Midge herself was always very careful to put in the appropriate amount of money for the numerous office whip-rounds. At her own father’s funeral, an overheard declaration from her mother that she had ‘only received fifty pounds for him’ had led to a young Midge spending several years under the misunderstanding that rather than being dead, her father had in fact been raffled off to the highest bidder.
‘Midge!’ Bridie’s side-eye informed Midge that her reaction was not what was expected. ‘Don’t be so ungrateful. I think it’s a fantastic idea.’
Midge decided that a joke of some sort must be being playedon her and pushed the voucher back towards the DCI. ‘Perhaps this present was meant for someone else... DI Atkins is retiring next week...’ DI Atkins was certainly the type to enjoy this sort of foolishness. He’d once tried to engage Midge in a conversation about star signs, of all things.
‘No,’ replied Goodall, shaking her head. ‘Definitely for you. Apparently, Haunting Holiday Excursions is run by an ex-copper who retired a few years ago. HR get a discount, so we’re all stuck with these for the foreseeable. What’s his name?... Jack... Randall, I think.’
The room around Midge shifted to the side suddenly.
‘John Rendell?’ She swallowed to moisten a throat that had turned dry. ‘Do you mean Rendell?’
Midge could feel Bridie’s inquisitive eyes boring into her as she waited for the DCI’s response.
‘Uh, yes. That’s it, think so. She nodded. ‘Bit before my time, of course, but you probably knew him.’
Midge pushed the voucher back into the envelope, still conscious of Bridie standing beside her. ‘I can’t... we’re busy.’
‘What are you talking about?’ frowned Bridie. ‘You’re not doing anything then.’
‘Your chemo...’ protested Midge, slightly breathless.
‘You weren’t coming to that anyway,’ replied Bridie. ‘It will be good for you, instead of sitting at home on your own.’
Midge wasn’t sure at what point ‘sitting at home on your own’ had become either a good or bad ‘thing’ but Bridie had certainly been putting more emphasis on it lately.
‘Look, feel free to do what you want with it,’ interrupted the DCI. ‘Personally, I’d much prefer a set of golf clubs.’
‘Oh, come on, Midge. It’ll be fun!’ cried Bridie, as they watched DCI Goodall walk off across the room. ‘You never know, you may enjoy it.’
Midge, who knew she most certainly would not enjoy it, said,‘But it’s with other people... a group...’ There would be introductions, hand shaking, the expectation to make small talk and, God forbid, the confusion of air kissing.
Bridie squeezed Midge’s hand. ‘Just think of it as a stately home tour, then, if nothing else.’
And a coach? They were to journey in a coach? That not only meant impossibly small seats for a person of her size but also a communal lavatory that actually travelled with them.
‘Really, when you think about it, all ghost stories are just unresolved murder cases,’ said Bridie. Midge frowned, opening her mouth to challenge the statement. ‘Look, I tell you what,’ Bridie stopped her as they watched the DCI head for the exit, ‘do this for me and I’ll try extra hard at the treatment not to swear at the nurses again.’
Which was a little unfair, Midge thought.
So, unsurprisingly, by the time they had finished their cocoa later that evening, the proposed trip was already a fait accompli. Midge had exhausted every possible argument she could think of, and Bridie was still cheerily emphatic that she would enjoy herself. Therefore, at 10 p.m., when Bridie extended her arm towards the stairs and asked her usual, ‘Shall we, old girl?’, Midge responded with a rather sulky, ‘You go on, these lights won’t turn themselves out.’ The prolonged debate about the trip had meant that by the time Midge climbed into their Laura Ashley bed it was already too late to even look at her embroidery – at which point, considering the intensity of the last few months, she actually began to wonder if a little time apart from Bridie would not be such a bad thing.
Friday 20 December
Chapter1
The coach was two minutes late. Not enough to annoy the rest of the assembled group despite the cold weather, but long enough to bother Midge, who had arrived fifteen minutes early in the hope of securing a seat close to the back so that she wouldn’t have to talk to anyone. She needn’t have worried.
There were only four others in their party and ten pieces of luggage.
Two expensive, black canvas suitcases belonged to a smartly dressed couple in matching sheepskin coats. They were about Midge’s age, and stood slightly off to the side talking between themselves. The man was also carrying a black leather medical bag, which Midge hadn’t added to her luggage tally, given its professional function. Five leopard-print cases of varying size surrounded a thirty-something female, who had introduced herself as Rona, without even looking up from her phone. The final pieces, aside from Midge’s own navy hostess suitcase, were a mismatched red suitcase with its keys still attached to the lock alongside a well-travelled green rucksack, both of which were being hovered over by a nervous young man dressed in so much black that Midge wondered if he had just come from a funeral.
‘We’ll be picking up a couple more at the services,’ explained Rendell from the coach steps.
She had recognized him immediately. True, the trousers were a little snugger around the waist, the skin more sagging and mottled, but the Scottish accent, wavy hair and overwhelming scent of cigars hadn’t changed.
Nor had the smarminess.
‘Lovely people! Gather round.’ He turned and shouted up to the coach driver, ‘Jesus Christ, Harold, you’ve parked in the middle of the road. I’ll need a gang plank to get this lot on, what’s the matter with you?’ As they waited for the door to fully open, he added, ‘Hurry up, now, come... come, I won’t bite, unless you want me to!’
