The Festival Murders

by Mark McCrum

  ‘He didn’t tell me,’ she said eventually. ‘Spineless creep. I found out at a dinner …’

  ‘Party?’ he said to fill the silence.

  ‘No, no, it was one of those sessions after a book launch. You know, where everybody’s a bit pissed and you go on to some restaurant and then wonder why you’ve bothered. As you find yourself sitting between the two most tedious people at the event.’

  Francis chuckled; he recognised the scenario all too well.

  ‘It was some bash at Daunt’s in Marylebone High Street. Afterwards about fifteen of us descended on this cheap Turkish place over the road. Souvlakia and shevtalia and red wine that gives you a hangover before you’ve finished your glass. Anyway, I found myself next to this chatty American who writes about fashion for the Sentinel. Skinny little creature with beady black eyes like a dachshund. Over the table was some enormous old hack who’d worked on the paper before they had their latest cull, wheezing as he crammed his face with kebab. Right in front of me they started gossiping about Bryce, neither of them obviously aware of my involvement with him. So I kept schtum and listened in. And the fashionista was full of this story that was apparently halfway round the office. That Bryce had finally left his long-term partner and run off with his girlfriend …’

  ‘You didn’t think they were talking about you?’

  ‘For about half a minute, yes. Typical Bryce, I thought. Finally gets it together to leave home and then doesn’t even bother to tell me. I was all set for the sketch of me, the siren who’d lured him away. Then came my shock. It wasn’t me at all. It was this “Asian babe”. My stomach just turned over, because I knew all about Priya. I’d even teased Bryce about fancying her, because he’d started repeating funny things she said to him at work, always a bad sign. Not that I ever thought she would look in his direction for more than a second. I listened for five minutes, just to be sure I hadn’t got my facts wrong, then I left the table and called him. He cut me off, the coward, then switched his phone off. I was sorely tempted to go straight to his house, but I couldn’t face Scarlett, so I waited till morning and turned up at the Sentinel.’

  ‘You bearded him in his lair?’

  ‘Had to. He wasn’t answering my calls. I knew it was press day and he’d be there. He was pretty cross actually.’

  ‘But not as cross as you?’

  ‘I was off the register. It was a wonder to behold. I really didn’t care who knew. Here was a guy who’d been promising me for five years that he was imminently going to leave his wife …’

  ‘I thought she wasn’t his wife?’

  ‘As good as. You’re right though. The bastard never gave her a commitment either. Not that that ever bothered me when I was with him. I was in love with him and he’d managed to fool me that he really was waiting for the right moment to go …’

  ‘Worried about the children?’

  ‘Of course. He wasn’t inhuman – and nor was I. I come from a broken family myself, so I knew what I was going to put those girls through. But he kept telling me how his relationship with Scarlett was a completely busted flush, she didn’t love him, they hadn’t had sex for five years, blah blah, and I believed him. So we were waiting for the twins to get into this school, some C of E place that meant he and Scarlett had to go to church together, present a united front; then we were waiting for them to be settled; then this, then that, on and on it went. Meanwhile, I’d put my own future on hold. I was forty, forty-one, forty-two … Was it time to secretly bin the contraceptives and present him with the baby he’d promised me? But you know, silly me, I didn’t want a relationship like that. I wanted it all. The honesty and the beautiful house.’

  ‘And who was going to pay for that?’ Francis asked ingenuously. ‘Presumably Scarlett would require maintenance of some kind.’

  ‘Don’t be fooled by the scruffy boho act. Bryce had more dough than he let on. I don’t know the exact details, but his Sentinel salary was pocket money basically.’

  ‘Was that part of the attraction?’ Francis asked.

  ‘Honestly?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘No.’ Her full lips cracked into a sly grin. ‘And then again, maybe yes.’

  ‘Which was it?’

  ‘“No” to start with. When I was still infatuated with him and knew nothing about all that. Other than thinking that he must have a bit of cash if he could afford to keep a flat to work in as well as a house. But then, as I stayed with him, and waited, and waited, it was probably a factor. We could have had a nice life together, if that’s what the silly twit had actually wanted. A nanny for the baby, holidays abroad, the full Monty.’

