Previously: Martin and Penhale have learned that Loveday Wenn was the one who attacked them with the drone and that her aunt Mrs. Daniels possibly murdered her uncle, framed Jago Powell to seem like he was drunk driving, and planned to poison Louisa and Jago to distract Martin from investigating. She also provided Rachel Wenn with the poison she used to commit suicide and may have also tried to commit other poisonings. Martin and Penhale drive to rescue Louisa at Wenn Hall but the whole group ends up getting locked in a cellar crypt. Martin overcomes his claustrophobia and figures a way out. However, Mrs. Daniels has apparently set the manor house on fire to make her escape. Fortunately Al Large is on the scene in his role as a movie extra.

Chapter 44: Action Man Al Large

Thursday Midday

"What are you talking about?" Martin demanded.

"He's a hero! It was just like a movie." Pauline finally let go of the actors' hands and grabbed her boyfriend by the arm to pull him over. "Tell them, Al!"

"Just saw things gettin' out of control and tried to set 'em right," Al said, scratching the back of his neck. "Saw you Doc, runnin' in to find Louisa here, so I went in to see what was what. I smelled smoke in the kitchen, and saw someone left the landline off the hook there, so I set it to rights and called 999. That's about it."

"No there's way more to it," Pauline eagerly continued. "He's too modest to tell you himself but Al saved the day. You see, he was taking a break from his new job - as a movie star - to see if he could get a mobile signal to call his Dad. He didn't know we were already on our way to see him. The rain let up so he climbed up that little hill behind the garden and he said he got a peculiar message from the Doc to stop Louisa from drinking tea, matter of life and death, and watch out for Mrs. Daniels, and so on. So he comes down the hill and goes into the house looking for Louisa, only there's nobody to be seen, right? And he smells smoke! So he goes into the kitchen and sees someone has left the hob turned up full with a bunch of kitchen towels on top of it and there's a blazing fire, and he turns the hob off and grabs a fire extinguisher and blasts it, then he goes and grabs the phone that's been left off the hook and calls 999… well he already told you that part."

She paused for a breath as the sirens grew very loud. The fire brigade sped into courtyard and stopped in front of the house where the Wenns ran over to direct the firefighters.

"Right, so Al runs to the film set and yells 'Fire! Fire!'" she continued. "And that's when me and Bert arrived, thinking we were going to spend a nice holiday watching our Al, in his new job as a movie star," Pauline clearly loved saying that, "and we're walking into the house just as everybody comes running out and it's raining harder now so we all run under the trees to get out of it, and then out comes Mrs. Daniels, only instead of heading for the trees like everyone else she runs over to her car. Except Penhale is parked right in back of her blocking her in, so she goes to his police car, which has the driver's window left open so it's getting all wet inside - good job there, Joe - and turns out he's left the keys in the ignition."

"You left the keys behind there too?" Martin was incredulous.

"It was in the heat of the moment, Doc," the constable replied, looking shame-faced. "No time to lose."

By now Bert emerged from the crowd in the courtyard, also soaked and grinning. "Tell 'em how Al saved the day, Pauline!"

"I'm telling them, Bert. So Mrs. Daniels gets in the police vehicle…"

"P.C. Penhale left the keys in there," Bert interrupted, "and she's tryin' to start it up only it won't start the first time she turns it, and it looks very suspicious, with her trying to take the police car. So we're all watchin' and Al calmly strolls over, all wet from the rain, reaches in the open window and pulls the keys out and pockets them. Mrs. D. is furious, she's leanin' out and she's hittin' him, trying to get the keys back, and he sees Joe's left his handcuffs on the floor just there and so he grabs them and handcuffs her wrist to the steering wheel. Just like in a movie it was, starrin' our Al!"

"That's what I said, it was just like in a movie!" Pauline said.

"Well, I figured she was up to no good, seein' as the Doc sent a warnin about her," Al said. "And it was suspicious, what with the fire and all."

During Pauline and Bert's enthusiastic telling of Al's exploits, it became clear some sort of argument was starting up by the police vehicle. The two actors had gone over there, seemingly out of a desire to escape their biggest fan, and a crowd had gathered to watch a red-faced and furious Mrs. Daniels now in a full-out shouting match with Jago Powell and the Wenns.

"This isn't even the first time you tried to poison me!" Jago was saying. "You must have put some concoction in my tea to get back at me, just enough to get me driving erratic along the cliff road. You reckoned I'd get killed and it would look like drink driving, like it was my own fault. I told P.C. Mylow I'd had nothing to drink but he didn't believe me. Everybody thinks I was off the wagon, the tabloids were all over it, and it cost me a lucrative contract to do an insurance company commercial."

"Since when do big Hollywood movie stars do commercials?" she countered.

"It was in Japan. Actors do them all the time there, as long as they don't air anywhere else. Anyway, it was your doing all along!"

"What's all this then?" Penhale demanded.

"You were jealous of him and Rachel, weren't you," Mrs. Wenn said.

"Yeah, now I know it was you Rachel was having the affair with!" Mr. Wenn shouted at Jago.

"Yes." Jago wasn't too proud to admit this. "She wasn't happy with you Michael, you must have known that."

Mrs. Daniels glared at Jago. "You were always a bad kid way back when, now you come back into town swanning about, playing the big movie star. Mr. Wenn agreed to open the house and grounds to your film crew because he needed the money, and you repay him by shagging his wife. And you think you're too good for the rest of us. Yes, I put something in your tea to teach you a lesson."

