Dead famous

by Ben Elton

  ‘Poor girl. What a way to spend your last few minutes, trying not to puke up all over people in a tiny plastic tent. God, she must have been drunk.’

  ‘She was. The report says eight times over the limit.’

  ‘That’s pretty seriously arsehole — legless. No wonder she was having trouble keeping it down.’

  ‘The report also says that her tongue was bruised.’

  ‘Bruised…You mean bitten?’

  ‘No, bruised, reminiscent of someone forcing a thumb into her mouth.’

  ‘Ugh…So somebody wanted to shut her up?’

  ‘That would seem the obvious interpretation.’

  ‘Perhaps that’s why she was gagging, because someone had their thumb in her mouth. No wonder she wanted to get out of that sweatbox in such a hurry.’

  ‘Yes, although if someone in that box had put a hand into Kelly’s mouth sufficiently hard to bruise her tongue, you’d think that someone would have heard her complain, wouldn’t you?’

  DAY THIRTY-TWO. 7.30 p.m.

  As the week went on the group began to get the hang of the ballet, and footage of them performing ‘The Flight of the Swan’ in unison, first out of the pool and then in it, became the most expensive four-minute item of video tape in the history of television. Besides the ballet, there was of course the simple drama of the inmates’ coexistence in the house for the viewing public to pore over and enjoy. Each of the inmates was forever looking at the others, eyeing them as potential murderers…as actual murderers. Every glance took on a sinister significance, sly, sideways looks, long piercing stares, hastily averted gazes. When properly edited, every twitch of every facial muscle on every housemate could be made to look like either a confession or an accusation of murder. And then there were the knives. Flush with money, Geraldine now maintained six cameramen in the camera run corridors at all times, ten at mealtimes. And the sole brief of most of these camera operators was to watch out for knives. Every time a housemate picked one up, to spread some butter, chop a carrot, carve a slice of meat, the cameras were there. Zooming in as the fingers closed around the hilt, catching the bright flash as the overhead strip- lighting bounced off the blade. The Peeping Tom psychologist stopped trawling the footage for flirtatious body language and started searching for the murderous variety. He was soon joined by a criminologist and an ex-chief constable, and together they discussed at length which of the seven suspects looked most at ease with a knife in their hand.

  DAY THIRTY-TWO. 11.00 p.m.

  The evenings were the worst times for the housemates. It was then, with nothing much to do, that they had time to think about their situation. When they spoke about it to each other, which was not often, they agreed that the worst aspect of it all was the not knowing. The rules of the game had not changed — they were allowed no contact with the outside world — and since their brief bewildering day in the eye of the storm they had heard and seen absolutely nothing. The sound of madness had been abruptly and completely turned off. It was as if a door had been slammed, which of course it had. Collectively and alone they longed for information. What was happening? Even Dervla with her secret source of information was in the dark. She had wondered whether her message-writer would stop after the murder, but he hadn’t.

  ‘They all think you’re beautiful, and so do L’

  ‘You look tired. Don’t worry. I love you.’’ One day Dervla risked mentioning the murder, pretending that she was talking to herself in the mirror.

  ‘Oh, God,’ she said to her reflection.

  ‘Who could have done this thing?’ The mirror did not tell her much.

  ‘Police don’t know,’ it said.

  ‘Police are fools.’

  DAY THIRTY-THREE. 9.00 a.m.

  The forensic technician brought the report on the sheet that had shrouded the killer to Coleridge personally.

  ‘Glad of the opportunity of a break from the lab,’ he said.

  ‘We don’t get out much and it’s not often that anything involving celebrities comes our way. I don’t suppose there’s any way you could blag me a trip behind the scenes, is there? Just next time you’re going. I’d love to see how they do it.’

  ‘No, there isn’t,’ Coleridge replied shortly.

  ‘Please tell me about the sheet.’

  ‘Absolute mess. Tons of conflicting DNA. Dead skin, bit of saliva, other stuff. You know sheets.’ Coleridge nodded and the technician continued.

