A Vicky Hill Exclusive! (6 page)

‘Good for you,’ I said, feeling more than a little affronted by the waitress’s overfamiliarity. ‘I’d like a cup of tea and a slice of fruitcake.’

‘I want to be a reporter,’ she gushed, ignoring my request.

‘Actually, I’d really like a cup of tea,’ I said, deeply resenting the impulse that put me in this position. So far, today had been filled with lunacy: Ronnie and the devil chickens, Lady Trewallyn’s bizarre behaviour with the mysterious Porsche driver, my landlady hiding under a bush – and now this.

‘I’d make a really good reporter. I see everything that goes on around here.’ Topaz tapped the side of her nose. ‘That’s why I like to keep this table free.’

‘It’s not easy to break into journalism.’

‘I’m not afraid of hard work and danger,’ Topaz said, adding eagerly, ‘You won’t be disappointed.’

A part of me felt boosted by her obvious admiration – the other resolved never to venture into the cafe again. I glanced out the window. Traffic was once again moving. The BMW remained, but there was no sign of Annabel.

I got to my feet. ‘On second thought, I’d better get back. Really busy—’

‘I’ll get your tea right away.’ Topaz sprang up. ‘Work
here
. Do! It’s lovely and quiet.’

Before I had a chance to protest, Topaz disappeared through a red and white plastic fringe, which presumably led to the kitchen.

It was true. The cafe was as silent as the grave. Topaz could be right. It was hard to think straight at the
Gazette
when everyone was on constant high alert, anticipating the next big scoop.

I sat back down and opened my reporter notebook. Finding the driver of the black Porsche should be fairly easy. A car like that in these parts was rare. With regards to the
ménage à trois
– well, it was understandable really, Lady Trewallyn was young and Sir Hugh, seventy-five. It seemed logical to assume Pierce Brosnan and Lady Trewallyn were lovers, despite her outburst at the cemetery. Adultery was a well-known country pursuit. Yet, true blue-blooded gentility tended to avoid public outcry like the plague.

I scribbled down:
Was Lady Trewallyn born into money, or did she marry it?

Topaz returned with a floral tray bearing a pot of tea, chipped cup and saucer, and a sliver of fruitcake. ‘Milk and sugar are on the table,’ she said. ‘I won’t disturb your important work.’

‘Thanks.’

‘I’ll wait over there. Just nod if you need anything.’

Topaz promptly sat down at the very next table – dead opposite. Playing with a stray strand of dark brown hair dangling from her mob cap, she stared at me. It was most unnerving. I shifted my chair around so my back was to her.

Pouring the greyish liquid into the cup, I took one look at the fruitcake and knew instantly it was going to be a disappointment. It had the waxy, glazed appearance seen in British Rail buffet cars. I took a bite. I was right. It was totally inedible.

Somehow the fruitcake emphasized for me the wretched fact that Annabel would be savouring one of Mrs Poultry’s leftover slices at The Grange tomorrow morning. Annabel was doing the interview. Annabel would be asking inciting questions. Annabel would have read the coroner’s report and know everything. Annabel would
shine. Blast Annabel!

Conscious of Topaz’s intense gaze boring into the back of my skull, I flipped through my notebook with assumed professionalism, scribbling down any words that came into my head –
sex, death, devil, chickens
.

I came across the notes I made for the hedge-jumping feature that I’d written in my free time. I’d actually slipped a copy onto Pete’s desk, but had not heard from him, yet. It appeared the newspaper did not go in for features. Presumably, they felt their readers did not want to broaden their minds and were happy with the staple fare of funerals, flower shows, and excruciatingly embarrassing theatre productions performed by the Gipping Bards.

However, with Sir Hugh’s death and this new hedge-jumping connection, my feature on Dave Randall might just hold some weight. I reread my notes. My face grew red when I realized I’d drawn a heart around Dave’s name with an arrow through it and written,
Dave Randall is HOT and I should know
.

