‘What the devil-’ began Hardcastle.

The singer or crooner appeared to be approaching the front door and words began to be discernible.

‘No, sweet-sweetie. In there, my love. Mindems tailems Shah-Shah-Mimi. Cleo-Cleopatra. Ah de doodlums. Ah lou-lou.’

Doors were heard to shut. Finally the front door opened. Facing them was a lady in a pale moss-green, rather rubbed, velvet tea gown. Her hair, in flaxen grey wisps, was twirled elaborately in a kind of coiffure of some thirty years back. Round her neck she was wearing a necklet of orange fur. Inspector Hardcastle said dubiously:

‘Mrs Hemming?’

‘I am Mrs Hemming. Gently, Sunbeam, gently doodleums.’

It was then that the inspector perceived that the orange fur was really a cat. It was not the only cat. Three other cats appeared along the hall, two of them miaowing. They took up their place, gazing at the visitors, twirling gently round their mistress’s skirts. At the same time a pervading smell of cat afflicted the nostrils of both men.

‘I am Detective Inspector Hardcastle.’

‘I hope you’ve come about that dreadful man who came to see me from the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals,’ said Mrs Hemming. ‘Disgraceful! I wrote and reported him. Saying my cats were kept in a condition prejudicial to their health and happiness! Quite disgraceful! Ilive for my cats, Inspector. They are my only joy and pleasure in life. Everything is done for them. Shah-Shah-Mimi. Notthere, sweetie.’

Shah-Shah-Mimi paid no attention to a restraining hand and jumped on the hall table. He sat down and washed his face, staring at the strangers.

‘Come in,’ said Mrs Hemming. ‘Oh no, not that room. I’d forgotten.’

She pushed open a door on the left. The atmosphere here was even more pungent.

‘Come on, my pretties, come on.’

In the room various brushes and combs with cat hairs in them lay about on chairs and tables. There were faded and soiled cushions, and there were at least six more cats. 

‘I live for my darlings,’ said Mrs Hemming. ‘They understand every word I say to them.’

Inspector Hardcastle walked in manfully. Unfortunately for him he was one of those men who have cat allergy. As usually happens on these occasions all the cats immediately made for him. One jumped on his knee, another rubbed affectionately against his trousers. Detective Inspector Hardcastle, who was a brave man, set his lips and endured.

‘I wonder if I could ask you a few questions, Mrs Hemming, about-’

‘Anything you please,’ said Mrs Hemming, interrupting him. ‘I have nothing to hide. I can show you the cats’ food, their beds where they sleep, five in my room, the other seven down here. They have only the very best fish cooked by myself.’

‘This is nothing to do withcats,’ said Hardcastle, raising his voice. ‘I came to talk to you about the unfortunate affair which happened next door. You have probably heard about it.’

‘Next door? You mean Mr Joshua’s dog?’

‘No,’ said Hardcastle, ‘I do not. I mean at Number 19 where a man was found murdered yesterday.’

‘Indeed?’ said Mrs Hemming, with polite interest but no more. Her eyes were still straying over her pets.

‘Were you at home yesterday afternoon, may I ask? That is to say between half past one and half past three?’

‘Oh yes, indeed. I usually do my shopping quite early in the day and then get back so that I can do the darlings’ lunch, and then comb and groom them.’

‘And you didn’t notice any activity next door? Police cars-ambulance-anything like that?’

‘Well, I’m afraid I didn’t look out of the front windows. I went out of the back of the house into the garden because dear Arabella was missing. She is quite a young cat and she had climbed up one of the trees and I was afraid she might not be able to get down. I tried to tempt her with a saucer of fish but she was frightened, poor little thing. I had to give up in the end and come back into the house. And would you believe it, just as I went through the door, down she came and followed me in.’ She looked from one man to the other as though testing their powers of belief.

‘Matter of fact, I would believe it,’ said Colin, unable to keep silence any more.

‘I beg your pardon?’ Mrs Hemming looked at him slightly startled.

‘I am much attached to cats,’ said Colin, ‘and I have therefore made a study of cat nature. What you have told me illustrates perfectly the pattern of cat behaviour and the rules they have made for themselves. In the same way your cats are all congregating round my friend who frankly does not care for cats, they will pay no attention to me in spite of all my blandishments.’

If it occurred to Mrs Hemming that Colin was hardly speaking in the proper role of sergeant of police, no trace of it appeared in her face. She merely murmured vaguely:

‘They always know, the dear things, don’t they?’

A handsome grey Persian put two paws on Inspector Hardcastle’s knees, looked at him in an ecstasy of pleasure and dug his claws in hard with a kneading action as though the inspector was a pincushion. Goaded beyond endurance, Inspector Hardcastle rose to his feet.

‘I wonder, madam,’ he said, ‘if I could see this back garden of yours.’

Colin grinned slightly.

‘Oh, of course, of course. Anything you please.’ Mrs Hemming rose.

The orange cat unwound itself from her neck. She replaced it in an absent-minded way with the grey Persian. She led the way out of the room. Hardcastle and Colin followed.

‘We’ve met before,’ said Colin to the orange cat and added, ‘Andyou’re a beauty, aren’t you,’ addressing another grey Persian who was sitting on a table by a Chinese lamp, swishing his tail slightly. Colin stroked him, tickled him behind the ears and the grey cat condescended to purr. 

‘Shut the door, please, as you come out, Mr-er-er,’ said Mrs Hemming from the hall. ‘There’s a sharp wind today and I don’t want my dears to get cold. Besides, there are those terrible boys-it’s really not safe to let the dear things wander about in the garden by themselves.’

She walked towards the back of the hall and opened a side door.

‘What terrible boys?’ asked Hardcastle.

‘Mrs Ramsay’s two boys. They live in the south part of the crescent. Our gardens more or less back on each other. Absolute young hooligans, that’s what they are. They have a catapult, you know, or they had. I insisted on its being confiscated but I have my suspicions. They make ambushes and hide. In the summer they throw apples.’

‘Disgraceful,’ said Colin.

The back garden was like the front only more so. It had some unkempt grass, some unpruned and crowded shrubs and a great many more laurels of the speckled variety, and some rather gloomy macrocarpas. In Colin’s opinion, both he and Hardcastle were wasting their time. There was a solid barrage of laurels, trees and shrubs through which nothing of Miss Pebmarsh’s garden could possibly be seen. Diana Lodge could be described as a fully detached house. From the point of view of its inhabitants, it might have had no neighbours. 

‘Number 19, did you say?’ said Mrs Hemming, pausing irresolutely in the middle of her back garden. ‘But I thought there was only one person living in the house, a blind woman.’

‘The murdered man was not an occupant of the house,’ said the inspector.

‘Oh, I see,’ said Mrs Hemming, still vaguely, ‘he came here to be murdered. How odd.’

‘Now that,’ said Colin thoughtfully to himself, ‘is a damned good description.’