“That’s an excellent idea,” said Mr. Webster. “The news of Abernathy’s death is bound to get out, and if it’s not solved quickly and quietly, we’ll have journalists and tourists swamping the house, poking their noses into our private affairs. Half the city will be lining up to take their turn at finding the killer! If one of you at this table can do the job, though, we might not have a scandal on our hands.”
Mrs. Webster didn’t look pleased. “And if one of them can’t?”
“Then we’ll have to alert the constable, scandal or not.” Mr. Webster looked around the table. “I’ll give you all until Sunday afternoon. If you don’t find us a murderer by then, I’ll bring in the police.”
“Don’t worry, my dear,” said Miss March. She squeezed Mrs. Webster’s hand. “I’m sure that won’t be necessary.”
The mention of the ten thousand dollars had been so invigorating that several of the detectives started to take tentative tastes of their dinner. Even Toby was feeling a little better. “With ten thousand dollars,” he said to Ivy, “I could fix all the leaks in Uncle Gabriel’s roof and keep Montrose Investigations in business.”
“I could rent an office on Detectives’ Row,” Ivy said. “I could hang up a big bronze sign with my name on it, and a smaller sign for Percival.”
“I could get a lifetime subscription to the Sphinx Monthly Reader,” said Toby.
“I could pay Lillie to go away,” said Ivy, “and to never come back.”
Mrs. Webster had overheard them. “You won’t do anything of the sort, Ivy,” she said, “and neither will you, Toby. I want both of you children to stay well out of the way of the investigation.”
“Oh, Mother!” said Ivy. “Don’t be silly. Who ever heard of a detective solving a case by staying away from it?”
Toby nodded. “Mr. Peartree said he’d reward anyone here who could find out how Mr. Abernathy died. What if ‘anyone’ is us?”
He was proud of this logic, but it wasn’t enough to convince Mrs. Webster. “No,” she said in a voice Toby didn’t want to argue with. “I won’t allow you two to put yourselves in danger. Murder is not for children.”
Ivy scowled at her mother. Then, deliberately, she rested both of her elbows on the table. Toby had guessed it already, but now he knew it for sure: Ivy Webster was the sort of girl who actually liked danger.
The dining room door opened, and Norton the footman limped through it. He handed a small paper card to Mrs. Webster. “I’m sorry to interrupt, madam,” he said, “but I thought you’d want to know that the doctor is here.”
CHAPTER 11
BERTRAM’S REMARKABLE DIGESTIVE TONIC
No one was allowed to bother Doctor Piper. While she examined Mr. Abernathy’s body in the Orchid Room, the soup was cleared away and followed by roast lamb, which was followed in turn by sweet dessert cakes (which Toby liked) and bitter coffee (which he didn’t). The minutes ticked by, and the detectives grew restless. One by one, they excused themselves from the dinner table to stretch their legs, explore the manor, or admire the Websters’ collection of Gyptian artifacts, though Toby guessed they were all really trying to sneak a look at whatever Doctor Piper was doing upstairs. He would have liked to do the same, but Mrs. Webster wasn’t letting him out of her sight. She herded him and Ivy into the parlor, where they played a halfhearted game of Snap and listened to Lillie practice her scales on the piano.
After a while, the others trickled in: first Julia Hartshorn with her crossword puzzle, then Mr. Rackham, who joined the card game and was promptly defeated by Ivy. Miss Price came in with her needlepoint and Miss March with her mystery novel; Philip Elwood even slipped his notebook into his pocket and banged out the low notes of a piano duet with Lillie.
When Mr. Peartree and Mr. Webster finally led Doctor Piper into the parlor, however, the music stopped. Toby threw down his playing cards in relief. He had been losing that round badly, and Ivy was getting more insufferable with every victory.
“Detectives,” said Doctor Piper, setting down her black medical bag. Her voice was brisk, and she wore cloth gloves and sensible shoes; Toby guessed she was the sort of person who didn’t put up with any nonsense. “I’ve completed a basic medical examination of the body, and I am prepared to share my early conclusions. Normally, I prefer to consult with the lead investigator on a case like this one, but the Websters tell me that you are all lead investigators, so I suppose you’ll all need to hear my report.”
