Jabardast
by Bertil Falk

A hornet's nest, that was what she had gotten herself into; murder, love, intrigue. Porneema reflected and wondered again at just how this had happened.

One bleak day in late spring, when twilight set in across the barren landscape, Poorneema Prakash was the only passenger on a northbound train. She was fairly tired. Early that same morning, her friends Roland Franzén, Lena-Britta and Lena-Britta's nameless fiancé had driven her across the bridge from Malmö to Copenhagen , where she was booked on the first morning-flight to London. From Heathrow Airport she took a cab to one of London's many railway stations. Changing to more and more primitive trains and she was now on the last leg of her journey.

Poornema Prakash was 19 years old when she was chosen Miss Dharampur. She was never voted Miss India, but had comew in a difficult fifth and so became a model. Her beauty carried her to the dream factories of Bollywood in Mumbai. There she won the principal part in a category potboiler movie. She played opposite Amitabh Dutt, the dream boy of mothers-in-law. The movie never became a blockbuster for the simple reason that it was never shown because of problems between the producer and the Indian board of film censors.

Poorneema's career on the silver screen never sailed with a fair wind and she began to feel that the cinema was not her cup of tea.

Therefore Poorneema returned to the university in Delhi . She studied languages and history. And when she swotted up Latin and Italian, she was fascinated by Gabriele de Mussi, who in his Istoria de morbo sive mortalitate que fuit de 1348 gave an account of the Black Death in Kaffa.

By the age of 26, Poorneema Prakash had appropriated to herself a few university degrees and had become a computer addict. For half a year, she did nothing but surf the net. Until one day, she pulled herself together and decided to do something completely different; it would have to be something she liked but which at the same time was profitable.

She thought of casting horoscopes, but she was compelled to admit to herself that she was too sceptical and too honest to make a living at that kind of business.

It was not until one evening as she babysat her brother's children and read aloud to them from Lindgren's Pippi Longstocking that she hit upon what to do. Pippi, that redheaded super-child used to appear as a turnupsnuffer. Poorneema Prakash decided on becoming such a freelancing human target-oriented detector, specialised in hunting up valuable rubbish for rich collectors.

On the occasion we now will be priviledged to hear about, she found a rare stamp for a rich lady in a town in the coal district of Britain. It was not a just dying town. It was, practically speaking, already dead. The inhabitants wandered about like lost souls. The only thing that had survived PM Margaret Thatcher's hand was Ye Olde Black Stone, a pub patronised by the former pitmen of the district, where they talked about the good old days when black gold kept the place alive and kicking.

The train crossed a bridge overlooking a river streaming out into the sea. There was a ferry berth transporting cars on both sides of the river. The head guard, whose main task seemed to be examining her ticket, called out to her that it was ten minutes before they arrived at her stop.

She adjusted her sari from Benares while the more and more barren scenery passed by in the dusk outside the window. After a few minutes, the train whistle sounded and the train slowed down. The first sign of life was a big structure to the left of the railway. The word MUSEUM shone with an ominous blue light from a big sign. The neon letters seemed to glow inappropriately in the gloom of night. In front of the building was a row of peculiar objects which Poorneema Prakash guessed were worn out mining tools.

The train stopped at the platform of a worn out station. Behind the station the land sloped upward and on that slope the town bent down towards the railway station. Lights glowed in the windows and in street lamps.

A young man waiting on the platform caught sight of her richly coloured sari and hastened on to her side to help with her bags.

“I'm John,” he said. “John Weaver. Mrs. Grafton asked me to pick you up. You must be the lady from India ?”

Poorneema nodded. “How did you guess?”

They both laughed at her simple joke.

“I'll drive you to Mrs. Grafton's house.”

“You work for Mrs. Grafton?” Poorneema asked.

