by Brian Hughes
“Now that you come to mention it, Inspector, there was something odd about his appearance. He was dressed as a clown.”
The scritch of the nib reached a halt.
“Well, what I saw was a child in some sort of pain,” announced a fragile gentleman. “It appeared to be struggling with something.”
“I saw a small gooseberry with Elvis Costello’s head.” This latest addition to the growing melee came from a sad individual in an all too short boiler suit. “Mind you, I ’aven’t ’ad me pills today.”
At which point the crowd erupted into a tumult of voices. The discord rose in volume, moments later several scuffles breaking loose.
“Making progress, Sir?” Malcolm pulled up alongside Nesbit, the body bag suspended between him and Constable Parkins. Nesbit tapped the end of his nose with his pen, creating several new blackheads on the bulb.
“Parkins! ’Ave this lot arrested and locked up, until they can sort out their story.”
This brought a halt to the argument. It didn’t last long, the angry crowd turning on the floundering constable instead. Nesbit turned to Clewes and rubbed his eyes.
“I think Malcolm, it’s time to call the investigation to an ’alt for the day. Would y’ care to join me for a pint of Old Bastard in the Thatch?”
Chapter Five: The Way through the Woods
Sometimes mysteries have an unfathomable heart. From direst murder to the simple misplacing of a key, some invisible intelligence seems to guide the hand of fate. According to Descartes this is the ‘Evil Genius’ at work. Here in this dark place lurks our ‘Evil Genius’, controlling Greyminster’s serial killer. But this isn’t the mind of the shape-shifting clown.
This is where his destroyer lurks. It’s a dark and festering place, so quiet that a pin-drop could burst an eardrum. What’s this? From the blackness comes a sound. It approaches quickly with the sort of uncomfortable buzz that a swarm of bees would make. A flash of brilliance hurtles past. Lets follow it.
What have we here? The bolt of electricity has disappeared into the passageways of a powerful mind. A mind of unimaginable strength. More obsessive than any yet encountered, playing out its brief life in perpetual repetition.
At which point the reader is no doubt asking, ‘What the Hell is he on about?’ Well, every puzzle has a creator. Answers are not always as obvious as they first appear to be. Have no doubt, we shall return to this unlit world before this book is over.
Malcolm rubbed his eyes and yawned onto the screen of his monitor. The day’s enquiries had resulted in nothing. No other suspects had been drawn up than the wafer-thin man and the transsexual clown.
From the bedrooms on either side his own, he could hear snores, harmonising across the landing. Timothy’s nasal shrill mixed with the bass of his mother’s vibrating palette. These were noises as indicative of the late hour as the beat of a jungle’s night. Downstairs the mantelpiece clock joined in with the chorus as it sounded midnight.
Malcolm focused on the mound of paper at his elbow. It had taken him several hours to download it from the university network. The murder investigation might not have been progressing quickly but there was still plenty of studying to be done for his promotion.
Outside the window Malcolm heard the muffled sounds of tyres on gravel. He recognised the splutter of Nesbit’s Bentley, accompanied by snatches of Mozart’s Eine Klein Nachtmusik. The car door slammed. The crunch of boots grew in volume as Nesbit approached the building. Malcolm sat upright, wearing a frown.
To be ’opes to God at this time of night, the idiot isn’t intendin’ to…
BANG! WALLOP! BANG! BANG!!
Nesbit hammered on the door. Splinters span towards the welcome mat. Moments later Malcolm cleared the bottom four stairs in a single bound. The door burst open, framing Nesbit’s silhouette. He looked down at the sergeant sprawled across the floor. “Malcolm…?”
Too late. The hullabaloo had drawn Mrs Clewes from her sleep. Now she stood on the landing, tugging her cardigan. Timothy’s pale face peered through the banister near her ankles. “What’s ’appened?”
“It’s only the inspector, Mum…” Malcolm hissed. “Go back t’ bed…”
He turned back to Nesbit who was rattling his pipe from one corner of his moustache to the other as though pruning a hedge. “Sir…it’s past midnight.”
“I know that, Clewes. I see your powers of reasonin’ ’aven’t been dampened by the lateness of the hour.” The pipe was removed, its bowl checked for no other reason than to make him look sophisticated, then reinserted at a cocksure angle. “A good policeman never goes off duty.”
