by G. M. Dobbs
‘Where’s Arthur?’
‘He’s in the house,’ Granny said. ‘Do you want to talk to Arthur? Do you want me to fetch him or do you want to come around to ours?’
‘To be honest,’ Stan said. ‘I just fancy a pint.’
Granny nodded, understanding.
‘We’ll talk later, then?’ she said.
Stan nodded.
That night as Granny lay in bed, she found it difficult to sleep, and so complying with the strict rules of matrimony, clause seven, sub section fifty four to be exact, Arthur wasn’t allowed to sleep either.
‘None of it makes any sense,’ Granny said. ‘Stan just couldn’t have killed Edith.’
‘They’ll find out who did,’ Arthur said, speaking into the pillow. The six pints he had drunk with Stan had taken their toll and he sorely needed to sleep.
‘Will they?’ Granny reached across to the nightstand for her pipe, pulling the quilt from Arthur and revealing his long-john clad legs. She sat up in bed, located her tobacco and started to fill the bowl.
‘It seems to me the police have already decided Stan’s guilty, ‘ she said presently’
‘Well they’re wrong.’
‘ Do you know they took his passport?’
‘Yes, Stan told me.’ Arthur pulled the quilt back over to cover his legs.
Granny lit her pipe.
‘Do you have to puff away on that in the bedroom,’ if ever a question was rhetorical then this was it and Arthur knew, to the word, what was coming next.
‘Do I moan when you’re smoking your roll-ups?’
Arthur secretly smiled to himself. Any more of this and he’d get up himself and grab a smoke and a cup of tea.
‘I just don’t understand any of this,’ Granny grumbled, speaking through a mouthful of smoke.
‘So you said. Now go back to sleep.’
Three or maybe four minutes of blissful silence followed and Arthur was just about to drift into the smooth cocoon of sleep when:
‘Why were they arguing?’
‘What?’
‘Stan and Edith. They were seen arguing.’
‘Stan said they weren’t exactly arguing.’
‘What were they doing then?’
Arthur sat up, wide-awake now. He knew there would be no chance of getting back to sleep until he’d had a cup of tea and maybe a snack.
‘Stan said Edith was acting strange, didn’t want to go to the fete,’ he said and reached over and pulled the cord on the lamp. The energy saving bulb let off a faint glow but slowly brightened. ‘He had to coax her to leave the house. There were some cross words on the way to the fete but nothing more. It wasn’t really an argument. Just a disagreement.’
‘But someone told the police it was an argument.’
‘You know what people are like.’
Granny mumbled and lay there in silence, puffing away at her pipe while her mind mulled over the problem of Stan and Edith. She was convinced Edith’s death had been a random attack, an attempted robbery that went wrong. Probably carried out by some youngster high on something or other.
There was no way Stan could have done it and there couldn’t possibly be any reason why anyone would want to hurt Edith. She was not the sort to make enemies
‘I’m going to make a cup of tea,’ Arthur said, climbing from bed. ‘You want one?’
Granny nodded, said nothing.
‘And then maybe we can go to sleep,’ Arthur said and cursed when he stubbed his toe on the edge of the bed.
‘Be quiet,’ Granny said. ‘You’ll wake Gerald.’
‘Gerald’s asleep,’ Arthur replied through gritted teeth. ‘Lucky him. I’d quite like to be asleep myself.’
‘No one asked you to get up,’ Granny puffed harder on her pipe.
Arthur said nothing and immediately left the bedroom.
And so she lay there, puffing on her pipe and mulling things over and over. Come morning she’d go and see Stan and hope he was up to talking things over. All she really knew was hearsay; little more than gossip. Granny felt that if she could just sit down and talk to Stan, go through everything that had happened on the day of the fete, she would be able to uncover some little detail that would prove his innocence.
For Stan must surely be innocent
Granny finished the pipe off and placed it on the nightstand and then rolled over and pulled the quilt up beneath her chin. Suddenly exhausted she closed her eyes and was fast asleep by the time Arthur returned with two cups of tea.
