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childhood. It was Daniel who was always there when I was growing up…teaching, explaining, joking, getting me into hot water. And—do you know?—I suspect the old thing’s still doing that!”
    â€œFrom beyond the grave?”
    â€œJust that!”
    She rummaged in her bag and took out a dog-eared postcard. “Have a look and tell me what I’m to make of this! Much delayed in the French postal system apparently, it was delivered while I was away in Egypt. Judging by the date, Esmé, this looks like my godfather’s very last message to me. Or to anyone. It appears to have been stamped the day after he was murdered. And that’s odd enough, but it’s by a long way not the oddest thing.”

CHAPTER 4
    E smé looked carefully at the photograph on the front and made no comment. She turned it over and studied the postmarks and then finally read the written message. Still silent, she looked doubtfully up at her friend.
    â€œTell me what you’re thinking,” Letty urged.
    â€œWell, Fontigny looks very pretty. Jolly good abbey, I’d say…The sender has dated it the second of October and the first of the postmarks bears the date of the day following. As you said. So far nothing remarkable.” She was keeping her voice deliberately neutral. “Um…just a couple of things…For a start, this card wasn’t sent to you and it wasn’t Daniel who sent it. I see it’s addressed to a Miss Tabitha T. c/o Mrs. M. Cartwright, thirty-five Albert Place, Cambridge. Don’t you think you should hand it back to one or other of these ladies?”
    â€œOf course it’s for me! Maggie Cartwright is my old governess. She lived with us at Melchester and taught me until I went to school and she retired. She used to call me Tabitha after the nursery rhyme…you know…
    â€œTabitha Twitchit is grown so fine
    She lies in bed until half past nine…
    â€œOn account of a period of slothful late-rising I experienced in my youth.”
    Esmé nodded, comprehending instantly. She glanced back down at the card. “Now I begin to understand the game. So—thanks to the insight and kind offices of your governess, this made its way on to Miss Twitchit.” Her mouth tightened with the effort to suppress laughter. “Using my deductive powers and my sketchy knowledge of the works of Beatrix Potter, I will guess that the signature at the end:—
your loving Jeremy F.—
”
    â€œFisher,” muttered Letty, ill at ease. “He was fond of fishing in the meadow by the river. Maggie Cartwright invented that one, too.” She glowered. “Well—what do you expect, Esmé? If someone’s checking his mail, he’s hardly likely to sign it
Lt.-Col. Daniel Thorndon, D.S.O.,
is he? Clearly, Daniel was trying to avoid interception by someone who was aware of
my
name and address—and
his.
”
    Esmé stared in disbelief for a moment, then continued her commentary in a deliberately bracing tone: “Well…No bloodstains on the postcard, I see. So you couldn’t say it had been snatched from his lifeless hand and put in the box by a tidy-minded killer? No…but I suppose you could say it looks rather battered?”
    â€œIt was retained by the police for a while. Daniel’s body was found near a postbox in the middle of the night. No reason for him to be walking the streets of Fontigny at that hour…the assumption was that he’d not been able to sleep and had spent a wakeful night writing up notes and had dashed off this postcard, which he popped into the post during his walk. They sealed the box and checked the contents. This must have been retained as evidence, inspected, and then sent on with all the rest of the mail the box contained some weeks later.”
    â€œSo it was waiting for you when you got back from Egypt?”
    Letty nodded. “That terrible time last year. I’d been sent