Hearing this made John feel very much the opposite of being in control. He knew a great deal about Adam Rolfe’s past. People who thought they knew Adam didn’t really know him at all. They’d be surprised at the truth, amazed that the clever but bullied man had once been far from that.
John had met him at a veteran’s club, a gathering place for people who’d served overseas with the UN. They’d hit it off immediately. However, there were differences. Whereas John had coped with his experiences, Adam Rolfe had not. He’d returned a different man, one that the likes of Arabella Neville had twisted around her little finger.
John hated what she’d done to his friend but couldn’t, wouldn’t interfere. Not my business, he’d said to himself. Deep down he’d known that in time Adam would revert to his old self and just … blow up.
‘Leave her,’ he said. ‘You know you should.’
Adam knocked back what remained of the drink. ‘I’m going to. I have to, for one reason if no other, for the look on my son’s face.’
John smiled and judged now was the time to pat his old friend on the shoulder.
‘Dominic looks like you.’
Adam gave a little smirk. ‘ He’s more like me than you think. I really think that if I don’t kill Arabella then he will.’
Chapter Five
Dealing with guests, Anna, and a toilet-roll pyramid brought on a resurgent appetite and a buzzing in Honey’s brain.
She told herself that her need for food was based on her energy levels. She burned off so many calories that they had to be replaced on a regular basis. It was a good enough excuse and she was swallowing it – along with the food.
Sometimes she was sure there was some kind of ley line her feet were automatically attracted to. Think food, feet travel. She headed for the dining room. Breakfast was served both to residents and passers-by until eleven o’clock. Only a few passers-by came in to take advantage of this new idea Smudger had come up with, so there was plenty left on the self-service counter.
Honey eyed the rashers of bacon, the sausages, mushrooms, baked beans, fried bread, and eggs; her mouth watering.
Lindsey was already there, dipping into half a grapefruit and a bowl of muesli, hidden beneath the servery.
Honey glimpsed the contents of Lindsey’s bowl.
Skirting the healthy stuff, she went to the hot plates ranged along the server, piling rashers of bacon and an egg between two slices of white bread. She felt Lindsey’s reproachful look even without raising her eyes from the sandwich.
‘Mother, that sandwich is very unhealthy and will do nothing for your diet except wreck it.’
‘I need the energy. My sugar count is so low I think I may faint.’
She wasn’t exactly lying. Unless you’re a director of a large group hotel, owning one means mucking in when needed. Take yesterday morning, for instance. Honey hadn’t expected to have needed to step in as a waitress, but Dumpy Doris, whose shift it was, had called in to say she’d got jammed in a taxi door and was still recovering. Because of the excess baggage she carried around her midriff, hips and thighs, Doris was always getting stuck in narrow and not so narrow places.
Honey took the cowardly dieter’s way out and changed the subject.
‘Has Anna been sick again? I didn’t like to ask.’
Lindsey nodded. ‘I haven’t seen her throw up yet, but I figured it best that she did reception and I gave you a hand clearing down all this lot. Doris won’t be back in until tomorrow. She’s suffering trauma on account of getting stuck in the taxi. Anyway, I didn’t think you’d want her vomiting in response to the smell of a full English breakfast.’
Anna, their Polish waitress-come-receptionist-come-chambermaid, was pregnant again and suffering from early morning sickness. The father was Rodney ‘Clint’ Eastwood, their heavily tattooed casual washer-up. He’d told Honey that the most artistic and ribald of all his tattoos were hidden beneath his clothes. He’d also offered to let her take a look. She’d declined. Anna had not.
Talk of throwing up pre-empted the appearance of Mary Jane, their resident professor of the paranormal who shared a room with Sir Cedric, a long-dead ancestor reputed to live in the closet in the corner of her room.
She came bouncing in, a picture of garish nonchalance. Just for a change she had jettisoned the usual pistachio green and shocking pink for a floaty kaftan scattered with random patches of peach and orange. Bangles of the same alternating colours rippled up and down her skinny arms, and large similarly coloured hoops dangled from her ears. She resembled a garish tent, the sort they use on campsites to camouflage the Portaloo.
