Free The Burry Man's Day by Catriona McPherson

the door and the rumble of voices carried quite clearly up through the murder hole towards us and then, after a pause, light footsteps came hurrying up the stone treads and a maid appeared in the doorway. She was in black with her linen cuffs and frilled table apron on and she brought with her a rich waft of cooking. A slow rolling rumble emanated from Daisy’s middle.
    ‘Please, madam, sir,’ said the maid, rather breathlessly. ‘The police are here.’
    ‘Land sake’s alive,’ said Buttercup in a mock American drawl. ‘All right, Jean, show them into the library. Cad? You’d better go up and be ready to meet them.’ But Cadwallader was shaking his head.
    ‘Bring them to the drawing room, Jean,’ he said. And then to Buttercup, ‘We will face them together.’ The maid looked from one to the other, bobbed a curtsy and left, and then all four of us scurried out of the hall behind her and made for the stairs. At the drawing-room landing Daisy and I naturally began to carry on up but Cadwallader let out an exclamation, almost a squeak of protest.
    ‘Don’t leave us,’ he said.
    ‘Very well,’ I said, glad to have my nosiness indulged, but at his look of relief I had to giggle. ‘My dear Cadwallader,’ I said, ‘they’re not coming for you.’
    Of course they were not, but anxiety is terribly catching and Cad’s hand-wringing trepidation, as we arranged ourselves in natural-looking poses and waited, infected all of us a little. Then the ringing tread of policemen’s boots on the stone steps did have rather an ominous feel to it, and so by the time the footsteps arrived in the passage outside the drawing-room door and the two men appeared in the flesh we were all cowering a little and inclined to gulp. There was a uniformed man, young and gormless-looking, busy casting his eyes around with interest at the interior of the castle, and an older figure, dressed in a light overcoat, carrying a soft hat, and looking surprised; not as though something in particular was surprising him right at the moment, more that surprise was the look of his face when at rest; surprise or a suppressed sneeze, one or the other. Anyway, it saved him from looking at all intimidating and one would have expected Cadwallader to rally.
    I waited for him or Buttercup to rise or at least to say something but nothing happened, despite Daisy kicking Buttercup’s ankle quite hard, and the senior policeman spoke first.
    ‘Inspector Cruickshank, madam, sir, madam, madam,’ he said and I marvelled at the composure it must have taken to get to the end of this without faltering. Still nothing from the host or hostess.
    ‘Good evening, Inspector,’ I said at last. ‘I’m Mrs Gilver, a friend of Mrs de Cassilis’s, and this is Mrs Esslemont. Mr and Mrs de Cassilis are . . .’ I tailed off, ‘hopeless’ being the only word I could think of, which was hardly apropos.
    ‘I’m not surprised,’ said Inspector Cruickshank. ‘What a terrible thing to happen. Robert Dudgeon, you can scarcely credit it. Hardly fifty.’
    This seemed to point very comfortingly down the heart attack or aneurysm route and Buttercup brightened visibly although Cad still hung his head like a dog expecting a kick.
    ‘Anyway,’ said Inspector Cruickshank and shifted rather awkwardly.
    ‘Do please sit down,’ said Daisy with another swift kick at Buttercup, which connected only with her chair leg and so had no effect. ‘And um . . .’ She glanced towards the young man hovering in the corner, but Inspector Cruickshank waved his hand and tush-tushed to say we need not worry about him.
    ‘The police surgeon is on his way,’ he said.
    ‘On his way here?’ said Buttercup, round-eyed. Inspector Cruickshank frowned and shook his head.
    ‘The fever hospital at Killinghouse Road is empty, given the time of year,’ he said. ‘So the post-mortem can be done there without delay. There is a room in a wee place by the gates of the cemetery too, but it’s really more