Cravendish
CHAPTER SIX
Cravendish's bread and butter, even though spread remarkably thinly and using some kind of own-branded butter that had been stored in the freezer for a fortnight, and was now partially made of ice, were the small cases he took on, as a way of keeping the business afloat, even if its buoyancy consisted of a metaphorical cardboard box held together with sticky tape that floats in a dirty and bracken puddle, filled with cigarette ends and at least one sweet wrapper or contraceptive, now spent. Very much like Cravendish's options.
The Oracle
They called her the Oracle, as she was perceived as the wisest woman in Brayburn, being its oldest resident at the tender age of one hundred and seven years. She was a regular of Cravendish's, often called in to settle a dispute between her and the staff at the Home. Una Cant was her real name, but very few people bothered to discover this by a simple process of asking her what her name was, an event seemingly beyond some slack-minded people. As usual, the condition of her medication was at issue, and she had called Cravendish in for assistance.
"I'm telling you, Cravendish, they come in here, take my pills, and -"
Sibil Northcott, the Manager of the Care Home took umbrage to the accusations laid before her, "Utter nonsense, and you know it, Mrs Cant! You very well know we look after your pills for safety -"
"You see? She admits it!" announced Una, satisfied.
Cravendish smiled and attempted to pacify the situation, "Yes, Una, I can see, but -"
Una had the bit in her teeth and was galloping around the paddock, "You don't understand! They're just petty thieves, the lot of them! Remember that fifty quid I lost?"
"I do, Una." acceded Cravendish with a sigh.
Sibil Northcott was beside herself, "Look, that was before my time -"
"I know." spat Una meaningfully, "It was the other venomous Manager that ran off with my things!"
"She retired, Mrs Cant." explained the Manager exhaustedly.
"Too right she did! Off with her ill-gotten gains, the evil cow!"
The Manager nearly buckled with indignation, "Now, Mrs Cant, that's not very nice -"
Cravendish sensed the growing need to defend someone. He took the Manager gently by the arm, "Look, I'm sure all of this is new to you, but if you leave it with me?"
"Alright. Just, just - you know!" described Sibil Northcott, with her pointed and painted finger - pointed painted, pink and a manifestly claw-like finger. There was something deeply disturbing about the woman, and Cravendish could see why Una had taken such a disliking to her, but the two of them let her leave unsatisfied. Perhaps she could claim her pound of flesh for her demonic soul later, after Cravendish was gone. For the meantime, Cravendish continued with his case - that of placating an old, lonely woman who was only seeking the company of a like-minded altruistic soul. Job done.
The Tip
Cravendish turned up, reluctantly, to the local Tip and Bottle Bank, down wind of the local supermarket; Farenbury's. On behalf of some accidental client, Cravendish was searching through the rubbish for a carelessly discarded ornament of principally sentimental value, yet culminated in a very real reward. Too often Cravendish would end up searching somewhere he would rather steer clear of, but sometimes, just sometimes - oh, heck. It paid the bills.
A dishevelled, dirty and delicate man sauntered up to Cravendish. He smelled of something disturbing. If the smell of rotting fish could be harnessed within a perfume, then the man had been doused in it, or perhaps partially drowned in a vat of Eau de Fishguts, "You're not going to find it there."
"Sorry?" asked Cravendish, suddenly aware that once smelled, he would never be able to scrub the odour of that man from his senses for perhaps the rest of his life, and had become resigned to that fact, though reluctantly.
"I said, you're not going to find it there." said the man, brushing his teeth with a previously discarded toilet brush.
"How do you know?" asked Cravendish, not entirely sure he really wanted to engage the man in conversation in case the odour was transferable.
"Because I was looking there only this morning. Because I picked the best stuff out of there and kept it."
Cravendish was now paying attention, "You didn't happen to come across a -"
"A red and green patterned rabbit, about - so long?" demonstrated the man with his dirty and calloused digits.
"Ah, that would be it. Do you have it?"
