A Fall from Grace

by Robert Barnard

  “Oh—before you get her, I believe you’ve been talking to the Vickerys—Dwayne and his mother.”

  “I was just going to tell you that,” lied Charlie. “I know the boy from the visit I made to the drama class at the high school here. You must have heard the rumor that’s going around the village: that my father-in-law’s death is connected—I suppose you could almost say inspired—by the death of one of the characters in a play put on by the drama stream.”

  “I had heard,” said Costello, with contempt in his voice. “I think more than enough has been said about those kids. As I probably made clear when we talked.”

  Charlie’s face was impassive, and he continued regardless. “I was alerted to the possibility of gossip by an odd visit I had from Harvey Buckworth, who is one of the stream’s teachers. I managed to get out of Dwayne what was worrying Buckworth, which he never came clean about himself. I told Mrs. Vickery it all seemed very far-fetched, and she really shouldn’t be keeping her son off school as a result of loose talk such as this.”

  “I’m not worried about her bloody son. All this talk will do is send people off on the wrong track. By now ninety percent of the village will be convinced it was a murder, whereas accident or suicide are much more likely explanations.”

  “I’d agree with you about accident—heart attack, leading to a fall. No indication of that, though, in the postmortem?”

  “None so far.”

  “But I can’t agree about suicide. No one who knew my father-in-law will believe he could consider robbing the world of his incomparable gifts by taking his own life.”

  “Maybe. You could be a bit biased, don’t you think? There could be reasons we know nothing about. Anyway, I’m relying on you keeping out of this, like we said. It’s probably not a case in any sensational sense of the word, but the last thing we need is Leeds sticking its nose into our business. Now, can I talk to your wife?”

  Charlie put down the phone without saying another word, and called Felicity. He listened in to her end of the conversation, and his wife reacted exactly as he had done. He hoped that Ben Costello was more tactful and less aggressive in his part of the dialogue than he had been with him.

  While they were still talking he went out and got into his car. On an impulse he drove toward Leeds by way of the road where Chris Carlson had set up his campaign headquarters. The office had had a coat of paint around the windows and on the shop board above the windows and doors. So far it was blank, but in the window there was a smart homemade poster simply shouting CARLSON FOR MAYOR. As he drove past he saw the boy whom Chris had called Peter wielding an enthusiastic paintbrush inside the shop. He stopped his car and went back. The door was open and he stood a moment looking.

  “Hi, Peter. You having fun?”

  The boy turned round and grinned.

  “Yeah. I really like painting. I’m thinking of doing it for a living.”

  Chris solving people’s life problems for them again!

  “Is Chris around?”

  “Not now. He will be. He’s gone to Radio Bradford to tell them about the mayor thing.”

  “The mayor thing?”

  “Like how it ought to be elected, how it hasn’t yet been tried properly and how the other system just produces party hacks.”

  So much for playing it softly and slowly until Archie Skelton had been lowered into his grave. Chris went his own path, that was for sure.

  “He’s taught you all the words, hasn’t he?” said Charlie mildly.

  “He tried out on me yesterday what he was going to say. He made it sound good. I don’t really know what a hack is, though.”

  “It’s somebody who just does all the dreary work and doesn’t have an original idea in him.”

  “Oh . . . Does Chris have original ideas?”

  “Yes, I’d say he does.”

  “He’s not doing what you said about lying low. When people come in here—curious-like—he gives them all this stuff about new ideas and party hacks.”

  “Well, he doesn’t have to take my advice. What’s the reaction?”

  “It varies. Some are enthusiastic, some less so. Somebody told him he shouldn’t speak ill of the dead . . . When he comes back he’s going to paint ‘Carlson for Mayor’ on the shop board over the door. I’ve got a lot of posters here if anyone comes in and seems like a supporter.”

  “Well, well. Chris could be right or wrong. He’s so bloody charming he’ll probably win over the doubters. I hope he’s paying you.”