  ‘I don’t suppose,’ Francis said casually, ‘he’d made any provision for you in his will?’

  Anna looked him slowly up and down. ‘What an innocent question, Francis. As a matter of fact, he had. So yes, I do have an extra motive.’

  ‘An extra motive?’

  ‘Come on, don’t play the naïf with me. Other than mere revenge. Isn’t that what the abandoned harpies in the books usually do it for?’

  ‘Had he left you a lot?’

  ‘I’ve no idea. But he used to say, “I’d hate it if I got run over by a bus one morning and you got nothing.” So yes, I reckon I was in for something.’

  ‘You’ve no idea how much?’

  ‘No.’ Her expression was unbending; if she knew more, she certainly wasn’t going to tell Francis about it.

  ‘So was the baby always part of the picture?’ he asked, after a moment.

  ‘We talked about it a lot. Particularly in the early days. He wanted to have a child with someone he loved, he said.’

  ‘Ouch,’ said Francis.

  Outside the café window, a picture-perfect toddler was standing on the pavement, trying to go one way while her mother went the other. She had curly ash-blonde hair and big blue eyes. She was wearing a denim dress, white tights speckled with stars, and shiny crimson shoes. ‘Maya, come on!’ called her mother. ‘We’re going this way.’

  ‘No, we’re not going this way,’ Maya cried, waving a finger. ‘We’re going this way.’

  Eventually the mother shook her head in desperation, swooped and grabbed her child and carried her off, screaming, under her arm. Had Bryce said yes, or Anna thrown the Microgynon to the winds, this little darling could have been hers; such was the unspoken thought that passed between them, as Anna met Francis’s eye, then gave him a surprisingly indulgent smile.

  ‘So why didn’t it happen?’ Francis asked.

  Anna sighed. ‘Bryce liked the idea in theory,’ she said, ‘but in practice he kept stalling, just as he did about leaving Scarlett. Didn’t I realise how disruptive it would be having a child? It would come between us. We’d never be able to jump on the Eurostar for a dirty weekend in Paris ever again. And so on. But then, when I threatened to leave him, he always came round. Yes, he said, he understood how important it was to me, just give him another couple of months. One interesting thing about him, though. He was never flippant about it. He never took any silly risks. I always thought he must have had a bad experience with a girlfriend in the past …’

  ‘Like?’

  ‘Having to go through with an abortion or something.’

  ‘He told you that?’

  ‘Never in so many words. But I got that feeling.’

  ‘Didn’t you ever ask him straight out?’

  ‘Of course. But he could be terribly uncommunicative. When it suited him. The bottom line was that he was very clever. He had this way of making you feel, when you were with him, as if you were the centre of his world and everything was going to be all right.’

  ‘I’d heard that. So you met Marvin soon after your bust-up with Bryce?’

  ‘I was already working with him. Bizarrely, before the Priya thing kicked off it was Bryce who was jealous about Marv. Or at least pretended to be. He used to make stupid jokes about how I fancied him. And I encouraged that thought, I have to admit.’

  ‘So how was h
e when you finally did go off with Marv?’

  ‘I don’t think he gave a toss. He was so besotted with Priya I could have brought Marv into his office and shagged him on the desk and got no reaction.’

  ‘You two got together quite quickly?’

  ‘The classic rebound.’

  ‘I didn’t say that.’

  ‘You were thinking it. Everyone does. But Marv has been a revelation to me.’

  ‘In what way?’

  ‘In every way. He’s strong. Principled. He’s there for me. He puts me on a pedestal, and that’s quite refreshing.’

  ‘Is it refreshing that he’s not from your world?’

  ‘By which you mean, “What on earth do you talk about?” Since he’s an ex-Marine who likes watching footie on telly and you’re a literary type happiest curled up with a book.’

  ‘I didn’t say that.’

  ‘All but. Marv is highly intelligent and very receptive. The fact that he’s not been lucky enough to have my particular kind of education means that there’s more, not less, for us to talk about. Especially when we’re in a place like this. His take on the book world is great. How it’s basically just a bunch of middle-class poseurs trying to prove how right-on and clever they are to each other.’

