To Love and to Perish

by steve higgs

  Oh, yeah, I had her attention now.

  ‘What if I promised to give you the mackerel exactly as you have just described it. Would you be willing to do something for me?’

  Amber narrowed her eyes. ‘I’m a cat. I already do plenty for you.’

  Scratching his left ear with a back foot, Buster laughed. ‘Oh, yeah? Like what?’

  ‘I enrich your life just by being here. Unlike the dog, I instil calm and a sense of wellbeing. I brighten any room I choose to enter … must I go on? Does your ignorance not embarrass you?’

  Amber was just being a cat, but she was going to have to dance to my tune if she wanted the poached fish.

  ‘Let me put it another way. What would you do, beyond that which you already do, for the offer of a piece of poached mackerel?’

  ‘Poached in milk,’ Amber reminded me.

  Buster said, ‘I’ll do anything you ask. I’ll do it right now, I’ll do it twice, and you only have to give me a gravy bone.’ His stumpy tail wagged incessantly.

  I took a gravy bone from the bone-print jar on the counter and threw it to him. It didn’t hit the ground.

  ‘A whole mackerel, Amber,’ I goaded. I could see she wanted to give in. ‘I need you to do a few things for me, that’s all.’

  Amber was wrestling with her desire for the super-tasty treat and her need to be haughty and dominant.

  ‘It’s the dog’s job to do things and run around obeying,’ she replied, but her words had a frustrated edge to them now.

  I crossed the room and gave her fur a stroke, smoothing it from head to tail. ‘A dog couldn’t do the things I need you to do, Amber. These tasks require a level of dexterity and agility only a cat can achieve.’ I had her, and she knew it.

  ‘What do you need me to do?’ she asked, closing her eyes, and leaning into my hand.

  Deploying a Spy

  Going through what I might need to do in my head, one task leapt to the fore. I needed to find out what Derek knew. He had been away from the office for some time with his ailments, but surely he would have at least an inkling as to what drove John to shove him over the balcony. I would also ask him about what John meant about not being the crook in the equation.

  Did John mean it was Derek? Surely not. Then who? And who did I hear destroying evidence last night and what was it evidence of? These questions and more made a long queue in my mind and only Derek would be able to answer them.

  I called Joanne, running through what I wanted to say in my head while I waited for the phone to connect.

  ‘Felicity?’ Joanne answered.

  ‘Hello, Joanne. I wanted to ask you about Derek,’ I got in quickly when she paused for breath. ‘Has his condition improved?’

  I could hear the sorrow in her voice when she replied. ‘No, Felicity. There’s been no improvement. His condition was terrible before John tried to kill him. It’s a miracle he survived the fall. How he got away without broken bones I will never know.’

  ‘Is he still unconscious?’ I wanted to know.

  A small sob and sniff came over the phone. ‘Yes. They sound hopeful, but I just don’t want to give myself too much hope. What if he never wakes up?’ she wailed.

  Regretfully, I knew exactly how she felt. Archie faded fast after his diagnosis. He’d been putting off going to see a doctor because he was sure the pain he felt would turn out to be nothing. It wasn’t, and by the time he finally sought help, it was too late for them to do anything.

  I wouldn’t wish the same experience on anyone. All I could do was make appropriate noises of sympathy and tell her to hope for the best. Given the state Derek was in prior to his ‘accident’ a pragmatist would argue it might be better to prepare for the worst.

  When it felt appropriate to do so, I said, ‘You probably don’t know this, but I ran into John last night when I went out for dinner. He sort of threatened me …’ Joanne gasped, but I ploughed on, ‘and he said he wasn’t the crook at the firm. Have you got any idea what he meant by that?’

  I suspected it was a dodgy question to ask. If Joanne knew something and it did tie to Derek, I doubted she would tell me anything. If it didn’t tie to Derek, I doubted she would know – she didn’t work at the firm.

  Joanne repeated my words. ‘A crook at the firm?’

  ‘That’s what John said.’

