A Theatrical Murder

by David W Robinson

  More soberly, Sheila insisted, “What we really need is to get back into the swing of things. It’s just after Christmas, Brenda. The Lazy Luncheonette has been quiet because most of our regulars are still off work. Once we get to Monday and everyone is back at work, we’ll soon sweat the excess off.”

  Brenda led the way from the shop, out into the cold and cloudy day. “I’m not talking about my weight, or yours. I’m talking about… oh, I don’t know.” She waved a hand at the area. “This.”

  Shivering as an icy blast of wind shot from the sea straight up the High Street, Sheila tried to follow her friend’s wave, seeking the focus of the vague gesture.

  For a Saturday afternoon, there were few people to be seen, and some of the small businesses had already drawn down the shutters. Christmas lights still flickered in the window of The Reading Room, and a large, free-standing Santa outside a gift shop wafted to and fro in the gales. Prevented from blowing away by two large sandbags on his base, his raised arm gave the absurd impression that he was beckoning to them. Her gaze moved swiftly yet again concentrating once more on the pub doorway, where a man she promptly recognised, and a woman she had never seen before, greeted each other with an air kiss. After exchanging a brief word, they stepped into the pub.

  “Odd,” she commented.

  “There’s nothing odd about it. As you pointed out, it’s just after Christmas. It’ll be getting dark in less than two hours and by the time we get back to Skegness, it’ll be night. It’s depressing, Sheila. We need to get away properly, get some sun on our backs, and like I said, I think I know just the place.” Brenda, too, scanned the High Street. “But I can’t see a travel agent’s.”

  Her mind still on the pair she had seen going into the pub, Sheila allowed her friend’s complaint to run its course before replying. “I’m not talking about your moans and groans. I’m talking about that man and woman I’ve just seen going into the pub.” She pointed across the street.

  “What man and woman?”

  “I don’t know who the woman was, but the man was Nat Billingham.”

  Brenda grinned. “With Teri?”

  “I just said, Brenda, I don’t know who the woman was, but I do know it wasn’t Teri.”

  The smile faded slowly from Brenda’s face as the import of Sheila’s message sank in. “So that’s his game, is it? Not drug dealing, but two-timing Teri.”

  “We can’t say that,” Sheila insisted. “Women do deal in drugs, you know, so this could be his contact.”

  “Women drug dealers are usually doing it because some man is forcing them.”

  “That does happen, but not always. It can be the other way round. On the other hand, a man playing away behind a woman’s back is not unheard of, is it?”

  A look of determination overcame Brenda. “Right. I’ll soon sort him out.”

  Sheila grabbed her arm and stayed her. “No, Brenda. We’re going to look absolute fools if we barge in there and learn it’s his sister.”

  “So what do you suggest? Wait here on the pavement until they come out? It’s cold, Sheila, and I don’t fancy a stakeout.”

  Sheila smiled slyly. “Why don’t we go for a drink? And if the place is fairly crowded, which in this weather, I imagine it will be, we can try and bag ourselves a table close to him and see what we can learn.”

  “Cunning,” Brenda chuckled. “What about Joe?”

  Sheila looked up and down the street. “I don’t see him anywhere. Do you?” Taking Brenda’s arm again, she checked both ways and they hurried across the street into the pub.

  ***

  Joe had no reason to suspect that Dempster was being anything but honest with him, but to make sure, after leaving the theatre, he crossed the road and made his way to the corner of the High Street, where he waited at the lower end of the steep ramp up to the beach.

  It did not take long for the cold to get to him. In a matter of just a few minutes, his toes were feeling numb, and his ears were stinging. He pulled his cap lower, but it made little difference. He checked his watch and decided he would give it no more than ten minutes. If nothing happened by then, he would ring the girls and arrange to meet them.

  He did not have to wait that long. In less than five minutes, Dempster hurried from the theatre, along the pavement, and turned right up the High Street. Joe stayed on the opposite side of the street, moving in the same direction, and when Dempster rushed into The Reading Room Joe crossed and followed him.

  The place was packed. “Must be most of Mablethorpe in here,” he muttered.

