Ain't Nobody (Bring Out Your Dead series - Part 29)

Continued from Episode 28 - 'Can't Get Used To Losing You'

The story so far (you can read from the start at 'Board Stiff!'):  Josiah and Archibald, our two Undertakers, are on a mission to Spain to collect the mortal remains of Sir Lewisham Carnock.  Nothing much has gone right for them since taking off from the U.K. and, right now, they are unknowingly heading a small convoy consisting of two British detectives, two tourists (one very reluctant) and a (possibly) dead convict on the run! After a very long, overnight journey, all of our travellers are nearing their destination, which presents a few problems for some of the ensemble.  Now read on:

“I Spy With My Little Eye…”  D.S. Stone began.

“Oh Gawd, not again!”  D.I. Wood growled.

“I did win, last time, sir” D.S. Stone pointed out, reproachfully.

“You’ve won every bleeding time!”  D.I. Wood sulked.

“Anyway, I Spy…”  D.S. Stone began, again.

“Yeah, yeah, we all know how it works!  We don’t have to go through this performance every ruddy time, do we?  What does it begin with?”

“B” D.S. Stone replied, smugly.

“’B’?  Right then, Barrier?” D.I. Wood suggested.

“No”

“Beaver?”

“Have you seen a beaver?”  D.S. Stone asked, excitedly

“No”

“Well, neither have I” D.S. Stone scowled, “so, no!”

“Blind Spot?”

“Blind Spot?  How the heck can you have ‘Blind Spot’?”  D.S. Stone protested, “by its very nature, you can’t see it!”

“I thought it was one of them wossnames” D.I. Wood shrugged, “you know, them zen-type things”

“Zen?”

“Yeah, you know, like the sound of one hand clapping and stuff”

“No!”

“Bus then?”

“What bus?”

“I don’t know!  It’s a road, I thought there might have been a bus on it but I blinked and missed it!”  D.I. Wood replied.

“I haven’t seen another vehicle for miles, apart from the back of that damn bright yellow van with the Undertakers and Miss Lace in it, which I’ve been staring at all night!”  D.S. Stone added, pointedly.

“Well, someone’s got to do it” D.I. Wood said, “All right, I give up!  What is it?”

“Bull” D.S. Stone smirked.

“Bull?  What flaming bull?”  D.I. Wood looked all around in a vain search.

“Out there, sir.  On that hillside” D.S. Stone pointed ahead.

“I can’t see no…oh, hang about, you mean like a silhouette?”

“That’s it, sir” D.S. Stone nodded, “they were originally located on roadsides all over Spain, to advertise a certain brand of alcohol”

“They’ve got their heads screwed on the right way, the Spanish” D.I. Wood said, approvingly, “fat chance of us being able to do that sort of thing”

“Most have been taken down but a few remain.  They’re considered to be iconic”

“Oh, flaming hell, don’t you start!”  D.I. Wood protested.

“Start what, sir?”

“With this ‘iconic’ bullshit!  Every bloody news item they go on about someone or something being ‘iconic’” He made the inverted commas sign with his fingers, “What a load of crap!  What does it mean, anyway?”

“Well, strictly speaking…” D.S. Stone began.

“Famous, that’s what they mean, so why not bloody say it?  Ruddy ‘iconic’” He sneered and stared at the Spanish landscape with barely concealed hostility.

“As I was saying,” D.S. Stone continued, patiently, “’iconic’, strictly speaking, means ‘symbolic, emblematic or representative’, which is certainly true of the bull silhouettes.  They’re considered to be representative of the Spanish character, hence why they have been preserved.”

“Symbolics is about right,” D.I. Wood grumbled, “but, yeah, I’ll give you that” He conceded, grudgingly.

* * * *

Meanwhile, in a car some way behind the detectives:

“Erm, you do know that we’ll be in Santander quite soon, don’t you?”  Lawrence ventured.

Amber turned her fixed gaze from the road, to her husband and raised an eyebrow.

“Is this the first instalment in a series of statements of the blindingly obvious, pray tell?”

“No, no, it’s just…”  Lawrence began and then nodded toward the back seat, currently piled high with bags which were, happily, covering the body of Frankie Knight.

