“How does your husband feel about you leaving them for a week to live with three other women and four men?”
Anne shrugged as they turned for the house. “He doesn’t mind as long as I’m not up to... you know… anything. And I wouldn’t, would I? Not on telly. Anyway, he’s outta work, so he has nothing better to do than sit round the house looking after the kids.”
Brenda felt bewildered by the confession. “All I can say is if my Colin were still here and I’d suggested it, he’d have gone right up the wall.”
“Ballistic, you mean? Why?”
“Because when I got married, back in the 1970s, it wasn’t the done thing.” Brenda’s features became glum. “Mind you, when I got married, there was nothing like I-Spy on telly. We had this documentary thing called The Family, but that was a genuine, fly-on-the-wall series, not a deliberately false set up like this.”
They reached the rear patio where Tanya sat talking with Greg and Ben. Brenda greeted them with a smile, Anne with a wave.
“We were just saying we’re looking forward to your meal tonight, Brenda,” Greg reported. “Not going to give us a hint what you’re doing?”
Brenda and Anne joined them. “All I will say, Greg, is you enjoyed Anne’s apple pie on Monday, and Dylan’s goulash on Tuesday, so you should love this.” She looked around. “And talking of Dylan, where is he? And where are Marc and Her Ladyship?”
“Dylan is with Ursula, somewhere,” Ben said.
“No prizes for guessing where.” Greg laughed and the rest joined in.
“Don’t know about Marc,” Tanya said. “Haven’t seen him since lunchtime.”
“Maybe Ursula is into threesomes,” Greg suggested with a saucy gleam in his eye.
“Don’t get me started,” Brenda warned, and she, too, smiled to show she was only joking.
She took a lounger and leaned back, gazing up into the sky. An airliner circled, on approach to Liverpool John Lennon Airport, and lower down, was a media helicopter.
“Don’t look now,” she said, “but we’re all on candid camera.”
As one they looked up and waved at the press.
“That’ll be all over the tabloids tomorrow,” Ben declared. “Warring Housies call a truce to sunbathe.”
Marc came out of the house and joined them, his face edged with worry. “Hi, guys. Has anyone seen, er, the cord from my dressing gown?”
Brenda turned her face away in an effort to hide her smile. Marc had proved a notorious fusspot, and reticent to the point of near silence in speaking out. Old for his years, he had arrived in the living room most mornings still wearing striped pyjamas and a faded, dark blue dressing gown, its cord tied tightly around his midriff.
“Not me,” Ben said.
“Haven’t seen it,” Greg replied. “You could ask Dylan, but I think he’s busy right now, with the bitch queen.”
Marc grimaced. “Yes. I heard them when I passed the, er, Romping Room.”
“That bed must be built like the ones we have at the hospital,” Tanya said. “Or maybe they’re secretly working for the company that makes them.”
“Bed testers not so anonymous.” Greg laughed and again everyone joined in.
Even Marc managed a smile before saying, “Oh, they’re not… you know. They were talking when I passed. Sounded a bit, excited, too. The both of them.”
“Maybe they were just building up to it,” Greg suggested, and everyone laughed again.
Brenda checked her watch. “Half past three,” she declared. Time I was getting things together for dinner.”
***
With the wall clock registering four in the afternoon, Joe closed the door on the last of the day’s customers, locked up and turned the sign to ‘closed’.
As always, the moment the Lazy Luncheonette ceased trading for the day, most of his irritation left him, and he joined Sheila and Cheryl near the counter for a final beaker of tea. Once they left, he would take the day’s takings up to his apartment, bring the books up to date, and then switch off totally.
On the wall above table 13, the TV played out the I-Spy drama, showing Brenda working in the kitchen, a bag of plain flour at her elbow, rolling out her pastry for the evening meal. Her forearms were bared, covered in the flour and she worked with a strength belying her feminine frame.
“She was always the best with a rolling pin,” Sheila commented.
“And I suppose there’s many a man who can vouch for it,” Joe quipped. “You know what you’re doing for tomorrow and over the weekend, Cheryl?”