  While Joe watched, Dempster collected a glass of beer from the far end of the crowded bar, and made his way to a single spare seat on a table by the rear wall. Once seated he dipped into his pocket, took out a seven-inch tablet and began to work with it.

  Dempster looked worried, and Joe was desperate to learn what he was up to. Securing a glass of beer, he was about to move when he spotted Sheila and Brenda sat right alongside the man. Sheila had seen him and was frantically waving for him to get out.

  With no intentions of doing do, Joe took out his mobile and called her.

  Dempster gave her no more than a passing glance as her phone rang.

  “Don’t say anything, just listen,” Joe said when Sheila made the connection. “Dempster is sat beside you, working on a tablet. I need to know what he’s doing. Don’t answer because he’ll rumble you.”

  “Right. Try looking in the window.” With that piece of advice, Sheila cut the connection.

  Joe stared at the phone as if it had betrayed him. He dropped it in his pocket, sipped his beer and turned his back on the bar. It was a languid, leisurely action, designed to arouse no suspicion, but giving him the opportunity to look around. Through the throng, he saw Sheila glance quickly, yet casually at Dempster’s screen, then turn back to talk to Brenda. Looking further around, still puzzled by her final remark, he took in the crowds around the open fire, and the couples and families chattering amongst themselves at tables decked with full, and in some cases, empty plates. Finally his eyes came to rest on the couple in the window table.

  He did not recognise the woman, a forty-something, good looking brunette, classily, yet sensibly dressed in a chunky sweater and dark trousers, enjoying a glass of red wine with her salad, as she spoke to the dark-haired man opposite her. It appeared to be some kind of romantic assignation, but Joe’s suspicions leaned in another direction.

  He could not see the man’s face, but he recognised Nat Billingham immediately, and as coincidence built upon coincidence, theories began to rampage through his mind. Raif Dempster and Nat Billingham in the same pub, along with an unknown attractive woman? There would be nothing sinister about such a coming-together were it not for the death of Malcolm Sedgwick, the conversation between Teri, Sheila and Brenda earlier, and the rushed actions of Raif Dempster.

  He considered trying to get nearer to Billingham and his lady friend, but there were other tables in the way, and no room anywhere close. And while Dempster was sat beside his two friends he couldn’t make his way there, either. He detached himself from the bar, ambled towards the door, and along the narrow aisle adjacent to the couple’s table, trying to look as if he was making for the fireplace.

  “Sedgwick’s death changes everything,” he heard Nat say. “I need to get things moving, Hattie.”

  “You can’t rush it, Nat. It’s not the way it works.”

  Joe had heard enough. He continued to the far end of the aisle, and turned right to bring himself past the crowded fire area, towards his friends. He bobbed, shuffled and weaved his way through the small crowd and fixed his eye on Brenda, who was staring urgently back at him.

  Joe raised his eyebrows for an explanation, but before Brenda could respond with gestures or words, a familiar face appeared in front of Joe.

  “Are you following me, pal?” Dempster demanded.

  Joe’s cheeks coloured and he resorted to bluster. “Oh. Hiya. What are you doing here? I thought you were due on st
age.”

  “I’m minding my own business. And it’s something you should learn to do.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Joe signalled frantically to Sheila and Brenda to join them.

  “I don’t like people following me. It makes me think they want something off me.”

  “I’m meeting my friends,” Joe said as his two companions came alongside. “Sheila, Brenda, this is Raif Dempster. You might remember him as Sedgwick’s schoolboy opponent at the Jolly Fisherman yesterday.”

  Brenda beamed. “Hello, Mr Dempster.”

  “Just think on.” The actor glowered, chewed spit for a moment, and left.

  “I was trying to warn you, Joe,” Brenda said as they watched Dempster’s back disappear from the pub.

  “Yeah. I guessed you were, but too late. For a drunk he moved pretty quickly.” Joe nodded back at their table, still vacant, and they sat again. “Did you see what he was doing?”

  “Not clearly,” Sheila replied, “but it looked like he was booking a flight.”