"No. That is to say, I own it. I found it, and it's mine."
Cravendish hadn't been prepared for this, but then he had forgotten to brush up on his online course of how to converse with utterly mad tramps, "Well, perhaps could I get it from you? Its just that a lady called -"
"Don't care mate." shrugged the man, continuing to brush his teeth, then his clothes, with the toilet brush.
Cravendish was lost for all but one word, "But -"
"Do you know I used to be something once?" ventured the man, inquisitively.
Cravendish nodded. He had seen Derek Stromme out and about, but also was aware of his ill-fated music career, and the subsequent toll it had taken on him, "I do. I really do, but could I -"
Derek was lost in a world of memory, where everything was rose-tinted and coated in drugs and alcohol, usually at the same time, "Toured the world we did! Well, toured most of the world. Okay, so we spent a little bit of time in America, but you can't expect to break there overnight!"
"Interesting, but -"
"First single went in at number thirty six! Next at twenty five! If Boffin hadn't sworn on live TV, who knows where we would be today, eh?"
Cravendish could sense this was going down an alleyway where the only exit involved the climbing over of used and abused needles, "Mr Stromme -"
"Call me Derek! Mr Stromme was my Dad's name! Well, actually it was Jenkins, but who ever heard of a Rock God called Derek Jenkins?"
Cravendish was running out of ideas, "Derek, I would love to stay, but I have far too much work -"
A light, a dim light of low wattage and covered in continual levels of dust, came on in the deep, dark and disturbed mind of Derek Stromme. It seemed he was perceiving a different scene unfolding before him than the one that largely continued in the sane world of reality, "So you want an autograph, eh? Always got time for a fan of Golden Mane! Those complete and utter ba -"
"It's fine!" uttered Cravendish, holding his palm up to halt the man in his actions, but Derek simply took out a twig from his pocket and attempted to sign Cravendish's palm with it.
"Hmm. Seems to have run out of ink. Hold on. Got another pen over here -" Derek looked about him, until that dim light began swinging in the desolate room of his brain.
A flash of inspiration suddenly came to Cravendish and he saluted it regally as it slid up the flagpole, "How about - how about you sign that ornament of a rabbit for me? That would be perfect!"
In Derek's world, this was a simple request. In that world, he was still ‘The Man’, "Ah! Right you are! So - you catch our latest disc? Released for the Christmas market, you know! We Three Kings Of Rock! Going to be a smash! Once Krape gets out of Rehab, of course. Oh, and Fillmont stops being dead. Still, its going to be a smash! Here!" Derek handed over the rabbit ornament, invisibly autographed with a used toothbrush. Cravendish would be sure to wash the thing before he handed it back to its rightful owner, "Hey!" continued Derek Stromme to a fleeting Cravendish, "Do you know where I can get a twelve-gauge E string around here? Oh, never mind! I found one! Wait, that's a string of spaghetti. Oh well!"
Stealing Seed
A resident had called in Cravendish to investigate a case of theft. Millicent Hyde-Renchent, a much nuptualled woman of years closer to autumn than summer, had noticed that quite regularly some things would go missing from her Garden, well intentioned, but sadly neglected though it was. It seemed that of late, someone had been sneaking into her Garden and stealing the very birdseed she had deposited upon the high bird table. Cravendish was well aware that at this juncture, much like many other similar junctures in his present life, beggars could not, indeed and with acquiescent wilfulness, be choosers. He set up a place from where to view the table in concealment and watched carefully for the culprit to strike. He was not there more than ten minutes, however, when the empirical evidence presented itself avianically.
"Mrs Hyde-Renchent?" requested Cravendish with politeness and grace.
"Yes?" answered the self-same, from her chair by the gas fire.
"Mrs Hyde-Renchent. The culprit, nee the thief of your feed, designated for birds, for the use of?" Cravendish was attempting to maintain a professional demeanour despite the circumstance.
"Yes?" she repeated in almost exactly the same tone and resonance.