  “Yeah. He’s paying me ten pounds a morning for painting. I like it. It’s better than school.”

  Charlie didn’t doubt it. He did wonder whether Chris was wise to employ a boy obviously bunking school and pay him well under the minimum wage.

  When he got into work he rang Felicity before getting down to a new case involving teenagers shoplifting on a council estate.

  “Did you listen to Radio Bradford this morning?” he asked her.

  “No, I listened to the Today program till I got fed up with that bossy woman, then I switched to Radio Three.”

  “Never mind. Chris was on, though—talking about keeping the mayor’s job elective. I wondered how it had gone.”

  “How do you know he was on?”

  “I talked to the boy at his campaign headquarters. So far as I can see, Chris is going all out from the word go.”

  “Isn’t that what you advised him against?”

  “Yes. But who takes advice from a policeman? I wouldn’t. I’ll hold my tongue in future. How did the conversation go with Ben Costello?”

  “I think I told him pretty much what you told him.”

  “You did. I listened to the first part.”

  “Be my guest. So what do you want to know?”

  “Was he aggressive, like he was with me?”

  “Not aggressive. Sort of contemptuous. There was a sneer in his voice, like he despises all women. Probably sleeps around so he can share his contempt more widely. I do hope you get this case right, Charlie, and he gets it wrong.”

  “I’ll do my best to oblige. Getting him to acknowledge there is, or could well be, a case here would be a start.”

  He could hear Felicity thinking.

  “I can see the problem of proving a murderous attack. And what else could justify spending much time or money on it? And getting into DNA testing will probably take a lot of both and still not give the police anything conclusive.”

  “Maybe.”

  “Seems to me if Ben Costello has his way there will be no case to investigate, and if it gets to DNA testing there will still be no case to investigate . . . Going back to Chris. There’s something that’s been jiggling round in the back of my mind for a while now, and I’ve finally brought it to the front and worked out why it’s been bothering me.”

  “Oh? What is it?”

  “It’s something I forgot to tell you in all the . . . fuss. I had a visit from Alison the morning after the carol service. The day Dad died, as it turned out. And the topic of Chris’s ‘mission’—if that’s what you call it—came up. We talked about how people found it helpful to talk over their problems with him, and Alison said, ‘Chris loves it all. It’s part of the healing process.’ And I think even at the time something clicked in my brain.”

  “Ye-e-es.”

  “And I’ve just realized what clicked, because it was as if she was saying it was part of the healing process for Chris.”

  Charlie thought that over.

  “Certainly when you said it now it sounded a bit odd. But that’s totally out of context, of course.”

  “But, Charlie, when you think about it, Chris usually talks over people’s problems and dilemmas, but as a rule there’s no obvious healing process for the people who come to him.”

  “Hmmm. Maybe not as a rule. But say there was someone who’d had a big tragedy in their life—say a bereavement—I could imagine them coming to Chris, and him helping them to come to terms with it.”

  “Maybe . . .
Charlie, how much do we know about Chris?”

  “I should think I know exactly what you know.”

  “It’s not much, then, is it. I’d like to know: Where does he come from? Where did he practice as a GP? Where was he a hospital consultant? Did he really give up his job because he was fed up with conditions in the National Health Service?”

  “That’s what he told us. In general we know what he’s told us, and we don’t know what he hasn’t told us.”

  “But wouldn’t you think that by now we’d know where he grew up? Know where he practiced medicine? I do.”

  “So do I, though you’ve got to remember he has a very neutral, middle-of-the-road accent. It gives nothing away. I shout London, he shouts nothing.”

  “He says nothing too. I know it has nothing to do with my dad’s death, but I think we should learn more about Chris Carlson.”

  CHAPTER 12

  The Man from Nowhere

  An opportunity to learn more of Chris’s background came a couple of days later, when he knocked on the door of Charlie and Felicity’s house in Walsh Street and came in, flourishing a bit of paper in Felicity’s face.

