Strangeways to Oldham (13 page)

It all seemed perfectly reasonable to Inspector Moody, who had been convinced, since his first encounter with Lady Amanda, that she was as daft as a brush. Being
Lady
Amanda, probably just meant that the family could afford to pay for a ‘minder' for her, rather than put her in a home for old crazies, which is where he, personally, considered she should be.

‘I shall release her into your care, then. But I shall be keeping an eye out for her in future. We can't have batty old biddies going around giving people terrible shocks, like that which she inflicted on Mr Foster this evening.'

‘You have my guarantee, Inspector,' said Beauchamp, pulling himself up to his full dignified height, and glaring at Lady Amanda, with the command to stay absolutely silent, in his eyes. She was getting agitated, and if she spoke now, it would ruin everything.

‘In that case, you may take her away. Trespass is a civil offence, and I understand that no damage has been done. Do you want to press charges for anything, Mr Foster?' he asked.

‘No. I just want her to leave me alone,' replied the householder.

‘That's good enough for me,' stated the inspector. ‘You are to stay away from this gentleman's house – in fact from any house, the windows of which you might want to peer through, indiscriminately. Do you understand me?' he asked, piercing Lady Amanda with his steely gaze.

She made as if to speak, but Beauchamp reached out a foot at the speed of lightning, and trod on her toes. ‘Ahhh!' she cried and, getting the message that had been so painfully delivered to her, added, ‘I understand.'

‘Good!' replied Inspector Moody, not having noticed Beauchamp's swift and effective action. ‘I do not expect to run into you again in similar circumstances. Do I make myself perfectly clear to you?'

‘Yes, Inspector.'

‘You may take her home, now, Mr Beauchamp. And you'd better make sure she stays there, and doesn't go off on one of her little “peeping-tom jaunts” again, or she'll be for it.' Turning to the uniformed officer who had driven him there, he instructed him, ‘I want you to keep an eye out for this old lady. She can be a real nuisance. Got that, Constable Glenister?'

‘Got it, sir,' replied the navy-blue clad figure, trying his hardest to suppress a smile at the situation. ‘If I see her, I'll run her in, and deliver her straight to you, Inspector.'

‘Good man!' Turning now to Lady Amanda and Beauchamp, he advised them to be on their way, and to keep under his radar, in the future.

Lady Amanda was speechless with rage, as they walked over to the Rolls, and then speechless with fury when she found Hugo lying across the backseat of the vehicle, snoring away as if he hadn't a care in the world.

‘Hugo!' she yelled, then pushed his leaden body as far as she could across the seat, so that she could get into the car herself. ‘There I was, in danger of my life, held at bay by a slavering monster of a dog, and then the police arrived.'

‘Wossat?' slurred Hugo, endeavouring to pull his sleep-drugged old body into an upright position.

‘And it wasn't just any old policeman,' she continued, ignoring the dilapidated state in which he had found himself, at being woken suddenly. ‘Oh no, it was Inspector Moody – the charming and polite Inspector Moody!'

‘And then what happened?' asked Hugo, his wits reassembling themselves with surprising speed.

‘
Then
Beauchamp came along and explained to the kind inspector that I was a loopy old biddy, who couldn't be trusted out on her own. And very convincing he was too, weren't you Beauchamp?'

The sound of a murmured, ‘Beecham,' reached them from the driver's seat.

‘So now he's had his worst fears confirmed, and he's even asked his constable – one PC Glenister, I believe – to keep his eyes peeled for me, in case I go wandering off again, to try to spy through people's windows, and watch them watching television, and doing other equally exciting things. And that brute with the dog! Why didn't he say anything about coming across us before? That's very suspicious behaviour in my opinion.'

‘Cor lummy, Manda! You did get yourself into a pickle, didn't you?' commented Hugo.

‘And a great help you were, I must say, staying in the car and having a cosy little nap. Why weren't you at my side, defending my sanity?'

‘Would it have done any good if I had been?' he asked, surprising Lady Amanda into a thoughtful silence.

‘I don't suppose it would have made the slightest difference,' she eventually admitted.

‘Beauchamp told me to stay put, so that I wouldn't be associated with you. I know we were seen together at the funeral, but if I wasn't known to be with you on this ill-fated little expedition this evening, perhaps I may not automatically be assumed to be your “partner in crime”,' Hugo explained.

‘Cunning old Beauchamp!' she exclaimed. ‘That means we can still use you as an agent, Hugo.'

