The Circle

by Peter Lovesey

  'The woman who had the letter published.'

  'Jessie. She's a widow. She was married to someone quite important in the church, an archdeacon, I believe. That's only one down from a bishop. Oh, and I didn't mention Naomi.'

  'X-ray eyes?'

  'What makes you say that?'

  'She saw right through Edgar Blacker and didn't mind saying so. She was the one who spoke up first, saying he was a bit flaky, raised too many hopes.'

  'That's true, now I recall it.' She stared at him for a moment in silence. 'You don't miss a thing.'

  'I bet you didn't put what she said in the minutes.'

  She coloured. 'It was off the cuff. I can't put down every word.' She handed him the cassette. 'But this will tell you everything that happened the evening Mr Blacker spoke to us.'

  'Thanks. And what about yourself?'

  She seemed surprised by the question. 'Me?'

  'Do you have a job, apart from the charity?'

  'I'm a chartered accountant, semi-retired. I wouldn't call it a job. I don't even have an office. I go on site and do the books for a few local businesses I've known for years.'

  'Is one of them a publisher?'

  A frown. 'No.'

  It was worth asking. 'Edgar Blacker wasn't a client, then?'

  'Certainly not. They're all old friends like my chiropodist, my dentist and the shop where I buy most of my clothes.'

  'You get some perks, then?'

  'Just goodwill. You won't get an accountant to admit to "perks", as you put it.'

  'I've heard of this. It's the barter economy. Like the Middle Ages. You have a skill to offer and so do your friends and neighbours. You help each other out and no money changes hands. Neat idea. If I had a useful talent, I'd be in there getting my hair cut for nothing and fruit cake at the weekend.'

  'Putting accountants like me out of a job.'

  Bob grinned. 'Hadn't thought of it like that.' His eyes held hers for a moment while he summed up what he'd learned so far. 'So your life is pretty busy with the charity shop and the accounting. Plus the circle. You've been the secretary from the beginning, right?'

  She nodded.

  'Well placed to know everyone in the circle?'

  'I suppose so.'

  He gave her a long look. 'All right, love. Cards on the table. Out of that lot, who could have started the fire that killed Blacker?'

  She shook her head. 'No, no. I refuse to speculate. It would be abusing my position.'

  'If I was another woman you'd speak out, no problem.'

  'That's different.'

  'I don't see why. You want me to play detective and you won't even give me the dope on the suspects.'

  She put her hand primly against her chest. 'I didn't say anything about playing detective. All I said was that Maurice could do with someone to speak up on his behalf.'

  Fair comment, he thought. It's Thomasine who wants me to play Sherlock Holmes.

  He tried a more subtle approach. 'Speaking up is no use unless we put someone else in the frame. Look at it another way. Who gets a clean sheet from you?'

  She sighed as a kind of protest, yet was persuaded to go down this route. 'Well, I can't really imagine any of the women doing such a thing. Dagmar is very proper, and so is Jessie. It wouldn't cross their minds. Naomi may be outspoken, but what you see is what you get, as they say. She'll tell you if something is wrong rather than acting on it secretly.'

  'And I suppose the dumb blonde isn't committed enough?'

  'Sharon? She's on the fringe really. I can't think what motive she would have. She hasn't written anything that I'm aware of, so she had no reason to be upset by the publisher.'

  'That leaves Thomasine.'

  She shot him a fierce look. 'No it doesn't. I can't see her harming a soul. She's a warm person, very friendly.'

  'True. We're down to the blokes, then. Leaving aside Maurice, who have we got?'

  'I won't be drawn,' Miss Snow said. 'I don't understand men. There's always the potential for violence in the male psyche, so far as I can tell.'

  'Basil?'

  She smiled, and she was drawn. 'Well, he's a sweetie. No, I can't see him as a fire-raiser.'

  'Zach?'

  'I said I won't be drawn.'

  'Anton? Tudor?'

  'I'm getting tired of this. Has it occurred to you, Bob, that the fire may have been started by someone from outside the circle? Edgar Blacker had his finger in other pies.'