‘I fancy a little snack,’ said Mary Jane. ‘I’m clear out of rice cakes and honey. Have you any granola?’
Honey fetched her a bowl of organic muesli. ‘On the house.’
‘Thanks. I could do with that. I think I expended too much energy yesterday. First I was doing readings for a couple of people who have enrolled for your mother’s dating site. It’s a little extra service she provides for them online. A little psychic forecasting so they know whether they’re compatible with each other.’
‘Does it work?’ asked Lindsey.
Mary Jane stopped dipping her spoon in the bowl. ‘Of course it works. Good pairings are ordained, not manufactured. Opposites may attract, but it doesn’t mean they stay the course.’
Honey gave that pronouncement serious thought. She and Carl, her first husband, had been complete opposites. She hadn’t known it at the time, but with hindsight she could see it plain as day. He’d thought marriage was between two people who lived together in the same house. Once you were away from each other, then you were single again. Simple!
Lost in thought, she jumped when a set of spindly fingers landed on her arm.
‘I have to tell you about the Australians,’ Mary Jane whispered. ‘Did you know that I heard them creeping around at three in the morning? What do you think they were up to?’
From past experience Honey would usually have said that they were preparing to check out without paying their bill. As it was, they had paid their bill and checked out at the appointed time.
‘Ghost hunting?’
Mary Jane shook her head. ‘They didn’t believe in ghosts. Said it was all a load of baloney when I mentioned Sir Cedric to them and the fact that I’ve joined the Bath and West Country Ghost Hunting Society. In fact they looked at me as though I was out of my mind. Would you credit that?’
The odd looks Honey had seen on the faces of the husband and wife were now made absolutely clear.
‘They seemed nice enough,’ said Honey. They were very understanding about the toilet roll pyramid, though she didn’t mention that. If she did, Mary Jane was sure to set some meaning into why they’d been piled up in that manner. Instead, the Californian septuagenarian fixed her with one eye, eyelid fluttering halfway down over the other. It was very disconcerting. Honey was reminded of a chameleon called Clarence she’d once seen in a pet shop. Clarence had been unnerving too.
‘They weren’t just here on vacation, you know. They were looking for someone. They told me so.’
Honey shrugged. ‘People do that all the time. A lot of people in Australia have relatives here and people lose track of their relatives.’
‘I overheard them saying they’d kill her if they ever tracked her down. Of course, they didn’t know I was listening. They shut up real fast when they realised I was close by.’
Honey agreed that it was a harsh way to treat a long-lost relative. Whatever must the woman have done to them?
Up until now, Honey’s comments had been wryly meant and wryly delivered. On seeing Mary Jane’s hurt expression, she instantly apologised.
‘Look, Mary Jane. They’re gone now; flown to pastures new. People say things like that all the time. I mean, how often have you heard me threaten to murder the chef?’
‘All the time.’
‘But I’ve never carried out that threat.’
Mary Jane sniffed and helped herself to more muesli
. ‘And you’re never likely to. He’s the one with the knives.’
Doherty called first thing the following day to say that he was fine, that having to be helped off the bar stool at the Zodiac Club the night before was due to it being too high.
Honey had suggested that it could be that training for a rugby match wasn’t a good idea for somebody of his age. The comment had gone down like a cast iron bathtub dropped from a tenth floor window. It hit heavy!
‘It’s the way I was sitting, leaning over the bar, reaching for the peanuts.’
‘Nuts,’ said Honey, and left it at that.
He was still rubbing his back when they got to her place but straightened up a little when she suggested getting Mary Jane to give him a lift home. Mary Jane’s reputation behind the wheel was known – and feared – by all. Taking the coward’s way out, he called a passing patrol car instead.
‘How’s the team shaping up?’ asked Lester, one of the patrolmen. ‘Can I put a tenner bet on our team winning?’
