Stiff News by Catherine Aird

‘She wasn’t ever one to hand decisions over to anyone else. Not Gertie.’
    â€˜And definitely not to doctors,’ said Bryant.
    â€˜Rather not.’ Captain Markyate endorsed this immediately. ‘And she told ’em so at the hospital, too. Don’t you remember how she got quite upset when some whippersnapper of a house physician asked her if she wanted to be resuscitated if she collapsed in there. Life was always worth living, she said. Gave them her curtain lecture on the importance of enjoying life to the full.’
    â€˜And to the bitter end,’ said Bryant.
    â€˜One of her favourite sayings, if you remember,’ said Hamish MacIver, ‘was that life was quite short enough as it was.’
    â€˜And that one about “the best was yet to be”,’ said Markyate gruffly. ‘Remember?’
    â€˜She wasn’t riddled with arthritis,’ said Miss Bentley feelingly.
    â€˜Gertie always seemed quite content with things as they were,’ murmured Markyate. ‘That was one of the best things about her.’
    The Brigadier said, ‘She wouldn’t ever become a member of the Escape Committee.’
    â€˜Not ever,’ agreed Markyate. ‘I mean,’ he added, flustered, ‘she hadn’t joined and then changed her mind, if you know what I mean. Some people,’ he bumbled on, ‘do.’
    â€˜I can understand that,’ volunteered Walter Bryant, looking a little embarrassed. ‘Take myself, for instance. Knowing Margot Ritchie has wrought a big change in the way I now see things … I’m resigning with immediate effect.’
    Miss Bentley looked as if she was about to speak but then thought better of it.
    â€˜I’m thinking very differently these days,’ he went on earnestly, ‘about almost everything.’
    â€˜Circumstances alter cases,’ said the Brigadier diplomatically.
    â€˜Hmm,’ said Miss Bentley again.
    â€˜Elizabeth Forbes just changed her mind,’ put in Peter Markyate, ‘between one day and the next.’
    â€˜Don’t know why, I’m sure,’ said the Brigadier. ‘It’s all right for old Walter here, but any change in circumstances there, poor woman, was for the worse surely.’
    Walter Bryant looked shrewdly across at him. ‘And what about Maisie Carruthers, Hamish? Will she join now she’s here, do you think? Or doesn’t she believe in our Escape Committee and the Almstone Pragmatic Sanction?’
    The Brigadier stiffened visibly, his face turning a turkey-red. ‘I really have no idea at all,’ he said distantly. ‘You’ll have to ask her that yourselves. I’m keeping out of it.’
    *   *   *
    In Sloan’s book ‘getting moving’ also included interviewing Judge Calum Gillespie. That aged legal gentleman received Detective Inspector Sloan and Detective Constable Crosby in his room at the Manor with an old-fashioned courtesy.
    â€˜Is this a duty visit, officers,’ he enquired, ‘or may I offer you both a glass of Madeira? I’ve got some very passable Old Trinity House Bual here if you would like it.’
    â€˜Duty, I’m afraid, sir,’ said Sloan. He knew full well that in the Judge’s private world officers and gentlemen and just plain officers were two quite different categories of men.
    â€˜Pity. You will, I trust, not think me uncivil if I myself indulge?’
    â€˜Indeed not,’ said Sloan truthfully. If there was one Latin tag fully appreciated by every policeman it was in vino veritas.
    â€˜At my time of life a little alcohol helps keep the arteries open.’ Judge Gillespie tottered to a side table and unstoppered a cut-glass decanter. Sloan watched as the neck of the decanter danced dangerously over the sherry glass. Miraculously, though, it never actually touched it and equally marvellously the Judge carried the full glass back without