Murder Most Royal

They had tasted many a Victoria sponge together, watched many a dog show, remarked on the beauty of many a flower arrangement. She was a talented pigeon breeder and her birds had beaten the Queen’s in a couple of races.

‘Very bad,’ Arthur said dully. ‘She’s in a coma, at the Queen Elizabeth.’

The local hospital was named after the Queen’s mother. One became used to being buildings and ships eventually.

‘Ivy took it harder than me,’ Arthur went on. ‘She never really liked it at home. Mum kept going on at her about school until she went half mad with it.

But Auntie Judy got it. She was somewhere Ivy could go, you know? And now it’s all gone to shi—Gone bad, ma’am.’

‘It must be a huge worry for you all.’

He shrugged. ‘Coming here helps. Like I say, it calms me. Ivy, too. Thanks for not minding. So she can stay? Keep coming over, I mean?’

‘Yes. If she can pull her weight here, as you say.’

‘No question, ma’am. She’s got a gift with animals. Horses and dogs especially.’

‘Then this is where she should be.

’

The Queen thought about Judy Rasperry all the way back to the house. A coma! The poor woman! Lying alone in the road until she was discovered. Was she still conscious at that point? And two young people who clearly needed her help. Judy was a woman in her fifties: at that age when everybody needs you – parents, children, workmates, pets . . . At WI meetings, she was always the person everyone turned to if the lights failed or the guest speaker was late or somebody went off with the key to the loo.

Her stories about it afterwards were a riot. How would they cope without her? And what about Arthur, and his forthright little sister? It was the deepest fear of many women, the Queen knew: not being there for the people who needed them. She understood it well.

‘Feeling better?’ Philip asked when she got back.

‘Up to a point.’ She told him about Mrs Raspberry and then, to lighten the tone a bit, about Ivy in the tack room.

‘Good God! On our own estate! We should have her horsewhipped.

’

‘I told her brother she can help out with the horses. I think it will do her good. She was the one who found the hand, by the way.’

‘Ah! So we have her to thank for all of this,’ Philip grunted.

The Queen pursed her lips. ‘If you mean for alerting the police to what happened to Ned, then yes. Otherwise, we might never have known.’

‘I mean for making us suddenly wonder if all our friends and neighbours are stone-cold killers.’

‘I never did,’ the Queen assured him.