by Mandy Morton
Betty and Beryl Butter had returned from their high street bakery bursting with news and freshly baked pies and pastries, and were holding court as they filled the canteen’s service area with the fruits of their labours.
‘High street’s awash! We haven’t seen anything like it since the avalanche ran down Pendle Hill, have we, Betty?’ said Beryl, unloading a tray of flapjacks onto the counter.
‘Poor Elsie Haddock’s got her mop out,’ Betty continued, ‘and as for Lavender Stamp’s post office – we left her wringing out her hand-knitted dolls. You know – the ones she sells as extras to her stamps and postal orders.’ Hettie nodded. It was general knowledge that the postmistress spent her lonely winter evenings knitting life-size male cats to fill the void in her life after being jilted by Laxton Sprat, a cat who had dallied with her affections before taking himself off to university many years before. Lavender had turned her back on romance, and had taken instead to creating the perfect male in rows of knit one purl one, which she sold in the post office once she had tired of them.
‘What about the bakery?’ Hettie asked, fearing for their own back room on the premises.
‘No problem our side of the street. There’s a bit of collateral damage to Beryl’s hollyhocks but that’s about it.’
Hettie breathed a sigh of relief and slumped down on the nearest chair. Delirium brought across a tray of teas and doughnuts, and Tilly and Morbid pounced on the food as if they hadn’t eaten for a week. Hettie hugged her cup of tea and allowed a wash of tiredness to engulf her for a few minutes. There was still much to do, and finding Downton Tabby’s head had become critical to the day’s success.
It was just as well that Tilly had refrained from changing into her new T-shirt until after the doughnuts. The jam that ran through them extended its journey across the old one, almost obliterating any sign of a book title. She marvelled at how Morbid was able to keep her doughnut under control without the slightest damage to her gothic look, and made a mental note to try to keep her clothes cleaner for longer.
The tea break was over, and Hettie had barely nibbled at her doughnut. She was exhausted and troubled by the macabre turn which the festival had been forced to take. Was it tiredness or fear which had made this scene of carnage an acceptable possibility? Displays of horror were nothing new in feline culture, but this was different: only a few hours ago, Downton Tabby was blustering his way through a book event; Charlene and Ann Brontë were using the militant side of their characters to create a spark that all potentially dull authors needed; and Emmeline drifted between two worlds, seemingly untouched by either. Now, three of them had been united in a grotesque tableau of death which would probably entertain and thrill far more than their books and TV shows could ever do.
Tilly had clearly found a new friend in Morbid Balm, who was delighting her with funereal stories as the doughnuts were succeeded by freshly baked sausage rolls. The Butters had turned the small field kitchen into a haven of expectation as they struggled to fill large catering pans with the ingredients for the day’s themed meals, and it occurred to Hettie that the hospitality tent had become a retreat from the seemingly unending chaos which existed outside its bubble of contentment. But it was time to make a move. She discarded her Lord of the Pies T-shirt and struggled into the new one, feeling better instantly. It was as if the night’s bloody work had been washed away, to be replaced by a new beginning. She stood up and strode out into the sunlight, determined to make the day a success.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
By half past eight, the stalls area outside the events marquee was a hubbub of cats and gossip, mostly led by Nicolette Upstart, who was delighting her fellow stallholders with a lurid and detailed account of the murders. Even the Green Peas and Cats of the Earth stalls had buried their differences and integrated themselves into the market society which was now blossoming. Tilly’s friend Jessie had added a selection of hand-painted wellingtons to her barrow, knowing that they would be an instant hit with festivalgoers. As soon as the storm struck the town, Jessie had left the comfort of her bed and – with a little help from a pipe or two of catnip – spent the rest of the night creating psychedelic masterpieces from the plain, dull mountain of second-hand wellingtons which had accumulated in her charity shop over the winter.
