Bunburry--A Murderous Ride

by Helena Marchmont

  His fists clenched more tightly. He could never tell anyone, not even Oscar, what had really happened the day that Vivian died.

  2. Marge and Liz

  “He looked like a drowned rat,” said Marge. “I’ve never seen anyone so miserable.”

  “Or more grateful to be rescued by you,” said Alfie. “Even more grateful than for that delicious meal.”

  Liz murmured sympathetically. “The bus service is quite dreadful. You really need a car.”

  Alfie had already planned his strategy. “Don’t let Betty hear you say that. She’ll tell you the answer isn’t a car but campaigning for better public transport.”

  Marge snorted. “That girl and her crazy schemes to save the planet.”

  “Now, dear,” reproved Liz. “I think protecting the environment is admirable.”

  “Not that it stops you borrowing my car whenever you want. So what’s all this, Alfie? Have you turned green?”

  “I’ve been going to the Green Party meetings,” said Alfie. He noticed Liz and Marge exchange a quick glance.

  “I thought Betty was the only Green Party member in Bunburry,” Marge said.

  “I haven’t joined the party as such,” said Alfie. “But the meetings are very stimulating.”

  “Who goes to these meetings?” There was a studied casualness in Marge’s question. “Just you and her?”

  “Chance would be a fine thing,” said Alfie. He said it deliberately, and noted another exchange of glances. If they thought he was pursuing the energetic American, they might stop their machinations. He strongly suspected that they wanted to pair him up with Liz’s great-niece, Emma. And he was certain that Emma would be horrified by the prospect. Since his involvement in apprehending a murderer, she was friendlier and more relaxed with him, but he still remembered her earlier cool appraisal of him. Perhaps that was just how police officers behaved, even when they were off duty, but he had felt slightly unnerved by it.

  Emma was twenty-six, only two years younger than Vivian. But he and Vivian had never felt the fourteen-year age gap between them, while Emma would see him as just another middle-aged man. He knew he could put a stop to Liz and Marge’s matchmaking by telling them that he was grieving for Vivian and had no interest in any other woman. But he didn’t want to tell anybody in Bunburry about her. He had come here to escape the pity, shock and embarrassment he had had to contend with in London. Bereavement had made him a pariah, someone whose very presence made people guilty about enjoying themselves. Here in Bunburry, he was offered sympathy, but Aunt Augusta had died after a long and happy life, and her death was in the natural order of things.

  Much as he wanted to hint to Marge and Liz that he and Betty Thorndike enjoyed tête-à-têtes, the truth won out. “The vicar comes to the meetings as well. We meet in the Horse, have a pint, and discuss how to stave off the impending apocalypse. Which mostly consists of not driving a car.”

  “Nobody knows more than Betty how inconvenient it is not to have a car,” said Marge. “Whenever she’s off teaching or evangelising or whatever she gets up to, she has to stay overnight because she can’t get back here. That girl has a network of friends’ sofas across six counties. Well, I tell you, it wouldn’t work for me.”

  “No, dear, given how grumpy you are, I don’t imagine you’ve got a network of friends, at least not any that would want you staying overnight,” said Liz.

  Alfie laughed. “And yet you’ve given her house room for, what, five years?”

  “I’m a living saint,” said Liz. “I put up with her so that nobody else has to. She’s quite handy for managing my fudge-making business, I grant you, but once she’s outlived her usefulness, I shall put her in a home.”

  “Excuse me,” said Marge, “I’m years younger than you.”

  “Only a very few, dear.”

  “And I’m not going in a home. People get murdered in homes.”

  “People get murdered in the centre of the village,” said Liz. “I shouldn’t say this, but it really was quite exciting playing amateur detective.”

  “You could have a loyalty card,” Alfie suggested. “Once someone has bought six packets of fudge, we solve a crime of their choice.”

  He expected Liz to smile at least, but her brows drew together. “And wouldn’t that just suit my great-niece’s sergeant. He didn’t have a thing to do with catching that murderer, and yet he managed to steal all the credit.”

  “Harold Wilson, the laziest man in Bunburry,” said Marge.

