‘All together now,’ shouted the biggest bearer, who also had the biggest voice.
‘Heave!’
The coffin was pulled back out, the men leaving it resting on the grass while they got their breath. Everyone attending took the opportunity to survey the printed image of Superman.
At last, in unison, the pallbearers jerked the coffin back on to their shoulders.
Dora shook her head.
Amber mumbled something else about her experiences with a cardboard wine carrier … ‘If it gets soggy … wham! Everything falls out the bottom.’
Things would have been all right. Honey was sure they would have been – if it hadn’t been raining, if the coffin hadn’t fallen into the muddy abyss of its final resting place; if the grass they’d rested it on hadn’t been soaking wet. Anyway, the coffin was reacting in exactly the same way as Amber’s supermarket wine holder. Sogginess was taking away its strength.
The pallbearers heaved the cardboard box on to their shoulders so it could be more easily placed in the straps that would lower it into Sean’s final resting place. Another shout of ‘Heave!’ and the straps were underneath and readjusted when the middle bit of the casket gave way. Sean O’Brian’s bottom, clad in scarlet underpants, was on show to the world.
More gasps of shock alarmed the crows in the trees and sent them flying and cawing.
The church deacon, a spirited man in black robes, tried to push Sean’s red rump back into place.
‘Get him in quick,’ said the young man Honey had been talking to who was now looking worried, no doubt concerned that all his best marketing efforts had been in vain.
The vicar had taken his place at the head of the grave, eyes heavenward; probably praying that this will soon be over, thought Honey.
Clearing his throat and opening his book, the vicar looked down into the grave, waiting for the pallbearers and funeral directors to get the show on the road and for the mourners to stop eyeballing the coffin and gather back around the grave or at the top of the slope where they’d been earlier.
Honey began to hiccup. She held her breath, she held her nose, she closed her eyes, but nothing would stop it.
‘Hannah, do control yourself,’ snapped her mother, eyes beetle-hard. ‘I wish I hadn’t asked you to come with us.’
‘Oh, but I’m glad I did.’ She hiccupped. ‘I wouldn’t have missed it for the world.’ Another hiccup. If she wasn’t hiccupping she’d be laughing. Of the two the hiccups best suited a funeral, though only just.
Suddenly the bottom of the cardboard coffin gave out altogether. Sean O’Brian flopped out onto the grass.
A gasp of surprise ran through those who saw what he was wearing. Those that hadn’t seen pushed forward, unwilling to miss the thrill of having something to talk about at the next Senior Citizens’ meeting.
Some giggled. Some gasped.
Honey’s hiccups stopped immediately. She hid her face and her laughter with both hands. She just couldn’t believe what she was seeing.
Some folk insist on being buried in their best clothes. Military types have a preference for the uniform they wore when serving their country. In Sean’s case he’d selected his own uniform – of sorts. Just like the printed effigy on his coffin he was wearing the unmistakable blue and red of Superman. Without the physique to fill it of course; his legs were skinny. His pants were large. His hair was tucked like a pillow beneath his head.
Honey pulled her hat down over her eyes and did her best to stifle her laughter, though she was far from the only one who found this amusing. Gasps and giggles of surprise were erupting with gay abandon. The widow had smothered her mouth with her handkerchief and was blushing profusely. Obviously he’d made stipulations in his will about what he wanted to be buried in. Judging by the widow’s blushes the outfit had been worn in life too – possibly in the bedroom.
‘I’ve got some tape,’ said the man representing the makers of the cardboard coffins.
He proceeded to tape the bottom of the coffin back together.
‘Ease him gently in,’ he said to the pallbearers.
Tears were streaming down Honey’s face. She held a balled-up tissue tight against her mouth. No TV comedy show could rival this!
Her mother’s elbow dug into her ribs. ‘Hannah! Show some respect.’
Fat chance. Or it would have been if what happened next hadn’t have happened; if she hadn’t caught sight of the look of horror on the vicar’s face.
His eyes were big and round and he was looking down into the grave. His long white fingers were splayed over his wide-open mouth.
