The Festival Murders

by Mark McCrum

  ‘There was police everywhere. Most of them in them white shell suits, forensics, is it, like that CSI: Crime Scene Investigation. They wouldn’t let me through. I know they’ve got a job to do but I was shocked. It’s the first time in sixty years I’ve not been allowed in that back door.’

  ‘Did you see the body?’

  ‘Couldn’t, could I? Not allowed round there either. Though I wouldn’t want to. Poor girl. What was she doing up on them battlements, that’s what I’d like to know. You wouldn’t catch me climbing out that window.’

  ‘What’s that then? The access to the roof?’

  ‘By the stairs to the tower, yes. You have to hoist yourself up to get through it. Then you can walk along. You can go all round the house, if you want. When Mr Gerald was younger he was always out there. Frightened the life out of his mother. Liked the view, he said. But he went to smoke, didn’t he? And not just ordinary ciggies either, though I never let on about that. They say you can see five counties from up there.’

  It was 9 p.m. now and through the treeline the sun was setting, a fiery orange ball. Down in the gardens the wood pigeons cooed on, oblivious. The police were still everywhere, looming white ghosts in the gathering gloaming. Francis didn’t see the point in staying out at Wyveridge. He had been back up to the room where Ranjit, Carly and Adam had been joined by other house guests, all sitting around on the floor like shocked zombies. There were no drugs in evidence, but a couple of bottles of wine had been opened and chillout music emanated from the sleek white sound dock that sat on the side. Francis had checked with Ranjit the identity of the three people Mrs Mac had remembered from lunch. The tall guy in the velvet jacket was almost certainly Rory, especially if he were with his little friend Neville. The American ‘hippy-chick’ could only be the poet Eva Edelstein. The three of them had gone to the festival, Ranjit thought, to see Joe Sacco, the cartoonist who made picture books about Palestine and other political subjects. ‘They almost certainly went on to the poetry slam afterwards,’ Ranjit said. ‘Rory fancies himself as a bit of a poet.’

  ‘He is a poet,’ said Carly. ‘And a bloody good one. I don’t know why you two have to put each other down the whole time. It’s so childish.’

  Francis ignored this. ‘Have you phoned them?’ he asked Ranjit.

  ‘We were just discussing that. I thought the best thing might be to go into town and look for them. Break it to them in person. I’m not sure I can stand spending the rest of the evening here.’

  As Francis drove back into Mold he recalled an incident from his school days. A boy who had taken LSD and jumped from the roof of Block B onto the tarmac car park below. He had, people said, decided he was an angel and could fly. He had broken his neck and died instantly. Luke Cooper. Francis could still remember his name. The tragedy had overshadowed the end of Francis’s last summer term, Speech Day and all.

  But no, on balance, he didn’t think this latest event was an accident – or a drugs-related freakout. Two unlikely deaths, so close together; his gut instinct was telling him that this had to be foul play. If his suspicions were well-founded, whoever was responsible was moving with care and intelligence. God, was he even in danger himself, sniffing around in the way he was?

  TWENTY

  The scene back at the White Hart was low-key. The bar and restaurant were still shut. Cathy was working at her screen in the corner of the little reception area. The hatch was open, but Francis didn’t disturb her.

  Up in his room, there was no sign of Priya, but she’d unpacked some of her stuff and moved her case onto the stand next to the wardrobe. On the glass shelf in the bathroom was a make-up bag, and next to that her trio of lipsticks: purple, cherry-red and maraschino. Francis sat down at the desk and wrote her a note on White Hart headed paper.

  9.25 p.m.

  Hi Priya,

  Hope you’re OK. I’ve come back hungry to find the hotel bar still closed so I’m going out to forage for some supper. Mobile number below if you want to join me – even for a pudding! Otherwise I’ll see you later. If you get back first, please help yourself to the bed. I’m fine on the sofa.

  You might have heard there’s been another death. Out at Wyveridge Hall. Grace, the gossip columnist on the Sentinel. Fell off the roof, it seems. I’ve just been out there – shocking, awful – another reason why I need a drink and some sustenance. Talk about all this later, I hope.

