Page 90 of Murder Most Actual
“Maybe you didn’t,” she said. “But—there’s just something in my head about—didn’t the colonel say something you really objected to? And … believe me, I’m not claiming that’s evidence. I’m very aware it’s not evidence.” She turned back to DCI McManus. “That just leaves the reverend. And I’m afraid that was Ruby. She’s the one that Mr B—the professor—was following in the first place. She knew the reverend used to work for him and was worried he was coming to take her out. I don’t know what happened; I was too busy nearly being murdered myself. But I’m willing to bet she just panicked.”
Liza was suddenly very aware that Ruby still had her pistol. “You know, you’ve been such a good sport I’m almost inclined to play along.” Slowly, deliberately, Ruby got to her feet. “I’ll tell you what, how’s this?” Laughing, she pressed one hand to her breast and, when she spoke again, her voice was even more oldey-timey radio announcer than usual. “Yes, I did it,” she declaimed, “and I’d do it again. Curse you, curse you forever!”
“Are you quite finished being annoying?” asked DCI McManus.
“Sorry.” Ruby gave him a winsome smile. “She just seemed to want it so badly. But, well, thinking about it, I am one of the few people in this room who’s armed, so I might actually be toddling off now. The lovely Ms Blaine is quite right about the professor, by the way—we’ve never met, but he’s looking at me exactly the way you look at somebody who stole one and a half million pounds from you, and I should know—I’ve seen it before.” She blew him a kiss with her free hand. “Goodbye, James. I wish we’d met in person earlier—it could have been fun. Oh, and”—she turned back to DCI McManus—”if you look, you’ll find most of the money stashed in different places around the hotel. I’d barely had time to spend any of it. Consider what’s left a tip. Ciao.”
To Liza’s frank amazement, Ruby began to walk casually out of the room, her pistol trained on DCI McManus. Less to Liza’s amazement, nobody did a damned thing about it. Sir Richard, she suspected, had decided that letting a suspect go was a good way to muddy the waters of his own trial, while Mr Burgh had gone the whole week without taking decisive action and wasn’t starting now. Much more to Liza’s amazement, she found herself standing up, grabbing her pistol, and pointing it directly at Ruby.
“Freeze.”
“Oh, darling, are you going to shoot me?” Ruby sounded almost affectionate.
To Liza’s left, DCI McManus was getting very slowly to his feet. “How about we all put our guns away, and then, let’s be clear, you are both massively under arrest.”
Ruby’s eyes flicked to the DCI. “I’m afraid not, Detective. I don’t really do prison. So unless somebody is going to shoot me—”
And Liza shot her.
Epilogue
Rachael, in the Studio, with Questions
Six months later
“I can’t believe you shot her,” said Rachael.
Liza laughed into her microphone. “I more shot at her. Turns out I’m fucking awful with guns. And kids, guns are not cool, and they don’t help. Take it from your Auntie Liz.”
“So what happened next?”
“Well, I missed completely, and she didn’t shoot me back—I guess all that flirting paid off. Then they did arrest her for killing the reverend, but then the whole case went dark. I think she probably cut some kind of deal for testimony against Professor Worth. But that trial is going to take forever because it has a lot of moving parts. I’ve given the police all the evidence I had—he’d kept my laptop, it turned out—but, yeah, it turns out the prof was the real deal. Or seems like it … I mean, innocent until proven guilty and all that. But some of the stuff he’s accused of is—yeah, it’s nasty. Listeners might remember our episode on Jonathan Wild, and he’s really the best comparison I can make. Upstanding citizen by day, criminal mastermind by night.”
“Of course, in Wild’s case, he was sort of both by night because most thief-taking happened after dark as well,” added Rachel.
“True.”
“And you were right about all the rest? The Ackroyds and Lady Tabitha and that lot?”
“More or less.” Liza took a sip of wine. “The police agreed with me about Malcom and Belloc, but since Vivien was dead there couldn’t be a trial. I think she’s got a brother who’s trying to clear her name, but since she hasn’t been formally convicted there’s technically nothing to clear. As for Lady Tabitha, the cops found traces of her blood on one of Sir Richard’s shirts, and he was found guilty a couple of months ago, but he’s appealing the verdict.”
“And the colonel?”
Liza laughed again, a little nervously this time. “Listeners, pause now if you want to play along at home. Or you could listen to the podcast again and see if you spot the thing I missed.”
“They’re not going to do that, Liz.”
“Just trying to build suspense. Actually, we could go to an ad read now if you wanted?”
Rachael poured another glass of wine. “That noise you hear,” she told the listeners, “is me getting Liza another drink, because she apparently needs to be bribed.”
“Okay.” Liza took the wine gratefully. “So, I was right: it was Emmeline White, although you probably already know that because TV Chef on Trial for Murder is kind of a big story. The thing I’d missed—that I eventually remembered, but not for weeks—is that she’d had a go at the colonel after he’d mentioned knowing a guy named White in the army. Turns out she’d had a brother, the brother had got killed, and she blamed his commanding officer.”
“Colonel Coleman?”
“Exactly.”
“She did plead guilty in the end. Which was good because I’m not sure I’d have wanted it to go to trial. I’d have had to take the stand and say, ‘Well, I suppose it’s like this, but what do I know? I’m a podcaster.’”