  “Harold Wilson?” repeated Alfie. “But Harold Wilson was a prime minister.”

  “I don’t think you can trademark names, dear,” said Liz. “Mr Wilson was a politician, not a brand.”

  “But it’s such a well-known name – what were his parents thinking?”

  “If Sergeant Wilson’s anything to go by, his family isn’t in the habit of thinking. But never mind him – we don’t want you catching pneumonia waiting for buses. I’m sure Marge wouldn’t mind lending you her car, would you, Marge?”

  “No, really,” Alfie cut in before Marge could answer, “I wouldn’t consider it. I’ll leave home in better time in future.”

  He was aware that Liz was observing him with eyes that seemed to miss nothing.

  “Is this to do with your grandparents?” she asked.

  That wasn’t what he had expected. “No. No, nothing to do with them.”

  “It’s just that you were a child when it happened, and you didn’t really know anything about it. We’ve stirred it all up for you. It must be very hard knowing that the crash was here, and perfectly understandable if you don’t fancy driving on our roads.”

  He couldn’t tell her that he was haunted by another accident entirely. And she was right: she and Marge had stirred it all up for him. He had always known his grandparents had been killed in a crash when he was twelve – that was why he and his mother had never returned to Bunburry. The shock had been to discover that it had been a head-on crash with a 17-year-old who was showing off his new sports car. And that the teenager was rich, privileged Charlie Tennison, son of Lord Caversham, whose wily lawyer had blamed the crash on Alfie’s grandparents, despite all the evidence to the contrary. And the jurors, after hearing character references from a vicar and a master at Eton, no doubt paid or pressurised by Lord Caversham, tugged their forelocks and found the teenager not guilty, when he should have been jailed for years. Alfie had never met Charlie Tennison, but he loathed him with every fibre of his being.

  He latched on to the excuse that Liz had offered him. “The roads round here aren’t what I’m used to. They’re very narrow.”

  “Then you’ll just have to get used to them,” said Marge. “You have a car, don’t you?”

  “I did,” said Alfie lightly. “It was in a bit of an accident and I’ve got out of the habit of driving.”

  “Oh dear,” said Liz. “That’s unpleasant. I hope nobody was hurt.”

  He was conscious that she was still watching him closely, and he sat very still, a fixed smile on his face, betraying Vivian with every word. “No, nothing like that. But the car wasn’t worth repairing.”

  Liz sighed. “And I can understand that you don’t think Gussie’s car is worth repairing either.”

  “Sorry?” said Alfie.

  “Maybe not repairing as such, but it would need a complete overhaul. It certainly wouldn’t pass its MOT. And it’s not the most practical car for the country.”

  “I didn’t know Aunt Augusta had a car,” said Alfie.

  There was a gasp from Marge. “Clarissa Hopkins!” she said accusingly, the use of Liz’s full name underlining the gravity of the situation. “Don’t tell me you haven’t given the boy the garage key!”

  “Garage?” said Alfie. He was sure he had been through and round the entire cottage and there had been no sign of a garage. He toyed with the idea of it b
eing a Cotswolds Narnia: he would open a cupboard to discover vast areas that weren’t visible from the outside.

  “I gave him the keys you laid out,” said Liz mildly.

  “But why on earth didn’t you point out the garage when we were showing him round?”

  “I wasn’t aware that I was garage monitor,” said Liz, less mildly. “Why on earth didn’t you point out the garage?”

  She was looking so uncharacteristically truculent that Alfie intervened. “You weren’t able to show me round, remember? I was so traumatised by the parlour wallpaper that you left me to recover with a cup of tea.”

  “We barely notice the wallpaper now,” said Liz, “but it does take some getting used to. Anyway, if you’re not going to drive Gussie’s car, Alfie, I’m sure you could get some money for it. It’s quite a good one.”

  “First I’ve got to find the garage. How have I missed it?”

  “Oh, it’s not attached to the house. Nobody had cars when these old cottages were built, and it would spoil the look of them if you added something on. If you go along the lane at the back, there’s a row of garages more or less hidden by the trees.”

