DEAD POET'S FOLLY
After Agatha Christie
"So here you are, Barry," said Roy. "Assisting at a murder once again."
"You are right," said Barry. "I was called down here to assist."
"Called down to assist?" Roy looked puzzled. Barry said quickly:
"I mean, I was asked down here to give away the prizes of this murder hunt."
"So Ursula told me."
"She told you nothing else?" said Barry, with apparent carelessness. He was anxious to discover whether Ursula had given Roy any hint of the real motives which had led her to insist on Barry's journey to Devon.
"Told me nothing else? She never stopped telling me things. Every possible and impossible motive for Mabel's murder. She set my head spinning. Phew! What an imagination!"
"She earns her living by her imagination, mon ami," said Barry drily.
"She mentioned a man called Terbish - did she imagine that?"
"No, that is a sober fact."
"There was something about a poem at breakfast and a boat and coming up the canal for the launch. I couldn't make head or tail of it."
Barry embarked upon an explanation. He told of the scene at the breakfast table, the poem, Mabel's headache.
"Ursula said that Mabel was frightened. Did you think she was afraid, too?"
"That was the impression she gave me."
"Afraid of this cousin of hers? Why"
Barry shrugged his shoulders.
Exhibit 1
