Bertie and the Kinky Politician (19 page)

‘Hello, Millicent. My name is Bertie. I'm going to jump your bones!' The television provided a rich source of material for these romantic occasions.

Millicent's head appeared from behind a bushy branch. She peered down to see a very handsome boy standing inside her cage. Inside! The other birds looked on, amazed at Bertie's sudden reappearance. One trilled a greeting, which, although the accent was unfamiliar, Bertie understood. He responded with his own formal call, a melodic screech that, although unintelligible to human ears, carried in its multi-layered harmonics information of his breed, status, sex and intent. As a youngster, Bertie had naturally learned how to communicate with many other species of birds, chattering across the still evening waters of the Madeira from the deck of the
Esmeralda
, learning both the human tongue from the girlish Celeste as well as his own language from his cousins swarming in the distant trees. All birds, having a common ancestry, understand the basic calls of almost every other species, even if the accents were sometimes atrocious, a linguistic feat of which humans remained blissfully ignorant.

The resident macaws responded politely to Bertie's greeting, bobbing heads and welcoming him with a nod and a whistle. Bertie stared up at Millicent for a few seconds, then spread his wings and displayed magnificently, a glorious violet splash, dazzling in its majesty. His audience cooed appreciatively and settled themselves down to watch the inevitable shenanigans with lively interest. If they'd had popcorn, it would have been passed around!

‘Rockall, north-north west, twelve miles.'

Bertie was forced to consider the possibility that Millicent's conversational skills were somewhat limited. However, talk could wait until later. He felt an uncontrollable stirring in parts which had never stirred before and launched himself with a wild cry of passion.

‘Forties! German Bight!' There was now an element of panic in Millicent's voice.

There was no thought of DNA testing. None. Nature took its course, if not entirely willingly, then certainly noisily, and was accompanied by agitated news of deteriorating weather conditions in Fastnet and a storm warning in Finisterre.

All told, it took him a little less than twelve seconds.

That's a man for you!

Chapter Ten

‘Your blasted macaw has raped Millicent!'

‘What?' Wilf cradled the receiver on one shoulder while sorting through the usual untidy pile of folders stacked precariously on his desk, an early morning sourness lending his face more than its usual hang-dog expression of melancholy. Colin Keynes was spitting blood on the other end of the phone. ‘What on earth are you talking about?'

‘Bertie! Surely you haven't forgotten that macaw you brought out to us yesterday.'

‘I'm hardly likely to, am I?' This delivered with all the compacted sarcasm of a worldly-wise, long-serving police officer.

‘Nor am I! He picked the lock of his cage and got in with our Millicent.'

‘So?'

‘So he's bloody well shagged her!' Keynes fizzed like water splashed on a hot plate. He really was rather upset. Outraged, to be honest. Wilf tossed the files, leaned back in his chair and smiled broadly. Good old Bertie. Nice to know someone was getting their claw-over.

‘Oh, dear,' he said mildly,

Keynes went critical, like a badly maintained Russian reactor. ‘“Oh dear!” Is that all you can frigging say?' he shrieked.

Wilf held the phone away from his head to protect his eardrum and covered the mouthpiece. ‘Bertie's humped that girlie parrot!' he announced to no one in particular. ‘They're not happy campers over at the zoo.' There was a ripple of laughter around the office.

Yates passed by and grinned. ‘Nice one, Wilf. That's made my day. Damned bird gets more sex than I do.'

Wilf considered his senior's statement while Keynes continued to fulminate and came to the conclusion no woman in her right mind would want to come within a million miles of Yates. She'd have to be on some sort of powerful and thoroughly illegal mind-altering substances to find him even tolerably pleasant. He returned to the splenetic keeper, still in a state of utmost agitation.

‘Mr Keynes,' interposed Wilf firmly. ‘Colin, calm down. I cannot see your problem. Does it really matter if Millicent is covered by Bertie or another male? If chicks hatch, does anyone really give a toss who's the father?'

‘But you don't understand,' Keynes yelled. ‘These macaws only mate with one partner. Milly now won't breed with any other male. She and Bertie are an item. Don't you get it – they've bonded. For life! That's truly knackered our breeding programme. God knows what's going to happen when Bertie is returned to his owner – poor Milly will be heartbroken. She'll pine.'