  He hesitated over the sign-off, then wrote:

  All best,

  Francis

  He left the hotel and walked down the road towards The Sun Rising. The sunset was almost over now; the fleet of brilliant pink ships, monsters and will o’ the wisps sailing across the sky had faded to a dull grey, though a deep crimson gash lingered in the heap of dark cloud by the western horizon. High above, in the trees by the road, the stark silhouettes of leaves trembled in the breeze. Francis shivered as he thought of Grace: her young, bright life, full of hope and expectation, cut off so suddenly. No way had she taken acid – or even drunk alcohol – and jumped off that roof.

  Yellow artificial light spilled out through the pub’s front door. Francis was glad to get inside. The front room was packed with festival goers, a jostle of faces up at the bar. What a day it had been. All he wanted now was a soothing pint and one of those shepherd’s pies from the specials board. That empty corner table would do him fine. That and a crumpled copy of the Sunday Sentinel. But when he got to the front and caught the eye of the plump barmaid with the livid spots of red at the centre of each of her paper-white cheeks, he was told he’d missed the chance of supper.

  ‘Sorry, sir. Last orders are at nine thirty.’

  ‘It’s nine forty-five,’ he said. ‘I’ve been queuing for over fifteen minutes. Couldn’t you manage something?’

  ‘Sorry, sir. Chef goes at ten. He’s just plating up a few puddings and then he’ll be off.’

  ‘Even during festival time?’

  ‘’Fraid so. Sorry.’

  ‘I’m sorry too,’ Francis said, turning tetchily on his heel.

  ‘You could try the Purple Pomegranate up the road,’ she called after him. ‘They’ve got a restaurant licence.’

  ‘Thanks.’ He turned back and managed – just – to flash her a smile; it was hardly her fault if Mutton Chops didn’t want to make money.

  He paced up the lane towards the lights of town, scanning the dark bushes to his left as he went, jumping at a sudden noise. But it was only a startled pheasant, making a break through the undergrowth. Pull yourself together, Francis. He didn’t seriously think he was in any immediate danger. But then neither had Bryce or Grace. What was it, he wondered, that linked them? They both worked on the Sentinel, but it couldn’t be that, could it? A lunatic with a grudge against a newspaper. Hardly.

  Fifty yards beyond the darkened ground-floor windows of the White Hart, he found the Purple Pomegranate, a smart-looking place with a handwritten menu and a wine list to each side of the front door. There was a touch of the Heston Blumenthals here: an array of alarming-sounding dishes at – frankly – London prices. Did he really want Locally Shot Duck Liver Pâté with Home-Made Blackberry Compote, Baby Gherkins and Toasted Brioche or Pecan Pie with Beetroot Ice Cream? What the heck! He was hungry now. He pushed through the door and stood on the mat inside, watching two teenaged waitresses in green spotted aprons service the tables. The customers were festival goers, one and all, guzzling their food and yelling noisily at each other (none of them, it seemed, had yet heard the news from Wyveridge). There were performers too. In one quick scan Francis spotted Julie Myerson, Howard Jacobson and Caitlin Moran. And hey, who was that across the room but ghostwriter Anna and her consort Marv dining with Jonty Smallbone (aka Family Man), today resplendent in an eye-catching purple floral shirt. His wife, beside him, looked as grim as ever. Francis flicked his gaze away before he should be caught staring.

  Finally the baby-faced maitre d’ with the pudding bowl haircut stopped shooting the breeze with the customers he’d been
serving ice cream sundaes to and came over. Sorry, sir, they were fully booked. No, there was no chance of a table later.

  ‘My apologies,’ he said, with a weary, slightly smug smile. ‘It’s festival time. You could try the Old Bakery, I suppose. Up the road. They might have something.’

  On account of their atrocious food, Francis thought. He paced on up the hill, still feeling edgy. Little bands of festival goers drifted past him, chatting away innocently about talks they’d been to: ‘simply love his drawings’ … ‘such an original way to deal with the subject’ … ‘it’s not poetry, it’s verbiage’ … ‘cut and pasted, really’. As he passed a hot dog van, the smell of onions, fried in old fat, simultaneously tugged at and turned his stomach. If necessary, he supposed, he could make do with that. A slimy orange frankfurter in a processed roll. A squodge of cheap mustard from the yellow plastic squirter. It was often the way at these festivals that after your starring role in a session, ego stroked to the max, you ended up alone in a KFC or McDonald’s.

