by Robin Storey
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Career conman Reuben Littlejohn is determined to go straight this time after his release from prison. But he hadn’t counted on stumbling across a plot to kill his parole officer Lucy, with whom he is madly in lust. The only way he can save her life is to commit a crime himself and jeopardize his own freedom – without his wife finding out.
‘A wonderful balance of mystery and suspense and light-hearted comedy and fun.’ – A Life Through Books
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Comedy Shorts
Four short stories…
ROBIN STOREY
This book is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to any person alive or dead is purely coincidental.
Copyright Robin Storey © 2015
www.storey-lines.com
The right of Robin Storey to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright Act (Australia) 1968.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission from the copyright owner, except in the case of quotations used for reviews or articles about the book.
Cover design by Judy Bullard
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eBook formatting by Maureen Cutajar
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Contents
Sleuthing for Beginners
A Peaceful Death
A Girl’s Best Friend
The Muse
SLEUTHING FOR BEGINNERS
I knew there was something fishy about Beryl Markwell’s death right from the start. I felt it in my bones, with all the instincts finely honed from years of burying myself in crime novels.
As usual, my flatmate Mia accused me of living in an ‘alternate reality.’ She’s studying psychology.
‘You have way too much time on your hands – being unemployed is doing your head in.’
‘I’m not unemployed, I’m just in between jobs. Like you’re in between men.’
Mia gave me a look that said it all – that I was in between men too, and my in between period was a lot longer than hers. But I didn’t care as much as she did. Or I pretended not to.
‘So the woman down the road, who wasn’t exactly young, dies suddenly. What’s so fishy about that?’
‘She wasn’t old either, she looked to be in her fifties and was super fit – always out power walking or doing Tai chi classes in the park. She made me feel like the original couch potato.’
‘Angie, healthy people die all the time. How do you know she didn’t have some illness that no-one knew about, like one of those heart viruses?’
I shook my head. ‘I have a feeling it’s something more. Anyway, Rick said the police are investigating.’
Rick from the corner store had broken the news to me that morning when I called in for milk. ‘Ian from next door found her, on the bedroom floor in her nightie. Dead as a doornail.’
‘The police always investigate when someone’s found dead,’ Mia said. ‘It’s just routine.’
‘We’ll see,’ I said.
*
I tossed and turned all night thinking about Beryl. Suicide wasn’t a likely option. On the few occasions I’d spoken to her, she was cheerful and friendly, and almost bursting out of her skin with health and vitality. She certainly didn’t have the demeanour of someone about to do herself in. Something was not right about her death.
I’d wanted to be a private detective since I was eight and discovered Enid Blyton’s Secret Seven. I fancied myself as a cross between independent Kinsey Millhone and sassy Stephanie Plum, with a large dollop of Miss Marple’s astuteness and enough of the sex appeal of Charlie’s Angels to get me out of trouble. Or into trouble. When I was downsized from my admin job six months ago, I’d asked my job agency if they would help fund me to get my private detective’s licence. My case manager looked at me as if I’d asked her to cough up for pole dancing lessons.
Now a chance to prove myself had fallen into my lap.
‘I’m going to find out how Beryl really died,’ I said at breakfast.
Mia rolled her eyes at me as she nibbled her toast. ‘For God’s sake, you’re not still on about that! What superhuman powers of deduction are you going to call on? Or maybe the answer will just manifest itself in a psychic vision.’
‘Despite your cynicism, I’ll tell you. I’m going to start with the obvious and question the neighbours, to see if they saw anything suspicious.’
‘And how are you going to do that without them telling you to mind your own business and slamming the door in your face?’
‘That I’m not going to tell you. You’ll have to wait and see.’
After Mia had left for Uni, I dragged my beaded evening bag out from the depths of my wardrobe, locked the apartment and crossed the road.
Beryl had lived across the road and up two houses. Her home, with its warm ochre tones and Mediterranean villa ambience, stood out in a street of unpretentious brick boxes. I didn’t know her neighbours, but took a punt that Ian lived on the farthest side and was the man I’d seen occasionally watering his front garden.
I knocked on the front door. The same portly, middle-aged man answered it.
‘Hi, I’m Angela, I live across the road.’
I held up the evening bag. ‘I found this on the footpath. Does this belong to anyone here?’
He peered at the bag. ‘Merle’s out shopping, but I’m pretty sure it’s not hers. Anyway, we haven’t been out at night for ages.’
‘Okay, thanks. Sorry to bother you,’ I rushed on, ‘you must be still in shock after discovering poor Beryl.’
He drew in his breath sharply.
‘You can say that again’ He held out his hand. ‘Sorry, I’m forgetting my manners. I’m Ian.’
We shook hands. ‘I talked to her a few times,’ I said. ‘She seemed like a nice person.’
‘She was a real lady, in the old-fashioned sense of the word.’
‘And she seemed so fit and healthy.’
