Page 19 of The Mystery Guest

“It is,” I reply. “I mean, itwasMr. Grimthorpe’s tea cart.”

“Boys!” Detective Stark calls out. “That one’s the Grimthorpe cart.” They nod and begin inspecting it with gloved hands.

“Was Grimthorpe in the room when you entered?” Stark asks.

“No. He was behind the hidden paneled door in the wall. Ms. Serena Sharpe, Mr. Grimthorpe’s personal secretary, knocked. Then Mr. Grimthorpe emerged. The room went pin-drop silent as he walked onto the stage and placed his cue cards on the podium.”

“Right. The cue cards. Boys!” she calls out. “Did you locate any cue cards?”

“No, ma’am,” the tall officer replies.

The other shakes his head.

“And what happened next, Molly?” Stark asks as she scribbles on her notepad.

“Mr. Grimthorpe cleared his throat and asked for a cup of tea, which Lily poured for him and rushed to the stage.”

“We’ll be testing the tea in that teapot.”

“No need,” I say. “It was English Breakfast. I know that for a fact.”

“I mean testing for toxins, Molly. Do you get that? We want to know if someone, like that half-wit in Mr. Snow’s office, put something in the writer’s tea.”

“There’s no need for name-calling,” I say. “And as for Grimthorpe’s tea, there most certainly was something in it: honey.”

“Honey,” Detective Stark repeats.

“Yes. From the honey pot I placed on the tea cart earlier. As I mentioned, right before the big event, I inspected the tea cart myself and realized there were qualitative faux pas.Mr. Grimthorpe takes his tea with honey, not sugar. I straightened an off-kilter doily, then switched out the sugar bowl for a honey pot.”

“Boys!” she calls out again. “Locate the honey pot on that cart.”

The gloved men search for it but fail to find it.

“It’s got to be there,” I say. “A high-quality silver pot with a small cutout in the lid for a Regency Grand spoon.” I march over to the cart, but when I arrive, all I see is a bare doily on the silver tray.

“The honey pot is gone,” I say. I look about the room. There are sugar bowls on every table but no other honey pots because they’re not a part of our regular tea service.

“How strange,” I say. “Mr. Grimthorpe walked off the stage himself to add more honey to his tea.”

“Did he drink from that cup that’s broken on the floor?” Detective Stark asks.

“Most definitely. We all saw it. He took several sips right away and a few more when he got back onstage. Then he put the cup down and started to speak. He was about to reveal a secret—he said as much—but before he could, he began to sway, appearing almost inebriated. Suddenly, he tipped forward and then crashed onto the floor on top of poor Lily.”

“And his teacup went flying,” Stark notes.

“It did,” I reply, eyeing the shards on the floor. “And so did the spoon and the saucer.”

Detective Stark walks over to the broken cup and saucer on the floor, gingerly crouching by the shards. She turns to her officers. “Boys, did you bag a spoon from the floor?”

“No,” says the tall one, and the other shakes his head.

She writes something down, then turns a page on her pad. “What happened after Grimthorpe collapsed?” she asks.

“Everyone rushed to the front of the room. There were calls for help, people jostling. I pushed my way forward, then I extricated Lily from underneath Mr. Grimthorpe. Mr. Snow and his personal secretary, Ms. Serena Sharpe, were trying to revive him.”

The detective’s head jolts up from her pad. “Where do you suppose she is now, that secretary?”

“In her room, perhaps?” I offer. “It adjoins Mr. Grimthorpe’s on the second floor.”

---