• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

‘And the result would have been the same. Yes, you are right, Tuppence. It’s morbid to reproach oneself over something one couldn’t help. What I would like to do is to make good now.’

‘And that’s not going to be easy.’

‘No, it isn’t. There are so many possibilities, and yet all of them seem wild and improbable. Supposing Dennis Radclyffe put the poison in the sandwiches. He knew he would be out to tea. That seems fairly plain sailing.’

‘Yes,’ said Tuppence, ‘that’s all right so far. Then we can put against that the fact that he was poisoned himself–so that seems to rule him out. There is one person we mustn’t forget–and that is Hannah.’

‘Hannah?’

‘People do all sorts of queer things when they have religious mania.’

‘She is pretty far gone with it too,’ said Tommy. ‘You ought to drop a word to Dr Burton about it.’

‘It must have come on very rapidly,’ said Tuppence. ‘That is if we go by what Miss Logan said.’

‘I believe religious mania does,’ said Tommy. ‘I mean, you go on singing hymns in your bedroom with the door open for years, and then you go suddenly right over the line and become violent.’

‘There is certainly more evidence against Hannah than against anybody else,’ said Tuppence thoughtfully. ‘And yet I have an idea –’ She stopped.

‘Yes?’ said Tommy encouragingly.

‘It is not really an idea. I suppose it is just a prejudice.’

‘A prejudice against someone?’

Tuppence nodded.

‘Tommy–did you like Mary Chilcott?’

Tommy considered.

‘Yes, I think I did. She struckme as extremely capable and business-like–perhaps a shade too much so–but very reliable.’

‘You didn’t think it was odd that she didn’t seem more upset?’

‘Well, in a way that is a point in her favour. I mean, if she had done anything, she would make a point of being upset–lay it on rather thick.’

‘I suppose so,’ said Tuppence. ‘And anyway there doesn’t seem to be any motive in her case. One doesn’t see what good this wholesale slaughter can do her.’

‘I suppose none of the servants are concerned?’

‘It doesn’t seem likely. They seem a quiet, reliable lot. I wonder what Esther Quant, the parlourmaid, was like.’

‘You mean, that if she was young and good-looking there was a chance that she was mixed up in it some way.’

‘That is what I mean,’ Tuppence sighed. ‘It is all very discouraging.’

‘Well, I suppose the police will get down to it all right,’ said Tommy.

‘Probably. I should like it to be us. By the way, did you notice a lot of small red dots on Miss Logan’s arm?’

‘I don’t think I did. What about them?’

‘They looked as though they were made by a hypodermic syringe,’ said Tuppence.

‘Probably Dr Burton gave her a hypodermic injection of some kind.’

‘Oh, very likely. But he wouldn’t give her about forty.’

‘The cocaine habit,’ suggested Tommy helpfully.

‘I thought of that,’ said Tuppence, ‘but her eyes were all right. You could see at once if it was cocaine or morphia. Besides, she doesn’t look that sort of old lady.’

‘Most respectable and God-fearing,’ agreed Tommy.

‘It is all very difficult,’ said Tuppence. ‘We have talked and talked and we don’t seem any nearer now than we were. Don’t let’s forget to call at the doctor’s on our way home.’

The doctor’s door was opened by a lanky boy of about fifteen.

‘Mr Blunt?’ he inquired. ‘Yes, the doctor is out, but he left a note for you in case you should call.’

He handed them the note in question and Tommy tore it open.

Dear Mr Blunt,

There is reason to believe that the poison employed was Ricin, a vegetable toxalbumose of tremendous potency.

Please keep this to yourself for the present.

Tommy let the note drop, but picked it up quickly.

‘Ricin,’ he murmured. ‘Know anything about it, Tuppence? You used to be rather well up in these things.’

‘Ricin,’ said Tuppence, thoughtfully. ‘You get it out of castor oil, I believe.’

‘I never did take kindly to castor oil,’ said Tommy. ‘I am more set against it than ever now.’

‘The oil’s all right. You get Ricin from the seeds of the castor oil plant. I believe I saw