by JL Merrow
“Maybe. To someone like that.”
I hoped they’d burn in hell. If, you know, it existed.
Phil carried on. “Or maybe your sister wasn’t the intended victim, have you thought of that?”
“That’d make more sense. If they thought it was Greg they were poisoning.”
“Or you.”
I choked on my cappuccino. Must be the biscotti crumbs. “You what? Why’d anyone want to kill me?”
Phil didn’t say, Because they’ve met you? which I was grateful for. “Why does anyone kill anyone?” he asked instead.
“You want to get all philosophical about it? I don’t know. Money, sex… Uh, maybe they were being blackmailed? They weren’t being blackmailed, by the way. At least, not by me. If I was supposed to be the victim.”
“Were you having sex with them?” He smirked at me over the rim of his mug.
“Well, Dave did say you’d be suspect number one if I ever kick the bucket in dodgy circs, so maybe.”
Phil nodded. “Yeah, that’s why I’d never poison you.”
“Thank God for small mercies.”
“I’d push you off a ladder or booby-trap your toaster. Make it look like an accident. Safest way.”
A woman on the next table shrieked with laughter, but I was fairly sure it was at something her friend had said, not the thought of Phil getting domestically violent with me. “Glad to hear you’ve got my untimely death all planned out. Oi, you didn’t tell Dave about this theory of yours, did you? They’ll be on you like a bloody rash if you did.” The last thing we needed was a bunch of flatfooted policemen poking their noses into our relationship.
“Course not. I’m not daft.” He paused. “Might be an idea if I move in with you for a bit, though. Just in case.”
“See, now, if you were trying to off me, that’s just what you’d do, innit? All those opportunities to shove me downstairs and say I tripped over the cat.” I wasn’t sure how I felt about him moving in. Yeah, it was nice waking up to him in my bed, and all right, I liked the cosy evenings and, yeah, the shagging, but did I really want him here all the time? Wasn’t that how the magic went out of a relationship? Plus, I’d have to start keeping the place tidy all the time. Phil’s flat was always immaculate, now he’d got rid of the last of the boxes from moving in.
Course, now I came to think about it, I’d never dropped round unannounced. Too much of a faff to find he wasn’t even in, so I always called first. Maybe he was a closet slob. Anyway, I decided to deal with his moving-in suggestion by the fiendishly cunning and mature method of ignoring it completely. “Right, assuming it’s not you, what does that leave? Money? I wish. Nah, can’t be me. Not unless Mum, Dad, Cherry and Richard all ganged up to get their hands on my two-bed semi in Fleetville. Which, I might add, is still mostly owned by the mortgage company.”
“What about your auntie’s legacy?”
“Seriously? You reckon Mr. M’s tried to off me to stop me getting my hands on a half share in his des res in Mill Hill? We don’t even know that’s what the legacy was—and anyway, wouldn’t it just go to my family?”
“Not necessarily. Some wills have a clause in saying the beneficiary has to outlive the deceased by at least thirty days. Look, I’m not saying you were the intended victim. I’m just saying it’s possible, all right? You were holding that drink for a while; they could have thought it was yours. It’s more likely than they thought it was Greg’s, anyway.”
“Shit.” My cappuccino curdled in my stomach.
“What is it?”
“I nearly drank some of it. I mean, I was wondering what Cherry was drinking, so I picked it up to have a sniff, but I didn’t want to make it obvious, so I pretended I was having a sip. I mean, I nearly did drink some.”
Phil frowned. “You’d have been fine. Cherry must have drunk more of it than that, and she’s going to be okay.” He still didn’t look happy about it, which was fine by me. I certainly wasn’t happy about it. “Has it ever occurred to you this whole legacy thing is a bit iffy? I mean, I get how your auntie wanted to have a last laugh with you about your hidden talents, but why hide something in her ex-husband’s house? Come to that, how did she even manage to do it?”
I shrugged. “Maybe he hasn’t changed the locks in the last fifteen years? I don’t know.”
“So what, you reckon your terminally ill auntie hopped onto the train from Scotland and came all this way, turning up fortuitously right when her ex happened to be out—which at his age probably only happens once every other month; you know what old people are like—nipped into the old place and stashed her will under the floorboards? Why not hide it in her own house? Or at least in her own bloody country?”