He shrugged. ‘You never know when your time’s going to be up. I must admit when I saw her lying on the bedroom floor my first thought was that she’d been attacked and robbed, but the house was spotless, as usual. Then I noticed a pile of vomit on the floor beside her, so I thought maybe she’d had a stroke.’
‘Do you know what the cause of death was?’
He shook his head. ‘I haven’t heard. The police came and had a look around the house and asked me a few questions, and that was it. I suppose there’ll be an autopsy.’
‘Why did you go over there? Did you suspect something was wrong?’
‘I’m the secretary of our local bowls club and I wanted her help to write the newsletter. She’s ..she was wonderful with words, spent hours on the computer writing long emails to people all over the world she’d met on her travels.’
He’d relaxed now into storytelling mode. ‘When she didn’t answer the door, I just assumed she was out. But then I noticed the morning newspaper still rolled up on the lawn, which was odd – she always told me if she was going away so I could keep an eye on the place. I tried the back door and it was unlocked, so I went in.’
‘So she definitely wasn’t attacked?’
He looked at me warily. ‘You’re not a reporter, are you?’
‘No way. I j
ust don’t like the thought there could be violent types prowling around the neighbourhood.’
‘I was there when they took the body away. There were no marks or bruises or anything like that.’ He lowered his voice. ‘But I didn’t want to look too closely because she was in her nightie.’
Of course,’ I said reassuringly. ’It’s very sad. I’m sure her children will be devastated.’
‘She’s only got one son, Neil. He’s got some high-powered job in science research in the States. I suppose he’ll be on his way over. Beryl was really proud of him, she talked about him a lot. She was even excited about a friend of his that she’d never met visiting her.’
‘Really? When did the friend visit?’
‘Hmm, when was that?’ He scratched his head. ‘Actually it was the day before she died, because she told me on Monday that he was coming the next afternoon. Apparently this friend’s mother is ready to go into a nursing home and because Beryl used to be the director of an aged care home, he wanted her advice on the best place to book her in.’
‘Did she mention his name?’
‘It started with M – was it Mike? Mitch? No, it was Max.’
He studied me again. ‘You’re asking a lot of questions for someone who’s not a reporter.’
I put on my most charming smile and fluttered my eyelashes. ‘I’m a woman, I have a naturally inquiring mind.’
I desperately wanted to ask Ian more about Max, but it would only further arouse his suspicions.
‘Thanks for your time. I must be off.’ I held up my purse. ‘On a mission to find the owner.’
I continued up the street, visiting Beryl’s closest neighbours with my ‘found’ evening bag as a prop to start conversation. If they were as nosy as neighbours in crime novels, someone would have noticed something about Beryl’s visitor, or at least come up with a useful tidbit that would later prove to be the key in solving the crime.
But nosy neighbours were in short supply. Two weren’t home, one woman had just moved in and hadn’t met her and two others knew her to say hullo to, but could offer nothing else. My last port of call was a dejected-looking cottage at the end of the street. A scrawny, hard-faced woman opened the front door, a cigarette drooping from her lips. I did my spiel. Her eyes darted to the evening bag and lit up.
‘Thanks, love, I wondered where it had got to!’
She grabbed it out of my hand. ‘I got a cab home from the services club and must have dropped it when I got out.’
She unclipped the bag, looked inside and pulled out a note. ‘And here’s my twenty bucks! Another flutter on the pokies tonight. Thanks heaps.’
She closed the door and left me standing there, open-mouthed.
*
Mia laughed so hard she slid off her chair and rolled on to the floor. I watched her, stony-faced.
‘That bag cost me eighty dollars. I feel like going to the club and snatching it back from her.’
Mia sat up, wiping away the tears. ‘And don’t forget the twenty bucks you left in it. That’s one hundred all up. Does this come out of the expense account?’
‘Very funny. Anyway, I learnt something useful from the neighbour who found her. About this friend of her son’s, Max. He sounds suspicious to me. Why would you go to the trouble of visiting someone you’ve never met when you can get all that information about nursing homes on the internet? And why not just ring her?’
‘Some people prefer to talk face to face. So what are you saying? That he had something to do with her death?’
‘Maybe.’
I wondered how I could find out if the autopsy had been done. In crime novels the
private eyes always have a contact in the police force, or an ex-policeman, they can wheedle information from. The only policeman I’d had contact with recently had given me a speeding ticket when I was running late for a job interview. Even if I could remember his name, he was hardly likely to succumb to my powers of persuasion.
Over a glass of chateau de cardboard, (private detectives usually have a bottle of whisky in their desk drawer, but my budget didn’t stretch to that), I made some notes on my progress so far.
Victim: female in her fifties.
Cause: unknown.
Result of autopsy: unknown.
Time of death: unknown, but presumably sometime between when Max left on Tuesday afternoon or evening and when Ian found her on Wednesday morning, assuming Max was the last person to see her alive.
Motive: unknown.
Next step of investigation: unknown.
