by Brian Hughes
“I know he’s as thick as two short planks, but to derail an ’ole train like that an’ only get mild concussion?”
The paramedic wiped the sweat from his forehead.
“To be honest I only found one bruise. It was on his head. Not even any signs of cranial fracture.”
“I saw what happened, mate.”
Agatha McBride stepped through the smoke. Her home-made artillery clanked as she ambled up to them.
“Not that your likely to f**kin’ believe me, but I was a witness t’ this f**kin’ great shag-up.”
Hodges peered down at her.
“Try me…”
“It was a f**kin’ demon what upended old Ivor ’ere.” She slapped the slab of metal beside her with one hoary palm, as though it was a sleeping rhinoceros. “Big bastard and all. Y’ can still see ’is teeth marks in the ’eadlamps.”
“Right…jolly good.” Hodges rocked back on his heels. “Thank you for that information. By the by, are you aware that firearms are illegal in Britain?”
“Said y’ wouldn’t believe me.” Agatha pulled her armoury about her ribs for more protection. “But as sure as bollox belong to vicars, I know what I saw.”
She pushed her grimy features towards him.
“I was distracted, y’ see? Some old codger fryin’ ’is bacon in the signal box drew me attention away for a moment. Too eager to shoot the serial killer, that was my problem. Got the smells all mixed up.”
She wrinkled her stubby nose as though making sure it was still up to par.
“When I come out agen, there was old Mr Twiddle ’anging from me bungee rope, a bloody great locomotive ’eading towards ’im from one side and a friggin’ great Beelzebub approachin’ from the other.”
Hodges tried to ignore her. The engines were cooling down now. The plate occasionally pinged as a rivet hurtled into the air.
Nesbit manoeuvred his wheelchair over the broken sprockets. The smell of Germoline rose from the fluorescent pink mound above his eye.
“Reg…” Hodges nodded, finding it difficult to communicate with somebody at knee height. “When the paramedics ’ave finished tendin’ to you tek the rest of the day off.”
“I’m all right, Cuthbert. Just a sprain and a bit of a bump t’ me head.” Nesbit removed his pipe from his pocket and studied its bent stem sadly. “Got t’ catch us a murderer, Sir!”
“Listen Reg…I know y’ mean well, but…” Hodges’ voice trailed off. Something difficult was about to be said. “Well…t’ put it frankly, you’re gettin’ a bit old for these shenanigans.”
“Too old?” The oxford dropped into Nesbit’s lap. “Too old?”
“And of course, there’s your other problem t’ be taken into consideration…”
“My other problem?” Nesbit frowned. “Is there anybody in the bleedin’ station who doesn’t know about that?”
“I’ll tell y’ what inspector.” Agatha stepped between them, brimming with amiable intent. “You go ’ome and ave a rest…”
She thought about that.
“Or a wank, or whatever suits you. And I’ll catch this bastard on me own. I know ’is scent now, and believe you me it stinks worse than one o’ Gyles Brandreth’s ’umorous puns. ’Ee’s ’eaded off into town somewhere. ’Ard little bugger, but not ’ard enough t’ grapple with Agatha McBride and get away with it.”
Malcolm adjusted his kipper tie. Then he inspected the toggles on his dufflecoat and unpinned the badge his mother had given him for his birthday.
A bolus of breath was gingerly tested against one cupped palm. Then a final attempt to organise his curls into a symmetrical shape, and he raised his fist to the front door.
“Hello Inspector…”
An emaciated head appeared at the bedroom window. It was flanked by two bellpulls of hair.
“How’s the collection going?”
“Collection? What collection? And it’s Sergeant, Miss…Sergeant Malcolm. I mean, Clewes. I was wondering if I could ask you a few more questions?”
“Hold on a moment. I’ll be right down.”
The sash window shuddered shut, splicing a tendril of blue smoke in half. Malcolm carried out another inspection of himself. He had just started a ‘Fly’ check when the front door opened and Janet looked out. He struggled desperately to close his dufflecoat, one stubborn toggle caught in his fastener.
