Murder in Cold Mud

by Emily Organ

  “Probably not. But it’s worth asking the question as you can never quite predict what women find themselves talking about at these sorts of gatherings.”

  “None of them are stupid enough to admit they’re about to do away with their husbands, if that’s what you’re thinking. Does our alibi put her in the clear?”

  “I don’t think it does. She left your home at a quarter past eight, when Mr Rumbold was still at the Wagon and Carrot.”

  “After which he moved on to the Pig and Scythe.”

  “I won’t bother asking how you know that, Mrs Churchill, but yes he did. He left the Pig and Scythe shortly before half past eleven and we estimate that the time of death was around a quarter to midnight.”

  “When Mrs Rumbold was presumably tucked up in bed at home.”

  “That’s what she’d have us believe.”

  “You don’t seriously think she’s the culprit do you, Inspector? I know she mentioned divorce at my party, but I think it was half-said in jest.”

  “Or said in half-jest,” added Pemberley.

  “What’s the difference?” asked Churchill.

  “I don’t know, but there’ll be one.”

  Inspector Mappin put away his notebook, finished his cup of tea and retrieved his helmet from the hatstand.

  “Thank you for your time, ladies,” he said. “Now, I must remind you not to—”

  “Meddle? I believe that’s a word you unfairly associate with our work, Inspector. Please don’t worry. We shall merely trip on by with the delicacy and grace of two ballerinas, shan’t we, Miss Pemberley?”

  “I don’t know any ballet moves.”

  “Maybe not, Pembers, but if you did I’m sure you would manage a plié with great aplomb. As for myself, I did a fair bit of ballerinaring in my youth.”

  An astonished snort erupted from Inspector Mappin.

  “Yes, it’s true, Inspector. I haven’t always been the size of a brick outhouse, you know. I once had a twenty-four-inch waist. And I can still pirouette when I’ve had enough gin to numb the old knees. My tutu is in storage back in London, though it would merely suffice as a garter these days. Inspector, your face has turned the colour of an angry tomato. Are you embarrassed by my mention of the word garter?”

  “No, not at all, Mrs Churchill. I’m not the type to embarrass easily. It’s just that all this talk of waists and pirouetting is confounding me a little. I need to get on with solving these murders.”

  “Absolutely, Inspector. And if you need us to be alibis for anyone else at the party do please let us know.”

  Inspector Mappin put his helmet on and left the office.

  Pemberley emitted a loud shriek as she returned to her desk.

  Churchill startled. “Good grief, trusty assistant! Why on earth are you making that horrible noise?”

  Pemberley gave a sob and pointed to a scrap of paper on her desk.

  “It’s the note Mr Rumbold put through our door! And now he’s dead!” She pulled a balled-up handkerchief from the sleeve of her colourless cardigan and squashed it into her eyes.

  Churchill walked over to Pemberley’s desk and put an arm around her thin frame. She glanced down at the note and felt a lump in her throat as she read the words Rumbold had written just a few days before:

  Forget about onions, problem now resolved.

  Mr Rumbold

  “Come now, Pemberley, it won’t do to get upset. He was quite an annoying man with exceptionally poor personal hygiene. It’s sad that he’s dead, but crying about it won’t bring him back. The best we can do now is find the chap who murdered him.”

  “But how can we do that without meddling?” wailed Pemberley.

  “Churchy always finds a way, Pembers.”

  Chapter 23

  “A nice cake will cheer you up, Pemberley,” said Churchill as she squeezed herself onto a flimsy chair in Mrs Bramley’s tea rooms. “And hopefully we’ll catch that Flatboot girl with her hand in the till while we’re at it. Don’t you ever pause to think how lucky we are to have a profession where we can enjoy a little tea and cake while we’re working?” She rearranged the lace tablecloth, which had become dislodged during her struggle to sit down.

  “We’re very lucky indeed. Mr Atkins enjoyed it, too. He once had an important case to investigate at Raffles Hotel in Singapore. He stayed there for three weeks and it didn’t cost him a bean.”

  “Is that so? Well, I’m the modest type, so I’m quite content with the Dorset tea rooms. I don’t go in for all that showy Raffles business.”

