Part Two - containing the solution to the whodunnit.
That evening Bainton Gray sat in his chair in front of the fire, thinking hard. This case was his most difficult. So many names kept running through his mind.... Gabriel... Ruth... Frances. Then there was Theodosia Francis..... and the chemist's clerk, Francis Lawrence.... Bainton jolted upright in the chair.
He'd thought of something.....
Of course! Why didn't he see it before?
All he needed to do was to make some enquiries. He sent a note to Sergeant Wright. It wasn't long before they were both heading to the church to check the parish records.
Bainton began to explain to the sergeant what he’d discovered. After Theodosia Crux had married Doctor Francis, the couple had had a son, Lawrence Francis.
The real name of the chemist's clerk, Francis Lawrence, was in fact
Lawrence Francis.
This meant that Lawrence Francis was Alice Smith’s half brother. But what significance would this have on the case? He wouldn’t inherit anything from her; she’d made no will.
But it did lead to intriguing possibilities over the Thorpe family.
Lawrence Francis had been courting Miss Thorpe. She was due to inherit property and money, after her father's death. But Gabriel Thorpe was now in jail and would probably hang for the murder of Alice Smith.
Two other people were also named in Gabriel Thorpe's will - Alice Smith and Ruth Thorpe.
Poor Alice was now dead - poisoned.
Ruth Thorpe was still alive. What if someone wanted
her dead as well?
Could someone be poisoning her?
Bainton had looked into the symptoms of arsenic poisoning. Apparently it could cause sleepiness, sickness, headaches and confusion. Ruth showed all of those symptoms. So
who would have knowledge of such poisons? Which of his suspects would know how to slowly poison someone?
Well, the son of a doctor might. Lawrence Francis also worked at a chemists and had access to arsenic.
But how was Bainton going to prove that he was the poisoner?
It was Sunday. The Thorpe family always went to church on Sundays.
The trap was laid that afternoon. The Thorpes left for church, as always. They didn't know why Sergeant Wright wanted to stay behind in their house.
But they'd had to agree to it, because they couldn’t really refuse.
Sergeant Wright hid in the kitchen larder cupboard, leaving the door slightly ajar. There was just a small crack so that he could peer out. He waited tensely….
Then he heard a noise at the back door. A tall figure crept in. He stood with his back to Wright and slowly took down the jar of sugar dusted sweets. He unscrewed the lid. The suspense was unbearable.....
But what he did took Wright’s breath away.
The suspect didn’t tamper with the sweets in any way. He wrapped about three of them in some paper and put them in his pocket. Wright watched him leave, bewildered. What was happening here?
He told Bainton, who was shocked and surprised. The sweets were clearly not going to be eaten. The police had already had the sweets analysed by an expert in poisons. The sugar dusting on them was found to be powdered arsenic. So why was the killer
removing the poisoned sweets?
There was only one thing left to do - question Lawrence Francis.
Lawrence Francis was calm as he was questioned. He explained all that he knew.
He admitted that he'd been courting Frances Thorpe, without her father’s knowledge.
But his mother, Theodosia, had found out. She'd told him that he mustn’t see Frances anymore. When pressed as to her reasons why, she'd confessed to him that the girl he loved was really his half sister. His mother said it wasn’t right somehow, it seemed incestuous.
His mother had been so upset and angry with him. Lawrence was told to end the relationship.
The next day he'd gone to see Frances Thorpe. He'd told her that he could no longer be her sweetheart. Frances had been very tearful when he'd told her. She'd wanted to know why.
Of course, he'd tried to avoid telling her - but she was wilful and insistent. He didn't like seeing her upset. He'd been in turmoil as to what to do, as he didn't want to end the relationship.
In the end, he'd confided to Frances that she had a sister. She'd wanted to know all about her. Frances had said that she was just curious.
Was Alice like her? What were her favourite flowers? Her favourite sweets? Did she like reading books? It had all seemed like innocent enough questions. But he didn’t know the answers, he'd never met Alice. So he'd asked his mother.
Theodosia knew a little about Alice; she'd had occasional contact with the Smith relatives over the years, more so since her husband's death. So she was able to tell him the answers to Frances' questions:
Alice's favourite flowers were poppies. Her favourite sweets were peppermint humbugs. No, she didn't have a favourite book. To be honest she couldn’t read or write very well.