“What?” Cheryl dragged her eyes from the TV. “Oh. Yes. Stop worrying, Uncle Joe. Me and Lee have run the place before for you, and we’ve never bankrupted you yet. We know exactly what to do.”
“Good girl,” Joe approved. “Remember, one of these days, all this will be yours.”
Cheryl gazed glumly round the café. “I’m so thrilled.”
Sheila laughed, Cheryl grinned and Joe rolled a cigarette. “Bloody kids. You’re just trying to wind me up so I’ll have a heart attack and you can get your hands on the place sooner.” He drank more tea. “I’ll be here first thing in the morning, but I have to leave at half past seven to get everyone on the bus at the Miner’s Arms. You’ve arranged for your two pals to come in? Pauline and Franny?”
Cheryl nodded. “They’ll be here. And you want me to pay them out of the takings?”
“Back pocket earnings,” Joe grumbled. “If the tax man ever rumbles it, we’re all in the sh… sugar.” He turned his attention on Sheila. “Did we circulate the members who are on the trip? Only everyone was too interested in Brenda last night.”
“I emailed them all first thing this morning, Joe, and those I couldn’t email, I phoned. Everything is in hand. So stop worrying.”
“I’m not worrying. I’m just being organised.” He nodded at the TV. “Which is more than those clowns are.”
Sheila frowned. “How do you mean?”
“Look at the space Brenda has to work in. I noticed the other night when that Anne woman was making the apple pie. One tiny worktop and she had to prepare the fruit and the pastry in the same area. Too much cleaning down between jobs.”
Sheila, too, studied the cramped area where Brenda was working on her pastry. “I see what you mean. I have more space in my kitchen, and that’s not particularly large.”
“It’s for the hatches,” Cheryl said, and they both looked at her for further explanation. “See, the Housies are not allowed to bring anything in with them, other than a few personal items. But they need stuff as they go through the week. Brenda needed the diced steak, the flour and potatoes. The backroom bods have to get all that to her, so the house is riddled with hatches where they can pass stuff through. And behind the hatches there’s, like, massive spaces, nearly the size of the rooms, where the crew operate. I should think it’s taken something off the kitchen.”
“You seem to know an awful lot about it, Cheryl,” Sheila observed.
Cheryl laughed. “It’s one of my favourite programmes. Our Lee bought me the I-Spy Annual last Christmas and there’s loadsa pages in it, telling you how it all works behind the scene.”
“The I-Spy Annual?” Joe asked. When Cheryl nodded, he shook his head sadly. “I think I’ll stick with the Beano.”
***
Camera 27 blinked and blacked out for the third time in four hours.
“Stock feed on twenty-seven.” Naughton barked. “Ten seconds ago.” With an irritated sigh, he asked, “What the hell is going on with that camera?”
“Been like it all week.” Katy said. “We’ve replaced it three times, now. One of the techs reckoned it must be something to do with the heat coming from the ovens.”
“Never been a problem at any other location,” Naughton pointed as the stock feed showed on 27 and the blanked screen moved to a fresh monitor.
It consisted of footage taken in the kitchen during the month when Gibraltar Hall was being prepared for the series. Such footage had been taken from all came
ras to be used in the event of a breakdown.
“Maybe we had more space to work in other locations,” Helen speculated. “Or maybe they were better ventilated. I’d have to check on that. Cut to the wider shot, Scott. Greg is poking his nose in and I think Brenda is about to give him a piece of her mind.”
“Cue 13,” Naughton called, “and go.”
The view on the main monitor switched to a wide angle of Brenda approaching Greg who was checking the canisters on the worktop by the ovens.
“These cameras are designed to work in a range of temperatures, Helen,” Naughton said. “Maybe the problem is with the wiring.”
“With less than forty-eight hours to go, I’m not sending a team in to rewire 27,” Helen declared. “We’ll have to muddle through as best we can.
“Cut to 12,” Naughton ordered. “No argument between Brenda and Greg.”
***
In the kitchen corner of the living room, Brenda had caught Greg checking through the various shakers on the worktop.
