Death of an Ordinary Guy

by Jo A. Hiestand

  Talbot Tanner was straightening up from a wood-bundling chore to drag his shirtsleeve beneath his nose. He eyed the debris, then Ramona, a shapely blonde in her early 40s. She seemed to have recovered from last evening’s shock, though her arm would take a bit longer to recover. It was held in a makeshift sling. The lilac print clashed with her teal blouse.

  “Should’ve had this garden taken care of long ago, afore it got to be such a mess,” Talbot was saying. The large rectangle of near-wild garden had indeed lost itself in the woods behind it. Vines, bracken and stinging nettle inched into cultivated territory. Ramona gazed at the invasive plants, shook her head, and apologized for being too busy to garden properly.

  Muttering that people had their own priorities in life, Talbot tackled the litter contributed by the trees. He gestured impatiently toward the huge bundles of branches and sawn up limbs dotting the garden like trussed haystacks.

  It was then that he saw me. Making some unpleasant remark about losing his breakfast, he showed me his backside as he stooped down to tie up some sticks. Ramona greeted me and asked who I was.

  “A bleedin’ copper,” Talbot grunted before I could reply. “So ring up your solicitor, Ramona, afore she totes you over her shoulder and throws you in the slammer!” His laugh disturbed the birds in the trees, for they flew up, chattering in annoyance and lighted in a grassy patch across the road.

  When I finally explained the reason for my early call, Ramona asked if I could wait a minute while Talbot finished up. Just as happy to get Talbot out of my life, I told them to go ahead.

  Talbot grumbled under his breath and applied himself to his chore. “If you call me afore you get so many castoffs,” he said to Ramona, “it wouldn’t take me so long.”

  We watched him make a final knot in the rope corralling a particularly large group of limbs. Ramona apologized. “Sneaked up on me, Talbot. I didn’t realize how many branches were down until I started weeding the other day. Then, too, that rainstorm brought more down. Too bad we couldn’t get to this before the fire. Could’ve used it last night.”

  “Might’ve if I’d had ’em earlier,” he said, bending over a bundle. He opened his pocketknife, visually inspected the blade as though he could discern its sharpness, and began sawing through the rope. The rope gave a satisfying ‘thwack’ as the knife sliced through the remaining fibers. Talbot snapped the knife closed, dropped it into his trouser pocket, and slowly coiled up the unused portion of rope. “Have to come back for it all,” he muttered, draping the rope over his shoulder. “When you said branches, I didn’t know how much you were talkin’ about. There’s branches and then there’s branches.” He watched Ramona dig into her pocket and extract several pound coins. In greedy anticipation, his tongue leisurely ran across the roughened skin of his lips. He took the money without a word of thanks. ”I’ll be back for the lot. Can’t say when, exactly. Have to see what I’m doin’ the rest of the week.” The coins clinked as he shoved them into his pocket. “Anything else you want? That tree’ll need some lookin’ after soon. Top her off so she won’t have all those long branches beggin’ to come down.” Pointing toward a patriarchal oak, he added, “I can do it pretty cheap. Halfords want some work in their back garden, too. I can do it all on the same day. Save myself a trip and give you a good price, since I’ll be right across the road.”

  “I’ll have to see, Talbot,” Ramona said, glancing from her watch to me. “I really have to get busy. I’ve a load of items to get through before I go to work. My half day,” she explained.

  Talbot tugged at the knot of the bundle, making certain of its strength. “Don’t want no accidents,” he said, tucking the rope’s end into the tangle of branches. He ignored me as he passed, coiling the leftover rope around his left shoulder.

  “I’ve had enough accidents, Lord knows,” Ramona said, lifting her slinged arm as though she was a bird with a broken wing.

  “Not painful, is it?”

  “Not the way I’m doped up. God, first this, then that damned corpse. If I’m not taking codeine for the arm, I’m downing Mogadon for the jitters. Makes me sleep.”

  I thought she wouldn’t be on the Mogadon for long. “Recent injury?”

  “Sunday afternoon. Byron stumbled into me. I sprained my wrist in the fall.”