“If you mean our passenger, dear, you may recall that I wanted to leave him in the undergrowth”

“You can’t do that, not to another human being” Lawrence shook his head.

“I could!”  Amber said, firmly, “he was threatening to shoot you, remember?”

“I don’t think he really meant it”

“Didn’t mean it!” Amber shrieked, “he’d got a gun, of course he meant it!”

“I just think we acted a little…”

“A little what?” Amber snarled, “Anyway, you didn’t ‘act’ at all!  You just did as you were told.  I acted and it’s a damn good job that I did.  What was to stop him killing both of us and making off with the car and all our belongings, eh?”

“If we were dead,” Lawrence pointed out, reasonably, “I doubt that whatever he might, or might not, have stolen, would really have been a consideration”

“That’s typical of you!  Always take the easy way out!”

“There’s nothing easy about having a dead body on your back seat!”  Lawrence folded his arms and seethed.

“He’s well covered up, we’re the only ones who know he’s there, it’s not a problem”

“This isn’t our car, Amber” Lawrence said, quietly.

“Ah, number two in the series, I take it?”

“No” Lawrence said, patiently, “I mean that, at some point, quite soon, we will have to return this car, empty of all our belongings, which will rather reveal our passenger”

“Yes, Lawrence, I am perfectly aware of our predicament” Amber hissed, “and its your fault we’re in this mess!”

“Me? You hit him on the head with the wheelbrace!”

“Look!  We can’t keep going round and round on this loop.  We are where we are, and that’s an end of it” Amber said, firmly.

They stared ahead, fixedly, as the little car hummed along the motorway.

“However…” Lawrence began, again.

“However, what?”  Amber snapped.

“Well…what are we going to do with him?”

“I don’t know!  What do YOU want to do with him?”

“I don’t want to do anything with him” Lawrence said, miserably.

“Oh, leave it to me, Lawrence” Amber snarled, “I’ll sort something out, just like I sort everything else out”

‘But we’re going to need some sort of a miracle’ Amber thought to herself and shivered a little.

* * * *

“We’ll be at the port soon” Chantelle nodded toward one the roadway signs.

“I must confess, it will be a blessing to get out of this van” Josiah attempted to stretch but was thwarted by the unrelenting bulk of Archibald Thurble.

“Can we have a paddle?” Archibald asked, excitedly.

“Paddle?  What do you mean by ‘paddle’?”  Josiah looked at his employee in amazement.

“You know, a paddle!  Where you take your shoes and socks off and plod about in the sea, style of thing” Archibald explained patiently.

“It’s a port!” Josiah stated.

“Yeah, I know, but it’s still the sea, innit?”

“It’s not really designed for paddling, Archie, sorry!” Chantelle chuckled.

“Awwww!” Archibald looked severely glum.

“Moreover, as I have pointed out on numerous previous occasions, this is not a vacation, it is a business trip” Josiah responded, sharply.

“Seems to me that I’ve been on duty ever since we left home!” Archibald sulked.

“On duty! You’ve been asleep pretty well constantly since we left Castilliano de la Ribera!”  Josiah fumed.

“He has got a point though, Mr. O.” Chantelle remarked, “whether he’s actively required to be doing something, or not, he’s effectively at work, isn’t he?”

“Well, yes, I take your point” Josiah snapped, “the problem is that this trip was only supposed to take 24 hours at the most!  I had not, in all honesty, anticipated that it would drag on for days on end.  So, yes, Miss Lace, you are entirely correct that Archibald is more than entitled to some free time”

“Oh great!”  Archibald beamed, “so does that mean I get to go for a paddle?”

“As Miss Lace has already explained, a port is not an appropriate venue for paddling.  However, there should be ample time for rest and relaxation once we are on board the ferry”

“Can you paddle on a ferry?”  Archibald looked hopeful.

“Only if it is a paddle steamer!”  Josiah smirked, and then, seeing the disbelieving looks from his travelling companions, “sorry, just my little joke. I don’t know what came over me, must be fatigue”

“It’s the way you tell them, Mr. O.” Chantelle winked and grinned.

 

Now read on in Episode 30