I shuffled my bum on my seat. When he put it like that, it did seem a bit daft. “Maybe she got someone to do it for her?”
“Who do you know that she’s kept in touch with down here?”
“Well, no one, apart from me. That I know of, I mean. It doesn’t mean she didn’t.”
“Even if she did have help, it’s a lot of bother. So why did she bother?”
“I don’t know!” I glanced around the place. The people at the next table had been replaced by a fat bloke with his iPad, and I hadn’t even noticed. “Maybe she was worried I wouldn’t go for it if it was too far away?”
“So why’s it so important to her you go along with it?” Phil leaned forward, pointing his teaspoon at my chest. “Maybe her will isn’t the only thing hidden in that house. Maybe that’s what she really wants you to find. ’Cause once you get in there, you’ll start getting vibes, or whatever, from anything hidden, won’t you?”
“Well, yeah. What do you reckon it is, though?”
“Maybe she murdered his first wife and buried the body under the patio? And now she’s dead, she wants the truth to be known?”
“Oi, Auntie Lol wasn’t a murderess.” I thought about it. “Mr. M could have done it, though. Maybe he’s got a whole bloody harem of wives buried under there. Like Bluebeard. Oh, bloody hell.” My gut twisted.
“What?”
“I just realised. That’d be a motive, wouldn’t it? For him to try and kill me. To stop me finding the bodies.” Was it me, or was it bloody chilly in here all of a sudden?
“Right. Well, you’re the one who’s met this Morangie bloke. Was he at the party?”
All at once, it warmed up again. “Oh. No, he wasn’t. I mean, I didn’t see him. And I think I would’ve noticed him, if he’d been there.” I gazed moodily into the dregs of my cappuccino, feeling like a muppet. Then I looked up. “Hang on, he’s got a son, hasn’t he? Maybe he sent him to do the dirty work?”
“So if your dad just gave you a call and said, Listen, son, I want you to go to a party and poison someone you’ve never met, you’d just up and do it, would you?”
“Well, no. But we’re not that close. Never have been.”
Phil raised an eyebrow. “We’re pretty close, you and me. Certainly were this morning, as I recall. If I asked you to go to a party and poison someone, would you do it then?”
“No! Fuck it, I’m not a murderer.” I may have said it a bit loud. The bloke on the table next to us shot me a startled look, quickly followed by a nervous smile. Which was daft, getting all worked up about it, seeing as I’d just said I wasn’t a murderer.
“See? That’s how most people would react. Still, might be worth looking into. How old’s this son supposed to be?”
“Dunno. Twenties? Thirties? Must be somewhere around there.”
Phil nodded. “I’ll see what I can turn up about him. You done there?”
I nodded, and we stood up, pulled on our jackets and headed out to brave the cold and the market-day crowds.
“I’m supposed to be going to Mr. M’s house in a couple of days,” I remembered. “Cherry set it up.”
“What day?”
“Monday. In the morning. Why?”
“Want me to come with?”
“Why?”
“H
ow about to make sure you don’t drink any nicotine cocktails?”
“If he starts offering cocktails at ten o’clock in the morning and I don’t twig, there’s something funny going on, I probably deserve to get poisoned.”
“Right. Because he’d never think of putting it in a cup of coffee.”
“I’m not totally daft, you know. Look, just hang a sign round my neck that says Nil by mouth, all right?”
Phil looked like he was seriously considering it. Then he glanced along the road at the market stalls. “Are we going to say hello to Darren while we’re here?” Phil had met Darren when I’d taken him up the Devil’s Dyke a while back. They got on disturbingly well, God knows why. Phil and my mate Gary, Darren’s bloke, still hadn’t really taken to each other. I’d have liked to think it was loyalty on Gary’s part and him reckoning Phil wasn’t really good enough for me, what with all our history and all. But basically I was fairly sure they just got on each other’s tits.
Darren and Phil, though, they got on like a house on fire. And I had a feeling I was the one who was going to end up with third-degree burns. “Well, I said hi to him only the other day…”
“So? I didn’t, did I?”
