the routine, the spacing between each glass changed, the order of the four did not.
“And you, Mr Duncan – you were on stage left in the line-up by the bar, and at the piano finale, did you sense or see any movement to the rear of the piano? No dark-cloaked villains?”
Paul reluctantly shook his head.
“Well, then, gentlemen, it seems you’re in the clear.” A pause. “Unless your full body searches reveal anything.”
“You’re not bloody serious, are you?” Paul moaned.
“Oh, I am, Mr Duncan, believe me. The sergeant here is very gentle though – usually.”
Gentle or not, the sergeant found nothing.
“Wouldn’t body cavities be a dangerous place to conceal cyanide?” Nick had become absorbed in the problem.
“Remarkable the way you cooks know so much about poison,” Bishop said admiringly. “We’re taking samples from all your food and kitchen utensils, of course.”
Les howled. “How am I supposed to make a living?”
“It’s what made a death we’re here to find out. Every scrap of paper, clothing, food and glasses will be bagged up for forensics to check, and every millimetre of stage and kitchen will be searched.”
“The hats!” Nick cried desperately. “They kept them on almost to the end. The poison must have been concealed in one of them.”
“Who
“If so, we’ll find traces,” Bishop assured him. “The way we’re going at the moment, however, it looks as if we can rule out Greta Hobbs’ death by murder. Much as I dislike the word, it does look impossible.” He grinned at the now visibly rejoicing Berties. “Mind you, you’d be surprised how often we think that at this stage.”
The sight of a huge mobile caravan drawn up in the side street next to the club, obviously, from Nick’s careful study, an incident room, was unnerving and confirmation enough that it had been murder. That made his summons back here with Les all the more daunting. Curiosity fought with fear of the “fix it on anyone” approach so beloved by the police in his reading material. Even spider-catching in Antarctica suddenly seemed preferable.
“Ah, our young detective.” Bishop greeted him from one corner of the kitchen made available for a table and chairs. “You’ll be pleased to hear you can go.”
“But that’s a scene of crimes’ van outside, isn’t it?” Nick was taken aback.
“Must be the CIA.”
Nick lingered as Les hastily cleared up and left. “You mean she wasn’t poisoned?” He tried not to sound disappointed.
“She was, but we’ve cleared your food.”
“So it was the drink?”
“It was. Forensic had a sleepless night. Nothing in the bottle, nothing in any of the glasses – save the one nearest to the lady, which was bung full of cyanide. And before you say suicide, forensic have found no traces of crystals in her clothing or handbag.”
Nick bade a silent last farewell to poisoned darts. “Suppose one of the strippers poisoned one of the
“Ashamed of you, lad. Where did he keep the crystals? And there’d be a fifth glass on the piano.”
“The hat?” Nick asked without much hope.
“Forget about hats. They were clean, too. What is it every self-respecting amateur detective pounces on?”
Nick didn’t like being mocked. “Fingerprints.”
“Right. And that’s why Mr Paul Duncan is at the station helping with enquiries.”
“All the glasses would have Hamish Scott’s prints on.” Nick was thinking it through. “So if he were the murderer he wouldn’t need to worry about his prints being on Greta’s glass, but the others would.”
“Greta’s glass had Duncan’s prints on it as well as her own and Scott’s. If we could find how he transported the poison, we could wrap this up. Now, you’ve quite a name at Scotland Yard, so you think about it.”
“I’ve never even had a caution.” What the hell was this?
“I went there to the Black Museum a while ago. Back in the dark ages there was an Auguste Didier who helped Rose of the Yard in a few cases, generally those with fancy touches in them. Any relation?”
“Great-grandfather,” Nick muttered reluctantly. Too much eagerness to claim kinship might not go down too well, and in any case he wasn’t sure the news was welcome. True, an amateur detective in deepest Muckshire as a rival was way outclassed by one working with Scotland Yard. Maybe he’d check into it sometime.
“Just in case you have plans to follow in great-grandad’s footsteps, I solve my own cases. Plain
“Right,” Nick hastily agreed.
“I don’t see how Paul Duncan can be guilty,” Nick proclaimed. Thinking of the impossible murder took his mind off his surroundings. Les’s kitchen in the rented industrial unit lurched its way through every food inspection, surviving more by luck of timing than merit.
“I told you to make that with huss.” Les peered peevishly at Nick’s work.
“For a monkfish kebab?”
“Who’s going to notice? It all gets charred to a cinder on the barbi.”
“All the Berties hated her, but they all stayed.”
“Ah, well, it was a living of some sort, even if Greta and good old Tony kept sixty per cent of it, and went on deluding them that they were building up a fund so that they could finance a launch into the big time. Not nice of Greta. It’s cheating,” Les added virtuously. He removed a chunk of fish from the end of each kebab. “Give ’em room to breathe,” he explained casually.
“No one came up from the rear, but what about from that side room on stage? The owner and his lighting chap were there. Of course, they still had to get the poison onto the stage.”
Les decided to be helpful. “You said it had to have been added between the two guzzling bouts. How about just stretching out from the wings?”
“Someone would have noticed a five-foot arm,” Nick retorted scathingly.
Les expired with a final shot. “Maybe it dropped from the ceiling. Now, could you condescend to earn some of that fortune I pay you?”
Nick did not reply. Les had set off a train of thought. He remembered Sherlock Holmes and the snake gliding down the bellrope; he remembered Dorothy Sayers, and an ingenious contraption; he even remembered poisoned darts…
“You again? Solved it yet?”
“I wondered if you’d checked the wings,” Nick blurted out, none too sure of his ground once faced with Bishop.
An amiable, if sardonic, smile. “Be my guest. Check ’em yourself. Let me know if I’ve missed anything. And let me tell you, Commander Bond, we’ve checked the spotlights and curtains half a dozen times. No cyanide crystals were showered down by guided missile, and no curtain rods left their moorings to deposit any either.
