The Devil's Ribbon by D. E. Meredith Page A

Hatton?’
    ‘The Garden of the Dead, Mr Tescalini. Is that what you are pointing at? Yes, it is very delightful, but I have never visited it myself.’
    Mr Tescalini seemed to understand and nodded in sympathy, but the conversation was abruptly called to a halt as the carriage came to a stop and the driver cried out, ‘Whoa there, my beauties.’
    ‘
Quanto costa
, signore?’ Mr Tescalini asked politely to the driver, doffing his battered derby.
    ‘A shilling to you, Mr Italiano,’ responded the driver. ‘And we’ll call it no more. A very good day to you, sir.’
    Hatton was always surprised how very politely everyone spoke tothe detective’s assistant, because his presentation to the world certainly didn’t invite such manners.
    The gate to the house was already open, a hand-painted sign decorated with a twist of tenacious buttercups announcing very prettily,
White Lodge
. There was a long gravel pathway winding to the house, past poppies, daylilies, delphinium, and a flush of hollyhocks and scrambling over an ornate wheelbarrow, terracotta pots, little topiary hedges, a spread of jasmine and honeysuckle. Hatton took a deep breath and filled his lungs with the perfumed air, and for just a second listened to the delightful drone of honeybees.
    But there was no time to spare. Mr Tescalini rapped on the door, his ham fists pounding, and it was instantly opened by a Special in a blue uniform with gilt buttons, who ushered them into what Hatton thought must be the study. But the curtains were shut, as was tradition with death, and the rheumy light offered him nothing.
    ‘Please see to the curtains, Mr Tescalini, for I cannot work in the dark.’
    A rush of light, and Hatton almost jumped out of his skin to see Inspector Grey sitting on a red leather and mahogany chair.
    ‘How very like you to draw the curtains, Hatton. But you’re quite right to illuminate the matter, and you’re exactly on time.’
    Hatton looked askance at him. ‘On time, Inspector?’
    ‘For a communion, Hatton.’
    The inspector spun the chair and faced him. ‘There is a mood of unease here, and I’m a great believer in the telling nature of sensation, when an unexpected death occurs. I know you are of a more scientific inclination, Professor, but as I sat here in the dark, on the dead man’schair, certain feelings began to form. They are not clear yet, but my initial hunches are rarely wrong.’
    Mr Tescalini stared at Hatton, his bloodshot eyes challenging the Professor to naysay these spiritualist connections, but Hatton simply let the mesmerism nonsense float, saying, ‘So you have a sensation, Inspector Grey? And yes, houses often do convey feelings. But what did the widow tell you? Anything of note?’
    Inspector Grey smiled, and lit a wafer-thin cigarillo.
    ‘That Gabriel McCarthy was a man under strain, Professor. It seems there were financial issues, which out of kindness I did not let her dwell on. But the widow is already fretting about the cost of shipping the body to the family estate in Donegal.’
    ‘I see,’ said Hatton, wishing the Inspector would stub his cigarillo out. This was a crime scene, and any trace of a vital odour that might linger in the air and lead them to a killer would be destroyed, masked at the very least.
    ‘There’s also a brother,’ Grey continued. ‘He has apparently lived with the couple since they married, having no place of his own. The widow says she hasn’t seen him since yesterday evening, and on that point, I must confess that I pushed a little and she became most distressed. Most agitated. She wrung her delicate hands, tears flowed, and she told me that the brothers were at loggerheads – over money, over politics, over being here in England, and other things besides which I can only guess at. All this’ – he looked at his pocket watch – ‘in under an hour. She was a tap, Hatton. After I adjusted the valve of her emotions, a veritable tap. And such an outpouring that I felt the