The boy looked frightened. Dot tried a gentle approach.
'I'm sure you're a good boy, Billy, and you like the chooks, don't you?' Billy nodded. 'And you remember Friday?'
'Man dead,' said Billy.
'That's right. Before the man was dead, did anyone come in here with a book?'
'No, but there was a lady.'
'You spend too much time looking at sheilas,' growled his boss, and Billy gaped again, losing whatever concentration he possessed.
'Tell me about the lady,' coaxed Dot.
'Lady with a chook on her hat,' said Billy importantly. 'Nice hat. It had a white chook on it. And shells.'
'Did she buy anything?'
'Two chooks,' said Billy.
'So she did. Why, does that mean something to you, Miss?' asked Mr Lane.
'It certainly does,' said Dot. 'I really want to find that lady. There can't be two hats like that in one market.'
'Well, if you really need to find her,' said Mr Lane slowly, 'I might be able to help.'
'How?' asked Dot.
'Well, she didn't want to carry two chooks and a dozen fresh eggs home in her hand, did she?'
'Do you deliver, Mr Lane?' asked Dot, reaching for her notebook.
'I do, Miss. But it doesn't seem right to give away a customer's address.'
Dot knew what was happening. Mr Lane was waiting for a bribe and Dot was momentarily at a loss. How do you bribe someone? Miss Fisher had not covered this in her briefing. She took out a ten shilling note and laid it on the counter. 'For your trouble,' she mumbled.
It was easier than she had thought. The note vanished with speed and Mr Lane seemed unaware that it had ever been there. He consulted his ledger.
'Delivery ... now where is it? Two chooks and a dozen ... yes. Here we are, Miss.' He jotted down the address and name on the corner of a piece of white wrapping paper. 'There you are, Miss. Good luck. Miss Lee's a real nice lady.'
Dot left the shop, vowing never to buy any of his produce. If he thought Miss Lee was a real nice lady, why did he need a financial inducement to give Dot the address? His chickens probably were poisoned, thought Dot, and went into the bird dealer's shop. So far, she was doing very well.
The air was full of twittering. Cages lined three of the walls. A profusion of rainbow-coloured finches, canaries and budgies occupied the smaller cages. Dot was bending to look into an elaborate wrought-iron construction when a gruff voice remarked, 'Pretty girl.'
Dot jumped. There did not seem to be anyone else in the small room. She looked around.
'Pretty girl,' said the voice again.
Dot heard a discordant whistle and then the jingle of a chain.
'Polly wants,' said the speaker, shuffling into sight.
It was the biggest white cockatoo that Dot had ever seen, sulphur-crested, with a beak which looked capable of opening tins. It was secured by one leg to a fine chain fixed to the perch, which allowed it considerable freedom of movement. It eyed Dot with its ancient cynical gaze and said again, 'Polly wants ...'
'Polly wants?' asked Dot. 'What does Polly want?'
'That's the trouble with that bird. He can't make up his mind,' observed another disembodied voice.
Dot began to feel that it was going to be a very strange afternoon.
From under the counter a small man arose. He was dressed in what had been a respectable blue suit, but he was liberally scattered with bird seed and he had hay in his thick fair hair.
'Sorry, I was just sweeping up some feed,' he said. 'What can I do for you, Miss? A nice budgie? Pair of lovebirds? How about a canary, I've got some fine singers.'
Dot explained her errand. Mr Gunn scratched his head, looking oddly reminiscent of the cockatoo. His fair hair spread like a crest, shedding bird seed.
'I didn't notice anyone carrying a book, not on Friday I remember the day because the police came and took statements from all of us. I was upset because that b... man Lane had poisoned some of my birds.'
'How do you know?' asked Dot, practically.
Mr Gunn blushed. 'It was the end of the week, and I was out of sunflower seeds, see, and he has an open sack of them, so I borrowed a couple of handfuls—I would have put them back at the end of the next week when I get my delivery It was for the one cage of zebra finches. They're seed eaters, Miss. I saw Lane throw a handful to a couple of penned chickens. Then, in the morning, I found my finches dead, and I saw his boy plucking a pair of chickens. They hadn't been killed in the usual way. Their necks weren't broken. He was selling poisoned chickens to the public, and I'll keep telling people that. It's not right.'
'What was wrong with the sunflower seeds? Did you ask him?'
'Well, no, I couldn't, could I? But those finches were healthy the night before and dead the next day and so were his chickens. I'm partial to a sunflower seed or two myself,' said Mr Gunn, looking more avian by the moment. 'Bl... very lucky I didn't eat any myself. Some ant poison or something must have got into the feed.'
Dot debated whether to tell him that Mr Lane was thinking of suing him for libel, or slander, but decided that it was not her argument and took her leave politely of both Mr Gunn and the parrot.
'Polly wants ...' it temporized as she shut the door.
'Make up your bloody mind,' said Mr Gunn, irritated.
By the time Dot reached Mrs Johnson's teashop she was ready for a nice cuppa and a sit down. She had drawn blanks in all the other businesses on this side of the market. Fred Marryat had shouted over the thud of his press that he hadn't seen anyone with a book and had offered her a special deal on personal cards, no rubbish, printed in the most elegant type and in the best style. Dot knew that visiting cards have to be engraved, not printed, and refused politely. Anthony Martin the chiropodist noticed only feet, though he was an encyclopedia of information on his special subject.
'People all walk differently,' he told Dot, who had sat down in his chair. His shop was hung with photographs of feet and posters which enjoined the reader to wear properly fitted shoes. An articulated skeletal foot occupied the counter. 'That's why second-hand shoes are always likely to pinch. You wear your shoe into the shape of your foot. Now you,' he looked at Dot's stockinged feet, 'you walk like you're in a hurry, lots to do, must get on. You wear your shoes on the ball of the foot. Nice straight wear though, not pigeon-toed or crooked. No bunions. Last you a lifetime, those feet. Got a good grip on the earth.'
Dot was pleased and bought a tin of foot powder, guaranteed to soothe and refresh.
Mrs Johnson was blonde, pretty and slightly harried.
'I'll do my best to help,' she declared. 'Imagine, arresting Miss Lee for murdering someone, it's absurd. All the traders think so. Mr Johnson nearly got himself arrested, calling the police a gang of Bolsheviks. Of course, he is hot tempered,' Mrs Johnson said admiringly. 'He wasn't a bit scared. Told them right to their faces that Miss Lee couldn't do a thing like that. And I told them too. But they arrested her anyway. Is there anything she needs, Miss Williams? And is she all right?'
'She's got books and comforts and things like that,' said Dot. 'She's brave. She's bearing up. But I'll tell her that you were asking after her, that'll cheer her up. Now, I'm trying to find the customers for that morning. Did you notice anyone?'
'Oh, dear, well, I saw a woman in the most absurd hat. And I think Mr Doherty's young men came in for a cup of coffee, they had a book. Something about horse-racing, I think it was.'
Dot took out her notebook. 'Who's Mr Doherty?' she asked.