Page 73 of Marriage and Murder
Stokes inclined his head. “Unless and until the time is right.” He shifted his gaze to Penelope and Madeline. “Now you’ve wrung all our news from us, what did you learn from the gossips?”
Penelope took a moment to order her recollections, then commenced, “First, from Mrs. Foswell’s observations, when Viola left the church and headed back through the village, Viola’s attitude was one of focused determination. Viola told Mrs. Foswell that she couldn’t dally and chat because she had an errand to complete before returning to Lavender Cottage, where she was expecting a visitor.”
Stokes looked eager. “Dare I hope this errand was to Penrose Cottage?”
Penelope’s lips curved. “Don’t leap ahead. We’ll get to the errand in due course.”
“I take it the visitor was Pincer,” Henry said.
“Viola didn’t say,” Madeline replied, “but as she promised to tell Mrs. Foswell all the next day, I suspect it was. The time certainly fits.”
Penelope resumed her report. “After Mrs. Foswell, we spoke with Iris Perkins, and she confirmed seeing Viola go to the church at a little after twelve, then return through the junction at about twelve-thirty.” She looked at Stokes and Barnaby. “From Iris’s veranda, where she was sitting, she has an unobstructed view of the junction, but she can’t see farther along Green Lane.” She paused, then went on, “Iris saw Viola enter the junction and turn toward Green Lane, but then she stopped, opened her tapestry bag, and drew out a folded paper. Iris thought it looked like some official document, as she thinks it had a seal.”
Henry stated, “A solicitor’s letter should have been sealed.”
Penelope nodded. “Iris saw Viola clutch the letter in her hand and determinedly march on down Green Lane.”
“Iris didn’t see anything more, but she told us Gladys Hooper had,” Madeline said, “so we went on to the Hoopers’ cottage.”
“And Gladys was quite ready to tell us all,” Penelope said. “Namely, that she had been visiting her old aunt, who lives farther out along Green Lane, and had been returning to share a light luncheon with Iris when she saw Viola marching toward her with a paper in her hand. Viola and Gladys exchanged waves, and then Viola turned in at the gate of Penrose Cottage.”
Penelope smiled as, their expressions eager, all the men leaned forward, then Barnaby impatiently waved at her to continue, and she went on, “Gladys is an accomplished gossip, and she scurried to a spot along the fence outside Penrose Cottage where, unseen, she could hear the words exchanged when Viola knocked on the door and Ida opened it.” She pausedfor breath, and the anticipation about the table palpably rose, then she related all that Gladys had overheard and also seen.
“Gladys saw the letter in Ida’s hand?” Stokes asked.
Penelope nodded. “And she also saw Viola leave soon after, and she didn’t have the letter with her then, or at least Gladys didn’t notice it.”
“If Ida had taken the letter into her hands, Viola wouldn’t have taken it back,” Barnaby said. “Not if she could help it.”
“And as it was addressed to Arthur,” Penelope pointed out, “Ida wouldn’t have refused to take it for him. By all accounts, Ida is Arthur’s protector. He gets on with doing what he loves while she deals with the world on his behalf.”
They pondered that, then Penelope concluded, “Gladys stopped at the corner and looked back and saw Viola come out of the Penroses’ gate and go in at Lavender Cottage.” Penelope paused, then smiled and added, “And Gladys’s last tidbit of information was that Ida served them freshly baked scones for afternoon tea.”
When the men blinked at her, Penelope explained, “Scone dough is made with flour.”
She sat back and thought things through, then summarized, “That’s the entirety of our information. While we still have nothing that conclusively proves, beyond all question, that Ida Penrose strangled Viola to death, all the facts we’ve assembled inescapably point to that.”
Barnaby and Stokes shared a long look, then Stokes softly grunted. “We’re going to have to chance our hand and arrest her and hope that on the balance of the evidence, she’ll be convicted.”
Barnaby turned to Henry. “What do you think?”
Henry had clearly been weighing up their arguments. He grimaced. “It’s hard to distance myself from this case…” He glanced at Madeline, then returned his gaze to Stokes.“However, I believe that on the balance of probabilities, you would get a conviction. Aside from all else, the question arises of who else could have done the deed. From Carter’s evidence, we know that the murderer was someone Viola knew, making the pool of suspects small, and virtually all except Ida Penrose are accounted for.”
“And,” Penelope put in, “don’t forget the timing. Gladys saw Viola go in through the Lavender Cottage gate at a minute or so before twelve-forty, and by one-thirty, Viola was dead and the murderer gone. It’s difficult to construct any scenario whereby, within that fifty-minute period, someone else came into the cottage, killed Viola, and left the property without encountering Monty coming in from the rear or being seen by anyone in the village.”
“Indeed,” Henry said. “And then there’s the matter of the solicitor’s letters. They haven’t been found, and the only persons with a motive for taking and burning them are Arthur and Ida Penrose.”
“And,” Penelope went on, “we know it wasn’t Arthur because he spent all the afternoon with Jim Swinson in the orchard.”
“The very orchard,” Barnaby said, “that was the subject of the solicitor’s letters.” He looked at Stokes, as did everyone else.
Stokes had been staring at the table, listening to all that was said. Now, he raised his gaze and looked around the gathering, then nodded and straightened in his chair. “So we chance our hand and see what happens. I can’t see that we’ve anything left to ferret out, no further information we might acquire to strengthen our case.”
Penelope nodded, too. “We’re in possession of all the facts we’re likely to learn.” She met Stokes’s gaze and grimaced. “Like you, I imagine those solicitor’s letters are cold ash by now.”
Stokes humphed. “She wouldn’t have kept them. She’s made few mistakes thus far.” He drew out his timepiece and consultedit, then tucked it away. “It’s close to one o’clock. We should wait until after lunchtime to have the best chance of finding her alone.” He glanced toward the kitchen, then cocked a brow at Madeline. “Is there anything we could eat while we wait?”
Madeline laughed, then shook her head and rose. She went into the kitchen, peered into the bread bin, then looked at the others. “I think we can manage sandwiches.”
