Sophie Hannah - A Game for All the Family

Eventually, everyone had quenched their nosiness for the time being, and they all ended up in the drawing room (apart from the police officers who had come to remove David Butcher’s body from the library—they had gone). Only the police and the Ingreys knew what was about to happen. It was clear from the faces of the Dodds and the Kirbyshires that they were puzzled to be at Speedwell House, and wondered what they were doing there.

Once everyone had finished eating and boosted their energy levels for the ordeal ahead, Sorrel stood up and spoke to the crowd. “Thank you all so much for coming. These gentlemen here are policemen. In a moment, they will go upstairs and arrest my youngest daughter, Perrine, for three murders: the murders of Malachy Dodd, Jack Kirbyshire and David Butcher.”

Gasps and exclamations exploded all over the room. “About time!” said Mrs. Dodd venomously.

Sorrel went on: “We, Perrine’s family, have always suspected that she was a killer, though she vigorously denied it. But a mother knows when there’s something askew in the mind or heart of her child, and I have always known this about Perrine, even before she murdered Malachy Dodd. When he died, and when Jack Kirbyshire died, I knew Perrine was guilty, but I couldn’t prove it. It was only when I saw her stab David Butcher that I finally had proof.”

“We all witnessed this stabbing,” Bascom added. “Me, Lisette and Allisande too.”

“We could have called the police straightaway,” said Sorrel, “but we wanted you all to be here. We’re aware that you see us as Perrine’s protectors, and, yes, we have been. We’ve imprisoned ourselves in order to keep her safe. It’s a natural impulse, to want to protect one’s family.”

“Bit late for some of us to do that, isn’t it?” muttered Mrs. Dodd bitterly.

“Will you pipe down?” David Butcher’s mother turned on her, surprising everybody. “I think we’ve heard just about enough from you. Do you know who my son was?”

“Leave it, dear,” muttered her husband.

But Mrs. Butcher did not wish to leave it. “He was a former organ scholar of King’s College, Cambridge!” she blurted out. “He had a glowing future ahead of him!”

“And so what?” said Mrs. Dodd, her voice trembling. “Are you saying that means my Malachy’s life doesn’t matter?”

“Let’s not do this,” said Jack Kirbyshire’s widow. “Please. Let’s not play hierarchical victim games.”

When someone says a word like “hierarchical” in an everyday setting, it often has the result that everyone immediately assumes that person must be right about everything, because they know a long word. This was what happened here. The Dodds and the Butchers piped down.

“What’s going to happen next?” asked Henrietta Sennitt-Sasse, rubbing her hands together in excitement. “Is Perrine going to be arrested while we watch? Will she go to prison forever?”

“ Pas devant les enfants! ” cried out Henrietta’s mother, but to no avail.

You might think from Henrietta’s remark that she was mean and relished the idea of long, endless prison sentences for others, but you’d be wrong. Henrietta had simply been starved of grown-up gossip all her life. This was the first interesting adult conversation she had ever been party to.

One of the policemen stood up and said, “It is overwhelmingly probable that Perrine will receive a custodial sentence, yes. But it’s unlikely she’ll go to prison forever. Remember, she’s still only a child, and the law likes to try to rehabilitate such young criminals wherever possible.”

“May I ask a question?” Jack Kirbyshire’s widow rose to her feet. “Perrine seems to have committed three murders, but only one was witnessed. Does that mean she might be convicted of only one murder, the murder of David Butcher?”

Mrs. Dodd leapt to her feet again. “That can’t happen! It would be an outrage! I want her to do time for Malachy, not just for some other murder!”

“There’s a good chance she will, if the information I’ve been given by Mrs. Ingrey here is correct,” said the policeman. “If there is no feasible way that Malachy could have fallen out of the window by accident—”

“There isn’t,” Sorrel Ingrey chipped in. “I’ve said this since the day he died. Malachy’s center of gravity was too low for him to have fallen out of that window. It just wouldn’t happen.”

“And it didn’t happen!” snapped Mrs. Dodd, red in the face.

Mrs. Butcher muttered something under her breath.

“What was that, you snide cow?” Mrs. Dodd demanded.

Mrs. Butcher shook her head. She had decided against saying what was on her mind, but then she couldn’t resist. “Do you have any shame at all?” she asked Mrs. Dodd. “Are you even a tiny bit embarrassed about how much airtime you’re taking up today?”

Mrs. Dodd replied with a sequence of obscenities so shocking that most people in the room turned red, and Mrs. Sennitt-Sasse screeched, “ PAS DEVANT LES ENFANTS! ” louder than ever before.

“Ladies, please,” said the policeman. “These arguments are not helping anything. To answer your question, Mrs. Kirbyshire”—he paused to smile in a noticeable way, to reward Mrs. Kirbyshire for being better behaved than Mrs. Dodd and Mrs. Butcher—“I’m very sorry to tell you this, but if we have difficulty making any of these murder accusations stick, it’s most likely to be your Jack’s murder that Perrine gets away with. He was standing on some scaffolding when she pushed him off, and so it really is possible that he could have fallen—even though we all know he didn’t.”

“As long as that evil little monster serves some years specifically for Malachy,” said Mrs. Dodd determinedly. “Special Malachy years. Lots of them.”

Lisette Ingrey at this point rose to her feet and cleared her throat.

“Wait,” she said. “This isn’t right. We’re all talking as if we know she’s guilty.”

“But you do!” said the policeman with a puzzled frown. “You saw her stab David Butcher to death, didn’t you?”

Lisette realized at that moment that she should not have agreed to lie. Her parents and Allisande were all glaring at her, scared that she was going to say, “Actually, no, I didn’t see my sister stab David Butcher. I just made that up.”

She couldn’t do that to them. “Yes,” she said. “Yes, I witnessed the stabbing of David Butcher by my sister Perrine. I know, for certain, that she is guilty of that one murder. About the deaths of Malachy Dodd and Jack Kirbyshire, however, I can’t be certain. All I can say is that I strongly suspect Perrine killed them both. That’s all anyone can say.” She turned to the policeman. “You can’t claim to know that Jack Kirbyshire didn’t fall,” she said. “You’re supposed to be an impartial officer of the law.”

The policeman had turned bright red. “You’re right,” he said. “I suppose it’s just so rare that someone’s entire family tells me they’re a killer—I assumed it must be true.”

“It is true,” said Sorrel.

“Even if it is, he shouldn’t say so!” Lisette protested. “His standards of evidence should be higher. Perrine deserves a fair trial, however evil we might think she is. We might be wrong!”

“You are right, miss,” said the policeman. “And if everyone has finished with the breakfast buffet, I will now go upstairs and arrest young Perrine, so that we can proceed as quickly as possible to that fair trial that we all agree she should have.”

As he left the room with Bascom and Sorrel Ingrey following behind him, Mrs. Dodd called out, “I don’t agree she deserves a fair trial! I think she should be hung, drawn and quartered in front of a large audience.”