“All except for the children,” said Mrs. Webster as she gathered up the playing cards. “I’m sure it will be much too unpleasant for them. Shall I take them up to bed?”
“Please don’t!” said Toby. He’d already seen a dead body that evening, and he was sure whatever the doctor had to say couldn’t be more unpleasant than that. “We want to know what’s happened.”
“Yes, we do,” said Ivy. “Toby discovered the murder, so he should be allowed to stay. And I don’t want to go to bed, either. Doctor Piper knows I have a particular interest in medical anatomy.”
Mrs. Webster looked more ready than ever to sweep them both upstairs, but Doctor Piper spoke first. “In my experience,” she said, “children are very good at uncovering gruesome details, and even better at imagining the ones they can’t uncover. It will be best for everyone in this room to hear the facts directly from me.” She unzipped her medical bag and pulled out a green glass bottle—the same one Toby had seen on the purple table in the Orchid Room, wrapped in a stained paper label. “I believe,” said Doctor Piper, “that Hugh Abernathy was deliberately poisoned with the liquid in this bottle.”
It was a well-known fact that Mr. Abernathy relied on Bertram’s Remarkable Digestive Tonic to keep his body as fit and nimble as his mind. He drank it three times a day—before breakfast, lunch, and dinner—and in the stories Toby had read, he was always complaining to Mr. Peartree about how foul it tasted. This hadn’t stopped most of the would-be detectives in Colebridge from buying their very own supplies of Bertram’s, though Toby had never seen a bottle anywhere in Uncle Gabriel’s house. Uncle Gabriel probably believed that a lifetime of indigestion was preferable to drinking even one sip of Hugh Abernathy’s favorite medicine.
Now, in the parlor, Mr. Peartree shook his head. “That’s impossible. Mr. Abernathy has been taking Bertram’s for years, and it’s never killed him before. He had a glass at noon today and was perfectly healthy afterward!”
“Then someone must have added poison to the tonic after noon.” Julia pulled on her own pair of gloves and picked up the Bertram’s bottle. “May I borrow this for testing, Doctor?”
“Certainly,” said Doctor Piper. “If I were you, Miss Hartshorn, I’d test first for Brandelburg acid. The effects are unmistakable.”
Ivy nudged Toby in the ribs. “That’s one of the three most popular poisons,” she whispered.
“I know,” Toby whispered back. “You said so in your lessons.” Ivy had also said in her lessons that Brandelburg acid wasn’t particularly difficult to find in Colebridge: it was in cleaning solutions, artists’ paints, silver polish, and even the fluids photographers used to develop their pictures. Toby wondered whether Ivy had a jug of it hidden away somewhere in the Investigatorium.
“Mr. Abernathy died quickly,” Doctor Piper said, “within a few minutes of drinking this tonic. Do any of you know when that might have been?”
“It must have been his five-o’clock dose,” said Mr. Peartree, knitting his fingers together and pulling them apart again. “He always drank his tonic at five precisely. The last time I spoke to him was at half past four.”
“And we found him dead at a quarter past six,” Toby volunteered.
The other detectives were all taking notes as quickly as they could write. “We know that someone added poison to Mr. Abernathy’s tonic between noon and five o’clock,” Philip said. He scratched his nose with the blunt end of his pen. “That should thin out the field of suspects. Who knew about Mr. Abernathy’s habit of taking Bertram’s?”
“Only everyone in the country!” said Julia. “You can’t get through an issue of the Sphinx without knowing that.” She looked meaningfully at Mr. Peartree.
Miss Price had stayed quiet while the doctor gave her report, but now she raised her hand. “I hope it won’t distress anyone to hear this,” she said, “but I believe all the people who are most likely to have poisoned Mr. Abernathy are gathered here in this very room.”
“Surely not!” said Mr. Webster. At the piano, Lillie put a hand on the keys to steady herself, playing a chord so earsplitting it sent Percival leaping into Toby’s lap. Toby didn’t mind, though. He was glad to have a friend close by. Percival certainly hadn’t murdered anyone, which was more than Toby could say for anyone else in the parlor.