Doherty assured him that the game was in the bag. They were cheerful when they dropped him off, though less so when Honey had to help him out of the car.
‘She hit me,’ he said laughingly. ‘Packs one hell of a punch.’
They seemed to accept his excuse and he did put on a good show of walking the short distance to the door. Once there his back let him down.
‘Ouch!’
Honey waved her hands in the air. ‘Not me this time.’
Realising his work colleagues were watching him, he called over his shoulder.
‘Count on me, lads.’
Their expressions had fallen. Honey suspected they’d be swapping their bet to the other side.
‘So who are you playing?’ she asked.
‘The fire brigade.’
‘Are they good?’
‘So-so.’
His expression said it all. She knew instantly, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that they were good. Really good.
‘Steve,’ she said gently, not wishing for any further cast iron baths to fall, ‘Don’t you think it might be best if you pull out of this game and leave it to somebody younger?’
A second bathtub crashed from a great height.
‘Honey, I’m good. Real good … …’
‘For your age.’
‘Hah!’ he said dismissively. ‘Just watch me move, baby! Just watch me move!’
She did. All the way to bed, though when he got there and she was there with him, he did give a pretty good performance. But she wasn’t a rugby team and he didn’t have to run fast or tackle a wall of masculine muscle. But it was up to him. His game. His body. His pain.
Chapter Six
Mary Jane was more wrinkled than a year-old crab apple. When she adopted her psychic expression the crows’ feet flowed into the rest of her face – like a crazy paving patio that had shattered into splinters. This was a psychic moment. Craning her scrawny neck she narrowed her eyes and peered up into Honey’s face.
‘Your aura’s a little wan this morning.’
‘Is it?’
‘You know it is.’
Their resident professor of the paranormal reckoned she could read people’s auras just by looking into their eyes. This morning Honey was fully aware that her eyes were red-rimmed and tired. Anybody could read them. The chef could read them and know she’d been out on a jolly the night before. The man who watered the window boxes could read them and know it. Next door’s cat could read them.
‘Wanna tell me about it?’
‘I’m just a little queasy …’ Honey began and patted her stomach. ‘It was probably something I ate … …’
Mary Jane tutted. ‘Feeling queasy is a sign of being off colour – or being pregnant. Let’s take it that it’s the former, shall we?’
‘The former. Definitely the former.’ Honey fanned herself with one hand, the other clinging to a pile of cereal bowls. ‘I’m too old for the other.’
As Mary Jane made no comment on that particular statement Honey assumed her psychic powers weren’t picking anything up to the contrary. Thank God for small mercies – or rather the lack of small miracles.
Today was the day for viewing Cobden Manor, a clear candidate for conversion into a country hotel.
It looked good in the brochure, all mellow stone, mullioned windows and mauve spikes of wisteria drooping in tiers to first storey height.
Grand gates opened on to the yellow sweep of a gravel drive, swerving through trees and acres of verdant grass. The interior shots showed large rooms with elegant wainscoting, high ceilings and ornate fireplaces decorated with cherubs, grapes and hunting scenes. There were close-ups of Wedgwood tiles and the details on the frames of massive overmantles.
‘Grand,’ she murmured, imagining herself as Hannah Driver, Lady of the Manor.
As arranged, Glenwood Halley, estate agent, phoned to say he would pick her up from outside the Zodiac at two thirty.
‘I’m sure Cobden Manor will tick all the right boxes,’ he added in a voice full of rounded consonants and an Oxbridge accent.
‘I’m sure it will,’ she responded.
He was the guy who’d invited her to the cocktail evening, had paused long enough to say hello before darting off to fawn over some TV soap star with a big hairdo and matching bank account.
She patted the glossy brochure before zipping it inside a lightweight briefcase, one that could be carried easily under her arm.
The briefcase would lend itself to the look; it didn’t hurt to appear as though you could afford a sheikh’s palace even if your cash only ran to a dilapidated farmhouse, though Cobden Manor was a bit more than that. She reminded herself that the particulars stated the mansion had undergone ‘recent refurbishment’, though a little finishing-off was needed in some of the outbuildings. TLC, Glenwood had said.