“Not at all. I'm her neighbour. I'm actually engaged on the museum project. It's part of the new employment policy. Only a few people have gotten jobs there. When the museum is completed, it hopefully will attract visitors, who will stay in town, eating and drinking at Ye Olde Black Stone, buying souvenirs, getting the town back on its feet again. The national travel agency has far-reaching plans for tourism here. It's part of the employment project.”

“I understand unemployment is rampant here.”

“The word is steeplechase,” he replied.

"Steeplechase? Excuse a foreigner. What has hurdle-racing to do with unemployment?”

"A small joke. It's a question of galloping unemployment.”

They both smiled and looked embarrassed.

Weaver drove the car through empty streets, empty except for a skinny dog grubbing in a rubbish-heap for something to eat. The two-storey stone-houses wore big black spots and Poorneema realised that this was a place where coal-heating was a centuries old habit.

The jaunt took about ten minutes. John Weaver helped Poorneema out of the car. Making eye contact with him she was shocked to notice something lascivious in his brown eyes.

The residence where Mr. Winston Grafton and his wife Garden Grafton spent their upper class days was situated on the fringe of this ghostlike town. Their home was like a country-house leaving no doubt about it that the Graftons socially were well above the unemployed miners. Mrs. Grafton stood waiting on the landing. She wore a simple black dress. She received Poorneema with open arms.

“Thank you, John,” she said, making short work of Weaver. “You'll hear from me.”

Before Poorneema managed to stop her, she had resolutely caught hold of the suitcase and was on her way into the house.

“You'll live with a view to the station and the museum,” she said and literally flew up the broad, oak-panelled stairs as if the suitcase were light fluff.

Mrs. Grafton could have been around 45 years old. Some grey had slipped into her hair and Poorneema was not surprised to learn that Mrs. Grafton once upon a time had been a successful pentathlete with Olympic merits.

“Take a shower and when you're ready, come down and have dinner with us,” Grafton said.

Poorneema's room was really pleasing, an exquisite wallpaper in grey and rose with streaks of green created a cosy atmosphere. A reproduction of the long ago so popular Toten-Insel by Böcklin hung above a writing-desk. A pair of translucent greencurtains almost imperceptibly framed a picture window. The bed was broad with a colourful bedspread. The big bathroom was provided with a whirlpool. Poorneema took a bath and put on a green sari of rayon from Gujarat .

Dinner was served in a small dining-room-like space next to the kitchen. A head shorter than his wife, Winston Grafton turned out to be a good-natured gentleman. He was moustached. His eyes looked constantly surprised, seeming to create riddles rather than solving them.

“My maternal grandfather was in India . He died in Calcutta , by malaria or dengue, I don't know. I think he's interred at the English graveyard there,” he said.

“Oh, you mean South Park Street Cemetery,” Poorneema said. “It's a very interesting graveyard. Dilapidated today, spooky, but exciting. A great grandchild of Charles II is buried there.”

“You've been there?”

"I found a stamp for your wife in Calcutta ,” Poorneema said and gave the old gentleman a kind smile. “Yes, I've been there. Strange coincidence, your grandfather is buried there and I found your wife's stamp there.”

“There's no relation,” Winston Grafton said.

“I collect Cinderella stamps,” Mrs. Grafton said as if she had to explain. “Stamps that are unofficial. They've not been released by any Government but by railway companies, shipping companies, private persons and other unofficial sources, so to speak. Like this stamp, Miss Prakash found for me. And which,” she stressed, “happens to be Indian.”

After dinner and before the evening tea, the two women sat down in an alcove.

Using a pair of tweezers, Poorneema Prakash took a black stamp out of a small, transparent envelope. It represented a turbaned soldier, a bearer of a standard with the text AZAD HIND. Two men flanked him. In their military caps they looked like two Nazi SA-men. The face value was 1 rupeee + 2 rupees and two vertical swords framed the three men.

Carefully, Mrs. Grafton studied the stamp. She held it with the pair of tweezers, put it down on the table and gave it an ocular inspection with a small folding magnifier.