  ‘I think they must have been sharing this one, or else they all slept together, because there’s strong evidence of four different male individuals on it, one of whom is particularly well represented. There are also traces of a fifth man. I presume that the prominent DNA represents the four boys left in the house and the fifth is Woggle. Let’s face it, he’d leave a pretty strong trail, wouldn’t he? Of course, I can’t be sure without samples from them all to compare it with.’

  ‘All of them? On that one sheet?’

  ‘So it would seem.’

  DAY THIRTY-THREE. 11.00 a.m.

  It’s eleven o’clock on day thirty-three, said Andy the narrator, ‘and the housemates have been summoned to the confession box in order to give a sample of their DNA. The police request is voluntary but none of the housemates refuse.’

  ‘Charming,’ Dervla observed drily.

  ‘Today’s task is to attempt to eliminate yourself from a murder investigation.’ Gazzer seemed disappointed.

  ‘I thought I was going to have to have one off the wrist and give ‘em a splash of bollock champagne,’ he said, ‘but they only wanted a scrape of skin.’

  DAY THIRTY-FOUR. 8.00 p.m.

  Layla stumbled away from the church, her eyes half blinded with tears. The priest had asked her what had made her feel the need of a faith that she had rejected when she was fifteen.

  ‘Father, I have a death on my conscience.’

  ‘What death? Who has died?’

  ‘A girl, a beautiful girl, an innocent I despised. I hated her, Father. And now she’s dead and I ought to be released. But it’s worse, she’s everywhere, and they’re calling her a saint.’

  ‘I don’t understand. Who was this girl? Who’s calling her a saint?’

  ‘Everyone. Just because she’s dead they print her picture and say she was a lovely girl and innocent and that she wouldn’t hurt a fly. Well, she hurt me. Father! She hurt me! And now she’s dead and she should be gone, but she isn’t! She’s still here. She’s still everywhere, a star!’ The priest looked hard at Layla through the grille. He had never watched House Arrest, but he did occasionally see a newspaper.

  ‘Hang on a minute,’ he said.

  ‘I know you, don’t I? You’re…’ Layla ran. Even in church she could not escape the shame of her poisonous notoriety as a nonentity. There was no sanctuary from her anti-fame. The fact that she was a failure, the first person to be thrown out of that house. And Kelly had nominated her and then kissed her in front of millions. The whole nation had seen Layla accept Kelly’s sympathy. And now Kelly was dead and Layla did not feel any better at all.

  DAY THIRTY-FIVE. 7.30 p.m.

  It was the first eviction night following the murder. An executive editorial decision had been taken that Chloe should remain upbeat and positive about events. This was, after all, the house style.

  ‘We all so miss Kelly big time, because she was such a top lady and a sweet young life cruelly snuffed out, which just should not have happened, right? Kelly was a laugh, she was a gas, she was bigged up, amped up, loads of fun and just lovely. And no way did she deserve such a pants thing to happen to her, not that anybody does. Ooooooh, Kelly, we miss you} We all just want to give you a big hug} But the show goes on and as the other inmates have made it clear, this whole gig right now is a tribute to Kelly’s gorgeous memory. So you just amp it up in heaven, Kezzer babe, ‘cos this one’s for you. All right! Let’s give it up large for another week in the housed This announcement was of course followed by the now famous credits. One house. Ten contestants. Thi
rty cameras. Forty microphones. One survivor. A sentence which now carried with it a highly provocative double meaning, but which, it was felt, it would be even more provocative to change. Either way, it was difficult to imagine better telly than this.

  ‘House, can you hear me? This is the voice of Chloe.’

  ‘Yes, we can hear you,’ said the seven people assembled on the couches, and for a moment everything seemed back to normal. It was almost possible to imagine that nobody had died.

  ‘The fourth person to leave the Peeping Tom house will be…’ A huge dramatic pause.

  ‘David! David, it’s time to go!’

  ‘Yes!’ Said David, punching the air in triumph, following the necessary practice of appearing absolutely delighted to be going.

  ‘David, pack your bags. You have one and a half hours to say your goodbyes, when we will be back live to see you leave the house!’ The nominees for that week had been David and Sally. Everyone had nominated Sally, because she had become so depressed, and a majority had voted for David, because he was a pain in the arse. By coincidence, the two people whom the inmates had nominated for eviction were also the nation’s two biggest suspects for the murder. Outside the house the eviction vote had turned into a national referendum on who had murdered Kelly. David won by a shade, and when the results were announced it was for a moment almost as if the crime had been solved.