‘Typical,’ Arthur grumbled and placed the cups on the nightstand before climbing in next to his wife. Within a few moments he was also asleep, the two cups of tea sat untouched on the nightstand.
Seven
Nigel smiled as he watched Natalie park the Corsa. She was certainly improving and had managed to reverse into Sheila’s driveway, which was a first since she usually drove in and then reversed out into traffic. Still she seemed to have gotten the hang of it now.
‘Well done,’ Nigel said, and then opened the door for her to step out. ‘We’ll have you doing three point turns and pulling in for tractors in the lanes in no time. You’re most certainly improving.’
‘I would be,’ Natalie grumbled. ‘It’s driving around all these narrow roads. At least in London the roads are wide enough and don’t seem to have been designed with a horse and cart in mind.’
‘I think it’s rather beautiful around here,’ Nigel said. It was another fine summer morning and Nigel found it a pleasant change after the hustle and bustle of city life. It was nice to hear bird song rather than the constant barping of car horns or the strain of oversized engines.
Natalie smiled and then leaned forward and kissed him gently on the cheek.
‘You’re intended’s watching through the window,’ she whispered.
Nigel turned and waved to his future wife and then took one of Natalie’s hands.
‘This time next week she’ll be my wife,’ he said.
‘Oh bliss,’ Natalie replied. ‘ She’ll make a decent man of you yet.’
‘ I wouldn’t think so,’ Nigel answered with a smile.
‘I hope not in any case,’ Natalie squeezed his hand.
‘ Come on,’ Nigel led her towards the house. ‘I’ll get my dearly beloved to rustle you up some breakfast.
‘I’ll have to go back to London tomorrow,’ Natalie said as they walked up the garden path. ‘Just for the weekend. I’ll be back Sunday.’
Nigel nodded his agreement.
‘Hopefully there’ll be a few developments,’ he said. ‘But Sheila’s going to be taking wedding invitations around the village this morning, so we’ll get some time alone today.’
Natalie squeezed his hand as they stepped into the house.
‘I can’t even make the funeral arrangements,’ Stan said. ‘The police won’t say when I’ll be able to do that. They won’t release the body and I can’t stand do think of my Edith laid up in the police morgue, alongside drug addicts and winos.’
‘It’s awful,’ Maud said and gave Stan a gentle smile.
‘Aye,’ Arthur nodded.
‘It’ll all sort itself out,’ Granny said, thinking that they should maybe change the subject. Stan looked absolutely drained and, as difficult as it was, he needed something to take his mind off his troubles.
They were in Granny’s living room, drinking tea and passing the time of day with idle chat. Granny’s home tended to serve as a kind of communal meeting place, always had, and on times could contain upwards of a dozen friends and neighbours. Today was more subdued and there were only the four of them, but it felt strange without Edith being here. Of course her death hung over proceedings, which made her, by default, a very real presence in the room. No matter what they tried to talk about, the subject always came back to Edith. All other topics of conversation seemed trivial in comparison.
Stan had been here since early this morning and seemed loath to return to his own home, which was understandable given the
strain he was under, while Maud had popped around an hour or so ago and showed no indication of leaving. She was on her third cup of tea and had lost count of the number of menthol cigarettes she’d smoked, though the pile of stubs in the ashtray told the story all too clearly. She’d need another packet soon.
Granny sat in her chair, like a Queen holding court over her subjects. She had her pipe; filled with a rich Latakia and Virginia blend, clamped between her teeth and every now and then she would nod and send a thick plume of smoke towards the ceiling.
‘I’ll have no life without her,’ Stan said. ‘ What will I do without my Edith? I may as well go to prison.’
‘Don’t talk like that,’ Granny said. ‘Someone killed Edith but we all know it wasn’t you, and the police’ll find out who it was. Sooner or later they’ll find out and then you can put things in order and get on with your life.’
‘Life,’ Stan said. ‘What good is it without Edith?’
