Matt Shaw - A Sting in the Tale - A Collection of Short Stories

One by one people slowly filtered from the room. Staff, Mr. Clack and a few other faces Fred didn’t recognise. It still left a room full of people he didn’t know though.

Fred continued, “Charities. I’m sorry but — at this time — we will not be making any donations. That may change in the future when I have gone through your policies and exactly what you do with the money obtained. I will not be harassed into this decision and nor do I need counsel as to how you operate. I will make the informed decision on my own. Thank you for coming. You know where the door is.”

A few more people left.

Fred looked around the room. There were still a number of people hanging around but he hoped these were the genuine people; those who were wanting to show support for Fred and Jude as well as pay their final respects to a man they had known personally and liked, or loved. Fred nodded a nod of satisfaction at a job well done and jumped down from the settee before walking back over to Graham, “Well that should make things easier,” he said.

Graham smiled, “Did you want to do this now then?” he asked. He reached into his pocket and withdrew an ivory coloured enveloped, closed via the use of a fancy looked red seal made of melted wax. Fred beamed. Of course he wanted to do it now. He was about to be the sole proprietor of six million pounds. Had he had his way, he would have done the reading first. At least that way he could have skipped on going to the service.

“I think it would be good to wrap these things up,” he smiled.

“Very well.” He ripped into the envelope. It wasn’t the way proceedings usually went but — technically — it was Fred’s choice when it happened. In this instance, Graham was simply the message boy. “If everybody could please take a seat,” he shouted out.

As the majority of the people in the room took a seat on whatever they could find, Fred walked over to the mantlepiece and leaned against it with an expectant look upon his face. Jude went and stood by his side. She too was smiling, aware that this was the moment her husband had been waiting for. He was going to be rich. They were going to be rich.

V I

Not many people cheer when they find out a loved one has died and yet that is exactly what Fred had done. He had put the phone down and let out the loudest cheer you could imagine. A roar so loud that it actually burned the back of his throat — and very nearly gave his wife, Jude, a heart attack of her own.

He explained to Jude what had happened; his brother had dropped dead whilst faffing about in his home and jumped immediately to the beautiful fact that they were rich. Even before the Will had been read, Fred had counted upon the money being his. And who was Jude to argue? Neither one of them had presumed that, considering Norman and Fred hadn’t spoken properly for a couple of years, the money could end up going elsewhere.

And yet…

V I I

“What?” Fred screamed out, causing Jude to jump. Slowly she took a side step away from her fuming husband. “Re-read it again! Check the name at the top! You did remember to bring the right piece of paperwork? This isn’t one of your other clients? You did say earlier that it wasn’t the first funeral you had been to this month. Did you get the paperwork mixed up?” He stormed over to where Graham was standing, addressing the room, and snatched the paperwork right from his hand. He turned his back on the watching eyes and scanned through the document once more; his eyes darting from side to side with startling speed and his heart pounding heavily in the back of his throat. “Fuck!” he screamed.

There — spelt out in clear English and black ink — it said it very clearly with very little room for misunderstanding; the whole estate was to be broken down and sold with all proceeds going to the local cattery.

“He doesn’t even like cats!” Fred screamed as he tossed the paperwork up in the air. “This isn’t right,” Fred continued, “I’m going to contest it. He can’t leave me with nothing! He can’t! We were brothers! He owes me this money, that selfish idiot! He owes me! You hear me?” People were looking at Fred with raised eyebrows but he didn’t care. He found the whole thing incredibly embarrassing and insulting to say the least. Since hearing of his brother’s death, he had already counted on that money. More than that, he had spent pretty much every penny in his head. He’d mentally purchased property overseas, a whole new wardrobe of designer clothes, expensive holidays, new furniture, more property, more clothes, a garage full of expensive to buy (and expensive to run) cars and all of the latest gadgets and tech. Everything he had ever wanted, he would now own. That was the plan at least. Instead, his brother screwed him. “We had a cat when we were growing up! He never fed him. He didn’t even pet him. And — let me tell you — when that cat died… I cried for about a week. Norman just asked mum when we were getting a puppy. No. No. This is a joke. This is wrong. This is…”

“A test.”

Fred fell silent immediately. He froze to the spot. The whole room was hushed. Had one dropped, you would have heard a pin fall to the floor. That was Norman’s voice. Slowly Fred turned around.

“Norman?”

“That’s right.”

“You’re alive?”

“That’s correct.”

“But… But… How? Why?” Fred spluttered as his face continued to grow redder and redder.

V I I I

Norman leaned down to the clock on the mantlepiece and looked closely at it. There — right in the centre — he could see the tiny hole in the face. Nestled on the other side, the latest in surveillance equipment staring right back at his face. With a buzz of excitement he hurried from the room and retired to one of the spare rooms; a room so infrequently used he often kept it locked.

Inside the room was a full set up of monitors — each capturing a different part of the house from the front door right the way through to the rear of the property. Wherever someone was, he would be able to keep an eye on them and — thanks to the audio recording equipment — he’d be able to hear them too. A cunning plan to see — and hear — what people really thought of him; a plan devised with the help of his solicitor when he admitted to struggling about what to do with his Will.

“There is one thing we could do,” Graham had said, “but you might think it somewhat extreme. It all depends on how desperate you are to ensure the money goes to the right person,” he continued.

Graham had helped Norman obtain the equipment and he even helped arrange the fake funeral and send out the invitations to the wake. Some of Norman’s most trusted staff — such as the butler — being on hand to help out too; the promise of a bonus payment in their monthly wage if they kept the whole thing secret. Graham — and some of the staff — had been instrumental in the keeping up of appearances and all for a very modest fee.

Norman didn’t mind paying the fee. It meant he got to see how his ‘guests’ behaved at the funeral. It gave him the opportunity to decide who to give the money to and who to cut from his life completely; clear the freeloading scum out, so to speak. And — with the final camera set up in the clock — it was time. All he needed to do now was ‘die’ and go away for a bit. The butler made the call to the families whilst Graham made the necessary arrangements with the funeral home and cemetery to ensure all were paid off and happy to go along with the scheme.

It couldn’t have gone any better. It was like a well-oiled machine. A well-oiled, well-financed machine at that.

I X

Fred was sitting in his beat-up car. Jude was sitting next to him. Neither were saying anything; both lost in their own little worlds, staring through the car windows. Fred’s mind was contemplating what he was going to do now. He had counted on that money to pay off some debts and live his life, never really finding his own success. He presumed that — one day — it would land in his lap. He just needed to be patient. That chance was gone now. His brother had made that very clear when he booted Fred — and the other freeloaders — from the house informing them they’d never receive a sniff of what he had to offer in the Will; superseded with a long lecture about how he’d been watching the reactions of the guests in the other room. Norman had referred to them all as parasites and bottom-feeders and then promptly kicked them out, telling them they were not welcome back. Fred had lost the money. Fred had lost his brother. The cash upset him.