‘There’s someone down there.’ His comment was directed at the church warden who, it seemed, was working on the side for the people who owned Memory Meadow.
A blast of wind blew water from the nearby trees. Honey felt the full blast of it sprinkling her face, but she didn’t move. Something was wrong. Something had happened that had not been planned.
The warden knelt at the graveside, finally going on all fours so he could peer into the grave without falling in himself.
Getting back on to his knees, face pale and confused, he looked up at the vicar.
‘It looks like a gorilla,’ he said.
Taking off his spectacles he gave them a wipe with a cloth.
Someone else, another mourner of fewer years and clearer eyesight, peered down too.
‘It does look kind of furry.’
Intrigued as to what or who might be in the hole and with a sense of foreboding, Honey edged her way forward and took a look.
‘It’s not an ape. It’s a teddy bear. It’s Teddy Devlin.’
Those gathered looked at her as thought she’d taken leave of her senses.
‘It’s a teddy bear,’ she explained. ‘I’m pretty sure it’s the one that’s missing from the Devlin Foundation. It’s a charity. They use the teddy bear for fundraising. You must have seen it in Bath if you’ve been shopping there.’
The vicar looked perplexed. ‘What’s it doing in there?’ His question was aimed at the church warden.
Feeling a great weight of responsibility on his shoulders, the church warden sighed.
‘I don’t know, your reverence.’
‘Then you’d better get down and find out. Get it out, in fact. It shouldn’t be down there.’
The vicar’s eyes were on him and speaking volumes. Fair enough, the plot had been reserved by Sean O’Brian and the teddy bear had no business being in there.
The church warden knew what he had to do. When it came to job description, he didn’t really have one. Whatever needs doing was his job in the absence of there being anyone else to do it.
With a heavy sigh, the middle-aged man took off his shoes and socks, rolled up his trouser legs, and tied his black robe between his legs.
The crowd, rabid with curiosity, ignored the action of the pallbearers stuffing Sean back into his coffin and peered into the hole.
The warden was helped down into the hole in order to carry out a closer examination of the teddy bear.
He looked at the bear then looked up.
‘She’s right. It is a teddy bear.’
Honey bent closer. The bottom of the hole was awash with soft mud. The teddy bear would be pretty heavy to lift out. She pointed the facts out to them.
‘He’ll be heavy. It may take more than one man to get him out.’
‘Well. We’d better get it shifted,’ said Joss, the representative from the cardboard coffin company. ‘Can someone give me a hand?’
A strong-looking girl in green leapt down into the hole with Joss and the church warden. Luckily she was wearing a pair of stout Doc Martens beneath her ankle-length skirt.
Between them they bent to take a grip. They barely moved him, silently straightening as though unsure what they were seeing or what to do next.
The church warden looked up, his face paler than when he’d gone into the hole. Raindrops spattered his glasses. Trickles of water ran down the sides of his face and a
droplet hung from the end of his nose.
Honey felt that tinge of foreboding again.
‘Vicar. We can’t move him.’ His voice was shaky. ‘I think we’d better call the police.’
Honey straightened. The church warden had called the teddy bear ‘him’ not ‘it’ as she would have expected. There was a man down there. A body.
Honey opened her mobile phone and pressed a memory key. Doherty answered on the third ring.
‘Honey! Having fun at the funeral?’
She cut him dead.
‘Steve. I think we just found Teddy Devlin – and he’s not alone.’
Chapter Six
Honey pulled off her hat. The brim had got so sodden that it had flopped around her head like a mildewed mushroom. Keeping it on would have meant cutting slits in it for her eyes.
She was standing in the rain. The young man from the cardboard coffin company was standing beneath an ancient tree. The tree occupied a spot among the graves in the churchyard next door. Its branches overhung the burial plots of Memory Meadow.
The young man was smoking. The vicar and the church warden had opted to stand in the church porch. Honey had explained her affiliation to the police via the Hotels Association.
