Page 3 of Blow Down (The Plumber's Mate)
She winced and glanced pointedly at the doormat, despite the fact it wasn’t raining outside, so I obligingly went through the motions.
And no, I hadn’t missed the fact I got a first name and she didn’t. I bet if I was lucky enough to get a cuppa, it’d be made with the second-best tea bags and come in a chipped mug kept ’specially for workmen and other oiks.
“Right, love, what’s the problem?” I flashed Mrs. F-M. my best smile.
She didn’t return it. “Less of the endearments, please. I am not your love. This way, please.”
She click-clacked ahead of me on sky-high heels, and I swear I heard the ancient timber floors groan as she approached. And who wears stilettos in their own house, anyhow? Speaking of which, her skirt and blouse were tight and tailored, more like a posh version of office wear than something you’d wear to clean the bathroom. Or show the plumber where the problem was, for that matter. So maybe I shouldn’t have been surprised when she led me not to a bathroom, downstairs loo, or even the kitchen or utility room, but right up several flights of creaking stairs to an attic bedroom. The door was locked, but she had a key.
Which made me wonder a bit, because this clearly wasn’t Mrs. F-M.’s bedroom. Despite the double bed, I was fairly sure it was a single woman’s room, and there was ample evidence the occupant was several clothing sizes larger than Mrs. F-M. To be perfectly frank, it looked like an explosion in a TK Maxx. Designer handbags and shoes littered the floor and the furniture indiscriminately, and there was a pile of frocks on the bed that could keep the Chelsea Oxfam shop going for a month.
As you’ve probably guessed, it was a pretty big room, as attics go. I mean, when most people talk about attics, they mean the space under the roof like I’ve got in my house where you can just about manage to shove a few suitcases and your Christmas decorations so they’re out of sight, out of mind. Or maybe, if you’re lucky, put up a couple of starving artists and a mad first wife for similar reasons. This was definitely more at the luxury loft conversion end of the market, with large dormer windows and more floor space than my whole upstairs.
There was also a distinct lack of plumbing anywhere I could tell. And trust me, I can tell. I was starting to get a bad feeling about this one.
“So what can I do you for, love?” It slipped out. Honest.
Mrs. F-M. looked like she’d just been served a glass of wine with bits of cork in it, but at least she didn’t tell me off again. “I need you to find my necklace.”
Despite the loud clunk as my heart plummeted into my boots, I played dumb. “What happened to it? Down the loo? Plug hole?”
“I doubt it. I’m sure the little darling is keeping it quite safe somewhere.” The way she said darling, you’d be forgiven for thinking it had only four letters and rhymed with blunt.
“Not sure I follow you,” I said a lot more breezily than I felt. I mean, I should’ve known. I really should’ve known. So much for all the years I’d spent training in my chosen profession, getting my City and Guilds and all that bollocks.
“Don’t be obtuse.” Yeah, I could tell she was a mate of Cherry’s. “I need you to do that thing of yours. Remote viewing. Divination. Whatever you like to call it.”
I’d never called it either of those things in my life. “Uh, did Cherry say something to you about, you know?”
“Obviously. Now, can we please get on with it? I presume you charge by the hour. And I have an appointment at four.”
I was going to kill Cherry, I decided. Beat her to death with a couple of bloody dowsing rods. Or strangle her with a pendulum. For a mo, I seriously considered telling Mrs. F-M. where to shove her flippin’ necklace, but, well, I’d have felt like a right bastard if Sis had ended up getting yet more grief over it all.
Which I know doesn’t exactly fit with the whole wanting-to-kill-her thing, but that’s family for you.
“You do realise, once I start looking, I’ll come up with all kinds of stuff, yeah?” I said, admitting defeat. “I mean, there might be stuff you don’t want me to find—”
“Then you’ll just have to focus, won’t you? Now, it’s a simple pendant. Eighteen-carat gold, with a central, heart-shaped pink diamond surrounded by white diamonds. Quite delicate. Antique. Extremely valuable.”
“And you’re sure someone’s hidden it? I mean, if it’s just lost—”
“Quite sure. Alexander’s little poppet has hated me since the minute we met—of course, nobody should dare to take the place of her sainted mother—and you should have seen her face when he gave it to me as a wedding gift. I wasn’t a bit surprised when it went missing two weeks ago.”
I was beginning to have a lot of sympathy with Little Poppet-darling. Mrs. F-M. didn’t realise how lucky she was that it was only the necklace that’d disappeared. Sod it. What was I supposed to do now? For starters, I only had Mrs. F-M.’s word for it the necklace actually belonged to her. And I really didn’t like the thought of helping her go behind her stepdaughter’s back.
Mrs. F-M. strode through the room, grinding a silk kimono casually into the carpet with her heel as she went, and flung open a door at the far end. “You’ll need to search in here too,” she said, switching on a light.
I’d thought the bedroom, large as it was, was cluttered. The space beyond, which was almost as big, looked like it held fodder for a whole series of Cash in the Attic, and several episodes of Antiques Roadshow besides. Not to mention Hoarders. No wonder she’d wanted to call in an expert to find anything in there.
Didn’t make me any happier about being the expert she’d called. “Well, it doesn’t always work . . .” I tried.
She gave me a sharp look. “Cherry said you had an excellent success rate.” Something told me Cherry’d be in for a right ear-bashing if I didn’t at least give it a go.
Course, she’d be in for one from me whatever, but that was different. That was family, that was. “Fine. I’ll just . . . Um. You mind leaving the room?”
It was nothing to do with the vibes. I just didn’t like her breathing down my neck all the time.
She gave me a different sort of look then, and her tongue darted out to wet her upper lip, which creeped me out a bit—I mean, I could imagine her doing that on purpose, thinking it was sexy or something, but it looked totally unconscious. Sort of like a python while it’s considering whether it’s really got room for a whole goat. “No, I think I’ll stay.”
