Thieves! (30 page)

Or
stolen
?
Good grief!
I had a startling epiphany. Hadn’t I heard Jimmy say “church window” and “pillar box”? What would he have to do with either? It was obvious. The gypsies were in cahoots with Bill Trenfold. Somehow they had persuaded him to be an accessory to the crime. Bill Trenfold wasn’t being forgetful about leaving the post boxes unlocked. He was doing it deliberately!

“What am I going to do?” said Whittler. It would certainly cause a scandal of almost Enron-like proportions in this community. I’d lost count of the number of times Mrs. Evans had complained about donating money to the Trewallyn Trio and her concerns about Reverend Whittler’s capabilities.

“Get the bank to trace the check when it turns up.” And what was the betting that the payee would have a different name!

“That’s far too late,” groaned Whittler. “What if we never get the money back?”

But I was only half listening. I wasn’t my father’s daughter for nothing. I knew all about check washing.

It was actually quite a simple process and could be done with household chemicals like acetone or bleach, even paint thinner. After erasing the payee, one simply wrote in the name needed, adjusted the amount, and deposited the check. A fake ID would secure a new bank account. With central banking and overseas call centers being the norm, by the time a rogue check was traced, it was too late. Money would have been withdrawn, the account closed, and the scam team moved on to pastures new. It was sheer genius. With Dora’s flashy Winnebago, it was obvious that the actual process happened in there. What a scoop!

“I don’t know why you are smiling,” Whittler scolded. “This is very serious.”

“I’m smiling because I’m quite sure there is nothing for you to worry about,” I said. “Do you trust me?”

“Of course, Vicky dear.”

“Can you stall them?”

Whittler brightened a little. “I’ll go and phone them right this minute.”

As he hurried off, my spirits fell. Did this mean that Noah was embroiled in the scam, too? What was I to do? Go to the police? Had I decided to stay and work in the family business, wouldn’t I be doing exactly what Noah was doing now?

Once again, I saw how easily love could get in the way of my career. What a horrible dilemma!

A sudden blast of a car horn brought me back to reality. A Westward TV white Ford Transit 2.4 TDCi with the usual rooftop antennas and satellite nosed through the crowd.

My dilemma was forgotten as I was consumed with a horrible gnawing feeling of envy. Annabel was about to be on the telly. Annabel was soon going to be propelled to instant stardom.

The crowd’s focus shifted away from the Morris dancers and seemed to move as one, away from the arena, much to the consternation of the competitors, who leapt even higher in an effort to keep their attention.

Confronting Bill Trenfold had now lost its urgency, and I found myself trailing after the news van along with everyone else. There was some problem as the line of customers outside Madame Dora’s tent refused to move to let the vehicle through—for some reason, Dora had decided to pitch her tent in an area that was supposed to be left clear for emergency vehicles.

The news van had to take a detour around the perimeter of the arena until it reached the bottom of the flight of steps that led up to the patio of The Grange.

I had no trouble pushing my way through to the front. “Let our Vicky by!” cried one. “Break a leg!” and “Here’s the star!” called out another. If only that were true!

As Topaz began to regally descend the steps, there was the odd speculative comment referencing “her ladyship’s” appearance in the
Plymouth Bugle
, but this was instantly squashed by a general sense of disbelief.

Eavesdropping on various conversations, I realized that Topaz was held in the same high esteem as our own Queen Elizabeth II. It occurred to me that if Topaz’s ridiculous pranks were ever exposed—throwing recycling around, stealing her own silver, and impersonating a lowly waitress—the town might never recover.

Today, Topaz wore a large straw hat and a pale blue linen suit—I was glad to see she had finally taken my advice and worn some magic knickers to control all that padding. Even from twenty feet away, I could see that her face was heavily powdered. She wore two bright spots of blusher on each cheek and a pale pink lipstick.

Standing ramrod straight, Topaz carried a square handbag with a snaffle-bit clasp. She paused on the bottom step, staring loftily across the crowds with a superior look that plainly said, “These are my people.”

Annabel appeared, looking stunning in a forest green silk dress and white denim jacket and carrying a new Kate Spade handbag. In her hand she held a sheaf of notes and was laughing with a burly cameraman sporting a heavy beard whom she kept calling Rock. “Rock, you are funny!” and “Rock, I don’t believe you!”

The two other members of the crew were Crispin, who reminded me of a ferret and was presumably the actual producer, and a very pale girl of around my age, who was dressed from head to foot in black and sported a large nose ring. She placed a sturdy metal cosmetic box on a collapsible table, then retrieved a plethora of cosmetic products and brushes from the box.

I scanned the growing crowd of admirers, waving at Mrs. Evans and noticing—with relief—that Barbara stood next to Wilf, her arm linked into his. Hopefully she’d come to her senses—especially now that I was about to expose her lover’s illegal business dealings.

Annabel waved me over. “I’m so excited,” she gushed. “All my life I’ve wanted to be on television.”

“And here you are,” I said with a tight smile.

“Have you met Cherish?” Annabel turned to the makeup artist. “Cherish has connections with the BBC.”

“My brother works in the cafeteria.” Cherish gave me a sweet smile. “Can I just finish you up, Ms. Lake?”

“
Ms.
Lake,” giggled Annabel.

Cherish took a large powder brush and loose powder pot and began to dab large puffy white clouds all over Annabel’s face.

I thought I was going to die of envy. Pete pushed through the crowds and readjusted the collar of her denim jacket. “You look good, Annie.”

Another
Annie
. I groaned.
Anyone
could look good if you had a full-time makeup person and the right lighting.

Cherish closed the lid of her sturdy metal box and put it on the ground. With a heavy-toothed comb and wire hairbrush in hand, she stepped up onto it and began to backcomb Annabel’s hair.

