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A Toast To Treachery: A Minnie Ming Mystery

Nancy's Notes 🖊️♬

Written for Sunday Whirl Wordle.
Here are Brenda’s prompt words:

swallow, tag, find, music, swelling, bell,
delirium, spell, pales, knowing, just, senses

Image by Me & ChatGPT

The music had stopped mid-waltz, the repeated scratching of the phonograph needle the only sound in the unusually quiet room. That was the first thing Inspector Minnie Ming noticed when she stepped into the Wallingford dining room. She carefully lifted the arm off the record and placed it in its cradle while taking stock of the scene before her.

Lady Wallingford lay on the settee, drifting in and out of delirium, a faint swelling at her throat. The guests hovered over her …. all but her nephew, Edmund, who remained seated, dabbing at dry eyes.

“A fainting spell,” he said. “She’s had them for years. It’s her heart.”

“Hearts rarely leave a rash,” Inspector Ming quipped.

She studied the table. Eight glasses had been raised when the dinner bell rang for the toast. Seven were empty. One stood untouched.

“Yours, Mr. Wallingford?”

“I …. don’t care for claret.”

“Then why pour it?” She walked from one side of the room to the other, deliberately pausing to examine each face. “Everyone drank from the same decanter, yet only your aunt fell ill. So the poison wasn’t in the wine. It was in her glass. And you couldn’t bring yourself to swallow a drop of yours …. because you weren’t quite sure the glasses hadn’t been switched.”

Edmund’s hand drifted, involuntarily, toward his breast pocket.

“Trust your senses, ladies and gentlemen. The obvious always gives itself away. I expect we’ll find a small vial there, with a pharmacy tag attached.”

Minnie Ming smiled faintly, knowing she had her man.

“Notice how he pales,” she said. “Just like that.”

The doctor rushed to his patient, the cousin gasped, the butler dropped his tray, and Edmund bolted for the door …. straight into the arms of the waiting constable.

NAR©2026
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This is “Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap” by AC/DC

Wordle 776

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