Lawrence had told Frances these little bits of information about Alice that he'd gleaned from his mother.
But Theodosia had found out that he was still meeting Frances. She'd been adamant that he must refrain from any further contact with the Thorpe family. Reluctantly, Lawrence had stopped seeing Frances for a while, although he was heartbroken.
But not long after, Theodosia had died rather unexpectedly…
Lawrence continued telling Bainton what he knew. He described how he'd resumed seeing Frances after his mother's death.
But then he'd learned that France's mother, Ruth Thorpe, was unwell. Lawrence had been puzzled over Frances’s lack of sympathy towards her mother. Her father was now in prison accused of murder. Even though he was protesting his innocence, he would probably be hung. But he'd observed that Frances didn't seem to be exhibiting any signs of loss or grief for her father either. She didn't even talk of him. Mostly she just talked about material things - like money and possessions. He'd become quite suspicious about Frances' apparent lack of concern.
Lawrence Francis was a doctor's son. Like his father, he took an interest in medicine and illnesses. He'd decided to look into Ruth Thorpe's symptoms, to see if there was a cause or cure. But he hadn't been able to find out what was causing her to feel so ill.
One day, Frances had visited him when he was alone at the chemist's. She'd asked him for something and he'd gone to the back room of the shop to fetch it.
Some day’s later, he'd noticed that poisons had gone missing from the shop. He couldn’t really bring himself to believe that Frances had taken them. He didn't like to confront her about it so he'd decided to do some sleuthing. But when Bainton had asked him his surname, he'd got nervous about his real identity being found out. So he'd said that his surname was Lawrence.
Bainton sat listening to Lawrence. He looked across at Sergeant Wright. The sergeant looked back at him. He knew that they were both thinking the same thing....
The Thorpe house was searched thoroughly. In Frances Thorpe's room the police found arsenic hidden away inside a hatbox.
Frances was arrested and questioned. At the police station she proved to be utterly remorseless and cold hearted.
A while later, Sergeant Wright and Bainton strolled back from the police house. The Sergeant looked thoughtful for a while, before he turned to Bainton:
"You were wrong about Lawrence Francis”, he ventured.
Bainton nodded, quite happily.
“It’s a good thing! I wouldn’t like to become a man who thinks himself clever. By always being right, I‘d only develop a high opinion of myself.”
Wright read the note that Bainton had sent him again, then added that
he had been right about Frances. Bainton, too, had been struck by her lack of empathy.
Bainton had also been suspicious about the note that had supposedly been written by Alice. He now realised that it had been conveniently placed so that it would be found by Penelope. He didn’t think that Mrs. Thorpe could have written it, as her hands shook.
There was another thing that had puzzled him. If Mrs. Thorpe's food
was being poisoned by Lawrence Francis, how could Lawrence be sure that Frances wouldn't eat it?
He thought of the sugar coated peppermints. On the outside they looked so sweet and tempting. But really they were dusted with pure poison.
The angelic looking Frances Thorpe was also like that....
Gabriel Thorpe had been released at last.
He was saddened by the loss of not only Alice, but now Frances, who was awaiting trial.
But his wife Ruth had been happy to be with him again. Her sourness had stemmed from jealously over what she had mistakenly believed was his love for Alice.
Her sickness had made her a bitter woman. But now she was feeling better, as she no longer had to endure the effects of the poison.
She could be happier now and comfort her grieving husband.
Back at the police station, Sgt. Wright and Bainton had finished discussing the case.
“Now then", said the sergeant, "you know I wouldn't let you go to all this trouble for nothing. It's only right that you should be rewarded. So I was thinking of a little something in return for your help.”
Bainton noticed the jar of Thorpe's Sarsaparilla Drops on the cupboard behind Sgt. Wright's desk. He eyed them with suspicion.
He looked at the sergeant with mild amusement. Was this some sort of joke?
"Any sweets are simply out of the question", he replied.
"Oh no, I didn't mean those!" said the sergeant hastily, seeing Bainton's look of indignation. "Those are from Thorpe's shop. We were testing some of the other sweets for arsenic as well. One of the staff must have left them there."
"Well, in that case", said Bainton, somewhat relieved, "I wouldn’t say no to a drink at The Crown and Oak!"
The End
Notes by the Author: 
