Curtain Call

by Graham Hurley

  With the kitchen full, H takes the opportunity to make another little speech. Last night was great, he says, but nothing comes for free. Later today he’ll be circulating details of another little wheeze he’s dreamed up to raise some moolah for Front Line. This time he has no plans to end up in hospital. The joke raises a chuckle from Dave Munroe but no one else has a clue what H is talking about. Pressed for details, he says he just wants people to pile in and help.

  ‘I’m after six volunteers,’ he says. ‘At five grand a pop. If you can’t manage that kind of money then find someone who can.’

  Five grand for what? He won’t say. Just wait for the email, he says. Just be fucking patient for a change.

  Later in the day I get a chance to corner him. Everyone but Dave Munroe has pushed off. Dave’s waiting for his carer to arrive and has holed himself up in the library with one of H’s true-crime books. I fetch him a coffee and we have a chat. H has told me he lives on the Isle of Wight. How come?

  ‘No choice, really. My lovely colleagues always suspected I was on the take but no one could prove it so once I retired I didn’t want to hang about in Pompey. I had a thing going with this woman down in Ventnor. She ran a B&B and the invite was there to move in. So I did. Best move ever. She looks after me a treat. Heart of gold. Lucky me, eh?’

  When he asks for sugar, I return to the kitchen and find H sitting at the table. He says he wants a word or two about Malo. I take the sugar to Dave and rejoin H.

  ‘It’s about this project,’ he says. ‘You remember in the pub the other night we agreed he needs something to get stuck into? Something to put his smell on? I think I’ve got just the thing.’

  Put his smell on. Very H.

  ‘And?’

  ‘I was talking to Mick Pain. Turns out he works on an old boat in the Camber Dock. Makes sense in a way. He’s a decent chippie.’

  The boat, H says, is a Brixham trawler, old as you like, lovely thing according to Mick. It’s owned by some charitable trust or other and they’re always looking for ways of trying to raise money to cover the upkeep.

  ‘I thought you said Front Line?’

  ‘I did. Here’s the deal. They can take six paying guests. They charge a grand each for a long weekend. We find six punters, five grand each, and off we go. We pay the trust people their whack and the rest goes to Front Line. That’s more than twenty grand if I’ve got the sums right. Not bad for a weekend’s work.’

  ‘Go where?’

  ‘France. Normandy. This is November. We push off on the tenth. The eleventh is Remembrance Day. We take lots of flowers. We look smart. We find a war memorial on one of those invasion beaches, and pay our respects. Then we have a beer or two and come home.’

  I nod. I see the logic. Clever.

  ‘It’s mustard,’ he says. ‘And the boy will be doing the work, keeping it together, keeping the show on the road. I’ve already mentioned it. He loves the idea. Big fucking smile on his face.’

  ‘Five thousand pounds is a lot. What makes you think people will pay that kind of money?’

  ‘You.’

  ‘Me?’

  ‘You’re coming, too. Star of the show. Three days with a movie queen? Cheap at the price. Can’t fail.’

  I’m speechless. I’ve never much liked boats, and I detest being the centre of that kind of attention. Neither reservation makes any difference. H will be booking the boat tomorrow. Everything else falls to Malo.

  ‘Do it for him,’ H urges me. ‘You can’t let the boy down.’

  I shake my head. Try to think of other excuses. But H is right. If Malo is to spend his days doing something useful then this sounds near-perfect.

  ‘This boat’s got a name?’

  ‘Yeah. Persephone.’

  ‘Persephone?’ I start to laugh. I did a Greek tragedy once on a bare clifftop stage near Land’s End.

  H wants to know what’s so funny.

  ‘You know about Persephone? You know who she was?’

  ‘Tell me.’

  ‘Queen of the Underworld.’

  H is staring at me. Then he shakes his head as if he can’t quite believe it.

  ‘Brilliant,’ he says. ‘You couldn’t make that up.’