  Another zinger from Miss Snow. He'd focused so much on Blacker's visit to the circle and his death the next night that he'd failed to look elsewhere.

  6

  The only way for writers to meet is to share a quick pee over a common lampfost.

  Cyril Connolly, The Unquiet Grave (1945)

  After he'd left, Bob still found it difficult to wrench his thoughts away from the circle. He asked himself if all this concern of Miss Snow's was driven by guilt. Suppose she'd started the fire that killed Edgar Blacker, planned it as a clean killing and been horrified when the police pulled in sweet old Maurice? She'd made it clear she wanted Bob in there batting for Maurice, but not doing the job of a detective. She'd be happy if Maurice was released without charge and no one took the rap.

  She had a will of iron. He could imagine her getting a fixed idea that Blacker had to be stiffed. And carrying it out. But what was her motive? The way she'd told it, Blacker hadn't rejected her book on the Snow dynasty. He'd looked at the script and made encouraging noises. No, if she was the killer, there had to be some bigger reason.

  He went into work and did the late shift, which meant he wasn't home until almost midnight. Sue had gone to bed and left something in a saucepan that looked murky but smelt all right. He lit the gas under it and checked the answerphone. The one message was from Thomasine: 'Thanks for looking after me last night. The less said about that, the better. The reason I'm calling is I have some news of Maurice. Bad news. I'm afraid they've charged him with murder. Can you get back to me?'

  Charged him, had they?

  Tomorrow, he decided.

  He was tired, but reckoned he ought to run that video, so he opened a can of lager, rescued his supper before it congealed and took it into the living room.

  Sue must have been watching something with the volume turned right up because the sound hit him like a plane coming in, and it was only the voices of the circle gathering in the New Park Centre. He reached for the remote.

  Snatches of conversation came and went. Miss Snow was trying to persuade Tudor to give the vote of thanks. Anton had been to the doctor again. Whoever was holding the camera was making mischief with the zoom, picking out long legs in white lace tights that turned out to be Sharon's, then Thomasine at a window taking a crafty smoke, and Basil checking his hairpiece in front of a picture. Everyone except Maurice and Zach came into shot. The odds were on Zach being the cameraman.

  'He's publishing Maurice,' Jessie was saying.

  'Can't be too choosy, then,' Thomasine said from the window.

  'What did you say?' Dagmar said.

  'Joke, dear. Maurice deserves to be published. And there's a market for his kind of book, real crime.'

  'Personally I wish he'd picked some more tasteful topic,' Jessie said.

  'Such as?'

  'I don't know. The royal family?'

  'Give me strength,' Thomasine said.

  'They call them three-six-fours in the library,' Tudor was heard saying out of shot.

  'Who - the royals?'

  'No, the people who read real crime. Three-six-four: Dewey Decimal System. Got it? Never linger round that section. Give it a wide berth.'

  'What nonsense!' Dagmar said.

  'I'm only passing it on, for what it's worth,' Tudor said. He was now in shot, and wearing a black velvet jacket and bow tie. 'I'm on familiar terms with the librarians. They all know me.'

  'That I can believe.'

  Miss Snow crossed in front of the camera. 'He's arrived. We ought to be seated.'

 
Some blurring of the images followed. A short break in the filming must have happened, because the next thing in focus was Maurice standing out front, addressing the audience. '. . . a special pleasure for me as one of his authors - shortly to be, at any rate - and I hope others in this room will be joining his list before long. As you know, he generously invited us to submit our work for consideration and a number of you took him up on the offer. Whilst we all understand the constraints on publishers, we hope very much, Edgar, that you will give us some pointers this evening on what you look for in a script. Members of the circle, please welcome Edgar Blacker.'

  Polite applause, and a close shot of the murder victim. Short, with thick, mustard-coloured hair, and a tanned face suggestive of a winter holiday. Dark eyes looking over gold-rimmed specs. Corduroy jacket in dark red, striped shirt and cravat. Image was important to this man. On the table in front of him was a stack of typescripts.