  I gave my condolences and asked if she had a few minutes for some questions about last night.

  While Talbot leisurely backed his truck out of the driveway, I followed Ramona into her house. Could either of them have rigged up the effigy in my room? Talbot certainly could—he was already on my list of Prime Suspects. But Ramona was doubtful, with her sprained wrist. Still, people have moved grand pianos single-handedly in a time of stress. I put her on my list of Doubtfuls. Ten minutes later I was walking back to The Broken Loaf, having learned about her Sunday.

  Even though my stomach prompted me to return to the pub for breakfast, I decided to question the Conways, owners of the village gift shop. It was next to the pub, but more importantly, I was determined to impress Graham with my initiative.

  The shop looked more like a cube of scarlet Virginia Creeper and green ivy than a man-made building, for its gray limestone was disappearing beneath the foliage. Rhododendrons, decades old, fanned out from the foundation, while crimson chrysanthemums dotted the greenery at its base. A gray flagstone path, free of autumn’s dregs, meandered from the road to the red door proclaiming ‘Conway Gifts’ overhead in white, Old English lettering.

  Eleanor Conway was sweeping the front step as I walked up, calling out ‘good morning’ in a puff of white vapor. The sun had just touched the shop’s tile roof, transforming the dew into sequins. A bullfinch perched on the gutter, alternately eyeing us and singing into the cool air. A nearby bush seemed to respond in kind. Love song or territorial war? The bird seemed undisturbed by either prospect, for he leisurely drank from the water in the bottom of the gutter.

  I stopped, trying to discern if it was a female or male bullfinch. In the dim light I couldn’t make out the coloring clearly, which would announce its sex to me. But I did know that quiet warble. What incredible luck! Bullfinch sightings were rare, a red alert posted for them. Their breeding pairs were down to 190,000 last time I had checked. Unlike the wrens I’d seen earlier, which were upwards of seven million pairs. A pity, for this bird was beautiful, with its red chest and belly, black wings and cap, and white rump. Yet this bullfinch sat on a gift shop roof as though it was the most ordinary occurrence in the world.

  Reluctantly I tore myself away from the bird, hoping I would sight it later.

  Eleanor seemed less interested in the bird than in knowing who was at her shop so early. I introduced myself and explained my errand. She nodded, setting her broom aside, and opened the door.

  It was a classic gift shop, offering the tourist the typical knitted apparel, jewelry, post cards, and mugs, and a small offering of emergency tourist essentials. It also offered the less typical pottery, watercolor paintings and embroidered place mats. A balance of predictable, indispensable and refinement.

  “We haven’t been here all that long,” Eleanor said, exchanging her nylon jacket for a wool blazer. She was soft, pink and round like an overripe peach, her cheeks flushed from her custodial duty. We sat in the back room—a catchall for received shipments, returned items and pre-posted packages, and a dispensary for quick meals—the electric kettle heating water for our tea, a tabby cat rubbing against my legs. Eleanor paused at a small mirror hung near the sink and pulled a leaf from her hair. It was brassy orange, the product of a bad dye job. Satisfied with her primping, she cleared a space on the wooden table top, spread a checkered tablecloth on it, and pulled out two mugs proclaiming ‘Buxton.’ It threw me momentarily. I had quite expected something more general, such as Derbyshire. But Upper Kingsleigh people can be tourists, too. I eyed the biscuit tin on top of the small fridge, wishing she would offer them. Unfortunately, her mind wasn’t on our stomachs.

  “Mason’s never here this early,�
� she said when I complimented her on the shop. “I open up. Mason joins me around 9:00, then I take a break for an hour or so, depending on customer flow, then rejoin him when business usually picks up. We both work together until late afternoon, when I leave to get tea on. He locks up at 7:00.”

  “Nice arrangement.”

  “It is. Especially since he’s an evening person and I’m an early riser.”

  “And it’s just the two of you working?”

  “We have help in the summer, when tourist trade is high. Doesn’t pay to keep on a third person during off season.”

