6. The Van Dyke Beard

evidence is slowly being accumulated...

“I hate it here in Midcomfort…” stammered Jonny as he stared in disbelief at the prone figure lying on the rug.

“Hello,” barked Jerry into his phone, “is that the police? I want to report a serious assault on my partner while I was out! I need Detective Inspector Winthorpe here and no-one else will do, and I need her now! It’s Jerry Newby here and I’m at home! She knows where I live. And I need an ambulance too”

He slammed the phone down before anyone could answer and turned to Angela and his son Jonny. “Look, lad, if you go upstairs and into the first room on the left … you know left, I hope … you’ll be in the room I’ve prepared for you. Stay there for about ten minutes and then, if you like, you can come back down. I see you’ve got a watch. I’m going to see if I can help Angela.”

“Is she… is she dead?” stammered Jonny.

“Could be, but I pray not. Now please do as I asked.”

Jonny nodded, wiped his eyes on the back of one hand and disappeared up the stairs.

Then Jerry knelt by the prone figure of his late wife’s best friend and felt for her pulse. She was warm to the touch, and he breathed a sigh of relief when he discovered a steady pulse. So despite first impressions, she wasn’t dead. The blade, then, hadn’t gone as far as her heart but had been somehow diverted. The woman was alive.

He knew it would be best if he waited for a paramedic to deal with the nasty looking knife, but close examination revealed that if it was the shortish kitchen knife he thought it might be, not much of it was in Angela and he breathed a second sigh of relief.

“Angela, can you hear me?” he whispered close to her right ear. Instead of replying to him he thought or imagined a slight movement as if she was putting every effort into trying to sit up.

“Angela,” he repeated, and added, “darling…”

Here eyes flickered as he looked into them, and he might have said more to her had not the front door been hammered.

It was DI Florence Winthorpe, and he could see Jack sitting in her car with a constable for company.

“I don’t know what happened,” he explained, “but she isn’t dead. Take a look.”

The DI went into the front room and noted the woman lying on the rug, eyes open and clearly groggy, and trying to move.

“Angela,” she said, for she had met the woman already and was on first name terms with her, “can you hear me?”

If Angela’s reply was either yes or no it wasn’t clear, though the fact that she made some kind of reply answered the DI’s question.

“You seem to have a sharp knife sticking out of you. Keep still while I remove it. It doesn’t seem to be very far in,” advised Florence.

“I was leaving it to a medic,” put in Jerry, “for safety, you know.”

“I know what I’m doing,” replied Florence, “now just keep still, Angela, and we’ll have it out in a jiff.”

When the blade was safely removed from Angela’s chest the DI helped her into an easy chair and sat opposite her. At the same time a clattering on the stairs told Jerry that Jonny’s ten minutes was up. The boy nervously entered the room and smiled when he noticed the erstwhile corpse sitting at ease in the chair.

“Come in, Jonny,” invited Jerry, “and say hello to your mother’s very best friend, This is Angela. Angela, this is Jack’s twin brother, Jonnyr.”

“Hi Angela. So you’re not dead?” amiled Jonny, “because when I saw you lying there with a dagger in your heart I surely believed you were dead. Honest I did.”

Angela tried to smile at the boy, but it didn’t quite work the way she intended, but he understood.

“Now, Angela, who did this to you?” asked Florence.

She hook her head and spoke quietly, “I had been to the shops, for some lard as it happens, I wanted to make some pastries, and when I got back home there was this man, I don’t know who he was but he looked cruel, poking around in our drawers. When he saw me he lunged out at me, and I saw the knife in his hands, it was one of our own kitchen knives, and then I felt it as it cut my skin… and then the world turned black and I fell to the floor. I must have done because that’s where I was when you woke me up…”

“Could you describe the man for me?” asked Florence.

Angela miserably shook her head. “I hardly saw him,” she whispered, “he was there…”

“How old would you say he was?” persisted the DI

She shook her head again. “Maybe forty or fifty,” she replied, “or it could have been twenty or thirty...he had a knife and I was scared!”

“And hair? Was he dark or blond or even bald?” asked Florence, “think hard, Angela, because it’s important. This man has got to be caught and punished for the way he treated you! It’s lucky that the wire in your bra got in the way of that blade!”

“Maybe forty then, and almost bald…” stammered Angela.

“And his voice? Did he have an accent of any sort?”

“I didn’t hear him speak! But yes, I did, its silly of me, I nearly forgot. He told me it was a lesson for Mr Newby to take notice of. Yes, that’s it! Tell him that his nipper will be next if he doesn’t toe the line…”

“Good. You’ve remembered something very important,” smiled Florence.

“And he had a little beard… just a tiny one underneath his bottom lip!” added Angela.

“I’ll get an artist to draw the man you saw. See how much you can remember and he’ll be here very soon. Or she. We have two officers who are excellent artists and you can choose which you prefer: male or female!”

“Artist… Van Dyke beard… that’s what it reminded me of… a very small grey Van Dyke beard!” spluttered Angela, “and his voice, let me see, it sounded local to me, as if he was in the corner shop buying something and ordering it… yes, that’s it, a tin of baked beans with sausages… that’s what he was buying… I saw him with my mind’s eye doing that because of the way he spoke…”

“Brilliant!” smiled DI Florence, “just keep trying to remember more and we’ll get the devil!”

“A female artist. If that’s all right. Not that it matters, but I’m more comfortable in the company of ladies if they’re all strangers…”

“I’ll have Ellen Defarge here almost before you can say Jack Robinson!” smiled the DI.

“And shoes. He had a hole in the sole of his shoe. I saw that as I blotted out on the floor, just as I fell, black shoes with a hole underneath in the sole…”

“That’s good! Save it up for when Ellen gets here! “ urged Florence, “now let’s get the other young man in from my car so that I can see exactly how identical the youngsters are!”

© Peter Rogerson 01.07.24