“Now then, Inspector. What was it you wanted to ask…?”
She offered him a hip-flask. From the smell he surmised it contained whisky.
“No thank you, Ma’am. Not while I’m on duty.”
“Call me Janette. Ma’am is such a silly, formal title.”
Malcolm felt himself going weak at the knees. There was something indescribably attractive about this woman. A vulnerability that, for the first time in his life, made Malcolm feel superior.
“I’m sure you’re not the sort of person to go all coy on people, are you, Inspector?”
Judging by his expression, he probably was.
“Right, well, Jar-nette…” Her name came out sounding odd. “I’m just making further enquiries about the murders in Greyminster. I was wondering if you could tell me about Dovecote Hall…”
“Is it terribly difficult being gay? Don’t the other constables call you truncheon boy?”
Malcolm stiffened into resolve. This was going to be a long conversation.
“I’m not actually gay, Miss. There’s obviously been some misunderstanding. I’ve got son at school. The fact that my marriage didn’t work is…”
“A lot of closet homosexuals have children nowadays. For appearance’s sake.” Janet chewed her bottom lip thoughtfully. It made her look a little like an afghan hound. “Look at Jeremy Thorpe. We’ve just been studying him in history.”
(The publishers would like to point out at this point that at his trial...a just and honourable trial...Jeremy Thorpe was found not guilty of homosexual liaisons or attempted murder. The above citation was only Janet’s personal opinion and should not be considered to be the author’s own conviction.)
“No really, Ma’am…er...Jar-nette.” Malcolm corrected himself, now reaching for that flask so recently refused. “I’m about as heterosexual as they come. Not that I’ve got anything against ’em, you understand? Just so long as they haven’t got anything against me.”
He took a swig that almost knocked his socks off. The whisky tasted vaguely of rotten fungi.
“Such a pity though. You’re a very good looking man, Inspector.”
“Sergeant, Miss. It’s Sergeant Clewes.”
“Perhaps all you need is a sensitive woman.” Janet was nothing if not persistent.
Malcolm took another swig and felt control slipping from his grasp.
“Sometimes that happens,” Janet continued. “Especially when people are uncertain about their own sexuality.”
“Jar-nette, please.” The smell of alcohol left Malcolm’s lips. “I’m here to make enquiries about the rag week stunt in 1997. The one involving the newspaper cutting.”
“Well…” Janet raised her eyes from Malcolm’s legs, flicking a drape of hair from her nose. “I don’t know anything about that. Perhaps you’d better come inside.”
She held the door open. Malcolm tried to work out which of the images before him was the real one, and peered inside.
“Tell me, Inspector, is there anything else you’re not allowed to do whilst you’re on duty?”
Constable Parkins pressed his nose against the window at the front of the station. Because of the distorted glass, his face resembled a hungry haddock.
Next to him stood Constable Took. They watched the crowd outside in silence, occasional blinking.
“We want police protection!” sang the gathering.
Cardboard signs were being levelled towards their cloakroom. Each one had a hand-painted aphorism such as, “Wot do we pay our council tax for?” or “Safeways - 800 packets of Crunchy Wheatflakes. This way up!” (That one had been drawing pinned to
the pole the wrong way round.)
At the front of the crowd Rose Beaumont struggled to keep her own banner aloft against the wind.
“Police Protection?” Constable Took lifted his mug. He snarled, breathing in the steam from his hot chocolate. “What do they think we are? Bloody miracle workers or sommet? We ’aven’t got time for messin’ around, ’ave we Parky?”
Parkins made no reply. Instead he gazed impassively at the crowd, occasionally wiping the pane with the sleeve of his jacket. He wasn’t even listening. He was too busy dreaming about landing a trout at the Anglers Club.
“I’ll give ’em bloody protection!” Took brought his truncheon down onto his mug. Hot chocolate slopped over the rim. “I’ll protect the stupid old bessums with me boot!”
“Further more we demand that every street has a constable twenty-four hours a day. A constable who will, in the course of his duties, pop in from time to time for a brew and a chat to ensure that all our needs are being attended to.”