“Yes,” she said, “it's the one.” She raised her head. “Was it difficult to find?”

“Not at all,” Poorneema said. “I went toCalcutta and I found it. It was like twenty questions on the BBC World Service. By the method of elimination one closes in on the target. It was not difficult.”

“Why Calcutta ?”

“Several reasons, but most important, Calcutta stamp-dealers are the stuff that bargains are made of.”

Mrs. Garden Grafton looked at Poorneema Prakash with a piercing gaze.

“I tried for years.” It sounded like an accusation. “You succeeded in two weeks.”

“That's what I'm paid for,” Poorneema responded.

“Of course,” Mrs. Grafton said. “Well, now I hope that you'll stay as our guest a couple of days. I would like to show you the military museum they're creating here.”

Oh, Poorneema thought. It is not a mining museum after all.

“And tomorrow night,” Mrs. Grafton continued, “I will go with my husband and our three girls, who are at a dancing lesson, to a circus. They've put up a big tent in a small nearby village. You must come with us. And we've things to talk about. There are a few other stamps I want you to find for me. Real Cinderella stamps, like this AZAD HIND one from that twilight zone between British imperialism and Indian independence.” She raised her head and looked into Poornerma's eyes. “I'm after the first Latvian stamps. They were of course knocked together during or immediately after WWI. Nevertheless, they were the first stamps with the word LATWIJA. Spelled with a W.”

“Sounds interesting,” Poorneeema said. “So, the girls go to dancing-lessons?"

"The town is not completely dead. Artificial respiration,” Mrs. Grafton explained. “The class is part of extensive occupational therapy for the town. The military museum is the most important part of the project. As for the Latvian stamps …”

Poorneema began to take an interest in the museum and looked forward to visiting it. A short while later, the girls turned up. There was Charlotte , a beautiful 18 years old, dressed in jeans, a jumper and gym shoes, further Emily, a 15 years old beauty on the verge of blossoming, and Anne, 12 years old, a jolly and unruly girl.

“Don't be deceived by our first names,” Anne said. “We are the opposite of the Brontë sisters. Mother read too many romantic nonsense books when she was our age.”

“At your age,” Emily rebuked her.

“Saucy girl,” Anne retorted and turned to Poorneema again. “Have you seen our garden? What kind of books do you think my granny read, since ma was christened Garden? Come, let me show you the garden.”

The girl took Poorneema's hand and almost dragged her through a side door.

Anne turned on the lights and in front of them a small garden was bathed in floodlights. It was surrounded by a six foot high stone wall containing different fruit-trees. There was a table with a few plastic garden chairs, quite like those Poorneema had seen at a sidewalk restaurant in Paris and an open-air-café in Kisumu.

They sat down and Anne inspected Poorneema with obvious enthusiasm as if she were her latest find . Slightly annoyed, but at the same time amused, Poorneema did not let on she knew she was being examined so closely.

“You've a nice home,” she said.

“You're a detective,” the girl said and looked around as if to make sure nobody heard them.

“Not exactly,” Poorneema said. “I call myself a turnupsnuffer and a turnupsnuffer is a person using just about the same methods as a detective or a journalist.”

“That's what I thought,” Anne said in a low voice and straightened her rosy jumper. “You have,” she lowered her voice even more, “landed in a hornet's nest.”

Poorneema realised that Anne was a girl with a fertile imagination.

“You too read a lot of books?” Poorneema wondered.

“Oh yes. I've read all the books about Nancy and Williams I could lay my hands on.”

That was the explanation. In this probably very boring little town, the need of excitement for a 12 year-old old must be great. Nancy books fed wild dreams.

“You don't believe me?” Anne said.

“What kind of a hornet's nest?” Poorneema wondered.

“Ma is up to something with our neighbour John Weaver, behind pa's back. At the same time John Weaver hovers about Charlotte and she doesn't exactly seem to be displeased with his courting.”

