13. THE BARMAID

THE CASE OF THE DIAMOND DENTURES 13

Royston was used to the appearance of sudden death, but this time he almost blacked out and it was only through a monumental and resourceful gathering of his own self control that he remained conscious, though little dark butterfly-like flutterings of blackness bordered his vision.

Then, “Ahoy up there! We’ve got a problem!” he called to those watching from the top of the cellar steps.

“We know that!” replied Blinky from where he stood, propping up the bar and looking every bit the archetypal alcoholic that he wasn’t, “the Telly’s on the blink,” he added.

“And I can see why,” replied Royston, a little more powerfully.

“What can you see?” asked Angelina from the second step down.

“A dead man,” replied Royston, “in a bubbling bath of bad beer and with the silliest grin on his face that any dead man I’ve seen ever had!”

“What the…!” shouted Blinky, and he pushed past Angelina in an effort to get to the bottom of the steps and see for himself what Royston had so adequately described.

He landed on top of his sergeant and the two ended up in an untidy heap on the dusty stone-flagged floor of the cellar with Angelina stepping onto them and adding to the chaos.

“What’s going on down there?” called a voice from above.

“Call the police!” replied Royston, the first to disentangle himself, “and an ambulance,” he added, “I think Nobby’s soared past the great divide and gone to his maker in the skies...”

“Do you have to sound so flowery?” growled Blinky.

“It’s not easy notifying family and friends that a loved one is dead,” replied Royston.

“I know. I’ve done it and it’s just as easy to say he’s snuffed it without going into makers and great divides,” growled Blinky.

“His teeth!” howled Royston, “his bloody teeth! They’ve gone!”

“What teeth?” asked Blinky.

“The diamond ones. He was grinning at me with them glittering in the great gaping chasm of his dead mouth! I saw them, glistering like stardust or the great wash of the milky way in the night sky!”

“And they were there? In his gob?”

“Mouth, please,” insisted Angelina. “but what’s more important as far as I can see is how he died? What happened that made the telly upstairs go off and he meet his maker so abruptly?”

Royston pointed. “That might have something to do with it,” he said quietly, “look at that flex from the camera … it’s an ancient piece of kit is that camera and it’s my guess that it operates on mains electricity. And that flex from it dangling in the stale beer must be what killed him! He was electrocuted and from the expression on his face his last moment wasn’t as pleasant as it might have been.”

“I shouldn’t think anyone’s last moment is exactly a walk in the park,” grunted Blinky, “but the big question is what happened to the teeth if Royston saw them when he came down, and then they were gone?”

“And where’s the barmaid? That buxom wench? Janie?” asked Royston quietly, as if to himself.

“Don’t say you fancy her!” exclaimed Angelina, blinking.

“Not at all,” muttered Royston, “but someone nicked the diamond gnashers and she’s not here, where she’s supposed to be.”

“You think it was she?” asked Blinky wonderingly, “and yes, it must have been! She was down here with him. She probably knows all there is to know about electricity and stuff like that and electrocuted the poor sod with that cable. Better not touch it ourselves, though, the local plods will want to examine the scene. We’re not coppers any more, so don’t have the right to interfere with a crime scene, more’s the pity.”

“I dared say there’s only one way out of this cellar, and that’s the steps we’ve just come down,” muttered Royston, “which can only mean she’s still somewhere near us, probably lurking behind a pile of barrels or beer crates, waiting for her chance to make a getaway!”

“That’s it!” hissed Blinky, and he raised his voice, “hey you, barmaid woman! We know you’re here,” he called out, “and it’ll be better for you if you hand yourself in right away. Save us a lot of trouble, it would, and make life a lot easier for you in the long run. Keep out of sight like you are and it’ll be life for murder, hand yourself in with a sensible explanation about what’s gone on down here and you could end up getting an award for bravery...”

“What is he saying?” hissed Angelina.

“The carrot and the stick,” replied Royston meaninglessly “offering the one and waving the other...”.

But there was no response to Blinky’s words, just a long silence and the sound of beer dripping out of a split in the tin bath.

“She must have found another way out,” suggested Royston.

“Good thinking!” enthused Blinky.

Meanwhile Angelina had wandered slowly to the far side of the cellar. It wasn’t easy for her to see much in the dim light once she was out of range of the single spotlight that illuminated the corpse in the bath, but she could feel the draft. Somewhere ahead of her there must be some kind of door, and it was probably open.

“Over here,” she called.

“Can’t see you,” bawled Blinky.

“I’m coming!” shouted Royston, “stay still till I find you.”

It didn’t take him long to locate Angelina, and he grabbed hold of one of her hands.

“Not now,” she whispered, “but maybe later?”

He groaned his agreement, and produced a small flashlight from his pocket. “Not much use these things,” he said, “but better than nothing.”

The two of them followed the dim illumination from a torch that was only ever designed to help him find where to put his key when arriving home at night, but soon came to what must have been a window high up on the wall.

“I’ll crawl through there,” he whispered to Angelina, and with a mighty heave and creaking of muscles that had long been unused to such exercise he managed to drag himself up and though the narrow window. “Tell Blinky to stay where he is,” he suggested to Angelina, “he wouldn’t be able to cope with this!”

Angelina relayed his message and Blinky responded, sounding only too happy to remain in the relative comfort of the cellar even if his only companion was a corpse.

“I’ll wait for the local plods to come,” he replied.

“Who are you calling a plod, mister?” grated a new voice from the top of the stairs.

Meanwhile Royston helped Angelina heave herself through the window. The surface on the other side was much higher, meaning that whereas the window was at the top of the wall inside the cellar, outside it was level with the pavement.

“So what now?” she whispered.

“Look!” he pointed and ahead of them, in the shadows and doing her best to keep well out of sight, they caught a glimpse of the barmaid from The Ginger Nut, and she was doing the seemingly impossible.

She was holding a besom broom in one hand whilst lifting one leg and mounting it as if she was a witch from ancient tales and about to take off into the night skies. Royston rubbed his eyes, but the image didn’t change.

And take off, it seemed, was exactly what she did do. Seated on what looked in the darkness very much like a broomstick she did a circle in the air before shrieking something that sounded suspiciously like see ya, chumps, and was gone, leaving a still world outside the pub behind her and a great deal of activity inside it as the local police tried to cope with Blinky calling them plods.

© Peter Rogerson 23.01.20