Alan Bradley - The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie

It made good chemical sense, I reasoned: If salts were a cure, and chicken broth were a cure, think of the magnificent restorative power of a glass of effervescent chicken broth! It boggled the mind. I'd patent the thing; it would be the world's first antidote against the common cold: De Luce's Deliquescence, Flavia's Foup Formula!

I even managed a moderately happy hum as I measured eight ounces of drinking water into a beaker, and set it over the flame to heat. Meanwhile, in a stoppered flask I boiled the torn shreds of eucalyptus leaves and watched as straw-colored drops of oil began to form at the end of the distillation coil.

When the water was at a rolling boil, I removed it from the heat and let it cool for several minutes, then dropped in two heaped teaspoons of Partington's Chicken Essence and a tablespoon of good old NaHCO 3.

I gave it a jolly good stir and let it foam like Vesuvius over the lip of the beaker. I pinched my nostrils shut and tossed back half of the concoction chug-a-lug.

Chicken fizz! O Lord, protect all of us who toil in the vineyards of experimental chemistry!

I unstoppered the flask and dumped the eucalyptus water, leaves and all, into the remains of the yellow soup. Then, peeling off my sweater and draping it over my head as a fume hood, I inhaled the camphoraceous steam of poultry eucalyptus, and somewhere up inside the sticky caverns of my head I thought I felt my sinuses throw their hands up into the air and surrender. I was feeling better already.

There was a sharp knock on the door and I nearly jumped out of my skin. So seldom did anyone come into this part of the house that a tap at the door was as unexpected as one of those sudden heart-clutching organ chords in a horror film when a door swings open upon a gallery of corpses. I shot back the bolt and there stood Dogger, wringing his hat like the Irish washerwoman. I could see that he had been having one of his episodes.

I reached out and touched his hands and they stilled at once. I had observed—although I did not often make use of the fact—that there were times when a touch could say things that words could not.

"What's the password?" I asked, linking my fingers together and placing both hands atop my head.

For about five and a half seconds Dogger looked blank, and then his tense jaw muscles relaxed slowly and he almost smiled. Like an automaton he meshed his fingers and copied my gesture.

"It's on the tip of my tongue," he said haltingly. Then, "I remember now: It's 'arsenic'"

"Careful you don't swallow it," I replied. "It's poison."

With a remarkable display of sheer willpower, Dogger made himself smile. The ritual had been properly observed.

"Enter, friend," I said, and swung the door wide.

Dogger stepped inside and looked round in wonder, as if he had suddenly found himself transported to an alchemist's lab in ancient Sumer. It had been so long since he had been in this part of the house that he had forgotten the room.

"So much glass," he said shakily.

I pulled out Tar's old Windsor chair from the desk, steadying it until Dogger had folded himself between its wooden arms.

"Have a sit. I'll fix you something."

I filled a clean flask with water and set it atop a wire mesh. Dogger started at the little “pop” of the Bunsen burner as I applied the match.

"Coming up," I said. "Ready in a jiff."

The fortunate thing about lab glassware is that it boils water at the speed of light. I threw a spoonful of black leaves into a beaker. When it had gone a deep red I handed it to Dogger, who stared at it skeptically.

"It's all right," I said. "It's Tetley's."

He sipped at the tea gingerly, blowing on the surface of the drink to cool it. As he drank, I remembered that there's a reason we English are ruled more by tea than by Buckingham Palace or His Majesty's Government: Apart from the soul, the brewing of tea is the only thing that sets us apart from the great apes—or so the Vicar had remarked to Father, who had told Feely, who had told Daffy, who had told me.

"Thank you," Dogger said. "I feel quite myself now. But there's something I must tell you, Miss Flavia."

I perched on the edge of the desk, trying to look chummy.

"Fire away," I said.

"Well," Dogger began, "you know that there are occasions when I have sometimes—that is, now and then, I have times when I—"

"Of course I do, Dogger," I said. "Don't we all?"

"I don't know. I don't remember. You see, the thing of it is that, when I was—" His eyes rolled like those of a cow in the killing-pen. "I think I might have done something to someone. And now they've gone and arrested the Colonel for it."

"Are you referring to Horace Bonepenny?"

There was a crash of glassware as Dogger dropped the beaker of tea on the floor. I scrambled for a cloth and for some stupid reason dabbed at his hands, which were quite dry.

"What do you know about Horace Bonepenny?" he demanded, clamping my wrist in a steely grip. If it hadn't been Dogger I should have been terrified.

"I know all about him," I said, gently prying his fingers loose. "I looked him up at the library. I talked to Miss Mountjoy, and Father told me the whole story Sunday evening."

"You saw Colonel de Luce Sunday evening? In Hinley?"

"Yes," I said. "I bicycled over. I told you he was well. Don't you remember?"

"No," Dogger said, shaking his head. "Sometimes I don't remember."

Could this be possible? Could Dogger have encountered Horace Bonepenny somewhere inside the house, or in the garden, then grappled with him and brought about his death? Had it been an accident? Or was there more to it than that?

"Tell me what happened," I said. "Tell me as much as you can remember."

"I was sleeping," Dogger said. "I heard voices—loud voices. I got up and went along to the Colonel's study. There was someone standing in the hall."

"That was me," I said. "I was in the hall."

"That was you," Dogger said. "You were in the hall."

"Yes. You told me to buzz off."

"I did?" Dogger seemed shocked.

"Yes, you told me to go back to bed."

"A man came out of the study," Dogger said suddenly. "I ducked in beside the clock and he walked right past me. I could have reached out and touched him."

It was clear he had jumped to a point in time after I had gone back to bed.

"But you didn't—touch him, I mean."

"Not then, no. I followed him into the garden. He didn't see me. I kept to the wall behind the greenhouse. He was standing in the cucumbers. eating something. agitated. talking to himself. foulest language. didn't seem to notice he was off the path. And then there were the fireworks."

"Fireworks?" I asked.

"You know, Catherine wheels, skyrockets, and all that. I thought there must be a fete in the village. It's June, you know. They often have a fete in June."

There had been no fête; of that I was sure. I'd rather slog the entire length of the Amazon in perforated tennis shoes than miss a chance to pitch coconuts at the Aunt Sally and gorge myself on rock cakes and strawberries-and-cream. No, I was well up on the dates of the fêtes.

"And then what happened?" I asked. We would sort out the details later.

"I must have fallen asleep," Dogger said. "When I woke up I was lying in the grass. It was wet. I got up and went in to bed. I didn't feel well. I must have had one of my bad turns. I don't remember."

"And you think that, during your bad turn, you might have killed Horace Bonepenny?"

Dogger nodded glumly. He touched the back of his head.

"Who else was there?” he asked.

Who else was there? Where had I heard that before? Of course! Hadn't Inspector Hewitt used those very words about Father?

"Bow your head, Dogger," I said.

"I'm sorry, Miss Flavia. If I killed someone I didn't mean to."