“Does Charlotte know that he …?” Poorneema said.

“Of course. We know everything, but I know more than the others and say nothing to my silly sisters. He's having an affair with Miss Jones too.”

“Does your ma know that he …?” Poorneema continued.

“Don't know.”

The insight into neighbourly terms and the family affairs of her hosts, which her presence had elicited from an evidently vivacious and anxious adolescent, was unexpected. John Weaver was obviously the town's unofficial Don Juan. Poorneema remembered the look in his eyes earlier. She had not misconstrued them.

“Why do you tell me these things?” Poorneema wondered.

“You're a detective,” the girl said, as if that explained everything.

"Not exactly,” Poorneema said.

“But almost,” the girl persisted and in her intonation was a desperate need of seeing Poorneema as a detective.

Poorneema said: “What do you expect me to do?”

“Investigate and straighten out this mess.”

“I can't possibly intervene in people's private lives,” said Poorneema. “Especially not the lives of my hosts and clients. These are the rules,” Poorneema emphasised.

Anne looked dashed. “So you're not going to do anything about it?” the girl said, disappointed.

“Certainly not,” Poorneema flatly said.

Thirty-six hours later she would have reason to reconsider her decision.

Poorneema fell asleep that first night and slept like the famous log. The next day she was thoroughly refreshed and after lunch together with all the five family members, they left for the museum.

Charlotte, who was in the process of learning to drive, was at the wheel, with her father Winston at her side. He was in a very good mood at the prospect of showing off his knowledge of military history. Toward the end of his career in the sappers, Margaret Thatcher picked up the gauntlet, which the Argentine military junta had thrown down by occupying the British Falkland Islands. Now hishobby seemed to be technical military history.

John Weaver welcomed them and introduced them to Edward Smith, the museum's superintendent.

Soon Alice Jones, a subordinate to Edward Smith, turned up with a digita lcamera around her neck, now and then snapping a picture. About 35 years old, she had a wide mouth, lips tastefully painted a quiet red, and she smiled readily. Moreover she was good-looking.

The different structures Poorneema had seen from the train turned out to be wooden full-scale models with iron mountings of ancient catapults, huge crossbow-like bolt throwers and wheel-furnished battering-rams, which had been used at warfare during sieges by commanders like Alexander the Great, Poliorketes and many others.

“These war-machines,” Edward Smith explained, “have all been built by the carpenters, who previously worked in now closed mines of the district. Since it's Saturday and they're all free, unfortunately, we can't show how the craftsmen work in the joiner's workshop in the museum where in the future models of different kinds will be manufactured.”

“Some of the catapults here could throw large rocks many hundred yards across town walls”, Winston Grafton said. “We're also getting a renovated Spitfire from WWII, a flat-bottomed boat used in Normandy on June 6, 1944 and some other things.”

“As a matter of fact we're negotiating about getting a catterpillar tank used by Field Marshal Montgomery during the desert war against Rommel,” Edward Smith disclosed.

Winston Grafton gave an account of the ancient mechanism of one of the old wooden catapults. "As you can see, the arm of the lever is stretched and kept in place by a rope in the rough wooden frame,” he said. “The boulder was placed in the spoon of the lever and the thick rope was cut with a sword to toss the stone… SWISCH!"

Alice Jones, worriedly walked backward and forward during the conversation. "I'm sorry, but I've a few other things to do in the town, so I'll leave you here,” she said and disappeared behind a catapult.

The group moved into the building. The bottom level was dedicated to methods of warfare of the past. WIth everything under construction nothing was on display but on the upper level there were many things to see, including enormous suits of armour and an impressive collection of swords and rapiers. Poorneema suspected that against the odds perhaps the museum could attract tourists.

Hearing a distant train whistle, Poorneema noted a train was coming from the north, as she tried to focus on Smith's lecture.