Rose lowered the traffic cone she’d borrowed from the roadworks at Southport Parade. Around her the pensioners continued to shout.
Mrs Wainthrop was adding her own contribution from the corner.
“We demand better tea making facilities at the Over Sixties Beetle Drive.”
Rose Beaumont was in her element. She’d missed out on the suffragette movement and spent the better part of her life tending to the worthless needs of her husband.
“Ladies and Gentlemen! Shut the bloody ’ell up before I ’ave you all arrested for contravenin’ the Public Order Act.” Constable Took appeared on the steps.
He was only a short man. Over the years his addiction for steak and kidney pies had made him look like a wombat. His truncheon slammed against his mug again.
“We pay our taxes!” Rose raised the orange megaphone, the brutality of the words almost dislodging Took’s helmet. “Why aren’t you doing something about it?”
“Because we ’aven’t got anybody to spare!” Took growled. “There’s only me, Parkins and Robins on duty. And Constable Robins is busy tryin’ to ’elp some old biddy out of the gas mains down Southport Parade.”
At the far end of York Street several thuds vibrated through the cobbles.
They grew louder with every thump, sending a chill through all those who heard them.
“How come you’re not out keeping our streets safe from murderers? These are dangerous times, Mister!”
Took lifted his mug and glowered across its rim.
“Because its me bloody coffee break, Mrs!”
The glowering stopped. The noise from the crowd suddenly stopped too. The atmosphere of York Street seemed to change.
Took glanced at the wrinkled heads, then followed their gaze to the end of the street.
With talons sparking the demon rounded the corner on all fours. It tore the name plate from number thirty-five, corkscrewed to a halt and battered the street lamp into a peculiar shape.
Its horns cast a shadow across the old biddies.
Then the animal lunged. The street became blocked. Pensioners detonated in all directions. Unhealthy snaps and howls of pain filled the air. Zimmer frames smashed against curbs.
Took shook his head angrily. He stepped out in front of the demon. A foolhardy manoeuvre on reflection.
“Now then, now then! W’at’s all this about, m’ laddo!?”
Obviously the question was beyond its understanding.
Its chest swelled and its nostrils snorted a boa of flame towards him. The noise was so loud that even the deafest pensioners covered their ears. Several hearing aids started whining.
The heat blistered the cobbles until they resembled chewing gum.
Constable Took became a frazzle of black bones.
Then nothing more than a melted stump of truncheon in a pond of bubbling fat.
A spiral of humorous smoke delivered its final insult to his bravery.
Screwing up its eyes, the demon brought its heel down on Mrs Clewes’ placard. It grabbed the traffic cone, swallowed it whole, belched so violently that several windows shattered and then thundered off.
Moments later, as the first groans started to work their way up from the gutters, Agatha McBride hurtled passed in its wake.
Let’s watch from above as the Hunted now pursues the Hunter.
Down below us is Greyminster. The crowd of geriatrics lies exploded around the police station. The demon and Agatha are galloping off round the narrow streets. Thundering along the aortas of the town like adrenaline.
Around the coffee ring of the bypass they charge, circling the carton of cress that’s Sword Street Park. That grubby building beneath us is what the council laughingly call the Swimming Pool. It’s difficult to equate something so bleak and miserable with leisure, I know. The shallow pool contains cockroaches the size of crabs. The water’s so stagnant it would make an ideal trampoline.
Our two specks have just entered the building with a great deal of shouting. Let’s go down and find out where they’ve gone.
The demon clattered towards the Men’s Changing Rooms. Its hooves scrabbled for purchase on the smooth floor, its bulging features reflected in abstract patterns around the walls. Close on its tail, rattling and banging, came Agatha. Her hobnailed boots screamed like a piece of chalk across a blackboard.
The demon reached the changing cubicles, forced itself against the planks and dispersed into the grain.
For a moment the cublicles shook.
Then a splintering ripple moved through the booths one by one.