  'I'm going to begin,' he said in a high-pitched voice, 'by putting you out of your misery. I'm hugely impressed by everything I've read in this sample of your work. In fact, I will go so far as to say that I could see myself publishing almost all of it. I don't know why the standard of your circle is so high. I confess that when Maurice asked me to look at some scripts I was not over keen. Is that a fair reflection, Maurice?'

  Beside him, Maurice gave a little twitch of the shoulders that could mean anything.

  'What I was given turned out to be a most exciting collection of scripts ranging from fantasy to family history, from verse to vegetables. No, don't smile. Publishing is a vast, all-inclusive industry and no topic is too humble to get into print. One of my bestselling books is nothing more than photos showing dogs that look exactly like their owners.'

  He smiled, trying for a response, and this time didn't get one. If the audience were of the same mind as Bob, they were too busy deciding which breed the speaker was. A Dandie Dinmont?

  'Well, I don't own a dog, so I'd better tell you something about myself. I've always been employed in publishing of some description, starting as tea boy at Eyre and Spottiswoode - a fine house no longer in being - and then as a packer in one of the big distributors' warehouses in Birmingham. My first editorial job was with a magazine publisher in Essex, working on several tides. After five or six years of that I got into educational books with Ward Lock. Loved it. I'd really found what I wanted to do. Stayed publishing school books until I'd saved enough to start my own business, the Blacker List, as I called it, and the rest is history.'

  History that passed me by, Bob thought.

  In the pause, the camera panned across the room. You can tell a lot from the backs of people's heads. The circle were taking in the spiel, but they didn't really want to know about Blacker's career. They couldn't wait to find out if he was going to offer contracts.

  He started talking about the stuff he published, reading from a catalogue, and it was clear from the fidgeting in the audience that he was losing them.

  Fast forward, Bob decided.

  When he pressed play the interesting bit was under way.

  '. . . an exquisite series of articles on gardening. Is the author here tonight?'

  One cautious hand was raised. Basil was checking his hairpiece with the other.

  'Well, sir, as you must be aware, gardening is big business. I like your approach. It's informative without being too technical for the average man.'

  'Really?' Basil was almost purring.

  'We'd need illustrations, of course, full colour on art paper, and you must provide a lot more text, because readers like value for money, but I'm confident we could have a success with your book. Do you have a nice garden of your own?'

  'Not bad,' Basil said.

  'Has it been on television?'

  'Good Lord, no.'

  'We can fix that for you. I have some contacts in the media.'

  Basil sounded alarmed. 'It isn't up to that standard.'

  'But you can make it so. Wonderful publicity. Free advertising, you see. We small publishers can't afford to advertise, so we take every opportunity we can. You'll be surprised how good your garden looks on the screen. We might also link up with the National Gardens Scheme and open it to the public.'

  'It's tiny,' Basil said.

  'That won't put off the visitors if we give it a good write-up.'

  'They'd have to come through the house.' Basil was in danger of being steamrollered. He turned to look at someone else in the audience.

  Then Naomi spoke up. 'I'm not having people through my house.'

  'And you are ... ?' Blacker said.

  'His partner.'

  Which was something Bob had not discovered until now. Basil and Naomi, green fingers linked with gimlet eyes, not a pairing he expected. He could imagine the look she was giving the speaker.

  In a clever attempt to divert her, Blacker said, 'And did you submit a script, madam?'

  "The Sussex Witchcraft Trials.'"

  'Oh, I remember. Admirable. Timely, too. Right now there's a blossoming of interest in the occult.'

  'Did you read it?'

  'Enthralling. Meticulously researched. I was unaware such things happened in this peaceful part of England.'

  'What things?'

  'Well, the witchcraft.'

  'The witchcraft didn't happen. That's the whole point of the book. They were innocent women.'

  Blacker made a clucking sound. 'But of course.'

  'Are you sure you read it?' Naomi was beginning to sound like a witchfinder herself.

  'Absolutely'

  'They were the seventeenth-century counterparts of the district nurse and the pharmacist.'

