EQMM, February 2008 Read online

  As my head swirled in the heavens, I watched Eaves draw back his arm like an arrow with a fist for a tip. Then he let it go. I waited for the impact, but it never came. His knockout punch had been intercepted by another arm, one that spun the cop around and fed his teeth a series of jabs. Eaves crumpled to the floor as blood streamed from his nose and mouth. Pete Gallagher stood over him, his fists the size of fieldstones, his veins the size of ropes.

  Clare Henry knelt over Parrish. She was talking to him and he was talking back. Gallagher helped me up and we checked on the sheriff. Parrish had been hit in the shoulder. He turned his sights on me. “Next time you're going to try to be a hero, let me know. I'll duck."

  I looked over at Eaves. The cop was flat on his back, his arms flung out to his sides, the coin lying lifeless in his palm. His face was turned away from me as air limped in and out of his chest. His uniform was darkened in spots by sweat and blood. The blood on his badge was beginning to dry.

  * * * *

  A month later I received a telegram:

  WESTERN UNION

  LONDON ENG 1045A

  MR DARROW NASH

  CAHUENGA BLDG LOS ANGELES CA

  RECEIPT OF PACKAGE CONFIRMED. ON BEHALF OF THE BRITISH GOVT THANK YOU FOR THE RETURN OF THE CORONATION COIN OF EDWARD V. AS THE BARD SAID, “HOW QUICKLY NATURE FALLS INTO REVOLT WHEN GOLD BECOMES HER OBJECT.” YOUR SELFLESS ACTIONS PROMOTE DIGNITY AND ORDER. WOULD THAT A THANK YOU EQUALLED THE VALUE OF THE RETURN OF SUCH A PRICELESS TREASURE.

  WITH KIND PERSONAL REGARDS.

  REGINALD CLAY—CURATOR—BRITISH MUSEUM

  * * * *

  I never got my twenty bucks back. And I never collected my two hundred dollar retainer.

  Twice my normal fee.

  Copyright (c) 2008 by C. J. Harper

  * * * *

  HONORING THE BAKER STREET IRREGULARS: For the 65th consecutive year copies of an EQMM winter issue will be distributed at the annual Baker Street Irregulars banquet, to help the world's oldest Sherlockian organization celebrate the January 6th birthday of Sherlock Holmes. This year, in our February issue, we've included a rare Holmes pastiche by Edward D. Hoch and a tale featuring Steve Hockensmith's Old Red, ardent admirer and follower of Holmes.

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  Fiction: THE CREAM TREATMENT by Jeffry Scott

  The pseudonymous Jeffry Scott, who's been writing for EQMM since 1972, always provides us with something a little unexpected, and never more so than in this new story. The former newspaper reporter and editor, who traveled the world for many years in pursuit of news stories, settles us comfortably in the English countryside for this tale on the cozy side.

  * * * *

  Mary Paraly coaxed, “Go on, Father, tell him about that bad business at Cherry Garth. ‘Twas so long ago it doesn't matter him knowing."

  Mrs. Paraly often addresses Jim as “Father,” though he is her husband. It started when their children were little and she couldn't get out of the trick of it, is her excuse. For twenty years or more Mr. Paraly was Police Constable Paraly, imposing the weight and majesty of the law on several Wessex villages while taking that, and indeed himself, very seriously. I suspect that Mary started the “Father” thing as a gentle reminder that Jim had a human role out of uniform.

  Jim and Mary are just about my oldest friends, in both senses of the term, but there's another reason for regular visits. You cannot write crime fiction—well, I can't—without straw for the bricks of imagination. Coppers are full of plots and twists they think of as anecdotes. Plus random stuff, often trivial to them yet priceless for you-had-to-be-there reasons. Inside information that an outsider has no chance of dreaming up.

  Frustratingly, ex-PC Paraly was a potential gold mine, but the shaft was sealed. Police officers sign up to the Official Secrets Act and it is supposed to be open-ended. Moreover, Jim prides himself on not being a gossip. Pumping, whining, or badgering alike had been wasted breath—until now.

  So when they had one of those short, unspoken exchanges long-married couples tend to go in for, and he conceded, “Well, mebbe I could tell the tale,” my little heart went pit-a-pat ... especially after Mary confided, “What Betty Barney did was murder, so listen hard."

