Embarrassment of Corpses, An Read Free Page A

staring at the alleged murderer of Sir Hargreaves Random.
    Oliver Swithin, feeling Mallard’s eyes upon him, stirred and turned over awkwardly on the narrow bed. The single blanket fell onto the floor.
    â€œHello,” he said huskily to the frowning policeman. He ran his tongue over his lips and scowled. Mallard closed the door behind him and leaned against it.
    â€œOllie, I wish you’d accept it that alcohol is not one of the major food groups,” he said. Oliver lifted his head from the grubby pillow.
    â€œI didn’t know this was your manor, Uncle Tim,” he said, register­ing pain as he sat up.
    â€œIt isn’t. Your friend Geoffrey Angelwine called me in a panic and said you’d been arrested. I thought I’d better come and bail you out. I was expecting a ‘drunk and disorderly,’ but you certainly don’t do things by halves. Murder of a Knight of the Realm—I wonder if that means you can be hanged by a silken rope. Or is that reserved for peers? Perhaps they’ll attach a tassel, anyway.”
    Oliver slowly dropped his feet to the cold floor of the cell. Without replying to his uncle, he reached for the trousers of his dinner suit, dragged them over his damp underpants, and stood up, clutching the waistband. (His braces and shoelaces had been removed to prevent any self-ad­ministered justice before the Crown could make its case.) Still half a head shorter than Mallard, Oliver yawned and pushed the fair fringe off his forehead with his free hand.
    â€œGod, you look awful,” said Mallard distastefully. “And would you mind staying downwind of me until you’ve brushed your teeth. Preferably your tongue and tonsils, too. I brought you a toothbrush. And a sweater. And you’ll need these.”
    He reached into his breast pocket and handed Oliver his glasses.
    â€œWhat are the charges?” the young man asked.
    â€œNo charges. Not a stain on your character, which is more than can be said for that suit.”
    â€œNot even resisting arrest?” Oliver persisted.
    Mallard smiled for the first time. “Oh, they were considering it. But not after the statement you gave that young constable—what was his name?—Urchin. How did it go? Something like ‘It’s a fair cop, guv. Gorblimey, I reckon you busies ’as got me bang to rights, so ’elp me, I should cocoa.’”
    Oliver grinned as he pulled his laceless suede shoes onto his bare feet. He slipped the damp socks into a jacket pocket.
    â€œUrchin took it all down,” Mallard continued, knowing better than to upbraid his nephew for wearing Hush Puppies with a tuxedo. “And I can just see the magistrate’s face. So the locals have decided not to press charges, providing you turn up at the inquest and say all the right things.”
    â€œThanks, Uncle.”
    â€œOh don’t thank me. Believe me, I had little enough to do with it. I’m as welcome here as a fart in a spacesuit. The last thing any local shop wants on a bank holiday Monday is a visit from the Yard.”
    â€œNot even when Sir Harry Random has been murdered?” asked Oliver quietly, without looking up.
    â€œNow don’t start that again,” snapped Mallard. “I’ve heard about that story you were trying to spin earlier, and I put it down in equal parts to the alcohol and your diseased imagination.”
    â€œâ€˜Judgment of beauty can err, what with the wine and the dark,’” Oliver quoted. “Ovid,” he added smugly. Mallard stared at him.
    â€œMaybe they should keep you here, after all,” he murmured.
    Still clutching his trousers, Oliver followed his uncle out of the cell, and after a brief visit to the washroom, joined him in the main public room of the police station. Mallard was deep in conversa­tion with one of the detectives who had responded to Urchin’s call earlier that morning, and who, despite the warm weather,