  ‘No, sorry, Felicity. I don’t know anything about that. Derek rarely talked to me about the print business. He knew I found it boring. You could ask Tamara. Or Tarquin,’ she added with a suggestion of enthusiasm to her tone. It made me think she must really like her daughter’s choice of husband. ‘Tarquin is essentially running the place anyway.’ Her voice turned glum again and she murmured. ‘Especially with both Derek and now John out of the picture.’

  We talked for a few more seconds. I got on okay with Joanne, but I was friends with Derek and didn’t really know his wife.

  With the call ended, I finally got myself ready for the day. Selecting a black skirt and a pure white blouse, I paired it with black knee-length boots and a camel brown rainmac. I popped my Prada sunglasses on my face, hooked my handbag over my left arm, and went in search of Amber.

  She has several favoured spots in my house, all of which are deliberately out of reach of Buster so he couldn’t mess with her while she slept. That didn’t stop him from sneaking up for a surprise bark attack when he felt she might not be expecting it, but today I found her on the windowsill in my bedroom, asleep and alone.

  She opened a suspicious eye as I approached.

  ‘You really want to go through with this?’ she asked.

  ‘You really want a poached mackerel?’ Before she could reply, I scooped her up and onto my chest where she dug her claws in to hold on. Mercifully, the rainmac bore the brunt of her assault, but I felt the tiny daggers find my skin in several places even with it to protect me.

  I needed to take Buster and Amber out at the same time and putting them in the front seat of my sports car at the same time would be much like putting them, and me, in a tumble dryer. It was for that reason that we were taking my other car.

  Having two cars when I am a widow who lives alone might seem completely redundant and I would not argue. However, I didn’t buy the second car, it was Archie’s pride and joy. When he passed, I kept it.

  My husband had been something of a car nut. Not that he lived in the garage and could be found forever tinkering under the bonnet, but he knew his cars and had rebuilt the mark two Ford Escort Mexico all by himself. It took him three years. I remember feeling entirely nonplussed when he brought it home … on a trailer because it didn’t run.

  However, when it was finished, even though it wasn’t my kind of car, I had to admit that there was a certain something about it. Now considered a modern classic, the late 1970s car was what I used when my two-seater Mercedes was an impractical choice.

  Today was such a day.

  Amber was less than happy. ‘Why am I the one going in the travel cage!’ she raged, clawing at the edges as I tried to slide her into it.

  ‘Because Buster doesn’t fit,’ I explained through gritted teeth. I really needed a pair of those gloves they use to handle barbed wire. ‘And if he did, I wouldn’t be able to carry him.’

  Snagging the last paw still hooked around a bar, I stuffed it inside and closed the plastic cage door. From inside came several unrepeatable phrases. One was to do with a dead pigeon and where she would like to put it – there had been no mention of lubricant.

  Trotting happily over, Buster sniffed at Amber’s cage where I’d set it on the carpet.

  ‘Oh, yes,’ he commented. ‘This is much more like it.’

  Amber screeched, ‘Felicity!’

  Just in time, I flicked out a toe to nudge his back leg. He was manoeuvring himself into position.

  ‘Buster! Don’t you dare!’

  He spun around looking surprised. ‘I’ve no idea what you are talking about.’

  I wagged a finger at him as I checked I had everythi
ng. ‘You were going to widdle on the cage with Amber in it. Don’t you tell me you weren’t.’

  Grumbling at being thwarted, he trotted to the door and waited there for me to catch up.

  I got them to the garage, got Archie’s old car warmed up and ready to go, and set off for my boutique in Rochester.

  My agenda for the day was filling fast and it had been full before I started to add in additional tasks like solving a crime.

  I went the long route, sweeping out through Cuxton and Halling, turning left at the new bridge to cross the river by Peter’s Village. I needed to get back to Aylesford; the scene of the crime, you might say.

  It was already after my usual time to arrive at work when I pulled up behind Orion Print again so I paused to call Justin – Archie’s old car has no handsfree system.

  ‘Felicity,’ Justin blurted. ‘Mindy just arrived with the wildest story.’

