Mydworth Mysteries - Deadly Cargo E-Book

Matthew Costello

• Herausgeber: Bastei Entertainment
• Kategorie: Krimi
• Serie: A Cosy Historical Mystery Series
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 178

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2020

Beschreibung

From the authors of the best-selling series CHERRINGHAM

Mydworth’s Excelsior Radio Company is world-famous for its expensive radio-phonographs. But suddenly the Excelsior delivery lorries start being hijacked, and the very future of the company is in doubt. Is this just about stolen radios - or is there something more secret and dangerous going on? When Harry and Kat are brought in to help, they decide to go undercover to solve the crimes and soon discover there are many more secrets to this mystery than meets the eye...

Co-authors Neil Richards (based in the UK) and Matthew Costello (based in the US), have been writing together since the mid-90s, creating innovative content and working on major projects for the BBC, Disney Channel, Sony, ABC, Eidos, and Nintendo to name but a few. Their transatlantic collaboration has underpinned scores of TV drama scripts, computer games, radio shows, and the best-selling mystery series Cherringham. Their latest series project is called Mydworth Mysteries.

Leseprobe

Contents

Cover

Mydworth Mysteries

About the Book

The Authors

Title

Copyright

1. Trouble on the Road

2. Tea Time Deferred

3. Excelsior

4. State of the Art

5. Trouble

6. The Investigation Begins

7. Meet the Workers

8. An Uninvited Guest

9. Under Cover

10. Checking the Facts

11. Truth at the Tempt-Tea Biscuit Company

12. The Secret of Brooke Farm

13. The Trap is Planned

14. A Trap is Sprung

15. The End of the Road

16. Silencing the Witness

17. A Late-night Chat

Mydworth Mysteries Episode 6

Reading Sample - Bunburry - Sheep Secrets

Mydworth Mysteries

Mydworth Mysteries is a series of self-contained novella-length mysteries, published in English and German. The stories are currently available as e-books and will soon be available as audiobooks in both languages.

About the Book

Mydworth's Excelsior Radio Company is world-famous for its expensive radio-phonographs. But suddenly the Excelsior delivery lorries start being hijacked, and the very future of the company is in doubt. Is this just about stolen radios – or is there something more secret and dangerous going on? When Harry and Kat are brought in to help, they decide to go undercover to solve the crimes and soon discover there are many more secrets to this mystery than meets the eye...

Main Characters

Sir Harry Mortimer, 30 – Born into a wealthy English aristocratic family, Harry is smart, funny and adventurous. Ten years in secret government service around the world has given him the perfect training to solve crimes; and though his title allows him access to the highest levels of English society, he’s just as much at home sipping a warm beer in the garden of a Sussex pub with his girl from the wrong side of the tracks – Kat Reilly.

Kat Reilly – Lady Mortimer, 29 – Kat grew up in the Bronx, right on Broadway. Her mother passed away when she was only eleven and she then helped her father run his small local bar The Lucky Shamrock. But Kat felt the call to adventure and excitement, first as a nurse on the battlefields of France, then working a series of jobs back in New York. After finishing college, she was recruited by the State Department, where she learned skills that would more than make her a match for the dashing Harry. To some, theirs is an unlikely pairing, but to those who know them both well, it’s nothing short of perfect.

The Authors

Matthew Costello (US-based) is the author of many successful novels published around the globe, including Vacation (2011, in development for film), Home (2014) and Beneath Still Waters (1989), which was adapted by Lionsgate as a major motion picture. He has written for The Disney Channel, BBC, SyFy and has also designed dozens of bestselling games including the critically acclaimed The 7th Guest, Doom 3, Rage, Pirates of the Caribbean, and, with Neil Richards, Planet of the Apes: Last Frontier.

Neil Richards (based in the UK) has worked as a producer and writer in TV and film, creating scripts for BBC, Disney, and Channel 4, and earning numerous Bafta nominations along the way. He’s also written script and story for over 30 video games including The Da Vinci Code and Planet of the Apes, and consults around the world on digital storytelling.

