Chapter 33

As you can imagine, the next twenty-four hours were utter chaos. Irene being hauled off, looking regal and stoic, the twins crying and saying that they hadn’t meant any harm.

“What were you thinking, handling cyanide?” Darcy asked them. “You were jolly lucky that you weren’t killed yourselves. It doesn’t take much of the vapor to kill someone.”

“We used Uncle Cedric’s special gloves,” Nick said. “And we only took a tiny drop. We only took a tiny drop of everything. It was only a bit of fun. We didn’t think our potion could possibly do any real harm.”

“Let’s hope that your bit of fun doesn’t wreck both your futures,” Darcy said.

“Did you take some of your own potion to make you sick?” I asked Katherine. “You’re lucky it didn’t kill you.”

“It wasn’t the potion,” she said. “I ate soap. I just wanted people to think I was being poisoned so nobody would suspect us.”

“Do you think we’ll go to prison?” Nick asked. His face was completely white and his eyes looked huge.

“Your grandmother has telephoned her solicitor. He’s an important man. He’ll know what to do,” I said. “I don’t think they send eleven-year-olds to prison.”

“They may send you off to some kind of strict school,” Darcy said.

“Good-oh. A school. That would be brilliant,” Nick said, and he ran off happily with Kat.

* * *

“WHAT HAPPENS NOW?” Jack asked.

Darcy, Jack and I were walking in the grounds. It was the day after Irene had tried to kill me. Edwina had made an urgent telephone call to Mr. Camden-Smythe, the family solicitor, and he had arrived first thing next morning. His Rolls-Royce stood parked on the forecourt now and he was in conference with Edwina.

“I don’t know,” I said.

It was a glorious, bright, spring day, with a gentle breeze stirring the daffodils and occasional puff-ball clouds drifting across a blue sky. Swans glided across a still, blue lake. Birds were twittering like mad in the trees. It was almost as if nature was mocking our present turmoil at Kingsdowne.

“Do you think the twins will be sent to some kind of reform school?” Jack asked. “They are too young for prison, aren’t they?”

“I overheard Mr. Camden-Smythe saying to Edwina that he thought it would be all right. He said there was clearly no intent to murder. It was just youthful experimentation and the court would understand that two bright children, cut off from normal life and encouraged in scientific experiments by their tutor, were horrified at the result of their experiment. He said he was sure any judge would agree to sending the children to separate boarding schools where they could be well supervised and continuously occupied.”