Murdering Ministers

by Alan Beechey

  “I could have you all arrested!” Mallard thundered, trying to look as fierce as Assistant Commissioner Weed looked when he was mildly peeved. He held the expression for five seconds, then he started to laugh too.

  He laughed longer and louder than the others. It was the first time since his enforced vacation and potential retirement that he had permitted himself to find anything funny. Oliver, watching his uncle wiping his eyes with a plain white napkin, knew this, and waited until his chuckles had largely subsided before asking the question that he guessed would be on Effie’s mind, too, although he suspected he knew the true answer.

  “So what brings you here, Uncle Tim?”

  Mallard gave a brisk shrug. “Oh, I was just in the neighborhood,” he answered casually. “At the Yard actually, down the road. I called your house, but nobody was in. So I thought I take a chance and see if you’d popped over here for brunch, since I have a bit of time to kill before tonight’s performance.”

  As Oliver thought. Mallard was bored stiff at home. Because of the long hours of murder investigations, Aunt Phoebe had grown used to not having her husband around during the day, and she had adopted a slew of hobbies, activities, and local causes, which couldn’t be put aside this side of Christmas. Phoebe had accepted that, apart from an elaborate annual jaunt to an exotic foreign location of her choosing, her quality time with Tim would have to be spent largely in bed at night, and she continued to make sure that they experienced the full range of options offered by that location, as she would often remark on family gatherings to Oliver’s general discomfort. However, it did explain why Mallard always made the long trip back to Theydon Bois every night, even during an intense investigation, when his colleagues might have found a cheap hotel or kipped down on one of the Yard’s well-used sofas.

  “I thought you were on holiday,” Effie remarked.

  “Oh, I needed to check something with the assistant commissioner’s office,” Mallard answered airily.

  “I’m surprised Weed was at work on a Sunday.”

  “Er, he wasn’t,” said Mallard, unavoidably glancing at Geoffrey. “In fact, the cleaners were in.” The two men smiled at each other. Oliver dismissed the hint of a conspiracy, on the grounds that Geoffrey Angelwine could not possibly have any secrets worth sharing. He assumed instead that Mallard’s visit to the Yard was another abortive attempt to steal his personnel file.

  “But enough about me,” Mallard said quickly. “How’s the case?”

  “Do you mean the disappearance or the murder?” Geoffrey asked before Oliver could stop him. He kicked him under the table anyway.

  “A murder!” Mallard breathed, his eyes widening behind his glasses. He smoothed his white moustache. “You’ve had a murder in Plumley! Oh, Effie, tell me all about it.”

  “Now, now, Tim,” she said quickly, “it only happened today, and I was there by accident, still looking for my runaway.”

  “You mean you discovered the body?” he asked, almost drooling in his thirst for information.

  “Not exactly. I was there even earlier.”

  “You witnessed it! By the cringe, Eff, you actually witnessed a murder! So did you make an arrest?”

  “An arrest has been made, but it wasn’t as simple as that. You see, strychnine was used, and—”

  ”Strychnine!” Mallard exclaimed, thumping his coffee mug on the table and clutching his head in his hands. A couple of customers who had just sat down tossed aside their menus and headed quickly for the door. Susie ignored them.

  “In thirty-five years on the force,” Mallard was complaining loudly, “I’ve never done a strychnine murder. Why, it’s positively Agatha Christie. And I take one lousy, unplanned vacation, and you get strychnine poisoning. I’m going to kill that Weed!”

  Three more tables tried to wave at their waiters, making scribbling gestures. Mallard sat up and pulled his chair closer to the table.

  “All right, Effie,” he said, “here’s what you have to do. Now the first thing to remember is that strychnine is surprisingly easy to find. It’s in old medicines and tonics that you can find in junk stores or people’s basements, it’s been used for pest control, for controlling facial tics—you can even order it over the Internet. Second, people don’t die through ingesting strychnine itself, but from the physical reactions it produces in the body. It takes about a hundred milligrams to be sure that somebody is dead…”

  “Tim.”

