[Chris O'Carroll]

No 4263
Set by J Seery
We asked for extracts from a tale of a fictional detective who has swapped his usual setting for that of another fictional detective.

This week’s winners
Hon menshes to Adrian Fry (“‘One across: opposite of yes, two letters.’ Disgusted, Morse threw the Midsomer Advertiser contemptuously aside”) and Katie Mallett (“Now, Mrs Hudson, I’m expecting a visitor for tea and I would like you to make sure it is the kind of tea that would make my acquaintance relaxed and comfortable”). I’d advise Horniman’s. The four winners can have £25 each, with the Tesco vouchers going in addition to Carolyn Thomas-Coxhead.

Kingsmarkham
It had been a tough day in Kingsmarkham but he had finally cracked the case. His assistant was full of admiration. “It beats me how you do it, Chief. How on earth did you spot that the poor old one-legged beggar was actually Professor Moriarty in disguise?” Ignoring the “no smoking” signs everywhere, Holmes puffed contentedly at his meerschaum pipe as he replied: “It was elementary, my dear Burden. My suspicions were aroused when I saw a blind cripple getting into a Mercedes; I simply asked to see his driving licence.”
Now, home at last, he picked up his violin and played a few notes but it didn’t have its usual soothing effect. He needed something stronger and was just preparing it when his wife, Dora, appeared. “Sher!” she expostulated. “I’ve asked you time and again not to shoot up with the children in the house!”
Brian Allgar

St Mary Mead I
“Thanks for coming, Vicar,” said Jack Frost, as he made room for the tea between some dirty laundry and a mountain of unsorted files and magazines. “I’m hoping you might be able to help me. We appear to have a sicko in St Mary Mead and he has been making nasty threats.”
“Threats?” asked the vicar.
“So it would seem,” replied Frost. “How else can you explain this sinister thing with the curved blades that was left on my doorstep with a note that warned: ‘These can cut off both heads and limbs’? Moreover, it was in your handwriting.”
“Oh, those. They’re secateurs,” explained the vicar. “I hoped you might find them useful.” Then, staring sadly out of the window, he mumbled, “Those poor roses and lilacs were the pride of the parish when Jane Marple lived here.”
J Garth Taylor

Botswana
Grace Makutsi adjusted her sizeable spectacles and pulled her jacket more tightly around her slight frame as the angry young man left the agency, crashing past the acacia tree into the bright sunlight.
“I shall now make us a nice cup of bush tea, Mma. We can think about this man and his problems more clearly then.”
A few chickens left the shade of the tree and pecked their way into the office. Jane Marple, perhaps regretting the dark bombazine although she would never have hinted at this and dreading yet more bush tea, reflected on the sustaining qualities of a proper pot of Horniman’s, especially in the face of a case of such evident wickedness as the young man had recounted: cattle theft was never an occurrence to be taken lightly but these were Sir Seretse Khama’s family’s cattle; it would not do.
“Thank you, Mma,” was all she said to her right-hand lady.
Carolyn Thomas-Coxhead

St Mary Mead II
I never warmed to the place. You see more people in one New York bar than in this whole sleepy English village. A fair percentage of the local hicks are slimy liars and stone-cold killers, just like in any big city, and they use a raised eyebrow the way I’d use a swift slap across the chops. This Cherry Baker dame was everything I didn’t like about them. I was always “Mr Hammer” to her, no matter how many times I told her to call me “Mike”, and she made it clear enough she never cared for my calling her friend “Jane” instead of “Miss Marple”. But none of that mattered when I found Cherry outside the vicarage, gutted like a Fulton Fish Market mackerel.
“Somebody will catch my fist in their puss for this,” I promised her bloody corpse, “or a lead slug from my rod in their belly.”
Chris O’Carroll

[Brian Allgar]

Yep, the Spherians have come up once more with a seventy-five percent solution, and an HM.

Congratulations all round, especially Carolyn, who again chews on a tasty Tesco voucher - although I do hope it's horse-free.

[Carolyn Thomas-Coxhead]

Originally Posted by Brian Allgar

Yep, the Spherians have come up once more with a seventy-five percent solution, and an HM.

Congratulations all round, especially Carolyn, who again chews on a tasty Tesco voucher - although I do hope it's horse-free.

Thanks, Brian. I shan't add to the growing nose-bag full of Tesco meat-and-meat-products gags: that would be flogging a dead horse.....

[John Whitworth]

Yeah. I thought of St Mary Mead and Mike Hammer. I should have won if it hadn't been for the small detail that I didn't write it. Well done Caroline, my amenuenius, as it were.

[Brian Allgar]

Yes, isn't it infuriating how these apparently insignificant details can have such momentous consequences? I ought to be a wealthy man today, but I omitted to take that tiny step of becoming rich.

By the way, your amanuensis for Mike Hammer was not Carolyn but Chris.

[John Whitworth]

Sorry, Chris. Nice entry by the way, even if it was mine really.

The English batsman Geoffrey Boycott was once run out by the other English batsman of the time, Denis Amiss, who went on to amass a huge score. Boycott sat in the pavilion with a towel over his head intoning sorrowfully. 'He's out there scoring MY runs.' Of course he said 'roons'.

Brian, you are rich in spirit.

[Janice D. Soderling]

Brian, Carolyn, Chris. The world would be a much duller place without you. Thx again.

[Brian Allgar]

Originally Posted by John Whitworth

Brian, you are rich in spirit.

You're right there, John. Aberlour, Balvenie, Cardhu, Dalwhinnie, Glenlivet, Glenmorangie, Jura, Knockando, Lagavulin, Macallan's ... There are a few letters missing, but I'm working on them.

[basil ransome-davies]

Originally Posted by John Whitworth

Sorry, Chris. Nice entry by the way, even if it was mine really.

The English batsman Geoffrey Boycott was once run out by the other English batsman of the time, Denis Amiss, who went on to amass a huge score. Boycott sat in the pavilion with a towel over his head intoning sorrowfully. 'He's out there scoring MY runs.' Of course he said 'roons'.

Brian, you are rich in spirit.

Whereas Boycott was notoriously mean in sprit, a selfish anal Yorkshireman with form for punching a woman.

[John Whitworth]

Indeed he was, Bazza. Look up cricinfo for Botham describing how HE deliberately ran Boycott out in a Test Match, having been sent in by the rest of the team to do just that. They've got footage of Boycs aghast and Botham absolutely helpless with laughter. Life-affirming stuff.

Highland Park, Islay Malt... North Port, Old Pulteney, Pittyvaich, Queen Anne, Royal Lochnagar, Strathmill, Tobermory....

Are there distilleries at Ullapool an on Yell?