“We thought of havng a mining museum,” Smith said, “but the districts are teeming with them and we cannot match what they have in other places. We arranged a brainstorming meeting at Ye Olde Black Stone and many pints later, Alice Jones put forward a proposal for a military museum.”

A stifled sound came from outside and they all turned to look through the window but the muffled sound disappeared in the clatter of the passing train filled to the brim with coal.

“They're still mining coal in the north?” Poorneema asked.

“A bit and it's transported as you can see on goods trains”, Edward Smith answered. “They come and go a couple of times day and night.”

Poorneema watched the train disappearing southwards. She looked for John Weaver but he was not in the room. He had obviously not bothered to come along up. As they returned outside the building, he was not there either.

While looking at the catapults, Poorneema had the strange feeling that something had changed and that something was the matter with … what? She looked around, but everything seemed to be as before. Her feeling persisted as she looked at the clumsy, wooden objects.

“What do you think?” Winston Grafton wondered as they returned to the mansion.

"Impressive," Poorneema Prakash admitted. "Instead of doing the most obvious and create a mining museum, you go for something different.”

“The good thing is,” said Charlotte, who elegantly drove the car, “that when they begin arranging packet tours, they will combine our military museum with a mining museum in the next county. Instead of competing for the tourists, we will share them.”

After lunch, Mrs. Grafton and Poorneema sat down and looked at Cinderella stamps. There were local stamps and ones from all over the world; transport stamps from South American ferry-services, railroad stamps from the United States and many others.

Later that evening, it was time for the circus. Poorneema placed a blue mark on her forehead, put a few blue glass bangles on her right arm and then selected a blue silk sari from Allahabad with wefts of silver thread. The Grafton family waited for her downstairs and a murmur of admiration went through the room when she walked down the broad oak stairs dressed in this magnificent creation.

“Wow!” Emily exclaimed and her sisters joined in the song of praise. They all wanted to touch the fabric.

The circus in a village a couple of kilometres to the west, took place in a large tent, illuminated and looking like a balloon in the growing darkness. It was an evening to remember. The tightrope walkers scored a success. The clowns provoked laughter. Miss Losec's horse riding aroused admiration. The living cannonball brought down the house, even though he did not score the bull's eye on the big target. He perforated one of the outer rings on the thin paper target. When Poorneema saw him flying across the tent, she thought of the catapults facing the railway outside the museum.

During intermission people took refreshments and the juggler delighted the spectators by keeping a great number of vinyl records in full swing with elegant variations. The elephant, which acted as a waitress wearing a gigantic apron, raised laughter and aroused admiration. In all, a successful evening.

“Has anyone seen John?” Charlotte wondered and her mother fixed her eyes upon her daughter. But nobody had seen John since the visit to the museum.

There was a follow-up-party at Ye Olde Black Stone, packed with people, the air was thick with smoke. Poorneema left. The streets in the village were illuminated and a lot of people from the surrounding district moved about this Saturday evening after the circus. The mansion was not only illuminated. It was floodlit. The master of the house sat smoking his pipe while reading in the kitchen, where Anne boiled coffee. The time was close on eleven o'clock. Poorneema knew that Mrs. Grafton stayed at the pub.

“Where are the others?” she asked.

“God knows,” said Winston Grafton.

“It seems as if John Weaver has gone up in smoke,” Anne said. “Nobody has seen him since we went to the museum.”

Winston Grafton stiffened. “What did you say?”

“It's as if he were swallowed up by the earth. The last anyone saw of him was near those silly old wooden machines. Nobody knows where he's gone.”

The next day everyone knew where John Weaver had gone. His battered body was washed ashore several kilometres from the railway-bridge. In spite of the fact that the body had been in the water, the coal-mixed blood on his face had not been completely washed away.

When Poorneema heard the news, she realised that she should have taken Anne Grafton's childish remarks seriously. She turned the matter over in her mind and found her way to the library at the end of the grey thoroughfare, quite a long way from Ye Olde Black Stone.

