The Dusk Begins

Perkins Manor
Courtyard
8:20am
 
The single jet black police car roamed up the driveway of Buckville Manor, it's freshly polished bumper battling against the morning wind, and halted with a screech on a free space on the gravel driveway. The doors opened on both sides and two men came out. One, an intermediate sized mman with a bushy brown moustache and smooth, gelled back brown hair, donned in a cheap trench coat, the other, a slightly taller man with almost too similar features to his counterpart, except his face was much more developed against his skull, his eyes sunk in. The tallest man was Constable Peter Chart, a rather inexperienced officer, only having been employed for just over a year. The smaller man was his significant other, Inspector Pry; a man to be admired, he was considered a brave hero back at the station. They slammed the doors shut and proceeded up the driveway, their same tailored leather shoes crunching against the fine stone of the gravel.

It was Inspector Pry who noticed it first. He usually always ended up noticing it first. His nose twitched as he eyes widened. The window of the house closest to them was no longer a window. It was mere collection of fragmented glass that was left, a huge hole replacing what should've been the rest of the pave. Someone had broken it. Thrown a brick through it, to be exact. The pair had gotten the call no more than fifteen minutes ago from a Mr. Archibald Perkins. He was dining in the dining room of his glorious manor with his daughter, Penelope, when suddenly a auburn coloured brick had hurdled through the air in a mighty throw and had come into collision with the glass. Archibald had apparantly called the police immediately.

Just then, the black door of the house opened, a large, well-defined man in a suit and tie came running down the stone steps. "Ah!" he exclaimed through thin lips, "there you are!" He rushed closer to them, his slippered feet smushing it's way through the earlier tidy gravel. "Bloody blighters, aren't they? I didn't know what to do. I was just having breakfast - marmalade on toast - when a brick came through the front window of the room! Penelope just screamed whilst I jumped up and looked through the window to see if I could get a good look at who had done it."

"And did you see anyone?" It was Constable Chart who made this reply.

"Unfortunately, no," Perkins sighed. "Although, I expect it was some ruddy hooligan or a jealous tramp."

"I'm Inspector Pry," Pry greeted, not really knowing that it was a bit too late for greetings. "And this," he pointed to his partner, "is Constable Chart."

"Yes, yes, hello," Perkins said.

"Do you have any idea of the exact time this incident occured?"

"As a matter of fact, I do. It was 7:50 exactly." Pry admired Perkins' precise obersarvional skills.

"Have you left everything exactly as it was?" Pry continued to question.

"Yes. The brick itself is still in the dining room, in the spot where it landed when it came through."

The front door, which Perkins had left slightly ajar when he first stormed out, opened once more, and this time a graceful young lady came outside. Both Pry and Chart found her instantaneously hypnotic. She had a pale, ghost-like face, with eyes bursting with colour, and her red-brown hair, tighed up with a clip, matched the shades of the leaves amongst the surrounding trees. She wore a pale yellow nightdress and had shoddily slipped on a pair of black heels. Her arms were folded.

"Daddy, is everything alright?" she asked. Her voice was smooth and melodic.

"Yes, darling, everything is okay. I'm just telling the police exactly what happened," her father replied. He leaned closer to Pry and said in a lower tone of voice, "she's been quite shaken up by this, you know."

Constable Chart looked at her. "I don't suppose you know who did this, do you? You didn't see anyone or anything?"

By this point, she was right next to her father. Her thin figure contrasted with his fat one. "No, no, I didn't see anything."

"Shame."

She merely smiled back.

Chessington Close
Study
8:45am

Dr. Quentin Black was sat behind the big oak desk in his study. Glasses perched on his thick nose, he concentrated devoutly upon a particularly bizarre case file. The corners of his mouth flickered as he read each sentence with particular care. Two equal bangs suddenly emenated from the study door. "Yes?" asked Black, not looking up from his reading. "It's only I, sir. I have the mail." It was a croaky, albeit elegant, matter-of-fact voice that had answered. Distinctly female.

