Jam and Jeopardy (21 page)

‘Did you add some to the raspberry jam, too?’ McGillivray asked, gently.

‘No. I didn’t even see any jam there. I was concentrating on the one thing I had to do. I knew where she kept her flour, because I once had to borrow a cupful though I never asked
for anything again. She was really quite sarcastic at that time, and said I should be more organised. What happens now? Will you arrest me?’

‘Oh, Grace, it was my fault as much as yours,’ Violet sobbed, but her sister’s look silenced her.

‘Nonsense! I was the one who suggested it and carried it out. Violet had no part in it, Inspector.’

David Moore’s face was a study in perplexity. ‘But sir . . . the flour . . . you know . . . Inspector, you can’t . . . it wasn’t . . .’

A hint of a smile lurked at the corners of McGillivray’s mouth. ‘What my sergeant is trying to say, although not very coherently, is that the flour, along with all Miss
Souter’s other foodstuffs, was completely free from any contamination.’

‘What?’ Grace Skinner’s chin dropped in amazement. ‘But I tell you, I did . . .’

‘I understand you had provocation and were under a great deal of stress, but I swear to you that you did
not
kill Janet Souter. There were no traces of arsenic in the contents of
her stomach, nor in her bloodstream.’

‘But I’ve been living with the terrible guilt ever since that Friday – it’s only just over a week, but it feels like eternity.’

‘Clear it from your conscience, dear lady, and think twice in future before you try dispensing justice. The plastic bag in full view in her shed contained ordinary flour, and we think she
made the substitution herself. She told Mrs Wakeford that her nephews were trying to poison her but they’d be disappointed, so she must have laid out the flour for them to use. We found the
arsenic later – hidden under her barrow.’

Looking intently at the haggard woman sitting whitefaced in front of him, McGillivray added, ‘She must have made the swop before Ronald Baker was due on the Saturday, so you’d only
put more flour in her bin. Now, Mrs Skinner, I’m going to forget we’ve had this conversation, and I’d advise you to put the whole thing out of your mind.’

Her eyes filled with tears, but as he turned to leave, she said, ‘Inspector, you said she wasn’t poisoned, so can you tell me how she was killed? It must have been murder, otherwise
you wouldn’t be investigating her death.’

He didn’t look round. ‘I’m sorry, I can’t tell you that. Good morning to you both.’

David Moore glanced at Violet, who was weeping silently into her handkerchief, then smiled to Grace and followed the inspector out, happy that Mrs Skinner was no longer a suspect.

‘There’s no need to report any of that,’ remarked McGillivray, gruffly. ‘And if you’re thinking of saying anything, don’t.’

‘No, sir.’ Moore could view his superior in a different light now. He was just a big softie.

Halfway down the path, McGillivray halted. ‘It might be worth paying another call on Mrs Wakeford when we’re here. We’ve broken down one of our prime suspects, and we may as
well try for a second.’

Mabel Wakeford’s greeting was quite bright. ‘I hope you don’t mind talking in the kitchen, Inspector. I’m just finishing my breakfast, as you can see.’

‘Not at all. It’s very cosy in here.’

‘That’s because the cooker’s been on. May I offer you both a cup of tea?’

‘That would be very acceptable, thank you.’

As she poured tea into the two extra cups she set out, she looked at McGillivray, waiting for him to state his business.

‘We’re making enquiries regarding jars of raspberry jam,’ he obliged.

‘R . . . raspberry j . . . jam?’ she echoed faintly, her face blanching.

‘It appears that Miss Souter had presented a jar to one or two people, and we wondered if you were also a recipient?’

‘No, no. Please, Inspector, who did she give them to?’

‘Mrs Grant, for one.’

The blood rushed from her face. ‘Oh, no! It was the jam after all, was it?’

‘I’m very much afraid so, and . . .’

‘Who else?’ she interrupted, her eyes staring wildly.

‘Her solicitor, and his wife had also to be taken to hospital.’

‘Oh, dear God, what have I done?’ Mabel dabbed her eyes with her serviette. ‘I didn’t mean to hurt anybody else, just Janet.’

‘What had she done to you that you wished to hurt her?’ The inspector had a good idea of the answer to his question, but he wanted to hear it from her own lips.

Her blue eyes lost their wildness. ‘I may as well tell you. She was so two-faced, pretending to be friendly, but waiting for a chance to stab you in the back. She’d found out, or
remembered, that I was . . . that my mother . . . that . . .’

