‘Her name’s Kitty, Kitty Cartarette. She came hipping and thighing down the hill with her eyes on the upper reaches of the Chyne where she expected to see Mr Phinn. She didn’t notice her husband in the willow grove, but that tells us nothing until we get a look at the landscape, and, anyway, her attention, she says, was elsewhere. She continued across the bridge and so home. She saw nothing unusual on the bridge. Now Lady Lacklander saw a woundy great trout lying on the bridge where, according to Lady L., Mr Phinn had furiously chucked it when he had his row, thirty-five minutes earlier, with Colonel Cartarette. The next thing that happens is that Mark Lacklander (who had been engaged in tennis and one supposes, rather solemn dalliance with that charming girl Rose Cartarette) leaves this house round about the time Mrs Cartarette returns to it and goes down to the Bottom Bridge where he does not find a woundy great trout and is certain that there was no trout to find. He does, however, find his grandmother’s sketching gear on the left bank of the Chyne and like a kind young bloke carries it back to Nunspardon, thus saving the footman a trip. He disappears into the spinney and as far as we know this darkling valley is left to itself until a quarter to nine when Nurse Kettle, who has been slapping Commander Syce’s lumbago next door, descends into Bottom Meadow, turns off to the right, hears the dog howling and discovers the body. Those are the facts, if they are facts, arising out of information received up to date. What emerges?’

Fox dragged his palm across his jaw. ‘For a secluded district,’ he said, ‘there seems to have been quite a bit of traffic in the valley of the Chyne.’

‘Doesn’t there? Down this hill. Over the bridge. Up the other hill and t’other way round. None of them meeting except the murdered man and old Phinn at half past seven and the murdered man and Lady Lacklander ten minutes later. Otherwise, it seems to have been a series of near misses on all hands. I can’t remember the layout of the valley with any accuracy but it appears that from the houses on this side only the upper reaches of the Chyne and a few yards below the bridge on the right bank are visible. We’ll have to do an elaborate check as soon as it’s light, which is hellish soon, by the way. Unless we find signs of angry locals hiding in the underbrush or of mysterious coloured gentlemen from the East lurking in the village, it’s going to look a bit like a small field of suspects.’

‘Meaning this lot,’ Fox said, with a wag of his head in the direction of the drawing-room.