Written in Blood

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Afterwards, talking to the police, no one could quite agree as to who had put forward Max Jennings’ name. One or two people thought it was Amy Lyddiard, who was sure it was her friend Sue Clapton. Sue disagreed, suggesting Rex St John, who said it certainly couldn’t have been him because he had never heard of the man let alone read his books. Laura Hutton admitted she might have been responsible, having recently come across an article in Harpers describing the author’s recent move to a village barely twenty miles away. Brian Clapton said whoever it was had inflicted on him the most boring evening he had ever spent in his entire life. But what Amy and Sue both agreed on was that poor Gerald’s reaction to the suggestion had been most dramatic.

No sooner were the words ‘Max Jennings’ uttered than, according to Amy who wrote block-buster fiction, he had apparently jumped, blanched, trembled, been taken aghast, stared wildly round or winced as if from some mysterious blow. And then he had dropped his coffee cup. There was immediately much fuss over the stained trousers and what with that and scraping the sugary residue off the carpet it was some ten minutes before the group reassembled. Sue made some fresh coffee using the special chocolate-truffle variety that Gerald had left ready and which Brian said he couldn’t tell from cocoa.

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