Agatha skidded into the wall mirror, raised her crossbow and watched the cubicle doors popping open. Several men in varying stages of undress flew over the crossbars.
The thunderous crashing reached the last pen and stopped.
Agatha sprang into action, hurdling the bathers with youthful dexterity.
She reached the final cubicle, bent one knee, kicked the oak door determindly and stared at the booth’s astonished occupant.
“Councillor Ordenshaw…Ma’am?”
She stepped backwards in shock, until her weapons clanged against the wall.
“What the f**kin’ ’ell are you doing ’ere?”
“More to the point…”
Councillor Ordenshaw tried to cover his secret with a screwed up blouse. It was too difficult. The hormone treatment had the same effect on his genitalia as a hot oven might have had on a prune.
“What are you doing here?”
“You’re a bleedin’ man!”
“A transsexual actually, Agatha. Gender disorder. I’m hoping for re-alignment surgery in September. I’m not allowed to use the women’s changing rooms because officially I’m still male.”
The councillor tried to conceal the swollen bumps on his chest. He leaned towards the old woman.
“Not a word of this to anyone, right? Or I’ll ’ave your licence revoked. Understood?”
“I understand…” Agatha grimaced. “But I’m not so sure about Russell Cowbell from the Chronicle ’ere.”
Propped against the skirting board was a skinny man in Bermuda shorts. Raising the Box Brownie to his eye he took a photograph. The flash bounced off the shiny walls.
“There’s no need for that!” Agatha snapped, her German helmet scratching the tiles. “I’m sure you’ve already ’ad enough snapshots through that knot ’ole in your cubicle as it is!”
That was where the conversation ended.
Startled by the flash bulb the cublicle bulged. With a growl the demon thrust its head through the planks, still partially mingled with the grain.
It battered Councillor Ordenshaw to the ground.
Then it sprinted off towards the pool.
Agatha was just in time to witness the bodies being spat from the water in the fashion of pips. Her boots splashed through the foot-spa in a spray of grime, carrying her into the main vault of the baths.
As it lumbered along the creature became translucent. Some parts of its anatomy were now liquef
ied.
It leapt over the springboard, sending a woman tipple-top-tailing towards the rafters. Her performance could have won her an Olympic Gold Medal.
Moments later the demon had diffused through the fire exit, into the midwinter world outside.
Beyond the baths sprawled a labyrinth of cobbled alleys.
Agatha had spent many happy hours ridding these ginnels of their disease-riddled occupants. Even now rats with their tails cut off still decorated the walls.
It wouldn’t be difficult to keep tabs on old Beelzebub down here! She’d known these dark and morbid ginnels since her childhood. Hunting grounds for interesting vermin to skin for her bedroom wall. With her nose twitching she followed the demon’s smell.
Then at last what Agatha had hoped for.
Dead Cat Lane!
A dead end!
The purple paint on the end wall (that once read, ‘TORIES OUT’ but now only read, ‘Toast’) bulged threateningly.
It looked as though a magnifying glass was being held above it.
Agatha stopped and chewed the situation over. She lowered the crossbow, thought about using the bazooka, gave that up as a bad idea, and searched for something else. A light bulb almost appeared above her head.
“Now I’ve got y’, f**kin’ Lucifer.” A grin broke out across the leathery encasement of her face. “You’re not gettin’ away this bleedin’ time!”
Chapter Sixteen: The Veiled Lodger
The front door rattled. Moments later Nesbit’s walking stick fumbled through it, accidentally prodding the battle-scarred cat.
Wearily he limped into the house. A bath was in order. A relaxing soak where his troubles would disappear with each bursting bubble. He manoeuvred himself gingerly into the bathroom, heaved the clothes horse into one corner, turned on the tap and threw a number of rubber ducks into the tub.
Several minutes later he lowered his hirsute body into the water. Puff-balls of steam drifted up towards the ceiling and the ducks bobbed up and down.
Bubble baths never lived up to the illustrations on their bottles. No matter how much of the damned stuff Nesbit poured it they always ended up as nothing more than a couple of threadbare patches of froth.