  ‘It’s true,’ I cut him off before he could say anything else. ‘I got arrested last night and released this morning. I’m running a little late, but I’ll be there in about half an hour. I was just calling to let you know.’

  ‘Are you okay?’ he asked.

  I replied with, ‘I’ll be fine.’ It wasn’t a lie. At least I didn’t think it was. Nothing really terrible had happened. In fact, looking back at it, the worst part was being spotted by Primrose. I was lucky Vince came along or she might have had pictures of me all over social media by now. I wouldn’t put it past her to email the people in my supply chain anyway and felt certain she would do her best to make sure prospective clients found out about my arrest.

  Thinking about the potential damage she might do steeled my will to solve the mystery and clear my name.

  Shaking my head to clear it and refocus on what I was doing, I said, ‘I’ll be there soon, Justin. I have to meet with the Couture Bridal Designs at noon and have quite a bit to do before then.’

  ‘I can take some more on,’ Justin swiftly volunteered. ‘Mindy can help out too,’ he added.

  I was sure she could. I ended the call and placed my phone back into my handbag.

  ‘Ready, Amber?’ I asked. ‘Ready to earn a mackerel?’

  ‘This is demeaning,’ she growled from the cage.

  ‘Which bit?’ I enquired, unsure exactly what she might be unhappy about.

  ‘Helping out,’ she replied snippily. ‘I’m a cat. I’m here to be worshipped. Doing things is not what cats do.’

  Sensing that she was just sounding off, I confirmed, ‘But you’ll do it for a mackerel?’

  ‘It had better be a big one.’

  I had to get out of the car to be able to get her cage from the back seat. I set it on the tarmac of the carpark and opened the little door.

  Lazily, languidly, she sauntered out; Amber was never one to hurry. My ragdoll cat performed a stretch, making her body seem twice the length it had been, then sat and started to clean a paw.

  ‘I’ll come back to this spot,’ I told her. ‘Just remember what I need you to do.’

  ‘Yes, yes,’ she replied. ‘It’s all very easy. Take the mutt and enjoy your day. If you feel like leaving him somewhere, I will take that in reward over a fish any day of the week.’

  Buster barked an insult of his own in response but couldn’t get to the cat when he lunged because he was strapped to the passenger seat. The dog harness let him get his front paws on to the driver’s seat before arresting his movement. At that point, he flipped and landed on his back. Now turned turtle on the passenger seat, his little paws waved helplessly in the air.

  Amber tutted and walked away.

  Righting himself, Buster said, ‘Quick, let’s go! She’ll never find us if we pack up and move home today.’

  ‘We are coming back for her later,’ I assured him.

  Buster licked his nose. ‘There’s just no cure for what you have, is there?’

  Given that I was having a conversation with my dog, I worried he might be right. As I pulled away, I wound down my window to call to Amber, but she was already nowhere in sight. Wondering if I was a genius or an idiot, and certain I would find out in the next day or so, I pointed the car towards Rochester and enjoyed working the stick as I took the back roads through the countryside to get there.

  Too Distracted

  There was a coffee waiting for me when I arrived; I could see it through the front window of the boutique. No doubt Mindy made the trip to the coffee shop in the High Street because it was one of the few tasks she knew how to do and because Justin felt prompted by my phone call.

  Justin jumped to his feet when he spotted me coming in. ‘Felicity, goodness, I still can’t believe something like this would happen to you.’

  Mindy appeared from the backroom with a stack of promotional material in her hands. ‘Oh, hi, Auntie. How was the big house?’

  The juxtaposition in attitude felt like social commentary on the generational gap. Justin was horrified to hear I got arrested. Mindy thought it was cool.

  Opting to focus on my business, I said, ‘It’s something we can discuss at a later date. Right now, we have several weddings looming and a need to fill our diary as far into next year as we can.’ Justin knew how right I was. Our continued success depended entirely upon landing the next big client and the one after that, ad infinitum. One thing with our market was the lack of repeat custom.

  It happened sometimes that an attendee at one of our weddings would then be impressed enough to choose my firm without even looking for alternatives, but for the most part I was out hunting down the clients, not waiting for them to come to me.

