Not as far as I… Oh,’ said Hilda, clearly recalling something. ‘There was someone here. I went out to take some orders to some of the lads from Oldbury, and when I come back there was–’
‘No,’ interrupted Lady Hardcastle, ‘let me say it. Thank you for letting us get involved with this case, Inspector,’ she said, turning to address Inspector Sunderland. ‘It really has been most diverting.’
‘My pleasure entirely, my lady,’ said the inspector with a slight bow.
‘And I think it only fair that I repay your kindness by explaining our findings and allowing you to arrest the guilty man.’
‘That would be rather welcome, my lady,’ he said.
‘Indeed,’ she said. ‘At first, the most obvious suspects seemed to be Mrs Carmichael and her would-be suitor, and they were my definite favourites for a while; with the old man gone, their path to true love would be clear. But then we met Morris Carmichael, the bullied son. We were told he was a wet lettuce, and against all my noblest intentions, his stammer made me think he wasn’t quite the full shilling. But when we spoke to him we found that he was all there and halfway back, and I began wondering if he’d done away with his tyrannical father. And, of course, Carmichael’s old “friend” Dick Alford’s rivalry might easily have turned deadly.’
‘Those are my main suspects, too, my lady,’ said the inspector. ‘But which of them was it? There’s only supposition and suspicion to go on.’
‘That’s the thing, Inspector,’ she said. ‘All we could do was plump for one and hope for the best. The odds were against us somewhat, but I’ve backed horses on longer odds and come home with the price of a new dress.’
The inspector smiled.
‘But then Armstrong here tried to pick some mushrooms and things became a lot clearer. We were warned off them by… by…’
‘Jed, my lady,’ I prompted.
‘Yes, by Jed, because although they looked ever so very much like delicious chanterelle mushrooms there were, in fact, an altogether less healthy variety called deadly webcap. And I was immediately put in mind of your new umbrella stand, Gertie dear.’
‘My umbrella stand?’ said Lady Farley-Stroud.
‘Yes, dear. The one you bought from… from…’
‘Pomphrey’s, my lady,’ I said, trying not to roll my eyes.
‘Pomphrey’s, yes. The elephant’s foot umbrella stand that looks just like the real thing. And those mushrooms in the woods looked just like chanterelles. And then I remembered that there were chanterelle mushrooms in the pies.’
‘I been using chanterelles for a few weeks,’ said Ronnie, proudly. ‘Adds a touch of class.’
‘Quite so,’ said Lady Hardcastle. ‘So if someone hit upon the idea of committing murder using deadly webcap mushrooms, then the pies in The Hayrick would be an ideal place to hide them. But that’s ridiculous. Who among your customers last would even know that you use chanterelle mushrooms? Who would think of such a convoluted way of killing someone? It’s altogether too far fetched. But then we visited my dear old friend Dr Gosling at the BRI and he told us that deadly webcap can take up to a week to kill, and suddenly I had the ideal man. Someone who was in the pub the week before Carmichael died, and who would have known all about mushrooms and how best to serve them. The man you found in your kitchen two weeks ago on market day, Hilda, was Laurence Dougal.’
Hilda’s toothless mouth hung open for a few seconds before she gathered her wits enough to speak. ‘So… so…’
‘Dougal had positioned himself near the door to the kitchen that day. Do you remember, Gertie? He was at the end of the bar when you pointed him out to us.’
‘I say,’ said Lady Farley-Stroud. ‘So he was.’
‘He waited there until Carmichael came to the bar to order his lunch, then while Hilda was delivering someone else’s order, he slipped into the kitchen and popped his deadly mushrooms into the next pie in line. It was risky – he might well have poisoned the wrong pie – but he was a desperate man and it was a gamble he was prepared to take. Hilda came back just as he was leaving, but didn’t think anything of it. Then he slipped back to his place at the bar and stayed there supping and chatting until he was sure that his plan had worked.’
‘But why would Dougal wish to kill Carmichael?’ asked Lady Farley-Stroud. ‘And how on earth did you realize it was he?’
‘The realization was rather prosaic once we were aware it was probably a mushroom: Dougal is a chef. Just the sort of chap who would have spotted the similarity between the poisonous mushrooms and the chanterelles that he had suggested Ronnie put in the beef and mushroom pies.’
‘It was Dougal as suggested it,’ said Ronnie. ‘Three or four weeks ago.’
‘Yes, he was already working on his plan. He might even have wanted to let the blame fall on you if anyone found out about the deadly webcap. “It’s an easy but tragic mistake to make,” people would say. “Poor old Ronnie accidentally picked poisonous mushrooms one day.” He was building his own alibi.’
‘The devious little–’
‘Just so,’ said Lady Hardcastle. ‘And he made sure that he wasn’t at the pub the day Carmichael died, too.’
‘That’s all satisfyingly plausible,’ said Inspector Sunderland. ‘But what was his motive?’
‘I was coming to that, Inspector,’ she said. ‘Something about Dougal had been niggling me for a while. Something about him seemed wrong, somehow. And then I was leafing through my notebook – thank you for the gift by the way, Inspector dear, it’s been most terribly useful – and I realized that he had skirted around the matter of his last conversation with Carmichael. He said they just chatted about “this and that”.’ She consulted her notebook. ‘“Nothing of consequence,” he told us.’
I remembered our conversation with Mrs Carmichael. ‘But Audrey Carmichael told us they’d had an argument,’ I said.
‘She did, pet. Scarcely conclusive – we’re not always proud of our public arguments – but odd that he should lie when he’d been so open about how difficult it was to get on with Carmichael. It was as if he didn’t want to have to answer questions about the specifics of the row. He didn’t want us to ask him what it was about.’
‘And what was it about?’ asked Lady Farley-Stroud.