by steve higgs
‘Kate is on her way to jail,’ smirked April, making a joke out of Victor’s claims. ‘She’s no more owner than her stupid little dog. That’s another thing I will be changing. No dogs in the café.’
‘He never goes in the kitchen,’ Victor protested, failing to see that acknowledging her argument gave her more power.
‘He’ll not be coming onto the premises from today. I want him gone within the hour,’ snapped April.
‘You are not in charge!’ Victor shouted. ‘You have no position to demand or dictate anything!’
April’s voice was at normal conversation volume when she delivered her next line. ‘You’re a good baker, Victor, but that doesn’t mean you are irreplaceable. You will need to watch your attitude if you hope to keep your position here.’
Victor screamed his frustration to the sky. ‘You can’t hire and fire either, you daft cow!’
‘That’s it!’ she growled. ‘I won’t take that kind of behaviour from my staff. You’re fired.’
Albert heard a sound, a fast shuffling of feet, and worried it might be Victor moving to throttle the older woman, he stepped into the room. His sudden appearance in the room surprised both occupants, but Victor wasn’t moving to attack April, he was thumping his head against the wall.
‘Who allowed you to come back here?’ snarled April, her stern expression well at home on her face. ‘I’ll have their job too. Look at that dog! It’s unhygienic, that’s what it is. Victor, see him out.’
‘Really, April. I thought I was fired,’ Victor pointed out. He turned toward Albert, but reversed direction to deliver a parting message to the crazy woman in her power suit. ‘I’m going back to work. I don’t care what you do, but any orders you attempt to give will be countered by my own. The staff won’t fall into line behind you. You might not have noticed, April, but they don’t like you. Nobody likes you. You are a malodorous old bag.’
‘Popularity is not a requirement of leadership, Victor. If you were management material, you would know that,’ she countered with a smile, his insults failing to even register.
He’d been trying to end the argument, but it was back in full swing again. ‘Popularity might not be required, but respect is!’ he shouted, anger making him raise his voice. ‘You have neither. Which when we add it to the FACT,’ he hit the word hard, ‘that you have no authority, makes you the one most likely to be leaving the business.’
‘Kate isn’t coming back, Victor,’ April stated confidently. ‘The courts will nullify her ownership because she lured Joel into making her a partner. That will leave the business adrift.’
Albert watched the interplay, listening to April’s words with interest to see if she would give anything away, but he’d heard enough and was ready to interrupt now.
‘Actually, that’s not how it will work at all,’ said Albert loudly enough to get April’s attention. A shuffling noise made him glance to his right where he spotted members of staff listening in from around the corner. ‘If Kate Harris is convicted, it will be in a criminal court. Criminal courts are not interested in property or business ownership. A civil case would have to be raised to prove Kate obtained ownership of this café by unfair means. That is a lengthy and longwinded process and then who would the ownership pass to?’
April rolled her eyes. ‘The manager of the business. Isn’t it obvious?’
Victor’s jaw fell open. ‘So that’s it! You don’t just want to run this place. You think you can steal it out from under everyone!’
Albert delivered the line he’d been holding in reserve. It was a bomb, and now felt like the moment to drop it. ‘Is that why you made an anonymous call to the police, April? It was you who told them Kate Harris killed Joel Clement.’
The room – the whole café – fell silent.
Where There’s Smoke …
Albert let the dust from his accusation settle for a few seconds, waiting for April to draw a breath as she readied her response. He expected a denial, but he didn’t give her the chance. The moment she looked like she might speak, he rolled right over the top of her. ‘I checked,’ he lied. ‘The call didn’t come with a name, but the dispatcher logged it and described the person’s voice. Did you know that when you make a 999 call, they are recorded?’ he took out his phone. ‘Would you like to hear the call you made?’