Suddenly, there was a united gasp of horror.

“Omigod!” Cherish turned even paler than she was already and fell off her makeshift stool.

In her hands she held a huge clump of hair, as if she had just taken a scalp in the Wild West.

“What’s the matter?” asked Annabel. There was a deathly hush.

Annabel’s hand flew up to the crown of her head, her eyes widening in confusion. She spun around and, with a look of utter horror, saw her own hair dangling from Cherish’s comb.

“Omigod!” She backed away, then turned tail and tore up the steps toward the house, her screams gradually receding into the distance.

“She never told me she had hair extensions,” cried Cherish. “Honest to God.”

I caught Mrs. Evans’s eye and saw a flicker of what I knew to be guilt. Someone began to laugh, and then everyone was laughing.

However, Topaz’s expression remained a mask of aristocratic indifference, and there, plain for all, was the difference between the upper and the lower classes. The former stayed cool and aloof in any situation, even if it was facing almost certain death by a thousand Zulus in deepest Africa, and the latter dissolved into hysterical disorder.

“Will you give this back to her?” said white-faced Cherish, offering me an auburn clump of hair the size of a fist.

“Put Vicky on camera!” Pete shouted.

It all happened so fast I didn’t have time to react as Crispin swept forward and pulled me out of the crowd. Within a matter of minutes, Cherish had
very
carefully brushed my hair and applied a coating of makeup and powder.

Topaz materialized at my side with just a curt nod of acknowledgment. A hush descended on the spectators.

Crispin handed me an earpiece and a cordless mike. “You do a general intro. The focus will be on her ladyship. We’ll have to feed you Annie’s questions.”
Does everyone call her Annie
? “There will be only one take.” Crispin patted my shoulder and returned to the news van.

At last I was going to be on telly! I was euphoric! Instant nerves made my head clear and my mind sharp. Cherish helped me adjust the earpiece.

“Put in a word for the Olympics!” called out Dave Randall.

“Quiet!” ordered Cherish, who had exchanged her powder brush for a clapperboard. “Ready to rock, Rock? Aaaaannnd . . . action!”

“Welcome to Gipping-on-Plym in deepest Devon and today’s spectacular Morris Dance-a-thon,” I said smoothly. “There are
many
Morris sides dancing here today, including a guest appearance by celebrity Phil—”

“Good morning, viewers,” said Topaz, snatching the mike from my hand. “Welcome to The Grange, my ancestral home. The Turberville-Spats can trace our family tree to the War of the Roses—”

“Phil’s participation”—I snatched the mike back—“in this prestigious event has already raised money—”

“Which is why today”—Topaz took it again and started walking away, closely followed by Rock and his camera—“I am making a nationwide appeal for the return of a pair of priceless Georgian tea urns that were given by George III when he visited Gipping in the summer of 1810, shortly before he was diagnosed with a bipolar disorder.”

Try as I might, I couldn’t grab the mike back. “There have been rumors that the Romany gypsies who are
guests
on my land are responsible,” Topaz went on in a lofty voice. “However, we now know this is not true, and it’s thought that because these Georgian urns were crafted by Hester Bateman—now dead but frightfully famous—these thefts can only be the work of an international silver thief called The Fog.”

The Fog?
I thought I was going to faint. A murmur of excitement mixed with fear swept through the crowd. Topaz thrust the mike back into my hand. “Vicky Hill is going to tell us all about this dangerous person.”

I stood there like an idiot.

“Tell them about The Fog,”
came the order through my earpiece.

“Yes, The Fog.” I struggled to think of something to say. “Isn’t he supposed to be in Brazil? I can’t imagine why he’d come to Gipping-on-Plym.”

“We don’t want your opinion,”
growled the voice in my ear. My mind literally went blank, and as I searched for something to say, I saw Probes watching me intensely.

“Good question and one I was anticipating,” said Topaz, taking the mike back once more. She seemed to magically produce a photograph out of thin air and held it up to the camera lens. It was a mug shot of Dad looking violent, taken at his last admission to Wormwood Scrubs prison. “This is whom we must be on the lookout for.”

“Is he armed and dangerous?”
urged the voice in my ear, but I was speechless with shock.

Suddenly, the music in the background stopped, and apart from a few stray bells, a deathly hush descended on the showground.

A lone voice cried out, “It’s out of control!”

The crowd around Topaz and I now swarmed back to the arena. Someone began to scream.

Rock darted up the steps, camera rolling. I followed and, from our vantage point, witnessed something I hoped never to see again.

The Gordon traction engine came trundling down the slope without a driver. Mary Berry slithered down the bank, having desperately tried to clamber into the empty cab but fallen. A cry of terror swept through the crowd, but luckily, Mary rolled away from the deadly wheels.

The traction engine began to pick up speed; it broke through the rope and bunting and into the arena, heading straight for Phil Burrows’s podium. Phil seemed rooted to the spot.

There were screams for him to “Jump! Jump! For pity’s sake!” and it was only as the giant wheels seemed to be upon him that he dived out of the way. The podium disappeared under the machine, reappearing seconds later as flat as a pancake.

Widespread shrieks switched to an eerie silence as it became apparent where the rogue machine was headed next.

Breaking through a flimsy post and rail fence, The Gordon plowed into Madame Dora’s tent with a sickening crunch. It went straight through and out the other side, continuing on its trail of destruction until it pitched forward into a drainage ditch and stopped.

It began to rain.

I
t had been an hour since Dora Pike had been whisked away in Steve’s ambulance. Having suffered from internal injuries beneath The Gordon’s giant wheels, her condition was described as “critical.” She was not expected to survive.