MATTHEW COSTELLONEIL RICHARDS

Deadly Cargo

BASTEI ENTERTAINMENT

Digital original edition

Bastei Entertainment is an imprint of Bastei Lübbe AG

Copyright © 2020 by Neil Richards & Matthew Costello

Copyright for this editon © 2020 by Bastei Lübbe AG, Schanzenstraße 6 – 20, 51063 Cologne, Germany

Written by Matthew Costello and Neil Richards

Edited by Eleanor Abraham

Project management: Kathrin Kummer

Cover illustrations © Getty Images: Jewelsy | Medioimages/Photodisc | wakr10 | Blackbeck

Cover design: Guter Punkt, München

E-book production: 3w+p GmbH, Rimpar (www.3wplusp.de)

ISBN 978-3-7325-6957-1

For information about the authors and their projects please visit: www.facebook.com/CherringhamMydworth

1. Trouble on the Road

Barry Hobbs was driving his lorry slowly – carefully – the six-cylinder, four-ton vehicle comfortably eating up the miles, its twin headlights lighting up the tarmac road ahead.

Emblazoned on the side were the words of the company he worked for: Excelsior Radios. And inside, as he knew only too well, securely stacked in wooden crates, his precious and delicate cargo.

Eight Windsor radio phonographs. Top of the Excelsior range. Walnut finish. Built-in speaker. Valve radio.

The very best of British engineering. And each one worth every penny of its fifty-guinea price tag.

If you had money to burn, of course.

Which Barry certainly didn’t. Not on his wages.

The lorry could usually manage a faster speed, especially on a main road like this, but – though Barry would have preferred to do this delivery run to Manchester as fast as possible – this time he was staying alert.

Looking for signs of anything wrong, anything that should cause him alarm, his hands tightly gripped on the large steering wheel.

He looked across the cab, out of the passenger window. To the west, the sun had gone down, but there was still light in the sky. Clear blue sky, making the daylight linger.

Good, he thought. Might catch up a few miles before it’s dark.

Though he had yelled at his mates on the loading bay to please hurry it up, it had still taken hours for them to get the giant radio phonographs out of the warehouse, all boxed up carefully for the journey.

Mustn’t have a nick or a scratch anywhere.

Customers paid plenty for them. And those customers wanted perfection.

But the loading-bay team had moved slowly, what with it being a Monday and so many lorries heading out, and there’d been nothing Barry could do to get on the road early.

Early, well – at least before dark.

And now, like it or not, he had a good number of hours ahead of him on the road – at night. He’d only just passed Oxford – hardly half way there.

Absolutely nothing he could do about that.

And while, oh yes, there were a few shortcuts he knew – narrow Cotswold lanes that went up towards Cherringham, clipped a few minutes before they came back to the main roads – he had decided, after what happened just over a month ago…

It’s strictly the main road for me.

Those shortcuts, so twisty, hedges scraping the side of the big lorry, barely fit for a car.

But in truth – it wasn’t the width of those roads that gave him pause.

He took a breath, trying not to think about it.

Instead he thought of getting to Manchester. Unloading. Then, to the Bricklayer’s Arms, hopefully in time for one of their greasy meat pies and a pint.

Not exactly the life, Barry thought.

But – like it or not – it was his life.

*

This main road seemed emptier and emptier as he snaked his way north – the occasional car, or another lorry, passing – his own headlights now properly cutting the gloom.

He had a thought, with these long drives, delivering the expensive radio sets… wouldn’t it be great if the damn lorry had a wireless radio!

Wouldn’t be so bored.

Barry was thinking the same thoughts over and over.

But always, in the back of his mind, that bit of fear.

And when he had that worrisome thought, he told himself, Cor, what are the odds?

There’s no odds. Lightning doesn’t strike in the same place twice.