  Francis laughed. ‘Is that what you think too?’

  ‘When I’m in a jaded mood. The other great thing about Marv is that he’s a great noticer. He sees everything, all the time. From the colour of the eyeshadow you’re wearing to the guy on the corner who might have a knife in his shoe. It’s an education walking the streets with him.’

  ‘Where’s he from?’

  ‘Nottingham, originally. He used the military to get himself away from a pretty shitty situation. As he says, if it hadn’t been the Marines, it would have been a gang …’

  ‘And now?’

  ‘He’s no use to them now, is he, so he’s out on his ear like all the others. Actually, that’s the thing that pisses him off most. Not so much losing his arm as his career. As he says, fighting’s what he was trained to do. It’s what he loved.’

  ‘So what are his plans?’

  ‘We’re hoping the book will do well.’

  ‘You can’t live on that, though.’

  ‘Andy McNab does. Anyway, there’s no reason why, with a bit of help, Marv mightn’t branch out, write a novel, even.’

  ‘No reason at all, Anna.’ Francis smiled. ‘With a bit of help. But that’s hardly going to pay the bills, is it?’

  ‘It might. With luck. In our game you never know, do you?’

  ‘That’s true. So you’re not planning a baby just yet?’

  ‘Francis! We’ve only been stepping out together for five months. Give us a chance!’

  TWENTY-TWO

  Letting himself into his hotel room half an hour later Francis found Priya slumped on the sofa. Her eyes were red; she had clearly been crying.

  ‘You’ve heard the news?’

  ‘Last night,’ she said. ‘I ran into Rory and some of the Wyveridge lot at that Joe Sacco talk, and we went on to the poetry slam and ended up in the pub. Then Ranjit phoned to say he had something terrible to tell us. When he turned up, some of them thought he was taking the piss. The rest of us were too stunned to take it in. Then they started ordering bottles of wine. A wake, they said, though I thought it was a bit early for that. That Eva woman was crying. Really howling. It was all too much for me, so I came back here.’

  ‘You didn’t see my note?’

  ‘Not till this morning. I was knackered. I lay down flat on the settee and the next thing I knew it was breakfast time.’

  Francis stared out across the room, watching the bright particles of dust dancing in the sunbeam that fell across the beige carpet in a narrow strip, the triangle at its tip reaching high up onto one of the wardrobe doors. Come to think of it, ‘dancing’ was entirely the wrong word; if this was a dance, it was the slowest, gentlest, swirling waltz.

  ‘What’s going on?’ Priya asked.

  ‘I wish I knew. So what did you think? About Bryce? Before this? That he’d been murdered?’

  ‘No, not to start with. But then, as the police stuck around, I was beginning to wonder. You?’

  ‘I thought they might find something.’

  ‘Like what?’ asked Priya.

  ‘That he’d been poisoned. Or suffocated.’

  ‘Poisoned! Why?’

  ‘He just looked so peaceful, lying there. He didn’t look like a man who’d suffered a heart attack – or a stroke …’

  ‘But poison! Wouldn’t he have been rolling around in agony?’

  ‘Not necessarily. There are some very sophisticated products out there these days.’

  ‘But who on earth would have given it to him? And when? Considering that he came straight back here after the party and went to bed.’

  ‘He made himself some herbal tea.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Priya. ‘He made himself some tea. From one of the sachets in the room. Who could possibly have known that he’d pick Tranquillity?’

  ‘Someone who knew him well.’ Francis gave Priya a searching look. ‘There are other possibilities. Someone might have done something to the home-made biscuits. Or the pillow chocolates.’

  ‘In that case I’d be dead too.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because I ate one.’

  ‘What! When? You told me you went in there, saw him and immediately started screaming.’

  ‘I did. But then when I went back up to the room to say goodbye I saw there was a second chocolate. On my side of the bed. Which I’m embarrassed to say I polished off.’ She smirked guiltily. ‘It sounds a bit macabre, doesn’t it, but I needed that fix.’

  ‘I see.’ That explained that then – unless this was a brilliant double bluff.