“I agree with Flossie,” Miss March said. “No one else has been allowed in the house this afternoon except for the servants, and I can’t imagine any of them would have a reason to want Hugh Abernathy out of the way.” She looked around the room, and Toby pulled Percival a little closer. Who did have a reason to poison Mr. Abernathy? Miss March obviously knew—or thought she did—but Toby didn’t think she was going to share that information with the others. As good as Miss March and Miss Price were at talking, they were even better at holding their tongues.
“Still,” said Mr. Rackham, “the servants will have to be interviewed, and the Websters as well. We’ve got to do this thing properly. Newfangled tricks and potions will only get an investigation so far.”
“They’ll get it quite far enough,” said Julia, “thank you very much.”
Doctor Piper tapped one of her sensible shoes on the floorboards. Toby had been right; she didn’t like nonsense. “I’ll have to take the body with me,” she said. “The county medical examiner will want to perform a more thorough investigation. Would a few of you please help me bring Mr. Abernathy down to my carriage?”
All the detectives stood up right away. So did Toby. “Are you going to carry the body?” Ivy asked him. She wrinkled her nose. “You really do like to be helpful, don’t you? You’re a very strange person.”
“I’m not the one who owns a human skeleton,” Toby pointed out. “And anyway, I’m not being helpful—at least not right now. Everyone’s going up to the Orchid Room, and I want to go, too. Mr. Abernathy’s case files are in there, remember?”
“Right!” said Ivy. “Good thinking, Detective Montrose.” She bounced out of her chair. “You’re wrong about my owning a skeleton, though. I already told you: Egbert is on loan.”
In the Orchid Room, Mr. Peartree held Mr. Abernathy’s arms and Miss March held his legs while the other detectives crowded in on all sides to get a better view. “Poor Hugh,” Miss Price murmured as Mr. Peartree staggered forward, hardly able to hold up his own arms along with Mr. Abernathy’s. “First to be murdered, and then to be carried down the servants’ stairs! He wouldn’t have found it very dignified.” She placed her hands on Toby’s shoulders. “You’re looking a little wobbly, dear. Are you feeling all right?”
Toby wasn’t all right. From the doorway of the Orchid Room, he could see that Mr. Abernathy’s dignity wasn’t the only thing missing from the scene of the crime. On the floor in front of him, where all those folders and papers had been stacked a few hours before, was nothing but an old carpet woven in long rows of violet diamonds and lavender stripes.
“It’s Mr. Abernathy’s case files,” Toby said. “I mean, actually, it isn’t the files. They’re gone.”
There was only one lamp in the Investigatorium. It flickered earnestly in a corner and cast nervous shadows onto the old velvet sofa, where Ivy sat with her legs crossed under her. She’d let Toby sit down, too, so he could tell the situation was serious. No one knew who had taken Mr. Abernathy’s files. The doctor swore she hadn’t moved them, but they’d been in the Orchid Room when she’d arrived, and now they absolutely weren’t.
“My god!” Mr. Rackham had said. “The murderer must have taken them!”
At this, Mrs. Webster had decided that enough was enough and that the children should be sent to bed before any more crimes could be committed. Toby and Ivy had protested, of course, but it didn’t do any good. They were marched down the hall and into their bedrooms while the other detectives studied every floorboard and windowpane in the Orchid Room, searching for clues to Mr. Abernathy’s death and to the whereabouts of the missing files. Julia had even mentioned something about taking fingerprints, and Toby wished he could have stayed to watch her do it. Instead, he crawled under his orange quilt, squeezed his eyes shut, and wondered how he’d ever be able to fall asleep in the same clothes he’d worn all day, with the buzz of detectives working just down the hall. Even if murder wasn’t for children, he couldn’t help feeling extremely left out.
Then Ivy had tapped on his door. She was draped in billowing pink flannel, with lace trim at the collar and all sorts of pockets in curious places. “Emergency meeting,” she’d said in a low voice. “Meet me upstairs in five minutes. And don’t you dare say a word about my nightgown.”
Toby had promised not to. There wasn’t much you could say about something that frightening.
Now, in the dim light of the Investigatorium, Ivy rolled up her sleeves. “I hereby call this emergency meeting to order,” she said. “Our assistant is asleep downstairs, but we can bring him up-to-date in the morning. Right now, we’ve got to decide what we’re going to do about this murder.”