Even if it wasn’t exactly “lightning” he was thinking about.

He thought of his wife, Molly. Their two little ’uns, Sam and Ellie, whom he loved to bits.

Thinking of them, always gave him an added boost when he was midway on his trip.

Midway. Halfway.

Sometimes Barry Hobbs spoke out loud to himself, saying, “Almost there! I’ve got this covered, I have.”

Even as he passed little side roads that he knew were shortcuts.

Shortcuts he didn’t take.

*

After another thirty minutes had passed, he saw something ahead, barely picked up by his headlights.

Something blocking the road. And as Barry slowed (while his heart picked up its pace), he saw it was a tree trunk.

He could see a car, headlights on, on the other side of the felled tree. Someone standing beside the trunk. Black car, man in a hat. A fedora.

Barry slowed even more, until he brought his lorry to a full stop a few yards short of the tree.

And now he could see the man, still just a shape, looking at the tree limb barring his way, heading in the other direction.

For a second, Barry thought about getting out of the cab, jumping down, having a quick chat with the other driver, as you do in such situations.

But he stopped himself. Thought twice about it. Given the circumstances.

With a shake of the head, the man got into his car, and began making a three-point turn that actually needed an additional back and forth, before he turned around, rear lights glowing like eyes, until they and the car disappeared in the distance.

Barry looked down at the seat next to him. The Motorist’s Road Atlas of Great Britain. Latest edition, but still not totally reliable, Hobbs knew.

This tree wasn’t going anywhere tonight. He was going to have to find another route. He remembered seeing a few small roads, a half mile or so back. No question. He’d have to use one of them.

The atlas popped open to the page covering this part of the Midlands.

He grabbed his torch from the small compartment to his left. Flashed it up and down.

Yeah, he thought. Couple of minor roads – should work. And he used his finger, the torch’s light trailing, to trace a route.

One – not too far back – looking nice and straight for a bit, a Roman road for sure.

Them Romans did a good job when they invaded!

But then he could see it turned twisty before it joined what looked like another main road that Barry knew would get him to Birmingham and then Manchester.

He checked his side mirrors and slammed the gear into reverse.

Licked his lips.

No one behind him. That was a good thing. For a lot of reasons.

He now had to do so many back-and-forths with the big lorry, gears crunching, to finally get it facing in the other direction.

Lost some valuable time here, he thought, finally ready to move on. And that Roman road was going to be a sizeable diversion.

Already he was seeing that meat pie and pint, fading away.

And that’s not all I’ve got to worry about, he thought.

*

The straight section of Roman road was firm and true, but then it ended in the usual series of twists and turns that made up most of England’s roads.

Barry had to drop down through the gears and go slowly, the Excelsior lorry not really fit for such a snakelike path around fields and streams and woods.

All the while, not a single car came the other way. Which was a blessing.

But also – perhaps puzzling? Had nobody else been forced to come through this way?

Nobody at all?

“Blimey,” he said, his hands locked on the steering wheel, the engine straining with the constant gear changes. “Come on old girl, you can do it.”

He knew it couldn’t be long now before he rejoined the main road.

Yeah, get back on the proper route, and away we go. Maybe a little more foot on the throttle. Make up some time.

But when he turned round one last tight bend, hedgerows brushing both sides of the lorry, he saw, dead ahead, a dark shape.

Barry quickly went to the brake, gently pumping it. Stopping short on a bend like this? Damn lorry could go head-over-heels.

Lights came on and he saw another lorry, facing this way.

Men outside, the back of the lorry clearly open.

Barry gulped. He felt himself begin to sweat, even as his braking brought him to a full stop.

And he thought, God, not again…

*

Barry stayed in his seat, as two men came over. They had caps on, pulled down tight. Faces looking like they’d been smeared with some oily smudge.

No way in hell they could be recognised… or identified.

Each man had a shotgun. As one came to the driver’s side, the other went to the passenger side.

