Chapter Four
After she had finished preparing the leeks and Squire Meyer had left the kitchen, Hermione felt the call of nature and hurried to the bathroom to answer it. She walked through the dining room, where Cutler was standing with his hand resting on his jacket pocket and a resolute expression resting on his face.
When she had passed through the dining room, Cutler stole into the kitchen and spied the leeks he despised so much on the counter, ready to be served. Looking around him to make sure he was alone, Cutler emptied the tureen of leeks (sugared, on toast) into a Tupperware bowl and carried it out the door and along the path leading to the garden and the stables. Outside the kitchen, he saw Wallaby Willoughby reading a book and Cheltham Chutney falling off his head. Would he never learn to balance properly? The oaf! And that Wallaby was a sissy. Cutler didn't like either one of those boys. And why should he? After all, he wasn't their father or anything.
When Cutler entered the stables, Squire Meyer, who had been pacing nervously, quickly faced him, raising a large butcher knife. He lowered it when he saw who had entered.
"Is Lord Chutney on his way here?" he asked Cutler.
"Not that I know of," replied the butler.
"Oh, well, then, I'll just go look for him, shall I?" said the squire absently as he left the stables in search of his master.
Alone in the stables with only Love-in-Disguise and the Tupperware bowl of leeks (sugared, on toast), Cutler approached the horse, holding the bowl out in front of him.
"Here's dinner, Love-in-Disguise," he cooed, presenting the bowl to the mare. A maniacal joy overtook him as he watched the horse devour the leeks (sugared, on toast) that he had grown to despise. After the bowl was licked clean, he went out to the garden to trample all the leeks growing there. Never again would he have to eat leeks (sugared, on toast) instead of his one pride and joy, his masterpiece, floop!
High on the pleasure he got from destroying the offending vegetables and the knowledge that his despicable master would soon be up in flames, he was startled to hear a scream coming from the house. He ran back to the house, entering through the kitchen door and found Hermione and Lady Chutney standing over lifeless body of Lord Marston Chutney.
"How did this happen?" he shrieked. "Who saw him last?"
"I had just seen him in the hallway after I went to the facilities," said the maid, "and I told him that Squire Meyer wanted to see him in the stables. He must have been on his way there when... when..."
Squire Meyer now entered the scene, trying to conceal a very large butcher knife down his pants and having a very hard time of it. He looked just as puzzled as everybody else.
"Wh-wh-what?" he stuttered as he joined the others around the body, wincing as he tried to walk with a butcher knife stuck halfway down his pants. It was a valiant effort.
Everyone was speechless.
Finally, the two boys, Cheltham, rubbing his head from having spent another unsuccessful day trying to stand on it, and Wallaby, with his finger marking his place in his book, walked into the kitchen.
"Is Dad all right?" Cheltham asked when he saw his father on the floor.
"No, you dip-stick, he's dead," said his cousin, who was smart enough to see that. "So, which one of you got him?" he asked, turning to the rest of the household- Squire Meyer with his clean and not-at-all bloodstained butcher knife, which he had finally taken out of his pants, to the relief of everyone in the room; Cutler, with his still complete and not-at-all singed book of matches; Hermione, with her empty bottle of rat poison; and Lady Chutney, who was kicking herself for not having procured a murder weapon like all the others had.
"He must have eaten the leeks, (poisoned, on toast)," said Hermione, seeing that the tureen was empty.
"No, he didn't," said Cutler, "because I took the leeks, and- did you say 'poisoned'?!"
Hermione nodded, and Cutler rushed out the door and toward the stables. Everyone else followed, except Lord Chutney, of course, because he was dead.
And so was Love-in-Disguise, as it turned out. Did you know that rat poison can kill a horse?