  “…but under certain circumstances, much lower doses will do the trick. So start by—”

  He stopped, partly because it had occurred to him that she had spoken his name, but mainly because she was waving her napkin at him, like a surrendering bandit.

  “Tim,” Effie said again, “I truly appreciate the advice, and there’s nobody on Earth I would rather hear it from, but it’s not my case. Detective Inspector Welkin is SIO. I’m only a sergeant, remember?”

  “Yes, but I would have thought with your experience on the squad, even those idiots over at Plumley would have made an exception.”

  “It’s not very likely that any murder would be left to a mere sergeant, no matter how respected his or her mentor,” Effie said with a gentle smile. Mallard thought for a second.

  “But surely young Welkin’s made you his number two for this one?”

  “No, and I don’t blame him,” she added quickly, before he could object to his former protégé’s apparent loss of reason. “This is a golden opportunity for the new man to train one or two of his regular team, not someone who’ll be out of his manor in a week or so. What if the investigation goes on longer?”

  Mallard knew she was right, and he sat in silence, distracted by the prospect of the following year. Yes, Effie would be out of Plumley CID and back at Scotland Yard on the second of January, but would he be there to lead her?

  “I bet you wish you were in on this one, too, eh?” he said to Oliver in avuncular tones.

  “Actually, Uncle, I spent an hour with the victim on Thursday and I visited the scene of the crime yesterday. And I’ve known the suspected killer since I was five.”

  “How unlike the home life of our own dear Queen,” said Susie merrily, while Mallard gaped at his nephew. She stood up and looked around the deserted restaurant, puzzled. Then she sat down again and poured herself a cup of coffee.

  ***

  If the bus stop opposite Plumley United Diaconalist Church were a “request” stop, with a red metal flag, a would-be passenger would have to stand on the curbside and raise a hand conspicuously in time for a bus driver to see the signal and come comfortably to a halt. However, it is not a request stop. It is a “compulsory” stop, which means a bus should stop automatically, without being hailed by someone on the pavement. Logically, therefore, there was no reason why the small, elderly man waiting there should have spent the last two hours with his arm more or less permanently raised to shoulder level and stiffly protruding into the path of oncoming traffic. Nor was there any logical reason why at least one of the five buses that had passed during this time should not have picked him up, arm or no arm.

  But the little man had long given up on logic, as he had given up on chance, luck, providence, the National Lottery, the British postal system, and—for now—London Transport. For this man was Underwood Tooth, the world’s leading expert on being ignored.

  Underwood was not at all surprised when the sixth bus shot by without slowing down, its bright headlights cutting through the darkness on this slightly misty evening, dazzling him as the bus missed him by inches. Nor was he bitter, being well used to his role in life after sixty-six years of being constantly overlooked by teachers, waiters, concierges, shop assistants, bank tellers, receptionists, and customer service representatives of all stripes. He merely took the opportunity to rub some life back into the aching muscles of his arm and shoulder and wonder again how long it would take him to walk home. Given the la
teness of the hour and the dwindling frequency of the Sunday evening service, he was beginning to think it might be rush hour next morning before a bus would stop to let off a passenger, and he could then make a salmonlike leap for the door before the driver let it slam in his face. A taxi was out of the question; cruising cabs were rare enough in the London suburbs, but since Underwood had never in his life succeeded in hailing one, he had no idea how they operated. He carried some vague impression that all taxi journeys, no matter what the destination, had to pass through Trafalgar Square.

  He gazed at the church across the road, its white neoclassical facade looming through the haze. Although Underwood took much comfort in believing that God, at least, was omniscient, he was not a regular churchgoer these days. Whenever he went to a service, he always seemed to find himself without a hymn book. But at least he had never in his life been accosted by a Jehovah’s Witness.

