Free Last Ditch by Ngaio Marsh

send him completely bonkers.’
    ‘I can but try.’
    He went into the house by the back-door, and following the sound of Jasper’s voice, found him at the telephone in an office where Mr Harkness evidently did his bookkeeping.
    Jasper said: ‘Yes. Thank you. As quick as you can, won’t you?’ and hung up the receiver. ‘What now?’ he asked. ‘How is he?’
    ‘As near as damn it off his head. But he’s doing stables at the moment. The girls thought, perhaps a drink.’
    ‘I doubt if we’ll find any.’
    ‘Should we look?’
    ‘I don’t know. Should we? Might it send him utterly cuckoo?’
    ‘That’s what we wondered,’ said Ricky.
    Jasper looked round the room and spotted a little corner cupboard. After a moment’s hesitation he opened the door and was confronted with a skull-and-crossbones badly drawn in red ink and supported by a legend:
    BEWARE! This Way Lies Damnation!!!
    The card on which this information was inscribed had been hung round the neck of a whisky bottle.
    ‘In the face of that,’ Ricky said, ‘what should we do?’
    ‘I’ve no idea. But I know what I’m going to do,’ said Jasper warmly. He unscrewed the cap and took a fairly generous pull at the bottle. ‘I needed that,’ he gasped and offered it to Ricky.
    ‘No, thanks,’ Ricky said. ‘I feel sick already.’
    ‘It takes all sorts,’ Jasper observed, wiping his mouth and returning the bottle to the cupboard. ‘The doctor’s coming,’ he said. ‘And so’s the vet.’ He indicated a list of numbers above the telephone. ‘And the ambulance.’
    ‘Good,’ said Ricky.
    ‘They all said: “Don’t move her.” ’
    ‘Good.’
    ‘The vet meant the mare.’
    ‘Naturally.’
    ‘God,’ said Jasper. ‘This is awful.’
    ‘Yes. Awful.’
    ‘Shall we go out?’
    ‘Yes.’
    They returned to the stable yard. Bruno and Mr Harkness were still in the loose-boxes. There was a sound of munching and an occasional snort.
    Jasper put his arm round his wife. ‘OK?’ he asked.
    ‘Yes. You’ve been drinking.’
    ‘Do you want some?’
    ‘No.’
    ‘Where’s Bruno?’
    Julia jerked her head at the loose-boxes. ‘Come over here,’ she said, and drew the two men towards the car. Carlotta was in the driver’s seat, smoking.
    ‘Listen,’ Julia said. ‘About Bruno. You know what he’s thinking, of course?’
    ‘What?’
    ‘He’s thinking it’s his fault. Because he jumped the gap first. So she thought she could.’
    ‘Not his fault if she did.’
    ‘That’s what I say,’ said Carlotta.
    ‘Try and persuade Bruno of it! He was told not to and now see what’s come of it. That’s the way he’s thinking.’
    ‘Silly little bastard,’ said his brother uneasily.
    Ricky said: ‘She’d made up her mind to do it before we got here. She’d have done it if Bruno had never appeared on the scene.’
    ‘Yes, Ricky,’ Julia said eagerly. ‘That’s just it. That’s the line we must take with Bruno. Do say all that to him, won’t you? How right you are.’
    ‘There’ll be an inquest, of course, and it’ll come out,’ Jasper said. ‘Bruno’s bit’ll come out.’
    ‘Hell,’ said Carlotta.
    A car appeared, rounded the corner of the house and pulled up. The driver, a man in a tweed suit carrying a professional bag, got out.
    ‘Dr Carey?’ Jasper asked.
    ‘Blacker’s the name. I’m the vet. Where’s Cuth? What’s up, anyway?’
    ‘I should explain,’ Jasper said, and was doing so when a second car arrived with a second man in a tweed suit carrying a professional bag. This was Dr Carey. Jasper began again. When he had finished Dr Carey said: ‘Where is she, then?’ and, being told, walked off down the horse-paddock. ‘When the ambulance comes – ‘ he threw over his shoulder – ‘will you show them where? I’ll see her uncle when I get back.’
    ‘I’d better talk to Cuth,’ said the vet. ‘This is a terrible thing. Where is he?’
    As if in answer to a summons, Mr Harkness appeared, like a