Murder By Mudpack: A Honey Driver Mystery (Honey Driver Mysteries)

by Jean G. Goodhind

  Feeling like a vandal, she punched at the plywood. It gave. There was just enough room for her fingers. She could cling on. In the meantime she called for help.

  Then it started to rain – heavily. The sound was astounding. Driven by a rising wind, it was hammering against the building, clattering against the windows. Puddles were already forming in the flower bed below – when she happened to glance that way. After all, if she’d been climbing Everest or even the face of the Empire State Building, someone would be telling her not to look down. And she wasn’t going to. No way!

  Her voice was getting lost on the wind. It was also getting weaker, the loud yell reduced to something like a croak.

  Chapter Twenty-seven

  Doherty was thoughtful as he made his way back along the path to the front of the house and his waiting car. Just as Honey had done, he stopped and admired his surroundings.

  ‘Very nice,’ he murmured.

  And it was.

  Lord Macrottie was a stickler for keeping the greenery in order and was very keen on growing his own vegetables. Doherty had commented on his green fingers and expressed his admiration that his lordship was helping the environment.

  He’d thought his comment would have been welcomed with some graciousness but it hadn’t happened. Either his lordship was consistently ungracious or the comment was irrelevant.

  The gravel crunched beneath his feet as he made for his car, opened the door and slid in.

  It was something of a surprise to see the empty passenger seat. He stared at it for a split second as though he might be mistaken and Honey had merely flipped off into another dimension and would reappear at any minute.

  But Honey was no character from a fourth dimension, he told himself – though it sometimes felt that way.

  Although the rain was beating a samba on the roof he had to go and find her; it was the gentlemanly thing to do.

  Luckily he’d brought an umbrella, a snazzy telescopic one that leapt fully open at the touch of a button.

  He headed away from the car and towards the house. He called her just the once. Calling for a second time seemed a waste of effort, the way the rain was hammering down.

  ‘Honey?’

  Puddles were forming fast on the driveway, which made him think the gravel had been applied only thinly, just enough to hide the grit and mud beneath.

  One puddle was beginning to run into another and another and another, each one nearer the house. The sight of it filled him with boyish nostalgia. He could remember damming up puddles with bits of brick, stone, and mud when he was a kid, or digging his own version of the Panama Canal and channelling the water from one puddle to another.

  Happy days, he thought, but then reminded himself that the present wasn’t so bad either, especially since he’d met Honey. Not that he’d told her that. But he would soon. And that wasn’t all he had to tell her. He had to mention Cheryl. He knew she’d noticed his furtiveness when answering phone calls from his ex-wife. She’d looked at him questioningly. He’d avoided admitting anything, but it couldn’t last. He’d get caught out sooner or later.

  His eyes stayed fixed on the puddles while the rain continued to hammer on his umbrella.

  His cell phone suddenly chirped into life. It was her. Cheryl.

  ‘She’s not home yet!’

  ‘Well she isn’t with me.’

  ‘How do I know you’re not lying?’

  Doherty sighed. How the hell had he and Cheryl got together in the first place? He came to the conclusion it must have been sheer lust. It certainly couldn’t have been compatibility and certainly not love. They loathed each other. His daughter was the only good thing to come out of the marriage – though she was only good sometimes.

  ‘Look, Cheryl, I can’t talk now. I’m busy.’

  ‘You always were.’

  She cut the connection before he had chance to say anything else, like pointing out to her that she was always spending money – more than he earned.

  He stared at the phone wondering whether she could read his thoughts. No, he decided. Technology hadn’t gone that far just yet.

  The trouble with Cheryl was that she continually fretted when Rachel was out of her sight – more specifically when she thought she was with her father.

  The girl was old enough to be out and about on her own, for God’s sake!

  The phone chirped for a second time. Sensing it was Cheryl again he considered ignoring it. Still, he couldn’t count on that.

  The number shown on the readout was not instantly recognizable. It wasn’t Cheryl.