  More loudly, Jim being tetchy about people mumbling—not that he's getting deaf, what an idea—she began, “This was when the Barneys had Cherry Garth Farm. Where all those bungalows are, t'other side of the river? That was a fine farm, though you'd never guess it now.

  "I dare say it broke Tom Barney's heart to make a mint of money for losing the place. House knocked down, some of the best grass in the county built over.” She grinned maliciously. “I'm not entirely joking, my dear. There'd be Friesians there yet; I love the sight of a black-and-white herd and so did Tom. Much good that did him—not to say Betty wore the trousers but she told him when he had decided anything, and explained what that might be. Assertive, they call it now, but we spelt that bossy when I was a girl."

  Jim pursed his lips. “Now, now, Betty wasn't so bad. Not until that girlie properly soured the milk for her, drove her a bit barmy."

  "Nice as pie,” his wife agreed. “Provided everything went as she wanted. Betty did the flowers in church and ran the Women's Institute—though she would have won all the cookery competitions even if the judges hadn't been scared of getting in her bad books. She was clerk of the parish council and lord knows what all besides. Oh yes, queen bee in these parts.

  "It's no good huffing and frowning, Father, I am only telling the truth. I liked the woman—” Mary broke off to wag a finger at me for chuckling. “Me and Betty Barney got on real well, ask anybody. But I saw her clear, there's no law against noticing that friends aren't perfect."

  "I reckon we've heard enough about your great friend Betty.” Jim Paraly's heavy sarcasm suggested that for once he was eager to Tell All, or at least get more than a word in edgeways. “Tom and Betty had just the one child, see. For Betty the sun rose and set on their Gordon. I'd have been proud of him, too. Good-hearted, never any trouble, but not a goody two shoes. Clever as well; sailed through the grammar school entry exam. Some lads would have got big-headed, start thinking they were a cut above.... He didn't."

  "Popular,” Mary summed up needlessly, “and naturally Betty Barney had plans for him. She'd got into the habit from years of running Tom. Had that boy's future mapped out while he was still in short trousers.

  "She was like those kings and queens in the olden days, all out for useful marriages. And there was her Gordon and the Farrows’ Sophie growing up like brother and sister only no blood ties. She must have rubbed her hands!"

  Jim Paraly explained that the farm owned by little Sophie Farrow's parents was next-door to Cherry Garth. Knock down half a dozen fences, bridge a stream, and the two could be merged in a single holding...

  "Betty and Winnie Farrow were cronies, in and out of each other's houses most days. Gordon and Sophie saw loads of each other when they were little—and after. Went to the same school till he passed for the Grammar, shared the same treats, and so on."

  "The men got on fine, went fishing, drank together on market days, but Bert couldn't stand Betty,” Mr. Paraly stated. “She had that one-holding notion from the start. First off, she wanted them to go halves on buying expensive gear both families could benefit from, combine harvesters and suchlike. Later it was, why not build a modern milking parlor at a halfway point, to serve both herds? That way they could save wages by keeping fewer herdsmen...

  "Bert Farrow wasn't having it. Some of his machinery was from his father's time but he was a dab hand at making do and his relics kept going. As for the building idea—scheming to do somebody out of a job for the sake of a few hundred quid more in the bank every month didn't sit well with him. He knew where that idea came from..."

  "Betty could have throttled him,” Mary Paraly broke in, with relish. “But there's more ways of killing a cat than choking it with cream.” For reasons beyond me, the old girl tittered and then shook he
r head in self-reproof. “That will keep, I mustn't muddle you. Young Gordon loved the land and Sophie was the same. Straight home from school, into her rough clothes and off to feed her calves or help with haymaking. They were a matched pair if ever there was...

  "Stars of the Young Farmers Club, they were. Gordon and Sophie were chairman and secretary, and they arranged all the social side, dances and barbecues. Betty counted on them becoming a real couple, churched and wed. Then Old Father Time would do his work and some fine day there'd be a Barney owning one big farm."

  Mary twinkled at me. “You had to feel sorry for Bert Farrow—he wanted their Soph’ to be happy and it was obvious what she wanted, so he was stuck. Betty would win in the end."

  "She's right,” Jim Paraly admitted, “for once. Betty was the sort as can play the long game if they must. Not that she meant to marry off Gordon for the sake of getting hold of next-door—but it was damned convenient him and Sophie being sweet on each other."