April’s face was like thunder. It was a dangerous game to play, but he’d been confident that the police must have gone after Kate when someone told them to. Randall had confirmed that, but Albert didn’t have a description of the voice and certainly didn’t have a recording of the call on his phone. He’d bluffed her, but he did so because her eyes betrayed her fear when he levelled the accusation at her.
Snatching up her handbag, April threw some items into it. ‘You shall be hearing from my lawyer!’ Albert didn’t give her threat much credence. ‘Kate Harris is guilty of murder and she is guilty of stealing from this business.’ April had looked like she was about to storm from the room, but Albert’s accusation had drawn the staff around the corner to come to the office door. With an audience, April chose to reveal what she knew. ‘Here!’ she railed. ‘Look at the accounts! Your beloved Kate has been pilfering from the till for months and doing her best to cover it up. Once a criminal, always a criminal.’ She stepped away from the screen, hooking her left arm through the loops of her handbag as she stormed for the office door. ‘This place will fall apart without me to run it. Let’s see how long you can manage without me! You’ll be begging me to come back!’ her voice echoed through the building. ‘Begging!’ her final shout was followed by the sound of a door slamming and the café was quiet again.
No one said anything for a few seconds.
Rex had been listening to the humans shouting at each other but hadn’t found it interesting. He couldn’t keep up with what was being said and they hadn’t mentioned food, walkies, or ball at any point, so he’d stopped bothering to listen. There was a rubbish bin in the corner behind the desk that had an apple core in it and a wrapper from a packet of chocolate digestives. There was some chocolate still inside the wrapper unless his nose was wrong – which it never was. However, he doubted it was worth the effort to retrieve.
Hans wandered through to find where all the humans had got to. ‘What’s going on?’ he asked Rex, foregoing his obligatory need to lead with an insult.
Rex sniffed the air. ‘Nothing interesting. Something is burning though.’ From a sitting position he jumped to his feet and barked. The sudden noise made everyone jump but before anyone had a chance to ask why the dog was barking, the smoke alarm burst into life.
Victor swore and he wasn’t the only one. April and the dodgy accounting were swiftly forgotten as the staff ran back to the kitchen which, by the time Albert got there, was filling with smoke. No one needed to take charge, not right away at least, the fire alarm and all the shouting before it had scared away all the customers. Anyone coming through the café front door now would swiftly turn around.
Albert coughed as acrid smoke caught in his throat and that was enough to convince him it was time to leave. A tray of clangers had been left to burn, that was the source of the smoke, the cause nothing more than curiosity as whoever should have been tending to them, drifted away to listen to April and Victor. It would be easily dealt with, but the café would be shut for the rest of the day, Albert felt certain of that.
Holding his breath until he got to the door, Albert’s pulse was beginning to hammer when he sucked in a lungful of cool, moist air. He was jostled in the doorway and hadn’t thought anyone was following him. Trying to get out of the way, he heard Victor’s voice and turned toward it, getting rewarded with a lump pressed into his arms.
‘Can you look after Hans while I deal with this?’ The lump in his arms was the dachshund, who looked bewildered and was coughing. Victor shouted, ‘Thanks,’ as he ran back through the café to the kitchen. He hadn’t waited for an answer.
Albert looked down at his new charge. ‘Hello, Hans.
’
Hans looked up, letting his tongue loll out as he greeted the old man. ‘I’m way better than a German Shepherd. You’ll soon be phoning the pound to drop off the stupid brute you’ve got so you can get a cool dog like me instead.’
Rex growled a warning.
‘Don’t go getting jealous now, Rex,’ Albert chided his dog. ‘I’m just holding him because we don’t have his lead with us.’
‘Yeah, that and because I’m adorable,’ cheered Hans, wriggling around until he was lying on his back and being cradled like a baby.
Rex growled again.
Albert had to wait ten minutes before Victor returned. Someone had come out to prop the front door open, using a chair which Albert then helpfully sat on to keep it in place. The doors and windows at the back were also open, the passage of air driving the smoke from the café as the staff cleaned up the mess.