“What are you nosying at?” she demanded as he replaced the lid on her flour shaker.
“I’m looking for sugar,” he pleaded and held up a cup and saucer. “For my coffee.”
Brenda moved the flour shaker to the rear of the worktop and slid the sugar across to him. “You’re the second one. Dylan was looking for it earlier. Now clear off.”
“Thanks,” he grinned and shook some into his coffee.
While he stirred, he checked the ovens. “Smells delicious, Brenda. Some kinda pie, but what’s in it?”
Brenda grinned. “I was going to do Ursula au vin, but I couldn’t find a van to run her over with.”
Greg laughed. Keeping his voice low, he said, “You’re just as evil as her, but you’re more fun.”
“Fun is my middle name.”
***
Working late into the evening on the Sanford 3rd Age Club monthly newsletter, Joe found his attention constantly distracted by events in the I-Spy house.
Brenda’s meat and potato pie had gone down well with the Housies. All except Dylan who, despite his earlier appetite, had gone off his feed by the time they sat down to eat.
He was full of apologies, naturally. “Sorry, Brenda. Been nibbling between meals. Excellent, though.”
The only other comment had come, predictably, from Ursula, who had cleared her plate before saying, “God knows what this’ll do to my figure.”
Joe was mad as hell at her. He recognised it as another attempt to have a go at Brenda. “It’s not a real gripe,” he said to Sheila on the phone. “She gobbled that pie down like she hadn’t eaten for a month.”
Brenda, however, was wiser than Joe. Unlike Wednesday, she refused to rise to Ursula’s sly dig. Instead, she said, “It won’t do you any harm to put a few pounds on, Ursula. It’ll turn you into a man’s woman.”
For a moment it looked as if Ursula would rise to the bait, but she did not. Instead, she opened her mouth in a gaping yawn. “Tired. Early night for me, I think.”
That did not happen either. After dinner, the Housies retired outside to enjoy the last of the evening sun, where they began to chat, and inevitably, the talk soon turned to reminiscences of their collective experience over the last few days. To Joe’s relief, and no doubt Brenda’s, the spat of the previous evening was not mentioned. Even Ursula took part in the debate with minimal animosity.
With one eye on them, Joe found his concentration on the club newsletter and a potential Murder Mystery Weekend in Lincoln later in the year, at best distracted, at worst waning.
At 11:15, he gave it up and switched off the computer. He had to be up early the following morning anyway (“When don’t I?” he grumbled to himself) and his enthusiasm for the newsletter had been taken over by the promise of a weekend in Chester, D-Day at the I-Spy house and the programme itself. But now that everyone had gone off to bed at Gibraltar Hall, there was nothing of to keep him up.
He picked up the TV remote and was about to switch off when the view, which had been swapping between the men’s dorm and the ladies, suddenly switched back to the latter, where Ursula was sitting up on the edge of the bed.
She took a cautious glance around at her companions, all of whom appeared to be sleeping, then slid her feet into carpet slippers and quietly left the room.
With a cigarette to finish, Joe put the remote down, and watched. It was not, in his opinion, the most riveting spectacle on TV, and if Brenda were not taking part, he would not have tuned in at all, but like so many viewers (according to the newspapers) this vexatious woman had attracted and fixed his attention.
Unlike so many of the viewers (again according to the newspapers) Joe did not believe her actions were real.
Several psychologists and sociologists, all of them way better qualified than he, had commented on her behaviour, putting forward many theories for her antics, but in Joe’s humble opinion, they had missed the obvious. She had trained as an actress and that meant she was well capable of faking anything she wanted. It did occur to him that he was biased in favour of Brenda and he could well be wrong, but he had expressed the opinion so many times in the last week, he’d left no one in doubt as to where he stood.
The view switched to the upper landing as Ursula emerged onto the landing, looked both ways and then turned to her left. Joe wondered how the camera switch worked. It was his understanding that there were no technicians or backroom boys on after ten in the evening.
“Movement sensors,” he said to himself. “It’s the only way.”