  For the rest of Sunday we’re in a bit of a trance. H mutters about Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and Dave Munroe departs when his specially adapted van arrives to collect him. That evening, deep into a showing of a Clint Eastwood movie, I get an apologetic email from Rosa, my agent. The actor playing against me in Going Solo has recovered. The producer wants to start rehearsals on Tuesday. Can I manage that? I text her a yes and mention it to H once the film’s over. Either he doesn’t hear me properly or he doesn’t care.

  ‘Whatever,’ he says.

  On Monday, Jessie once again runs me to the station in Dorchester. I try and dream up ways of convincing her that Andy hasn’t got into my knickers but I sense she’s in no mood to listen. Only when I mention that I might be away for a while does she brighten up.

  ‘Take your time,’ she says. ‘We’ll look after Malo.’

  Back in London I phone my neuro-consultant and explain the issue over the insurance for the Montréal movie. He’s sympathetic but can do nothing until I’ve had the three-month scan. Only then can he be sure of my prognosis. I relay this news to Rosa, who isn’t best pleased. I suggest that maybe we can skate round it somehow. She says she’ll try.

  I spend the evening going through the BBC script. Rehearsals start the following morning in a basement studio in Broadcasting House. I’ve never done radio before and I like it a great deal. It feels very intimate and I love playing from a script I can see in front of me. The producer is young, fresh out of Cambridge, and he reminds me a little of Berndt in his earlier days. He has a delicate way of suggesting changes of nuance and tone in delivering particular lines and I quickly learn to trust him. By lunchtime we’ve made a great deal of progress and the afternoon goes so well that he thinks we might make a start on the recording a little earlier than planned.

  That night I take Evelyn to a play I know she wants to see at the Harold Pinter theatre. In a way it’s a thank-you for all the support she’s given me over the past few weeks and I know she’s touched that I’ve managed to lay hands on a couple of tickets. The play – Oslo – is excellent, richly deserving the rave reviews in every corner of the press, and she insists on treating me to a late supper in an Italian place she knows in Covent Garden. The place is buzzing and we linger over coffee and a couple of brandies after the meal. I tell her about Malo, and a little about the party at the weekend. A family reunion doesn’t really do it justice but that’s the story I’m sticking to. Evelyn might be incredibly well-read but deep down I suspect she’s a woman of tender sensibilities. I don’t want to shock her.

  ‘So what’s this Hayden person like?’

  It’s hard to do justice to H. In a way he belongs among the pages of a novel.

  ‘He’s larger than life,’ I tell her. ‘He’s bold and he’s loud and what you see is pretty much what you get. But Malo seems to think the world of him and that’s good enough for me.’

  ‘Malo’s happy down there?’

  ‘Very.’

  ‘That’s good. I’m glad.’

  She asks about my journalist friend. She’s met Mitch on a number of occasions and I think she approves. I tell her we met recently for lunch but again I spare her the details.

  ‘You don’t think you two might …?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Shame. I just wondered …’

  ‘I’m afraid not. Just now I’m trying very hard just to stay in one piece. You’ve no idea how wearying that can be.’

  ‘And the radio thing?’

  I tell her about today’s rehearsal. The sound effects, in particular, I find astonishing. Half close your eyes during various flashback sequences and you could have been living in the Blitz. This makes Evelyn laugh. She settles the bill and I splash out on a cab back to Holland Park. We say our goodbyes outside he
r door and I give her a hug.

  ‘Thank you,’ I say, ‘for everything.’

  When I let myself in my answerphone is flashing red in the darkness. I turn on the lights and press the play button to access the message. It’s Mitch. He’s been trying my phone all evening but I’ve obviously got the thing switched off. We need to talk. It sounds urgent.

  I reach for the phone, then have second thoughts. A check on my mobile reveals two more messages, both from Mitch, but he’s right, I’ve been unobtainable. I fetch a glass of water from the kitchen and make myself comfortable on the sofa. I know I should phone him. I know it’s what he wants. But there’s something inside me that is weary of playing the agent in enemy territory.

  I’m sure that H has been up to all kinds of mischief in his life, but as far as Malo and I are concerned he’s been nothing but generous. Is it really my job to hazard all that? No matter what Mitch tells me about UKIP, and the perils of Brexit, and all the rest of the doomster nonsense? Shouldn’t I simply be grateful that fate has given my son a father who really cares about him?

