Murder Most Royal

They apparently hunted the boar down together the next day. I know he’s good enough to have done it, and not that many people are.’

‘Why didn’t she simply get Ned to take his animals back?’

‘She said she didn’t trust him not to let them escape again. Relations had broken down. She was angry and upset and did the first thing that occurred to her. That’s her story, anyway. Cassidy backs it up.’

‘They’re quite a double act, those two,’ the Queen said thoughtfully.

The house party at Sandringham got through a few bottles of its own that evening.

After breakfast the next morning, while several of the guests were sleeping it off, the Queen took the dogs for a walk on her own so she could think. A circuit of the lakes generally suited this purpose. They weren’t large – more oversized ponds, really – and had been created with islands, rockeries and rich planting, so the eye would always have something to admire. Her great-grandfather once said he would have liked to be a landscape gardener if he hadn’t been king. The Queen did not personally agree, but thought what a jolly job it must be: out in the fresh air much of the time, surrounded by nature, making things. She had yet to meet a landscape gardener whose company she didn’t enjoy.

Yesterday, she’d asked Mrs Maddox whether there were any rumours about Mrs Fisher and the bean counter. Astrid Westover had suggested ‘the awful man from Muncaster’ threatened Ned because of the death of Mrs Fisher’s cockapoo.

The Queen had assumed Astrid was alluding to Matt Fisher, but now she wondered if the ‘awful man’ was Cassidy, and Astrid had been referring to the scuffle in the pub car park that Sir Simon had mentioned. It is quite an emotional involvement, to shoot a boar and then threaten a man because the animal has caused the death of your ex-employer’s wife’s pet dog. Then to hide a damaged car and get that same ex-employer’s wife to confirm when the accident happened. The Queen was starting to see Cassidy with new eyes.

The housekeeper had readily confirmed the Queen’s suspicions. According to the servants’ hall at Muncaster, the affair had started in the summer. Apparently it was in revenge for Mr Fisher’s relationship with his art adviser. The Queen reflected that one missed all the country gossip when one was in London. Although, of course, the city was a rumour-factory of its own.