‘Never mind, dear,’ said her husband.

Alleyn asked if anybody from the Island had been at the first service. Nobody, it appeared. There were several at the nine o’clock.

‘The Barrimores, for instance?’

No, not the Barrimores.

There was a silence through which the non-attendance of the Barrimores was somehow established as a normal state-of-affairs.

‘Although,’ Mrs Carstairs said, in extenuation of a criticism that no one had voiced, ‘Margaret used to come quite regularly at one time, Adrian. Before Wally’s Warts, you remember?’

‘Not that there’s any connection, Dulcie.’

‘Of course not, dear. And Patrick and nice Jenny Williams have been to evensong, we must remember.’

‘So we must,’ her husband agreed.

‘Poor things. They’ll all be terribly upset no doubt,’ Mrs Carstairs said to Alleyn. ‘Such a shock for everyone.’

Alleyn said carefully: ‘Appalling. And apart from everything else a great worry for Barrimore, one imagines. After all, it won’t do his business any good, this sort of catastrophe.’

They looked uncomfortable and faintly shocked. ‘Well – ’ they both said and stopped short.

‘At least,’ Alleyn said casually, ‘I suppose The Boy-and-Lobster is his affair, isn’t it?’

‘It’s the property of the estate,’ Coombe said. ‘Miss Pride’s the landlord. But I have heard they put everything they’d got into it.’

‘She did,’ Mrs Carstairs said firmly. ‘It was Margaret Barrimore’s money, wasn’t it, Adrian?’

‘My dear, I don’t know. In any case –’

‘Yes, dear. Of course,’ said Mrs Carstairs, turning pink. She glanced distractedly at the knees of her linen dress. ‘O, look!’ she said. ‘Now, I shall have to change. It was that henbane that did it. What a disgrace I am. Sunday and everything.’

‘You melt into your background, my dear,’ the Rector observed. ‘Like a wood-nymph,’ he added, with an air of recklessness.

‘Adrian, you are awful,’ said Mrs Carstairs automatically. It was clear that he was in love with her.

Alleyn said: ‘So there would be a gap of about an hour and a quarter between the first and second services?’

‘This morning, yes,’ said the Rector. ‘Because of the rain, you see, and the small attendance at seven.’

‘How do you manage?’ Alleyn asked Mrs Carstairs. ‘Breakfast must be quite a problem.’

‘Oh, there’s usually time to boil an egg before nine. This morning, as you see, we had over an hour. At least,’ she corrected herself. ‘You didn’t, did you, dear? Adrian had to make a visit: poor old Mr Thomas,’ she said to Coombe. ‘Going, I’m afraid.’

‘So you were alone after all. When did you hear of the tragedy, Mrs Carstairs?’

‘Before matins. Half past ten. Several people had seen the – well, the ambulance and the stretcher, you know. And Adrian met Sergeant Pender and – and there it was.’

‘Is it true?’ the Rector asked abruptly. ‘Was it – deliberate? Pender said – I mean?’

‘I’m afraid so.’

‘How very dreadful,’ he said. ‘How appallingly dreadful.’