‘Call me an amateur sleuth,’ she said rather boldly, suddenly feeling quite proud of the description.
The vicar looked relieved. ‘Good. If you’re a crime madam you can take charge and tell the police where we are in case they need to question us. I want nothing to do with dead bodies unless in my official capacity.’ He glanced at his watch. ‘And they’d better hurry up. I’ve got a christening at four.’
Honey opted to stay put on the slope at the top of the grave. Number one, she thought it her duty and, number two, although the oak under which Joss stood gave shelter from the elements, she didn’t want to put up with a smoker.
The mourners, including the widow, had gone off to the Poacher where the wake was to be held.
Honey had expected Arlene, Sean’s widow, to be upset. Actually she turned out to be quite pragmatic about the whole affair.
‘There’s a hole in the ground reserved for Sean. He’ll get in it eventually. I can’t neglect my guests. It wouldn’t be right.’ So off she went to the Poacher to preside over her husband’s wake.
Honey felt it a little selfish of the woman, but under the circumstances the fewer people treading around the crime scene the better.
There was time to study the scene before the heavy mob arrived – that is, Doherty and his cohorts.
The biggest victim, poor old Sean O’Brian, was left inside his soggy cardboard casket getting steadily soggier, though the church warden had borrowed one of the scouts’ tents to throw over it. Despite rejecting Sean’s advances, Honey couldn’t help feeling sorry for the poor old chap. He’d been abandoned at his own funeral – even by his wife.
Feeling a bit of a crime madam – which seemed quite a fun term to her mind – Honey had taken charge. The church warden, who acted as custodian of both the church graveyard and the ecologically acceptable, had been intent on getting the teddy bear-covered victim out of the hole so that the burial could go ahead. Honey had stopped him. ‘The crime scene must not be disturbed. You’ll contaminate the evidence. Detective Chief Inspector Doherty is on his way. Do nothing until he gets here.’
It sounded funny saying that. Detective Chief Inspector Doherty. Steve had finally got the promotion he’d never wanted, foisted on him due to the lack of other candidates, or so he’d informed her. She didn’t believe that. Doherty liked to go his own way and without interference. A bit of a loner, he’d never liked having a sidekick trailing round with him either – except her, but that was different. It was only occasional. So far he’d avoided the sidekick thing, but it couldn’t last.
She was thinking all this as she gazed down into the hole. Teddy Devlin’s black button eyes reflected the glassy gleam of the sky and droplets of rain glistened like teardrops. Poor old Teddy Devlin. Stuffed with a corpse.
Screeching car tyres heralded the arrival of the cavalry. Four police vehicles arrived in quick succession, their occupants spilling out on to the verge on the other side of the wall.
A group of mourners were taking a cigarette break outside the Poacher on the other side of the road. Initially they eyed the cops’ arrival with interest but they didn’t hang about. The warmth of the bar and a slap-up buffet beckoned.
Doherty was the first to come striding across, his feet sensibly clad in green wellies. The rest lingered on the other side, some changing into waterproofs, others into the white jumpsuits of their trade.
A smile lurked around his mouth though he shook his head as though in reprimand. ‘What’s with you and dead people? Are you in communication with the afterlife or something?’
She stood with folded arms, hat in one hand, hair running with water.
‘I’ll run that one past Mary Jane. Anyway, Teddy Devlin is down there.’ She pointed at the hole.
Bending his knees and resting his hands on them, he peered in. His toes were close to the edge, pressing water out of the mud.
Honey waited.
Still bent low, he nodded grimly.
‘Well he definitely fits the description.’
‘Definitely a teddy bear.’
‘More to the point, it’s definitely Teddy Devlin. Right,’ he said straightening. ‘I suppose we’d better see what Teddy Devlin is made of.’
‘Well, it certainly isn’t kapok.’
He jumped in and bent over the body. Carefully, so as not to disturb anything too much, Doherty pulled at the costume. The head, made of something solid, came forward. He pulled it down thus exposing a face.
‘Poor sod,’
Honey’s jaw dropped. ‘I know who that is.’
