“Could you remember the date, do you think?”

“Not within a day or so I couldn’t, for I wouldn’t wish to swear to a fib, but it wasn’t far off the longest day, for I remember making that same remark to the gentleman for something to say, you know.”

“That’s near enough,” said Parker. “Round about June 20th, or 21st, or something like that?”

“That’s right, as near as I can speak to it. And as to the time of night, that I can tell you – knowing how keen you ’tecs always are on the hands of the clock.” Mrs. Bulfinch giggled again and looked archly round for applause. “There was a gentleman sitting there – I didn’t know him, he was a stranger to the district – and he asked what was our closing hour and I told him 11 o’clock, and he said, ‘Thank God! I thought I was going to be turned out at 10.30,’ and I looked at the clock and said, ‘Oh, you’re all right, anyhow, sir; we always keep that clock a quarter of an hour fast.’ The clock said twenty past, so I know it must have been five past ten really. So we got talking a bit about these prohibitionists and the way they had been trying it on again to get our licensing-hour altered to half-past ten, only we had a good friend on the Bench in Mr. Judkins, and while we was discussing it, I remember so well, the door was pushed open hurried-like and a young gentleman comes in, almost falls in, I might say, and he calls, ‘Give me a double brandy, quick.’ Well, I didn’t like to serve him all at once, he looked so white and queer, I thought he’d had one or two over the eight already, and the boss was most particular about that sort of thing. Still, he spoke all right – quite clear and not repeating himself nor nothing, and his eyes, though they did look a bit funny, weren’t fixed-like, if you understand me. We get to size folks up pretty well in our business, you know. He sort of held on to the bar, all scrunched up together and bent double, and he says, ‘Make it a stiff one, there’s a good girl, I’m feeling awful bad.’ The gentleman I’d been talking to, he says to him, ‘Hold up,’ he says, ‘what’s the matter?’ and the gentleman says, ‘I’m going to be ill.’ And he puts his hands across his waistcoat like so!”

Mrs. Bulfinch clasped her waist and rolled her big blue eyes dramatically.

“Well, then I see he wasn’t drunk, so I mixed him a double Martell with just a splash of soda and he gulps it down, and says, ‘That’s better.’ And the other gentleman puts his arm round him and helps him to a seat. There was a good many other people in the bar, but they didn’t notice much, being full of the racing news. Presently the gentleman asks me for a glass of water, and I fetched it to him, and he says: ‘Sorry if I frightened you, but I’ve just had a bad shock, and it must have gone to my inside. I’m subject to gastric trouble,’ he says, ‘and any worry or shock always affects my stomach. However,’ he says, ‘perhaps this will stop it.’ And he takes out a white paper packet with some powder in it, and drops it into the glass of water and stirs it up with a fountain-pen and drinks it off.”

“Did it fizz or anything?” asked Wimsey.

“No; it was just a plain powder, and it took a bit of a time to mix. He drank it off and said, ‘That settles it,’ or ‘That’ll settle it,’ or something of that sort. And then he says, ‘Thanks very much. I’m better now and I’d better get home in case it takes me again.’ And he raised his hat – he was quite the gentleman – and off he goes.”

‘How much powder do you think he put in?”

“Oh, a good dollop. He didn’t measure it or anything, just shot it in out of the packet. Near a dessert spoonful it might have been.”

“And what happened to the packet?” prompted Parker.

“Ah, there you are.” Mrs. Bulfinch took a glance at Wimsey’s face and seemed pleased with the effect she was producing.

“We’d just got the last customer out – about five past eleven, that would be, and George was locking the door, when I see something white on the seat. Somebody’s handkerchief I thought it was, but when I picked it up, I see it was the paper packet. So I said to George, ‘Hullo! the gentleman’s left his medicine behind him.’ So George asked what gentleman, and I told him, and he said, ‘What is it?’ and I looked, but the label had been torn off. It was just one of them chemist’s packets, you know, with the ends turned up and the label stuck across, but there wasn’t a bit of the label left.”

“You couldn’t even see whether it had been printed in black or in red?”

“Well, now.” Mrs. Bulfinch considered. “Well, no, I couldn’t say that. Now you mention it, I do seem to recollect that there was something red about the packet, somewhere, but I can’t clearly call it to mind. I wouldn’t swear. I know there wasn’t any name or printing of any kind, because I looked to see what it was.”

“You didn’t try tasting it, I suppose?”

“Not me. It might have been poison or something. I tell you, he was a funny looking customer.” Parker and Wimsey exchanged glances.

“Was that what you thought at the time?” enquired Wimsey, “or did it only occur to you later on – after you’d read about the case, you know?”

“I thought it at the time, of course,” retorted Mrs. Bulfinch, snappishly. “Aren’t I telling you that’s why I didn’t taste it? I said so to George at the time, what’s more. Besides, if it wasn’t poison, it might be ‘snow’ or something. ‘Best not touch it,’ that’s what I said to George, and he said ‘Chuck it in the fire.’ But I wouldn’t have that. The gentleman might have come back for it. So I stuck it up on the shelf behind the bar, where they keep the spirits, and never thought of it again from that day to yesterday, when your policeman came round about it.”

“It’s been looked for there,” said Parker, “but they can’t seem to find it anywhere.”

“Well, I don’t know about that. I put it there and I left the Rings in August, so what’s gone with it I can’t say. Daresay they threw it away when they were cleaning. Wait a bit, though – I’m wrong when I say I never thought about it again. I did just wonder about it when I read the report of the trial in the News of the World, and I said to George, ‘I wouldn’t be surprised if that was the gentleman who came into the Rings one night and seemed so poorly – just fancy!’ I said – just like that. And George said, ‘Now don’t you get fancies, Gracie my girl; you don’t want to get mixed up in a police case.’ George has always held his head high, you see.”

“It’s a pity you didn’t come forward with this story,” said Parker, severely.

“Well, how was I to know it was important? The taxi-driver had seen him a few minutes afterwards and he was ill then, so the powder couldn’t have had anything to do with it, if it was him, which I couldn’t swear to. And anyhow, I didn’t see about it till the trial was all over and finished with.”

“There will be a new trial, though,” said Parker, “and you may have to give evidence at that.”

“You know where to find me,” said Mrs. Bulfinch, with spirit. “I shan’t run away.”

“We’re very much obliged to you for coming now,” added Wimsey, pleasantly.

“Don’t mention it,” said the lady. “Is that all you want, Mr. Chief-Inspector?”

“That’s all at present. If we find the packet, we may ask you to identify it. And, by the way, it’s advisable not to discuss these matters with your friends, Mrs. Bulfinch. Sometimes ladies get talking, and one thing leads to another, and in the end they remember incidents that never took place at all. You understand.”

“I never was one for talking,” said Mrs. Bulfinch, offended. “And it’s my opinion, when it comes to putting two and-two together to make five of ’em, the ladies aren’t in it with the gentlemen.”

“I may pass this on to the solicitors for the defence, I suppose?” said Wimsey, when the witness had departed.

“Of course,” said Parker, “that’s why I asked you to come and hear it – for what it’s worth. Meanwhile, we shall of course have a good hunt for the packet.”