More shadowy men in black woollen balaclava hats, their faces completely concealed, stood nearby.

A team, Barry thought.

Just like last time.

The man at his door climbed up to the lorry’s running board, popped open the door, pointed the barrel of the gun at Barry’s head…

And spoke.

His voice low, gravelly, as if he was making an effort to change it.

The words, short, clear – and reinforced by a movement of the gun.

“Get out. On the ground. Hands behind your head.”

*

Barry sat on a rough patch of ground, the hedge behind him. He watched the crew unload the Excelsior truck, and carry the well-protected radios to the other truck.

So fast!

If they ever needed another line of work, a team like this would be great working the loading dock.

But then, they had to be fast. Somehow they’d shut this road off so that no one would come through. Maybe another tree limb, a pretend broken-down car?

Barry could imagine these blokes must have thought of everything, as he watched the last massive radio carefully fitted into the other truck.

And that truck, nothing special about it, nothing you’d remember. Black, beaten up. Licence plates muddy, unreadable.

For now, Barry guessed.

The man who had told him what to do walked over. He pulled out a revolver from a back pocket, and tapped Barry on the top of his head with the barrel.

Hard enough to cause pain.

“You. Sit here. Fifteen… twenty minutes. Don’t even think of moving before that.”

With the gun barrel still resting on his head, Barry nodded.

The man grunted, and then with one more tap, turned, and walked back to the loaded lorry, engine already running, lights thrown on… then climbed up to the passenger seat, the rest of the crew in the back with the radios.

Barry’s hands remained locked behind his head as he watched the lorry spit out a heavy cough of exhaust, then begin to chug away.

Lightning does strike twice, thought Barry.

How unlucky can one bloke get?

How am I going to tell when fifteen minutes has gone by? What if someone’s watching me?

So, he sat there, in the dark, under the stars, rocks digging into his backside, the night turned cool.

Knowing that when the time was finally up, there’d be only one thing to do…

Drive all the way back to the Excelsior factory.

And wouldn’t that be fun?

2. Tea Time Deferred

Sir Harry Mortimer came hurrying down the stairs – a perfect day for a round of golf, planned for this afternoon with his old schoolmate, Terry Wilson, all arranged at the Royal Ashdown Club. And he had an idea.

Beautiful day like today – maybe Kat might like to make up a foursome, get Terry’s wife along too?

But when Harry came into the sitting room, he heard voices.

“Um, Kat I—”

And he stopped at the entrance, the bevelled glass doors open, to see Kat on the dark blue love seat, while facing her, on the big maroon leather sofa, sat Nicola Green and another woman.

From whose crumpled expression Harry guessed that something unfortunate had occurred.

His first thought: Kat won’t be able to join us for a round at the Ashdown.

“Oh, Harry – good, you’re here. Nicola called. I said to bring Mrs Hobbs straight over.”

Harry smiled, nodded. “Nicola, Mrs Hobbs.”

Nicola was, Harry well knew, one of the “stars” of Mydworth. Running the hand-to-mouth Women’s Voluntary Service, she was dedicated to changing the lot of women, this day, this age, right here.

And with Kat now working two days a week alongside her, he couldn’t be more supportive.

Still, Harry had the sudden feeling that what he was about to hear might affect his afternoon plans.

He pulled an armchair close to his wife. At which point, Maggie came in with a tea service.

“Oh, Sir Harry, I didn’t know you were joining them. We’ll need another cup!”

Harry was about to tell her not to bother but, all things considered, tea might be exactly what was required, and he let her hurry off to get a cup. He turned to the others.

“So, tell me. Is there something up?”

He saw Kat’s dark eyes on him. Did she guess he might be a tad disappointed, losing his round? She knew him well enough to know that his sense of duty was deeply ingrained.

“Sir Harry,” Nicola started, “Mrs Hobbs came to the WVS first thing this morning.”