“But he does need t’ sleep, Sir.” Malcolm struggled to his feet.
“Nonsense Clewes. I was passin’ and I noticed your light on.” As though this was sufficient explanation for his visit, Nesbit turned and strolled off towards his car. “Come on Clewes, there’s work t’ be done.”
Several facial expressions enacted the drama of Malcolm’s incomprehension. The first act was Anger stormily tossing his brows, with cameo roles from Confusion and Resentment to follow. Malcolm reluctantly gathered his belongings together. He replaced his balaclava on the shelf and glanced at his mother.
“What’s going on Malcolm? What’s he want with y’ now?”
“Just go back t’ bed, Mum. It’s only police business.”
“Well, I’m not ’appy about it. That man’s no right turnin’ up ’ere at this ungodly hour. Off out with ’im now, I suppose?”
“I have to Mum. It’s my job.”
“Have y’ got your vest on?”
“Yes Mum…”
“’Old on. I’ll get the Vick’s. It’s chilly tonight Malcolm. You’ll need to protect your chest. We don’t want Mr Fog getting his fingers into your lungs, do we?”
She disappeared from view. Moments later the bathroom switch was pressed and a carpet of yellow light unfurled down the stairs. Malcolm seized the opportunity to escape.
Mist wrapped itself about his boots as he trudged towards Nesbit’s car. Malcolm knew he was doomed forever to take a back seat in the great journey of life, the only influence he'd ever have being that of stopping the ride every so often whilst he was violently sick.
He reached for the handle and gave a tug. A wall of Mozart hit him. Battling against it he climbed onto the front seat and stifled a yawn.
The London Symphony Orchestra was making his ears hurt. Small phantoms of fog danced around the tree roots as the Bentley made its way down the country lanes.
“Where exactly are we going, Sir?”
“What?”
“I SAID WHERE EXACTLY…” Oh, never mind. I’m sure to find out sooner or later.
Nesbit fumbled for the crumpled paper being tumble-dried above the dashboard. Without removing his pipe, he handed the letter to his colleague.
“This was faxed to the office earlier…” Malcolm managed to catch the odd syllable of that statement above the music. This was what the message read, its characters having been removed from magazines using scissors:
ATT. InsPecT. NESbiT.
I hAve MuRdeREd CoUnciLLor ORdeNsHaw. SErvEs tHe iDiOt RigHT.
wiLL dEpoSit ThE bodY aT The GRid rEFErence iNDicaTEd beLoW.
Beneath this was a scrawled map of Bevel’s Brook. Malcolm studied the letter again. “Have you any idea who sent this, Sir?”
“What?”
“Have you any idea…”
“Psychology, Clewes!” Nesbit tapped his temple with one finger whilst Mozart tore at his sideburns. “Dostoyevsky ’ad a character in Crime and Punishment. Used psychology to capture the murderer. Don’t you ever read books, Sergeant?”
“Yes, Sir. But I haven’t read every book ever written.”
“I set ’im up, Clewes. Gave the Chronicle a false report. Thought that’d bring the bugger out of the woodwork! Only to be ’opes he ’asn’t actually committed the murder!”
“It might just be a forgery, Sir?”
“No, Bevel’s Brook, Clewes. Now
here near the forge! You know what your problem is?” Malcolm couldn’t hear the question, so he ignored it. “Y’ watch too much television. ’Aven’t watched it for years meself. Can’t be doing with all the rubbish! Dulls the senses.”
Nesbit thought about that for a moment. “I could never understand why Steve Austin’s hand had curly black hair when it was in close up.”
“What, Sir?”
“Sorry Clewes. Can’t hear you?”
“Why don’t you turn the cassette down, Sir?”
“What was that, Clewes?”
Malcolm searched desperately for the volume control.
“WHY DON’T YOU…” That was where the conversation ended. The thunderous roar of the orchestra had suddenly vanished leaving only the scream of unravelling cassette.
Malcolm’s head hit the dashboard. There was a long and silent pause. At length:
“What…happened, Sir?”
He sat upright unsteadily, his ginger hair having been flattened into the shape of a speaker. There was no response, just a gurgle that sounded like a bullfrog farting. When Malcolm managed to focus properly, he stared at Nesbit. His superior was prodding at the black bowl submerged in his throat. Malcolm grabbed it and gave a tug. With a wet sounding slop the pipe came free from Nesbit’s gullet.
