The Allotments

The allotments behind the gasworks · a Sunday in June 1953 · the week of the Coronation · Difficulty: Rookie 2 · 6×6

The allotments behind the gasworks, a Sunday in June 1953 – the week of the Coronation. Bunting hung from the tool shed, the runner beans were climbing their poles, and every plot-holder was getting ready for the vegetable show. Violetta, the chairwoman of the allotment society, had walked round with her clipboard that morning and told one of them that their plot would be taken away for untidiness. By noon she was dead in the orchard, beside an apple tree. Five people were on the allotments, and each gave one short statement – find the one who was alone with her.

Rules

1. Every row and every column holds exactly one person. As soon as you place someone, cross out their whole row and column.
2. “Beside” = directly left, right, above or below, and in the same area. Squares with objects (the wheelbarrow, the herb beds, the apple trees, the flower bed, the scarecrow and the well) cannot be occupied; the bench and the deckchairs can.
3. The murderer was alone with the victim: nobody else was in that area.

Statements

• Alfie (a retired postman): He was beside the bench.
• Bronwen (a nurse from the cottage hospital): She was in the Herb Garden.
• Crosby (a bus driver who grew prize marrows): He was beside the scarecrow.
• Dymphna (a widow who grew sweet peas): She was in the last column.
• Elmer (the society's treasurer): He was the only one sitting in a deckchair.
• Violetta (the chairwoman of the allotment society): The victim. She was found in the Orchard, beside an apple tree – alone with the murderer.

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