Tea? Coffee? Murder! - The Final Words of Ian O'Shelley (eBook)

Chapter One, in which various encounters take place, some of which are momentous

“No, I don’t deny it. I murdered Robert Tennant,” Christine Langley said calmly, brushing a strand of hair from her face. “I had to. He was a bully … a coward … a devil. A teacher who drove two boys to their deaths. Shamed them and encouraged others to treat them like fools. He’s to blame.” She shook her head. “And worse — worse than the fact that he drove those boys to kill themselves?” Christine looked ahead with a penetrating gaze. “He mocked them afterwards. Said they had finally found some guts.” She nodded emphatically. “He had to die. Not just for revenge, but to protect others — the innocent.”

She rolled her eyes.

“No, detective, the school did nothing. The school cared more about sporting triumphs than the lives of two clever, sensitive boys. Tennant’s victories counted for more with the school administration than a handful of students falling by the wayside. Killing him was the only way.

“And Claire Tennant? Well, she tried to stop me. Tried to protect her loving husband. Huh.” Christine shrugged her shoulders. “If you want to protect bad people, then you can’t be a good person, can you?”

She paused as if listening to a voice.

“You almost prevented me from punishing Claire. You know how I feel about that, don’t you? I’m sorry it has to end like this.”

Then she reached for the pistol lying on the table to her right and fired three shots.

The lights went out and … thunderous applause erupted.

*

“Wow, that was impressive,” Nathalie said to her cook Louise, who was standing with a torch by the switches that turned the various lights in the pub on and off.

She flipped one switch after another, being careful to do so slowly, not wanting to break the spell the audience were under, and bring them back from the play to reality too quickly.

“Very,” said Louise. “After ten minutes I was completely captivated.”

Nathalie nodded and looked around. “Judging by the applause, the audience agrees.”

Eighty or so guests had gathered in the taproom of the cosy pub. The play had been completely sold out, but about a dozen stragglers had been allowed to stand at the back. Louise — always conscious of safety — had wanted to keep to the announced number of audience members, but Nathalie had finally persuaded her to squeeze a few more in. After all, those stragglers were our regular and beloved paying customers.

The audience were all chatting animatedly, making their way to the tables on the terrace in front of the pub.

“It was a good idea to extend the terrace into the car park tonight,” Louise noted as she saw people streaming outside, where the waiters were already waiting to take their drink orders.

Nathalie nodded in agreement. “You’ve done well, Louise.”

“I do my best.”

Nathalie looked at the older woman. A little more than six weeks after taking over the Black Feather, she was in some respects still a mystery to her. If what she said was true, she was a former agent for a still-unnamed UK intelligence service. How had she put it?

There’s nothing secret about a secret service if everyone knows it exists.

An internet search for anything other than the known secret services was fruitless. Louise would have something more to say about it once they had known each other a little longer, Nathalie told herself.

“Well, this evening was your idea, Nathalie,” Louise added appreciatively. “I take my imaginary hat off to you. It went brilliantly.”

Louise was unaware just how grateful Nathalie was that the night had gone without a hitch. She had come up with the idea following a performance in the local church hall. A theatre troupe on tour with a stage version of Arsenic and Old Lace had played to a half-empty hall. This wasn’t because there was no interest in the event — the locals had attended with enthusiasm. Rather, the hall was a bit oversized by today’s standards. Fifty or sixty years ago, when television and internet did not provide round-the-clock entertainment, they might have been looking at a full house.

It had got Nathalie thinking. If the same performance had been held in her pub it would have been a sell-out. The Black Feather had just enough room to be able to accommodate an audience. And suddenly a sparsely attended night of “am dram” in the church hall could be described as a “standing room only” sell-out gig at the Black Feather. She had checked the listings in some theatrical magazines and, to her delight, found a local actress looking for experience in small venues.

