“It’s pudding grass, Mr. Astley,” Perkins said.
“Is it really?” Christopher gave it a dubious look, and then shot me one out of the corner of his eye. My lips twitched. Christopher turned back to Perkins. “Thank you.”
“Of course, sir.”
Perkins took a step back. We proceeded across the marble floor and up the stairs. I managed to keep a straight face until we were out of sight down the first floor corridor before I burst into laughter. “Good grief, Christopher, did you see his face? He thinks you’re bringing flowers for Constable Collins because you’re sweet on him.”
“Yes,” Christopher grumbled, “thank you for pointing that out, Pippa.” The tips of his ears were hot. “You don’t think Collins will think that, do you?”
“Of course not,” I reassured him. “And he’ll also be able to tell us whether this is pennyroyal or whatever pudding grass is, if they’re different. We just have to find him.”
I looked around.
The first floor was quiet. All the bedroom doors were shut, and there were no sounds of voices anywhere except behind the Fortescues’ closed door. As a married couple whom no one could fault for wanting their private time, I suppose they had opted for a lie-down after luncheon and all the excitement of this morning.
“He must have started the search upstairs,” I said. “There’s simply no way he could have managed to go through all of these rooms already if he hadn’t.”
Christopher nodded. “And why not? Cecily’s room is up there, and so are the most likely suspects.”
I arched a brow at that, and he added, “Or at least most of them are. I suppose Geoffrey is down on this level, and so are Crispin, Francis, and I. Just because we know that none ofthe Astleys are involved, doesn’t mean that Constable Collins believes that to be true.”
Indubitably. Although I had done my best to convince him of it.
“He probably started in Cecily’s room, in case there’s something among her possessions that would shed some light on this situation. Perhaps even… a diary.” He sounded optimistic when he added, “It’s what I would have done.”
“She was in no condition to update her diary last night,” I said. “If it’s there, it won’t tell us who brought her a cup of tea to settle her stomach.”
“Of course not,” Christopher agreed. “But she might have mentioned which gentleman—I use the word advisedly—she has been spending her time with lately.”
Yes, of course she might have done. She hadn’t confided in anyone else, it seemed, but she might have told her diary. Even an initial would be helpful, since we had, here at Marsden, a rather finite suspect pool. And all of them with different initials, at least apart from the youngest Astley boys and Constance.
“We’ll try there first,” I said. “And if he’s not in Cecily’s room, I suppose we can yell for him.”
“I’m sure we’ll find him,” Christopher said, and exited into the second floor hallway. It looked much the same as the first floor ditto, if a bit narrower and a bit less opulent. All the doors were shut except for the one into Cecily’s room, from which we could hear rustling and the occasional mutter.
I expected there to be someone else inside, but no, when we reached the doorway, Constable Collins was on his own inside the room, and the muttering must be him talking to himself. By that time he had heard us approach, and had turned towards the open door.
“Oh,” he said when he saw us, and his posture lost some of its stiffness, “it’s you two.”
“It’s us. Christopher has something for you.” I moved aside so Christopher could step into the room and present Collins with his weed.
There was a beat of silence.
“Really,” Collins’s voice said dryly, “you shouldn’t have.”
I bit back a snigger as Christopher’s shoulders dropped. “It’s the wrong kind, isn’t it? Perkins called it a pudding plant.”
“No,” Collins said, eyeing it, “it’s exactly the right kind. Where did you find it?”
“Just a quarter mile or so away from the manor,” I told him, as I leaned my shoulder in the doorway. “In the ditch between here and the Dower House. Well within walking distance for anyone interested in picking some.”
“What we don’t know,” Christopher added, “is what someone would do with it after they got it. It’s possible to brew it into tea, of course, and it seems someone did that…”
He glanced at me, and I nodded, “but we’re not sure who would have had that opportunity apart from the kitchen staff. It’s not likely that the staff would have allowed any of the guests to walk into the kitchen to use the cooker.”
Collins nodded and put the stalk down carefully on top of the tallboy. “Cook or the kitchen maid would definitely be able to say whether anyone did that. But it’s not likely that they’d allow it. It’s more likely that they’d have taken the leaves off someone’s hands and brewed the tea themselves.”
“And if that’s how it happened,” I said, “they would know who it was.”
