We all watched Toots with bated breath. The twins looked on, confused and angry.
We watched in horror as Toots began to fall forwards with an almighty crash; like a tree that had just been felled, she face-planted straight into the bowl of plum pottage.
Beebee and Ceecee shrieked, while Martha rushed to Toots’s side. Jeannie stood frozen, her face a mask of horror. Fergus, startled from his drunken stupor, attempted to stand but only managed to slide further down in his chair.
‘Oh my God, Toots!’ Clem cried, her hands flying to her mouth.
I leapt into action, arriving at Toots’s side. I picked her head up out of the bowl. My God, she was light, what was she made out of, paper? I gently turned her head to the side. Her eyes were open, her face smeared with the dark, sticky pudding. I eased her back upright, the slop falling from her face and down her front.
‘Toots?’ I said clearly, as I held my fingers in front of her nose and mouth to check if she was breathing. Not a whisper could I feel, but the plum pottage or figgy pudding or whatever it was got onto my fingers and I almost gagged. I checked her pulse as her head lolled backwards, the whole room watching me as I manhandled her like a ragdoll.
Slowly, I turned to look at everyone.
‘I think she’s… she’s gone,’ I said, my voice feeling surreal and disconnected. I gently pushed away the bowl and rested her head back down on the table. ‘Martha, please get your father. Tell him to call an ambulance … the police… just dial nine-nine-nine.’
Martha nodded numbly and rushed out of the room.
Jeannie was looking at me wild-eyed. ‘Start CPR, Olivia!’
I backed away shaking my head. Like hell was I putting my mouth aroundthat. The figgy pudding was bad enough, but what if it was poisoned?
‘I think you should do it, Jeannie,’ I said, voice shaking.
‘Absolutely not!’ she said outraged. ‘Martha, you do it.’
‘She’s not doing it,’ I said firmly. ‘One of the twins should do it!’
‘Someone should do something!’ wailed Clem.
‘You poisoned her, you should do it!’ I shot back.
‘You,’ said Jeannie, aiming her finger at Aunt Clem. ‘You did this!’
‘I didn’t do anything!’ screeched Clem.
‘It wasn’t Clem’s fault, it was the brandy’s fault,’ Fergus slurred, attempting to point an accusing finger at the bowl of pudding. ‘Bad figgy pudding!’
‘Even if you didn’t put something in that pudding, you certainly gave her a heart attack by revealing all of those awful things!’ accused Jeannie.
‘No, no!’ cried Clem.
Miles and Callum burst into the room, eyes wide. They beheld Toots, lying with a face smeared with lumpy brown mush.
‘What’s going on here?’ said Miles, rushing to Toots to examine her.
‘Christ on a bike,’ said Callum. ‘Not another one?’
‘Well, you must have done something!’ continued Jeannie. ‘Youdidput something in that pudding. It makes perfect sense.’ She shook her head bitterly as she approached Clem, like a rattlesnake about to strike. ‘You thought, if you got rid of Eugene, you’d get a payout.
And when that didn’t happen, you came begging George and me for handouts. And when we refused and told you it was being signed over to Tristan, you started sowing seeds of doubt about their marriage.’
‘What?’ asked Beebee, unable to take her eyes off Toots. ‘What seeds of doubt?’
Jeannie ignored her, pushing her face right up against Clem’s now. ‘And when I wouldn’t listen, you went straight for the source. You killed my George! And now I’m next. Well, I’ll tell you now, you conniving trout, you won’t get a damned thing!’
Clementine recoiled, her face a mixture of shock and indignation. ‘How dare you! I would never?—’
‘That’s enough!’ Miles shouted, silencing the room. He knelt beside Toots, checking her pulse again himself. ‘This is not the time for accusations. I’ll call the police now.’
