Birthdays Can Be Murder (6 page)

‘Oh, don’t worry, Mum, I know how to take care of myself. I always go into the shop myself and get what I need. I’m not so naive as to leave it up to Keith. Men are so lax about that kind of thing, aren’t they?’

‘I’m not listening to this anymore,’ Sherri said grimly, and from her somewhat unconventional position lying flat under the table, Jenny saw one set of high heels turn smartly and leave the room. Alicia quickly ran after her, and after waiting a cautious moment or two, Jenny was able to climb stiffly from off the floor, the offending napkin still clutched tightly in her hand.

Once mobile again, Jenny made her way briskly to the kitchen. There, as she’d suspected, the butter hadn’t yet been taken from the fridge and would need to soften a little first. ‘Vera, can you open the windows, love?’ she called, her round face flushed from the heat of the stove. ‘It’s already so damned hot in here.’

Vera quickly agreed and Martha smiled happily. ‘Want some help with that?’ she asked sweetly.

‘No, thanks,’ Jenny said stiffly. ‘You can chop me some mint, though, if you’re not doing anything.’

Martha gaped at her, then marched out of the kitchen in high dudgeon. Vera giggled.

A dark shape jumped up onto the windowsill outside, and the cat stared in, his tail flickering angrily.

Vera moved hastily away.

Out on the front lawn a huge marquee was being erected, with the party co-ordinator in close attendance, and Jenny glanced up, distracted, as a couple of busy young men flitted past the window.

‘Doesn’t the tent look pretty?’ Vera said. ‘I love those stripey ones, don’t you? It always reminds me of a fair.’

Jenny glanced towards the marquee. The party staff were certainly hard at it all right, and she only hoped they’d still look fresh come the evening. It was a hot day and all that running about couldn’t be doing them any good. The uniforms were smart though. Dark blue trousers for the men, and pencil-line skirts for the women, with white shirts or blouses, with rounded blue collars. They looked cool and elegant, and Jenny only hoped they’d stay that way.

If there was anything guaranteed to put a guest off his food, it was having it served by a waiter with a sweaty armpit.

‘Yes, very nice, Vera,’ Jenny muttered absently, and was about to carry on stuffing some tomatoes when she just caught a glimpse of a frizzy blonde head, and turned back sharply to look once more.

That particular waitress had her back towards the cook, though, and quickly disappeared behind the half-erected marquee, her tight blonde curls bouncing in the sunlight. And yet Jenny knew that she had seen that frizzy blonde head somewhere before, and quite recently. But where had it been? Then she shrugged, and promptly put it out of her mind.

She needed all her concentration for the prawns she was using to make Prawns Magenta. She took them out of the fridge and gave them a careful, suspicious sniff.

Out in the garden, Inspector Mollineaux, with Sergeant Mollern at his side, stood on a pretty little rustic bridge and stared down into the pond.

The body of Jimmy Speight had been autopsied and was due to be released to the local undertakers soon. A light rain during the night and now the bright sunshine had all but obliterated the traces left by the heavy boots of the policemen who had crowded around the pond yesterday. All was peace again. A boy might never have died there.

‘Looks like an accident, sir,’ Mollern said, with no inflection at all in his voice.

‘Yes,’ Mollineaux agreed. ‘The blood we found on the branch floating beside him matches his and is perfectly consistent with him hitting his head on it.’

‘And he could very easily have grabbed at the branch, half-dazed, like, in an attempt to stop himself falling in and broke it off,’ Mollern continued, still in that emotionless way so many people found disconcerting.

‘Oh yes. It’s all very feasible. Very neat and tidy,’ Mollineaux agreed. ‘Except the boy was a nosy little sod. Everyone agrees on that. And when nosy people end up dead in ponds …’ He shrugged graphically but didn’t voice out loud the conclusion of his train of thought.

Mollern sighed. After a while he said thoughtfully, ‘Justin Greer had that big barney with him.’

Mollineaux stirred. ‘You know, I’ve been hearing some interesting things about Justin since he’s taken over the running of the company,’ he replied thoughtfully. ‘He’s getting awfully rich, awfully quickly. He’s into computers and selling on the internet and all that. Well up too on foreign trade, the European market, and taking advantage of the subsidies system and so on. I just wonder if it’s all strictly on the up and up.’

Mollern nodded. ‘A clever man on a computer can hide all sorts of things nowadays, if he knows what he’s at,’ he agreed. ‘Justin might only be just twenty-one, but the money market is traditionally a young man’s game, isn’t it? Look at all those young rogue traders who lost banks millions. And I understand Jimmy Speight was a bit of a computer whizz himself. If he managed to get access to Greer’s computer, who knows what a clever hacker might have found out?’