‘Life goes on,’ Granny gently scolded Stan. ‘Edith wouldn’t have wanted you to mope about and fall to pieces. She’d have wanted you to get on with things and you will get on with things.’
Before another word could be said there was a knock on the front door and Arthur got up and went to answer the caller. A few moments later he returned with Sheila in tow.
‘Sheila’s brought us a wedding invitation,’ Arthur said, reading directly from a small card: ‘Nigel Charlton and Sheila Clacket request the pleasure of your company at their marriage ceremony.’
‘No Nigel,’ Maud observed. “I thought you two were inseparable.’
‘Oh, he spending the afternoon with his daughter, Natalie,’ Sheila said. ‘She’s got to go back to London for the weekend, and they’ve hardly seen each other since she came down. What with the wedding to sort out and everything that goes with it, we’ve not had a moment to spare.’
‘Never mind with Nigel’s daughter back in London that’ll leave the lovebirds all alone,’ Maud said and grinned. She took her leopard skin cigarette case from her bag and popped another of the menthol cigarettes between her teeth, her lipstick looked vividly scarlet in contrast to the white filter tip.
‘I’ve brought yours,’ Sheila blushed and handed an envelope to Maud. She was carrying a dozen or so of the small golden envelopes, and for a moment it seemed she was about to hand one over to Stan, when a look of horror crossed her face.
‘I’m so sorry,’ she said. ‘ How insensitive of me. I just didn’t see you there. I am so deeply sorry.’
Granny sighed.
Once more, it seemed, they were back on the subject of Edith’s death.
Stan looked at Sheila but the expression on his face said that he was out to lunch, not quite with it. He frowned, stood and pointed.
‘It was you, ‘ he said, his hands shaking, his eyes bulging.
Sheila dropped the cards she had been carrying and her hands went to her mouth in a theatrical gesture that could have come from a 1940’s noir movie. Her eyes widened as she watched the seemingly demented man before her.
‘What,’ she stammered.
Arthur stood and placed an arm around his friend’s shoulders, but Stan pulled away, staring at Sheila again. For one awful moment it looked as if he was going to attack the woman but then he shook his head and barged out of the room.
The front door sounded as he left the house.
‘I’d better go after him,’ Arthur said and left the house.
‘What did he mean?’ Sheila asked, bending to pick up her cards. ‘What was me?’ her hands were trembling as she picked at the cards, having to get her nails under them to lift them from the carpet. Once she had done so she sat herself down on the sofa and seemed to go into some sort of trance.
‘I’m home,’ came Gerald’s high-pitched voice as he slammed the back door behind him.
‘That’s all we need,’ Granny muttered to herself. There were times when her son’s constant cheerfulness could be infectious but this was not one of them.
Gerald waltzed into the room, cheerfully swinging a carrier bag that held the logo of a well-known clothing chain. He looked at the three women’s faces, which seemed to be sucking all the sunshine from the room and the smile on his lips was quickly replaced with a frown.
‘Somebody died?’ Gerald was not aware of his insensitive the wise crack was given all that had happened of late, but he got no reply other than a stern look from his mother. He shrugged his shoulders and left again. Whatever was happening here he wanted nothing to do with it and he suddenly felt the urge to escape to his room and his Diana Ross record collection.
Granny looked at Sheila and felt intense sympathy for the woman. Stan’s outburst had clearly shaken her up, no more than that it had scared her.
But what had Stan meant by that?
Surely, not that Sheila had murdered Edith?
No, Granny told herself. Stan had no more idea who the killer had been than anyone else.
What then had he meant?
“It was you,” he had said, clearly directing the accusation at Sheila, though what it was Sheila had supposed to have done remained, for the moment at least, a mystery.
‘What did he mean?’ Sheila was now openly sobbing. ‘What was me?’
‘There,’ Maud, menthol ciggie in mouth went and sat next to Sheila and tapped her back to comfort her. ‘Don’t let it bother you. Stan’s not himself. We all know that.’