‘For the fjords?'

‘Don't get smart with me, Thompson,' he snarled. ‘This is a catastrophe.'

‘Come on, Colin, surely it's not that bad. Treat their encounter as a blessing in disguise.
Brief Encounter
in feathers.' Wilf idly speculated on how macaws mated. Noisily, in all probability. Have to watch the claws. Still, not as dangerous as porcupines or tarantulas, and they manage without too many problems. Plenty of them mooching about in the wild. Keynes was still blathering on interminably when a passing constable slipped a note onto Wilf's desk …

Wilf coaxed Bertie out of the police van, again thankful for the protection provided by the thick gauntlet. Bertie's claws easily encircled his wrist. He could feel their tips indent the glove like hypodermic needles. Collecting him from the zoo had been a little awkward. Keynes was like a father who'd just discovered his virginal daughter had spent a weekend on enthusiastic sausage manoeuvres with the Parachute Regiment. Wilf and, it has to be said, Bertie, were both entirely unsympathetic. However, for a species noted for its uxoriousness he had been less reluctant to be prised away from his new amour than might have been expected. Wilf guessed Millicent's limited meteorological vocabulary probably had something to do with it, but at least the macaw gave him no trouble on the short trip to Greenwich.

He looked fondly at the big bird. It was so difficult not to like him. ‘Is this home, Bertie?'

‘Home. Yes.' There was a note of distinct excitement in the musical voice. He bobbed his head and began to trill loudly. An ivory Persian curled up on the mat opened an eye and instantly leapt to its feet as if it had been juiced with several thousand very unwelcome volts. It hissed menacingly with fur raised before pelting for cover in the bushes. No love lost there, observed Wilf.

‘Good.' He always knew it would be a simple problem to solve. Bertie's disappearance would inevitably be reported so all he had to do was wait. If only every case was as easy to solve.

‘Wilf?'

‘Yes, Bertie?'

‘Thank you.'

‘My pleasure.' He rang the bell. A few moments later, the door swung open.

‘Bertie! My darling!'

‘Mummy!' There was a sudden rush of blue as Bertie swept up from Wilf's arm and turned full somersaults above their heads, singing in an exuberant paean of joyful happiness. Celeste grabbed a leather gauntlet from a table beside the door and slipped it on, calling to him. Bertie trilled wildly and with a fluttering sweep of wings, settled on her arm like a giant feathery gargoyle. She was overwhelmed, kissing and stroking the macaw, her eyes streaming helplessly. Wilf was surprisingly moved. In a job not noted for many genuinely happy moments, this was a sight to savour. For some strange reason, Bertie began to purr very loudly.

‘Oh, Bertie, you naughty boy, where have you been?'

‘Zoo. With Wilf.'

Celeste seemed to notice Wilf for the first time and wiping the tears away, smiled with obvious embarrassment. ‘Detective Constable Thompson? I'm sorry about the blubbing, but Bertie is, well, he's someone very special.' The macaw was most definitely much more than a mere pet.

‘A pleasure to meet you, Miss Gordon. I can see I've come to the right house.' Bertie rubbed cheeks with Celeste and chattered like a small child.

‘Please, call me Celeste. I can't thank you enough for finding him. Do come in and have a cup of tea. I want you to tell me all about his adventures.'

Wilf hesitated for a moment. There was an ever-growing mountain of urgent paperwork back at the station, but Celeste
was
a very attractive woman. Rich copper hair gleamed around her shoulders. He'd never seen such a unique shade of glowing ginger. ‘Thanks, Celeste, I'd love a cup. My name's Wilf, by the way.'

Wilf despatched the van driver back to the station and followed Celeste indoors. She led him into the salon and urged Bertie on to his perch beside the sofa where he immediately bent to investigate the contents of his food pan. The tea took a few minutes to arrive, giving Wilf time to examine the room. After so many years in the force, he couldn't help himself. There was a definite foreign theme in the decor, exotic, Latin, and brilliantly colourful. Indian artefacts lined the walls; bows and blowpipes, feathered head-dresses and rainbowed hangings. Brightly patterned rugs were scattered over the parquet flooring while various paintings and photographs depicted native village scenes and landscapes of rugged mountains, dense forests and broad, lazy rivers. One in particular caught his eye and he peered more closely. He recognised Celeste as a young girl with long ginger pig-tails surrounded by the cheerful crew of a river steamer, the laughing group standing under the shade of an awning stretched over its stern. An infant parrot sat on her shoulder, awkward and blue, and he realised with some surprise it was Bertie. Judging from Celeste's age now, that meant the macaw must be almost thirty years old, possibly more!