  I think of the trawler down in Portsmouth and my adolescent boy suddenly handed responsibilities he could never have dreamed of. A couple of weeks ago he was slumped on this same sofa, totally Zombied. Now he’s tasked with extracting a great deal of money from people he barely knows. That’s a steep learning curve, something Berndt would never have dreamed up, and when I’ve drained the glass I decide to call it a night. Mitch will have to wait. Maybe I’ll phone him first thing tomorrow. Maybe.

  I don’t. For whatever reason I fail to hear the alarm clock and by the time I’m properly awake I have barely an hour to make it to Central London. I swallow a bowl of cereal and skip my make-up. By the time I make it to the basement studio, the rest of the cast and production crew are already eyeballing the day’s first scene. I mutter my apologies and slip into my chair in the recording booth.

  My script is still on the music stand where I left it. I find my place and we kick off. Mercifully the male lead has a protracted coughing fit which gets us all wondering whether he’s really better. The producer fetches water from the nearby washroom. It doesn’t do the trick and so the producer calls a break while the male lead pops out to the nearest chemist for throat lozenges. With nothing better to do I ask the recording engineer if I can take a peek at his paper. It happens to be the Guardian.

  I briefly scan the first couple of pages and I’m about to turn to the arts section at the back when I take a second look at the photo beneath the main story on page four. It shows a UKIP politician snapped on his own front doorstep. The last time I saw Spencer Willoughby he was roaring drunk at H’s dinner table. Now he’s opened the door to a press photographer and he looks less than pleased.

  The accompanying story has been lifted from Mitch’s Finisterra website. It reveals that UKIP may be standing aside to give Tory candidates a clear run in the next general election. Not only that but sizeable donations to the Kippers are alleged to be ending up in Conservative Central Office. The most recent donation is alleged to be half a million pounds. More details on the website.

  My heart is sinking. I use my smart phone to access the full story from Finisterra. An old photo of H shows him inspecting a vast gin palace at the Southampton Boat Show. I’m not aware of any plans on H’s part to acquire this trophy motor cruiser but that’s far from the point. This single image has done untold damage to the Tory party, to UKIP, to Spencer Willoughby and to H himself. Anyone who suspects that democracy has been handed to the fat cats need look no further. My eye drifts to the Finisterra byline. The name of the journalist responsible for this damning exclusive? Mitch Culligan.

  Rehearsals begin again with the return of the male lead. Mid-morning, the producer calls a break. I step out of the studio and call Mitch. I’ve read the story again and I’m beyond angry.

  I ask him what the fuck’s going on.

  ‘I’ve been trying to contact you,’ he says.

  ‘I know.’

  ‘Since yesterday.’

  ‘Yes. So what did you want? Were you trying to warn me?’

  ‘I needed to let you know.’

  ‘And if I’d objected? Asked you to think again? Asked you not to publish?’

  ‘That might have been difficult.’

  ‘Difficult?’ I’m ready to explode. ‘I gave you that information on trust. You told me it was for your book. That’s what I believed. That’s what you said. A book we can sit down and talk about. In a book you can put all this stuff at arm’s length. Now I find it all over the fucking internet. And it’s wrong, by the way.’

  ‘What’s wrong?’

  ‘The figure you quoted. The half million pounds.’

  ‘That’s what you told me.’

  ‘I said “may”. I said “might”. I said I couldn’t be sure. If you want the real figure it’s five hundred quid. That might keep UKIP in beers for an evening or two but it’s not half a million. You should have checked.’

  The phone goes dead. He’s cut me off. Bastard. Then I start to wonder about H. Did he really mean five hundred? Or has he been stringing me along as well? These questions are impossible to answer, especially now. The studio manager is beckoning me inside. My day job awaits. Shit, I think. Shit. Shit. Shit.

  We break for lunch at one. So far cast and crew have shared adjoining tables at the Broadcasting House canteen. On this occasion I skip the Beeb salad and head out to the street where I can try and get my teeming thoughts in order. When I check my phone this time there are a couple of texts, both of them from people I’ve never heard of. I scroll slowly through them. They’re both demanding a call back, I’ve no idea why, then I pause on a name I recognize. Spencer Willoughby. The message is blunt. I’ve grassed him up. He thought he was in discreet company at H’s table and it turns out he wasn’t. Very shortly I may be hearing from his solicitor. Over and out.