  However, since this was the last Sunday before Christmas, he had decided to make a rare visit to a place of worship, and a pin stuck in his local Yellow Pages had perforated Plumley United Diaconalist Church, a half-hour bus-ride from his home in Finchley. Long past the habit of phoning ahead for information, he had taken the chance that there would be an evening service at six or six-thirty. But as he had walked toward the building at six forty-five—the bus had taken him three stops further than he wanted—he could see that the front doors were closed and some sort of tape or ribbon was stretched across them. It could have been yellow or white, it was hard to tell the color under the sodium streetlamps. And it had writing on it. No doubt it said “Happy Christmas” or some other seasonal message. He adjusted his glasses. Something about a cross? Surely that was better for Easter. Oh, “Do Not Cross.” Good heavens, it was a police notice. But no policeman around to explain it.

  Too late to find another church, Underwood crossed the street and began his long wait for the return bus. He was looking forward to a long, hot bath, not simply because of the evening chill, but to soothe his many aches. For him, Christmas was a season of bruises—the crowds in the High Street meant more people bumping into him or unapologetically treading on his feet while he was shopping. But at least there were the pantomimes to look forward to. He could relax there, immune to every other Englishman’s terror that some monstrous, superannuated comic in women’s clothes or a third-rate novelty-act conjuror would select him to go up on the stage to receive the traditional abject humiliation, a “bit of fun” for the sadistic pleasure of all the other reprieved playgoers. Underwood would never be on the sharp end of the phrase “a gentleman from the audience—perhaps you, sir?”

  The crime scene tape must also have attracted the attention of the young woman walking past the church. Certainly, she had ducked into the deserted car park and was now approaching the front door. She glanced around, rather guiltily, Underwood thought, as if conscious that she was trespassing. Could you trespass on church property? he wondered. Or did the medieval laws of sanctuary still apply (not that he would ever need them)? And anyway, aren’t we supposed to forgive those who trespass against us?

  He tittered at this thought, and the woman seemed to look right at him, but had apparently not noticed the small, solitary figure across the street, reminding him again that he’d make a good peeping Tom, if only he lacked the morals. The woman was little more than a moving shadow to him, but he had an impression of long red hair under a beret, and a remarkably short cloak and skirt for the weather. But what was she doing? Was that fake snow she was spraying across the front of the doors, white writing on the black paint? Maybe it was a Christmas decoration, although why she should seem so furtive was beyond him. She shook the can again, and it rattled. Then she added a few more characters and slipped away, almost running down the street past that big Victorian house on the right of the church.

  Underwood couldn’t help himself. He had to know what she was doing, spraying words onto the church door at ten o’clock in the evening. He glanced both ways, although the roadway was deserted, and scuttled across the street, stopping at the church steps.

  Revelation, 11:7

  How odd! He would have to look that up when he got home. But clearly not a Christmas text. He knew the Christmas story was split between the gospels of St. Matthew and St. Luke, but thanks to Sunday School Nativity plays and composite versions of the tale for children, he was in his thirties before he found out there was precious little overlap between the two accounts. The vicar of his local church had never given him a straight answer to that observation. Or any other observation, come to think of it.

  And it wasn’t that plastic snow she had used, but white oil paint. Had he witnessed an act of vandalism? Perhaps he should report this to the minister. His address and telephone number were on the notice-board. Would it be too late to call tonight? Would the church have one of these newfangled push-button response systems that inevitably either disconnected him or left him in an inescapable repeating cycle of the same questions? (At least this was one frustration of modern life that was not limited to him he had discovered, overhearing loud complaining, conversations in elevators between people who thought they were alone.)

  He had just produced his pocket diary and was noting the phone number of a Reverend Paul Piltdown, when a bus slowed to a halt on the other side of the street. Underwood ran.

  Chapter Six

  In This World of Sin

  Monday, December 22

  Detective Constable Trevor Stoodby without a moustache was a distinct improvement. Stoodby standing in the middle of the CID office and thoughtfully reading a Bible was a greater tribute to Effie’s reforming influence than even she could have anticipated.

  “If you’re looking for a loophole, Trevor, remember that there are ten commandments but only seven deadly sins,” she said brightly as she hung up her coat.