For a long while, the two policemen stood on the pretty bridge, looking into the pretty pond, and saying nothing.

A
T THREE O’CLOCK
the band arrived, and Jenny watched a scarecrow lookalike carry a red and black electric guitar across the lawn and enter the ballroom through the open French windows. A skinhead followed, carrying and dropping a drum kit, then a very beautiful young man indeed who carried nothing at all. Must be the lead singer, Jenny surmised. On his heels came a small troop of roadies, electricians and other technicians.

Sherri Greer, who was attempting to stay out of the party co-ordinator’s way, while at the same time seeing that nothing went amiss, was looking more and more frazzled by the minute. Eventually, she flopped down on the garden bench next to the roses in front of the kitchen window, and blew out her cheeks in a gesture of defeat.

As Jenny began to slice potatoes wafer thin, which were to be placed on top of a vegetable-layer stack, she watched Alicia emerge from the herb garden at the far end of the greenhouse and smooth down her badly wrinkled dress. No prizes for guessing what she’d just been up to, or with whom.

Jenny hastily bent her head and began to brush melted butter on top of the vegetable layer. Now all it needed was a few hours in the fridge before cooking, to harden it slightly.

‘Oh, Mum, there you are. I was hoping I’d get you at a good moment. Have you seen my outfit for tonight? Justin lent me the money for it, since I’m short. I really don’t know why you and Dad don’t just let me have a credit card.’

‘No, I haven’t seen it,’ Sherri hastily cut across her daughter’s whining recital. ‘Perhaps Mrs Williams is pressing it for you.’

‘No, Mum, I don’t mean that it’s gone missing. I meant have you
seen
it? It’s a gorgeous electric-blue silk, with a silver-thread motif. It’s absolutely fabulous. I got it from this wonderful boutique I know in Chelsea.’

‘I don’t wish to know about your haunts in London, dear,’ Sherri said sharply. But Alicia pretended not to understand the chilly reference to her favourite trysting spot, and when Jenny happened to glance up, it was to see her nestle beside her mother, twirling a carnation absently between her fingers.

‘I was just thinking how well your sapphire and diamond set would go with it. Being dark blue, I mean,’ she said casually.

‘
I
was going to wear those,’ Sherri said sharply, and Alicia shrugged an elegant shoulder.

‘Oh? What dress were you going to wear?’

‘My orange taffeta.’

‘And you were going to wear sapphires with it? Oh, Mum, come on! I always said you had no dress sense, and this proves it.’

‘Really?’ Sherri said mildly. ‘And what would you suggest I wear?’ Her silky words gave Jenny the satisfying sensation that Alicia could not quite fool her mother as well as she thought.

‘With an orange dress? Well, that amber and silver set you have, for instance. Or even emeralds, but you’d need other green accessories. Have you got a green bag and shoes?’

‘Somewhere.’

‘Well, there you are then. Then I can have the sapphires.’

‘You can
borrow
them, yes,’ Sherri corrected tellingly.

‘Thank you, Mumsie! Although, you know, I really ought to have
some
jewellery of my own.’

‘All my gems will come to you in the Will,’ Sherri said with a finality that was unmistakable, and then rose with a sigh. Jenny smiled over her carrot julienne. ‘Now I’d better go and see how that band you hired is getting on. I’m sure our small ballroom is not at all what they’re used to.’

As the two women wandered to the French windows and disappeared, Jenny checked her watch for about the thousandth time and sighed in relief. Back on schedule.

‘What do you want done with this stock, Miss Starling?’ Vera piped up from the stove. ‘It’s been barely simmering for hours now.’

‘Good,’ Jenny said with a satisfied smile. At last, things were coming together. ‘Did you put in the fresh basil, like I said?’ In the ominous silence that followed, Jenny glanced over her shoulder, took one look at Vera gnawing industriously on her lower lip and shook her head. ‘I’ll go and get it,’ she said, wondering at the same time where Martha had disappeared to. No doubt the resident cook was endeavouring to teach her a lesson by making herself scarce just when things were beginning to get hectic. Jenny could have told her it would be a wasted effort. She was used to working alone under pressure, and much preferred it to having people under her feet.

She was just returning from the herb garden, crossing the pleasantly cool hall with a sizeable bunch of basil grasped firmly in her hand, when Babs Walker appeared on the landing, swathed in black silk and emanating a cloud of expensive French perfume.