Doherty looked up at her. ‘You do?’
‘C.A. Wright. And he’s not a poor sod. He’s a rat. Put me down on the list of suspects.’
‘That bad?’
‘Very.’
She gave him a hand getting back up. Beyond him she saw the church warden skirt the incident tape and walk hurriedly over the grass, the hem of his black robe splattered with mud.
‘Inspector …’
‘Chief Inspector …’
The warden, still polishing the drops of water from his glasses, asked when he might expect use of the grave. ‘After all,’ he pointed out imperiously, ‘we have a body for burial. The vicar, our eco-interment officer, Joss, and I are quite concerned. We cannot guarantee how long we can keep the deceased decently covered.’
The young man who’d given Honey his card and had stood smoking beneath the tree joined the church warden.
‘The casket is meant to decompose pretty quickly,’ added Joss. ‘We’re going to have a body lying here with nothing around it. I cannot guarantee how long the casket will last before disintegrating.’
Doherty took a peep beneath the soaking wet scouts’ tent. ‘I shouldn’t think he’s going to worry too much about being decent. Is that the coffin?’ He sounded surprised.
Joss volleyed forth with his lengthy sales pitch about earth to earth, wastage of hardwood on coffins being unnecessary, and the planting of trees. He also added the bit about how you could have your cardboard coffin printed to order.
‘In your case you could have a policeman in full uniform,’ he said cheerily.
‘I’ll bear that in mind.’
Whilst scrutinizing the coffin, Doherty kept a straight face, though his facial muscles were quivering under the strain.
‘Superman! Well that’s original.’
‘He’s dressed like Superman too,’ Honey informed him. ‘I think he may have made a habit of it – you know – in the bedroom.’
‘Is that so? Never done that one myself. Still, there’s always a first time.’
One side of his mouth threatened to smile, but good for him, he managed to keep it under control.
‘Sean had something of a reputation with the ladies,’ Honey e
xplained.
Doherty’s eyes met hers. ‘I get your meaning. Superman. Right.’
He turned to the church warden and Joss, the self-styled eco-interment officer.
‘How about digging a fresh grave away from the crime scene? Down the bottom there against the wall would suit me.’
He pointed to the wall skirting the road.
The warden and the young man looked at each other as though a 100-watt electric light bulb had just been switched on – or at least an energy-efficient alternative.
The church warden shook his head. ‘Mind you, I can’t get a gravedigger out to dig at the drop of a hat. These things have to be planned.’
‘We’ve got a digger. I’ll do it,’ said Joss. ‘I think over there by the wall should be OK. It’s a bit near the road but I do know that there’s no bodies buried there.’
Doherty nodded slowly. ‘That works for me.’
His eyes followed them all the way to an old stone barn in the corner of the field where Joss unfastened and opened one side of the big double doors. A puff of smoke, the sound of an engine, and a mechanical digger emerged.
He helped Honey down the slope and told her the good news. ‘They’re going to dig a new grave. I didn’t expect them to be mechanized. Will you look at that?’
‘I am looking. Not exactly hard labour; not exactly eco-friendly labour either.’
His hand brushed her elbow. It was nothing to an observer; nothing in the great scheme of sexual fantasy, but it still made her tingle.
‘I like your touch, DCI Doherty, but I’m afraid I have to leave you to it. Duty calls.’
‘Back to the hotel?’
She shook her head. ‘I’m off across the road to the Poacher.’
He nodded casually, his eyes still following the progress of the mechanical digger.
‘Lucky you.’
‘Would you like me to have a word with the widow?’
Doherty shrugged. ‘She’s not likely to know much about the bear or the victim, is she?’
‘I meant offer her commiserations and inform her that Mr O’Brian is being interred in another part of Memory Meadow.’
‘Oh, I see. Yes, you do that. I’ll hang around here and ask this guy what he knows about it. He dug the hole. I have to ask the question, did they also throw in a stiff?’
Wicked Words: A Honey Driver Murder Mystery (Honey Driver Mysteries) Page 8