  “And you’ve been here…”

  “Four years. We bought it when Mason was made redundant.”

  I accepted the hot tea, added two lumps of sugar, and said, “Oh? I’m sorry. It must have been hard for you. What was he in?”

  “Accounting. All of a sudden they had too many accountants. They hadn’t hired on new staff in years, but all of a sudden they had too many. No loss of clients, no deduction in business. Just too many accountants. Mason was the first out the door.”

  There was an awkward silence in which I could hear the electric kettle murmuring and the cat purring. I counted the seconds between purrs and the drip of water from the spigot. The droplets echoed as they hit the water in the saucepan. Domestic, safe sounds that comforted in an upsetting world. “We thought it was a safe venture,” Eleanor said, as though reading my thoughts. “It’s hard when you reach a certain age, Sergeant. Employers look at you, see only the wrinkles and age spots and broadening waistline. And then calculate the years till you’ll retire. You, as a person with a brain, vanish. They forget you’re just as capable as you were yesterday and the day before. Yet suddenly you’re too stupid to do anything.”

  I felt self-conscious about my relative youth, and tried to hide my unblemished hands. After I made some inane remark about knowing a lot of people who were in that situation, Eleanor said, “We’re not so old. We’re just 59, for God’s sake!”

  I refrained from saying that was my parents’ ages. There are times when consoling banter is out of place.

  “Mason’s a hard worker. He tried for months to get another job but after repeatedly hearing the same excuses, well… We thought we’d go into business for ourselves. Might as well kill yourself working for your own benefit instead of for some ungrateful boss, as Mason puts it.”

  I agreed silently, though not putting Graham into that boss category. I’d had my fill of ungrateful bosses before I had joined the Force.

  She sighed, staring into her tea. “It’s worked out well so far.”

  Until this murder, I thought. And with the threat of Upper Kingsleigh losing more tourists, what would that do to their trade? And future?

  “We were late to the bonfire,” she said after I had asked her about Sunday evening. “We arrived just as the vicar was finishing his speech and handing off the torch. We try to miss the opening shenanigans—not because we don’t like them or are anti-social. It’s just that Mason gets uncomfortable around Talbot.”

  He’s not the only one. I asked her if Mason always felt like that.

  “No. Just around dole and bonfire time, when Talbot grouses about the dole money.”

  “He does tend to rabbit on about the subject, from what I understand.”

  “It’s not so much the continuous complaining. It’s Talbot’s talk about the war. It reminds Mason of his own tough times. He was an orphan.”

  An emphatic ringing of the shop’s overhead doorbell pulled Eleanor from her chair. “Now, who on earth…”

  “Want me to see?” I asked.

  “I’ll scream if I need you. Early for a burglar, don’t you think?”

  I agreed, and stood up, looking around for a weapon. Two sets of not-so-stealthy footsteps approached and moments later Byron MacKinnon and Mason Conway walked into the back room. Mason reminded me of the numbers he used to work with: round as a zero from hours of sitting at his books.

  Eleanor looked relieved, and I sat down, releasing the paring knife. Greetings were exchanged. The men sat at the table while Eleanor refilled the kettle and turned it on.

  “Didn’t mean to interrupt,” Byron said, giving me the once-over, “but Eleanor usually has the shop open by now and I normally stop by for a cuppa. If this is a bad time— If this is official business—”

  “Not at all,” I said, thinking I could check Byron and Mason off my interview list at the same time. “Tea and a chat—nice way to start the day.” I bent over to pet the cat. He was entwining himself around my legs, as though he expected me to feed him. I hoped I would be able to make it to the door when I had to leave.

  “You’re starting the day early, dear.” Eleanor gave her husband the mug with a chip on the rim.

  “I was up—couldn’t sleep well after… I— I saw Byron coming, and thought I’d join him in a cuppa.” His stare was subtler than Byron’s. I decided to let them think this was purely social.