  Worse and worse, I think. Little me in the middle of a media shit storm with nowhere to hide. I phone Mitch again. He apologizes at once for hanging up on me.

  ‘Someone more important to talk to?’

  ‘Something like that.’

  I ask him again why he chose to publish now and not later. This time he’s blaming his publisher.

  ‘They wanted advance publicity,’ he says, ‘for the book. It’s Theresa May’s big speech tomorrow, up in Manchester. We needed to get in her face.’

  Part of me marvels at the little party tricks these people get up to. Shafting the Tories. Winding up the Maybot. The rest of me is still very angry. Angry and betrayed.

  ‘Betrayed? How does that work?’

  ‘I trusted you.’

  ‘Trusted me how?’

  ‘To protect our interests. Mine and my son’s. I won’t bother you with the details but I dread to think where this thing is going to end.’

  ‘I don’t understand.’

  ‘Yes, you do. You asked me to keep my eyes open. To look around. To report back. And that’s exactly what I did because I assumed you’d act like any decent human being when it came to using any of this stuff. Instead, I find myself all over a national paper.’

  ‘Nonsense. You’re not mentioned anywhere.’

  ‘And you really think that matters? You really think there aren’t people out there who might draw the odd conclusion?’

  I tell him about the text from Willoughby.

  ‘So what’s he going to do about it?’

  ‘I’ve no idea. Until his solicitor tells me.’

  ‘He’s brought in the lawyers? Already?’

  ‘So he says.’

  ‘He’s bluffing. They all do that. Forget it.’

  Forget it? I explode on the phone. Tell Mitch what a snake he is. All the time I thought he had my best interests at heart. Now this.

  There’s a long silence. I’m watching a couple snatching a kiss across the road and for a moment I wonder whether Mitch has hung up on me again. Then he’s back on the line.

  ‘This is about
Prentice, isn’t it? And about Malo?’

  ‘I don’t know what you mean.’

  ‘Is he your son’s father? All I need is a yes or a no.’

  ‘Why? What would you do with either?’

  ‘That’s immaterial. I just want to get the story straight. Do I hear a yes?’

  ‘You hear nothing.’ It’s my turn to hang up.

  I feel like crying. I feel like setting off west and taking the long way home. I feel like spending the entire afternoon blanking myself off from my phone, from my army of new friends, and from anything else that can hurt me. Instead, as I must, I go back to the studio.

  By early evening, we’ve made a decent start on the recording. Another day and a half should see it finished. The male lead suggests a drink in a pub he knows nearby. Exhausted, I accept.

  He buys me a large gin and tonic. He settles into the chair across the table. He’s drinking Guinness.

  ‘You look terrible,’ he says.

  ‘Thanks.’

  ‘What’s the matter?’

  I shake my head. Everything is blurring. Everything is slipping out of focus. Unusually for a man, he’s carrying a handkerchief.

  ‘Here.’ He’s trying to be gentle. ‘Blow your nose.’

  I try and dry my tears. It’s hopeless. He slips into the chair beside me and I feel myself collapsing against him. Pathetic, I tell myself. Pathetic and unnecessary. He puts one arm round me, offering comfort. Mercifully, he doesn’t ask me what’s wrong.

  The great thing about London is that nobody else seems to care. I’m not talking about the male lead. I’m talking about everyone else in the pub. I’m sobbing my heart out and no one even looks up from their smart phones.

  When I’ve finally stopped crying and got some kind of grip I bring this to the attention of my new companion.

  ‘Don’t you think that’s remarkable?’ I ask him.

  He smiles and asks me whether I’d prefer otherwise. Anonymity is bred deep in this city’s bones. Speaking personally, he thinks that’s rather wonderful.

  ‘But you’re an actor,’ I say. ‘And we’re all show-offs. It’s in the job description. The last place we need to be is off the fucking radar.’