  ‘It never occurred to me,’ she muttered. ‘I could have bought it too …’

  ‘I’m glad to have that explanation.’

  ‘What, you mean …?’

  ‘I thought it was possible you’d thrown it away,’ Francis said. ‘Or hidden it. While you were up there, changing.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘To cover up the evidence.’

  ‘You thought I was …?’

  ‘The first person on the scene is always a suspect, Priya. You know that.’

  ‘You seriously thought I might have had something to do with it?’ Her voice had dropped to a whisper.

  ‘The one rule of thumb in this business is that you can never rule anything out.’

  She laughed bitterly. ‘I’m surprised you let me stay in the same room as you, Francis. I might have slipped you a poisoned choccy too. What was my motive supposed to be, by the way?’

  ‘I had no idea. Unless you’d managed to get Bryce to change his will with the same speed that you sorted out every other aspect of his life.’

  ‘What! So I targeted him from the start. Knew he was rich. Talked myself into a job as his deputy. Seduced him. But why Bryce? Why didn’t I go for – I don’t know – a hedge funder? Why didn’t I marry a hedge funder, come to that? Get myself the man and the lifestyle without the hassle of killing someone.’

  ‘I’m sorry, Priya. I was trying to keep an open mind.’

  ‘And how about poor Grace? How do I fit into that?’

  ‘Second murders usually happen because someone discovers something the murderer of the first victim doesn’t want them to know. Grace was looking for answers yesterday. The first person she spoke to when she got into Mold was you.’

  ‘How d’you know that?’

  ‘She left her scarf here, on the bed.’

  ‘Did she now? I hate to disillusion you, Francis, but she was buzzing around talking to everyone. Virginia, Jonty, Dan, she was like a bitch on heat. So what was I supposed to have told her that was so incriminating?’

  ‘I’ve no idea. But then again I’ve no idea what you were up to yesterday afternoon.’

  ‘Meaning?’

  ‘In theory, it’s entirely
possible you drove out to Wyveridge with Grace …’

  ‘Yeah, right. “Oh do please show me the famous view from the battlements, Grace.” Push. Bye bye. I was at your event, Francis. In case you didn’t notice. I was about to tell you how interesting I found it. All that stuff about the Chinese and Dupin being a model for Holmes. After which I came back here for a snooze and then went out to hear Joe Sacco talk about graphic novels. The rest you know.’

  ‘Did anybody see you come back here?’

  ‘Not you, obviously. Hey, where were you after your talk? Perhaps it was you who was out at Wyveridge?’

  ‘Don’t be silly. I was in the Green Room.’

  ‘Apart from anything else I don’t see what my motive could have been. I owe my job on the paper to Bryce. Now he’s gone, I’ll be lucky to keep it …’

  Suddenly she was in tears; and Francis felt terrible. He had been trying to be straight with her, but it hadn’t come out well. He sat down next to her on the sofa.

  ‘I’m sorry, Priya. That was very inconsiderate of me.’

  ‘No, no, it wasn’t.’ She looked up at him with gleaming eyes. ‘Why shouldn’t you suspect me? As you said, I was first on the scene. It’s just … well … I thought we were working together on this. I thought we trusted each other.’

  ‘We do … we are. I’m sorry. I was thinking aloud. I didn’t mean it.’

  ‘But you clearly did.’

  ‘I suppose I’d decided that someone had done it and my list of suspects is lamentably small. I mean, unless these two incidents were unrelated accidents, which seems unlikely, we’re still left with the basic question – why on earth would someone want to murder Bryce? A nasty review just isn’t enough of a motive.’

  ‘No.’ Priya pulled a tissue out of her pocket and wiped her face. ‘But what,’ she said, after a few moments, ‘if it were more than a review? What if it was an actual exposé? Would that be enough, d’you think?’

  ‘What d’you mean?’

  ‘I’m not sure I should tell you this. I promised Bryce I wouldn’t breathe a word.’

  ‘About what?’

  ‘Celebrity and Hypocrisy.’

  ‘The talk he never gave?’

  Priya nodded. ‘But how am I supposed to trust you? Especially after all you’ve just said.’