  Alfie had seen the building in the distance but had assumed it was some sort of derelict craft shop. Now it turned out he had inherited a garage and a car as well as a cottage, the last thing he wanted. He hoped that Liz was right and that someone, somewhere would take the car off his hands.

  3. Gussie’s Garage

  The garage door was stuck fast with frost and it took all Alfie’s strength to wrench it open. There were no windows and it was a few moments before his eyes adjusted to the gloom. A number of packing cases were stacked by the walls, and pieces of discarded furniture, but there, in the middle, was a car-shaped tarpaulin.

  Flanked by Liz and Marge, he entered the garage, and lifted up a corner of the tarpaulin to reveal grey-blue paintwork and an elongated grille. He had a weird sensation of déjà vu. Hurriedly, he pulled off the whole covering and stood staring at the car.

  ***

  The sight of it took him back to when he was eleven years old, or perhaps only ten. His mother had deposited him with his grandparents the previous day and returned to her job in London. He had spent the first full day of the summer holidays roaming over the Cotswold hills. His grandmother made him a packet of sandwiches, but he ate them within an hour of leaving the cottage, and eventually it was hunger that led him to check the time. He was late for supper. His grandparents were completely unreasonable about being punctual for meals, but for once he didn’t mind. He hoped it would be macaroni cheese.

  But as he’d turned the corner into the lane, all thought of food vanished. There was a car in front of his grandparents’ cottage. A Jaguar. A Jaguar convertible. He raced towards it, reached it, stretched out his hand to touch the hallowed bonnet.

  “Hello, Alfie,” came a voice and he snatched his hand back, afraid of getting told off.

  “Go ahead, it won’t bite.”

  Tentatively, he drew his fingers across the narrow bonnet to the deep curve of one of the four headlights.

  “Do you want to go for a spin in it?”

  “Augusta!” His grandmother had appeared at the front door. “Alfie’s already late for supper.”

  “I’m sure another ten minutes won’t matter,” said Aunt Augusta. “Come on, Alfie, hop in.”

  “I won’t keep supper waiting for you, you know,” his grandmother warned.

  Alfie’s stomach gave a faint rumble. “I don’t care.” He would happily starve to death if it meant he could ride in a Jaguar convertible.

  With a huff of exasperation, his grandmother went back into the cottage, slamming the front door behind her.

  “Your grandparents don’t appreciate cars,” said Aunt Augusta.

  “I know. They’ve got a Hillman Imp,” said Alfie.

  She burst into peals of laughter. “Oh, I like that, Alfie, very good! I must remember it.”

  He wasn’t aware that he had said anything particularly clever, but basked in her praise nonetheless.

  “Now, roof up or down?”

  There was only one possible answer.

  “Down, please.”

  “It’s easier with two,” she said.

  The navy-blue fabric roof was firmly attached to the bodywork, but she showed him how to unfasten it, and together they concertinaed it back in the direction of the boot. Alfie tried to push it flat, but it got jammed in an unsightly lump. He felt his face go hot. Had he broken it? There would be no supper, no drive, and the eternal shame of having damaged the most beautiful car he had ever seen.

  “Don’t worry,” Aunt Augusta said, cheerfully reassuring. “There’s a knack to it.” She came round to his side of the car, put her hand under the fabric and adjusted something. “There, try again.”

  The roof sank obediently into place. Aunt Augusta opened the passenger door for him and he scrambled onto the grey leather seat. The dashboard was polished wood, with a locked glove compartment and a myriad of dials and switches in front of the driver’s seat, including a vast speedometer. He searched for the seatbelt but couldn’t find it.

  “This is a classic car, built before seatbelts,” said Aunt Augusta, climbing in and wrapping a headscarf round her shoulder-length curls. “Don’t worry, I’ll drive carefully. Where do you want to go?”

  He could have said: Let the car go wherever it wants. All I want to do is take in every incredible second of sitting here. Instead, he just shrugged. “Don’t mind.”

  She turned the key in the ignition with a satisfying solid click and the engine purred. A deeper sound as the car moved from first to second as they eased down the narrow lane, then into third in the street beyond, then out on to the open road in fourth.

