Page 77 of Welcome to Murder Week

“You do?” Amity says.

It’s amazing what you can retain even from reading when you’re only half awake.

“It was a flatter,” I say.

“That’s exactly right.” Mr. Welch looks impressed.

“Granddaughter of a blacksmith.” I wink.

“What’s a flatter?” Amity asks.

“It’s like a hammer, but it’s square, with a smooth surface and sharp edges,” I say.

“On the nose,” the blacksmith says. “It’s struck with a hammer and used to smooth out bumps and marks.”

“Where did you learn about a flatter?” Amity asks me.

“From Roland Wingford’s crime-solving farrier, Cuddy Claptrop. Who else?”

CHAPTER FIFTY

We’re too excited by what we’ve learned from Mr. Welch for a sit-down lunch, so we get fish and chips to go and return to the cottage. We prop our evidence board against the wall above the kitchen table so we can work while we eat.

“If the murder weapon was stolen when the blacksmith was at Hadley Hall, then Lady Blanders could be the murderer,” Wyatt says, dousing his fish with salt and vinegar.

“Or Gladys Crone,” I say. “She was hanging around the stable. Couldn’t she have taken the flatter?”

“But wasn’t one of Roland’s rules that the culprit couldn’t be a servant?” Amity squeezes lemon on her fish.

“That’s right,” Wyatt says. “But she could have been an accomplice.”

We agree to focus on Lady Blanders and to try and figure out why she might want to kill Tracy Penny. After all the emotional drama of my mother’s story, it’s a welcome relief to be doing something silly again.

Wyatt starts moving photographs from our visit with Lady Blanders to the top of the bulletin board: Lady Blanders on horseback, a close-up of her new boots, the morning room, the creepy paintingover the fireplace, the picture of Sproton House, Lady Blanders’s hand lifting the teapot extra high, her bracelet dangling off her wrist.

“Let’s look at photos from the salon again,” Wyatt says. “There has to be a connection.”

We sift through the photos, this time removing those related to suspects we’ve eliminated. We toss pictures of the calla lilies and the card from Gordon, the eviction notice, and the Filofax with its scribbled “TELL PIPPA!” On the board we put up snapshots of Tracy’s empty refrigerator, unmade bed, and the framed pictures on the salon walls.

“Could it have to do with Sproton House, the place that Lady Blanders visits every month?” Amity says. “Did Tracy work at the salon there?”

“Why would she drive all the way to Whitby to cut hair when she has her own salon here?” Wyatt says.

Amity puts down her fork.

“Hold on. Sproton House is in Whitby?”

“That’s right,” Wyatt says, tapping on his notebook.

“Isn’t that where Tracy used to work and still sometimes volunteered?” Amity says. “Whitby Stables?”

We all react like it’s a light bulb moment, but we can’t figure out a connection.

“We have to think beyond the obvious,” Amity says. “We can’t make the same mistake they made in Agatha Christie’sThe Mirror Crack’d from Side to Sideby assuming there couldn’t be anything connecting a glamorous American movie star and a provincial English fan. We have to find the baby.”

“What baby?” I say.

“I’m speaking metaphorically,” Amity says. “By ‘baby,’ I mean the hidden connection between Lady Blanders and Tracy Penny.”

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