‘That you were an illegitimate child, Mrs Wakeford?’

‘Oh! You knew about that?’

‘I’ve known for some time, and it’s really nothing to be ashamed of. Many famous people were born out of wedlock.’

She shuddered at the word. ‘I couldn’t bear to think of people sniggering at me.’

‘Only people like Janet Souter would snigger, but there was more to it than that, wasn’t there?’

‘What do you mean?’ Her eyes refused to meet his.

‘There was another reason for you wanting to silence her. Something even more private.’

‘I suppose you know about that, too.’ She straightened her shoulders. ‘Yes, I was afraid she’d find out about my own illegitimate child, and I couldn’t have that
circulating round the village. I wouldn’t have been able to hold my head up.’

She took a sip of her tea and laid the cup in the saucer carefully. ‘She’d been going on about how she hoped her nephews would try to poison her with the arsenic in her shed,
that’s what put the idea into my head. When I saw her going out one morning, I went round to her house. There were three jars of raspberry jam sitting on her draining board, and I thought,
raspberry jam’s got such a strong flavour she wouldn’t taste the stuff if I put it in there.’

She paused for a moment, reliving the horror of what she’d done. ‘I got the bag from her shed, and took the covers off the jars. She always uses circles cut from red gingham to make
them more attractive. Then I added half a teaspoonful to each jar.’

The irreverent thought crossed David Moore’s mind that it was almost as if she were giving them a new recipe. Rasp and Arsenic Jam. He tried to stifle the laugh which welled up in him and
it came out as a spluttering cough, making the inspector kick his shins under the table. With a great effort, he kept listening to what the woman was saying.

‘I stirred it in well, to be sure it was mixed thoroughly.’

At that, the sergeant whipped his handkerchief out of his pocket and held it over his mouth, trying to make his mirth sound like a choking fit. ‘I’m sorry,’ he gasped, after a
moment. ‘Tea went down the wrong way.’

Clearly annoyed by this untimely, and unseemly, interruption, McGillivray glowered at him. The look was enough to quell Moore’s giggles.

Mabel Wakeford had scarcely noticed the young man’s confusion. ‘Then I replaced the covers and washed her spoon, before I put it in her dustbin just to be on the safe side. I
returned the arsenic to her shed, of course.’

She looked imploringly at the inspector. ‘I must have been mad. Later on, I was appalled at what I’d done, but she’d come back by that time, and there was no way I could do
anything about it. I didn’t have the least idea that she’d give the jars away, that’s really awful. But she must have used the third jar herself, or she wouldn’t be dead,
would she?’

McGillivray leaned forward and said quietly, ‘I don’t think she did. She hadn’t ingested any of the arsenic. Now, when did all this take place?’

‘It was nearly two weeks before she died, and I’ve been through absolute hell since then.’

‘Was that before the church Sale of Work? It strikes me the jam and cakes had been laid out to give to Mrs Valentine.’

‘That’s right. Mrs Valentine had been round collecting later on that same day, now that you speak about it.’

Without thinking, McGillivray helped himself to a piece of toast, and stretched across for the marmalade. ‘Now, we’ve . . .’

‘Inspector.’ Mabel’s anxious voice interrupted him. ‘How could Janet Souter have given the jars of jam away, when she gave them to Mrs Valentine?’

‘That good lady apparently arrived at an inconvenient time, so the old lady refused to get them for her.’

‘She could be very nasty, but what a thing to do to the minister’s wife, she’s such a pleasant young woman.’

Taking a bite of toast, McGillivray chewed and swallowed. ‘As I was about to say, we’ve accounted for two of the jars, but you said there were three. I wonder where the other one
went? It wasn’t amongst the stuff that was taken away to be tested.’

‘I hope to God you trace it before . . .’ She paused, her eyes tortured. ‘What’ll happen to me now? Will I be charged with murder? I deserve to be, because I meant to do
it, but only to stop her vicious tongue.’

‘Do you know what happened to your child?’

The abrupt question startled her. ‘No, I never saw it. I don’t even know if it was a boy or a girl. I shouldn’t have let my mother persuade me to have it adopted. Even if
I’d kept it, the shame I’d have gone through wouldn’t have been nearly as bad as the disgrace this is going to bring me.’ Her voice broke and she dabbed her eyes again.

Wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, McGillivray looked at her compassionately. ‘You didn’t commit murder, Mrs Wakeford, whatever your intention, although two innocent ladies
have had to endure discomfort because of you. However, until we find the missing jar of jam, I’m going to leave things as they are.’

‘Thank you, and I hope you find it quickly. I don’t know what came over me, and I know I’ll have to pay for my sins.’

‘One thing more. When the body was found, why did you cast suspicion on Miss Souter’s two nephews? It would have been more sensible if you’d held your tongue and accepted
Randall’s verdict of a heart attack as a godsend.’

Her shoulders lifted briefly. ‘I really can’t tell you why. I suppose I felt so guilty about what I’d done, I subconsciously wanted to be found out and punished. But Miss
Souter did say that about Ronald and Stephen trying to poison her, and that they’d be disappointed. I presumed they’d be in the clear.’

The inspector stood up. ‘Things would have been very much worse for you, if you’d succeeded in your purpose.’ His voice was reproving. ‘Be thankful you
didn’t.’

David Moore glanced back as he closed the door. The woman was staring into space, twisting her serviette round and round her fingers, and his heart went out to her in her misery.

‘I can understand why that poor lady tried to shut the old harpy up,’ McGillivray remarked. ‘The thing is, she didn’t accomplish it. Who did?’

He stopped with his hand on the gate. ‘We’ll have to find that jam, before somebody else falls foul of the stuff.’ He walked towards the car, then halted again. ‘Who else
would have called on the old woman between the time she laid out these things for the minister’s wife and the day she was found dead? That’s over two weeks – there must have been
somebody.’

‘Sir, she told Mrs Valentine that the chiropodist was in her house when she called. Would she have given it to him?’

The inspector looked more cheerful. ‘Could be, though she fully expected Mrs V. to go back for her donation. I tell you what. You go back to the station, lad, find out the
chiropodist’s phone number, if Black’s got it, and ring him up and ask.’

‘Yes, sir.’ Moore idly wondered what McGillivray intended to do in the meantime.

‘Another thing that’s just come to me. If Mrs Wakeford added half a teaspoon of arsenic to each jar, it would have been pretty lethal, I’d have thought, yet two women were only
slightly affected. Go and have a word with the retired glass worker about what he actually gave to Miss Souter.’

Moore looked puzzled. ‘D’you think he’d diluted it?’

‘He might have done, to make it less deadly before he gave it to a woman of her age.’ McGillivray’s eyes twinkled suddenly. ‘Can you remember all that with your limited
intelligence?’

Moore ignored the wisecrack. ‘Contact the chiropodist, then the retired glass-worker. Anything else, sir?’

‘Yes, make a report of all we’ve done since the funeral. I’m going down to see Mrs White.’

A cheeky grin appeared on the sergeant’s face. ‘Have you succumbed to the delectable May’s charms, sir?’

‘Not on your life! I’m a confirmed bachelor, lad.’

‘They’re often first to fall, especially to women like her.’

‘Ach shit!’ said McGillivray companionably.

Moore set off down the High Street chuckling. At the police station, his telephone call to the chiropodist drew a blank, so he walked, rather sadly, to the address Sergeant Black had given him
for the retired glass-worker.

Davie Livingstone looked up from his newspaper when his tiny wife showed in the visitor. Quite stout, almost completely bald, his red face was cheery and welcoming.

‘I’m Detective Sergeant Moore,’ the young man began, but got no further.

‘Speak o’ the devil. I was just sayin’ to the wife, nae ten minutes ago, “It’s funny the ’tecs havena been to see me.” An’ she says to me, she
says, “You’d better go an’ have a word wi’ them.” An’ here you are.’

Moore’s eyes widened. ‘Yes?’

‘It’s this business o’ Janet Souter bein’ murdered. They tell me a’body thinks it was the arsenic I gave her that killed her, but it couldna’ve
been.’

‘No?’

‘No.’ Davie folded his paper methodically, then stretched over to lay it on the table.

The sergeant watched him rather impatiently, but when the man took his pipe off the mantelpiece and began to fill it, slowly and deliberately, Moore could wait no longer. ‘Why could it not
have been the arsenic?’

Davie looked up from his absorbing task. ‘It’s like this. After I tell’t her I’d give her some, I got to thinkin’. I’d warned her to be careful, but she was a
really auld woman and could easy’ve got muddled. So I puzzled my brains how to tone it down a bit, then I minded about the powder the wife uses when she’s had a bath.’