  ‘Hello.’

  ‘Dad?’

  Rachel!

  ‘Where are you?’

  ‘I’m still in Bath. I’m looking for a flat. I’m not going home. I don’t care what you say, I’m not going home.’

  ‘So you want to be independent.’

  Cheryl wouldn’t believe that, of course. He sensed a storm brewing and it had nothing to do with the rain coming down in sheets.

  ‘Will you help me get somewhere to stay?’

  ‘Where are you at present?’

  ‘In the park.’

  ‘Christ!’ He threw back his head. ‘You’re not sleeping there?’

  ‘No. I got offered this place by some guy who was going away for a while, but it’s only temporary.’

  ‘OK,’ he said, nodding slowly. ‘I’ll get you somewhere to stay.’

  They arranged to meet.

  What with the rain and the phone, he didn’t hear Honey trying to attract his attention – not even when he’d terminated the connection.

  Water was dripping from the building. Some droplets were bigger than others and the noise on his umbrella was deafening.

  Honey saw him from out of the corner of her eye.

  ‘Hey!’

  He was on the phone. He didn’t hear.

  She turned as far as she dared without losing her grip. She couldn’t see his face and couldn’t really hear what was being said.

  Anyway, curiosity about who might be phoning him was of secondary concern.

  The soft lead of the window frame was getting softer beneath the heat and the pressure of her fingertips. The small square of lead was beginning to bow outwards.

  ‘Oh, help,’ she said to herself in a wee voice. Then louder. ‘Steve! Help me!’

  The rain was furious, the wind whipping it on to Steve’s umbrella with hurricane force.

  He was right beneath her now, oblivious to her shouts and seemingly mesmerized by the sight of the puddles and a small duck that had decided to take up residence.

  Her fingers were going numb. Her hair was soaking wet and plastered against her head. The lead framing of that particular section of window frame was like putty beneath her touch. It was ballooning outwards, more and more, and more …

  Suddenly it went.

  It was hard to make out who was the most surprised; Honey, Steve Doherty, or the duck that had perhaps been looking for a quiet life, isolation from its extended family. The duck went screeching into the air. Steve fell solidly on to his back.

  He’d tipped both his head and his umbrella back at the right moment. She’d caught him squarely amidships so that he ended up spread-eagled in the puddles he’d been admiring, the umbrella spinning off like a top.

  ‘What the hell were you doing up there?’

  He sounded angry. He looked angry. It wasn’t often he lost patience with her, but this was certainly one of those times.

  ‘Nothing broken,’ she exclaimed with relief.

  ‘There wouldn’t be,’ he said between wheezing breaths. ‘I can’t say the same for myself.’

  He was holding his arm protectively across his midriff. The breath had been knocked out of him.

  Apologizing profusely, she helped him to his feet. He leaned forward, hands on knees and trying to catch his breath.

  ‘Phew! Fooo,’ he said, which Honey roughly translated as ‘I think you’ve punctured my lungs, but don’t worry, I’ll get over
it.’

  A few coughs followed before he straightened and asked the question he’d asked previously – though this time more vehemently, and with a lot more bad language.

  Honey winced at each word, not daring to interrupt. At last it appeared he’d either run out of words or run out of breath; possibly both.

  He fixed her with those deep blue eyes of his. Another time, another place, she might have leapt on him again, though less violently. But not today. The grass was too wet and the weather inclement. All the same, she couldn’t help making some kind of affectionate gesture.

  ‘Steve, sweetie. Let me kiss it better.’

  She threw her arms around his neck and hugged him close.

  He yelped with pain. ‘Ouch!’ One hand went to the small of his back, another to his ribs as he rocked on his heels.

  ‘Sorry! Sorry! Sorry!’

  Honey reached for him again, but didn’t dare touch.

  ‘Does it hurt that much?’

  ‘You’re no lightweight.’