Toby hadn’t realized there was anything to decide. “What about your mother?” he said. “She said we’re not allowed to get anywhere near it.”
“Oh, don’t mind Mother.” Ivy rolled her eyes. “She’s always saying things like that. You’ve just got to ignore her. You can do that, can’t you, Toby? Or are you as well behaved as Lillie?”
When she put it that way, it sounded suspiciously like a dare. “I’m not that well behaved.”
“Good,” said Ivy, “because we can’t leave this investigation up to the other detectives. You heard what Miss Price said: one of them could be the killer! For all we know, all five of them joined forces to poison Mr. Abernathy.”
The lamp in the corner summoned up its enthusiasm and blazed brighter, making Toby squint. He didn’t like danger anywhere nearly as much as Ivy did, but she was right: the others couldn’t be trusted, not even the detectives Uncle Gabriel had known for years. Somewhere in Coleford Manor, right under their noses, a murderer was paging through Hugh Abernathy’s case files—or, even worse, destroying them forever, along with Toby’s last hope of finding out the truth about his parents. Toby could hardly stand to think about it. “You’re right,” he said. “We’ve got to investigate.”
“I knew you’d think so!” Ivy clapped her hands. “Oh, Toby, I can see it now. Mr. Peartree will write about our adventures and publish them in the Sphinx! ‘Inspector Webster and the Mystery of the Poisoned Sleuth’! Or maybe ‘Inspector Webster in Peril at the Manor’! Or—”
“Um,” said Toby. “Can’t my name be in the titles, too?”
“Inspector Webster and Detective Montrose? It’s sort of a mouthful.”
“But we’re partners.” Toby hesitated. “We are partners, right?”
Ivy chewed her bottom lip. “Right. We’re a team. We’re . . . Webster and Montrose, Private Investigators.” She said it again, trying out the sound of it. Then she looked up at Toby and grinned. “The sleuths who make criminals shiver.”
PART III
SUSPECTS AND SECRETS
CHAPTER 12
MADAME ERMINTRUDE
It was morning in the Marigold Room. Daylight burst in through Toby’s orange curtains, the local birds were in full-throated chorus outside his window, and Percival was sitting on his stomach.
“Good morning to you, too,” Toby said. His mind was still cobwebbed over with sleep, but he was alert enough to guess a few things. “Did Ivy let you in?”
“Wrong!” Across the room, someone flung open the curtains. Toby squinted at her. She wore a long dr
ess that looked like a lot of silk scarves sewn together, with even more scarves wrapped around her neck. Her hair was covered by a floppy straw hat, and her eyes were hidden behind a pair of motoring goggles. “I,” she said, “am Madame Ermintrude, the world-famous fortune-teller and race-car driver.”
“Sorry, Ivy, but I’m not going to call you Madame Ermintrude.” Toby wriggled out from under Percival’s claws. “Isn’t it too early for disguises?”
“It’s practically seven.” Ivy pushed her motoring goggles up onto her forehead. “And no time is too early for good detective work. But how did you know it was me? No one in the Sphinx ever guesses that they’re talking to Hugh Abernathy in disguise.”
“I don’t think Madame Ermintrude was one of his disguises.” Hugh Abernathy had been famous for playing hundreds of different roles during his adventures, and a few times he’d even fooled Mr. Peartree into believing he was a sausage vendor or a Gallian aristocrat. But Ivy was no Hugh Abernathy. “It’s a good disguise, though,” Toby said, “if you need to read someone’s fortune or drive a race car. Do you?”
“Not today.” Ivy frowned. “I’ll keep working on it.” She unwound a few of her scarves and sat down in the orange armchair, shoving aside the stack of pillows that had never really looked much like Uncle Gabriel. “I could hardly sleep last night, could you? I kept thinking about who the murderer might be, and about the three Ms.”
Toby hadn’t slept much, either. Every time he’d closed his eyes, he’d seen Mr. Abernathy, cold and lifeless in that purple chair, and he’d jolted awake again. He guessed, though, that Ivy didn’t allow herself to have nightmares. “What are the three Ms?” he asked.
“Don’t you remember? They’re in lesson twelve of the correspondence course. What are the three crucial things any criminal needs in order to commit a crime?”
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