Ursula carried on along the corridor, weaving from side to side, and once put out a hand to steady herself, leaving Joe to assume she was drunk; an idea which gave him hope for Brenda. Alcohol was against the I-Spy rules. Halfway along the landing, Ursula stopped. Again she looked left and right and then entered the Romping Room.
“Dirtbag,” Joe grumbled.
He watched for a few minutes longer. The view switched back to the men’s dorm, then the women’s as one or other Housey moved in their beds, but no one got up. Eventually Joe shut down the TV, and following the Housies’ lead, went to bed.
***
Ursula yawned and checked her watch again. Where the hell was he? His note had said half past eleven and it was almost midnight.
Her thin nightwear already removed, she felt warm enough in the temperature controlled environment, but even naked, she felt the weight of fatigue pressing in on her. She really didn’t feel like it but he’d been her only true ally this week. It was the least she could do to reward him for his loyalty.
The paradox was not lost on her. His loyalty had been secured by sex and now she would grant him her body again to ensure that same loyalty.
“Well, girl, what’s your body for if not to get what you want?”
The thought brought back memories of twenty years ago and another night with another man. To this day she still felt the full revulsion at some of the things she had done. And for what? Oh, he had kept his side of the bargain, but the promise of stardom had never quite materialised. She also remembered her fear when the police interviewed her after he had died. As if she had anything to do with it.
He got what he deserved, she thought to herself, but I never did.
In order to suppress the distressing recollections, she forced more memories to the fore. If that hadn’t happened she wouldn’t be here, now, standing on the threshold of a renewed career in the spotlight. Victor’s death, ignominious and shaming though it may have been for his reputation, had nonetheless brought her to this point.
Where the hell was this idiot? Why wasn’t he here? She checked the time again and read only a few minutes further on from the last time she had looked.
She would give him another twenty minutes. After that, he could sod off. With less than 48 hours to go in this hell hole, she would have no more need for him anyway.
Fantasies of her new rich and famous lifestyle invaded her mind, and while she indulged them her eyelids began to droop and she
nodded off to sleep.
***
“Where is Ursula?” Naughton grumbled. “Don’t tell me she’s in the Romping Room again.”
On the main feed, seven of the eight Housies were settling down to breakfast in the dining area of the living room. Some of them had complained verbally about headaches, Brenda, Naughton noticed, had taken two paracetamol, and without exception they appeared to be drinking a lot of water.
“Is there some kind of bug running through the house?” he had asked before his comment on Ursula.
“Dunno about a bug,” Katy said, “but if Ursula is in the Romping Room, she’s on her own. The rest of them are here.” She waved a hand vaguely at the main monitor.
“Master Spy,” Naughton ordered, “ask the Housies for a volunteer to drag Ursula out of the Romping Room. Preferably one of the women, preferably not Brenda and not Tanya.”
“You’re not leaving me a lot of choice, are you?” Master Spy’s voice came back over the private channel.
“Brenda might throttle her and Tanya might try to seduce her,” Naughton retorted.
“That’s appalling,” Katy protested. “Tanya might be batting for the other side, but it’s not been an issue with anyone all week.”
“Playing it safe,” Naughton assured her. “We don’t want another battle like the one we had the other night.”
Master Spy’s voice burst through the main feed. “Anne, may we ask you to go to the Romping Room and check on Ursula, please?”
“No problem,” Anne replied and excusing herself, left the breakfast table.
Greg also excused himself to visit the toilet. “Told you I wasn’t too good last night, didn’t I?”
In the control room, Naughton groaned. “I knew it. A stomach bug. Get onto services. I wanna know about that meat we gave Brenda for her pie yesterday.”
Katy picked up the telephone.
“And get Helen in here,” Naughton ordered as his assistant began to speak into the receiver. “Tell her it’s hit the fan big time.” He jabbed his microphone button. “Master Spy, ask the Housies if everyone is feeling yuk.”
Almost immediately Master Spy’s voice overrode the muted conversation of the Housies. “May I ask, are you all feeling unwell this morning?”
The I-Spy Murders Page 7