To her relief the night was a success. Could it be repeated? She hoped so, but it was hard to say. Tonight’s performance had been an adaptation of a little-known short story, Convicted by the famous writer Ian O’Shelley, and therefore something rather out of the ordinary, which might have attracted more interest than the umpteenth stage version of Arsenic and Old Lace.

“Miss Langley, you were outstanding,” Louise said suddenly, bringing Nathalie out of her thoughts. Christine Langley, the actress in the play had joined them.

“Thank you very much,” she replied, almost embarrassed. She was more than half a head shorter than Nathalie, in her mid-twenties, and so delicately built that you’d be afraid to hug her. “That’s nice of you.”

While she was talking, she was approached by some audience members who shook her hand and wanted to take a selfie with her.

“Let’s get you a drink,” said Louise.

The young woman managed to make her way through the audience to the bar and took a seat, the many compliments she’d received on the way ensuring she was visibly blushing.

“A beer?” asked Nathalie.

“Just water, please,” the actress said, untying her long honey-blonde hair so that she could retie it, tighter. “I can’t hold my drink, and when I’m as warm as I am right now, even less so.” She smiled fleetingly. “Besides, being onstage tonight was intoxication enough.”

“Is this the first time you’ve done a monologue like this, all on your own?” Louise put the glass of water down for her.

Christine nodded and fanned herself. “That’s right. And I was so nervous. In a normal play you have at least two or three cast members who can help you if you get stuck. But like this … all I could do was improvise and hope no one would notice.”

“You did really well,” Nathalie said.

The young woman blushed. “It could have gone better. If you noticed …”

Nathalie waved it off. “You were great. Great choice of writer, Christine, and a perfect performance. You know, Convicted was the first grown-up story I read as a teenager.”

“You must have been precocious,” Louise said with a grin and leaned with her elbows on the counter.

“I was never a fan of Enid Blyton and co. No. Crime was more my taste, even then! I came across a collection of short stories by O’Shelley in the school library and the first one I read was Convicted. After that I fell in love with him.” Nathalie looked pensively through the open window at the improvised terrace, where guests were crowding the tables. “He’s a local, you know.”

Ian O’Shelley owned a little cottage out by Cornell’s Field where he retreated for a few weeks, two or three times a year.

“So Louise was telling me. How on earth did you get your hands on a copy of this though? When I tried to buy a copy, I simply couldn’t,” Christine said.

Nathalie looked a little embarrassed. “I already had it. It was the first and, I would like to point out, the only book I ever stole from a library.”

“What?” cried Louise, in mock disbelief.

“Yes, I know. All these years it’s been my secret.” Nathalie laughed. “I’m surprised none of your contacts knew about it.”

“Oh yes, missing library books were our department’s biggest headache.”

“Well, what does that say about the competence of your department?”

Nathalie and Louise both laughed. The actress looked confused.

“Just an in-joke.”

“If we explained it … it still wouldn’t be funny.”

Christine nodded as if she knew what they were talking about.

“Well, thank you anyway for making me aware of this text and giving me a chance to do this performance. There aren’t that many plays for just one person, so this monologue was a great choice. And it simply had to be by O’Shelley — he’s such a favourite of mine.”

“It was my pleasure,” Nathalie replied. “It’s thrilling to have a real actress in our beautiful Earlsraven. Glad to give you something to get your teeth into.”

“Thank you,” the young woman said, blushing again. “But I’m not that much of a real actress yet either.”

“Now please, Miss Langley,” Louise protested. “Anyone who can act in the Mousetrap for three weeks in London should be allowed to call herself a real actress.”

“I was the understudy for the understudy,” said Christine.

“So that means you only have two in front of you,” Louise said. “And you’ve probably got a hundred more behind you, all of them much worse than you.”

Christine took a sip of water. Louise’s words were an attempt at a compliment, to be sure.

“Well, who do we have here?” a man’s voice sounded behind the actress. “If it isn’t the infamous serial killer...