  ‘It’s David!’ The press wires hummed.

  ‘As we have suspected all along.’

  ‘Yes! It’s David!’ They shouted on the radio and on the live TV news links. Some even added, ‘We are expecting an arrest shortly,’ as if while in the house David had been enjoying some kind of sanctuary from the law but now that the people had spoken he could expect no further reprieve. Inside the house the ninety minutes of allotted departure time ticked by slowly. It did not take David long to pack, and there was only so much group hugging and swearing of undying loyalty that you could do to somebody whom you heartily disliked and whom you suspected might be a murderer. Under normal circumstances the correct etiquette at evictions would be for everybody to put up a hysterical pretence that, despite everything, they adored the person departing and were desperately sorry to see them go. But on this particular night, the tiniest whiff of real reality could not be prevented from intruding. Not on the outside, though. Outside the house the rules of TV still applied. David stepped out to the throbbing beat of ‘Eye Of The Tiger’ and into the white light of a thousand flash cameras. The crowd was enormous. David had been terrified moments before,but now he found himself uplifted by the noise of the crowd. For this one moment at least he was the star he so desperately wanted to be. The eyes of the entire world were upon him and to his credit he pulled off those few seconds with great aplomb. His beautiful shoulder-length hair was lent life by a light breeze, his big black coat billowed romantically. He gave a sardonic smile, threw wide his arms and gave a deep bow. The crowd, who appreciated a bit of theatre, rewarded David with a redoubled cheer. Then, smiling broadly, David swept a hand through his beautiful hair and boarded the platform of the cherry picker to be lifted up over the moat. When he arrived at the other side he bowed deep once more and kissed Chloe’s hand. The crowd whooped again while simultaneously observing that David was an even bigger arsehole than they had previously thought. Together David and Chloe took the short limousine ride to the studio. The music throbbed, the lights bobbed and weaved and the crowd shouted and waved their placards.

  ‘we love DERVLA!’ And ‘jazz is lush!’ Finally David and Chloe managed to get to the couch, where only Layla had sat before, and begin their chat.

  ‘Wow!’ Shouted Chloe.

  ‘Amped up! All right! You OK, Dave?’

  ‘Yes, Chloe, I’m fine.’

  ‘Wicked!’

  ‘Absolutely. Wicked indeed.’

  ‘Look, fair play to you, David,’ Chloe gushed.

  ‘Respect and all that big-time. You’ve been through it, and we all haven’t, and it must have been an incredibly weird experience and all that, but I’ve got ask you this, you know that, don’t you? Of course you do, you know what I’m going to ask, I can see it in your face, you do know, don’t you? What I’m going to ask? Of course you do, so let’s get it over with. The big question everybody wants to know is, ‘Did you kill Kelly?’ ‘ ‘No, absolutely not. I loved Kelly.’ David gave it his best shot the short pause before answering to focus fully and assume the appropriate look of pained sincerity, the tiny catch in the voice, but it did him no good. The crowd wanted a result; they booed, they jeered; a chant developed: ‘Killer. Killer. Killer.’ David was stunned. He hadn’t expected this.

  ‘Sorry, babe. They think you did it, babe,’said Chloe.

  ‘Sorry and all that, but at the end of the day there it is, babe.’

  ‘But I didn’t do it, I promise.’

  ‘All right, then,’ said Chloe, perking up.

  ‘Let’s see if anybody thinks somebody else did it.’ There were substantial cheers for this proposition, some without doubt coming from the same people who had only moments before condemned David. The situation,like the police investigation, was confused.

  ‘Well, fair play to you, Dave,’ said Chloe.

  ‘There are lot of young ladies on your side, I can see that, and can you blame them? Wicked!’ And, of course, at this the cheering redoubled.

  ‘So come on, then, David. If you didn’t do it, who do you think did?’

  ‘Well, I don’t know. I’d have to say Garry, but it’s just a guess. I really don’t know.’