Not the sort of report to inspire confidence in my sleuthing abilities. If I hadn’t been so sure I was right about Beryl’s death, I would have thrown in my private eye L plates there and then. I was hampered by the fact that this was real life – fictional sleuths have a happy knack of knowing all sorts of useful people, from hookers and shady low-lifes to government clerks willing to risk their jobs by imparting confidential information.
My social network was disappointingly small and unremarkable. My work friends had drifted away, perhaps fearing that unemployment was catching, and apart from Mia there was only Rick at the convenience store and Pauline, my employment case manager. And the guy at the local servo, whose name I didn’t know.
I woke up next morning under a black cloud, due only in part to the cheap wine. What would Stephanie Plum do to cheer herself up? Donuts. I downed two cups of coffee to kick-start myself, grabbed my purse and left Mia hunched over an assignment on personality disorders. A walk in the spring sunshine would pre-burn some calories in readiness for the onslaught.
Ian was weeding his front garden. He looked up and waved as I crossed the road.
‘Beautiful day, isn’t it? Did you find the owner of the bag?’
‘Yes.’ I gritted my teeth. ‘It was the woman at the end of the street.’
‘Lucky for her you found it. Beryl’s funeral’s on Monday. Did you see the notice in the paper?’
‘No. Does that mean they’ve done the autopsy?’
‘I believe so. I spoke to Neil this morning, he flew in yesterday. Apparently it was a heart attack. So there you go. You can be as fit as a Mallee bull and it’ll still get you.’
‘I guess so.’
Heart attack. I knew that supposedly healthy people died of heart attacks, but I wasn’t about to give up just because medical opinion was against me. A good sleuth never takes anything on face value.
I looked over at Beryl’s house and saw a late model sedan parked in the driveway. A tall man with receding fair hair came out of the front door, got into the car, and nodded in our direction before backing out and speeding off.
‘Poor fellow, he seems pretty cut up,’ Ian said. ‘Soon as he arrived he had to rush around finalising the funeral arrangements. I think he’s still jetlagged.’
‘I guess Max would be upset as well, to find out he was probably the last person to see her alive. Did you happen to catch a glimpse of him?’
Ian shook his head. ‘There was a car parked outside her house, an old Ford. I suppose that was his, but I didn’t see him arrive or leave.’
Asking if he’d noticed the number plate was pushing it. Anyway, I didn’t know anyone in the transport department I could bribe for the owner’s details. I really needed to get out more.
I ambled to the local shopping centre, bought a bag of hot cinnamon donuts and sat on an outdoor bench, basking in the warmth of the sun. After two donuts, I was feeling queasy and threw half the third in the bin. Jesus, I couldn’t even succeed at an eating binge!
The Cancer Help pre-loved clothes store was opposite. It had become my main fashion outlet since I’d lost my job, the only drawback being that I had to plunder piles of terry towelling track suits and size 8 midriff tops to find my booty. I wiped my hands on my jeans and went inside.
‘Hullo, love!’ Terri said.
Curvaceous with bright red hair, she always wore an in-store outfit with often startling results. Today it was a psychedeli
c blouse with a purple striped skirt. She was wrapping a fur-trimmed coat for a middle-aged woman.
I flicked through the rack of skirts, looking for something corporate to wear to my next job interview. Sleuths could get away with jeans – the shabbier, the better.
‘It’s a gorgeous coat,’ the customer said. ‘Who’d give away something like this to an op shop?’
‘Some people have more clothes than they know what to do with, love,’ Terri said.
After the customer left, she leant over the counter and said in a low voice,’ I didn’t like to tell her that the woman who donated that coat is dead anyway. Some people are a bit funny about things like that.’
‘Who donated it?’
‘A local lady, Beryl Markwell. Every time she had a clean-out she’d come in with mountains of clothes – Lisa Ho, Carla Zampatti, all good quality stuff. I asked her why she didn’t sell them on consignment and she said she’d rather donate them and she didn’t need the money anyway. And now she’s dead, poor thing.’
‘She was obviously well-off, then.’
‘I reckon. She told me her husband was a property developer before he died so he must have left her a few bucks. And she was always jet-setting off somewhere, to visit her son or go on one of those merry widow cruises.’
She nodded to the rack of skirts. ‘Anything there grab you?’
I pulled out a grey tailored skirt, size 18. ‘Only this one. I’ll have to eat a few more donuts.’
*
I could have hugged Terri for being my first and so far only useful contact. She’d given me valuable information. Beryl had money and the obvious person to benefit was her son. An excellent motive for wanting her dead. But how did you kill someone and make it look like a heart attack? Doubly tricky if you’re in another country at the time.
Although Neil could have lied about arriving from the USA yesterday – he could have flown in a few days ago, lain low, killed his mother, then re-surfaced, pretending to have just arrived. And then there was Max. Where did he fit in?
When I got home, I Googled Neil Markwell to see what I could find out about him. There were a couple of pages of Neil Markwells – a few in the USA, some on Facebook, but none that seemed to fit with what I knew of him.
‘What are you doing?’
Mia had come into my bedroom and was looking over my shoulder.
‘Trying to dig up some dirt on Neil Markwell.’