I had hoped Dave would like my story about his triumphs – enough to ask me out on a date, perhaps take me back to Cricket Lodge where he lived like Mellors, the gamekeeper in
Lady Chatterley’s Lover
. Unbeknown to Dave, I had earmarked him as the lucky man to take my virginity. Suppressing a shiver of anticipation, the tearoom faded as I thought back to last weekend when we first met.

Hedge-jumping was still a controversial sport in the West Country because environmentalists claimed it was barbaric. When I first saw signs leading to the showground, I presumed it was a regular horse-jumping event. You can imagine my surprise when I realized there wasn’t a horse to be seen. Dozens of men dressed in heavy commando-style jackets and gabardine trousers reinforced with serge gaiters limbered up in an open field bordered by a pristine seven-foot-high prickly hawthorn hedge.

The hedge was sectioned off in slices with blue ribbon and numbered. Each competitor drew a number and headed over towards his section, where a line judge marked the ground with white chalk two feet away from the hedge base.

Spectators had congregated in groups here and there. Some held flasks of coffee or cherry brandy; some were there just to cheer on their favourite jumper – others to enjoy the possible arrival of an ambulance.

I soon discerned the rules. The jumper was allowed to back up to a maximum of twenty-five feet, marked with an orange traffic cone, and then, under the starter’s gun, would run full speed towards his fate. On the chalk baseline, he would leap off the ground using his preferred style of jump and, hopefully, land safely on the other side.

The trophy was awarded to the man, or woman, who cleared the hedge without damage to Mother Nature’s glory or vital body parts. Points were awarded for style – of which there were many. The Fosbury Flop, the Belly Roll, or the Straddle.

The first time I watched Dave attempt the Fosbury Flop, I feared he was attempting a bizarre form of suicide and would break his neck. Dave charged towards the hedge with a gait that resembled a lame duck. At the last moment, he swerved to the right, stomped one foot down on the chalk line, and twisted his body round so his back was to the brush. Looking over his shoulder, Dave launched up and over, legs pointing skyward, and soared over the hedge with his back barely skimming the top before disappearing headfirst from view. Fortunately, a burst of applause from the other side signalled that he was in one piece.

For me, it had been love at first sight. I tried to think of a way to force an introduction and came up with the feature idea. He was
very
happy to talk to the press – even promised to drop into the office with some professional photographs, especially for me.

Truthfully, Tony was the sports reporter – presumably hedge-jumping was a sport – but when I broached the subject, he dismissed it, saying the newspaper didn’t want to cater to maniacs; that to ‘Report it, would be to support it.’

Pushing Dave firmly out of my mind, I finished my weak, watery tea and closed my notebook. Topaz fluttered over and handed me the bill. ‘Did you finish your story?’

‘Not quite,’ I said.

‘What’s it about?’

‘It’s secret.’

Topaz clasped her hands together and went into raptures. ‘I just love secrets! I’m frightfully good at keeping them, too.
Do
tell!’

‘If I did, it wouldn’t really be a secret, would it?’ I said, hoping she’d get the hint and shut up. I counted the exact amount in small change, and left it on the table. ‘Thanks for the tea.’

I got to my feet and headed towards the door. Topaz followed me with doglike devotion. ‘I say – do you want to go out for a drink tomorrow night?’

‘Tomorrow?’ I said, mentally preparing my standard list of excuses, although I did feel a pang of guilt. Could Topaz be as lonely as me?

‘Please?’ Topaz beamed, then her expression changed. ‘Wait! What’s this?’

She reached over and gently disentangled a prickly bur from my hair. ‘Goodness. Have you been playing in hedges?’ she said, adding suspiciously, ‘A hawthorn hedge – to be precise.’

‘No.’ Her question caught me by surprise. It was curiously specific. She did not look the gardening type.

Topaz pocketed the bur, her expression stony. ‘Do you know Dave Randall?’

I paused, unsure how to answer. How odd that she would connect the bur with Dave. Topaz had already revealed she wanted to be a reporter. My hedge-jumping idea was unique. Plagiarism was everywhere – even in High Street cafes. How did I know that she hadn’t quietly stood over my shoulder and read my work! What would stop her submitting the story herself? Most important – who
was
Topaz? She sounded too posh to be a waitress, and she definitely couldn’t make a decent cup of tea.

