A Murder is Announced

Phillipa did not reply.

Miss Blacklock was glancing round the room. Mitzi had put the sherry and three dishes containing olives, cheese straws and some little fancy pastries on the table in the middle of the room.

‘You might move that tray—or the whole table if you like—round the corner into the bay window in the other room, Patrick, if you don’t mind. After all, I am not giving a party! I haven’t asked anyone. And I don’t intend to make it obvious that I expect people to turn up.’

‘You wish, Aunt Letty, to disguise your intelligent anticipation?’

‘Very nicely put, Patrick. Thank you, my dear boy.’

‘Now we can all give a lovely performance of a quiet evening at home,’ said Julia, ‘and be quite surprised when somebody drops in.’

Miss Blacklock had picked up the sherry bottle. She stood holding it uncertainly in her hand.

Patrick reassured her.

‘There’s quite half a bottle there. It ought to be enough.’

‘Oh, yes—yes …’ She hesitated. Then, with a slight flush, she said:

‘Patrick, would you mind … there’s a new bottle in the cupboard in the pantry … Bring it and a corkscrew. I—we—might as well have a new bottle. This—this has been opened some time.’

Patrick went on his errand without a word. He returned with the new bottle and drew the cork. He looked up curiously at Miss Blacklock as he placed it on the tray.

‘Taking this seriously, aren’t you, darling?’ he asked gently.

‘Oh,’ cried Dora Bunner, shocked. ‘Surely, Letty, you can’t imagine—’

‘Hush,’ said Miss Blacklock quickly. ‘That’s the bell. You see, my intelligent anticipation is being justified.’

Mitzi opened the door of the drawing-room and admitted Colonel and Mrs Easterbrook. She had her own methods of announcing people.

‘Here is Colonel and Mrs Easterbrook to see you,’ she said conversationally.

Colonel Easterbrook was very bluff and breezy to cover some slight embarrassment.

‘Hope you don’t mind us dropping in,’ he said. (A subdued gurgle came from Julia.) ‘Happened to be passing this way—eh what? Quite a mild evening. Notice you’ve got your central heating on. We haven’t started ours yet.’

‘Aren’t your chrysanthemums lovely?’ gushed Mrs Easterbrook. ‘Such beauties!’

‘They’re rather scraggy, really,’ said Julia.

Mrs Easterbrook greeted Phillipa Haymes with a little extra cordiality to show that she quite understood that Phillipa was not really an agricultural labourer.

‘How is Mrs Lucas’ garden getting on?’ she asked. ‘Do you think it will ever be straight again? Completely neglected all through the war—and then only that dreadful old man Ashe who simply did nothing but sweep up a few leaves and put in a few cabbage plants.’

‘It’s yielding to treatment,’ said Phillipa. ‘But it will take a little time.’

Mitzi opened the door again and said:

‘Here are the ladies from Boulders.’

‘’Evening,’ said Miss Hinchcliffe, striding over and taking Miss Blacklock’s hand in her formidable grip. ‘I said to Murgatroyd: “Let’s just drop in at Little Paddocks!” I wanted to ask you how your ducks are laying.’

‘The evenings do draw in so quickly now, don’t they?’ said Miss Murgatroyd to Patrick in a rather fluttery way. ‘What lovely chrysanthemums!’

‘Scraggy!’ said Julia.

‘Why can’t you be co-operative?’ murmured Patrick to her in a reproachful aside.

‘You’ve got your central heating on,’ said Miss Hinchcliffe. She said it accusingly. ‘Very early.’

‘The house gets so damp this time of year,’ said Miss Blacklock.

Patrick signalled with his eyebrows: ‘Sherry yet?’ and Miss Blacklock signalled back: ‘Not yet.’

She said to Colonel Easterbrook:

‘Are you getting any bulbs from Holland this year?’

The door again opened and Mrs Swettenham came in rather guiltily, followed by a scowling and uncomfortable Edmund.

‘Here we are!’ said Mrs Swettenham gaily, gazing round her with frank curiosity. Then, feeling suddenly uncomfortable, she went on: ‘I just thought I’d pop in and ask you if by any chance you wanted a kitten, Miss Blacklock? Our cat is just—’

‘About to be brought to bed of the progeny of a ginger tom,’ said Edmund. ‘The result will, I think, be frightful. Don’t say you haven’t been warned!’

‘She’s a very good mouser,’ said Mrs Swettenham hastily. And added: ‘What lovely chrysanthemums!’

‘You’ve got your central heating on, haven’t you?’ asked Edmund, with an air of originality.

‘Aren’t people just like gramophone records?’ murmured Julia.

‘I don’t like the news,’ said Colonel Easterbrook to Patrick, buttonholing him fiercely. ‘I don’t like it at all. If you ask me, war’s inevitable—absolutely inevitable.’

‘I never pay any attention to news,’ said Patrick.

Once more the door opened and Mrs Harmon came in.

Her battered felt hat was stuck on the back of her head in a vague attempt to be fashionable and she had put on a rather limp frilly blouse instead of her usual pullover.

‘Hallo, Miss Blacklock,’ she exclaimed, beaming all over her round face. ‘I’m not too late, am I? When does the murder begin?’

There was an audible series of gasps. Julia gave an approving little giggle, Patrick crinkled up his face and Miss Blacklock smiled at her latest guest.

‘Julian is just frantic with rage that he can’t be here,’ said Mrs Harmon. ‘He adores murders. That’s really why he preached such a good sermon last Sunday—I suppose I oughtn’t to say it was a good sermon as he’s my husband—but it really was good, didn’t you think?—so much better than his usual sermons. But as I was saying it was all because of Death Does the Hat Trick. Have you read it? The girl at Boots’ kept it for me specially. It’s simply baffling. You keep thinking you know—and then the whole thing switches round—and there are a lovely lot of murders, four or five of them. Well, I left it in the study when Julian was shutting himself up there to do his sermon, and he just picked it up and simply could not put it down! And consequently he had to write his sermon in a frightful hurry and had to just put down what he wanted to say very simply—without any scholarly twists and bits and learned references—and naturally it was heaps better. Oh, dear, I’m talking too much. But do tell me, when is the murder going to begin?’

Miss Blacklock looked at the clock on the mantelpiece.

‘If it’s going to begin,’ she said cheerfully, ‘it ought to begin soon. It’s just a minute to the half hour. In the meantime, have a glass of sherry.’