Free A Puzzle in a Pear Tree by Parnell Hall Page B

could see him centering himself, trying to focus his attention away from poor Dorrie and onto the problem at hand. It clearly wasn’t easy.
    Doddsworth regarded the crime-scene ribbon stretched across the front of the stable, muttered, “Utterly ineffective, since she fell out there. Everyone and my auntie Enid’s been across that snow. You’ve got your police, your doctor, your ambulance men, the two trolleys they pushed. Plus however many spectators were milling about.”
    “None. I read ’em the riot act, kept ’em on the road.” Chief Harper pointed to the crowd of people avidly gathered in front of the church. “As you can see.”
    “Yes. But all the actors jumped down. And I understand some idiot onlookers rushed across the lawn.”
    Cora Felton flushed. Having been too far away to see which Virgin Mary took the plunge, she’d scampered across the green in record-breaking time. Idiot onlookers, indeed.
    “So what can you tell from the tracks?” she asked judiciously, in an attempt to distance herself from the gawkers.
    “Not bloody much,” Doddsworth told her. “Rum show, really. Makes us dependent on the accounts of witnesses. Who, I daresay, are generally unreliable. Nonetheless, the actors here freezing their bums would surely have noticed if some bloke happened by.”
    “Well, they didn’t,” Chief Harper said sourly. “Even her boyfriend was no help.”
    Doddsworth’s eyebrows rose. “What, her steady chap? Was he here too?”
    “He was Joseph.”
    “Blimey.” Doddsworth thought a moment. “What was the cause of death?”
    “Don’t know.” Harper turned, called, “Hey, Barney, got anything yet?”
    “I’m pronouncing her dead.” The doctor jerked his thumb at the EMS unit, who were loading the body onto a gurney. “They’ll run her down to the hospital, but she’s beyond help. I’ll finish up there.”
    “You got a cause of death?”
    “You’ll know when I do.”
    Dr. Nathan followed the gurney off.
    “Any chance it was natural causes?” Doddsworth asked.
    “Not likely,” Harper told him.
    “Right. Because of the childish ditties. Without the verses, it’s an odds-on bet to be a natural death. With them, the reverse is true.”
    “Could she have been shot?” Cora suggested.
    “I don’t see how,” Doddsworth said.
    Cora pointed to the church. “High-powered rifle. Telescopic sight.”
    “The actors would hear the shot.”
    “And think it was a car backfiring,” Cora pointed out.
    Doddsworth shook his head. “No, we have a subtle crime here. Must have, or it wouldn’t have met with success.”
    “As to that—” Chief Harper began.
    Doddsworth cut him off, shouting at the police officer and young woman coming across the green, “See here, now! This is a crime scene! Stay in the road!”
    “I want my clothes!” the police officer shouted.
    Doddsworth, surprised to hear Sherry Carter’s voice coming out of the officer’s huge overcoat and hat, exclaimed, “What the deuce!”
    “My niece,” Cora explained. “She’s dressed as the Virgin Mary. She came to relieve the corpse. Her clothes are part of the crime scene. She must have borrowed Dan Finley’s coat.”
    “Is that Miss Rebecca with her?”
    “Yes, it is.”
    “Excellent. I want a word with her. Look here,” Doddsworth yelled, “you shouldn’t come this way. Do go around by the actors’ path.”
    Sherry and Becky retreated to the road and worked their way around the green to the path Sherry had taken not an hour before. They made their way to the crèche, stepped inside.
    “Miss Baldwin. Miss Carter,” Chief Harper said. “Just a few questions, if you don’t mind. Miss Baldwin, you called me last night to tell me you were switching spots with Dorrie Taggart.”
    “You knew about this
last night
?” Cora said accusingly.
    Chief Harper ignored her. He said to Becky Baldwin, “Why did you change your schedule?”
    “I didn’t change it. She did.”
    “Oh?”
    “She called me up,