‘Not on your life!' he blurted out. ‘Not after tonight. Now, tell me all about it; it must have been awful.' Not only did Hugo long for the details of the adventure he had slept through, but he knew, if he got Lady Amanda going, she would talk herself into a better mood, just by stealing the limelight, and telling a story in which she was the central character.

Back at Belchester Towers, Beauchamp efficiently produced mugs of cocoa, and the pair of elderly amateur sleuths made their way to bed, both eager for the oblivion that a good night's sleep would offer them.

Chapter Fourteen

No one in Belchester Towers rose early the next morning, and, as Lady Amanda Holmes and Dr Hugo Watson straggled downstairs, Beauchamp suggested that they lie low for a bit, and quit the sleuthing just for a while. He advised them that the bringing to justice of the evil Moriarty could be delayed, at least until they had their strength back, as Lestrade would never get the thing sorted out on his own. Maybe they could occupy themselves in some other, more innocent, way, as today was Sunday.

Lady Amanda gave the idea her best attention, then nodded her head in decision, and announced, ‘I know what we'll do! We'll go over to Enid Tweedie's place and give it that airing I promised myself we'd do, before she returned home. You can come too, Beauchamp, for “the heavy”. It wouldn't be right for a batty, fragile old biddy like myself to be taxed too much physically, now would it?'

‘No, my lady,' answered Beauchamp, wooden-faced. Would he never be allowed to forget what had been said the previous evening? That the expediency and quick-wittedness that had extracted her from a very uncomfortable position the night before, and had been the only possible means of removing her from a situation that might have ended in her arrest, had not seemed to have occurred to her, yet.

As a sort of apology (although he didn't see what he had to apologise for) he made them a sumptuous breakfast that included such little treats as kidneys and kedgeree, and left them to help themselves. After all, he had saved some for himself, and his portion awaited him in the kitchen, keeping warm in the slowly cooling oven.

At ten o'clock, Lady Amanda presented herself in the kitchen, demanded to be allowed to raid the cupboard of cleaning products and equipment, and ordered him to load the vacuum cleaner into the boot of the Rolls.

When he returned from this errand, he found her in the middle of the kitchen, standing beside a broom, dustpan and brush, and mop and bucket, with a carrier bag clutched in each hand. ‘I've gathered up polish, bleach, scouring powder, cloths, air freshener, lavatory cleaner, and that spray stuff that's supposed to eliminate foul odours. That should do us, shouldn't it?' she asked.

‘You seem to have covered most things, my lady, but may I suggest a glass cleaner as well, for windows and mirrors?' Beauchamp replied.

‘If you must! I'll get some out of your cupboard, and you can start loading this stuff into the boot, while I go and boot Hugo up the backside, to get
his
engine running. The exercise of a bit of cleaning will do his stiff old joints good – get some movement back into them,' she stated, and stumped out of the room, in search of the aforementioned unfortunate Hugo, who didn't know what was about to hit him, and by the time he spotted the whirlwind that was Lady Amanda, would not find himself in a suitable position to escape what was about to happen to him.

Poor Hugo was discovered behind an open copy of a Sunday newspaper, taking a casual look at the main news. Lady Amanda, rather in the manner of Beauchamp, approached him without a sound to alert him, and he suddenly found the newspaper torn from his grasp, and was then hauled unceremoniously to his feet.

‘Look lively, Hugo!' she boomed, causing him to shrink away from this virago that had suddenly disturbed his Sunday morning musings. ‘We're off to Enid's to get the place ready for her return home. Come on! Chop-chop! Haven't got time to waste!'

‘I say, Manda, old bean. Give a chap a chance to digest his breakfast, won't you? The world won't come to an end if we don't go this very minute, will it?'

‘It might! You never know. Now, look lively, and get yourself out of the house and into the Rolls. Operation Airing Enid is about to begin!'

It was, of course, useless to try to reason with Lady Amanda, when she was in one of her get-up-and-go moods, and so he trailed listlessly behind her, like a naughty schoolboy, approaching the room used for detention.

Enid Tweedie's tiny house was in a road un-edifyingly named ‘Plague Alley', and this name seemed to have shaped her life. She had spent many years of her life in and out of hospital, having this altered or that removed, thus living up to the suffering implied in the name of the street where she lived.