  On the corner, by the steep road down to the river and the bridge, he was relieved to see the lit-up hanging sign for the Old Bakery. There was a waitress at the door who looked like a young starlet from the Fifties – albeit with a silver ring through her dainty upturned nose. Did they have a table for one? ‘Not a problem,’ she sang.

  She led Francis through the crowded room to a place by the wall. He sat and studied the menu and the wine list; then, having made his choice, gazed absently around. The owners clearly had a taste for mixing it up. A ship’s wheel hung below a moth-eaten fox’s head. A copy of the famous Warhol screen-print of Marilyn, with yellow hair, blue eye shadow and pink lips, was right next to a black and white photo of what looked like Mold High Street early last century. Shelves, inset into the roughly rendered wall, were crowded with odd objects: dusty, cloth-covered old hardbacks, china Toby jugs, a framed bus timetable.

  Away on the far side, he spotted another lone diner, head bent over a book. It was badger-woman Virginia Westcott, no less! Even as he glanced over, she looked up and caught his eye; then smiled, shyly almost, before returning to her reading.

  The waitress came over to take his order. He settled on a half bottle of Chilean Cab Sav to wash down his meal; even though he badly needed a drink, he didn’t want to be waking in the small hours tonight. He took out his notebook and studied it with a contemplative air. Across the room he was aware of Virginia waving at the waitress, then gesturing towards him. The girl was back; she looked almost embarrassed.

  ‘Sorry, sir. That lady over there said that if you cared to join her at all that would be fine by her.’

  ‘And would that be fine by you?’

  The girl was blushing. ‘How d’you mean?’

  ‘Bill-wise, table-wise …’

  ‘Oh right. We can transfer your bill, sir, no problem.’

  It would be rude to refuse; Francis got to his feet and went over.

  ‘Sorry,’ Virginia said as he joined her. ‘That was terribly forward of me. You probably wanted to cogitate on your own.’

  ‘Not at all. I could use some company.’

  ‘I’ve been in these situations before. At literary festivals. Where you have all the writers staying in the same hotel and they sit tight at their own tables throughout dinner. Seems a shame to me, missing the chance to interact with another mind that’s probably a cut above the ordinary. We’re alone enough with our screens as it is.’

  ‘We are.’

  ‘My event is over but I booked for another night. I always think it’s a pity to come all the way to these things and then rush off straight after one’s finished. Other people’s talks can be so interesting. So how did yours go?’

  ‘OK.’

  ‘Don’t be so absurdly modest, Francis. Your tent was packed out. I’m sure it was a great success. Did you spill the beans?’

  ‘About?’

  ‘Everything you saw early this morning.’

  ‘Not really, no. I think some of them might have been a bit frustrated. Sitting through a history of the detective novel and then not getting the juicy details they wanted. As it’s turned out, I’m glad I didn’t say more.’

  ‘How d’you mean?’

  ‘Haven’t you heard? There’s been another death.’

  ‘What? Who? Where?’ Either Virginia was a magnificent actress or she was genuinely shocked; her eyes were alive with alarm.

  ‘Grace Pritchard. She’s one of the gossip columnists on the Sentinel …’

  ‘Short-haired, blonde little piece?’

  ‘You got her.’

  ‘She spoke to me about Bryce.’

  ‘Did she?’

  ‘Just this morning. Cornered me on the terrace of the White Hart while I was having a coffee. She’d somehow found out that we’d been an item, years ago.’

  ‘I’m impressed.’

  ‘So was I. It’s not as if it’s common knowledge. She even wanted to film me talking about it. I’m afraid I declined. Unlike that poser Jonty Smallbone. He couldn’t wait to get in front of her camera and opine about the situation. So what happened to the poor child?’

  ‘She fell off the roof of Wyveridge Hall. Apparently.’

  ‘What on earth was she doing up there?’

  ‘Nobody knows. Although she was carrying a video camera with her. So it’s possible she may have been trying to film the scenery.’

  ‘And now she’s dead?’

  ‘I’m afraid so. It’s a good thirty feet up to those battlements. She’d have been lucky to have survived a fall like that. Even if she’d landed on grass.’