  ‘Ouch! That hurt. I did call out to you, but you didn’t hear me.’

  He immediately regretted what he’d said. ‘OK. So what the hell were you doing up there anyway?’

  She cosied up to him like Guy Fawkes admitting he had a barrel of gunpowder in his back pocket. ‘Haven’t you noticed?’

  Detective Inspector Steve Doherty prided himself on being a pretty observant copper, but what he might have observed and what Honey might have observed were two different things.

  Honey went ahead and enlightened him.

  ‘Look at it.’

  She pointed at the window where she’d been clinging like a sparrowhawk just a few minutes earlier. ‘That window isn’t complete. It’s got bits of glass missing – luckily for me as it turned out. And these steps,’ she said, pulling on his sleeve, dragging him to the steps and pointing at the crumbling stone. ‘The brickwork is crumbling too.’

  Doherty took it all in and agreed that some aspects of the old building needed a bit of TLC.

  ‘Isn’t that why he’s been in contact with English Heritage? Don’t they fund renovations and all that?’

  She agreed that they did. ‘But they haven’t got bottomless pockets. Inside as well as out, this place needs more than tender loving care. That’s what I was doing up there; I wanted to see whether the inside is as rough as the outside. The room on the left seems OK, but the one on this side needs serious attention. Most of the ceiling is on the floor, there are gaps in the floorboards, and the windows are falling out.’

  ‘You learned all that being perched on a windowsill?’

  ‘I had a lot of time to study the subject due to a lack of knights in shining armour.’

  Doherty looked thoughtful. ‘Well, we can’t hold letting an historic house fall to rack and ruin against him.’

  Honey stared at him, shaking her head in disbelief.

  ‘Don’t you see? He has to plant vegetables in order to survive. He’s strapped for cash, Steve. Stony broke, in fact!’

  ‘And your point is?’

  She shrugged. What was her point? The fact was that she was so carried away with all this she’d forgotten that Lord Macrottie was not a suspect. And why should he be? His wife had been staying at the beauty clinic while he’d held the fort at home here, planting his veggie patch and such like.

  ‘He could have sneaked in and done her in for the insurance money.’

  Doherty shook his head.

  ‘He’s got a cast-iron alibi. He was playing skittles at the local pub. There were witnesses.’

  ‘Oh!’

  She thought again of the sighting of the scruffy character in the grounds of The Beauty Spot. ‘He was wearing the right clothes,’ she pointed out.

  Doherty sighed. ‘And before you mention the gardener and the fact that his clothes are scruffy, don’t go there. You’re clutching at straws.’

  Honey exhaled a lungful of air which helped blow wet fronds of hair away from her face.

  ‘It was a thought. Shall we make tracks?’

  His phone rang. It surprised her when he walked off hugging it to his ear, one hand cuffed around his mouth.

  This was new.

  ‘Was it something I said?’

  He didn’t hear her. She hadn’t said it loud enough for him to hear.

  He’d checked the caller on the screen before heading off, so he knew who it was and he didn’t want her to hear the conversation.

  She’d never had him do that before. Even if the Chief Constable was on the end of the phone, he’d still stay close to her. There had never been any secrets between them and definitely no subterfuge. Having him make it so obvious he didn’t want her to hear shouldn’t hurt her, but it did.

  Ever since they’d got together they’d been open with each other. A small incident, she said to herself. Take no notice.

  But she couldn’t help it and when she thought about it, she realized he had been a little offhand lately. Usually he’d invited her along to interview just about everyone connected with the case. Initially he’d had her stay at The Beauty Spot. Something had happened just after that to change things and she didn’t know what.

  Yes, just lately he’d definitely been a little offhand. Not in a nasty way, it had to be said, but furtively, bluntly, as if he was half way to telling her his problem but couldn’t quite make it.

  But what problem?

  What secret?

  Another woman?