As word spread about the murders, Nicolette realised she had missed a trick by washing Downton Tabby’s blood from her pop-up stall. In hindsight, she could have offered it as a gory murder exhibit for the crime fiction fans who would besiege the festival once the gates to Furcross were opened at ten. As it was, most of the night’s terror had been contained on the small dais in the library, and except for a crumpled bunk bed in the Brontë’s camper van, there was very little to show of Charlene’s deadly rampage.
Mr Chapter and Mr Spine had had a terrible journey in from Southwool. The festival’s booksellers had driven their van through deep water, moved fallen trees, and been stuck in mud twice before they reached Furcross. Their shop, which took up a prime position on the seafront, had escaped the flooding by a whisker, thanks to Mr Chapter’s speedy response to a threateningly high sea. Living over the shop, he’d acted quickly, piling the shop doorway with the sandbags that were kept in the book overspill shed for such emergencies. His neighbours had not been so diligent, and it was with a certain smugness that he drove off to collect Mr Spine that morning, while the other seafront shopkeepers busied themselves with mops, buckets and damaged stock.
Their three trestle tables had withstood the battering of the storm, and the thick waterproof tarpaulins with which they’d covered the books had only leaked in a couple of places. They lifted and folded the covers in a methodical display of synchronisation as their fellow stallholders looked on. Then – with barely a second glance at the books – they headed for the hospitality tent for a much needed breakfast.
It was Jessie who noticed first. Having set out her stall, she wandered across to browse the books. The festival authors were prominent, with the Brontës taking centre stage on the middle trestle table, flanked by P. D. Hodge and Nicolette Upstart. On the table to the right, there were collections of signed copies from romantic novelists: Mavis Binky stood out, along with her arch and very pink rival Barbara Catland, and then came the latest books from Terry Scratchit and J. K. Roll-on, both leading the bestseller lists in the art of fantasy writing. Jessie loved anything with a wizard or a ghost in it, and she decided to treat herself later in the day if her decorated wellingtons were a success.
The final table groaned under the weight of Downton Tabby’s efforts, and it was here that Jessie paused, then froze, then let out a high-pitched cry which could easily have woken all the cats buried in the memorial gardens. Hettie was on her way out of the library at the time and was the first to reach Jessie’s side. Together, they stared open-mouthed at the display before them. There was no doubt that this was a unique and innovative way to sell books, and a passer-by might be inclined to offer nothing more than a smile, having no idea about what he was actually looking at. Downton Tabby’s head sat squarely in the middle of a mountain of his books, with a cigar jammed in his mouth and his monocle placed in front of his right eye. The cat’s head showed no signs of its gory detachment from its body, and could have easily been one of the plaster dummies that Jessie used to display her cloche hats.
‘Well, Charlene Brontë certainly missed her vocation,’ said Hettie, stepping forward to take a closer look. ‘She should have gone into window dressing and display – or maybe a job at Madame Tussaud’s would have suited her.’
Jessie laughed nervously. ‘At least you can finish your tableau now.’
Hettie nodded. ‘Yes, and just in time. Morbid Balm has started to pack her kit away. I’d better deliver this to her so that she can finish the job.’ She lifted the head from its nest of books and carried it at arm’s length into the library by its ears. Jessie tidied the books, removing two that were particularly bloodstained; no doubt when the story broke, those particular copies would s
ell for huge prices to the collectors of murder relics, but it was a trade that Jessie had no time for.
‘I could stitch it back on,’ said Morbid, enthusing over the head in the library. ‘It depends what sort of effect you want. The rest of him needs a change of clothes, unless you want the bloodstains as a feature. The head looks quite respectable as it is, really. We could just stick it on a plate and put it in Ann Brontë’s lap and not bother with the rest of him, or we could make up an old-fashioned block to make it look like an execution – head one side, body the other. That would look good with the broadsword.’
Hettie shook her head. ‘To be honest, Morbid, as long as it draws the crowds I couldn’t care less. There needs to be a vague statement, like murderer and victims, but I’ll leave the rest of it up to you.’
