LITMIR.BIZ

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Dad."

      "Your mother and me won't stand for it — understand?"

      "Sorry, Dad."

      "You will be if you don't shape up.

      "I'll have to do the honours, I suppose," says Daphne Lovelace, breaking a twenty-minute silence as she and Bliss approach Westchester. "It ought to be church, but my front room would probably be more fitting; I don't think God's been on Minnie's Christmas list for a few years now. And you'd be amazed what they charge for a service today."

      "I wonder if she wanted to be buried or cremated," Bliss muses aloud, though Daphne's response holds no answer.

      "I don't even know if she's got a will. I thought she was just like the rest of us, with a little rainy-day money tucked away somewhere, until a few weeks ago when she told me her plans."

      The day that Minnie broke the news about her grand intentions had started inauspiciously for Daphne. Her kitten, Missie Rouge, had rounded up a couple of mice for recreation, but the young cat's natural boisterousness had overcome one of the terrified creatures as she'd enthusiastically batted it around the kitchen floor, whereas the other had gone to ground under the kitchen cabinet.

      Minnie's unexpected arrival found Daphne sprawled on the kitchen floor with the vacuum cleaner's hose stuck under the cupboard.

      "I did ring the bell…" Minnie started, explaining why she had used her emergencies-only spare key on her friend's front door, but Daphne shushed her.

      "Mouse," she whispered, then yelped joyfully as the little animal disappeared up the tube with a pronounced, "Plop!"

      "That's put the wind up him," she cried triumphantly, and then she rushed into the garden to release the tiny rodent.

      "Shakes ‘em up a bit," she explained on her return, "but they usually survive." Then she turned quizzically to Minnie. "It's Wednesday. Isn't it your bingo day?"

      "I thought it must be Alzheimer's or the gin bottle," Daphne continues to Bliss as they slow down in Westchester's suburbs. "I'd never seen her so flighty. And you know what she can be like when she gets excited. ‘How about you and me taking a trip all the way around the world, Daph?' she said, out of the blue, so I started telling her all the places I'd like to go, just to humour her."

      "But she was serious?"

      "Absolutely. I even went with her to Maplin's when she booked. Then we had to go to London to get her a passport."

      "Daphne…" Bliss pauses and puts a note of concern in his voice. "You do realize that the local police will probably want you to identify the body."

      "Oh. Don't worry, David. I've seen more bodies than I care to remember. It's the least I can do for the poor old soul."

      "I'll drop you home first and make some enquiries," says Bliss, knowing that he could just as easily pick up his cell phone and call Westchester's police control room, but preferring not to do so with Daphne sitting alongside him.

      It is approaching nine o'clock when Daphne turns the key in her front door.

      "I'll light the fire," she says, shuddering at the coolness of the empty house and the realization that she'll never be opening the door to her oldest friend again.

      Bliss switches on the television and is surprised to discover that Minnie has become the poster child for Age Concern, and several other elderly-rights groups, and her demise has been catapulted to first place in the national news.

      "With surveys just out showing that forty-seven percent of the general population, and a staggering seventy-eight percent of the elderly, are frightened to venture out after dark," begins the newscaster with a backdrop of a heavily dressed bag lady struggling along a dark street, "residents of the usually peaceful community of Westchester were shocked to learn today that a frail widow —"

      "Turn it off, David. They make her seem like some friendless down and out," says Daphne. "I'll put the kettle on."

      The sound of the front-door bell makes them jump.

      "I'll go," says Bliss, and he is met at the door by Phil and Maggie Morgan, Daphne's elderly neighbours. Phil has armed himself with a large flashlight and the fireplace poker and is riding shotgun as he constantly sweeps the bushes while Maggie gushes, "Minnie's been murdered, David."

      "I know…"

      "Pushed in front of an express."

      "You'd better come in —"

      "They say that bits of her were scattered halfway to Briddlestone," chimes in Phil, and Bliss changes his mind, eases himself out of the door and drops his voice.

      "Look… You can come in, but please don't upset Daphne. She doesn't want to talk about it at the moment, though it would be nice if you'd stay with her while I go to the station to find out what's happening."

      Westchester's railway station is alive with uniforms when Bliss arrives ten minutes later. County police officers, together with specialists from the British Transport Police, shelter under the platform canopy, while a team of forensic scenes-of-crime technicians are scouring the track at the end of the platform in the daylight of a dozen halogen floodlights. But it's a lost cause. The driving rain has washed away all trace of the incident, and the speeding train has spread Minnie's remains for nearly a mile.

      A cluster of officers gathered around a mobile control room in the station's parking lot fall silent as Bliss approaches, seeking the officer in command. He flashes his badge — "D.I. Bliss. Met. police C.I.D.," says Bliss, momentarily forgetting his recent promotion.

      "Wow! God's squad," mutters the junior officer.

      Detective Inspector Mainsbridge of the Transport Police introduces himself with a quizzical eye on Bliss's morning coat.

      Bliss takes a mental look at himself and laughs, "It's my daughter's wedding. It's going back to the hire place tomorrow."

      "National Crimes' Squad?" questions Mainsbridge, wondering why the heavy brigade would be involved in such a straightforward murder.

      "Hardly — Interpol liaison officer, actually. I just knew Mrs. Dennon, that's all."

      "Did you know her well?" asks Mainsbridge, angling for the significance of Bliss's presence.

      "Just a friend of a friend — Daphne Lovelace. She was with me at the wedding. Have you established a motive?"

      "Mugging. The surveillance camera caught him grabbing her bag. The tape's fuzzy, but we should be able to get the lab boys to clean it up."

      "Cash?"

      "Could be as much as ten grand in big ones, we think."

      "Phew!" exclaims Bliss. "Ten thousand quid. That's a hefty bundle for an old woman to be carting around. How d'ye know?"

      "We've got her bank book. It seems as though she's cleaned out her life savings over the past couple of weeks, two withdrawals totalling seven thousand. And it looks as though she took out a loan for another three."

      "Hmm," hums Bliss. "You might want to check with the local travel agents on that. My info is that she's just spent thirty grand on a world trip."

      Now it's Mainsbridge's turn to be surprised. "You're well informed."

      "Inside information," Bliss says smugly, then asks, "Where's the body now, Mike?"

      Mainsbridge takes a meaningful look along the tracks before replying. "We've found a couple of bucketfuls so far."

      "Oh, shit," moans Bliss.

      "Could you formally I.D. her for us, Dave?"

      "Not in a bucket, I couldn't," replies Bliss seriously, and Mainsbridge gives him a wry smile.

      "Well, if it isn't Chief Inspector Bliss of the Yard," says a familiar voice, and Bliss warms at the approach of a smiling face.

      "As soon as I heard that Daphne Lovelace was involved I guessed you'd show up," laughs Superintendent

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