"Well - it's the birds." explained Cravendish, as plainly as a plain.
"Sorry?"
"The thief of your bird seed is, in fact, the birds themselves." continued Cravendish.
"Oh. What shall we do about that then?" asked Mrs Hyde-Renchent, at once both shocked and confused.
"As I see it, Mrs Hyde-Renchent, you have two options; option one is to stop buying the seed and putting it upon the table, and option two is to let the birds, on the bird table, eat the bird seed." said Cravendish, packing away his surveillance equipment, which constituted a pair of theatre glasses and a pad and pencil, with the eraser missing.
"Do you think that wise?" asked Mrs Hyde-Renchent, concerned.
"Yes, Mrs Hyde-Renchent, I do."
"Well, then. I shall endeavour to deal with the situation." she bounded with confidence.
"I wish you every luck with that." expressed Cravendish, calm as a hippopotamus in an earthquake. Mrs Hyde-Renchent showed Cravendish to the door. Cravendish half expected her to faint clear away from the sudden knowledge that someone had thrown post onto her floor without a by-your-leave. Which brought Cravendish onto his next case; the post.
The Post
It seemed from a certain street, post had gone missing, or had been stolen. An avid fox was at first blamed, but this was quickly dismissed when some folks realised that what would a fox want with other peoples post? Well, they couldn't read, for one thing. After some searching, Cravendish settled the problem fairly quickly.
It seemed that Eric the Postman had suffered a recent breakup with a young lady from the Estate, and she had left the poor man devastated. Eric had fallen into a spiral of hate and alcohol, leading to drunken deliveries in the mornings. As the letters came pouring in to the wrong houses and streets, many simply ignored this fact and threw the letters that weren't theirs away. Another visit to the dump, and a further unintelligible conversation with Derek Stromme revealed that he had collated them into a pile he called Fan Mail, just waiting to be utterly ignored by a Rock Star, as was his want. After promising to buy Golden Mane's back catalogue, Derek released the post to Cravendish, who subsequently found Eric the Postman in the Beer Garden of the Fox and Apple. Cravendish spent some time sitting with the man and listening to his tale of woe, and how no woman ever flaming understood him, and that they were all the same, except his dear old Mom, something they bonded over quite easily. Eventually, Eric was persuaded to redeliver the post, and Cravendish went about his business. And no more was heard of the Postal Thief of Drubbery Street.
The Wife
The last, but by no means least, case of his current run of largely pointless tasks, with just a modicum of altruistic and selfless conditioning, was of a woman convinced that her neighbours were stealing from her. And Cravendish knew her. Her husband was the Worshipful Master of his Lodge; Wendy Raggle.
Cravendish knocked at the detached property, with ample parking for two cars and a speed boat. Wendy answered it in next to nothing, "Cravendish! Come in quickly! I don't want them to see!" She dragged him inside and closed the door, allowing her flimsy dressing gown to fall open, revealing a near naked negligée that could barely, by any legal standards, be described as clothing. She dragged Cravendish upstairs and into the spare room, where she pointed him to a window, partially curtained. Cravendish was suddenly quite afraid to venture inside, lest she shut the door and lock it behind him. He did, however, step over the threshold eventually. Surely it had to be a coincidence that she was barely dressed and that Cravendish had happened to come round, at a time prearranged by both, and frankly without her husband's knowledge? "Look! Look at them! Just waiting, aren't they? Do you find me attractive, Cravendish?"
"I'm sorry?" he rushed anxiously.
"No need to be sorry! I'm still a young - relatively young and vibrant woman! Don't you want me, Cravendish? Don't you want to tear off my clothes with your teeth? Oh, please, Cravendish! Take me on the bed!" Wendy jumped awkwardly onto the single bed of the spare room, but Cravendish was down the stairs and out into the street before Wendy had bounced more than twice on the springy bed. Cravendish had scarpered.
It seemed even to the desperate Cravendish, there were just some cases that weren't worth the hassle.
No comments:
Post a Comment