10. THE YOU-KNOW-WHAT

THE CASE OF THE DIAMOND DENTURES 10

The barmaid was blushing. Of that there could be no doubt, or if she wasn’t blushing she had smeared something like carmine powder across her face so that it gave the appearance of blushing. The landlord, or Nobby to his friends and foes alike, was too busy attending to a faulty trouser zip to think of doing anything as extreme as blushing, though. Anyway, he clearly sported dull white face make-up which would hide even the fiercest blush, and in addition to that his bulbous plastic nose cast a shadow that hid most of his cheeks anyway.

“You been up to your hijinks again then, Nobby?” asked the one and only other local customer with a lascivious wink.

“Woof?” enquired his dog.

“She likes it, does our Janie, don’t you lass?” asked Nobby, “a bit of this and a bit of that never did anyone any harm, and that’s a fact.”

“Depends what the this or that are, I suppose,” philosophised Ronnie, and from the small yelp that was emitted under the table it seemed that his dog agreed with him.

“What do you say, Janie?” asked Nobby, finally getting the zip to fall to pieces in his hand. “Dang it,” he added in disgust. ”Ain’t what they used to be, these zips. Whoever heard of them breakin’ like this, just fallin’ to bits and embarrassin’ a man in his prime?”

“Mine’s okay,” grinned Ronnie.

“But then, you ain’t got a Janie after yours half the time,” grumbled Nobby, “it’s jus’ one of those things us workin’ men ‘ave to put up with, is barmaids forever snatching at their zips!”

“Well I never did anything of the sort, you sleazebag!” exclaimed Janie, “I never heard such talk in all my living days! As if I’d ever dream of doing any such thing!”

“Excuse me,” put in Royston before Angelina became mother to a bright idea and decided to take him down the cellar steps to see what was there that had caused so much red-faced commotion, “but could you tell me where we are exactly? We seem to have got lost and all the roads round here look the same.”

Nobby grinned broadly. “That’s because they mostly are,” he laughed, “It’s easy goin’ astray in this neck of the woods, getting lost I mean. But you’re okay where you are, bein’ in in the finest pub for mile around, which is the back end of Cuffington, which is off the Swanspottle road leading out of Brumpton,” replied Nobby, yanking on the bulbous red nose and detaching it from his more natural appendage, and rubbing the now sore latter gingerly.

“Do you know anything about a chap called Igor?” asked Angelina, not wanting to waste too much time on small talk which, she suspected, would probably lead them nowhere and cause more confusion than anything. She had already decided that casual conversation in The Ginger Nut usually said nothing and meant even less.

“You mean the hairy bloke with the huge you-know what?” asked Janie, whose face had settled down to a more or less pallid complexion.

“How do you know about his you-know-what?” demanded Nobby, thumping the bar, “you shouldn’t go about finding out about things like that!”

“A girl’s got to have hobbies,” she sniffed.

“Well, he’s what we call the caveman in this neck of the woods on account of the fact that he lives in a cave with that woman of his, and what she sees in him is hard to fathom,” began Nobby, “I mean, he don’t even wear trousers, and them pants of ‘is...”.

“Probably his huge you-know-what,” put in Ronnie, “if what that there Janie says is true, and who can tell?”

“Nah, it’s his money,” sniffed Nobby, “That’s what you birds is after, ain’t it, Janie? I hear as he’s rolling in it. They reckon as ‘e had a top notch job which he got fed up with. Maybe he discovered that too much dosh is bad for the soul, or summat like that. Cause it sure to goodness is. Why, there were tales told about his falsies...”

“Falsies?” asked Royston, eagerly.

“Yes. Falsies. It was going round, what, a couple of months ago now before that woman of his put in an appearance, that he had a set of fine falsies worth a million, or so it was said, though you know how easy it is for folk to start exaggeratin’ when it comes to dosh and the value of things. It’s what I says about dosh...”

“Teeth?” asked Blinky.

“What? Falsie teeth?” cackled Nobby, “Bless you, no! No such luck, fella. I mean false you-know-whats. Thingawhatsits. A set of them made out of India Rubber and bouncy as who can tell!”

“Thingawhatsits?” asked Angelina, finding the general conversation in The Ginger Nut to be very much to her liking even though she could barely understand every other word, and half the other syllables meant nothing.

“Thingamajigs. Bouncy balls. Rubber toys for kiddies to throw at a lass,” explained Janie as though nothing else came into her mind.

“I thought you meant something else,” murmured Angelina, “excuse my ignorance.”

At that, Janie squawked as though one of her ancestors might have been a parrot. “You mean them things down below that a bloke might have?” she asked, giggling, “I don’t know what sort of folk we are living round here, but we don’t go round measuring blokes things down below! How disgusting! No, innocent thingamjigs. That’s what we meant, weren’t it, Nobby?”

“If you say so, Janie,” he nodded, “where am I going to get another zip at this time of day?”

“Take them trousers off and I’ll fix ‘em,” promised Janie.

“What? In here? Folks might see my pants!” protested Nobby.

“As long as they’re nice and clean, what does it matter?” she said with a wink at the three strangers, “just you wait there and I’ll go and fetch my sewing box.”

Blinky stood up and looked at his companions with a confused expression on his face.

“There’s nothing to be discovered here. We might as well go,” he said.

“Sorry, boss, but the batteries are charging and that sort of thing takes time,” Royston told him. “I’ll tell you what, I’ll get another drink in for the three of us, and take your time sipping it. That should just about do it and if we sip it real slow I shouldn’t end up over the limit… But we don’t want to break down before we get home, do we?”

He went to the bar and Nobby, now minus his trousers but the near-nakedness was hidden by the bar, winked at him.

“I’ve got a question for you three clever dicks,” he said, “and I’ll bet you a pound to a penny that you can’t answer it!”

“Go on then,” nodded Royston.

“What is it that’s sharper than a glass shard and can munch onions without weeping?” asked the landlord.

“I know!” shouted Blinky, Angelina and Royston as one.

“You do?” frowned Nobby.

“Of course. It’s a set of diamond dentures that someone with a large red nose, probably a bit like the one you had stuck to your face not ten minutes since, pinched from our friend Igor the other night...” said Royston, “and pinching stuff is theft, and theft’s against the law, and we three are all ex-coppers...”

© Peter Rogerson, 21.01.20