Wilf's attention wandered from the photo. He picked up a wooden effigy and stared at its outsized erect phallus. The figurine was coarsely carved in mahogany, but the unfeasibly engorged genitals were exquisitely detailed and anatomically perfect in every way. Celeste bustled in and noticed his interest. ‘It's a tribal fertility icon from Brazil,' she said without embarrassment. ‘I lived in the heart of the Amazon Basin until my parents died. As you can see, I brought much home with me.' She nodded at the decorations around the room. ‘A lovely reminder of an extraordinary country.'

‘Is this modelled on a real man?' Wilf felt a depressing wash of inadequacy on being confronted with such enormous tackle.

She smiled at his mock indignation. ‘Now then, Wilf, in all honesty do you really think I would've come home had the men of Brazil been so sumptuously endowed?' Wilf decided he liked her sense of humour. He threw his mac over the back of a chair and sat down. Celeste poured and Bertie whistled happily like a milkman going about his morning round on a sunny summer's morning.

‘You have some lovely things here.'

‘Thank you. Brazil is a wondrous country, full of cultural and artistic delights.'

‘Too many bugs for me.' Wilf was not an acolyte of exotic travel. Ramsgate pushed all his buttons, thank you very much.

‘There are creatures much more terrifying than the bugs, believe me.'

‘Such as?'

‘Snakes, for instance.'

‘Yuk!'

‘And caimans.'

‘That's a sort of dwarf crocodile, isn't it?'

‘That's right, but in the deep jungle rivers they run up to a size big enough to take a man.'

‘Nasty. Ever see a piranha?'

‘My favourite psycho-fish. Sure, I've seen plenty and things can get ugly if you come across a big shoal.'

‘Good lord,' muttered Wilf, pulling a face. ‘What an awful place.'

‘Not so, it's astonishing, despite the occasional viciousness of its flora and fauna.'

‘Then why have you returned to boring old Greenwich?'

‘I suppose I just wanted to be back in England. Nothing forced me home. I had a very nice villa in Manaus, but I got lonely after Dad died. We kept each other company when Mum passed on, but Brazil was something I shared with my parents.' Celeste neglected to mention that, in fact, the real reason she'd returned to Britain was to search out the very sort of man she'd found in James. It had taken many years, but eventually it dawned on her that if she stayed in South America then she would forever remain sexually unfulfilled. However, although she already liked this policeman, she certainly did not like him enough to tell him that!

Wilf seemed satisfied with her answer and moved on to another topic. As a copper, it came as second nature to be always asking questions. ‘So tell me, Celeste, why did Bertie escape? I can't believe he left you by choice.'

‘Defending me against burglars the night before last.'

‘Burglars!' Wilf looked up from his cup, his professional interest sharpening considerably. ‘What happened?'

‘Bertie woke me at about one in the morning. There was a hell of a row coming from downstairs so I went to investigate. I thought he was attacking Sebastian again.'

‘That wouldn't be the cat, by any chance – the Persian I saw scuttling for cover?'

‘Yes. They don't get on too well.'

‘He did seem keen to avoid Bertie's company.'

‘But when I got downstairs I found two intruders in here standing beside my bureau.'

‘Has this been reported?'

‘Yes. I've had no end of visits from the police since. It's considered a serious crime because of my injuries.' She nodded at the sling supporting her arm.

‘Were you visited by a SOCO?'

‘A what?'

‘Scenes of Crime Officer.'

‘Ah, yes, you mean Debbie. She came just as I was taken to hospital and was still here when I got back. Everything had been photographed and she was busy looking for fingerprints. A constable explained everything.'

‘His name?'

‘PC Drewing. Do you know him?'

‘Yes. Ian's a good lad. I'll pull the file when I get back to the station, but please go on. Do you think you could recognise the men again?' He sipped his tea and eyed her over the top of his cup. She really was quite gorgeous. Lovely legs – and those glorious emerald eyes!