Stately Homicide

Stately Homicide Read Free Page B

Book: Stately Homicide Read Free
Author: S. T. Haymon
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ex-burglar’s face became suffused with a snobbery exquisite in its unselfconscious purity – ‘he’s always popping in and out of our place. Says Mollie’s Victoria sponge is the stuff dreams are made of. William Shakespeare, The Tempest , Act IV, Scene I.’
    â€˜You don’t say! Istvan. Funny sort of name.’
    â€˜Ah. That’s account of his granny, the countess. Hungarian for Stephen. Good King Wenceslas looked out, on the feast of Istvan. That’s what it ought to be, only it don’t rhyme with “even”. One of the Karhazy family, the old countess,’ the little man went on. ‘Owned half of Hungary, till the Reds took it away. You can read it all in that guidebook you got there.’
    â€˜Oh ah. Dull as ditch water. They always are. The people in charge here ought to put you on to writing a fresh one.’
    â€˜Funny you should say that.’ Percy Toller’s glow became positively incandescent. ‘Mollie’s always on at me about that very thing. Will she be chuffed to hear I ran into you! Mr Jurnet!’ – the little man repossessed himself of the detective’s hand – ‘How about a bite of tea with us after we shut up shop here? It’d be an honour! We close at six sharp, and it don’t take me ten minutes to bike home. There’s a nice bit of ham – I got it myself in Bersham this morning, to be sure it’s fresh in this heat, so I know there’s plenty for three, an’ Mollie’s always got a cake in the cake tin on the off-chance someone may drop in –’
    â€˜Stuff dreams are made of, eh?’ Jurnet had no difficulty in making his voice suitably regretful. Ham and Victoria sponge with the undemanding Tollers was infinitely to be preferred to the high fibre and high thinking to be expected at the Marches. For a moment he was tempted. Then: ‘Only wish I could say yes. Previous engagement, I’m afraid. Like the Yanks say, can I take a rain check on it?’
    â€˜Any time, Mr Jurnet! Pippins, Bullensthorpe. Anyone ’ll direct you.’
    â€˜I’ll do that. Meanwhile, give Mollie my love and say how much I look forward to seeing her again soon. I must be getting on,’ Jurnet finished without enthusiasm. ‘I suppose if I keep going I’ll end up in the Appleyard Room eventually?’
    â€˜You’ll see a sign at the end of the passage.’ Percy Toller shook his head in wonderment. ‘Fancy you, a police officer of all people, an’ never been there before!’
    â€˜There has to be a first time for everything.’
    â€˜No offence meant,’ the little man responded quickly, ‘and none taken, I should hope. It’s only – I mean, a man like that, one of our great English heroes, like Nelson and Lawrence of Arabia, and him local, too –’
    â€˜I’m not much of a one for heroes,’ Jurnet said, not for the first time that day.
    â€˜But he was a wonderful man! A modern Scarlet Pimpernel.’
    â€˜Give me Leslie Howard any day of the week.’
    â€˜Now I know you’re joking! Just you wait till you see all the things they got there about him.’
    â€˜Drowned, wasn’t he? I seem to remember something –’
    â€˜Ah, that was a tragedy, all right. Down by the old mill. You can actually see it from the Appleyard Room – well, not this time of year, but in the winter when the leaves are down. Falling to pieces even then, so they say. Bit of the old grid, or whatever it is they call it, regulates the flow of water, suddenly dropped and caught him square on the back of the neck, just as he come swimming by. Nearly took his head off, by all accounts – just like George Bullen, his ancestor.’ The little man looked suitably portentous. ‘History repeating itself, as you might say.’
    â€˜Not quite in the same class as going to the block for incest.’
    â€˜Beheaded, I

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