“Did y’ see it, Clewes?” Nesbit coughed. “There was a man in the road. Just for a moment. Then he vanished.” He flattened his nose against the window. “Look at that? Bevel’s Brook, Clewes. We’re at Bevel’s Brook.”
Malcolm stared at the post hammered into the ditch. Nesbit wrenched the door open and struggled onto the sodden verge. “’Ee must ’ave been tryin’ to tell us somethin’.”
“Who, Sir?”
“The ghost, Clewes. The bloody ghost…that old fellow with the stick.” Nesbit stopped and thought about that. “Yes, well, any’ow…come along, Sergeant. Work t’ be done.” And he fought his way through a thicket of gorse, ignorant of the gate four yards further on.
Here is the cobbled yard at the Barley farm. It’s washed in moonlight and smells of rotting manure. Up above, clouds slither across the moon on mysterious journeys to exotic lands, dragging shadows in their wake.
Two beams of torchlight splinter through the fog like Chinese firecrackers. Two voices arrive in close pursuit, each short of breath.
“Could y’ slow down please, Sir? I don’t think there’s any need to…”
“Murder not enough, Clewes?”
“Well, the truth is, Sir, if Councillor Ordenshaw ’as been murdered we’re not going to be much use tonight, are we?”
And now come the shapes. Two silhouettes. The dancing torches sweep the clutter. One beam follows a trail of footprints before alighting on a row of crucified vermin. Sorrowful moles tacked in crosses to a fence.
The light flickers briefly and then fizzles out. “Shine your torch over ’ere, Sergeant. There’s some sort of sack.” The remaining beam circles the yard in confusion, lands on a sack and shortens in length as Malcolm advances. The bag appears to be moving.
“’Elp us get this thing undone.”
The torch flashes upwards, highlighting the gussets of the clouds. Then with a crash it falls to the ground. Moments later there is a noise like a galleon’s sails.
“What the buggerin’ Nora?”
Honk, honk. Crash! Thud. ‘Ooof’ “Grab ’im! Grab ’im Clewes!” Honk, honk. Crunch! “Bloody ’Ell.” Boot segues spark across the cobbles. Bodies stumble in all directions. Between them hurtles a creature, no taller than three feet.
“I’ve got ’im, Sir. At least, I’ve got somethin’”
“Is it movin’ Clewes?”
“Yes, Sir. But…AAARRRRRGH!!!”
Giles Barley awoke from his troubled slumbers, his dirty hair plastered to his head with perspiration. He blinked at his socks poking out from the end of his duvet. Shouts and howls rose up from the yard below.
Intruders!
He shook his head to dislodge any insects that had set up home in his ears overnight, then grabbed his night-cap before leaping into action. A clang indicated his foot had misjudged the whereabouts of his chamber pot.
Moments later a guttering candle scribbled its light across the walls of the farmhouse. Mrs Barley didn’t hear the sounds of her husband on the stairs. She was fast asleep, her cardigan sleeves rolled up, her corpulent arms immersed in the icy water across which her King Edward’s bobbed.
The fluttering wings of candle light flashed along the muzzle of Giles’ blunderbuss. Several bantams grumbled in their sleep along the draining board. Giles set one cauliflower ear against the door. Raising the barrel to his eyes, his trembling fingers gripped the trigger. Seconds later the door crashed open, bringing splinters from the wall.
Nesbit and Clewes froze. They blinked as Giles Barley attempted to inflate himself into his night-shirt. There was a flash of gunpowder, closely tracked by saltpetre peppering the building behind them. As the smoke cleared, Nesbit raised a finger.
“Put the gun down, Sir. We ’appen to be police officers pursuing a criminal investigation!”
“I don’t cares ’oo you are…” The blunderbuss remained aloft, swinging from the farmer’s head like some sort of gibbet. “You’re on moi property, and that means I’ve got the rights t’ shoot ya.”
“No it doesn’t! You’re obstructin’ an inspector in the course of ’is duties, and as such…”
“What you doin’ with me prize goose?” The barrel sank with the anticlimax of an unsuccessful coupling. Nesbit turned. A bright orange beak clamped him squarely on his nose, as Malcolm struggled with the goose’s neck.