  “But it’s a wonderful hotel.”

  “I’m sure it is, Pembers,” said Churchill, purposefully distracting herself by trying to summon Kitty Flatboot.

  “I stayed there a few times while I was—”

  “A companion to a lady of international travel. Yes, I think you’ve told me about it a few times now. This Flatboot waitress is rather slow off the mark, isn’t she? Oh, here she comes.”

  Kitty Flatboot sulkily took Churchill’s order and ambled off to the kitchen.

  “It always amazes me how so many members of the lower classes take no pride in their work,” commented Churchill. “That sticky Kitty acts as if she’s here under sufferance.”

  “Perhaps she is.”

  “Nonsense. She should be grateful for any decent paid employment. She’s far better off working as a waitress here than as a scullery maid elsewhere. Or as a chamber maid, for that matter. She should be happy that a girl like herself – with, dare I say it, a minimal level of education – doesn’t have to empty slops from other people’s chamber pots.”

  “I think we should all be grateful we don’t have to do that.”

  “I don’t know why Mrs Bramley wants us to take the time to spot the girl with her hand in the till. She should just dismiss her and be done with it.”

  “Perhaps Mrs Bramley is more tolerant than your good self, Mrs Churchill.”

  “Soft is what I call it. She’s another person who wouldn’t last five minutes in the Home Counties.”

  “Would she be eaten alive by the ladies of Richmond-upon-Thames?”

  “Most definitely. But she’d be lucky if she even got past Weybridge; they’re very particular in that part of the world.”

  Kitty Flatboot returned with a pot of tea and a heavily laden cake stand.

  “What a wonderful display of cakes,” said Churchill. “With that array I could almost forgive you for refusing to smile, Miss Flatboot.”

  The waitress glared at her. “Why d’you keep starin’ at me?”

  “Staring?” Churchill felt her cheeks flush. “I don’t stare, young lady.”

  “You’ve been starin’ at me as if you’ve been talkin’ about me.”

  “I don’t talk about people either.”

  “I feel as if you’re talkin’ and starin’, and I don’t like it.”

  “Well, perhaps you wrongly assume that people are taking an interest in you when they’re not. This is the problem with young people these days, isn’t it, Miss Pemberley? They’re terribly self-absorbed.”

  Kitty glared at her again and walked away.

  “I think subtlety might be the best approach here, Mrs Churchill,” whispered Pemberley.

  “There’s no need to remind me how to do my job,” hissed Churchill as she poured out the tea.

  “But she knew you were talking about her. How can you carry out effective surveillance when you keep drawing attention to yourself?”

  “It just happens to be fairly quiet in here, Pembers, and without many other customers about the Flatboot girl has simply assumed we’re watching her.”

  “And she’s right. You’re sitting there gawking at her and making loud comments, which I’m sure half the clientele can hear.”

  “Fine,” said Churchill through clenched teeth. “If you think you’ll do better at this surveillance business you can take over the case while I look after the more important business of solving murders.”

  Churchill not
iced her chair felt lop-sided.

  “I’m probably no better at it—”

  “No, I’m sure you will be, Pembers. You handle it all and inform Mrs Bramley next time you see that girl with her hand in the till. Have you told her about the incident when Kitty short-changed poor Mr Harding? No? I expected as much. It’s down to me to do all the work as usual.”

  “Please don’t take offence, Mrs Churchill, I merely suggested a little subtlety. And the name of the company is Churchill’s Detective Agency, which means—”

  “That I must do most of the work. Yes, yes. I get it.” Churchill took a gulp of tea and winced as she burnt her tongue. “Ouch!” she exclaimed, quickly changing her tone when she noticed Pemberley’s crestfallen face. “Oh no, Pembers, please don’t cry.”

  Pemberley dabbed at her eyes with her handkerchief and Churchill felt her chair wobble.

  “Pembers, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to be snappy. I suppose I took offence at the suggestion that I’m not as subtle as I’d like to be with my surveillance.”

  “You’re not,” sobbed Pemberley.