  “I say, I’m sorry to trouble you, but could you take a look at this? There’s a lot of pernickety old retired people around here who worry about ‘who’ when it should be ‘whom.’ ”

  “I don’t know anyone who worries about that any longer. Languages change, and ‘whom’ is approaching its sell-by date. But there are people who feel very strongly about ‘may’ and ‘might,’ not to mention ‘lay’ and ‘lie.’ So what is this, then?”

  “It’s a sort of election address. An appeal to the voters. This is the bit where I tell them about myself.”

  Felicity had expected something of the sort, and then took the statement over to the sofa, where Charlie was sitting reading The Times, and together they went through it. This was the sort of opportunity that Charlie was longing for.

  CHRIS CARLSON—THIS IS WHO I AM

  I have lived in Slepton Edge now for three years, and thanks to the warm welcome I’ve received from the people I feel already that I belong here. Now I want to offer myself for the second time in the election for Mayor of Halifax, because I am anxious for this chance to serve the citizens of the town as a whole.

  I resigned from my hospital job because I saw which way the National Health Service was going: the family doctor was a dying breed; at hospitals even those with serious illnesses were treated on a conveyor-belt system. Worse is threatened now. Monster medical centers will replace the old surgeries and health centers. They will have people who can treat every imaginable illness, but there will be nobody there who can look at the whole person behind his medical problems. The same is true in so many areas: in education schools have got bigger, and each pupil becomes a tiny speck on a screen. In crime the policemen toil away producing statistics. They’re never seen on the streets.

  We need a new way, where the individual comes first.

  VOTE FOR ME ON FEB —!

  “A lot of people won’t like ‘his’ for ‘his or her,’ you know,” said Felicity.

  “I thought that was grammatically OK,” said Chris.

  “We’re not talking grammar, we’re talking people’s sensibilities.”

  “Is this the statement you put out last time?” asked Charlie.

  “Well, along the same lines. Don’t you like it?”

  “I suppose since it worked last time it must be OK. But I’d have said this isn’t a CV at all—not a comprehensive bio. It doesn’t tell the voters anything about you or what you’ve done. It’s more a policy statement, or a rallying cry.”

  “But surely they will all want to know where I stand?”

  “First of all they’ll want to know about you. How old are you? Where do you come from? How long did you practice medicine? How do you make your living now?”

  Chris screwed up his face.

  “A lot of those things would act against me, I should think. If I proclaim the fact that I’m a Southerner, even a reformed one, they’ll think of me as a carpetbagger. Then again, what will they think if I say I earn my living by selling pictures? I’d guess they’ll class me as the next thing to a door-to-door salesman or a gypsy. I think there’s a lot to be said for vagueness.”

  Charlie shook his head, with the certainty of one who has been much longer in the North.

  “But as the campaign hots up you’ll be forced to tell them more. The big parties will make sure of that. If it’s not them, it’ll be the punters. You’ll be glad-handing it in the street, or raising your pint mug in the pub, and someone will ask you where you came from, what your father did for a living, how you met Alison.”

  “Why should it matter to them whether I come from X or Y?”

  “It fills in the picture.”

  “What if I told them to mind their own business?”

  “They’ll say it is their business. You made it so by standing for election. And you’ll have lost one and probably more votes.”

  Chris stood, his fingers rubbing his chin, considering.

  “Well, I’ll think it over.”

  “Do,” said Charlie, keeping the conversation light. “There’s a thin line between not telling people about something and concealing it. I’m sure you’ve no intention of concealing, but if you ask me it would be dangerous to seem to be doing it.”

  “Good point. Well, thanks for your help. See you soon.”

  And he went off bearing the biography that wasn’t really a biography at all. Neither Charlie nor Felicity was surprised a few days later to see copies of it on the counter of the village supermarket with a “his or her” inserted, but otherwise unchanged.

  “Well, he did only come to consult you on the wording,” said Charlie.