The library was only open on Friday evenings, but Poorneema nevertheless knocked at the door. She had been told that someone lived on the upper floor. Quite right. A window was opened and Alice Jones looked down at her.

“Oh, Miss Prakash,” she exclaimed. “I'll come down and open for you.” And so she did. No longer painted with her discreet lipstick, she looked quite pale.

“I'm sorry that I disturb you like this on a Sunday,” Poorneema began, but was immediately interrupted.

“I never attend church, so it doesn't matter as far as I'm concerned,” Alice Jones said. “To me Sunday is an ordinary day. Please come in. What can I do for you?”

“I know the library is closed. Are you the librarian?”

“Yes, but it doesn't matter. What are you looking for?”

Poorneema hesitated. “I'm pretty sure that you don't have the book I'm looking for,” she said, “but I would like to look at an encyclopedia.”

“We have a few encyclopedias.”

Poorneema soon found what she was looking for and she was about to shut two volumes, when Alice Jones prevented her.

“I take care of them and put them back where they belong,” she said and smiled.

Poorneema smiled back.

Interesting thoughts mixed with each other in Poorneema's head. She went straight from the library down to the museum building, where she ran across Edward Smith.

“Have you heard that John Weaver has been found dead?” was the first thing he said.

“Yes.”

“How is that possible? How on earth could he have landed up on a riverbank at a place that is more than thirty kilometres from here which cannot be reached by car since there are no roads leading there?”

“Heaven knows,” Poorneema said. “May I look around?”

“Of course.”

Poorneema walked to the other side of the building where the wooden machines were lined up. Edward Smith followed close behind and saw how she scanned the area, giving it a searching look. Suddenly she stopped and turned her eyes to one of the catapults.

In that moment, she thought that she knew what had happened. The suspicion had been rankling her ever since she heard where Weaver had been found and now it seemed to her that her suspicion was confirmed. But who did it and why?

Smith could have done it, but what was his motive? At least three members of the Grafton family, maybe all five, had reason to put Weaver to death, that is, if Poorneema was well informed on this point. And then she had the outside factor. There were probably several people who had a reason to kill the district's Don Juan.

She quit pondering, deciding instead to check a few things and make a plan. Cooperating with the police, she informed them of her intentions and they decided to wait and see if the murderer would reveal his or her identity.

Poorneema was the bait. She told all the family members that she had worked out how the murder had been committed and that it only was a question of time until she identified the perpetrator. She said the same thing to the regular customers of Ye Olde Black Stone. In just a few hours the rumour travelled all over the village. Either the murderer would bite the bait and be unmasked or the murderer would hide.

The trap was set when Poorneema seemed to walk alone late in the evening through the empty streets of the town. Out of the shadows a person holding a knife which flashed for a moment in the dim light of a distant street lamp was seen. The assailant missed her victim and was removed screaming by a couple of sturdy policemen.

“How did you solve the problem?” Edward Smith wondered when they met the next day at Ye Olde Black Stone.

Poorneema sipped her pale ale, “When I learned that John Weaver was found dead far away from the town in a place where he couldn't have been transported without difficulty well, I thought of the man who was shot like a cannon ball and hit that target at the circus. It screamed JABARDAST in my head.”

“It screamed what?”

“Jabardast. It's Hindi. It means ‘very, very fantastic.' It echoed and bounced inside my head. I thought of Münchausen, that thundering German liar in Latvia , who said he had ridden on a cannon ball. So I went to the library where I found what I needed. You see, in the year of 1346 Tartars and Venetians besieged the city of Kaffa in Genua. The situation was hopeless. According to Gabriele di Mussi, the besiegers were stricken by the Black Death and died like flies. They used catapults to launch burning balls across the walls of Kaffa. Then the chieftain of the tartars, Kipchak Khan Janibeg, was forced by the plague to suspend the siege. But before he left, he used the catapults to launch bodies of people who had died of the pestilence across the walls of Kaffa. I'm not fully sure, but it must have been the first use of biological warfare, or at least one of the first.”