"Oh, come in, Mrs. White" The Doctor pushed the paperwork aside and smiled at the woman who entered. An empowered woman. A woman of order and method. Her bright white hair moulded around her head, her white-grey suit matched the this hair, and a bead of fake pearls wrapped tightly around her neck all somehow represented a twisted innocence. Angelic, almost. But not quite. This was Honoria White. In her wrinkled hands were two letters, made of the highest class. She placed them on the table.

Quentin Black grabbed the nearby letter opener; a simple affair with a dimly gold handle, and flicked open the envelope of the first letter. He folded out the paper, his eyes scanned it quickly and he put it back into it's original envelope. Mrs. White, who was heading back out, stopped in her tracks when her master's voice called. "A letter from Archibald Perkins."

"Indeed, sir?"

"Yes. He's throwing some sort of silly party. It's his publishing company's twentieth birthday or something nonsecal like that."

"Would you like me to send a reply?"

"Not yet. I need to decide whether or not to go, first. What do you think?"

"Well, sir," she stuttered. It was so rare he asked for her opinion. "I think it best if you went. It would do you good to go out. After all, it has been a while."

"I suppose. But, still, the man's so frightfully arrogant. Something about him annoys me."

"Really, sir?"

"Yes."

"In that case you might be interested in the news I've just heard from Ms. Cookson down at the post office." It was also rare for Mrs. White to ever indulge in tasteless gossip, but today was a day of new experiences. He had already asked of her opinion, which he ever seldom does, so maybe now would finally be the chance for their relationship to flourish a little better. "Mr. Perkins had one of his windows smashed earlier this morning."

Dr. Black took off his glasses and stared bewildered at his housekeeper. "What?"

"Yes. Someone threw a brick right into it, apparantly. Makes you wonder, it does. I always thought this village was so safe."

"Quite." Black put on his glasses again. "Tell you what, I think I'll go to this pointless party."

"Of course. I'll begin to write to a reply, then."

"And you can join me."

The comment seemed so powerless, so casual. Honoria White's eyes gleamed and glittered as she swung round to stare at her employer. "Really, sir?"

"Yes. Well, I don't exactly have anyone else, do I?"

White replied with a smirk and a small nod and left the room.

Dr. Black picked up the second letter, tore open the seal with the blade of the letter opener, and folded out it's contents. His eyes ran over the page. He gulped. He felt himself begin to hyperventalate. Putting the sheet of paper back into the envelope, he sighed. The Doctor stood up and paused for a moment. "Damn it!" he shouted, banging his fists against the oak desk.

Arlington Point
Studio
8:55am

Joseph Boddy, clad in a plain white shirt and loose trousers was busy at work with a painting. His clothes were plastered with paint marks and dusty residue. The canvas infront of him, the pallet in hand, he stared abstractedly at the posing young woman . He licked his lips and continued to stroke the big sheet of paper with a delicate paint brush.

The woman, who sat contently on a chaise lounger for him, seemed frozen stiff. Her smiling face, with just a hint of sadness, never flinched. Her whole body seemed stuck in time. The only thing that moved were her eyelids, that blinked every few seconds. That was all. The perfect hands were close together on the lap of her picture perfect body.

Boddy pressed on, dabbing for different colours as he crafted his piece. He stopped. He put the pallet and brush down on a nearby stool and picked up a glass of water. "That'll do for now. I'm getting tired."

The woman breathed a sigh of relief and her frozen manner quickly abolished. "How is it coming along?" she asked as she flicked a lock a brown hair behind her ear.

"Great. You look absolutely brilliant." A bit of water had found it's way on his moustache and he wiped it off with the sleeve of his shirt. The woman, marvelled in a bright red dress, stood up and walked forward. "Can I see it?"

"No." The reply was unemotionless.

"Oh, alright." She walked over to him and took the glass of water out his hands. She put it back on the stool and then wrapped her slinky arms around him. "I'm awfully flattered you're doing this."

"Oh, please, Jacqueline, who else could look so radiant as you for this piece?"

Jacqueline giggled and leant in for a kiss with her illustrater. He gladly returned the favour with his muse. "Jacqueline Scarlet," he began, "you are one of a kind." She giggled again and sat back on the chaise lounger, resting her head on the pillows. She grabbed her crimson handbag, pulled out a cigarette and a lighter, lit it and puffed on it contently.

