Dear Jo,

You are correct in thinking that Mrs Partridge did not merely slip and fall and thus receive some inexplicable blow to the eye.

All in all, your deductions were correct. Well done. I will, however, tell you exactly what happened, according to my assessment and those of the coroner.

Mrs Partridge was a fit and healthy woman of forty. On her return home, it was mid-afternoon, just starting to get dark and she used the back door as was usual. Maybe struggled with key in the lock with one hand so threw/dropped her rucksack up against door. It’s not hard to imagine her being a little frustrated, being tired and cold, wanting to get in the house. Eventually the lock became free.

She heard something, though, above her and looked up; maybe water dripped on her glasses so she removed them and looked up again as the noise sounded out. Little did she know that the weight of the bag would cause the already melting, four foot icicle to dislodge from the guttering. Indeed, it fell and penetrated her left eye socket, causing a seizure, bleeding and death. As she fell, her glasses were discarded and the icicle spear broke off as she made contact with ground, leaving a shard imbedded in the cavity. As she lay undiscovered, the frozen shrapnel melted all but a trace of the weapon that drained and dripped off her face and froze on the path.

An unfortunate accident indeed.

To answer some of your questions I have worked on many strange cases of a similar theme, not all shrouded in death, might I add. I’m afraid to admit I do find the morbid rather exciting though. You say that you are more than happy to work with me so I feel that now the preliminaries are out of the way, we should begin on a new case.

Yours

Swan