***
Michael gathered everyone in the library after dinner to plan the recreation of the murder.
“The time of year is quite wrong,” he said with a frown, “but if we hold the enactment at dusk, that would be close enough to the situation of near-dawn in June.”
“I hope you do not expect me to reprise my rôle in the events of that night, Captain,” Lady Alice said.
“No, indeed, my lady! Under no circumstances! If you wish, you may choose to be elsewhere — not in the castle at all. Or, you may stay with those who were not present that night. I suggest that those not participating may wait in the great hall, since we know that the murderer must have passed that way twice. I shall invite Sir Hubert Strong to be a witness, also, as magistrate, and if the lady’s husband approves, I propose to invite Mrs Walter Atherton to play your part, Lady Alice — to find the body and raise the alarm.”
“Winnie!” Walter said. “Why Winnie in particular?”
“Because she is exceptionally calm and sensible, sir. She was a great help to me in the early days of the investigation, and she has already acted as Lady Alice once before, when I was testing whether a lady would be strong enough to wield the axe.”
“I should be happy to help in any way I can,” Winnie said, “but I draw the line at screaming.”
There was a ripple of amusement around the room.
“No screaming needed,” Michael said. “There is a loud hand-bell in the old school room. That will serve the purpose very well. Everyone apart from Lady Alice who was here that night should be in the room he or she occupied then, and should react precisely as they reacted at the time. The servants, too. I shall explain what is expected of them. What I hope is that someone will remember something… some trivial thing that may have been forgotten or overlooked at the time. Or notice something, perhaps. Mr Kent recalled seeing someone goingdownthe mainstairs, so we will find out if our fleeing murderer is indeed visible on the stairs. The timing will be an important consideration, so Mr Willerton-Forbes and I will be noting how long everything takes. Is everyone clear on what is to be done?”
“I believe you have forgotten one point,” Kent said.
“Have I?” He smiled widely.
“The murderer. Who is to play the leading rôle in this little play? You?”
“Not I, no. I need to watch what happens. Who would like to be the murderer?”
There was general laughter.
“It sounds amusing,” Izzy said, “but I imagine you will want a male murderer.”
“Hardly amusing, Izzy,” the earl said. “We are talking about the recreation of a realmurder, not some foolish Drury Lane farce.”
“I do think the murderer was male, yes,” Michael said hastily. “Long skirts are a great hindrance to speedy movement, I imagine, and the murderer must have moved fast.”
“Must he?” Lord Farramont said. “Might he not have crept about through the castle for some time before blundering into Mr Nicholson’s room?”
“That is certainly a possibility,” Michael said evenly.
“Might he already have been inside the castle?” Lord Farramont said. “One of the inhabitants, perhaps.”
There was an intake of breath around the room at this suggestion.
“One of us?” Olivia cried. “What a horrid idea!”
“And a most unlikely one, my lady,” Michael said quickly. “Someone living in the castle would hardly have needed to resort to an axe to murder anyone. A drop of rat poison in the brandy decanter or the morning chocolate would do the job mosteffectively. No, this was someone — a man, certainly — who entered the castle from outside.”
She nodded, still looking rather anxious. Lord Kiltarlity, who sat beside her, squeezed her hand reassuringly, and was rewarded by a tremulous smile.
“We cannot know how long the villain was here before the murder was committed,” Michael went on, “but for the purposes of recreating the crime, I wish to know what is the shortest time it would have taken him. Therefore, I propose that he enters by the garden door where the bolt was broken, proceeds up the service stairs to the great hall, collects the axe, and then goes directly to Mr Nicholson’s room. Given that Mr Kent Atherton saw a fleeing figure, I further propose that Mrs Walter Atherton, in her rôle as Lady Alice, should hear something and enter Mr Nicholson’s room immediately.”
“So this is all guesswork?” Eustace said. “You have no idea how it happened, have you?”
“No one can know precisely what happened leading up to the murder,” Michael said carefully.
“Except the murderer,” Kent said, to more laughter.
“True. If anyone would like to reveal his identity, we can ask him,” Michael said. “Until then, I propose to work with the most likely situation, which to my mind is that the murderer wished to get in and out as quickly as possible, before he was spotted by a servant up early. So… does anyone apart from Lady Farramont wish to be the murderer?”
