656. Chapter 656

After Head Case

Episode 4.03

By

UCSBdad

Disclaimer: I won't own Castle for an eternity. Rating: K Time: See above.

"Um, that is, Lady Castle?" The uniformed bobby asked, obviously unsure of how to address the beautiful Scotland Yard detective inspector.

"Please, Mason, isn't it? Call me Detective Inspector Beckett. Here on the job I'm still Beckett. At home, I'm just Kate. It's only on very formal occasions that I'm Lady Katherine Castle now that I've married Sir Richard, or Rick as I call him."

"Yes, Detective Inspector Beckett. Chief Inspector Douglas would like you to come to his office at once. It's quite important."

Kate left her office at once and headed for the Chief Inspector, turning every male head as she walked through New Scotland Yard. Although only dressed in a fashionable tweed suit and sensible shoes with four inch heels, Kate Beckett was a rare beauty as every man who watched her could attest.

She knocked on the Chief Inspector's door. "Come in, Beckett." He called.

"How did you know it was me, sir?" She asked with a smile.

"Not many people in the Yard wear high heels, barring that scamp Hunt, and I'm a bit concerned about him.

Kate nodded. Constable Colin Hunt was a bit outre but he had made a wonderful flower girl at her wedding.

"But on to business. Sir Marmaduke Whistle-Britches has been murdered. The most brilliant scientist the British medical profession has to offer, dead. "

"What can you tell me about it, sir?"

"Nothing, I'm afraid."

"You mean it's some sort of secret? Special Branch sort of thing?" Beckett asked, now confused.

Douglas shook his head. "No. All that was found in Sir Marmaduke's flat was a large amount of blood. His wife had just gone down to get the mail, was only gone a few minutes and when she came back, all she found was a huge pool of blood."

"I'll go talk to her, sir." Beckett said.

As she walked out of Scotland Yard, she heard the horn of a car honking excessively. She glowered at the driver, but then recognized him. "Rick! What are you doing here?"

"I knew you'd need a ride to Sir Marmaduke's flat, so I came over in my brand new 1924 MG roadster to give you a lift."

She narrowed her eyes. "How did you know I'd be going there?"

Castle shrugged. "I know a chap."

Lady Whistle-Britches was much younger than her husband and rather attractive, in a cheap sort of way, Castle thought. Not the sort of woman he'd be interested in.

"Lady Whistle-Britches…" Beckett began.

"Oh, please call me Lady Meredith. Everyone does."

"And this gentleman is?"

"I'm Doctor Joshua Harley-Davidson. I was a colleague of Marmaduke's. Brilliant chap. He was working on some sort of device that he said would end death."

"Rather H.G Wells, isn't it?" Castle said.

The doctor shrugged. "He was brilliant."

"He discovered a cure for hemorrhoids when he was just in his first year of medical school." Said Lady Meredith.

"People told him he was wasting his time working on hemorrhoids, but he just said, "These are the 'roids I'm looking for." The doctor added.

Rick and Kate interrogated the two, but they appeared to know nothing about the presumed death of Sir Marmaduke.

"That doctor seemed awfully familiar with the widow." Castle said as he drove her back to the Yard.

"Oh, you just want it to be a woman so you can have your fictional detective, Nicole Cold, get in a cat fight with her in your next book."

"The thought of that's oddly arousing. Could we stop and buy some orange marmalade before we go home tonight?"

"Naughty boy." She said, but with a naughty smile.

The next day, Constable Ryan knocked on Beckett's office door. "Pardon, ma'am, but we looked over Sir Marmaduke's cheque book. He's been paying for a room in the Rancid Hotel. That's where that….Um, fellows…Who….Um…" Ryan began to blush.

Beckett smiled at him. "The word is pimp. I am a copper, you'll remember. I am aware of things the average lady might not know. But you'd be surprised what we ladies know. We should go investigate the flat. Coming, Castle?"

They arrived at the Rancid in a police car which caused everyone sight to run madly away. "We should have taken my car." Rick said.

"Ryan would have had to sit on my lap then to get us all into your MG." Kate said.