  His expression turned sardonic. “And then when Gordon was seventeen or so and playing rugger for the County Colts, he went and got his nose broken and a couple of teeth knocked out, the way you do—"

  "Horrible game, ought to be banned like bare-knuckle boxing."

  "That flat nose stopped him being too handsome for his own good. What I'm trying to tell you is, Gordon went to the dentist at Gurnard Wells and it was all up with him. She told him to spit in the bowl—"

  "Don't be so coarse, Father! Not true, either. Kim was just the receptionist, didn't have the brains to be a nurse."

  "Kimberly Stottle was her name,” Jim steam-rollered on. “Always tickles me, a stunner with an odd name, but it never worried young Gordie. Soon as he clapped eyes on her, that was it. Young Farmers had to get along without him, likewise Sophie. He was off to Gurnard Wells every chance he got. You couldn't blame him. Kim was..."

  While Jim honed praise, Mary dug me in the ribs. “Flashy-pretty in a cheap way, no denying, but that girl was next best thing to a nitwit."

  "Radiant, I was going to say. Lit up a room, did Kimberly Stottle."

  Unkindly amused, Mrs. Paraly jeered, “He means sexy, pardon the expression. You'd have sworn all the men—His Lordship here as well, shame on him—were wearing them kipper ties, only it was their tongues hanging out."

  If the thing can be done, then Jim blew down the stem of his pipe with an air of dignified reproof before tamping a fresh load of baccy. “There she goes, exaggerating. Though fair play, Kim was a cracker and a peach. Once Gordon showed her off around the village, folk said good luck to him—wasn't as if he was breaking an engagement, more of an expectation, like. It hadn't got beyond friendship. No shame, no blame."

  "That wasn't how his mother felt,” Mary cackled. “My word, Betty was in a state. Poor Sophie too, though she took it better. When you're that fond of somebody you want them to be happy and Gordon was over the moon, so Soph’ stood aside.

  "Of course, Betty Barney put her foot down firmly, the very worst thing to do. Gordon was her son as well as Tom's, and he had her backbone. Would not be moved. And his precious Kimberly was one too many for Betty as well—” Breaking off, Mary bit her lip. “I said the girl had no more sense than a wet hen, but looking back, maybe she was deep-down clever and a ninny, both at once. Some are.

  "From the outset she called Betty ‘Mummy Barney,’ like marrying Gordon was certain as day follows night. Fair drove Betty wild ... Betty tried freezing her out, or being downright rude and nasty behind Gordon's back—she told me all about it—and Miss Kimberly Stottle just giggled...” Mary Paraly put on a gormlessly arch voice, “Ooh, Mummy Barney, you are a tease!"

  "Finally Betty laid out all the reasons Kim was wrong for Gordon. She knew nothing about farming and didn't want to know—ugh, all that mud and muck and getting up before daylight ... She liked town life and there wasn't any at Cherry Garth. Kim loved music, if you can call that pop stuff music, and Gordon was tone deaf, Sunday morning at St. Peter's with the hymn-singing was a right ordeal for him. Loads of reasons, all making good sense, and Kim nodded away.

  "But just when Betty thought she had got somewhere, the girl stopped nodding and gave her the goo-goo eyes instead. ‘But Mummy Barney, I lu-uu-uv him,'” Mrs. Paraly mimicked again. “So there was no shifting either of them, and Betty's great plan was no-go. Oh, I did have to work hard not laughing every time she told me the latest."

  "She's got a cruel side, my wife,” Jim observed. “Mark you, it was about time that woman learned she couldn't always have her own way. Bound to happen, we all meet our match sometime or other. “But then"—he jabbed the fuming pipe at Mary—"she got this terrible idea in her head."

  "Well, what was I to think, Father?” And to me, “It was just like Treasure Island in St. Peter's that day. You know, the lad falls into the apple barrel and hears the pirates talking out of turn, never knowing he's there to hear it?

  "I was in the vestry darning surplices and I must have dozed off. Next thing there was talk going on outside, and glass clinking, water sloshing. Betty come to fix the flowers and Sophie Farrow was helping her. I would have called out, but then Betty said, ‘Don't worry your head about Kimberly Stottle, my dear.'

  "Ooh, the way she said that! Made me stay quiet, you may be sure. Sophie said summat, she was quiet-spoken and they were in church, after all. But I heard Betty all right. ‘He's going away soon. He won't want Kimberly Stottle when he gets home again, not after I have finished with Madam.’”

