Dear Diary

Poor Aunt P, losing Arthur has hit her hard yet she won't give in to her grief. She's allowed a psychiatrist of some sort to take over the house with his 'patients' though as I said to Dot, they are far too wealthy to be mad, they are just 'unwell'.

She called me in when one of the ladies died – she found her, in her room. When I got there, with Dot, Jack was already on the scene with his new constable, Martin, who was a bit too sure of himself even when Dot found some rubber outside the room of the victim and Jack accepted it as evidence.

Jack and I went to see the doctor, Samuels, who I got the feeling was hiding an awful lot. I spoke to one of the younger women, Jemima, very upset about the death of her friend. The secretary was rather cagey.

Aunt P was evasive when I spoke to her about why Samuels was there, her insomnia and Arthur, she claimed.

In the morgue, with Mac's damning endorsement of Samuels' methods, we discussed the use of an 'electrical massager' I swear Jack was embarrassed but he did know what I was talking about and I would love to get the background of that out of him, something to do with a Chinese brothel in his cadet years.

Jemima's father didn't have much good to say about him, either, and he seemed concerned that his daughter would be unduly influenced.

We found the 'percussor' hidden in Aunt P's fernery; I had to explain what it was to Dot. I took it to Jack, and we called in Dr Perkins who developed the device, the wires had been tampered with, he claimed he took it from the victim but her fingers had been broken in that action; he said it wasn't used to avoid controversy.

Samuels has been in court before over the deaths of some of his clients, most of whom donated to his clinic very, very generously.

I got very worried about Aunt P, apparently Samuels was hypnotising her and I worried she had agreed to donate much more than the £1000 in the accounts.

I agree with Samuels on one thing, the treatment for 'female hysteria' of a hysterectomy is excessive and that was what most of his patients were facing, even Jemima who is still very young for that kind of surgery.

Jemima's father still insisted on taking her away, which she obviously didn't want to do as she went up to the tower and threatened to jump. Jemima knew rather a lot, and she told me when we were standing on the ledge that the original victim, Betsy Cohen, had made the secretary give her the percussor but before we could talk to Harriet (secretary) she was poisoned – dear heaven, women seemed to be dying all over Aunt P's house!

Jack agreed to let Samuels hypnotise Jemima, to tell the truth about what she saw and though she couldn't give details she gave enough.

Harriet and her brother were having 'relations' and she had seen them through the bathroom keyhole, but it was Betsy who had seen it first. You know, Diary, even if I had a brother the idea of engaging in any kind of sexual activity with the spawn of my father fills me with horror.

Throughout this case, even when Dolores, who loved to be free (wander about naked) myself and Aunt P and Jemima threatened to strip in the driveway, Jack has allowed me to lead more than follow, whether it was because it was all happening at my aunt's home, or because it was a uniquely female case I don't know, and I will get the story of the Chinese brothel out of him one day.

There was one quite lovely thing that happened, actually. Bert is such a softy but I never saw him being so gentle with Aunt P as he was this time. He must have spoken to her about trying to forget Arthur, but he had the idea we should celebrate the boy's life; Aunt P has been turning all the photographs face down, refusing to talk about him but it was eating her up inside, we could all see that, so we had a little sing song for him. The Raggers had been taking him out to a place where he could have a sing around a piano when they found out Samuels was using music as therapy for him. So, the cook made his favourite scallop pies, Delores, a rather nice pianist when she wasn't stripping naked, played, Cec started the song, 'There's a long, long trail a winding' and Samuels and I joined him. Finally Aunt P wept for his loss, on Bert's shoulder, everybody was quite moved at the music and the idea there would be scallop pies in heaven.

Jack says he has trouble recalling trauma so I might have to get him on the couch one evening, in a more intimate setting as he put it – he's on the verge methinks – but of all things in this case, the sweetest thing was Bert and his gentleness. We all miss Arthur, he was a simple, sweet soul who was taken far too soon – I may keep toffee apples in his memory.

Now, where to put the psychiatrist's couch?