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then?”
    â€œYes indeed. He may bring down a sergeant, but they’re bound to need your help.” Sir Leonard waved his hands at the spread of papers on the desk. “All the information at your fingertips, eh? That’s the stuff. I expect you have a list of everyone in the house?”
    â€œNot yet,” Crummle admitted grudgingly.
    â€œI expect Mrs. Walsdorf can tell you, Sir Leonard,” Daisy suggested. “She’s Lady Fotheringay’s niece but most of the business of running the household seems to land on her shoulders.”
    â€œSounds like a German name. Married a Jerry, eh?”
    â€œNo, he’s from Luxemburg. He’s Lord Haverhill’s secretary.”
    â€œAh. Righty-ho, then, Mrs. Walsdorf it shall be. I’ll hand the list on to you, Inspector, when I’m done with it. Now I’m going to go
and find a telephone elsewhere and leave you to finish your little chat with Mrs. Fletcher.”
    Turning, he bowed to Daisy with a wink which confirmed to her that his “London DCI” was indeed Alec. As he limped out, she wondered how Alec felt about his summons to Haverhill for a murder three days before he had been due to arrive for a wedding.
    Â 
    Alec stood in the doorway of Lady Eva’s private sitting room in her house in Belgravia. His immediate impression was of luxury, brocades and velvets in rich colours, gleaming wood, thick-pile carpet, and everywhere photographs in silver frames.
    Beside him, Lady Eva’s housekeeper twittered on. “Yes, the house belongs to the Devenish family, but her ladyship lives here alone—lived, I should say. I can’t take it in she’s gone, and that’s a fact. Full of life, she was when last I saw her, looking forward to seeing Miss Lucy wed, that she’s so fond of. What a nasty business! I don’t know what the world’s coming to, really I don’t.”
    â€œThe Devenishes visited often, I suppose?”
    â€œWell, not to say often. Sir James, that’s her ladyship’s son, he’s a countryman through and through, if you know what I mean. Mr. Edward, the young master, has his own flat in town he shares with friends, doesn’t care to live with his gran, well that’s natural, isn’t it? He came to tea now and then, not as often as she’d’ve liked, I dare say. Lady Devenish comes up for shopping, and of course the young ladies had their presentations—before the War that was—and all married well enough, saving Miss Angela.”
    â€œMiss Angela’s not married?”
    â€œNor like to be. That’s why my lady left most of her own money to her, and some to Miss Lucy. She liked an independent spirit in a young lady, she’d tell me, long as everything was quite proper.”
    Dismayed to hear Lucy had a motive for doing in her great-aunt, Alec glanced back to see if Ernie Piper was taking notes. The young detective constable’s pencil was busy.

    â€œMuch money, is there?”
    â€œNo lack,” said the housekeeper complacently. “No fussing about the price of coal in this house, I’m glad to say. Besides the income the late Sir Granville left her ladyship, she has her own fortune from an aunt that married well and had no children. There’s a nice bit going to Miss Angela and Miss Lucy, and what’s left over to the young master. Of course the house belongs to the master, Sir James. Part of the estate it is.”
    â€œLady Eva seems to have confided in you a good deal.”
    â€œBless you, sir, I’ve been with her ladyship thirty years. You can’t live with someone that long without you learn something of their affairs, whether you will or no. A word or two here and a word or two there, if you know what I mean. And no fussing about the price of coal, like I said. Lordy, Lordy, I can hardly believe she’s gone. There’ll be changes around here, for sure. I only hope Sir James