Page 30 of Seven Reasons to Murder Your Dinner Guests

Melvin shrugs and picks up Janet’s tribute from the table, flicks through it. They used that lovely poem from Four Weddings and a Funeral . As his eyes bounce over the familiar words, he can’t help but hear them in John Hannah’s delicious Scottish brogue.

Then his phone beeps with a message. Christian.

We’re at the bistro. Where are you?

He glances at his watch. Nearly midday already.

He felt brilliant at 10:00 a.m., when he’d decided to head straight to the pub, his body buzzing with J?germeister and Red Bull.

But now, as the sugary cocktail hits his stomach and he considers the prospect of eating lunch while hiding his inevitable hangover, he suddenly feels a touch nauseous. There’s only one thing for it.

“Anyone up for a real drink, somewhere with a bit more atmosphere?” he says now, raising eyebrows at Vivienne and Tristan. “I know a little place around the corner.”

“Sorry, I can’t. Got some work to do,” Tristan says, pushing his chair back so quickly that it flips over onto the carpet.

“On a Saturday?” Vivienne asks quietly. A look passes between them, and Melvin briefly wonders what they’re silently conveying.

“Yep, big project beginning on Monday. I need to get a head start,” he says, giving Vivienne a quick kiss on the cheek and then raising a hand at Melvin before walking out the door.

“What about it, Vivienne? Say goodbye to Janet properly?” Melvin asks.

“Go on, then,” she says, standing up.

***

Vivienne perches on a bench next to a small table by the door while Melvin gets their drinks.

The barman greets him like an old friend, and Melvin wonders if that’s how he treats everyone or if he remembers Melvin from a night out.

He peers at the barman’s bald head, semicircle glasses with red frames, scarlet suit, and bright-yellow pocket square and tries to find a memory that matches this rather memorable image.

He finds nothing, and so nods politely and orders the drinks.

His mobile starts to buzz in his pocket.

Christian again. He quickly rejects the call but not before the barman spots it.

“Trying to avoid someone, are we?” He chuckles. “Have you been a naughty boy?”

“Oh, nothing that exciting,” Melvin mutters, quickly passing the man a ￡20 note and willing the conversation to end.

While the man counts out his change, Melvin types a text out to Christian.

Still at Janet’s wake. Everyone very upset! I’ll ring when it’s over.

A reply pops up almost instantly.

Poor you! Hang in there. We’ll see you later. Xx

Melvin sighs, switches his phone off, and puts it back in his pocket. He carries the drinks over to the table and finds Vivienne is giving him a curious look.

“A friend of yours?” she asks, tilting her head toward the barman, who Melvin sees is wiping down the bar while gazing over at him.

“Never met him,” Melvin says, then lifts his glass. “To fabulous Janet. Heaven just gained a very mischievous angel.”

They clink glasses, and Melvin takes a big gulp of his beer and sighs. No matter how many expensive and interesting wines Christian has persuaded him to try, he still feels you can’t beat a good old pint.

“It’s just tragic. Bill seemed devastated. He clearly had no idea what she was up to that night,” says Vivienne. “Marriages are really a mystery to me.”

A moment of silence settles between them; then Melvin remembers something.

“Actually, I did hear something about Janet’s death that struck me as odd,” he says.

“What was it?” Vivienne asks, putting her wine down and giving Melvin all her attention.

“Well, I was quite surprised by who was first on the scene…” he teases.

“Who?”

“Giles,” Melvin says and then waits for Vivienne to put the pieces together.

She leans back on the bench and folds her arms across her chest. Then it hits her. She sits forward again.

“Not…her brother-in-law? Caroline’s husband from the wake?” Vivienne cries.

“The very one,” Melvin tells her, trying but failing not to smile broadly at the revelation.

“So that’s where she must have been. Oh, Janet, of all the men in London,” Vivienne says, then reaches into her voluminous handbag to pull out her notebook.

“He was shocked—but I wouldn’t say devastated, exactly,” Melvin says, hoping this nugget of information will get Vivienne off his back for a bit.

“That actually fits in with a theory I’ve been working on,” Vivienne tells him, flicking through her book. “I know it sounds odd, but I wonder if Janet’s behavior somehow led to her death.”

“All the evidence points to another accident,” Melvin says. “She probably stormed off after a lovers’ tiff and ran into the road.”