She selected something suitable to wear for a girl about to consider parting with well over two million pounds – if she could get the mortgage, that is.
‘Looking good,’ she cooed at her reflection. She saw the hint of a midriff spare tyre and breathed in.
The outfit was businesslike, smart and smoothed over the lumpy bits. If in doubt wear black. Her trousers were black, her jacket a checked design of black and shocking pink. A set of gilded buttons vied in brilliance with the gold studs glinting in her ears. A pretend Rolex, a Liz Claiborne handbag, and a dab of French perfume behind each ear and she was ready to roll. The big bag was hardly high fashion, but it certainly had purpose. Phone, purse, tissues and driving slippers all fitted in nicely. The driving slippers were especially important; four-inch heels could only be endured for so long. If she got really fed up with carrying the briefcase, she could shove that in there too.
Dark hair tousled around a studious face, her daughter Lindsey stood watching her, arms folded and looking thoughtful.
Somehow it always unnerved her when her daughter looked thoughtful. It gave her the feeling that some criticism was in the offing.
She spread her hands, dividing her attention between the mirror and her daughter.
‘Is my slip showing?’
‘You’re not wearing a slip.’
‘You’re wearing that look.’
‘What look?’
‘The one that makes me feel as though I’m about to take up lap dancing.’
Lindsey shrugged. ‘If that’s your aim, feel free.’
Honey turned and faced her full on. ‘Something’s on your mind.’
There was a pause. Then she said it.
‘Mum. Are you sure you should be doing this?’
Honey pulled a face, looked herself up and down, and tried to make out that she didn’t know what Lindsey was referring to.
Pointedly she looked down at her feet.
‘OK, I know these heels are a bit over the top, but I can wear my slippers until I get there.’
‘That wasn’t what I meant and you know I didn’t. I meant selling this place and setting up a hotel in the countryside.�
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Honey sighed. If anyone was going to detect her indecision, it was going to be Lindsey.
‘It won’t be easy. I know that, but I do like a challenge.’ She hesitated. Was Lindsey likely to move with her, or would she stay in Bath? Was it possible that Emmett, the tin man in leather skirt and thong sandals, would whisk her away to his villa – or whatever a Roman impersonator lived in these days.
‘Oh, Lindz. If you don’t want to move out of Bath, you just say so now.’
‘I’m not thinking about me. I’m thinking about you. Are you absolutely sure about this? Are you moving on for the right reasons? Will it be better than this?’
Stretching her arms, she indicated the old coach house they’d done up together, the collection of ancient underwear behind sheets of non-reflective Plexiglas, the carved oak coffer, the twin table lamps, made of brass and Baroque in design, that had started life as candlesticks; all had been gathered over a period of time, bought on a whim, each connected to a specific event in their lives – only small events, but precious to them.
‘I just thought it would be fun to have a new challenge, and this city – I’d like to get away from it. That man that came in the other day unnerved me. You know they’re out there, waiting to wander in and ask daft questions or run amok with an offensive weapon.’
‘No one has yet.’
‘There’s always a first time.’ On reflection the first time of being attacked with an offensive weapon, could also be the last, but Honey wasn’t going there.
‘The truth is that you’re undecided,’ said Lindsey nodding sagely. ‘That’s good. Keep an open mind. Don’t let this estate agent bully you into buying status. That’s what people hope they’re getting when they buy a stately home.’
‘Come on, Lindz. You don’t really think Doherty would let him bully me, do you?’
‘Weigh it all up. Watch what you say, and watch what you do.’
‘I will. I’ll keep an open mind, but, and I only say but, if it all works out you’ll still be my right-hand man won’t you? You’ll have carte blanche with the new bookings system. New laptop. New printer. The lot.’
Lindsey sighed and threw her mother a look that made Honey feel about thirteen.
Death of a Diva: A Honey Driver Murder Mystery (Honey Driver Mysteries Book 9) Page 4