"So you were jealous of the attention Mr. Powell was getting from the first Mrs. Wenn, then," Penhale said.

"Jealous?" She spat out the word. "He meant nothing to her! He's just a jumped up little tosser, no matter how much people fawn over him."

"We had broken it off by then anyway," Jago said to Mr. Wenn. "Not that it's any excuse, but that wasn't even why this old witch was mad at me. Not really, was it?" He goaded Mrs. Daniels. "Go on, tell them the real reason."

She refused to speak so he went on. "She had a movie script she wanted me to look at. So I agreed to read it, for Rachel's sake, and I tried to get through it, I really tried, but it was rubbish."

Mrs. Daniels's face softened and she looked for a moment like she might actually cry. "I put my heart and soul into that script. It was a beautiful story… about the forbidden love between a mature woman and the younger woman she mentors. You could never understand."

Jago scoffed. "You're mad as a hatter! There was no sense of setting, barely any plot, the characters were one dimensional at best. And the dialogue? Atrocious! You might as well have typed 'all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy' over and over, that's how bad it was."

The crowd laughed. Mrs. Daniels's expression changed in an instant to fury.

"Right! It's all easy for a tosser like you. You've got looks and money but you came from nothing just like me, you're no better than me. I just meant to shake you up a bit. You're still here, everybody still swoons at the sight of you. Didn't hurt you much, did it."

"But you meant to poison us this time, me and Louisa!" he countered.

"I've got nothing against Miss Glasson," she insisted. "I just needed something to distract the doctor. That police constable was easy to fool, but the doctor was getting too close for comfort. I had to do something. You were just collateral damage this time."

Penhale bristled. Martin felt a chill that had nothing to do with the rain that was soaking everyone there.

"And what about me?" Mr. Wenn butted in. "Not enough you tried to burn down my home, with me and all these other people in it, I might add, but it isn't even the first time you tried to kill me! What did I do to deserve this? I gave you a job when Rachel asked, I've always been a good employer, and I even gave you a rise when Loveday - your niece - wanted me to."

Mrs. Daniels scoffed at the mention of her niece. "She never did me any favours. Her mum was my sister, she always bullied and teased me… because I was different. I shouldn't have set the fire. I panicked, suddenly it was all closing in on me and I thought I could destroy the evidence."

"And all our lives along with it," Mr. Wenn added, grimly.

"Panicking as an excuse for murderous behaviour seems to run in the family," Martin murmured, but no one seemed to hear him.

"And now you're under investigation for murdering your own brother!" Penhale said.

"I shouldn't have done it. I know I shouldn't have done any of it, but what's done is done. You could never understand how it's been for me. My mother had to get married young because she was pregnant with me, and she resented me for it. I was an unwanted child and I was different. She doted on my younger brother and sister but she wanted nothing to do with me."

Martin shuddered again from a chill that had nothing to do with the rain. In spite of himself, he felt a strange sympathy for this disturbed woman. Her angry, erratic demeanour was in sharp contrast to her usual cold, blank affect. He wondered if she might be suffering from undiagnosed bipolar disorder.

"My father was always stricter with me than the others. I was the ugly duckling, the odd one, who had to be stuck in the cupboard without my supper for misbehaving. When I got older and it was clear I didn't favour men they disowned me. When I met Rachel she was the bright star in my sky. She would never give me the time of day, but working for her, taking care of her, just being near her was enough. I understand why she decided to kill herself, but when I heard she said those terrible, cruel things about me in her final note… something in me snapped. You could never understand."

"No, I don't understand, and at this point I don't want to," Mr. Wenn interrupted her. "You even bloody poisoned my dog, for God's sake!"

"I never did!" she said. "That wasn't my doing. I may have done some bad things but I had nothing to do with you or the poor dog taking ill that time. That must have been nature just taking its course."

"But what about me?" Wynnie interrupted. "I had terrible stomach pains after you gave me herbal tea for my migraine. I simply could not concentrate on my acting craft!"

"You!" The housekeeper retorted. "I helped you out with your headache, I didn't do anything else to you. Maybe you're just a needy, insecure hypochondriac!"

Wynnie recoiled as if she had been slapped and as she prepared to strike back verbally Penhale finally decided to step in and take control of the situation. "Agnes Daniels, I am hereby arresting you on a charge of… I can't even list everything at this point. How about arson to start? We'll get you arraigned on that, and then get the rest sorted. My work here is done."

"You bloody moron," she snarled at him. "You'd never have figured out any of this on your own. It was you!" She turned on Martin directly. "If I just could have gotten you out of the way…"

Martin took a step back, all sympathy gone now, and instinctively moved protectively in front of Louisa to make she was well away from the angry woman.

"I guess my work here isn't done," Penhale said. "I'm afraid I'm gonna have to call for backup."

"What for?" Martin asked. "You've got her dead to rights, she's not going anywhere."

"That's just it. She's madder than a hive of bees. I can't exactly drive with her like that and I'm afraid to unlock those handcuffs."

To be continued…

Note: 999 is the equivalent of 911 in the U.S. Also, I couldn't resist having Jago lose a chance to do insurance commercial the way MC did with Churchill Insurance a few years ago (although with MC it was due to too many speeding tickets).