Vivienne purses her lips, sighs.

“I keep thinking about her drinking, her eating, her flirting—her gluttony.”

“OK…”

She opens her notebook and shows him a circular sketch featuring seven rough drawings of animals with a word written in red next to each one.

“You remember we talked about the black-and-white drawing on the wall of Serendipity’s, with the same images on the place settings? Well, I found out that it’s a very old portrayal of the seven deadly sins.”

“Like, pride, lust, gluttony, and all that?”

“There were seven images and seven guests.” Vivienne points at each drawing in her book. “Janet’s showed a pig eating a roast dinner, and that’s the image for—guess what?”

“Gluttony?”

“Stella’s was a lizard with a scroll, depicting greed; Matthew’s was a male sheep leering at a ewe—lust; Gordon’s is peacock, for pride; and Tristan’s was two dogs fighting, that’s wrath,” she says.

“What about mine? The cat smoking a pipe?”

“It’s supposed to be sloth, Melvin,” Vivienne tells him with a grimace.

“Well, I’ve never thought of myself as lazy,” Melvin says.

“No, you’re not lazy at all,” Vivienne responds. “I looked it up. Sloth can also refer to a lack of action, a person who just lets things happen.”

“Ha. Well, perhaps this party planner knows me better than I know myself,” Melvin says, then rubs his eyes. He’s too tired for this.

“I mean, they don’t all add up,” Vivienne goes on. “Was Stella really greedy or just prideful? And I’d never describe Tristan as angry.”

Melvin thinks of the many glimpses of barely contained anger he’s seen from Tristan, the clenched fists and jaw, the scathing comments and withering looks, but he doesn’t want to encourage another of Vivienne’s wacky theories.

Since Matthew’s funeral, Vivienne has been bombarding him with requests to help with her “investigation.” To appease her, he replied and told her he’d spoken to the Serendipity’s landlord, who claimed he couldn’t find the contact details of the person who hired the venue that night.

After that, she messaged every few days, asking about Janet’s records, about how CCTV worked, even requested copies of the police reports for Matthew’s and Stella’s deaths.

Sometimes he responded to say his superior wouldn’t allow it, sometimes he told her he couldn’t find anything, other times he just deleted her message.

“If it makes you feel any better, mine is envy. It’s described as ‘rottenness of the bones.’” Vivienne shudders. “Perhaps the worst death is waiting for me.”

Melvin looks at Vivienne and, for the first time, sees fear in her face.

“You must try and forget about the numbers,” he says softly. “It will drive you insane. The best thing to do is just live your life.”

“I know, but it’s eating me up. My life feels richer than it ever has, which only makes me more afraid that it will be ripped away when I’m least expecting it,” she confesses.

Melvin rests his large hand on Vivienne’s small one and smiles at her.

“The other part of my seven deadly sins theory is that the party host—the killer—is the devil character in the picture,” Vivienne babbles on.

“I’ll humor you,” Melvin sighs. “So who’s the devil?”

“Someone outside the group, someone who knows us all separately, who orchestrated the dinner party and the numbers and is picking us off one by one,” says Vivienne. “And I bet they weren’t far away during the dinner party. Probably watching us all.”

“So…”

“Maybe properties around Serendipity’s had CCTV and recorded someone lurking?” Vivienne proposes. “Or it could even have been one of the waiters, or the chef?”

“OK, OK, Vivienne,” Melvin says, slowly nodding his head. “I’ll speak to the landlord again. See what I can find out.”

“I’m going back to Salvation Road, going door-to-door and speaking to the neighbors,” Vivienne says.

Melvin leans back in his chair, a wave of exhaustion suddenly crashing over him.

“Are you ever going to let this go?” he asks.

“No, I’ve got too much to live for,” she tells him. “But, Melvin, I’ve got to ask: What’s going on? You look dreadful. Have you really come straight from a night out? Presumably, Mary wasn’t with you.”

“No, she wasn’t,” Melvin says wearily. Even his head nods forward, as if his neck is tired of holding it up, of facilitating all the lies that come from his mouth.

“You don’t have to tell me,” Vivienne assures him, her tone sympathetic. “People handle illness in different ways. Is Mary very poorly again?”

Melvin looks at her, weighs his options, and chooses to tell the truth. It will be a novel feeling for him.