what Susan had told them of the interview.
‘They asked Morpeth and me in turn to show them our hats,’ said Bryony, ‘but, of course, neither of us ever wears a hat. A headscarf is the most we ever aspire to. Perhaps we would have hats if we ever went to church, but we never do go to church. I daresay Susan goes to early service on Sundays because she was brought up in Axehead vicarage and she is never here before about half-past nine every Sunday. We, Morpeth and I, have a long lie-in on that day of the week, but Susan’s adoptive father was the vicar of Axehead, Abbots Bay and Abbots Crozier, so she may have formed a childhood habit of Sunday churchgoing that she can’t break. On the other hand, she also may think a long lie-in is her due on Sundays, as she is up so early during the rest of the week. We have never asked any questions. We give her breakfast when she turns up, having had ours a little earlier. As a matter of fact, Morpeth is usually out with a couple of the hounds when Susan gets here on Sundays, so I sit in the kitchen and chat with Susan while she has her bacon and egg.’
‘And you do not possess a hat of any kind?’ asked Dame Beatrice.
‘Neither of us does, and I can’t imagine Susan ever wears one, even for church. Customs have changed over that sort of conventional thing. I am told that some of the holidaymakers turn up in trousers, although the present incumbent has had a strong word to say in the parish magazine about shorts and bras.’
‘Do the summer visitors read the parish magazine?’ asked Laura, who was also present at the conference.
‘I shouldn’t think so,’ Bryony admitted, ‘but perhaps they get the message in other ways. Anyway, the vicar can hardly preach a sermon about such women’s matters, although he did nip a nudist colony in the bud down at Abbots Bay last summer.’
‘The vicar couldn’t preach a sermon about women in bras and shorts?’ said Laura. ‘I bet he would if he dared. I could give him his text, too. How about the seventh chapter of Proverbs, verse ten?’
‘We don’t know much about the Old Testament,’ said Bryony.
‘You’ve missed a treat. Great stuff. I was brought up on it. May I quote?’ Without waiting for the consent or otherwise of her hearers, Laura continued, ‘Authorised Version, of course. To my mind, there is no other worth reading. “Behold, there met him a woman with the attire of an harlot.” My word! What wouldn’t I give to be in the pulpit with a text like that under my belt with which to wallop the ungodly! But perhaps, if the vicar used a text like that to rebuke the female holidaymakers, he might stir up the disapproval of another Jeanie Deans.’
‘People don’t bring their own stools to church nowadays,’ said Morpeth.
‘There are always hassocks,’ returned Laura.
‘We began by mentioning hats,’ said Dame Beatrice. ‘What had hats to do with the visit from the police?’
‘I don’t know. They didn’t say. They didn’t really tell us anything. They asked very politely whether we would allow the sergeant to inspect the whole of the house. They admitted they hadn’t got a search warrant. I don’t know what Morpeth thought — ’
‘It scared me,’ said Morpeth. ‘It looked as though they though I was telling a lie when I said I didn’t possess a hat. Anyway, it was better not to put obstacles in their way, so I said that, if Bryony agreed to it, I had no objection whatever to letting them search the house.’
‘I said the same,’ said Bryony. ‘I wasn’t exactly scared, but I
‘Did you hear what was said after the sergeant had searched the house?’
‘No. They moved apart from me and spoke in undertones but I think it was to the effect that the sergeant had not found hats or anything else he had been looking for. They went away after they had seen Susan, but I don’t believe they were satisfied. I watched them out of the window and they went in the direction of the garage. It wasn’t on their way to the gate, so I don’t know what they wanted with it. We keep it locked, but they didn’t ask for the key.’
‘Do you think they had come upon some information which had caused them to visit you?’
‘Well, of course, it was not our first visit from the police. We had an inspector called Burfield after Susan found the body. He was in uniform, but these two plain-clothes men were detectives and we didn’t like that at all. As for the information, so-called, we realised where that must have come from when we remembered the five rabbits in the postbox.’
‘Rabbits in the postbox? ’ exclaimed Laura.
‘Oh, dead ones, of course, ’ said Morpeth. ‘ Adams, the village poacher, had put them there, the day Sekhmet disappeared. We told Susan to give him his money if he called while we were out. He must have come up to the house with them early in the morning, I suppose, and thought it was too early to knock us up.’
‘Other times he left some rabbits in the kitchen,’ said Morpeth, ‘but he couldn’t do that this time because we lock the back door every night since we had the prowler.’
‘So this poacher saw something he thought suspicious and went to the police,’ said Dame Beatrice. ‘If the man is a hunter of illicit fish or game, it seems a strange thing for him to have done.’
‘Oh, Adams would do anything for the sake of a ten-pence piece,’ said Bryony. ‘Besides, although he has been up before the magistrates in Axehead a couple of times, he has never been convicted of anything.’
‘Is there any reason why he should want to make trouble?’
‘I’m sure there isn’t. His rabbits are useful because they are a change of diet for the hounds and we always pay him promptly.’
‘So you think that he really did see whatever he seems to have mentioned to the police?’
‘Well, you know, Susan was very doubtful about that inquest. She said the man would have kicked Sekhmet, not given the dog his trousers. But I do think Adams could have come and told us that he was going to the police with information and then left us to deal with the matter. Is there anything you can do to get the police off our backs? I’m sure they suspect murder, as Susan does.’
‘Has this poacher a home?’