The house fronted straight out on to the pavement, with no front garden dividing it from the narrow walkway. It had two bedrooms upstairs, and only a living room and a kitchen downstairs, a ramshackle bathroom having been tacked on to the back of it, somewhere back in the mists of time. Its number was thirteen, and this seemed appropriate, too, given Enid's unfortunate medical history.

She lived here with her aged mother, and an evil-smelling, and even fouler-tempered cat, the name of which, Lady Amanda had never bothered to enquire after, knowing only that Enid loved it dearly, as if it had been one of her own children.

Producing the key that Enid had previously bestowed on her from her handbag, Lady Amanda opened the door, and the three of them backed away, as a foul stench rushed out to engulf them in its greeting.

‘What, in the name of all that's holy, is that ghastly smell?' asked Hugo, removing a handkerchief from his trouser pocket, and clasping it to his face. ‘I could do with one of those old-fashioned vinaigrette things. We're surely not going in there, are we?'

‘I'd forgotten about her mother's cigars,' said Lady Amanda, coughing in a ladylike way, behind her hand. ‘The smell, as I understand it,' she went on, ‘is comprised of the copious amounts of wee-wee with which Enid's mother generously sprinkles every piece of soft furnishing she comes into contact with.

‘There is an additional layer added by that stinky old cat of hers, that not only smells of dead cat, but also pees everywhere, marking its territory, I suppose. The final ingredient is the lingering whiff of the small cigars which Enid's mother has recently taken to smoking. She had decided, apparently, that she wasn't getting the best value out of her old age pension, and took up the foul things to augment the gin she purchased, to make life a bit more bearable for the poor old thing that she considers herself to be.

‘I haven't actually been here since she started smoking them, but I shall advise Enid to dissuade her from continuing to do so. The old dear's waited on hand, foot, and finger, and I don't see why she should be allowed to choke her daughter to death, just because she's got nothing better to spend her money on.

‘I'll go in first, and open all the windows, and the back door, and then, when it's cleared a bit, you can bring all the gear in, and we can get started,' concluded Lady Amanda Golightly, carer for of old cleaners, and narrator of family histories.

A few minutes later, Beauchamp led the way, discharging a white cloud of air freshener before him, as he made his way into the pungent little dwelling. Hugo followed behind, reluctantly, his handkerchief still held to his nose. Fortunately for him, he still carried on the habit, learnt from his father, of sprinkling his handkerchiefs with cologne, and this scent, clasped to his face as it was, gave him the courage to follow Beauchamp.

Lady Amanda was already busy, throwing the cushions from the sofa and armchairs into the back yard, so that they could take the air. She had also gathered all the dishcloths, tea towels and bathroom towels she could lay her hands on, and the washing machine was already chugging away. With the windows open wide, the place already smelled better, and Beauchamp took charge of the vacuum cleaner, while Lady Amanda sat Hugo down at a small dining table with some brass ornaments, cleaner and a cloth.

‘That shouldn't prove too strenuous for you, Hugo, old chum,' she trilled, always happy when she was bossing other people around. ‘Get those gleaming, and it'll make all the difference to the end result.'

At one-thirty, they took a break, Beauchamp fetching boxes of sandwiches and flasks of coffee, which he had somehow found the time to prepare before they left, from the boot of the Rolls.

‘I don't know how you do it, Beauchamp!' declared Lady Amanda. ‘I thought we'd have to send out for fish and chips.'

‘No chance of that, on a Sunday, if you don't mind me mentioning it, my lady,' he replied then added, very quietly under his breath, ‘and it's Beecham!'

‘Oh, smoked salmon and cucumber with horseradish,' declared Hugo, after his first bite. ‘My absolute favourite, Beauchamp, you clever old stick. I hope Amanda knows what a treasure you are, and pays you accordingly.'

With as much dignity as he could muster, given that he was covered in dust, his normally immaculate clothing dirt-smeared and begrimed, Beauchamp replied, ‘I am perfectly happy with the remuneration that Lady Amanda accords to be my due,' and bridled a little, at so coarse a mention of financial matters while eating.

By four-thirty, they had done as much as their energy would allow, the place was looking sparkling, and smelling much better, and Lady Amanda was having a last spray around with, first the air freshener, then with the fabric freshener.

‘That should do!' she declared. ‘Enid will be delighted when she gets back, but I'm going to advise her not to let her sister know that she's home. The longer she can keep that evil-smelling old witch of a mother of hers out of this place, the better. I'm going to suggest that she approach the local authority, with a view to getting her into a home. I'd love to see what they made of her at the Birdlings, and I might even get Enid to agree, now that she's stayed there, and found it very accommodating.'

