Murder in the churchyard.
The church clock chimes languidly twice, an apparent insomniac. A cock crows, the full moon comes from behind an errant, wandering patch of cloud. It illuminates the carved limestone gargoyle waterspouts on the corners of the church roof. They have their mouths stretched open to release the rainwater deposited on the leaded slate roof, their tongues fully extended, screaming in their silent, unending torment to carry their message of memento mori, reminding everyone that life is short, everyone will die and then everything will get a lot worse than this life has been.
The roof has recently been repaired as most of the previously fitted lead had been purloined one dark, moonless night by a group of men, desperate to sell the lead for money that would go some way towards feeding their starving families. The roof five had been caught when one of their number slithered off the roof in the dark, wrenching his back as he rebounded off a flying buttress and broke his resulting vertical fall onto the stone flags in front of the West Door with his legs. He broke both of his legs in the process, the ends of his shin bones protruding through the flesh. The other four tried to help him but were apprehended by the peelers. All five perpetrators were publicly hanged of course, pour encourager les autres.
The roof is safe tonight, there is too much moonlight to hide any skullduggery being perpetrated, even if anyone dared to challenge the hangman’s noose. As the moon rises higher in the night sky, the liquid shadow inside the West porch, black as a raven’s wing, starts to retreat and the silvery selenic light reveals a recumbent body slumped across the threshold, a line of crumb-carrying ants marching across the fedora covering its face. The clock is now silent, resting for the next hour, relishing the thought of the day to come when it would have the chance to chime to mark each of the quarter hours.
The peeler on duty, Sergeant Doodlgregg, had found the body on his beat by happenstance whilst navigating towards the church porch for his customary nighttime clay pipe of tobacco. After ensuring that the man had indeed departed this life, he made haste to the local hostelry where he knew the Exeter coach had staged overnight to rest the horses. The two gentlemen passengers were abed but his lively banging on the door soon roused them from their slumber together with mine host who was mightily displeased at the interruption to his repose.
The two gentlemen hurriedly dressed in casual, but elegant clothes, given the time of the morning and the urgency of the summons it was no time to be fastidious, and followed the good sergeant to the church. A minister clad in a chasuble complete with a blue stole was there before them, standing over the body, clutching a comely maiden by the hand,
‘Are you the Vicar of this church?’ demanded Holmes
‘I am indeed, I am the Reverend Ernest Cholmondly-Smythe.’ I have been the incumbent here for some seven years. This lady, who has been constantly at my side as my life partner is the honourable Rebecca Winstanley of Cortlesham Hall, on the hill overlooking the village.’
‘Are you married?’ asked Holmes, somewhat impertinently.
‘No, but we have been betrothed for many a year.
‘Are you either of you acquainted with this man?’
‘We have never seen him before.’
‘Then I shall use my powers of deduction. I fear we have a cereal killer here, Watson.’
‘How do you deduce that Holmes, old boy?’ asked a surprised and incredulous Watson.
‘You see those crumbs the ants are carrying? They appear to be from a brand of breakfast cereal made from maize. I think you will find that the body is that of a foreign gentleman from Cincinnati; only an American would wear a fedora in a churchyard at this time in the morning, and, what is even more incredible, he is wearing brown shoes. This means that there is a possibility that this could be a crime of fashion. Please be so kind as to check his pockets for any identification, Watson.
‘That is amaizing Holmes, his business introduction card shows he is a Dr Kellogg from Cincinnati.’
‘Thank you my dear chap but please leave the puns to me.’
‘Righto, Holmes, old boy, but where does the early cock crow come in?’
‘I would be very surprised that, when we turn the body over, if we do not find a cornflake packet there with the famous image of the ubiquitous cockerel on the front.’
‘Would you help me roll the body over please, Sergeant Doodlgregg, my good fellow? asked Watson.
‘Certainly Sir,’ said the sergeant, unchaining his cape, removing it from his shoulders with an effort and laying it on the dew laden-grass. They rolled the body over, with a great deal of puffing from the Sergeant.
‘Why are you so out of breath sergeant?’ asked the good doctor with his usual professional curiosity.
‘Oi’ve been getting rather a large belly recently, sir so I’ve been on one of those new-fangled low carbohydrate diets.’
‘Those diets are a waist of time, if you ask me,’ affirmed Watson
‘ No one is Watson and I’ve told you before about those puns.’
‘Sorry Holmes, we’ve found the cereal packet that you predicted, I assume that confirms your deductions?’
Well, partly, but I am wondering if there have been any other suspicious deaths in the village recently Sergeant?’ enquired Holmes.
‘Not really Sir, there was old Mrs Weetabix of course, who was found dead at her home in Alpen Crescent last week with seven stab wounds in her back. A clear case of suicide we decided. Ten days ago we found the bodies of three patients in the local bedlam. We put that down as a random nut cluster at the time. We also found two gentlemen who had apparently shot each other from twenty two paces. We assumed they had fought a duel to the death by chocolate. The fact that no ferrero rocher were found at the scene puzzled us until we realised that some ruffians from the village had probably made off with the praline confectionary. I suppose we should include All-Bran Stoker’s family who disappeared last year. That case kept us going down at the station for a while, I can tell you. We even followed a lead to the Abbey on the East Cliff above Whitby, alas without success.’
‘Thank you Sergeant. Wait! Can you hear that noise?’
‘Do you mean that snapping?’ asked Watson.
‘No, you fool, that is just the crack of dawn. Listen carefully; unless I am very much mistaken, that is the call of a Corvus albicollis – the white-necked raven. That is an indication of thaumaturgy being practiced near here.
‘Thaumaturgy? Heaven forfend, what is that?
‘It is the practice of magic, either black or white, it’s use is usually accompanied by the appearance of a raven. Ah, there’s one over on that gravestone. Let’s have a closer look.’
‘It’s the red sandstone gravestone of a vicar, Rev. E.C. Smythe, the inscription states that he died two hundred years ago today. Why, that’s…’ Watson turned quickly to look at where the priest had been a few moments before, there was no sign of him. ‘What’s going on Holmes, I don’t think I understand any of this, I don’t like it either, I tell you. Where have they both gone?’
Relax, Watson, it was just the the unquiet spirit of the vicar visiting his old ministry on the anniversary of his death. I think you will also find the grave, somewhere in this churchyard, of the Lady Rebecca who died before the estimable E. C. Smythe. He was following the ley lines to his ancient church here, St Quiricus and St Julietta, which is built at the crossing of two lines. I deduced the possibility of him being in spirit when I saw him robed ready for a service at this time of the morning. He has been searching for his lost love across the years. He was also probably here to point us in the right direction to help solve all these murders in the village over the last few weeks. He meant us no harm, it was a white necked raven after all, which usually means that white magic is being practised.
‘How will we ever find out who killed all those people, Holmes?’
‘I think that you will find that our sergeant here has a lot to answer for in this case. Please check his breath. Because of his low carbohydrate diet, I expect him to have a bad case of halitosis caused by his body burning fat and going into ketosis. His breath will smell of acetone but you will understand this better than me Watson, being a medical man. His name, with a missing ‘e’, means that he is a Walloon from southern Belgium with a de haut en bas attitude . Never trust a policeman from Belgium unless he is called Poirot, Watson. I think this is an opportune time to offer him this bowl of muesli which will force a confession from him.’
‘You are an incredible detective, Holmes,’ muttered Watson as he poured half a pint of best semi skim into the cereal bowl.
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