“Yeah, I s’pose.” We couldn’t be more than fifty yards away from Darren’s pitch, so there was no excuse not to drop in on him really. We wandered down the street, Phil’s shoulders taking up way too much room in the narrow gap between stalls and shop fronts. Past the sock stall, past the silver jewellery, past the hat stall, past the ladies’ undies, and there we were at Darren’s fruit-and-veg emporium. We heard him before we saw him, of course. He was in full voice, extolling the virtues of seasonal produce.
“Git your brussels sprouts, they’re not just for Christmas. Come on, ladies, fresh cauli, pahnd a—” He broke off mid-spiel to flash a grin at Phil so wide you could see his gold tooth. “Well, if it ain’t Dirk Gently. How yer doing, mate?”
Phil smiled back. “Not too bad. Yourself?”
“Dirk Gently?” I interrupted. “If that’s your porn-star name, it needs a bit of work. Stab Ruggedly, maybe, or Shaft Vigorously?”
Phil rolled his eyes. “Prick. Dirk Gently is a fictional private detective. Haven’t you ever heard of Douglas Adams? Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy?”
“Hey, I heard of the film. I just never got around to seeing it, that’s all.”
“Tragic,” Darren put in. “Bet he doesn’t have a bloody clue where his towel is.”
Phil sniggered.
See, this was why I hadn’t been keen on dropping by the stall. “Oi, this better not be some gag about those sanitary things women wear.”
Both of them cracked up.
An old lady in a coat that looked like she’d knitted it herself thirty years ago took pity on my obvious terminal bewilderment. “It’s a quote, dear. The radio show was very popular in its day. It’s supposed to be a good idea to always know where your towel is. Of course, at my age, I always feel I’m doing well if I can remember where my house is.”
I winked at her. “Nah, you look like you’ve got plenty of marbles left.”
“Trouble is, I’ve forgotten where I put them.” Her wrinkly cheeks dimpled.
“Oi, Phil,” Darren’s voice cut in. “Better watch out. Looks like pintsize has got himself a girlfriend.”
She wagged a mitten at him. “You’re a cheeky young man, and I hope you’re ashamed of yourself. Now, I’d like some stewing vegetables, please.”
“Coming right up, so no getting saucy with Tom Thumb there while you’re waiting.” Darren tipped a couple of bowls into a carrier bag and held it ready to hand over. “That’ll be fifty pee.” He waited patiently while she counted out her coins with bloodless fingers. “Cheers, love. You enjoy your supper.”
“Shouldn’t that have been two pounds?” I asked when she’d doddered out of sight.
“Who are you, Chancellor of the bleedin’ Exchequer? Ain’t you heard? Bottom’s dropped right out of the root veg market. It’s all these Waitrose shoppers demanding baby courgettes and premature bloody pea sprouts.” Darren shrugged and rearranged a couple of cabbages. “She ain’t got much. Used to be a nurse, and the pension’s bugger all. When it’s summer, she comes round at packing-up time when I’m selling stuff off cheap, but she don’t like being out after dark.”
“Darren,” I said sincerely. “You give me faith for the future of humanity.”
“Oi, give over. It’s only a couple of turnips, not the national debt of Ethi-bloody-opia. No need to go having a moment over it.”
“Wedding plans going okay?” Phil asked abruptly. He must have been just as uncomfortable with all the genuine emotion and spirit of charity flying around as the rest of us.
“Yeah, great. Few hitches—Gary was all set on releasing a flock of doves, bless his fluffy little heart, but I told him, last thing you want when you’re in your dry-clean-only gear is a load of birds shitting everywhere. And no one wants crap on the cake. So we got that sorted, but now we’re looking at menus. We’re trying to decide between a buffet and a sit-down. What did you have at yours?”
Phil at least had the decency to shoot me an uncomfortable glance. “Sit-down. Wasn’t a big do, though.”
“No? How many did you have?”
“Couple of dozen.”
“Bloody hell, that’s tiny. That’s like the bloody Paretski of weddings.” Har sodding har. “What were you—Billy-no-mates, a Barnardos boy, or both?”
Phil grunted. “None of my family went.”
Something wasn’t right there. “Hang on,” I butted in. “What about all those family Christmases you told me about where you and The Mys—I mean, Mark—had to turn up or get disowned?”