“It’s a trap, Sir!” He gave up and let the goose stomp off towards the slimy horse trough. “A wild goose chase! You know what this means, Sir?”
“Ey!” Nesbit rubbed his swollen nose. “Ith meanth our killer ’ath got a thenth of ’umour thath almost as bad as Richard Whitely’s.”
“No, Sir.” Malcolm’s voice rose in panic. “It means the killer is still on the loose. He’s thrown us off the track, ’cos he’s about t’ strike again!”
What have we here? A shadowy figure behind the Clewes’ residence. It mounts the drainpipe with the precision of a comical acrobat. Its enormous feet slip on the bathroom window ledge. Then it squeezes itself in through the tiny window. A pair of long shoes squeak across the bathroom floor and onto the landing. There is a buzz as a bow tie revolves through three hundred and sixty degrees.
Timothy Clewes slept, the tiny crease of his mouth keeping a pillow feather aloft above his head. Children tend to sleep more soundly than adults. So deeply, in fact, that Timothy didn’t wake up as the clown entered his bedroom. One of its fingers delicately stroked a ginger kiss curl from his forehead.
“Malcolm?” There was a click as the Mickey Mouse night-light cast its nightmarish glow across the bedroom. “Malcolm, is that you?”
Mrs Clewes tottered through the door, squinting. What happened next was very confusing. As Malcolm’s mother screamed, Timothy shot up in bed, grabbed the felt gonk on the shelf and brought various toys crashing down. The clown lurched towards the old woman and accidenally stood on a tonka truck. Unable to stop himself, he took a lunge towards the window.
With the sound of shattering glass and tearing trousers, he plummetted through the air and hit the gravel below.
Moments later, leaving his bulbous nose behind in a puddle, he ran through the fog whilst behind him the distraught grandmother howled.
Chapter Six: One Corpse Too Many
‘The Great Bonanza Give-away: All this week in your favourite newspaper, the bubbling Chronicle, one of our lucky readers can win a years supply of Stay-Cosy socks (as advertised on Radio Minster). That’s right, you haven’t misread the headlines. The Greyminster Chronicle in conjunction with Stay-Cosy products brings you the greatest give-away ever in our one hundred and twenty-seven years of publication.
All you have to do is turn to page fourteen and answer 59 questions,
on subjects ranging from ‘Quantum Physics’ to ‘Thermonuclear Dynamics,’ before completing the phrase ‘I think the Greyminster Chronicle is utterly fab, because….’ in no less that one hundred words. What could be easier?
(Applicants must be over ninety-two years old and have a collection of Chronicle front pages dating back to 1906. The editor’s decision will be final and absolute.)
And remember folks, A Stay-Cosy sock keeps your Grey Toesies Hot! Plus, an update on the Greyminster murders on the lower half of page seventeen.’
Extract from The Greyminster Chronicle (Early Edition) Feb. 16th 1999.
The ghostly fog made its way through the back door of the station. It was torn into shreds by the legs that entered behind it. Drips of mud freckled the floor behind the policemen as they approached the hat-stand gloomily.
“Reg…?” Nesbit froze in the middle of removing the straw-infested trilby from his head. “When y’r ready…”
He rolled his eyes and discovered Malcolm glaring back at him.
“And you’d better bring Sergeant Clewes along with y’.” Superintendent Hodges vanished back into his office, leaving the two of them dripping with soaked manure.
An insult left Nesbit’s lips. A mutter so quiet it barely managed to stir the edge of his moustache.
He wasn’t surprised to find Hodges planted back behind his desk, apparently engulfed in paperwork. It was all part and parcel of that humiliation process again. Either that or Hodges had some sort of doppelganger to run around for him. Even Hodges, however, couldn’t ignore the two puddles of slurry growing round his subordinates boots for long.
“Right…’Ow’s the investigation goin’?” He threw himself back into the upholstered chair, forcing his words through one palm as though reluctant to let them go.
“Well, Sir…”
“Shall I tell you ’ow it’s goin’, Reg?” Nesbit had known Hodges long enough to recognise his rhetoric. “It’s goin’ bloody awful, that’s ’ow! I’ve seen less incompetent baboons down at the Monkey ’Ouse tryin’ to set up a tea party! ”