'What about time of death?' he asked.
The doctor glanced over at the clock and his own watch.
'Just after half-past five now,' he said. 'say I saw her about twenty past five – she'd been dead about an hour. Roughly, that is to say. Put it between four o'clock and twenty to five. Let you know if there's anything more after the autopsy.' He added: 'You'll get the proper report with the long words in due course. I'll be off now. I've got some patients to see.'
He left the room and Inspector Bland asked Hoskins to fetch Miss Brewis. His spirits rose a little when Miss Brewis came into the room. Here, as he recognised at once, was efficiency. He would get clear answers to his questions, definite times and no muddle-headedness.
'Mrs Tucker's in my sitting-room,' Miss Brewis said as she sat down. 'I've broken the news to her and given her some tea. She's very upset, naturally. She wanted to see the body but I told her it was much better not. Mr Tucker gets off work at six o'clock and was coming to join his wife here. I told them to look out for him and bring him along when he arrives. The younger children are at the fete still, and someone is keeping an eye on them.'
'Excellent,' said Inspector Bland, with approval. 'I think before I see Mrs Tucker I would like to hear what you and Lady Stubbs can tell me.'
'I don't know where Lady Stubbs is,' said Miss Brewis acidly. 'I rather imagine she got bored with the fete and has wandered off somewhere, but I don't expect she can tell you anything more than I can. What exactly is it that you want to know?'
'I want to know all the details of this murder hunt first and of how this girl, Marlene Tucker, came to be taking a part in it.'
'That's quite easy.'
Succinctly and clearly Miss Brewis explained the idea of the murder hunt as an original attraction for the fete, the engaging of Mrs Oliver, the well-known novelist, to arrange the matter, and a short outline of the plot.
'Originally,' Miss Brewis explained, 'Mrs Alec Legge was to have taken the part of the victim.'
'Mrs Alec Legge?' queried the inspector.
Constable Hoskins put in an explanatory word.
'She and Mr Legge have the Lawders' cottage, the pink one down by Mill Creek. Came here a month ago, they did. Two or three months they got it for.'
'I see. And Mrs Legge, you say, was to be the original victim? Why was that changed?'
'Well, one evening Mrs Legge told all our fortunes and was so good at it that it was decided we'd have a fortune teller's tent as one of the attractions and that Mrs Legge should put on Eastern dress and be Madame Zuleika and tell fortunes at half a crown a time. I don't think that's really illegal, is it, Inspector? I mean it's usually done at these kind of fetes.'
Inspector Bland smiled faintly.
'Fortune telling and raffles aren't always taken too seriously, Miss Brewis,' he said. 'Now and then we have to – er – make an example.'
'But usually you're tactful? Well, that's how it was. Mrs Legge agreed to help us that way and so we had to find somebody else to do the body. The local Guides were helping us at the fete, and I think someone suggested that one of the Guides would do quite well.'
'Just who was it who suggested that, Miss Brewis?'
'Really, I don't quite know… I think it may have been Mrs Masterton, the Member's wife. No, perhaps it was Captain Warburton… Really, I can't be sure. But, anyway, it was suggested.'
'Is there any reason why this particular girl should have been chosen?'
'N-no, I don't think so. Her people are tenants on the estate, and her mother, Mrs Tucker, sometimes comes to help in the kitchen. I don't know quite why we settled on her. Probably her name came to mind first. We asked her and she seemed quite pleased to do it.'
'She definitely wanted to do it?'
'Oh, yes, I think she was flattered. She was a very moronic kind of girl,' continued Miss Brewis, 'she couldn't have acted a part or anything like that. But this was all very simple, and she felt she'd been singled out from the others and was pleased about it.'
'What exactly was it that she had to do?'
'She had to stay in the boathouse. When she heard anyone coming to the door she was to lie down on the floor, put the cord round her neck and sham dead.' Miss Brewis's tones were calm and business-like. The fact that the girl who was to sham dead had actually been found dead did not at the moment appear to affect her emotionally.
'Rather a boring way for the girl to spend the afternoon when she might have been at the fete,' suggested Inspector Bland.
'I suppose it was in a way,' said Miss Brewis, 'but one can't have everything, can one? And Marlene did enjoy the idea of being the body. It made her feel important. She had a pile of papers and things to read to keep her amused.'
'And something to eat as well?' said the inspector. 'I noticed there was a tray down there with a plate and glass.'
'Oh, yes, she had a big plate of sweet cakes, and a raspberry fruit drink. I took them down to her myself.'
Bland looked up sharply.
'You took them down to her? When?'
'About the middle of the afternoon.'
'What time exactly? Can you remember?'
Miss Brewis considered a moment.
'Let me see. Children's Fancy Dress was judged, there was a little delay – Lady Stubbs couldn't be found, but Mrs Folliat took her place, so that was all right… Yes, it must have been – I'm almost sure – about five minutes past four that I collected the cakes and the fruit drink.'
'And you took them down to her at the boathouse yourself. What time did you reach there?'
'Oh, it takes about five minutes to go down to the boathouse – about quarter past four, I should think.'
'And at quarter past four Marlene Tucker was alive and well?'
'Yes, of course,' said Miss Brewis, 'and very eager to know how people were getting on with the murder hunt, too. I'm afraid I couldn't tell her. I'd been too busy with the side shows on the lawn, but I did know that a lot of people had entered for it. Twenty or thirty to my own knowledge. Probably a good many more.'
'How did you find Marlene when you arrived at the boathouse?'
'I've just told you.'
'No, no, I don't mean that. I mean, was she lying on the floor shamming dead when you opened the door?'
'Oh, no,' said Miss Brewis, 'because I called out just before I got there. So she opened the door and I took the tray in and put it on the table.'
'At a quarter past four,' said Bland, writing it down, 'Marlene Tucker was alive and well. You will understand, I'm sure, Miss Brewis, that that is a very important point. You are quite sure of your times?'
'I can't be exactly sure because I didn't look at my watch, but I had looked at it a short time previously and that's as near as I can get.' She added, with a sudden dawning realisation of the inspector's point, 'Do you mean that it was soon after -'
'It can't have been very long after, Miss Brewis.'
'Oh, dear,' said Miss Brewis.
It was a rather inadequate expression, but nevertheless it conveyed well enough Miss Brewis's dismay and concern.
'Now, Miss Brewis, on your way down to the boathouse and on your way back again to the house, did you meet anybody or see anyone near the boathouse?'
Miss Brewis considered.
'No,' she said, 'I didn't meet anyone. I might have, of course, because the grounds are open to everyone this afternoon. But on the whole, people tend to stay round the lawn and the side shows and all that. They like to go round the kitchen gardens and the greenhouses, but they don't walk through the woodlands as much as I should
