Free Death in High Heels by Christianna Brand Page B

one of them couldn’t resist the temptation of all that poison lying about, and that he or she deliberately and of malice aforethought pinched a little of it and sprinkled it on the poor girl’s food; but who it was, I haven’t the faintest idea!”
    “She didn’t eat anything else during the day, sir?”
    “No, I’ve got that pretty well set. She took nothing except the meat and vegetables; and the jelly which I think is obviously an innocent party. If she’d taken oxalic before she got to the shop, the symptoms would have come on much earlier and anyway the coincidence would have been a bit too much, wouldn’t it? She didn’t have any tea because she had already been taken ill; and she didn’t leave the place to get hold of any more poison outside; and, as far as I can make out, she didn’t eat anything in her own office; so we’re left with the meat and two veg.”
    “It was curry, sir, wasn’t it?”
    “Yes, curried rabbit and, of course, that was a gift to any poisoner, Bedd. It would absorb the crystals quite quickly, especially if they were rather fine as oxalic acid often is; and it would disguise the taste as much as anything could. It evidently didn’t disguise it entirely, because, according to Mrs. ’Arris, the girl did complain; but she was always a bit fussy about her food and nobody took any notice of her.”
    “Bit of a coincidence, would you say, sir, having such a perfect dish to ’and, all ready for putting poison on? Couldn’t ’ave been arranged, could it?”
    “I don’t think so. The cook makes up the menus and it was all fixed before ever the poison was brought into the place; in fact, it was already cooking by then. No, I think it was just a bit of luck and the murderer took advantage of it. I look at it this way; the whole thing was done on the spur of the moment; there was the poison lying about and it suddenly occurred to somebody that if they got hold of a little of it, a chance might come for them to use it; then they discovered that there was curry for lunch, and there was their opportunity sooner than they could have hoped. What we want to find out is, who had that opportunity, and who, out of all the people who had the opportunity to obtain it, had the opportunity to administer it; and out of them who had the motive.”
    “Process of elimination, Mr. Charlesworth?”
    “Well, I’m very fond of my process of elimination. I like to clear out the Might-have-done-its and the Would-have-done-its and the Look-as-if-they-done-its and get down to the Could -have-done-its; when I’ve done that I look for motive; and when I’ve got that, I look for proofs. I like to clear my decks for action. Unfortunately, in this case nearly every blighter in the cast seems to have been a Could-have-done-it.”
    “They’d have to have the two opportunities, sir. One to obtain and one to administer.”
    “Practically all of them had both.”
    “That’s a pity, sir. Don’t leave the decks quite so clear for action, do it?” said Bedd, with a twinkle.
    Charlesworth acknowledged this thrust with rueful good-humour and proceeded to relate the history of the luncheon hour as he had gleaned it from Bevan on the previous morning. Bedd listened acutely and at the conclusion emitted a heavy groan. “Decks don’t look too good now, sir! Wot a shambles!”
    “You see what I meant? Every single soul went to the table or near the plate of food. Of course you can’t say that everyone would actually have been able to put anything on to the plate, but, on-the other hand, we can’t be sure that any of them would not have been able to. Certainly no one saw anything funny, but that means exactly nothing.”
    They pondered in silence for a while. “Let’s make a list,” said Charlesworth at last.
    “Three columns,” agreed the sergeant. “Opportunity to Obtain, Opportunity to Administer, and Motive. How’s that, sir?”
    “Column number three’s going to look a bit thin, but never mind, go