  “Yes, all right, I admit it. Subtlety has never been my strong point, which I suppose is quite a drawback when it comes to detective work. Now, let’s get those eyes dried and crack on with solving our cases. That’s why we’re here, isn’t it?”

  There was a sudden crack and Churchill suddenly found herself on the floor with a sharp pain in her lower back.

  “My chair… Help Pemberley!”

  All she could see was the underside of the table and the edge of the lace tablecloth.

  “Mrs Churchill! Are you all right?” Pemberley’s concerned face appeared above her. “My goodness! What happened to your chair?”

  Churchill glanced at the chair legs lying beside her on the floor.

  “It gave up the ghost, that’s what. Please can you help me up?”

  Pemberley, Mrs Bramley and Kitty Flatboot managed to lift Churchill up from the floor and seat her on a sturdier chair which Mrs Bramley brought out from the kitchen.

  “Oh Mrs Churchill, I’m sorry. I should’ve got the chair fixed,” she said.

  “There weren’t nothin’ wrong with it,” said Kitty with a smile.

  Churchill ignored the waitress’s barbed comment, keen to forget about the episode as quickly as possible.

  “Please don’t worry Mrs Bramley, it’s merely one of those things.”

  “But you hurt yerself.”

  “Merely a bump, Mrs Bramley. Think nothing of it. With Battenberg as good as this, I have quite forgotten about it already.”

  She pretended not to notice as Kitty Flatboot walked away, failing to stifle a laugh.

  “Oh, good.” Mrs Bramley gave a bashful grin. “It were Barney’s favourite. He liked it so much ’e even went there.”

  “Went where?”

  “Ter Battenberg. In Germany.”

  “Good grief. What a long way to travel just for some cake.”

  “And there weren’t none there!”

  “No cake?”

  “No Battenberg cake.”

  “Because it’s not actually a German cake,” Pemberley chipped in. “The Victorians named it so to honour the marriage of Princess Victoria and Prince Louis of Battenberg.”

  “If only you could somehow travel back in time and inform Mr Bramley of that, Pembers. It would have saved him a completely futile journey.”

  “Perhaps I will one day.”

  “’E loved carrot cake too,” said Mrs Bramley. “It was ’is dream for me to make carrot cake wiv carrots ’e’d growed ’imself. Trouble was they never came to nuffink.”

  “I’m sorry to hear it, Mrs Bramley. Carrots are not an easy vegetable to grow.”

  “So ’ave yer caught ’er yet?” she whispered, nodding in Kitty’s direction.

  “Not yet, Mrs Bramley, and I’m afraid to say that she appears to be on to us this morning. She asked me to stop staring at her.”

  “Oh, well p’raps you should then?”

  “It won’t be easy to catch her with her hand in the till without looking at her.”

  “I don’t s’pose it will. And she’s lookin’ over at us now.”

  “I’d say that our cover has been blown for today. We’re going to have to take a different tack.”

  “I’m sure you’ll come up wiv summat, Mrs Churchill.”

  “Rotten luck about old Rumbold, isn’t it?”

  “Awful.” Mrs Bramley’s face sank. “I’m strugglin’ ter believe it. And that poor Mrs Rumbold. I’ll pay ’er a visit after I’ve finished up ’ere for the day.”

  “Has there been any gossip in here about who might be behind it?”

  “All sorts o’ names ’ave been discussed, but ev’ryone’s baffled.”

  “Didn’t you mention that one of your customers saw Rumbold leaving the allotments with a gun in his hand following the murder of Mr Williams?”

  “Oh ’im, yeah.”

  “Has he speculated on this latest tragedy at all?”

  “Funny you should ask. He said ’e ’eard footsteps runnin’ down the ’igh street late last night, an’ the sound of a man laughin’.”

  “Laughing?”

  “Yeah, almost like an evil cackle, ’e said.”

  “Goodness me. Can you recall the witness’s name yet?”

  “It’s Mr… Oh, I keep forgettin’ it. It’ll come ter me in a minute. Square chin and spectacles. Brown ’air. Orders egg sandwiches but never eats ’is crusts.”