  ‘You’re telling me she hit the terrace?’

  ‘’Fraid so.’

  ‘How horrible!’ Virginia drained her glass of wine in a single gulp and poured herself another. ‘This rather changes the picture, doesn’t it?’

  ‘You think?’

  ‘To paraphrase Oscar Wilde: one sudden death at a literary festival could be regarded as a misfortune, two looks dreadfully suspicious.’

  ‘It does put a different complexion on Bryce’s death, doesn’t it?’

  The waitress was upon them, carrying Francis’s starter.

  ‘Eat up,’ said Virginia. ‘It’s actually rather good in here. Despite the bizarre decor.’

  As Francis forked up a lightly browned scallop and a gleaming lump of black pudding, Virginia rummaged in her handbag. ‘But how on earth is Bryce linked to this unfortunate young woman? There’s your conundrum.’

  ‘Grace was a gossip columnist. And a more assiduous one than most. She was trying to find out what had happened to Bryce. Maybe she stumbled on some evidence.’

  ‘But wouldn’t she have told somebody? If she had. If not the police, her newspaper?’

  ‘Maybe the murderer got to her before that could happen.’

  ‘The oldest one in the book,’ said Virginia, pulling out her iPhone. ‘You of all people should know that.’

  ‘Just because it’s a cliché doesn’t make it any the less likely.’

  ‘I suppose not. Let’s see what the Twitterati are saying on the subject. Bloody typical, now the signal’s gone. And this place doesn’t even have wi-fi.’ Virginia stared crossly at her screen, then took another swig of wine. ‘So, are you going to tell me who your suspects are?’

  He wasn’t, not in any detail; but it would be good to play along. ‘OK,’ he said, ‘so we have to start with our first victim. Assuming, of course, that there was foul play, why would anyone want to do him in?’

  ‘Easy. Bryce aroused intense feelings, like all very special people. He’d just abandoned two women, at least one of whom may have stood to gain financially. Hell hath no fury, especially if there’s spondulas involved.’

  ‘You think …?’

  ‘He and Scarlett were together for a heck of a long time. I doubt he left her with nothing, especially as he had plenty to spare. Anyway, for all his emotional callousness, Bryce had a weird sentimental streak. Look at how he held onto my pen.’
>
  ‘And Anna?’

  Virginia shrugged. ‘Don’t rule it out. He might well have left her something. Out of sheer guilt, if nothing else. And she has that ex-Marine with her. Who presumably knows how to do someone in in any number of expert ways.’

  Francis laughed, with relief that someone had been thinking along similar lines to him.

  ‘I’m not joking,’ she said. ‘So who else are you fingering?’

  Francis smiled. ‘I have some thoughts …’

  ‘He says, cryptically. But he’s certainly not going to share them with an inquisitive middle-aged novelist he barely knows.’

  Francis ignored this tack. ‘What do you think?’ he asked.

  ‘Besides the women in the case, I’ve no idea. I suppose he was frightfully rude about Dan Dickson. Though if there were a murder every time there was a literary assassination our stock of writers would be sorely depleted.’

  ‘I don’t think Dan is terribly likely.’

  ‘Me neither. Though I should perhaps share with you an interesting vignette I came across during my post-prandial stroll last night. Dan and Bryce, engaged in old-fashioned fisticuffs, down by the bridge.’

  ‘You’re not serious?’

  ‘I am. It was an odd little scene, so odd I was wondering at first whether I’d had too much to drink at Laetitia’s party. The pair of them piled out of a taxi together, arguing, then sort of squared up to each other, almost like a staged fight. Dan launched a punch, Bryce tried to retaliate, then Dan knocked Bryce over. Onto the road. At which point they must have realised how silly they were being, because as Bryce struggled to his feet again, Dan held up his hands and they stopped, quite suddenly. Then they walked off together and sat on the bridge, where they engaged in a very intense conversation.’

  ‘Did you get any idea what it was all about?’

  ‘None at all. I was a good fifty yards away.’

  ‘The review presumably. Though would they really come to blows just about that? It’s a shame you weren’t closer.’

  She pouted her lips and made a mock-contrite face. ‘Sorry.’