"I meant the Rolls, of course." Castle said, upset at the thought of his wife being that close to another man.

"It'd be stolen for sure." Ryan said.

"We should check number fifteen." Beckett said, heading into the decrepit building.

They got a shock when they reached number fifteen.

"I got a shock." Castle exclaimed as Beckett kicked the door in. "And do you always have to kick doors in?"

Beckett shrugged. "Old habits are hard to break. And there's a live electrical wire attached to the doorknob. The door is booby trapped to keep people away."

"Look!" Ryan said. "A complete operating theater. What would that be for?"

"Showing moving pictures perhaps?" Castle suggested. "That William S. Hart film is being shown this weekend. Shall we go?

Ryan blushed again. "My wife, Jenny, is rather liberal, sir, but I doubt she'd approve."

"He was asking me, Ryan." Beckett said as gently as she could.

The three tracked down the landlady of the premises.

"Call me, Gina, coppers." She said harshly. "And that's all you'll be getting from me. I know my rights."

Castle smiled. "Do you know what a twenty pound note looks like?" He held one out. Gina snatched at it, but he easily kept it out of her reach.

"All I know is that there were three of them."

"A threesome? That's against the law, although frightfully amusing." Castle said with a dreamy look in his eyes before he noticed Beckett glaring at him. "Or so I've been told."

"No, three gents. Toffs, they were. Real gentlemen they were. At least two of them. The third was some sort of servant."

"Can you describe the gentlemen?" Beckett asked.

Gina shook her head. "I'm afraid not. They wore their coat collars up and had hats pulled way down. I never got a look at their faces."

"What about the servant?"

"He was called Igor Demming. I heard one call to him once."

Back at the Yard, Beckett found the file on Igor Demming. "A small time gangster, but just muscle working for those smarter than himself. He once worked for a chimpanzee who had escaped from the zoo. Demming fell deeply in debt to the chimp playing and losing at three card monte."

"Where is he now?" Castle asked.

"In the wind. We have no idea."

Castle smiled. "As it happens, I know a chap."

Later that afternoon, Castle and Beckett strolled casually through a rougher section of east London. There, ahead of them was a group of men around a cardboard box. A man detached himself from the crowd and casually wandered over. "He's the big one on the end. The one losing his money." Then the man walked off.

Beckett walked up behind the man. "Igor Demming? Detective Inspector Beckett, the Yard."

The other players ran away, but Castle removed some bananas from under his coat and handed it to the dealer. "Get lost, Jojo. The next time we'll have to run you in."

Jojo nodded, climbed over a wall and was gone.

"You ain't got nothing on me, coppers." Snarled Demming.

"I have a search warrant for your flat, Demming. Let's go see what's to be seen."

Arriving at Demming's flat, Beckett told him to open the door. He hesitated. "You know it's booby trapped with electricity, don't you?"

Demming nodded. "It'll fry me. I can't touch it."

"We'll get the power company to turn off the power. I'll go find a phone." Castle volunteered.

Demming was so relieved he sagged and leaned against the door. That was his last mistake. Electricity shot through him and the overload knocked out all of the power in the building. Beckett kicked the door in.

There in the room were Meredith, Harley-Davidson and Sir Marmaduke Whistle-Britches. "I'm alive!" Cried Sir Marmaduke." I'm alive."

Beckett had knelt beside the other two. "But these two aren't. Neither is Demming. What happened here?"

"I found a way to bring back the dead." Sir Marmaduke said proudly. "But my wife and her lover, Harley-Davidson wanted it for themselves to get rich. But, having murdered me, they weren't smart enough to figure out what to do it, so they decided to bring me back to show them how. However, it seems to take the life force of three people to bring one back to life."

"That is a problem." Castle admitted.

That night in the Castle's spacious flat in Mayfair, the two prepared to go to bed. "Defeating death. How I'd love to be with you for an eternity." Said Sir Richard.

"Somehow I think that death is like that game of three card monte, Castle. He'll always win."

"But not for a very long time, Kate. We will be together."

"Always."