Hettie turned on her heel and walked back out into the sunshine, leaving Morbid Balm to her work. Tilly had joined Jessie by her stall and was admiring the painted wellingtons as Hettie approached. ‘Got the head just in time then,’ she said.
‘Yes. I’ve left Morbid to decide where to stick it. Are we all set in the events marquee?’ Tilly nodded, and glanced across at the tent just as Muddy Fryer emerged, looking like she’d spent three days longer than everyone else at a rather good party. The sunlight blinded her for a moment, causing her to crash into Nicolette’s pop-up, but she bounced off it and offered her apologies. Finally able to focus, she made a beeline for Jessie’s stall. ‘Nice wellies,’ she said, admiring the new stock. ‘As I’m stayin’ on to do the murder ballads, I was wonderin’ if you could sell me tapes again? I’ll have to fetch some more from me van if I can find the cricket field. And I ought to get me Arthurian stuff shifted before the crowds descend. Do you know if me sword’s turned up yet?’
Both Tilly and Jessie shot a look at Hettie, indicating that she had been chosen to field that particular enquiry. Hettie responded by taking Muddy’s paw and leading her back into the library. The singer gasped at the dais. ‘Oh my word! You don’t do things by halves round here, do you? They are all dead, aren’t they? Not just clever make-up? I got this friend who sprays herself with gold paint and stands on a box all day not moving a muscle. She makes more than I do singin’ me songs, but she goes through hell when it’s time to comb the paint out of her fur. Even when she’s clean, she’s got gold highlights. Still, you’d have to pay a fortune for them these days. I once had highlights, but they’d turned purple by the third day of the tour and I had to wear a mummer’s mask for the rest of the gigs to cover them up.’
Hettie realised that she could listen to Muddy Fryer all day if she had the time. Like her songs, her conversation always had a strong story running through it, but now Hettie was more concerned with convincing the singer that her precious broadsword was the only thing propping up Charlene Brontë’s body, and that to remove it would be a catastrophe. She’d hoped to enlist Morbid’s support but the undertaker had become totally star-struck in the presence of Muddy Fryer, whose tales of death and destruction had become the soundtrack to her life, possibly even encouraging her to take up a career with Shroud and Trestle. Hettie stared at the tableau for a moment, and chose her words carefully. ‘The thing is, your sword has vanquished a murderer – and for that reason it should be displayed to its full potential. We’ll be taking the whole thing down later, but if we could borrow the sword until then, we could even pay you a small hire charge.’
Muddy tilted her head to one side, taking in the details of the scene before her. Morbid had positioned Downton Tabby’s torso at the feet of Ann Brontë, while the towering figure of Charlene dominated the scene. ‘It’s a bit like the ballad of the Elric Knight,’ she said, ‘except it was a hand he cut off. More dramatic to have the head, though. I might sing that one later – seems appropriate with what you’ve got goin’ on here.’ Muddy skipped into a sunbeam that had just hit the library floor and began to sing:
At midnight mark the moon upstart
And the knight walked up and down,
While loudest cracks of thunder roared
Out over the hill so brown,
And in the twinkling of an eye
He spied an armed knight,
A gay lady bearing the sword,
His armour shining bright
A small but appreciative audience had now gathered in the library. Poppa and Mr Pushkin arrived fresh from waving off Evil Simmonds and her TV crew; Polly Hodge was tapping along from the crime section, where she seemed to have set up her own observation desk; and Morbid seemed to be involved in some sort of gothic step dance, parading Downton Tabby’s head around the room and bringing it to rest on Ann Brontë’s lap as Muddy reached the conclusion of her ballad:
And Sir Colvin has taken the bloody hand,
And set before the King,
And the morn it was on Wednesday
When he married his daughter Jean
Muddy bowed to her audience, which had grown in size during the song, and now Jessie, Tilly and Nicolette stood at the French windows, lured over by the singer’s beautiful voice.