  “Was he now?” Joe grinned. “Interesting.”

  “What did you make of the lovebirds, Joe?” Brenda indicated the window table where Nat and his lunch date were preparing to leave. “We followed them in here, and I think he’s cheating on Teri.”

  “You may be right, you may not be. All I caught as I passed them was a mention of Sedgwick’s death and her telling him not to rush things.”

  “What does Sedgwick’s death have to do with him cheating on Teri?”

  “It doesn’t, Brenda,” Joe told her. “But if this woman is the link in the drug chain, then it makes a bit more sense. And if you add to that Dempster turning up here, then it begins to look very suspicious. I meanersay, if Dempster is booking a flight, it’s ten to one, he’s running away. So why didn’t he deal with it at the theatre?”

  Sheila gestured at various notices on the wall. “Free wi-fi here, Joe. And he’d be a lot less noticeable in a crowd like this.”

  “True. It could also mean that he was waiting to speak to Billingham until he noticed me. You didn’t see the way he rushed to get here. He’s a worried man.”

  “I think we should challenge them,” Brenda declared.

  “And tip them off?” Joe asked. “I don’t think so. Let’s wait and see what develops, eh?”

  Sheila lowered her gaze, picked up her glass and stared glumly into it. “I don’t think we’ll have to wait that long. Nat is coming this way.”

  Across the room, Nat had, indeed, stood and while his lady friend settled the bill at the bar, he made his way through the crowds to them.

  If he was at all worried by their presence, he did not show it. Instead, he greeted them with a warm smile. “Mrs Riley, Mrs Jump, Mr Murray. Surprised to see you here.”

  “We were going to Seal Sanctuary,” Brenda said, “but it’s closed because of the bad weather. Apparently that happens.”

  “Oh. Right.”

  “And I came here to see Raif Dempster,” Joe said. “In fact he was in here a minute or two ago. I’m surprised you didn’t see him.”

  “I’m with, er, a friend. Harriet Deakin. We’ve been too busy chatting to notice anything. I only spotted you as I got up just now. You know how it is.”

  “Yeah. We do.”

  “Oh, well. Nice to see you all. Enjoy the rest of your day.” With a nod, he left and joined Harriet Deakin at the door.

  “Cheating git,” Brenda declared. “But at least we know who he’s cheating with.” She drank her Campari. “Shall we get back to Skeggy and tell Teri what we know?”

  Joe drained his glass and Sheila did likewise. “I don’t know that there’s anything we can tell Teri,” Sheila said as they prepared to leave.

  “True, and we shouldn’t upset her any more than we have to. But there are ways of learning who Harriet Deakin is.” Joe grinned at them. “I’ll look her up on the web.”

  ***

  From the pub, they walked back down to the seafront and over the ramp to the beach. Spreading out either side of them was the raised promenade, lined with stalls, all closed. Ahead were the soft sands, and the sea boiling and frothing as the winds drove it to the shore.

  Sheila and Brenda insisted on walking on the sand. “Just for the sake of it, Joe,” Brenda assured him.

  His trainers were already damp from the day’s rain, and he declined, preferring instead, to take a bench on the promenade and watch them while mulling his thoughts. The mulling did not last long. He could find no satisfactory explanation for the antics of Dempster or Nat Billingham and the mysterious Harriet Deakin, so he dragged out his copy of Goldeneye, and settled down to read while waiting for the women to return.

  The reading did not last long either. Twenty yards away, Brenda’s block heels were sinking into the sand and even though they were laughing and joking, his friends needed help.

  With an irritated “Tsk,” he slotted the book into his pocket and walked down the steps to the beach.

  He had imagined that the rain might have tamped down the sand, but he was wrong. It was surprising how hard it was to walk. His feet sank in and kicked up clods of sand as he made his way to them.

  Brenda had abandoned her shoes and prepared to walk barefoot back to the promenade. Joe prised the shoes from the sand and followed, muttering his annoyance as he did so.

  “Stop being such a misery guts, Joe,” Brenda laughed as she sat down to clean up her shoes. “Somewhere down the years you forgot what it is to have fun.”