‘What a mess,’ muttered Victor, sagging against the doorframe. ‘Would you like a free clanger? It may or may not be flavoured by the smoke.’ Victor pointed to the glass cabinet set into the counter which was mostly full of clangers waiting to be sold. ‘I’ve got about a day’s worth of product going to waste now. I can’t sell it, and we’ll have to air the café out for the rest of the day to make sure it doesn’t smell when we open tomorrow morning. It’s just one thing after another at the moment.’ He sighed, a weary, mournful noise that captured how he felt without the need for words. ‘I wonder if the café can survive this.’
He didn’t expect a response to his statement and Albert didn’t offer one. He was thinking about what he did want to eat as a smoke flavoured clanger did not appeal. He was also pondering what he could or should do next. Having established that the police focussed their attention on Kate because April fingered her for the crime, he understood how the current situation came about. However, he hadn’t gained any useful knowledge. Kate still had no alibi and all the motive. No one else had presented themselves as a viable suspect to investigate – he didn’t for one moment think April was guilty – so what was his next move? It already felt like he was clutching at straws.
Sucking on his lips in thought, he decided that if all he had to clutch at were straws, he might as well accept it and see what fruit they might bear. ‘Do you, by any chance, have a key to your sister’s house?’
Kate’s Place
Victor didn’t have a key, but he knew where Kate kept her spare. Returning from a quick trip to the accountancy office in the back of the building, he also had Hans’s lead in his hand when he got back.
‘Can you keep Hans with you for a little while, please?’ he begged.
Rex couldn’t believe his ears. Nor his eyes, when they set off together, Hans straining his lead to be the dog in front even though he was one quarter Rex’s length.
Victor needed to keep the café doors open and didn’t want to lock Hans in one of the backrooms where he might start chewing things. Albert didn’t think Hans would do that, chewing destructively is something dogs grow out of when they are still puppies, but he thought it might do Rex good to have a doggy friend around for a while.
‘I can’t believe you are coming with us,’ muttered Rex.
Hans sniggered. ‘Worried you might get replaced?’
‘By you? Be serious. My human likes to have a dog by his side, not a handbag accessory,’
‘Hey!’ yelled Albert as the dachshund threw his snapping teeth at Rex’s front paws. After that, he kept them both on short leads and to either side of him, positioning himself in the middle. ‘I don’t care which one of you started it.’ he chastised them both equally. ‘I’ll be the one who finishes it.’
When he came across a public house, Albert didn’t think twice about going inside. It was one he had passed on his way into the town the day he arrived, and it boasted Bedfordshire’s finest selection of craft ciders. Albert usually drank stout if he were to have a longer drink, or sometimes a lager if he wanted to drink it quickly. Today, a cider sounded tempting, but more than anything, he needed a rest.
Failing to observe the dull aches creeping into his legs, hips, and back would only result in feeling too sore to do anything tomorrow. He was keen to get to Kate’s but would be good to no one if he wore himself out.
In the pub, he ended up with Hans on his lap. This was partly to keep the two dogs apart because they wouldn’t stop growling at each other, and partly because the dog was jumping up and wagging his tail to be picked up.
‘See,’ Hans goaded Rex, ‘You’re already second fiddle, wolf.’
Rex narrowed his eyes and curled back his top lip. He was going to get even with the dachshund soon enough. Until then, he laid himself on the wooden floor and closed his eyes to consider his possible methods of revenge.
After sampling his pint of cold, crisp, apple cider, Albert busied himself with a call to his eldest son, Gary.
‘Dad,’ said Gary when he answered the phone.
With the immediate impression that his son was too busy to talk, Albert said, ‘I’m just checking in, son. If you are busy at work, you can call me back when it’s more convenient to you.’
‘No, now is as good of a time as any. Are you still expecting to arrive in York on time?’
Albert was supposed to be leaving Biggleswade today and was yet to speak with the pub landlord about staying on an extra night. However, given the time, he had to accept it was already impractical to travel to York today.