  He laughed politely, although it was clear that the comment had passed at least fifty feet above his head. “Oh, good morning, Ma’am. I’m checking out last night’s graffiti.”

  “Graffiti?” Effie asked, wondering why all the office chairs had been placed on one side of the large table in the middle of the room, which had been transformed overnight into an incident room for the Tapster murder. Through the glass wall of his small office, she could see Welkin on the telephone, talking urgently and taking notes. She perched on her desk and sipped the tea she had picked up for lunch.

  “Yes, last night,” Stoodby said swiftly, fighting back an instinctive twinge of appreciation for Effie’s legs. “Some time before midnight, somebody spray-painted a biblical reference on the front doors of the church.”

  “Don’t we have anyone keeping an eye on the place?”

  “Oh yes, we had a uniformed constable patrolling the perimeter all night, but he didn’t see or hear anything. No witnesses have turned up either.”

  “So what’s the reference?”

  “I can’t make head or tail of it. It’s from the Book of Revelation. Listen. ‘And when they have finished their testimony, the beast that ascendeth out of the bottomless pit shall make war against them, and shall overcome them, and kill them.’ What do you make of that, Sarge? Sounds a bit like a threat.”

  “Or a prophesy. We need to get a sense of the context.”

  The door to the room opened, letting in the wispy-haired stick insect (whom she now knew as Detective Constable Graham Paddock) and the bespectacled, chinless chicken (Detective Constable Terry “Tezza” Foot), who had been summoned from their morning assignments by a call from Welkin. This gave Effie a momentary view down the corridor to the public waiting room, where a small man was sitting patiently on a bench. She could have sworn he had been there when she left that morning to visit a succession of outraged and frightened Plumley householders whose homes had been burgled over the weekend. The door swung shut again.

  “Anybody looked in on the murderer lately?” asked Foot loudly. Paul Piltdown had spent the night voluntar
ily in a detention cell and a great deal of the morning in an interview room with Welkin and Stoodby.

  “He hasn’t confessed and he hasn’t been charged,” Effie reminded him. Paddock looked at Foot, as if they were confirming a private joke.

  “Yeah, I know, Sarge,” Foot continued, trying to contain a broad smile, which made it look as if he was leering at her. “But these vicars, they’re all the same, ain’t they? Bent or randy or both. If their hands aren’t in the collection plate, then they’re up the verger’s wife’s skirts. Or some choirboy’s cassock.”

  “That’s what you think, is it?” Effie said, with feigned innocence.

  Sensing her disapproval, Foot grunted humorlessly and turned back to Paddock, strangely ignoring Stoodby. Tish Belfry hurried into the room, and Effie caught a wisp of Foot’s whispered conversation, which included specifying which item of Tish’s clothing he would personally like to ascend, preferably on the inside, and the two detectives snickered again. Stoodby shook his head sadly, but if Tish had heard the remark, she ignored it. She stopped dead as she reached her desk.

  “Who took my chair?” she demanded.

  “Inspector Welkin,” Stoodby told her immediately. “And he wants all of us to wait here until he’s ready.”

  Tish looked puzzled. “I hope this isn’t going to take too long,” she said urgently to Effie. “I need to follow up on something about Tina Quarterboy. I’ve had an idea.”

  Effie and Tish had split up for the morning, checking on various weekend incidents that proved there was more to Plumley’s criminal underbelly than murdered lay ministers and disappearing teenagers. Effie had hardly spoken to her assistant since the murder. She had justified the previous day’s lunch break with Oliver as partial compensation for her late night and for the stress of the morning—and she knew that Welkin would be too busy with the aftermath of the murder to miss her. Afterwards, she had driven back to Plumley, sending Tish off duty and then spending several fruitless hours reviewing every statement taken in the Tina Quarterboy case. But she had yet to follow up on Tina’s brief reappearance. A house-to-house of the area around the church seemed the next move, although it had been too late in the day to get that organized. She found she wanted to ask Piltdown more about the missing girl, but even though he was conveniently on the premises, he was off limits to her.