  For the weddings already booked and being arranged there were all manner of strange and wonderful requests. We had a request to get Rod Stewart to perform at a billionaire octogenarian’s wedding. He was tying the knot with an athletic woman in her early thirties. My biggest hope with that wedding was that the groom would survive to attend the ceremony. Trying to book Rod Stewart is just one example of where my time goes.

  Not that I mind. Weddings like that one would pay all our wages and all the bills for the year and do me no harm in my bid to attract the attention of Prince Marcus.

  We settled down to get to work and I tried to focus my attention, I truly did. The wedding on Raven Island next weekend would see me and my entire entourage travelling to stay there on Friday. Justin was going two days earlier with Mindy to start making sure everything was as it should be. They would be there to meet the caterers as they arrived, oversee cleaning, make arrangements for the band who were to arrive on the Saturday morning … there was a lot to do. The celebrity couple had spent over forty thousand pounds just on flowers which all had to be arranged according to their specifications.

  To make things more interesting, the island could only be accessed by vehicle twice a day at low tide. There was a window of about forty minutes when the causeway became exposed, that is provided a storm hadn’t shifted a sandbar to make it impassable or it wasn’t the time of the moon cycle when the low tide was still too high to expose the road.

  Complex? Yes. That’s why they pay me the big bucks.

  Yet, despite all that stuff swirling around in my head, I could not shift the questions about Derek Bleakwith and John Ramsey. Who was the man I overheard plotting to destroy evidence last night? Who did tamper with John Ramsey’s brakes? It certainly wasn’t Derek getting his own back for John pushing him. Were they even tampered with? Or had Vince, the pirate that he is, made it up because he wanted to come to my house for breakfast?

  After an hour of not being very productive because I just couldn’t get my mind to stay on the job, I accepted defeat.

  ‘Mindy do you feel like getting out of the boutique for a while? I need to visit a few people.’

  My question made Justin raise his head. ‘Everything okay, Felicity?’

  I gave him a half shrug and blew out a breath to show my frustration. ‘I am distracted by the events of last night,’ I told him the truth. ‘I can’t concentrate so I’m going to f
eed the voices in my head and hope they shut up.’

  Mindy asked, ‘What are you going to feed them with?’ She had a hopeful expression like I was going to take her out for burgers.

  With a deep breath in through my nose, I set my resolve and said, ‘Answers.’

  Buster clambered to his feet, licking his nose with a snuffling snort. ‘Adventure dog reporting for duty. Let’s go get the bad guys.’

  I collected my coat and bag, gave Buster’s lead to Mindy – she could strain to keep him under control instead of me for once – and we left the boutique.

  In the carpark, Mindy spotted Archie’s car. ‘Oh, wow! I didn’t realise you still had this. Uncle Archibald’s car is soooo old. How come you have this and not your Mercedes?’

  I frowned but said nothing. The car wasn’t as old as me. I opened my mouth to explain that I’d needed to drop Amber off this morning but shut it again before the first word made it past my lips. How would I explain deploying a feline spy to anyone?

  Instead, I lied. ‘I fancied a change, and it does it good to have a run every now and then. Otherwise, things start to seize.’ Don’t ask me where I dredged that little snippet of information from. I expect it was something Archie once said.

  Mindy grabbed the passenger door handle and tried to open it. She expected central locking, of course. The idea of a car that had to be opened with a key one door at a time was completely alien to her. This was probably like travelling back in time.

  I had to coax Buster into the back and fiddle with the seat belt again to make sure he was secure.

  He said, ‘I’m sure the official sidekick needs to ride shotgun.’

  Tightening his harness, I whispered. ‘You’ll be more comfortable back here. There’s plenty of room for you to stretch out.’

  ‘More like limber up,’ he grunted. ‘I need my muscles loose if I am to fight criminals and deliver justice this day.’

  I really need to start unplugging the television before I leave him in the house.

  Mindy was in the front seat and all buckled in when I finally settled behind the wheel. Her eyes were agog as she looked around the vintage car.