Boddy sat down next to her and wrapped his arm around her nimble shoulder. "Listen, how would you like to come to a dinner party with me?"

"And here was I beginning to think you were ashamed of me."

"No. So how about it?"

"Whose dinner party? Let me guess: that dodgy Doctor friend of your's, or maybe that cuckoo bird lady - Peacock, is it? Oh, for God's sake, don't tell me it's that creepy Colonel Mustard fellow."

"Now why don't you like him?"

"Gee, I don't know. Maybe it's because he's living with a woman twenty years his junior," she took another puff.

"I thought you were were quite open-minded, Jacqueline."

"I can quickly change my mind, you know," she smiled, her teeth shining.

"If you must know it's at Archie Perkins' place."

"Oh, him. No chance of being sexually harrassed there, then," she chuckled.

"Hey! There's only one who can get to sexually harrass you," Joseph Boddy breathed in her ear.

"Hm? And who's that?"

He leaned closer. "Me."

The two laughed, bouncing off of eachother's amusement. Boddy grabbed her and began to worship her neck with his lips.

Green Motors
Car Park
9:30am

Dr. Black stood and stared at the small car-selling establishment. Wearing a black leather coat, and a bowler hat over his balding head, he was fully armed against the rising gusts of wind. He walked across the street, his gloved hands in his coat pockets, pretending to look as happy as he could. Don't ask how. He was never a very good actor. He went into the store.

Chessington Close
Hall/Courtyard
9:35am

Mrs. White was just arranging a vase of flowers when the door chimed it's loud chime, that seemed to echo through the empty halls of the house. Honoria checked to see if she looked acceptable in a nearby mirror and then walked briskly to the front door. She opened it and was greeted by a tall, gallant-looking man in a bronze-coloured coat, a pretty young thing in pastel orange attached to one of his arms.

"Colonel Mustard. Miss Peach. What can I do for you?" she asked, feigning friendliness.

"It's such a lovely morning, I thought it best if Maybelle and I had a little stroll. Is Quentin in?" asked the Colonel with a warm smile protruding from underneath his proud moustache.

"I'm afraid you've just missed him. He's got out somewhere."

"Oh, dear," he groaned. "Did he --"

"He didn't say where, no," the efficient housekeeper prompty responded.

"Blast. Never mind."

As this conversation was taking place, Maybelle Peach found herself looking at a young man digging up some roots in a nearby hedge of the garden. His fine brown hair blew in the wind and his cheeks were rosy and right. She couldn't help looking at him through those deep eyes of hers. He seemed so preoccupied with his work. He didn't even seem to notice anything that was going on around him. Almost as though, he were in his own little world. Peach didn't know why but she found that strangely intresting. Almost attractive. The man suddenly looked up and glanced at her. Such a handsome face! She blushed and rapidly turned back to the grim face of the dreaded Honoria White, whose face juxtaposed notably.

Mustard was talking to White about the weather or something. After the conversation had ran it's course, Miss Peach said, rather surprisngly, "Can we get going, Clifford? I want to go into town and get some supplies." She had a very dinstinct, almost exaggerated American accent.

"Of course, darling. We'll get going now. See you, Mrs. White," he made a gesture of the hand and the two departed down the driveway and back onto the curved path which led into town.

Mrs. White moved her head aside slightly and shouted to the young man gardening, "Is everything alright, Claudio?" The young man; Claudio Brunette, looked up, nodded and continued with his work.

Meanwhile, in the library, a large woman doused in pink cloth and shawls, had her beringed fingers against the window, her bloodshocked eyes looked longingly ahead at something in the distance.

Green Motors
Green's Office
9:40am

"Sit down, Quentin, quick," instructed the patronising man in a designer green suit behind a small office desk.

Dr. Black removed his hat, putting it on the nearby hat stand and sat down infront of his aquaintance. "Now what are you talking about?" asked the man in the green suit, with a frown and a sneering expression.

"Look, Green, he knows."

"What? How?"

"How the Hell do I know? He's not as a big of an idiot as we thought he was."

Mr. Green leant back in his chair and contemplated to himself.

"I had to come to you straightaway. What do you think we should do?" asked the Doctor, hastily.

Mr. Green grinned.

To be continued...