‘I think I will stay another night here, actually. It’s rather nice,’ he said, opting to give an answer that was wholly true while also avoiding the truth.
There was silence at the other end for a beat until Gary said, ‘You’ve got a case to investigate, haven’t you? Has that brother of mine been helping you again? Selina has been off with sick kids and you haven’t asked me for anything, unless that’s what this call is for.’
‘Not at all, son,’ Albert protested.
‘Then it’s Randall,’ concluded Gary, passing sentence on his younger brother. ‘What bother are you getting into this time, Dad?’
Albert blew out a frustrated breath. ‘No bother, Gary. There’s just a wrongfully accused woman and I am looking to see if I can find the real killer.’
‘Killer!’ blurted his eldest son. ‘Oh, my God, Dad. You’re interfering with a murder investigation!’
Getting grumpy, and wishing he hadn’t made the call, Albert defended himself. ‘I’m not interfering. I’m just looking around a bit. You did read about the thing in Stilton, right?’ Albert felt his children were too harsh with him. To his mind, he’d been rather successful of late.
However, Gary saw a chance to hammer home his point. ‘If you mean, did I read about your dog wrecking the cheese rolling race, then yes, I did. And I saw it on television. And I found an A3 poster of you chasing Rex as he ran off with a whole Stilton in his mouth. It was stuck to my desk when I came to work two days ago, and I haven’t found the culprit yet.’
Albert couldn’t stop himself from sniggering. It hadn’t been funny at the time, but when he watched the footage on the news that night – it made the national ten o’clock BBC broadcast as a human interest snippet - he’d been unable to stop himself from laughing.
Gary was about to get upset, so Albert quashed his mirth, saying, ‘I just called to check in, Gary. I’ll see you in York in two days.’
Albert got another sigh in response. ‘Yes, Dad. Two days. I’m coming in on the midday rocket from London; a two-hour straight shot from Kings Cross to York.’
‘I’ll meet you at the station,’ Albert volunteered. ‘I expect there will be a bar or a coffee shop nearby where I can wait with Rex.’
The phone call ended, and Albert finished his tall glass of cider. In retrospect he probably should have opted for tea or coffee or maybe even a hot chocolate. The temperature was dipping outside; it was a cold autumn day with a stiff breeze kicking the leaves along the street and forming eddies at the edge of buildings where they would dance as if engaging in a gam
e.
Kate’s house was right across town, the directions Victor gave easy enough to follow so he walked right to it without needing to back track. In his long police career, Albert had only needed to force entry to a property on three occasions. Doing so in an urban environment always attracted the attention of neighbours who would call the police as an immediate response. Without a key, he wouldn’t have dreamed of trying to get into Kate’s property. He’d thought about having a look around it many hours ago; it was an obvious place to explore since Joel had possibly been taken from here and Kate was accused of not being here when she claimed to be. Albert’s expectation was that he would come later with Victor, but this worked too.
Using the key, he let himself in, strolling up the path as if he belonged there. If a neighbour saw him, he didn’t think they would call the police, but if they did, he had a key and permission to be inside the premises.
Albert had to nudge Rex to get him inside because he’s stopped halfway across the threshold. Then he left the dogs, unclipping each from their leads so they could explore while he methodically inspected the house for clues.
Rex froze the moment the door opened. The humans had been here, the ones who were in the café yesterday and following them this morning. He sucked in a big sample of air, holding it as he broke the scents down and filed them away. There was no mistaking it, no question in his mind. As he understood it, a human had been killed and Han’s human, the female one, was taken away by the police for doing it. He’d never been able to bend his head around humans’ need to kill each other. Kill for food, yes. Protect your territory, yes, and he accepted that in the course of protecting one’s territory, it might be necessary to kill. However, humans would just bump each other off for no good reason at all. A lot of it seemed to revolve around mating and that was just bonkers.