  Jim Paraly cut in, “National Service was still on, remember. Gordon had to go when he reached eighteen. They put him in the army and what with Korea and all that, he was in for the best part of three years."

  "Never mind why he was leaving.” Miffed at her drama being sabotaged, Mary was quite sharp. “Hearing that about ‘not wanting her’ and ‘when I have finished with her’ shook me up. Betty sounded so ... calm and confident and pleased with herself. Determined, too, but she always was.

  "They'd be coming into the vestry soon to wash out the vases in that little cubbyhole where the sink is, so I slipped out the back way and told Father all about it."

  "Awkward,” ex-PC Paraly commented. “I mean, it could have been a threat—"

  "Confound you, Jim, it was a bloomin’ threat.” (Very strong language from Mrs. Paraly.) “I heard the way Betty came out with it."

  "Have it your way—she always knows best, my wife—but a threat to do what, exactly? Nothing there worthy of police action. Besides which, if Betty Barney denied saying any such thing and wanted to know where my information came from, what then? Mary here wasn't about to stand up and accuse a good friend, let the whole village think her a hole-and-corner eavesdropper spreading wild stories..."

  She turned a shoulder to him but conceded, “That is what spiteful folk would have made of it. All I could do was beg Father to keep an eye on Betty. Then Gordon was called up and off he went for basic training up North somewhere. That was when we both started fretting, admit it, Jim."

  "'Twas strange,” Mr. Paraly agreed. “I'm a great believer in character. People don't change overnight, nor in a twelvemonth, neither. Age mellows? What a joke—nasty ones get deeper set in their ways while the good ‘uns go on as usual. That's why I can't abide the nonsense on TV, all them serials Mary won't miss a minute of. People being saints one minute and devils the next, just to help the story along, is silly enough to make a cat laugh."

  "Your point?” I enquired. Let Jim Paraly detour to the flaws in TV fiction—he is tiresomely well informed on the soaps despite alleging hostile indifference—and we'd be lost.

  He glowered at me. “I'm getting there. Gordon hadn't gone a week before Kim Stottle moved in at Cherry Garth with Tom and Betty. I saw her at the shop, she had stopped off to buy trashy magazines, taxi outside burning money while she chattered away.

  "I didn't have to ask her what was up, just listen. Kind Mummy Barney was taking her in while Gordon did his army time. Couldn't bear the thought of Kim pining a
way on her own in a bed-sitter at Gurnard Wells, waiting for his letters. What she needed was home comforts ... Aye-aye, I thought, what is going on? Taking pity on the fly in her ointment wasn't the Betty B. I knew."

  Betty could be genial when it suited her, Mary Paraly confirmed, but patience with fools or forgiveness to enemies were not on her agenda. “The girl was an orphan and she knew which side her bread was buttered,” Mary went on. “I wouldn't say Miss Kimberly was dead idle, she certainly slaved over her appearance. Not above half keen on working for a living though, put it that way. Move in with the Barneys, free meals and no rent to pay? Too far to Gurnard Wells for traveling there and back every day, so goodbye dentist—perfect excuse to chuck up her job. I'd have gone to Cherry Garth, in her shoes. If-so-be I was too stupid to ask myself what was behind it..."

  "First and foremost,” Jim Paraly argued, “making her a member of the family, good as, meant Betty Barney had given in. As young Kim must have seen it. That was the real bait.

  "I could not believe that Betty would, um, do anything drastic. That wasn't in her either. Except that it isn't in anybody ... until them as thinks so are proved wrong. What do friends, neighbors, loved ones usually say after a murder, for instance? Good old George or sweet Aunt Lizzie was the last person on earth they'd have expected to do such a thing..."

  * * * *

  Although Mary Paraly shared that incredulity, she could not forget Betty Barney's tone when making a promise to Sophie. Nor could she ignore the fact that farms are highly dangerous places. (More so sixty years ago, with Health & Safety regulations in their infancy.) Machines can be treacherous, many of the tools are sharp, and animals may rebel.

  Every year some local had a close shave: They were the lucky ones. At longer intervals something terrible occurred. And these were people well aware of the dangers, not townies. Like a certain Kimberly Stottle, eminently qualified for an accident...

  Jim Paraly had ordered his wife to keep her trap shut. Talk spreads in villages, emotional blood-poisoning, and slander is a serious matter. Chances were it was all stuff and nonsense, anyway. Yet he was secretly uneasy.