  ‘Well, we’ll just have to wait to the end of the series to find out, won’t we? Said Chloe, which was an outrageous and entirely unfounded statement, but it sounded convincing enough, such is the seductive power of television.

  ‘In the meantime,’ Chloe shouted, ‘let’s take a look at some of Dave’s finest moments in the house.’

  DAY THIRTY-FIVE. 10 p.m.

  Coleridge’s team had to deal with thousands of calls from cranks. Every second ring of the phone heralded yet another clairvoyant who had seen the culprit in a dream. Hooper kept a little tally.

  ‘Dervla appears in most of the male clairvoyants’ dreams, and Jazz in the birds’. Funny that, isn’t it?’ This call was different, though. It came just as the closing credits of the House Arrest Eviction Special were rolling on the TV in the police incident room. When Hooper picked up the phone there was something about the caller’s calm and steady tone that made him decide to listen.

  ‘I am a Catholic priest,’ said the rather formal, foreign- sounding voice.

  ‘I recently heard a confession from a very distressed young woman. I cannot of course tell you any details, but I believe you should be looking not only at the people who remain in the house, but also those who have left it.’

  ‘Have you been speaking to Layla, sir?’ Hooper replied.

  ‘Because we have so far been unable to locate her.’

  ‘I can’t say anything more, except that I believe that you should continue trying to find her.’ At that the priest clearly felt that he had already said enough, because he abruptly concluded the conversation and rang off.

  DAY THIRTY-SIX. 11.00 a.m.

  The results of the house DNA tests took three days to arrive, which Coleridge thought was outrageous. As expected, the individuals represented on the sheet were the male housemates. Jazz, most prominently, Gazzer, David and Hamish equally clearly, and Woggle the least. Woggle, of course, had not been available to supply a sample, having famously skipped bail and disappeared. However, when he left the house he had accidentally left his second pair of socks behind, which despite having since been buried in the garden by the other boys, yielded copious quantities of anarchist DNA.

  ‘So the sheet points towards Jazz, then,’ said Hooper.

  ‘Well, perhaps, but we’d expect his presence to be detected more strongly, since he wore the sheet after Geraldine and her team had arrived.’

  ‘Yes, convenient, that, wasn�
��t it?’ Hooper observed drily.

  ‘Covers his tracks very nicely, except that if one of the others had worn it too we would expect their presence to show more strongly also. After all, the killer would have been sweating like a pig when he put it on.’

  ‘But all the other three have come up equally.’

  ‘Exactly, sir.’

  ‘Which is a bit weird in itself, isn’t it?’ Said Trish.

  ‘Sort of supports the idea that they were all in it, and they had a pact, to divide suspicion.’

  ‘Well, anyway, at least it rules the girls out,’ said Hooper.

  ‘You think so?’ Coleridge enquired.

  ‘Well, doesn’t it?’

  ‘Only if the sheet under discussion was the one the killer used to hide under, which it probably is, but we can’t be certain. We know that it’s the sheet Jazz grabbed after the Peeping Tom people had entered the house, but can we be sure it was the one that the killer dropped onto the pile when he returned to the sweatbox?’

  ‘Well, it was on top.’

  ‘Yes, but the pile was fairly jumbled, and all the sheets were the same dark colour. More than one sheet may have been on top, so to speak. The tape is not entirely clear.’

  ‘So it doesn’t help us at all, then?’ Said Trish.

  ‘Well, I think it could strengthen a case; it just couldn’t make one. If there was further evidence against Jazz, this sheet would help, that’s all.’

  DAY THIRTY-SEVEN. 9.30 p.m.

  For six hours the house had been completely empty, the thirty cameras and forty microphones recording nothing but empty rooms and silence. Six hours of nothing, which had been diligently watched by millions of computer-owners all over the world. It had begun at three o’clock that afternoon when the police arrived and collected all of the housemates, taking them away without explanation. Naturally this caused a sensation. The lunchtime news bulletins were filled with breathless stories of group conspiracies, and halfway round the world, down in the southern hemisphere, newspaper editors preparing their morning editions considered risking pre-emptive headlines announcing ‘THEY ALL DUNNIT!’ The reality made everybody look stupid, particularly the police.