  It was the obvious solution. Her insides crawled around at the thought of it. She tried swallowing and telling herself she was letting her imagination run away with her. It didn’t work. There was an empty feeling in her stomach as though she hadn’t eaten for days.

  He nodded silently and looked away from her. Something was on his mind. She could tell. He hadn’t said anything saucy. Doherty always said something saucy to her, especially when he was about to get her alone. OK, his car was small, but it was cosy. Thighs and shoulders rubbed nicely together as they drove along.

  Usually he would kiss her once they were seated and belted up. But he didn’t.

  ‘Is something wrong?’

  He switched on the engine. ‘I’ve got something to tell you. Something I should have told you before.’

  The houses around the old mansion that housed The Beauty Spot were recently built and although two-thirds of the project was complete, the final third was still in the construction stage.

  The truck delivering yet another load of cement which would form the foundations of another detached house had backed into position. The huge drum was turning, keeping the cement at the right consistency. The chute that would deliver the cement was in place.

  Everything was set to go until the driver spotted something he didn’t like. Usually there were at least two construction workers working the chute so that the cement was laid evenly. Today there was only one.

  The driver shouted. ‘Are you all there is this morning?’

  Nodding, the man shouted over the din. ‘’Fraid so. Me mate’s gone for the tea.’

  The driver rolled his eyes and swore under his breath.

  He glanced at the clock in the dashboard of the truck. He didn’t like delivering part of the load with only one bloke keeping his eyes on things. Normally he might have hung about until someone else arrived, but he had another drop to do after this. There was no way he could hang about.

  ‘I’ll chance it,’ he muttered to himself and pressed the button.

  Kevin, the guy who was overseeing the operation, was feeling pleased with himself. He was young and inexperienced but loved to feel important. He’d almost whooped with joy when old Charlie had pronounced he needed a cup of tea and the bathroom.

  ‘Give me a shout when the cement arrives,’ he’d said.

  Kevin had said that he would do that, though in reality he had it in mind to prove to all and sundry how efficient he could be – given the chance. And here was the chance! He could do this by himself. All he had to do was to make
sure the cement went in evenly. If it didn’t then it was in with shovels to even it out, and nobody wanted to do that.

  The pump kicked in and Kevin was there, positioning the chute so that the mix coming out went to where it was wanted.

  Like a thick grey pudding mix, it spewed out of the chute into the waiting trench.

  Unfortunately for Kevin, he hadn’t considered that the force of the ejection gave the chute an energy all of its own.

  Like a huge serpent, it writhed away from him, promptly filling then overfilling a portion of trench while Kevin tried frantically to bring it back under control.

  Horrified, he gazed at the mountain of cement building up in one place.

  ‘Shut it off! Shut it off,’ he shouted.

  Out of the corner of his eye he saw old Charlie staggering towards him as fast as his old legs could go.

  He could see the old guy’s mouth opening wide and imagined what he was saying.

  ‘Shit,’ he muttered as the chute came to a juddering halt. ‘Shit!’

  He saw old Charlie looking into the trench. It was difficult to read the look on his face, but it certainly wasn’t pretty, in fact it was the worst look he’d ever seen on anyone’s face.

  In his mind he was already collecting his cards and wages due plus a warning never to darken the site again. Perhaps if he apologized and begged profusely enough …?

  The driver leapt down from his cab, fists clenched and face red with anger.

  At first sight he’d looked as though he was going to use his fists, but there must have been something about the look of horror on old Charlie’s face.

  His expression a mix of anger and puzzlement, the driver gave Kevin a push as he strode by.

  Old Charlie was pointing now, his mouth open but no sound coming out.

  The driver stood next to Charlie. His jaw dropped too.

  Kevin, feeling pale and wobbly, looked down to where they were looking.

  The painted fingernails and the fine white hand looked incongruous among all that cement.

  Kevin balked and shook his head. ‘I didn’t see her. Honest I didn’t.’

  The driver, his eyes still on the woman’s hand, got out his cell phone and called the police.