Gibbous House 68

We went passing swift on foot to the pond. Allen kept up a rattling farrago of questions which Maccabi wisely ignored, whilst I brought up the rear behind my supposed betters. If the policeman was peevish at this apparent usurpation of his role, he hid it well behind his silence. The angle of the late shepherd's neck was still convincing enough to my eye to be the cause of death. The silent policeman bent down to examine the body somewhat closely. The greater part of it was not under water, perhaps the half of one leg and the other below the knee only were submerged. The as yet un-named constable lifted each leg carefully out of the water and uttered but one word:

'Broken.' He said.

Cullis deceased's tumble down the hillside had been a precipitous one, true, but I was mildly surprised at this intelligence. I stood a little closer the better to hear any more gobbets of wisdom that might fall from the policeman's lips. The man ran his hands the length of the body, felt the neck with it's improbable angle and discovered – I assumed from the wordless grunt he gave when he felt the cranium – the site of the blow I had dealt the shepherd.

Allen had followed this with feverish attention, all the while scribbling in his damned notebook. I was half-expecting - no gleefully anticipating – the next terse utterance from the policeman's mouth, which was, of course,

'Murder.'

Maccabi was completely and utterly unmoved. Allen grew still more excitable, forgetting himself so far as to address what he believed to be a servant and asked me:

'Know him, did you? Like him? Likeable fellow, was he?'

'I did not sir, I am recently arrived myself.'

If the scribbler had noticed that my own diction was somewhat more refined and less brusque than his own, he gave no sign of it, merely turning his fervid eye on Maccabi and sending a further salvo of questions in his direction. Maccabi caught my eye with a questioning look, and I gave him a nod. The man was no dullard, I had to allow him that, and he began the introductions forthwith; again, for a reporter, Allen proved remarkably unobservant - or the scribbling was a proof of a prodigiously unreliable memory. It appeared he had not noticed my sudden promotion to master of Gibbous House. It worried me more that the policeman did not care to make anything of my brief masquerade as a humble servant of the house. In light of my recently revealed status, I enquired:

'So, Constable Turner, may the cadaver be despatched to the undertakers'? I fear his brother is determined to achieve a rapid burial.'

Turner merely uttered 'Brother?' in the most quizzical manner and I suggested we all repair to the house to discuss what should next be done. The policeman strode purposefully off toward the house entrance, thwarting my intention to herd the both of them in via the servants' entrance. The reporter, perhaps affronted by being for the most part ignored whatever he said, took to reading aloud excerpts from his notebook. It seemed his note-taking was not of the highest quality as, amongst other things, I was surprised to learn that I had in my employ one Zebediah Macindoe and that a shepherd named Portcullis was recently found mothered in a pound.