“My husband, he doesn’t know a thing. Think he’d be ashamed, don’t you know?”

The woman’s eyes scanned Kat and Harry too.

“Why don’t you tell them what happened, Molly?” said Nicola.

Molly Hobbs nodded.

“You see, my husband works for Excelsior.”

Harry leaned over to Kat, thinking – while she was still getting to know Mydworth and the surrounding area after only a few months here – she may not have heard that name.

“They make radio phonographs, Kat. Absolute top-of-the-range, so I’ve heard. I do believe they have a new factory and warehouse just beyond the station.”

He turned to the women on the sofa. “Am I right, Mrs Hobbs?”

Mrs Hobbs nodded. “Barry, he’s a driver, you see…”

“Your husband?” said Kat.

“That’s right, my hubby,” said Mrs Hobbs, as if everyone knew Barry. “Anyway, about a month back, while he was doing one of his runs, he got stopped, and his entire lorry full of radios… taken!”

“Really?” said Harry, leaning forward. “Didn’t hear a word about that.”

“That’s as maybe,” said Mrs Hobbs, dismissively. “Everybody knows that’s not the first time they’ve lost a lorry, oh no. But they’re keeping tight, they are, got a lid on it for some reason.”

While Harry pondered that information, Maggie returned with an additional cup.

Harry took it and started pouring the tea. “I’ll do the honours.”

The steeping tea sent a small smoky plume up in the room – the morning sun illuminating the few dust motes that had escaped Maggie’s diligent attention.

Kat leaned forward, her voice gentle. “They went to the police, I imagine?”

“Oh, yes. But the police didn’t find nothing. Just like they didn’t with the other robberies. So – everything went back to normal. Least that’s all we heard about it. But then—”

Suddenly Harry thought the idea of roaming about over manicured greens chasing a white dimpled ball with a golf club wasn’t half as interesting as this.

“Then, just two nights ago, it happened again. His whole load… taken!”

“Now that is bad luck,” Harry said.

He noticed that Nicola had taken a cup and passed it to the woman who seemed preoccupied sharing her story.

“Well, you see m’lord—”

Harry leaned forward. “Just ‘Sir Harry’, Mrs Hobbs. Lowly baronet and all that.”

Harry’s words seemed to have the effect of loosening the tightly wound woman.

She sniffed, took a breath.

“Yes, Sir Harry, it was bad luck. And that’s what my Barry thought. But then they sacked him.”

“They?” said Kat. “You mean the company?”

“Well, the fella what did the firing… that transportation boss… Mr Fowler. But I’m sure he did it under orders from the owner Mr Powell.”

The name was new to Harry. He certainly didn’t recognise it from any town matters that he had been involved in since his return from the Middle East with Kat. And he didn’t think he had seen him at any of his Aunt Lavinia’s “do’s”.

“Well, that seems dashed unfair,” he said. “Chap gets robbed on the road? Well, get mad at the robbers. Track them down.”

The woman put down her tea cup since her hands had started shaking again. “Spot on, Sir Harry! I mean, we have two little ones. We got bills to pay – got to eat like other people. Whatever will we do now?”

Nicola reached over and patted the woman’s hands, entwined together. “The Woman’s Voluntary Service can see to some support, Molly. You won’t go hungry.”

Another sniff. And the woman turned from Nicola, to look again – eyes pleading – straight at Harry and then Kat. “But he’s been with Excelsior ten years. Don’t you see? What else does he have? He’s a good man. A good father. Why should he carry the can?”

And at that, Harry felt the double-barrel look of two pairs of eyes: Kat, not needing to say a word to him, and Nicola, whose eyes maybe held a flicker of hope.

Caught in the crossfire.

And Harry nodded.

“Tell you what, Mrs Hobbs. Why don’t we have a little chat with your husband—”

The woman quickly began shaking her head.

“No, no. The man has too much of that beastly pride. If he even knew I was here asking for help…”