‘It was probably all this talk of a wedding,’ Sheila nodded. ‘It must hurt for Stan to see someone so joyous when he feel as if his entire world has ended. Poor man.’
‘Yes,’ Maud looked at the wedding invitation Sheila had handed her. ‘That’ll be it.’
‘Poor man,’ Sheila said again.
‘I’ll get you a cup of tea,’ Granny got to her feet and cringed at the ache in her back. ‘That’s help calm you down. But I wouldn’t let it worry you too much. As you say Stan’s under a lot of strain and he’s not himself, probably didn’t know what he was saying.’
Sheila nodded, sobbed.
‘Thank you,’ she said.
Eight
Granny stormed into the police station and went straight to the reception counter, which was unmanned.
Typical, the old woman thought.
There was a bell on the counter with a sign that told visitors to ring for attention, and Granny did so. She pressed the button twice and then once more for luck.
Several minutes passed during which Granny read the posters that were stuck to the wall with yellowing sticky tape. She had learned all about the threat of the Colorado Beetle and had been warned that speed kills and told what to do if she thought a loved one was addicted to drugs, before she grew impatient and once more pressed the bell upon the counter.
‘Shop,’ she shouted, leaning over the counter and trying to see into the rear of the station. She rang the bell thrice more in quick succession. She was about to ring again when she saw a familiar face coming through from the rear of the building.
‘Dai Twice,’ Granny smiled. ‘There’s nice you look in your uniform.’
Constable David Davies, more commonly known as David Two-Times and even more commonly as Dai Twice, frowned.
‘It’s Constable Davies when I’m on duty, Granny.’
‘But what are you doing here?’ Granny asked. ‘You’re a plastic bobby, one of those specials. I thought you just walked the streets checking on tax discs and giving the village kids a hard time. All the real police out hiding in bushes with speed cameras, are they?’
‘I am the real police,’ Twice snapped.
‘Of course you are,’ Granny smiled. ‘No offence meant, Dai.’
‘I have the same powers as the regular police,’ Twice said, obviously haven’t taken offence. He would have liked to adopt a sterner tone with the old lady but she had known him all his life, and was a distant relation on his father’s side, so he found it difficult to muster up sufficient ire.
Granny was about to make a crack about T
wice being given his own speed camera soon, but though better of it.
‘And I’m on desk duty,’ Twice continued. ‘Now Granny, the question is what do you want here?’
‘I want to see Chief Inspector Miskin,’ Granny said.
‘Why?’
‘Because I have information for him.’
‘What information?’
‘Never you mind, Dai Twice,’ Granny said and upon noticing the look on Twice’s face added: ‘Constable Davies.’
‘Very well,’ Twice said. ‘You wait there. I’ll go and see if the inspector’s available.’
Granny sighed and sat herself down on the worn bench that ran the length of the far wall. She picked up a leaflet from the stack besides her and read all about safe sex. It was woeful reading material but was marginally more interesting than the statistics concerning the Colorado Beetle. She was marvelling at the sheer variety of bizarre things that people voluntarily did to each other, when Dai Twice opened the door besides the reception partition and told her to follow him.
‘What’s this about, then?’ Twice asked as he led the old woman down a corridor towards the back of the building.
‘Colorado Beetles,’ Granny said and smiled at the look on Twice’s face.
‘Beetles?’ Twice wasn’t all sure if Granny was being serious or not, but something was up and he had expected the chief inspector to turn her away, but as soon as he had announced her presence he had been told to show her in. This was all deeply strange and whatever business the old woman had with the inspector, Twice doubted it had anything to do with beetles, Colorado or otherwise since the only beetles the old woman would know anything about were, John, Paul, George and Ringo.
‘Oh yes,’ Granny said. ‘Nasty little pests, but I do believe they practise safe sex.’
‘Yes, er, um - well,’ Twice said. The word sex had sounded dirty coming out of the old woman’s mouth and the constable felt himself blushing. He was relieved when they reached the inspector’s door. He knocked and then opened the door, allowing Granny to enter.’