Poorneema paused.

“If in the 14 th century they were able to launch human bodies with catapults, one should be able to do the same thing today. So I knew I had chosen a trail worth following. At my suggestion, the railway authorities and the police inspected the coal-filled wagons, which had passed by the museum that day. They found the train waiting for further instructions on a dead end siding at a shunting yard somewhere south of the river. There was a car with much clotted blood on the pile of coal. The rest goes without saying.”

Poorneema paused again.

“The murderer succeeded to get John Weaver to sit down on the lever-spoon, whereupon it was a child's play to loosen the rope that kept the lever in place.

John Weaver was immediately thrown hundreds of meters at the same time as a goods train filled with coal passed by. The body fell on a wagon and hit the top of the coal. The train continued southwards with the bloodstained corpse on the coal. After ten minutes, the train passed the bridge and as ill luck will have it, the body fell straight into the river below. It floated ashore along the river at a distance of about thirty kilometres from here. He was found on a spot that strictly only can be reached from the waterside, via helicopter, or on footpaths, since there are no carriageways in the area.”

“But tell me, Miss Prakash, how did you find out who the perpetrator was?” Edward Smith asked.

“Before I tell you that, I should perhaps tell you when this happened?”

“Well, when was it?”

“It happened when we all were upstairs in the museum and looked at the weapons. Even at the time when the murder took place, I had a vague feeling that something had changed amongst the catapults. What my subconscious noted was simply that the lever of one of the catapults was no longer turned backwards and fastened. It pointed straight up in the air. Do you remember that we heard a stifled sound and when we rushed to the window we saw a goods train passing by? That muffled sound we heard was when the catapult was released and John Weaver's body thrown away. When we came to the window, the body had already hit one of the wagons. I eventually realised it had to be Alice Jones. ”

“How did you suspect her and no one else?”

“My suspicion was born in the library, when I was to shut the books. Alice Jones prevented me from doing that. She told me that she would take care of them and put them back in the on the bookshelves. I noted that she was interested in what I had looked up and I realised that if she was the guilty person, after reading about Kaffa and Gabriele de Mussi, she would understand that I knew how John Weaver had been murdered.”

“I see.”

“As a matter of fact, she was the only one, who could have done it, wasn't she? She was with us when we visited the museum building and she was the only one, except John Weaver, who left the party and didn't walk up to the first floor.

And she confirmed her guilt through her silly attempt to kill me with a knife.”

“And if she hadn't tried to do that?”

“There were nevertheless enough facts to pass a sentence. Since it was elucidated when the murder took place and how it happened, all people who were at the museum could certify that she, on the ground that she had other things to do, had left the party before we walked up to the first floor.”

“I can attest to that myself,” Edward Smith said. “What about the motive?”

“Well, a little bird whispered in my ear that among the women our murdered Don Juan courted was not only the little bird's mother and sister but also a certain Miss Jones. Alice Jones wanted John Weaver for herself, a not uncommon desire in cases like this for that matter. But he was a compulsive seducer. She had enough of it and killed him when an opportunity presented itself.”

“A thoroughly tested motive for murder,” said Edward Smith, “but how did she succeed in getting him into the spoon of the lever?”

“Remember that she went about with a camera? She asked him to sit down on the lever for a photo. The police found the pictures she took. There you'll find not only us among the old catapults but also John Weaver sitting in the spoon seconds before she released the lever.”

Edward Smith struck his chin.

“Wasn't it difficult to figure all this out?” he asked.

“Not at all. It was like figuring out how to find a rare stamp for Mrs. Grafton.”

To this very day a stranger at Ye Olde Black Stone has to listen to this story. It is actually commercialised and is an integral component of the tourist concept, which has caused the old mining town to be revived after all the years of closed down mines and unemployment. Too twist an old phrase: It's a bad murder that blows no good.