Sentence The Thirtysixth
Detective Sergeant Gordon Brevity's phone rang – and at that same instant so also did those belonging to his wife, Goldy, her cousins Trixie, Leigh and WPC Isa Urquhart, who all jumped at the sudden cacophony of chimes, tunes, bells and buzzers; while in the Advocates' Dining Room in the Court of Session, Daphne's telephone rang, which slightly acerbated, not only herself, she having never really come to terms with carrying something she thought more properly installed in an office, or a red box on a street corner, but also a number of prominent Advocates, learned Judges and other personages of the Justiciary; in The Copper Kettle Tea-Room, Maude's phone rang, but she didn't hear it, so engrossed was she in her chat with Cecilia and Grizzel, and their close and erudite friends Lettice Pumpherston of the National Library and Tuffy Ladywood of the Museum of Scotland, both up for a day of leisure from their delightful cottage in the Borders, where Maude and Daphne had spent many a happy weekend; and back in Maude and Daphne's flat, it was Elvira Dumbiedykes – on loan from her father Gregor (Daphne and Maude's cousin) working alone through the accumulation of books, papers, charts and family trees, who put out her hand at that very first tremble which precedes a ringing, and answered what turned out to be a conference call put out from the passageway above the fateful oubliette by her cousin Jinty – Elvira was the first to hear, through a torrent of sobs, coughs, hiccups, tears and groans, the awful news that Jinty and Roxy had discovered the brutally murdered body of a young man in that self-same cell in which Daphne had been immured (albeit and only fortuitously) briefly just a few days before – and this latest felony likely to have occurred yestreen at the very latest, although the hidden location meant that daylight would never have been an obstacle to the foul deed's commission; and Elvira it was who, regarding herself as the Officer of the Watch on duty at the helm of his ship of state, who took quick command and speaking rapidly and clearly, allocated various tasks to all the others listening on their own telephones – all except Daphne who hadn't yet mastered the trick of answering her mobile phone, and Maude, who hadn't yet heard hers ringing at the bottom of her handbag, under her chair, in the busy and noisy tearoom, over the voices of Cecilia, Grizzel, Lettice, Tuffy and herself; which is how it came to pass that even after the conferencing was over and Chronus, the God of Time himself, had extracted his penance as Shylock would have claimed Antonio's “pound of flesh,” the pendulum had been set in motion while it's two central figures, Daphne and Maude – plus Angus Og of the Bog (and his mysterious Master – or was Gordon Brevity wrong, and should that be Mistress – all continued with their day in absolute ignorance of their Countdown to Destiny!
Detective Sergeant Gordon Brevity's phone rang – and at that same instant so also did those belonging to his wife, Goldy, her cousins Trixie, Leigh and WPC Isa Urquhart, who all jumped at the sudden cacophony of chimes, tunes, bells and buzzers; while in the Advocates' Dining Room in the Court of Session, Daphne's telephone rang, which slightly acerbated, not only herself, she having never really come to terms with carrying something she thought more properly installed in an office, or a red box on a street corner, but also a number of prominent Advocates, learned Judges and other personages of the Justiciary; in The Copper Kettle Tea-Room, Maude's phone rang, but she didn't hear it, so engrossed was she in her chat with Cecilia and Grizzel, and their close and erudite friends Lettice Pumpherston of the National Library and Tuffy Ladywood of the Museum of Scotland, both up for a day of leisure from their delightful cottage in the Borders, where Maude and Daphne had spent many a happy weekend; and back in Maude and Daphne's flat, it was Elvira Dumbiedykes – on loan from her father Gregor (Daphne and Maude's cousin) working alone through the accumulation of books, papers, charts and family trees, who put out her hand at that very first tremble which precedes a ringing, and answered what turned out to be a conference call put out from the passageway above the fateful oubliette by her cousin Jinty – Elvira was the first to hear, through a torrent of sobs, coughs, hiccups, tears and groans, the awful news that Jinty and Roxy had discovered the brutally murdered body of a young man in that self-same cell in which Daphne had been immured (albeit and only fortuitously) briefly just a few days before – and this latest felony likely to have occurred yestreen at the very latest, although the hidden location meant that daylight would never have been an obstacle to the foul deed's commission; and Elvira it was who, regarding herself as the Officer of the Watch on duty at the helm of his ship of state, who took quick command and speaking rapidly and clearly, allocated various tasks to all the others listening on their own telephones – all except Daphne who hadn't yet mastered the trick of answering her mobile phone, and Maude, who hadn't yet heard hers ringing at the bottom of her handbag, under her chair, in the busy and noisy tearoom, over the voices of Cecilia, Grizzel, Lettice, Tuffy and herself; which is how it came to pass that even after the conferencing was over and Chronus, the God of Time himself, had extracted his penance as Shylock would have claimed Antonio's “pound of flesh,” the pendulum had been set in motion while it's two central figures, Daphne and Maude – plus Angus Og of the Bog (and his mysterious Master – or was Gordon Brevity wrong, and should that be Mistress – all continued with their day in absolute ignorance of their Countdown to Destiny!
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