A Murder Mystery for Christmas

K · A Murder Mystery for Christmas

Murder at Skastingham Manor

The wind howled around the vast country home of the long absent Lord Skastingham. The windows rattled and the ill fitting door shook in the storm. Despite Skastingham’s absence, twelve of his closest friends and relations had been invited to a grand banquet.

The place cards had been set out by Skastingham’s faithful butler, Smithee, who ran the house unaided apart from his mysterious powers.

Lady Kiki Montgomery, was seated next to Lord Ci Nejunkington. On her left was Darth, the Earl of Morphbury, who sat beside Lady Rhyanne Fotherington Smythe, an heiress. Then there was Duke Reddington Poole, The Hon. Bridget Amberville, Baron Andy McSherwood and Baroness Christine Di Or.

Continuing around the table, Lady Caterina Napperley, fresh from her affair with the gamekeeper Mellons, the suave Lord Nick De Ville; Honey, Duchess of Marjoribanks, and The Hon. Roderick Glennbury.

The evening was progressing in a most excellent fashion, with gales of laughter gusting up and down the table. A sudden roar of wind, however, made all the lights go out, and the guests all leapt up in horror. Smithee bustled in with candles, and re-lit all the candelabras.

But when all was light again, one of the guests was lying dead on the floor. The other eleven shrieked, in a manly or womanly fashion, and glanced around at each other. Who had murdered the unfortunate guest?

[please continue...]

K

PS The suave Nick De Ville [geddit?] is in fact our very own Lucifer!

Catnapper

I was wondering who Nick was at first...then it dawned on me

Lucifer_666

Lord Nick is me?? You really have to look hard to see me there now

The Hon. Roderick Glennbury remained motionless on the floor as the surrounding panicked commotion loudened.
"Okay calm down, calm down everyone....let me just check" announced a curly haired and black mustached Smithee looking excedingly annoyed at how screamish all these upper class people were. He bent down and pressed his fingers unto the victim's neck "He's dead alright" and with that further announcement Baroness Christine Di Or faints and collapses into Lord Nick De Ville's waiting arms much to his obvious delight as he stares down her large gaping cleavage. Duke Reddington Poole reached over to the nearest wine glass "I need ...hic..a drink" he splutters out, everybody knew the Duke had a drink problem ever since his wife up and left him and now lives as a man so it came to no real surprise to most when he arrived to the house already a little unsteady on his feet. "I wouldn't do that Sir!" Smithee says while pulling and tugging the drink from the Duke's stubborn hand "Good God man......wh.. what are ya up to?" the intoxicated Reddington responds as he stumbles slightly back releasing the glass safely to Smithee. "Sorry Sir...but I believe it may be unwise to drink anymore from this table after all the cause of death has not been established yet" With that statement everyone looked at their drinks in shock and silence until Lord Ci Nejunkington raised his head "Surely your not suggesting Smithee that poison was used?"
"Well think about it there is no knife in the back or any other obvious signs so its a reasonable assumption.....anyway better safe than sorry" Lady Caterina Napperley responds with a soft smile on her pale pretty face which lit the hearts of all the men in the room. Lady Kiki sneers..."Yeah like you would know anything about being careful?"
Lady Cat turns and both Ladies come face to face "Why don't you keep your mouth shut Lady.......erm.....whats your name today?" At that point three of the men had to hold Lady Kiki back for it was widely known that Lady Kiki had a strange habit of changing her name every year or so, perhaps for tax reasons, perhaps she led multiple lives, or maybe it was just a strange fetish? ...nobody really knew for sure and it was one of those mysterious that kept those upper-class neighbours constantly speculating.
"Enough!.....Smithee contact the Police now,... Reddington sit down and sober up, Lord Nick get the Baroness to a sofa" shouts Duchess Honey in a very commanding way while she places her copy of 'Feminism and Why Men are Crap?' down on the table and proceeds to take off her jacket to reveal a little tight grey tank top "Okay this is how its going to work....when I tell you all to do something...you do it" she continues much to the obvious dispair of everyone in the room except Lord Nick who had already left in search of a sofa or bed to lay the Baroness down on with a quick excited "Will do!"
Baron Andy McSherwood, an old fashioned type man of little words and very little patience for any type of demonstration of Girl Power, went straight to the phone and placed the reciever to his ear "The Line is dead!" Everyone looked at one another....

Catnapper

K

Everyone looked at each other in varying degrees of terror, except Lady Kiki. She was remembering her time in Australia with Lord Nick. Even though he pretended not to, he knew the secret of why she changed her name every so often, and the secret couldn't be kept for much longer.

Meanwhile Baron Andy could not help showing off his old fashioned manliness, by drinking a huge Viking horn of beer, knocking all the other men out with one punch, and tossing the caber he'd brought with him from the Highlands.

Honey was shocked to the core, but secretly turned on, and she and Caterina swooned to the floor.