  Byron took it as such, for in the brief silence he said, “Do you know what Arthur’s done? Thanks, El.” Byron accepted the cup of tea and poured a great deal of cream into it. He stirred it, clinking the spoon against the cup’s sides. The clinking increased in volume and tempo as he explained. “Another couple wanted to leave this morning. Halfway into their stay and they want to leave. Of course, he rang up Graham to see if it was all right. Which it was! Just ‘Keep me informed of your whereabouts’ and off they went. Sorry.” His clinking slowed briefly as he looked at me, only to return to tempo and volume when he continued. “They must be low on the suspect list if he lets them go.”

  I looked at the three of them, again mentally calculating if they could have rigged up the Guy, or even why they would have done it.

  “Poor Arthur,” Eleanor said. ”Is he dispirited by all this?”

  “He’s not exactly dancing through daisies, but to look at him, he’s fine. It wasn’t his fault Pedersen was murdered.”

  “I better see Kris when I close up.” She scribbled ‘Kris’ on the flap of a convenient cardboard box.

  “You can go during the day if it’s slow,” Mason said. “Won’t interfere with tea when Derek gets home.”

  “The thing is,” Byron said, the spoon falling onto the saucer. “The bloody thing is that Arthur refunded their money!” He waited for his statement to impact the Conways.

  Blinking either at the volume or at the meaning, Eleanor said, “He always was a gentleman, Byron. You can tell breeding without a coat of arms painted on everything.”

  “Has he ever made refunds before,” I asked.

  “Oh, a few people have canceled a trip and have received their money back,” he said, his voice back to a more normal volume, “but that’s once or twice a year. And certainly not at the rate they’re wanting to leave now.”

  “How many guests are at the manor?”

  “We had booked nearly a dozen rooms—singles and doubles.”

  I agreed that the reservations would bring in a sizable chunk of cash.

  “You’re damned right about that! And with Arthur returning everything—even after expenses…”

  “Hope he won’t get burnt,” Mason said. A silence settled on the group, now somber. Mason got up and poured his tea into the sink, muttering it wasn’t to his liking. Byron shoved his cup from him with such violence that the remaining liquid in the cup sloshed into the saucer. Eleanor thought better of pursuing the biscuit tin and said, “I‘m amazed people are leaving. People are such voyeurs these days. Court telly and tell-all talk shows, things on the news I never would have imagined seeing… I would have thought this would induce the crowds instead of reducing them.”

  “Maybe it will,” Byron agreed, his eyes brightening. He smiled as though he could see the reservations piling up. “But right now it’s a repellant. When you’re too close to it, when you’ve been in the fray, it’s frightening. Especially if you think you’re the next victim.”

  Mason said, “There are many types of victims. We
may all end up as victims before this is over. How long you people planning on being here?” He leaned forward, coming close to me, as though challenging me to answer correctly.

  I told him we wouldn’t leave until we had secured an arrest of the guilty party.

  “And how long’s that?” His breath came across the table in one quick exhale.

  “Mason,” Eleanor said, her hand going to his shoulder, “what kind of question is that? The sergeant—”

  “The sergeant knows what kind of question it is. One from a concerned citizen. One who doesn’t want the police traipsing around, scaring away tourists. What the hell’s wrong with that?”

  I assured the Conways it was all right and that we were working as efficiently and swiftly as possible.

  “I should damn well hope so. You can’t expect tourists to hang about all week until you lot get out of their way. Blocking everything they’ve come to see…”

  “They may come later,” I said. ”It’s just like the curious to want to see Where It Was Done.”

  “And take away a piece of the scene?” Byron said.

  Eleanor shuddered. “Gruesome souvenirs.”

  “Let’s hope they still want less grisly ones,” Mason muttered.

  I asked Byron if he thought any more tourists would leave the manor.

  “I haven’t a feel for it yet. Last night I wouldn’t have thought this would happen, but this morning…” He shrugged and grabbed his cup. Throwing his head back, he finished his tea. “Cold,” he said, grimacing. “There may be a life line in this morass. This is one of our busiest times of the year. The three-day events are getting very popular. And we do an awful lot at Christmas—mummers and the Merrie Olde England bit with feasts in the manor’s dining room, carols on authentic instruments. That sort of thing.”