  “I recall that description, Mrs Bramley, thank you. We’ll keep an eye out for him, won’t we, Miss Pemberley? In the meantime, our work here is done for the day as Miss Flatboot has become too suspicious of us. I think a stroll is in order.” She winced at the pain in her back. “A bit of fresh air will do us good.”

  Chapter 24

  Churchill ensured that their steps took them in the direction of the duck pond at the heart of the village green. The crowds had departed and two police constables appeared to be carrying out a detailed search of the area. The long, graceful fronds of a weeping willow swung gently in the breeze, and at the centre of the pond sat a small island that was home to a lively duck house.

  The larger of the two constables waded around the island in a pair of oilcloth fishing waders. The other stood on the bank of the pond surrounded by ducks and holding a frying pan.

  “Good afternoon, Constables,” said Churchill. “How goes it?”

  “It would go better if the ducks left me alone,” replied the officer holding the frying pan.

  “Perhaps they’re trying to stop you frying their fish,” said Churchill.

  “Ducks don’t eat fish,” said Pemberley.

  “So they don’t, silly me,” said Churchill. “Some fowl species consume them, though, don’t they? I’m surprised you haven’t been attacked by an angry heron, yet Constable.”

  “He gave them some of his sandwiches, that’s what,” the large officer in waders called over.

  “Oh dear, always a mistake,” said Churchill.

  “I was once harassed by a squirrel for three long weeks,” said Pemberley.

  “All because you gave it a bit of food, eh? It should never be done.”

  “I didn’t even feed it.”

  “Well, you must have done something.”

  “I did nothing at all. It just took a shine to me.”

  “That makes sense. Now then, Constable, perhaps you can explain to us what you’re doing with the frying pan.”

  “I found it.”

  “Clearly, but where?”

  “PC Gussage found it,” replied the constable, pointing to his colleague in waders.

  “Yeah, I found it,” said PC Gussage.

  “Where?”

  “In this pond.”

  “Really? Someone dropped their frying pan into the duck pond?” Churchill chuckled. “I wonder how on earth that came about. It looks like a rather fine frying pan, too. Cast iron, I shouldn’t wonder. And it doesn’t appear t
o have been in the duck pond for long, it’s not rusty at all… Oh, Pembers! Oh my goodness!”

  Churchill grasped her secretary’s arm to steady herself.

  “Are you all right, Mrs Churchill?” asked Pemberley.

  Churchill pointed at the frying pan in the constable’s hand, her mouth opening and closing like that of a fish as she tried to articulate the words. “Th-th-that’s it, Pembers,” she gasped. “The weapon! Didn’t Chief Inspector Long-Surname mention that Rumbold had suffered a blow to the head?”

  Pemberley paled. “My goodness, yes, he did!”

  “A frying pan, Pembers. That’s what the poor chap’s bonce was bashed with. And once the murderer was done with it he tossed it into the duck pond.”

  “Along with Mr Rumbold.”

  “Exactly. How awful!”

  Pemberley shook her head sadly. “If only ducks could speak,” she said.

  “Talking ducks? What on earth are you on about woman?” Churchill demanded.

  “They must have witnessed it! They were probably roosting on that little island of theirs. Perhaps a duck was sitting on top of the duck house at the time, as one of them is right now.”

  Churchill glanced at the female mallard squatting on the duck house roof.

  “I see what you mean, Pemberley. If only they could, eh? How frustrating. Have you tried interviewing the ducks, Constables?”

  Her question was met with a blank stare from the two policemen.

  “Just a little joke of mine,” continued Churchill. “Did you realise you’d found the murder weapon?”

  The constables both surveyed the frying pan.

  “We suspected as much,” replied PC Gussage, “but it ain’t got a dent in it.”

  “It’s got a cast-iron bottom,” said Churchill. “An elephant couldn’t make a dent in that.”

  “It probably wouldn’t even try,” added Pemberley.

  “No, it probably wouldn’t, my trusty assistant. But I think the lack of dent by no means rules out the frying pan as a tool in Rumbold’s murder. He died from drowning, didn’t he? All that was required from that formidable piece of cookware was a glancing blow to the back of the head to stun him.”