The Sibyl in Her Grave by Sarah Caudwell Page B

in the presence of the vulture. At the cost of several savage pecks, Daphne managed to remove the bird to the conservatory. After that, we waited at the far end of the room while the doctor carried out his examination.
    “Heart,” he said, when he’d finished. “What did she expect, carrying all that weight?” He seldom misses a chance to point out the dangers of obesity.
    “Will she have to go to hospital?” asked poor Daphne.
    “It’s not the hospital she’s needing,” said Selkirk, with his usual tact. “It’s the undertaker’s. She’s dead, lassie—been dead for hours.”
    And poor Daphne threw herself down on the floor and howled.
    You’ll understand by this time why it’s been a trying day. It’s now nearly midnight, and I thought when I came to bed that I’d go straight to sleep. But I found I couldn’t, and decided to write to you instead.
    The funeral’s on Friday, and with Daphne having no close family I somehow feel responsible for seeing that it all goes properly. There are all sorts of things that I could quite reasonably be lying awake and worrying about—like how to make Daphne presentable for it, and what to give people to eat, and whether we can find anyone to say a few words about how nice Isabella was.
    What seems to be stopping me from sleeping, though, isn’t any of those things but a perfectly idiotic question of no importance at all, which is nagging away at me like a clue in the crossword that one hasn’t managed to get the answer to. As soon as I close my eyes, the absurd question which comes into my head and starts buzzing round there is, “Do men with Mercedes cars usually wash their own glasses?”
    Yours with very much love,
Reg
    “Dear me,” said Selena, turning her wineglass between her fingers, “it almost sounds as if she thought—” “She can’t really be suggesting—” said Ragwort.
    “She thinks there’s something fishy about it,” said Cantrip, his eyes brightening with innocent enthusiasm at the thought of homicide. “The way she sees it, when you’re rich enough to have a Mercedes, you leave the dirty work to someone else. So if you suddenly start offering to help with the washing up, it’s a definite sign of fishiness. Bet you anything she’s right.”
    “On the other hand,” said Selena, “isn’t it just possible that it was simply an act of politeness?”
    “Though perhaps,” said Ragwort, “a rather officious one. One doesn’t normally offer to do the washing up if one’s simply been having drinks with someone—one would think they might feel embarrassed if they hadn’t tidied the kitchen. It’s different, of course, if they’re family, or if one’s staying the night.”
    “Right,” said Cantrip. “So he didn’t do it to be polite, he did it because Isabella’s had cyanide in the bottom.”
    “Surely not cyanide?” said Julia. “According to all that I have read on the subject—which I may say includes the complete works of the late Dame Agatha Christie and other almost equally distinguished authorities—the effect of cyanide is virtually instantaneous. When Maurice took Daphne home, the black Mercedes had already gone and Isabella was still well enough to shout out to Daphne that she didn’t want her for anything.”
    “Oh, all right then,” said Cantrip, “arsenic or something—there are lots of poisons that take an hour or two to work. So at some stage in his chat with Isabella he slips whatever it is into her glass and sticks around until she’s finished drinking it. Then he does his New Man bit and washes up the glasses before he goes. He drives off, and Daphne and the Reverend get back ten minutes later, before whatever it is has started to work.”
    “I defer,” said Selena, “to those who have read morewidely than I have on the subject, but isn’t it considered usual for murderers to have some sort of motive?”
    “Certainly,” said Julia. “But Isabella sounds like the sort of woman practically