Poppa and Mr Pushkin invited Muddy to join them for breakfast, with a promise that Poppa would move her Arthurian props and escort her to the cricket field afterwards to reunite her with her van. The three cats left the library as Turner Page appeared with Hacky Redtop and Prunella Snap from the local paper. Hettie would dearly have loved to take a picture of their faces as they stared at the scene before them. Morbid, having no appetite for anything remotely connected to the media, packed her kit up and beat a hasty retreat, promising to send her bill when she got round to it.
Hacky was a seasoned newspaper cat, who had worked for all the big national dailies before setting up his own evening and Sunday papers in the town. He had turned his paw to every sort of print journalism, from working in war zones to becoming a celebrated theatre critic, although he regarded those particular jobs as having more in common than most cats would think. Prunella Snap had fallen from grace as a photographer due to some careless and unprofessional mishaps with her Olympus Trip, but Hacky had recognised her talent, and his forgiving nature and encouragement had made her an important part of his operation. Today, the shock on their faces was worth the front page of any cat’s money.
‘Miss Bagshot, I wonder if you might be happy to … er … fill Mr Redtop in with the details of the new direction the festival has been forced to take?’ said Turner, taking in the full impact of the display for the first time. Giving Hettie no chance to respond, he strode out through the French windows, mumbling something about breakfast.
Prunella, having got over the shock, began to photograph the tableau from every angle, precariously balancing herself on a library chair to take a close-up of Charlene Brontë’s blackened head and laser eyes. By the time she’d finished, she was certain of having several shots worthy of the Sunday Snout’s front page, as well as a hefty pictorial gallery for an inside spread.
Polly Hodge had invited Hettie and Hacky Redtop into her makeshift research area in the library so that they could ‘discuss the situation in private’, then perched herself on the edge of the desk to take in every word and description on offer. Hettie had decided to stick to the absolute facts of the case, and she recounted the night’s events as they had unfolded. In no time at all, Hacky had filled ten pages of his notebook and was keen to return to his office to prepare a special Saturday evening edition, as well as going big on the Sunday Snout.
The crowds were beginning to build at the gates to Furcross House when Hettie waved Hacky and Prunella on their way. She was pleased to have the story released into the public domain and, in years to come, the Furcross Literary Murders would be studied by authors, agents and publishers alike as an example of how greed, fame and jealousy could collide with the most horrific results. For now, for her own peace of mind, Hettie was keen to find answers to some of the questions that still lingered in her mind. With most of the protagonists dead, it was going to be a difficult case to solve to her own satisfaction.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Penny Stone-Cragg should have retired years ago, but she was a cat who would never be suited to twilight years of gardening and knitting. She was one of the most prestigious literary agents in the country and had her well-manicured claws in every aspect of the publishing industry, including a small but lucrative publishing house of her own which flourished by picking up titles from long-dead authors and reprinting them at a price most cats could afford. Her classics range, as she liked to call it, gave her a specialisation which was rare in an agent-publisher; most of her rivals subscribed to an ‘out of print, out of mind’ policy, preferring to sign up young and talented writers for very small advances and derisory royalties.
Penny’s living authors all had a certain amount of celebrity status: the Brontë sisters were a phenomenon she couldn’t resist, and the fact that they’d completed manuscripts which had lain untouched for over a century added an extra spark of interest for her and the wider public. She had also handled the affairs of Downton Tabby in the early days of his success, negotiating his first TV deal, but an acrimonious parting of the ways severed their professional relationship. These days, with her health failing, Penny had resolved not to take on any more clients. The Brontës kept her as busy as she wanted to be, and now that her asthma attacks were becoming more frequent, charging round the country to attend her authors’ events had become a little too much for her. She was making an exception this weekend and had decided to attend the second day of the festival – not to support her own authors, but to cast a curious eye across Downton Tabby now that he was at the height of his celebrity.