He didn’t answer for a moment. “That was after my dad died.”
Oh. I supposed that explained a couple of things. I wasn’t sure which couple, mind, but I was pretty sure this must have been a significant factor in making up the six-foot-one, emotionally constipated private eye currently squiring me about town. “Um, how’d he die?” I asked weakly.
“Heart attack.” Phil huffed without humour. “Docs told him years before he ought to cut down on the booze and the fried stuff, but he wasn’t having any of it.”
I didn’t know what to say. Phil still looked cut up about it. Maybe they hadn’t been talking when he’d died? I tried to imagine how I’d feel if my dad popped off after we’d had a row, but to be honest, he’s never really done rows. He’s always been more into disappointed looks or, in extreme cases, disappearing into the garden shed for the rest of the day.
Darren nodded sadly. “I’m always telling people they should eat more veg.”
“Chance would be a flippin’ fine thing,” a sharp female voice cut in. “I’ve been standing here half an hour while you lot tell each other your life stories. Any chance I might actually get served today?” She was around my age, her face pinched with cold. Or maybe it was just the Essex up-do giving her a migraine.
Either way, it didn’t seem like a good idea to piss her off anymore. Plus Darren had a living to make. Phil and me said quick good-byes and legged it.
Chapter Twelve
Phil and me had gone our separate ways after we’d talked to Darren. He’d said he had stuff to do, but he’d see me later for a curry. When I opened the door to him that evening, he was lugging a smart leather holdall and a laptop bag.
I raised an eyebrow. “Guess you were serious about moving in, then.” Luckily, I’d had stuff to do that afternoon too, and it’d involved a bit of a blitz on the pigsty that was my house.
“Just for the weekend. If that’s all right.” He hovered, stony-faced, on the doormat for a mo instead of barging past me like he usually did. Shit, was he nervous?
Now I was nervous too. “Er, yeah. Course. Come in.” Bloody hell, any minute now I’d offer to shake hands. But it felt weird, this. A bit, well, significant. Despite the fact he’d stayed over here plenty of nights. But those had just happened. He’d neve
r brought luggage before.
“Thought it’d make sense. In the circumstances,” he muttered, looking at his feet as he wiped them carefully.
“You mean, in case Mr. M pops round and tries to poison me? I thought we’d decided he couldn’t have had anything to do with it, though?” I could have kicked myself the moment I’d said it. Did I want him to bugger off again? “Course, better to be safe than sorry and all that bollocks.”
He gave a quick nod. “There were a lot of people in that place. There’s no guarantee you’d have seen everyone who was there—especially someone you’d only met once, and who was trying to avoid you.”
“He’d have had to be trying bloody hard. Not the sort of looks you forget.” Nice one, Paretski. Go on, shoot yourself in the other foot now.
Phil raised an eyebrow. “Fancy him, did you?”
I shuddered. “Not so much, no. Are you coming in, or were you planning on camping out on the doormat all night?”
He smirked. “Going to make it worth my while?”
“Oh yeah.” I leered at him. “I ordered poppadoms and everything.”
“Think I’m easy, do you? One poppadom and I’m anyone’s?”
“Reckon I’ve got a jar of mango chutney in the cupboard,” I said and licked my lips for good measure.
“Well, in that case, you’re on.” Phil lumbered past me and dumped his bag in the hall. “Kinky sod.”
After an early night that didn’t involve a whole lot of sleep, we had a lazy, shagged-out Sunday morning on the sofa with the papers. Well, I did anyway. Phil had been slouched at the other end of the sofa, Merlin on his lap, making eyes at his phone for the last ten minutes. I had a strong suspicion he was doing some work.
“I want you to go along and take a look at this lot,” he said just as I was about to tell him he might as well stop pretending and get his bloody laptop out. “Says here they meet on Monday nights.”
I folded the sports pages to keep my place for later. There’s a lot to get through on a Sunday. “What lot?”
“The Lea Valley Literati.” He held out his phone and flashed the screen at me. Seeing as the website he was looking at apparently didn’t have a mobile version, all I could read was “ley Lite,” which sounded like something lay readers cut their teeth on when they were just starting out.