‘Dave who?’

‘Randall,’ she said coldly. ‘The hedge-jumping champion.’

‘I’ve heard of him, of course.’ It wasn’t a lie. I didn’t know Dave personally – although I intended to. ‘Is he a friend of yours?’

Topaz shook her head and looked glumly out the window. ‘There are some nasty things going on in Gipping.
Nasty
things.’

My heart skipped a beat. Topaz might be a useful person to know, after all – especially with her penchant for blatant spying.

‘Tomorrow night sounds great,’ I said.

‘Just the two of us.’ Topaz grabbed my arm. ‘Don’t tell that awful Annabel Lake, will you?’

‘Of course not.’ I nodded in complete agreement. ‘Just you and me.’

I crossed the road with a skip in my step. Today was turning out quite well, after all. Without so much as a whisper about money for services rendered, I’d just recruited my very first informer.

A
nnabel was waiting for me in reception. ‘There you are!’ she called out, perched on the counter that separated Barbara’s filing cabinets from the rest of the room.

‘Here I am,’ I said, dismayed at her miraculous recovery from food poisoning. ‘Has the report—?’

‘Sssh!’ Annabel nimbly sprang off the counter with catlike grace and grabbed my arm. ‘Quickly, let’s talk in the nook.’

The nook was an in-house joke. Back in the early seventies, a flimsy plywood wall had been crudely erected to partition off the far corner of reception into a temporary interview area that would supposedly guarantee privacy and comfort. Privacy was debatable, since the walls were paper thin. A brown and cream spangled curtain that closely resembled the entrance to a fortuneteller’s grotto guarded the entrance.

Annabel pushed me inside and pulled the curtain closed with a flourish. The nook was gloomy and smelled of the stale cigarettes that overfilled the ashtray on a small, circular plastic table. Annabel pushed me down onto one of the two green plastic chairs.

‘How was the funeral?’ she whispered, pointing dramatically in Barbara’s direction. ‘Don’t let her hear. She’s a nosy cow.’

‘Did you get the report?’ I said in a low voice.

‘Did you get the Porsche driver’s name?’

How typical! Annabel was bartering one piece of information for another. ‘Not yet but I
did
find out he isn’t a Trewallyn.’

‘Not local and not family, either?’ Annabel frowned. ‘How odd . . .’

I stole a quick glance, wondering if news of the graveyard scrap had already reached her ears. ‘Why? Did you hear something different?’

‘I should have gone to the church, obviously.’

‘It was just another funeral.’ I stifled a yawn, aware that my heart had begun to thump in a disconcertingly erratic manner. ‘Why the sudden interest?’

‘Oh, you know. Details. Little giveaways. Behaviour slipups.’

‘You’ve read the coroner’s report, obviously.’ I tried to keep the envy out of my voice.

‘Sssh! For heaven’s sake, Vicky, keep your voice down,’ Annabel hissed. ‘It’s not here yet. Pete is going demented. He’s even gone to find Brian himself.’

‘What a bore.’ I had no idea who Brian was.

‘Pete’s terrified it will get into the wrong hands.’

My mind was going a mile a minute. Unless Annabel was deliberately misleading me, she had not gone to grill Ronnie Binns, after all. Perhaps his staunch denial about the chickens meant someone else had got to him first – or had he taken his story elsewhere?

Casually, I asked, ‘Did you think any more about those dead chickens?’

‘Honestly, Vicky! What are you – a vegetarian or something?’

‘I just don’t like cruelty to animals,’ I retorted.

‘You’ll never be a good journalist if you let sentiment get in the way of professionalism.’

I marvelled at how Annabel always managed to turn anything I said into an insult.

Suddenly, she fell silent – her expression fixed in an unnatural frown. I could see she wanted to ask me something. ‘Vicky, will you do me a little favour?’

‘It depends,’ I said, mentally cursing her if she asked me to make the tea. With Pete gone, Tony and Edward out – I was damned if I was going to make someone my junior a cuppa.