opened at six thirty the following morning. Some of the old men wake up early and like to take a short walk.’
‘And who is responsible for the opening and closing?’
‘Usually it is the porter. Last night he was off duty so I did it at the usual times.’
‘And you saw nothing unusual on either occasion?’
‘No, I did not.’
‘Could the killer have come in yesterday evening,’ said Inspector Fletcher, ‘and spent the night in the hall or the chapel?’
‘Well, he could, but I don’t think we’d find any trace of him. The hall is locked overnight, the chapel left open in case religion overcomes the old men in the night. The chapel was cleaned early this morning at seven o’clock before the body was discovered. And the old men have been tramping all over both hall and chapel since then.’
Inspector Fletcher paused. Another line of inquiry seemed to have been blocked off. Before he had a chance to say any more, there was a shout from a constable on the grass outside.
‘Inspector, sir! You’re to come at once, sir! We’ve got a visitor!’
Fletcher groaned. Visitors on occasions like this at the very start of an investigation usually meant trouble. Sometimes they were superior officers, keen to carp and criticize. On this occasion, as he told his wife that evening, it was much worse than that.
The third visitor to the Jesus Hospital that morning arrived just before twelve o’clock. Those residents comforting themselves from the shock of murder in the morning and, what was worse in their book, murder before breakfast,looked out of their windows and saw an enormous motor car arrive and a tall portly gentleman with white hair and a black walking stick climb out and knock imperiously on Thomas Monk’s door. This was Sir Peregrine Fishborne, Prime Warden of the Silkworkers, come to inspect the crisis in his kingdom. He was well known in the City of London, Sir Peregrine, for his speed in the despatch of business and his position as head of one of the foremost insurance companies in the country.
‘Monk,’ he said to the Warden when he had regained his office, ‘what the hell is going on here? What’s this crisis you mentioned on the phone? Damn inconvenient having to trundle out into the back of beyond for some mess in this bloody hospital!’
‘There’s been a murder, sir,’ said Monk, standing to attention as he always did when talking to the Prime Warden.
‘Murder? Here? In Buckinghamshire? In the Jesus Hospital? Don’t be ridiculous.’ He turned to stare at the policeman. ‘And who the hell are you?’ he said, eyeing Inspector Fletcher as if he had just delivered the week’s coal.
‘Ah, hm, ah, I am the policeman assigned to the case.’ He paused as if he might have temporarily forgotten his name. ‘Albert Fletcher, hm, Inspector Albert Fletcher, at your service, sir.’
Sir Peregrine threw him another of his turn-a-man-to-stone-at-fifty-paces looks. ‘And what can you tell us about the dead man?’
There was another pause while the Inspector searched in his pockets for the vital notebook.
‘Well,’ he began, inspecting his handwriting carefully, ‘the dead man was called Meredith, Abel Meredith. Ah, hm, he died of a knife wound to the area between the pharynx and the larynx.’
‘Somebody cut his throat, you mean,’ snarled Sir Peregrine. ‘We’re in a bloody almshouse here, not a medical school, for Christ’s sake. What age was this unfortunate Meredith?’
‘Hm, ah,’ said the Inspector, ‘over sixty at least or he wouldn’t be here. Do you know how old he was, Warden?’
The Warden intervened immediately in case there was another salvo from Sir Peregrine.
‘Sixty-four, sir, that’s how old he was. Last birthday six weeks ago. He paid for a very fine drinking session in the back room of the Rose and Crown, Abel Meredith, I’ll give him that. One of the very few occasions he was known to pay for a round.’
‘I see,’ said Sir Peregrine in his most