She peered over the balcony in such a way that Jenny wondered if she secretly needed glasses. No doubt the young lady would rather go blind than cover up those huge pansy eyes of hers. Someone should sit her down and persuade her to buy contact lenses.

‘Oh, at last. You must be the cook.’ Babs let her eyes flicker briefly and disdainfully over her. ‘I’m absolutely ravenous. Bring up a sandwich, will you? Smoked salmon, I think.’

Jenny, her mind reeling as it tried unsuccessfully to grapple with the concept of placing delicately smoked salmon between bread, let the girl slip away before she could properly vent her spleen. Slamming into the kitchen, she barked at Vera to slap a single layer of the smoked salmon from the fridge between some bread, and stormed to her soup pot. She was so incensed, she didn’t even stop Vera from putting margarine on the bread. Instead she smiled and took the plate from the baffled daily’s hand and marched back into the hall.

There she stopped dead at the sight of the stranger in the hall, and blinked. The man was dressed in full evening dress, but of the white-suited variety, and was so enormously fat that the outfit served only to make him look like a giant meringue. His hair was of an unfortunate crinkled black, but his skin was quite pleasantly tanned. His appearance, however, might have been more quickly assimilated had it not been for the huge and odd bouquet of flowers he was carrying. In his hand was the biggest bunch of bird-of-paradise flowers and assorted greenery that Jenny had ever seen. They looked about as out of place in the genteel and ever-so-British hall of The Beeches as a pair of exotic parrots would have looked in a Liverpool dockyard.

‘Arbie!’

Alicia Greer sailed into the tableau, and Jenny watched, fascinated by the combination they made. Alicia went straight to the stranger and kissed him on both cheeks. ‘Are these for me? Oh, Arbie, you shouldn’t have,’ Alicia said, then laughed at the disconcerted look that passed over his moon-like face. ‘Oh, Arbie, I’m only teasing. Don’t worry, I know just who they’re really for, and I must say I wish you loads of luck. You’re gonna need it.’

Although Jenny had no idea what was going on, she had the sudden and unshakeable feeling that Alicia Greer was being very spiteful indeed. ‘Have you brought the rest of the flowers with you?’ she carried on, glancing over his shoulder to the driveway, where a dark green van was parked. ‘I see you have. I hope they’re all as lovely as these.’

‘They’re just what you ordered, Alicia. Would I ever dare bring anything else?’ His voice was very nearly amused.

Jenny began to sidle around them, a little difficult for a woman of her stature to accomplish, but luckily the pair seemed too intent on their business to pay her much heed.

‘Orchids, lilies, loads of roses of course, carnations.’ The man was ticking them off on the fingers of his left hand – not easy when his other hand encased what looked like a whole Borneo jungle.

‘And freesias. Lots of freesias,’ Alicia prompted. ‘I adore their scent.’

‘I’ve emptied the greenhouses of them,’ the unusual and mysterious Arbie assured her.

Jenny, having gained the stairs, nipped smartly up them and then began to knock on doors. At last, from behind one, a small voice piped up. Jenny entered and stared at an empty room. Just then, Babs emerged from the bathroom, her hair swathed turban-like in a towel, a Japanese silk bathrobe wrapped around her curvaceous body. ‘Ooh, lovely. Put it in the sitting room, will you? Wasn’t it thoughtful of Justin to give me a suite?’

Jenny didn’t think a comment was called for, and did as she was told, mainly because she felt such a sudden and strong sense of pity for the woman. She was so desperate to make the move from working to upper class; so needy for all the good things in life. And so determined to appear to be something she so obviously was not, and could never be. Jenny could only hope that when the time came, Justin would let her down lightly, but she rather doubted it. She doubted it a lot.

She’d just put the plate of foul sandwiches on a rather nice table when she heard a knock on the door and Babs grunt in exasperation. An instant later, she heard the door click open.

‘Hello, Babs. Guess who?’

Jenny instantly recognized the voice as belonging to the man with all the flowers.

‘Arbie! What the hell are you doing here?’ Babs’s voice suddenly lost all the imitation dulcet qualities, and the raw edge of real anger grated through.

‘Why wouldn’t I be here? I’ve known the Greers for years. It was me who introduced you to Justin, remember?’ The pause between the last two words was a distinctly bitter one.

‘Arbie,’ Babs sighed, and a cajoling note crept quickly into her next words. ‘I wasn’t expecting you to be invited. Surely you don’t want to come? Wouldn’t it be easier on everyone if you stayed only for a little while, just to be polite, and then went home?’

‘Better for whom?’ Arbie asked, his voice so soft and yet so full of repressed rage that Jenny actually shivered. A caterpillar of real fear and unease began to creep up her spine.