  “True. But it’s odd, isn’t it, that he claims to be the people’s candidate, but he’s not listening to anyone.”

  It was next day, from police headquarters in Leeds, that Charlie rang his old boss, ex-superintendent Oddie, now retired and running a model train shop in a shopping mall near Hebden Bridge. The voice rang out louder and livelier than when Oddie had been burdened by his regular job.

  “Charlie! Wonderful to hear from you! I was going to ring you when I read in the local paper of your bereavement, but then I thought that you and Felicity were hardly likely to be bowed down with grief, so I didn’t know what tone of voice to adopt.”

  “Ever the sensitive cop,” said Charlie, grinning with pleasure at reestablishing contact. “No, we’re not bowed down, but the fact that the cause of death is not yet established is troubling us.”

  “Really? I thought he’d just stumbled over, after perhaps a glass or two too much at Sunday lunch.”

  “You could still be right. I’m willing to bet that wasn’t the case, though that’s sheer guesswork-cum-experience, and I’m not letting on to the local Halifax cop, who doesn’t seem interested in the murder possibility. Mike, does your retirement give you any spare time? Are you interested in using your police contacts to find out a few things for us?”

  “Sure, I’d enjoy it. But what’s stopping you—? Oh, of course. It’s the Rupert Coggenhoe business and you’re too close, right?”

  “Right. No question of my being involved in any way at all. And with the Halifax man being in a ‘you keep off my territory’ mood, I’m having to be very careful. I’d rather not speak on the phone. Would it be all right if I came over?”

  “Look forward to it. Do we make a date and time?”

  “Difficult, work being what it is. But there’s no great urgency. I’ll drop by in the next few days.”

  But as it turned out it was the next day when Charlie found himself in Luddenden, and when his job was done he drove in the direction of Hebden Bridge and the disused mill just outside it, which had smartened itself up into a collection of boutiques and specialist shops. He parked his car, then lingered over the shops nearest the entrance, all aiming to be Harvey Nicks if only they had the money and the
flair. Five minutes later he came upon Oddie’s Trains, tucked away but probably well-known to a small and monomaniacal clique of customers. Charlie had to admit he was enchanted by the display in the window of the Rocket, the Royal Scot, and the latest train in the Virgin squad, of which so much was promised. He was a little boy again by the time Mike spotted him from inside and came out to drag him over the threshold.

  “Come in and have a look at something. I’ve chosen the most suitable train for the four-year-old daughter of a rising policeman, and it’s a present, so you can’t quarrel with my choice. It’s good to see you, Charlie. No starry-eyed little customers at the moment, so it’s ideal. Why don’t you sit down and tell me what you want done.”

  When they were settled down around the counter, surrounded by steam and diesel engines drawing passenger or freight stock of ancient and modern design, Charlie got straight to business.

  “You guessed it was about Coggenhoe’s death. I don’t like calling him Dad, and it’s something I never did to his face. I’ll tell you right away that the connection with what I want you to get on to is almost nonexistent, but even so, putting you on to this chap is a little bit distasteful. The man has become a friend since we moved to Slepton Edge. In fact, he and his wife are our best friends there. His name is Chris Carlson, he’s early to midthirties, wife expecting. He’s a retired medical consultant, or perhaps one just taking time out. He’s dabbling in local politics, taking a totally independent line, and not doing too badly. Makes a sort of living by painting local scenes—solid middle-of-the-road kinds of pictures, quite attractive.”

  “I think I registered him when he did quite well in the election for mayor earlier this year. He didn’t sound a middle-of-the-road kind of person.”

  “He’s not. If he’s anything it’s a maverick. The other thing that marks him off is that he’s become a sort of father confessor figure for Slepton—or an agony aunt, if you prefer. He’s so likeable and sympathetic that people come to him with their problems.”

  “Is that what Rupert Coggenhoe did?”

  “No—not at all. Chris did try to offer him advice—not his usual practice, but he knew we were worried about him—but he was slapped down.”