  “What’s her top speed?” breathed Alfie.

  “Oh, one-twenty, one-twenty-five,” said Aunt Augusta.

  His eyes widened. “You’ve done the ton?”

  “All the time. It’s the only way to travel.”

  “Don’t you get stopped by the police?”

  “They’ve never been able to catch me. Are you up for it?”

  Alfie swallowed, nodded. Aunt Augusta pressed down on the accelerator and the car surged forward. Alfie forced himself to keep his eyes open despite the wind whipping into his face. Hills, fences, fields whizzed past in a blur. He was in a Jaguar convertible, going at over a hundred miles an hour. It was impossible for life to get any better.

  “Enjoying it?” yelled Aunt Augusta.

  He nodded dumbly.

  “Well, once you learn to drive, you’ll have to try it out for yourself.”

  Life did get better. Better and better. He was going to drive a Jaguar convertible. He was still grinning idiotically when they pulled up outside his grandparents’ cottage twenty minutes later. Aunt Augusta accompanied him inside and stood beside him, her hand on his shoulder.

  “This young man has been an excellent co-driver and navigator and deserves some supper immediately.”

  His grandmother got up from the kitchen table, half-frowning, half-smiling. “I suppose there might still be some macaroni cheese in the Aga.”

  ***

  All these years on, Alfie still remembered the macaroni cheese, the topping crisp and crunchy from overbaking, exactly the way he preferred it, but he didn’t remember saying goodbye to Aunt Augusta. He didn’t even remember thanking her, although he hoped he had. But even if he hadn’t, she must have known how much he had enjoyed the drive. He grinned to himself, recognising now that she had been teasing him, pretending that they were doing the ton when they couldn’t have been going at much over fifty. The sensation of speed on the country road had been so great that he hadn’t even looked at the speedometer.

  Until now, he hadn’t been able to picture Aunt Augusta at all. She was still hazy, since he had been paying much
more attention to the Jaguar, but she had been wearing a trouser suit, he thought.

  He turned to Marge and Liz who were busy folding back the tarpaulin. “I remember Aunt Augusta wearing a headscarf when the roof was down.”

  “That was when she had that terrible perm,” said Marge. “She looked like a prize poodle.”

  “She looked very fashionable, dear,” said Liz. “It was the eighties. She was trying to look like Farrah Fawcett. We all were.”

  “I wasn’t,” snorted Marge. “I was trying to look like Mia Farrow. In her elfin bob days.”

  “Oh, is that what you were trying to do?” asked Liz innocently. “I just thought you had had an accident with your hair scissors.”

  Alfie laughed and was rewarded with a smart tap on the arm from Marge.

  “Don’t be so rude,” she said. “I’ll have you know I looked more like Mia Farrow than Mia Farrow.”

  “I can believe it,” said Alfie honestly. Even now, forty years on, Marge was elegantly petite, the oversized glasses simply emphasising how tiny she was. Liz, taller and broader, exuded strength, and Alfie would have compared her more to Sigourney Weaver. And yet in their conversation, aside from their mock bickering, Marge was the one who was forthright and spoke her mind, while Liz was more contained, more observant. He still felt too embarrassed to admit to them that he barely remembered Aunt Augusta, their best friend, and he had deliberately tried to make it sound as though he had had innumerable outings in her car. He wasn’t sure whether Liz was convinced.

  He hoped to be more convincing with his next reminiscence. “You know, she once told me I could drive it when I got my licence.”

  Liz and Marge beamed at one another.

  “So what are you going to do?” asked Liz.

  “I’m going to have a look at it,” said Alfie.

  “That’s our cue to leave,” said Marge. “He’ll have us changing the oil and cleaning spark plugs if we’re not careful.”

  Alfie let them go, not clarifying that he was literally only going to look at the car. Slowly, he walked round it, admiring it as a beautiful object, dreading it as a challenge. He imagined selling it to a dealer. He imagined selling it for scrap. He imagined racing down the road in it at 120mph. What he didn’t imagine was that it would be impounded as a murder weapon, and he would be the prime suspect.