  'Thank you for making the point so clearly. I can see splendid opportunities here for television interviews with nurses and pharmacists asking them if they've ever thought of themselves as witches. Oh, I like it. We must speak more about this book,' Blacker said, grabbing another script and turning the pages. 'I thought these poems were highly original. Who is Thomasine?'

  A hand waved just in front of him.

  'Poetry, to be candid, is not a big seller. However . . . these, I thought, may well be worth developing. Wry, thought-provoking, evocative and - if I may be so bold -sometimes sensuous. It's a winning combination. Have you been published before?'

  'Only in my school magazine,' Thomasine said, 'and I was up before the head when she read it.'

  There was some laughter at this.

  'Saucy stuff, then?'

  'That wasn't how the head put it.'

  'Didn't she spot your potential?'

  'No. She thought some boy had.'

  More laughter.

  This was becoming Thomasine's show, and Blacker smiled, but without real amusement. 'I'll say this. Properly edited, pruned of a few excesses, your poems could do rather well. A tweak here, a spot of fine-tuning there. We'd need to be selective. Not all of them work so well as the best, but neither did Wordsworth's. I would envisage a series of slim volumes on various themes.'

  'Suits me,' Thomasine said.

  He picked up another script. "The Snows of Yesteryear". An extraordinary project, taking a group of moderately well-known people with nothing more in common than their surname, and recounting their lives in detail. I have to say that it gripped me from the beginning. There's a touch of Lytton Strachey about this concept. Yet the author must be excessively modest, because he or she doesn't disclose his or her name.'

  Maurice the chair said, 'She's our secretary, Miss Snow.'

  'How fitting. I should have guessed.'

  Miss Snow hadn't looked up from the minutes she was taking.

  'Have you read the Strachey book, Eminent Victorians, Miss Snow?'

  She shook her head without raising it.

  'Then I can recommend it. He casts his net a little wider than you, but his refusal to be impressed by the famous folk he writes about is worth examining. It is clear that you know your subjects intimately, yet one has to be careful not to turn it into hagiography. Are you familiar
with the term?'

  A voice - not Miss Snow's - said, 'Lives of the saints.' It was Anton.

  'Thank you. Actually I was addressing Miss Snow.'

  'She's writing everything down,' Anton said. 'She can't take the minutes and talk to you at the same time.'

  'I see. Well, kindly take this down, Miss Snow. With some judicious rewriting, more light and shade, a little irony here and there, I would expect to market this book as a breakthrough in biography, a whole new approach. I can see it getting reviewed in all the upmarket papers.'

  She nodded her appreciation.

  He reached for another script. He wasn't wasting time. 'Ah. The work of fantasy.'

  'Tudor's autobiography?' Thomasine said, and there were more suppressed laughs.

  'I think not,' Blacker said. 'This is a major work of the imagination by someone who calls himself Zach.'

  The image on the screen jerked.

  'That's me,' Zach was heard to say.

  'Your real name?'

  'Yep.'

  'Useful for a fantasy writer. Well, Zach, are you published already?'

  'No. This is my first attempt.'

  'Congratulations, then. You've produced a work of epic proportions.'

  'Too long?'

  'No, no. I love it. What an undertaking, and how inventive. You've created your own extraordinary world, and made it real for the reader. Your warrior hero - what is he called?'

  'Madrigor.'

  'Yes. He's a superb creation. Larger than life, yet with enough of humanity about him to engage our sympathy. His adventures have all the excitement of Sir Walter Scott with the added element of science fiction. Have you read Tolkien?'

  'Yes.'

  'Like him?'

  'He's the king.'

  'All I can say is that you could very well become the heir to his millions of readers. I can't remember coming across a first novel of such promise. It may take time, but I have every confidence.'

  Thomasine said, 'How will he reach millions of readers if you can't afford to advertise?'

  'He'll sell the film rights. This story is so visual, I can picture the scenes already.'

  'He'll need an agent if he's getting into film deals.'

  'Not necessarily. I can handle that.'