Sir Richard ladled the steaming brew into two glasses, and gave one to the magistrate. “Draw up a chair to the fire, Mr Philips. It is, as you say, a very bad business. I should tell you that I am intimately acquainted with the family of the deceased.”
Mr Philips fished Sir Richard’s note out of his pocket. “Yes, yes, just as I supposed, sir. I do not know how you would otherwise have furnished me with the poor man’s name. You know him, in fact. Precisely! He was travelling in your company, perhaps?”
“No,” said Sir Richard, taking a chair on the opposite side of the fireplace. “He was staying with a friend who lives in the neighbourhood. The name was, I think, Luttrell.”
“Indeed! This becomes more and more—But pray continue, sir! You were not, then, together?”
“No, nothing of the sort. I came into the west country in family affairs. I need not burden you with them, I think.”
“Quite, quite! Family affairs: yes! Go on, sir! How came you to discover Mr Brandon’s body?”
“Oh, by accident! But it will be better, perhaps, if I recount my share in this affair from its start.”
“Certainly! Yes! Pray do so, sir! This is a remarkably good bowl of punch, I may say.”
“I am generally thought to have something of a knack with a punch bowl,” bowed Sir Richard. “To go back, then, to the start! You have no doubt heard, Mr Philips, of the Brandon diamonds?”
From the startled expression in the magistrate’s eyes, and the slight dropping of his jaw, it was apparent that he had not. He said: “Diamonds? Really, I fear—No, I must confess that I had not heard of the Brandon diamonds.”