The African Poison Murders by Elspeth Huxley Read Free Book Online Page B

spoke flatly; he could see that her mind was made up.
    “I’d like to know your husband’s normal routine, if you please, Mrs Munson. Starting from the time the houseboy called him in the morning.”
    She looked down at the coverings and said, as if she knew he was wasting his time: “Mr Munson got up early, of course — we work for our living on this farm, unlike some I could name. He was called about six, or a little before.”
    “With tea?”
    “Yes, with a cup of tea. Then he went out to the farm, generally to see to the milking first of all.
    Sometimes that was close at hand, at other times he would ride out on a pony to one of the movable bails, perhaps three or four miles away. Then he’d do the calf-feeding and enter up the milk records, and see the separating properly started. On days when they were dipping he would go out to one of the dips, or attend to whatever needed to be done.
    I can’t tell you exactly what he did every day. It depended on what was going on.”
    “How much time did he give the pyrethrum, usually?”
    She looked at him in surprise, and spoke with impatience. “Do you think these sort of questions help you to find out how Mr Munson died? He 52
    didn’t have a great deal to do with it. Edward Corcoran is supposed to be in charge of the crops, but you can’t stick to hard and fast rules. Sometimes Mr Munson looked over it to see that everything was all right. You’ve got to see to things yourself on a farm.”
    “And he’d come back to breakfast, I suppose?”
    “Between nine and ten.” She shot him an impatient look. “Why don’t you question some of the boys? I can’t tell you anything about it.”
    “I’ll get around to that, Mrs Munson. Did you see your husband this morning, before he went out?”
    She looked down at her feet, two hillocks under the dirty plaid rug. Her podgy face was quite expressionless. He wondered if she felt sorrow underneath, or anger, or a sort of amorphous indifference to life.
    “No”, she replied. “The boy brings my tea at the same time, but Mr Munson had gone out before I was up.”
    “Last night, when you saw him last, was he all right — his health normal, and nothing on his mind?”
    “He was in perfect health. And if you knew anything about farming, young man, you’d know there’s always something on a farmer’s mind.”
    “And you dined alone — you four — you had no visitors or guests?”
    For the first time she hesitated, and although her 53
    expression did not change he got the impression that the question had annoyed her.
    “We had a guest,” she said.
    “I’d like to have the name.”
    She raised her black eyes to his face, and this time he had no doubt of her anger.
    “Why don’t you do your duty? Do you think all these silly questions will do any good? Mr Munson’s body has been taken to his bedroom. I should have thought that even an official of the Chania police would have known enough to have an examination made. But you sit here and badger me with questions …” She closed her eyes and lay back on the cushions, her face a pasty grey.
    “I’d still like to know the name of your guest last night, Mrs Munson.”
    She moved impatiently on the settee. “A man called Wendtland came to dinner. A compatriot of Mr Munson’s, and an old friend. Now will you go and do your job? You’ve wasted enough time….”
    Vachell rose abruptly and said he wouldn’t bother her any more just now. She told him where to find her husband’s bedroom, at the other end of the building they were in. Her own bedroom was next door, opening out of the sitting-room where she was lying; then came a bathroom which they shared, and Munson’s room beyond that again. “There’s a doctor on the road,” Vachell told her from the doorway. “I’ll send him right in to you, Mrs Munson. He’ll be able to fix you up.”
    Her beady black eyes had followed him to the 54
    door.“I don’t need a doctor,” she snapped. “They’re a lot of