Excerpt from the book called The Frisby Waterless Murders
“Anyway, thank you for your help Bridie, I am sure I will see you later.”
Knowles and Gerald Kennedy walked back to their seats.
“Anyway, you were talking about the smoke and the fact it only really affected the people in Seats 15 through 25.”
“Well there was smoke in the whole carriage for about a minute, but it seemed to linger for longer around those seats, probably because the windows were open there.”
“And what happened in terms of people moving around?”
“Most people headed for the doors at the ends of the carriage I think, so they could get some fresh air; I don’t really know because I was at the kitchen car end and was trying to find how the smoke had entered the carriage.”
“There would have been a lot of moving around, but perhaps the Major would have been hampered by his left leg and stayed put?”
“Perhaps, I am sure he was in his seat when I went to close the window near him.”
“Right, but in the melee it would have been perfectly possible for someone to stab him with a small dart containing a poison and then remove the dart again.”
“It is possible as I am not sure anyone could account for their whereabouts all the time as people were reacting to the situation and not acting rationally.”
“Oh, I think one person was acting rationally if they stabbed the Major during the smoke infestation. The train was stationary during the whole time?”
“It only started to move when the smoke was cleared almost completely.”
Knowles wrote something down in his notebook and then spoke “Who found out that the Major was dead?”
“His wife did, Mrs Samantha Harkness, she tried to rouse him once all the smoke had cleared away and everyone had calmed down. It was almost tragi-comic as she slapped him a couple of times and then screamed ‘There’s been a murder’. At almost the exact same time Madge Williams slumped forward and Doris Williams screamed out too before turning around to Samantha Harkness and saying something to the effect ‘What are you doing – that is supposed to be my line?’ I think Harold Trimble shouted out “So we get two murders to investigate that’s value for money.” I asked Mrs Harkness what she was doing and she told me that her husband was dead, really dead, and hadn’t died temporarily for the entertainment of everyone else aboard. I checked his pulse, phoned the police, and told Madge Williams to stop playing dead as we had a real death for the police to investigate.”
“Mrs Harkness sounds a very cool customer.”
Julian Worker Fiction Writing 