‘I say, what a topping idea, old thing,' agreed Hugo. ‘If staying in that dreadful place is her idea of heaven, then she surely needs a lucky break in life, don't you agree?'

‘I shall do my utmost to persuade her that her mother would be much better off, in the tender care of the place that has so admirably suited her, and I'm pretty certain she'll agree. What do you think, Beauchamp?'

‘I,' intoned Beauchamp, ‘am not paid to think, my lady.'

On arrival back at Belchester Towers, Beauchamp, usually the most stoic of characters, gave a yelp of alarm, as the car approached the frontage.

‘Whatever is it, Beauchamp?' asked Lady Amanda, thoroughly shaken. It must be something dreadful, if Beauchamp had reacted in such an atypical way.

‘The front doors are wide open, my lady,' he informed her, a quaver in his voice. ‘It would appear that we have, or have had, intruders. Does my lady have her mobile telephone apparatus with her?' he asked, putting the Rolls into reverse, and moving it out of view from the front of the property, sensibly placing it behind a clump of large trees.

‘Most certainly, Beauchamp. It's in my handbag.'

‘Then may I suggest most respectfully, my lady, that the police are informed?' he advised her.

Of course, it was Inspector Moody who attended the call-out, and very scathing he was too, of the circumstances of his summoning.

‘Are you sure the silly old biddy didn't just forget to close the doors, when you went out?' he asked Hugo, a malicious gleam in his eye.

‘Lady Amanda is not a silly old biddy, and I personally saw Beauchamp both close and lock them, before he got into the Rolls,' Hugo answered, as insolently as he could manage given his innate good manners.

‘Does anyone else have a key to the property?' Moody enquired, and was referred by Hugo to Beauchamp, who was waiting in stand-by mode, should he be able to provide any help.

‘Lady Amanda has no relatives, and rarely entertains. To my knowledge, no one has keys to the property, except Lady Amanda and myself,' he replied with dignity.

‘Has anything been taken – stolen,' the inspector continued.

‘Nothing,' confirmed the fount of all wisdom that was Beauchamp, ‘but several things have been moved from their usual places.'

‘Such as?' Inspector Moody showed a reluctant interest in this piece of information.

‘The ormolu clock that you may observe on the mantelpiece,' began Beauchamp, ‘was originally on the mantelpiece in the dining room. And here, in the drawing room, the bronze you may observe on the low table was on the mantelpiece in here.

‘Similarly, there are things which seem to have been taken from the library and put in the study, and things which have migrated from the study to the library,' he concluded.

‘And you're perfectly sure that your employer,' here, Moody gave Lady Amanda a malevolent stare, ‘did not move these things without your knowledge, before you left the house this morning?'

‘Absolutely sure, Inspector. I was last to leave the property and, if you would take the care to notice the objects which have been moved, they are all too bulky and heavy for Lady Amanda to have moved on her own.'

‘Could Mr Chumley-Wumley-Doodle have helped her?' Moody asked, with a sneer in his voice at the complexity and calibre of Hugo's triple-barrelled surname.

‘Mr Cholmondley-Crichton-Crump has neither the strength nor the mobility to undertake such an exercise, Inspector,' Beauchamp informed the policeman, pronouncing Hugo's name with absolute precision, maintaining his dignity with difficulty, and fighting a powerful urge to give the inspector the benefit of a ‘bunch of fives', Beauchamp-style. He had been a boxing champion in the army, and felt that he would soon show he hadn't lost his touch, if he let fly.

‘I should request that you all refrain from touching the objects that have been moved, and I shall send a man along to dust them all for fingerprints. If anyone else has handled them, we'll soon find out who,' he informed them, in the most pompous of voices, and incorrect grammar.

‘Not if the person who handled them wore gloves.' Lady Amanda had spoken for the first time since Inspector Moody had arrived, and her voice had a sharp, sarcastic edge to it. Moody chose to ignore her, and instead, warned Beauchamp and Hugo to keep a good eye on old Wandering Winnie, or they'd have him to answer to.

When the door had closed behind him, the two men put their fingers in their ears, in anticipation of Lady Amanda's no doubt violent reaction, to being treated as if she were soft in the head, but were rewarded with an unexpected silence.