Clara stood in the doorway to the dining room at Chadwick Manor. It was a grand room with oak-panelled walls and oil paintings of ancestors looking down at the large table which occupied the majority of the room.
It looked eerily abandoned. The chairs were in disarray, left exactly how they had been that evening. The table had been cleared of the plates and cutlery, but coasters and centrepieces remained, and the candles were burnt halfway down.
Clara thought it reminiscent of a haunted house.
“We took all of the food, drink, plates, bowls, cutlery, et cetera away to be analysed,” Will explained. “No trace of poison in anything.”
Vanessa had circled the table three times, taking in everything from every angle possible. Clara had no idea what she was looking for, or if she’d found it.
Will approached the table. “Here, at the head of the table, was Angus Chadwick. On his right was his wife, Genevieve. To his left, Julian Bridgewater. Next to Julian was Felicity Abbot; next to her, Sylvester King. Next to Genevieve was Pippa; beside her was Jemima Vos.” Will walked around the table, indicating each chair as he went. He leaned on the back of the chair at the opposite end to where Angus had sat.
“He collapsed just before ten o’clock. An ambulance was summoned at ten; Mr King made the call. Attempts were made to revive the deceased by Julian Bridgewater, but those attempts had stopped by the time the ambulance arrived at twenty past.”
“So, it was either visibly obvious that he wouldn’t be revived,” Vanessa said, “or Julian knew that it was fruitless for other reasons.”
She walked over to the long, antique sideboard which filled most of the wall at the end of the room. On top of the sideboard was all of the cutlery, crockery, and glassware which had been analysed by the police.
“We have a number of timelines of events for the evening,” Will said, “from all of the suspects. Unfortunately, after the main course was consumed, the diners all had cocktails and seemed to scatter. Everyone spoke with Angus at some point in the forty minutes before he was killed, some privately in his office, some in the sitting room.”
“Six wine glasses,” Vanessa said.
“Sorry?” Will walked over to the sideboard.
“There were seven diners, and yet there are six wine glasses,” Vanessa said.
Clara joined them and looked at the wine glasses, counting them for herself.
“A water glass,” Vanessa continued, tapping the edge of a tumbler, “would indicate that someone wasn’t drinking with dinner.”
“That’s true,” Will agreed.
“However, that doesn’t explain why there are only five cocktail glasses,” Vanessa continued. “If you’re drinking wine with dinner, then surely you’d also indulge in a cocktail?”
“Weren’t all of these people driving?” Clara asked.
“We’re in the country now, dear, people are stupid,” Vanessa stated. She turned to Will. “You say the party dispersed into the sitting room and the office?”
Will nodded and gestured for Vanessa to follow him.
Clara walked around the dining room table, wondering what the atmosphere had been like on the night of the murder. Had tempers been frayed? Had people been polite? What was Angus’ announcement? There were no answers to be found.
She left the room and followed the sound of quiet chatter into what appeared to be Angus’ office. It was a typical, old-style office, exactly what she expected the man of the manor to have. A large desk with a green leather top sat in front of a large window; behind it was a large, leather office chair. Papers were strewn everywhere over the desk in what some might call organised chaos, but what Clara thought of as a mess.
There was an uncomfortable-looking sofa and two leather tub chairs. The room was again surrounded by oil paintings of long-deceased relatives. Clara was glad that tradition was no longer a popular one. She’d hate to eat her breakfast, or conduct her work, with the beady eyes of her grandparents staring down at her.
“After dinner, separately and privately, Angus spoke with Felicity, Julian, and Sylvester privately in this room,” Will explained. “Each time, the door was closed.”
Vanessa pointed at the paperwork on the desk. “I assume someone has been through all of this?”
“Yes, and believe me, we put it back the way we found it. There was nothing that pointed towards a motive—general council documents, various legal documents to do with businesses he owned or had invested in. Paperwork, basically, lots and lots of paperwork.”
“He needs a secretary,” Clara commented.
“He had one,” Vanessa said. “In fact, he’s had several. They all leave within a few weeks, from what I’ve heard.”
Will took out his notepad and jotted that down.
Vanessa turned and regarded the window, running her hand over the four sides before looking up at the curtain pole. She then turned and started to inspect the filing cabinet and knickknacks that sat on top of it.
“Could someone have broken in, poisoned him, and then left again?” Clara asked.
“Unlikely,” Will said. “All of the windows are locked from the inside, and there are perimeter alarms on all the doors and windows. He wasn’t alone at any point in the evening, except to go to the bathroom once. No one else saw anyone hanging around.”
“Well, that answers that,” Vanessa said.
Clara turned to see her aunt leaning into the open fireplace and pointing at something. She looked more closely at the burnt-down wood and soot. Something glinted in the blackness.
“Is that… glass?” Clara asked.
“It is.” Vanessa stood up. “If I’m not mistaken, that’s the missing cocktail glass.”
Will gently manoeuvred Clara to one side and knelt down. He pulled a thick, plastic evidence bag from his inner jacket pocket and then some gloves. He snapped on the gloves and set about extracting the glass pieces from the fireplace. Slowly, piece by piece, he pulled out the remains of an ornate-looking glass, similar to the saucer-style glasses that were on the sideboard in the dining room.
It did indeed look like the missing glass. Vanessa was looking exceptionally pleased with herself.
“Good spot,” Will said. He placed the glass pieces in the evidence bag carefully. “I’ll kill whoever searched this room, right after I call someone to come and bike this to the lab immediately.”