The Markyate Custard Inspector

I was halfway through cleaning a ground-floor window in Markyate when a purple sock appeared on the other side of the glass and demanded to inspect my custard.

At least, that was what I understood through the window. Its woolly moustache wobbled with considerable authority.

“I’m afraid I’ve only brought water,” I said.

The sock slowly sank out of sight, looking deeply disappointed despite having two buttons for eyes.

Mrs Fenella Pook opened the front door. “You’ve met the inspector, then.”

“I hope I haven’t failed anything.”

“Not yet. He usually gives people a chance to fetch a pudding.”

I’d arrived at the little courtyard of cottages under a sky the colour of wet paving. There were daffodils nodding beside the gates and a determined breeze trying to turn my jacket collar inside out. Inside Mrs Pook’s house, preparations were apparently under way for something much grander than window cleaning.

A cardboard theatre stood on her dining table. Red tea towels formed its curtains, and a handwritten programme announced The Missing Custard, performed by her grandson, Ivo.

“He’s been working on it all week,” she told me quietly. “Three neighbours are coming at eleven. Nothing enormous. He asked them himself.”

From beneath the table came a small voice.

“The performance has been cancelled.”

Mrs Pook glanced at the clock.

“Permanently,” the voice added.

I carried on with the windows while she went to investigate. Through the glass, I could see a wooden spoon wearing a paper bonnet, a shoebox labelled POLICE STATION and one small trainer sticking out beneath the tablecloth.

Then the first neighbour arrived carrying a tin of biscuits.

The trainer vanished.

Mrs Pook came back to the door, holding the programme rather carefully. “He was perfectly happy until we put the chairs out. Now he says he can’t remember a word.”

I looked past her. Three dining chairs faced the little theatre in a very straight row. To an adult, it was a cosy gathering. From somewhere beneath that table, I imagined it looked rather different.

But the custard inspector had spoken to me without any trouble at all.

“Would he mind checking my work?” I asked. “That bottom pane could do with an official inspection.”

Mrs Pook disappeared inside. A moment later, the purple sock rose above the windowsill.

I bent down to its level.

“Any custard?” it asked through the glass.

“Still none. It’s becoming quite worrying.”

A small giggle escaped from below the sill.

Mrs Pook opened the window a little, and the inspector began explaining that all the custard in the kingdom had disappeared. I rested my cloth on the bucket and listened.

Behind him, Mrs Pook quietly moved the chairs away from their stern little row. Her visitors settled on the sofa with their tea.

A spoon in a bonnet appeared. It denied everything. Then a striped sock admitted to borrowing the custard to give its goldfish a bath.

“That seems difficult to clean up,” I said.

“It was a very small goldfish,” came the reply.

By then, the laughter inside was louder than mine. Ivo peeped above the sill, checked the room behind him, and stayed where he was.

The mystery ended with the goldfish receiving a proper bowl of water and everybody else receiving imaginary pudding. There was applause, a bow, and then another bow performed entirely by the inspector’s moustache.

As I packed away, Ivo brought me a biscuit wrapped in a napkin.

“For the outside audience,” he said.

I thanked him and glanced back at the bright window. The inspector was already questioning Mrs Pook about a missing trifle.

Some cases, apparently, couldn’t wait until after lunch.