  “Fun? Oh, yes, I remember that. It’s what you got up to in the memorial park on dark winters’ nights when you were with a woman who—”

  “There are other forms of fun, Joe” Sheila cut him off.

  “Yeah, well, sinking into Mablethorpe’s beach to celebrate the New Year isn’t my idea of a good time.” He checked his watch. “Quarter past three. If you’re done making fools of yourselves, we’d better be getting back for the bus.”

  After a steady, and languid stroll back up the High Street, Sheila and Brenda called into the supermarket across the street from their bus stop, where they stocked up on sweets and soft drinks while Joe paid his lottery numbers, and by ten minutes to four they were on the bus for the steady plod back to Skegness.

  The street lights were already on, working to dispel the gloom of an afternoon in the worst depths of winter. As the driver moved off, his headlights on, the first drops of rain struck his windscreen.

  “We’ve seen no sign of the sun since before Christmas.” Brenda turned to look over her shoulder. “Would you mind if Sheila and I took a week off early in March, Joe?”

  Immersed once more in the intrigue of Goldeneye, Joe merely grunted.

  A fan of the Bond novels since his teens, Joe had seen the movie of Goldeneye when it first came out, and the book was based on the film script.

  “What interests me,” he had said to his two companions on the journey from Skegness, “is the way the past comes back to haunt double-oh-seven.”

  As the bus made its steady way back through the villages, the wind buffeting it in the more open stretches of the coastal road, Joe allowed his mind to drift on the way such things happened in real life. Dempster and Sedgwick had been sworn and bitter enemies for years, and now, that past had come back to haunt them both in a brace of Lincolnshire seaside towns. Did it have any bearing on Sedgwick’s death? Dempster’s hurry and apparent worry after Joe’s chat would indicate so, but perhaps it was the reminder of those angry years, and the sudden, violent death of his enemy, which had driven him out of the theatre to seek a free wi-fi area where he could book his flight to Alicante (after their tête à tête, Joe was sure that was where the pantomime actor was headed).

  Arriving back in Skegness just after five, sitting with Nichols and Hinch by quarter past, he was surprised to learn that the law were ahead of him.

  “We checked Dempster out seven ways from Sunday,” Nichols said. “After you told us about the snit by the Jolly Fisherman.
He’s clean. He was prosecuted a coupla times for possession when he was younger, but that was back in the seventies, but nothing since. Besides, the NCA have had people keeping an eye on this mob ever since they left Newcastle, and Dempster has had no contact with them.”

  “Dempster saw the show in Stockton,” Joe argued.

  “We know,” the inspector said. “But he was in the audience, not shifting drugs by the stage door.”

  “It was just an idea,” Joe replied. “There’s a lot of bad blood between them, according to my information, and it goes back a long way.”

  “Mid-seventies,” Nichols said. “Road traffic accident. A young woman was killed when a car went into the river up in Gateshead. Irma Karlinsky and Edgar Anderton were in the car, too. They were all spaced out and the girl who was driving lost control. They all got out, but the driver drowned.”

  Joe frowned. “Nat Billingham was telling me something about it. But if they survived, how come they fell out over it? Surely they should have been angry with the driver, not each other.”

  “You’d have to ask them,” Hinch said. “Maybe they were in competition for the woman. Maybe one of them had scored with her and the other was trying to upset the applecart, and maybe that’s why she lost control.” She yawned. “Whatever it was, they’ve never had anything but hate for each other ever since.”

  “Like I said, it was an idea. You any further forward on the poison?”

  Nichols shook his head. “Nope. It’ll probably be Monday before we get it all together.” He, too, yawned. “Not that it’ll tell us much, I don’t imagine.”

  “Well, the first question you have to ask is how did anyone get to shoot the poison into him with so many potential witnesses around.”

  “Could have been slow-acting, Mr Murray,” Hinch said. “If so, it could have been injected before he went on stage.”

  “It could even have been self-inflicted,” Nichols pointed out. “We haven’t checked his medical records yet, and for all we know he may have had a terminal illness and decided to go out in a blaze of glory.”