Last Tango in Aberystwyth Read Free Page A

what.’
    The next bus was over an hour away so we went to the Cabin coffee bar in Pier Street and sat in one of the booths looking out on to the street. After extracting as much mileage as she could from my ignorance on the subject, Calamity explained what an Aunt Minnie was.
    â€˜It’s a word the spies use; it means pictures that tourists take that then become of interest to the intelligence community because they accidentally include something top secret in the background. Like a Russian missile or a defector.’
    â€˜And who’s Aunt Minnie?’
    â€˜They call them that because there’s always someone’s aunt in the foreground.’
    â€˜It’s a bit of a long shot, isn’t it?’
    â€˜You never know. Some of this stuff will prove useful one day, take my word for it.’
    I handed her a photo of Dean Morgan that had arrived in the post. ‘We’ll just have to hope no one defects this afternoon, we’ve got a real job. If we’re lucky, we might even get paid.’
    Calamity scrutinised the photo. ‘Preacher man, huh? How boring.’
    â€˜This is the sort of preacher man who would be right up your street. He’s from the Faculty of Undertaking.’
    â€˜They teach that?’
    â€˜You have to learn somehow.’
    â€˜So what did he do?’
    â€˜He’s been teaching the Undertaking course out at Lampeter for thirty years. Then one day he decides to visit Aberystwyth.He hasn’t been heard of since. The worry is, he might have become part of the curriculum. The client is a girl called Gretel. She’s one of his students.’
    â€˜You’d think she’d be pleased her teacher had done a bunk.’
    â€˜They’re not like that out at Lampeter.’
    *
    Gretel had called three days ago. I told her to come to town, my office was on Canticle Street, but she giggled at the very idea and said, ‘Oh but I couldn’t!’ as if Canticle Street was in Gomorrah. So I agreed to go to Lampeter and asked her for a description. She said she would be wearing a brown Mother Hubbard, a black headscarf and big wooden beads. And she was quite fat. I thought that shouldn’t be too difficult but when our bus turned into a main street lined with dreamy old sandstone colleges, I saw six other girls just like it.
    The pub on the high street was easy to find. The Jolly Ferryman, two doors down from the souvenir shop selling bonsai yew trees. A pub with olde worlde bow windows and panes of glass like the bottom of a milk bottle – the sort that make your vision go bleary even before you’ve taken a drink. When I walked in a fat girl in a Mother Hubbard waved from the window alcove.
    Gretel introduced herself and her friend Morgana and asked us what we wanted to drink. Morgana said amiably, ‘You and your daughter must be tired after your long journey from the city.’
    â€˜I’m not his daughter,’ said Calamity. ‘I’m his partner, I’m a detective.’
    â€˜What city?’ I said.
    The girls broke into a peal of giggles like silvery bells, and covered their mouths with their hands.
    â€˜Why, Aberystwyth of course!’
    A number of people in the pub looked round sternly at the mention of the name. I ordered a rum and Calamity ordered a whisky sour which I changed to a ginger beer. When the drinks arrived we chinked glasses and I said, ‘So why undertaking?’ The girls paused politely as if allowing the other to go first. Gretel said, ‘Strictly speaking, I’m not doing “undertaking” as such. I’m doing media studies.’
    â€˜Are you hoping to write for the parish magazine?’
    â€˜Oh no! Not that sort of media. I mean I’m studying to be a medium.’
    I said, ‘Ah.’ And then after I’d thought some more, added, ‘I didn’t know you could do that.’
    Gretel smiled and looked down at her clogs. ‘You don’t