‘For all of us, of course,’ Babs said, her tone of voice full of coo and confidence. It made Jenny shake her head in amazement. Was the girl blind or just without any common sense at all? Couldn’t she tell she had a tiger by the tail in there? Obviously not, for Babs carried on as blithely as a butterfly. ‘You know it’s no good, don’t you? Be a little angel, Arbie, and, oh, are these for me? They’re lovely, really.’

Evidently Arbie had handed over the blooms in an attempt to forestall her, for she saw Babs briefly cross the open doorway in order to lay the bouquet on a table by the window before turning back to her visitor.

‘I’m glad you like them. They always remind me of you.’ Arbie’s voice was softer now and genuinely smitten.

‘Oh, Arbie, don’t,’ Babs said. ‘It’s all over. Please, just accept it.’

‘No.’

It was that simple. Jenny knew it, even though she couldn’t even see the expression on his face. He was not the kind of man who said one thing and meant another. Moreover, he was obviously the kind of man who could become obsessive. Babs would have to tread warily. Very warily indeed, she thought.

‘Well, you’ll just have to,’ Babs snapped, her voice rising as her temper did likewise. ‘Justin and I are to be married. So you’ll just have to accept it.’

‘Do you want me to do the wedding flowers?’ Arbie asked, his voice so mockingly amused and vicious now that even Babs, at last, seemed to get the message.

‘Don’t be so cruel!’ she gasped. ‘I wouldn’t dream of asking you. Do you think I’m so heartless?’

‘As a matter of fact, yes,’ Arbie said, and in that moment Jenny realized that she should never have pictured him as a meringue. A meringue crumbled at the onset of a spoon, but there was nothing soft about Arbie the florist. Rock cake, perhaps.

‘Not that it matters, of course,’ he carried on, and from the sitting room Jenny could picture him prowling around the room. ‘Because he’ll never marry you, not in a million years. I know Justin. Better than you do, it seems.’

‘Liar!’ Babs shot back. ‘You’re just saying that, hoping I’ll take you back.’

‘Hoping you’ll settle for a rather less rich, less handsome catch, you mean,’ Arbie corrected her. ‘You might as well say it. You see, Babs, I know you too. Inside and out. And it still doesn’t matter.’

Jenny glanced at her watch. Damn! She was behind schedule
again
. She’d never had a job go so unevenly before. Why couldn’t Babs Walker have the good sense to marry Arbie and have done with it? He must have money to have attracted her in the first place, and he evidently loved her something stupid. He’d put up with her infidelities, shower her with gifts and never cheat on her. An ideal husband, in fact. But no, she had to try for Justin Greer, of all men. Just because of his pretty face and lean, sexy body.

‘Get out,’ Babs said, her voice wavering. Perhaps, at last, she was beginning to see the real Arbie, not the fool she thought she’d hooked and then discarded for a better catch. For now there was something approaching real fear in her voice.

‘Oh, I’ll go for now. I have to oversee the flowers, but as you can see, I’m already dressed for the banquet, so I won’t even need to go home to change. Oh yes, Alicia invited me to it. Didn’t you know?’

And with that excellent parting shot, the door opened and then slammed shut. Taking a big breath, Jenny stepped out into the bedroom. Babs Walker stared at her, her pansy eyes widening in dismay as she watched the Junoesque cook bolt for the door and realized she must have heard every word.

‘Oh, Alicia.’ Jenny, having just escaped Babs Walker’s room, noticed Alicia and Justin coming out of the library. ‘I need you to check the cake. I’ve iced it in a way I hope you’ll like.’

‘Oh, lovely. Where is it? In the ballroom?’

‘No, the kitchen.’

‘Oh. Well, I think Justin should be the one to check it, don’t you? Then it can be a surprise for me,’ she said with an offhand laugh, and promptly disappeared back into the library. Jenny sighed deeply. Honestly, anyone would think Alicia was allergic to the kitchen.

‘Lead on, Macduff,’ Justin said, giving her a knowing grin. ‘And don’t try to domesticate my sister. It’s a wasted effort.’

Jenny shot him an arch look. ‘My dear Mr Greer. I wouldn’t dream of trying to teach your sister, or yourself for that matter, anything at all.’

Justin was still laughing when he stepped into the kitchen and looked around with impressed eyes. ‘Everything seems to be going well. Hello, gorgeous,’ he said to Vera, who blushed to the roots of her hair. If they’d been able to see them, her toes would probably have been beetroot too. ‘So where’s this cake of my sister’s?’