'Well this isn't any good,' snapped Bridget Amberville, who had been strangely quiet for the whole meal. 'Nearly everyone's on the floor.'

'Ahem!' said Smithee. 'I think we're forgetting the main point here. The phone is dead, and we are stranded.'

'Nonsense!' said Bridget. 'We have the old fashioned method of semaphore. We ladies can use our petticoats as flags.'

Suddenly, all the men leapt up, conscious again, and helped the ladies remove their undergarments.

'Stop!' shouted Lord Ci Nejunkie. Everyone glared at him. 'I mean, we don't need to use petticoats. I heard a rumour that there is an Enigma Machine hidden somewhere in this building.'

Everyone ignored him and carried on with what they were doing.

lord vader

baron andy then pipes up , " right lads and lassies get yer thinking caps on we need a viable plan of action , none of this crap we have come up with so far "

honey and caterina both looked at each other , you could tell they were in love with the baron .

so they all took a piece of paper and a pencil , and put down what they thought should happen ,

then baron andy says , " and remember nae body goes anywhere alone" .

they all agreed .

Lucifer_666

Ten minutes had passed since Lord Nick had gotten Baroness Christine to a bed, he pulled up his pants and walked out content and happy ....it reminded him of his time Down Under (the country I mean

) when he was a much younger man and was working for the British Government, the mission was simple ....contact Kay Ridealot she was the local informant on a major Global terrorist based in Austrailia, she was a top class hooker, the kind of woman that whipped men to a frenzy, showed her baps constantly and passed wind without care but still managed to keep an air of elegance and class about her that had her customers coming back for more...it was this that attracted many a top class criminal and made her extremely important to the welfare of the free world. If only everyone knew what Lord Nick did?.....That the upper-class woman that everyone believed was Lady Kiki was really once Kay Ridealot.....but the question that really haunted the Lord was... Did she know herself?....Yes she knew she was with him in Austrailia but exactly how much did she truly remember? How many more personalties would emerge? The Lady was truly disturbed...he already knew of six separate manifestations already, there was the single Mother called Kathy Rose and her imaginary baby boy 'Bud', the steamy novel writer known by many as Katarina Stumpalump...who apparently went missing years ago, an overweight business man called Kian Carlos were she literally would wear padding and don a 'Poirot' mustache and suit, and of course finally Kaylita Kooprick the teenage schoolgirl with pigtails and lollipops who seduced all her headmasters in three separate schools. He had met them all over the years after bringing down the Austrailian terrorist and had felt it his duty to help her start again bringing her back to her family and her rightful position as Lady Kiki....So it came as a bit of a shock in this last few years that he had heard that she was back changing her name? Could this be a re-emergence of her multiple personality disorder? He knew he had to find out ...after all it was part of the reason he was there at the dinner in the first place.
Lord Nick entered the dining room just as they were picking partners but Kiki swiftly linked arms with Lord Ci Nejunkie and tugged him along with her "We'll check the first floor rooms" and with that quick announcement they were gone much to the annoyance of Nick. Suddenly two arms link both sides of the Lord and before he can even think he is whisked out the door with Caterina and Honey "We''ll check the second floor" the ladies say in unison almost like it was pre-planed or both knew exactly what was going to take place. Slowly Baron Andy McSherwood could feel his arm being linked too, he sternly looks around to find the intoxicated Duke Reddington Poole by his side giving a wink and a wry smile "I guess that leaves us two then" he eventually stumbles out......Andy was aware it was most definitely the kilt he was wearing that had the Duke confused but he eventually reasoned 'what the hell' and left practically carrying the drunken man..... The remainder in the room decided to check the ground floor and keep vigil at the body. It was fortunate that nobody knew of Bridget's past and the fact that she was found innocent in court on a technicality to a charge of necrophilia it would most definitely have triggered more suspicion at her hastiness to volunteer to stay with the body or the fact that she kept stroking it but alas the rest remained blisssfuly ignorant.
Meanwhile Kiki and Lord Ci Nejunkie reach the first door and cautiously turn the knob however abruptly the door flings open and there before them is......

lord vader

" jeeeesssus christ you lot shut for a minute " said baron mcsherwood

everyone stops talking and listened,

" right you lot ken am a medium as well , and i tell ya there be ghosts in here folks ,and one of the them is our dead friend over there , only he can lead us to the killer .

but i do think it's worth finding out why the gardener wiz diggin a big hole"

K

If only Lord Nick had known that Lady Kiki was really a gay man in a woman's body, whose real name was Kevin. This would have given an entirely different aspect to their wild nights of passionate love making in Australia.

lord vader

baron mcsherwood , screwed up his face after he found out , saying

" a man dressed up as a wuman , yuck , get oot ma site ya jessy"

lord vader

so mcsherwood says " oh stuff this am hungry , am gawn tae the kitchen tae see whits fur eating , whos cmonig with me "

honey and caterina piped up " we'll cmoe too"