Ten Year Stretch

by Martin Edwards

  Aside from my embarrassment, there was a potential Walls of Jericho situation here. As of old, I imagined traffic on other continents screeching to a halt. The floor actually shuddered, as did we all. About twenty of us, waiting now for an irritating length of time for the lift doors to open. We were all trying to get to the Saturday 2.30 p.m. panel featuring U.S. global-best-seller Randall Spear.

  ‘Botox boobs?’ I said. ‘I thought Botox was for crow’s-feet, lined foreheads, and stuff.’

  ‘And armpits.’

  ‘Armpits.’

  ‘Yeah, have you never seen how wrinkled your armpits can be?

  ‘To be honest, I don’t look at my armpits much. Plus I’ve got hair in them.’

  Bridget snorted. An interesting sound.

  ‘Armpit hair is the latest trend on Instagram among women. According to the Daily Mail—so it must be true—a quarter of millennial women have hairy armpits.’

  ‘Okay—but going back to what you were saying…’

  ‘Botox has taken over from implants for boobs. Painless, scar-free, immediate. Lasts between four and six months.’

  ‘How’s it work?’

  ‘I should know that, how? And care, why?’

  A skinny American woman with knitting needles sticking out of her shoulder bag (best not to ask) was standing behind Bridget. She chipped in:

  ‘It weakens the pectoralis minor muscles beneath the breasts which means that the major muscles above have to do more work. It gives your breasts a lift. And you don’t get crepey cleavage. In fact, it knocks years off your cleavage. It works especially well with a large embonpoint.’ She looked at me. ‘Tits to you.’

  Well, tits to you too, I thought but didn’t say. I’m a writer, for goodness sake, I know what an ‘embonpoint’ is. More or less. I looked at her bag again. She had so many knitting needles sticking out, it looked like Robin Hood’s quiver of arrows. She indicated her own flat chest. ‘Not that I have that problem.’

  What were the chances of two women with a clearly intimate knowledge of Botox boobs meeting at a lift door in a hotel in Bristol hosting a crime fiction festival? Well, quite high, given that in the crime-writing fraternity normal rules about what was…well, normal, did not always apply.

  There was momentary silence filled by a tall, bald, stoop-shouldered Canadian saying loudly to his much shorter wife:

  ‘It’s a de facto monopsony.’

  He spoke loudly, I knew, because he was hard of hearing. But all I could think of was reaching over and brushing the flakes of dandruff off his shoulders. I’ve always assumed that dandruff on a bald man can only mean God really has it in for him. This guy looked like he’d been standing too near a log fire where the ash had drifted and settled on him.

  ‘Obviously,’ his wife said, quietly but fiercely.

  ‘What?’ he said, stooping more. I saw that her height and (maliciously?) low voice were probably the reasons he was stoop-shouldered. Relationships, eh?

  ‘I said obviously it’s a de facto monopsony.’

  Bridget swung round to face them.

  ‘What the defuckto are you talking about?’

  ‘Monopsony—it’s an economics thing,’ the gangly Canadian said. ‘Where a single buyer has a choice of the same product from a number of suppliers. So the convention bookshop has a problem because crime fiction buyers have a range of suppliers to go to and if they are volume buyers, then obviously, they are going to be looking at price—’

  I saw Bridget give him a withering look but, foolishly, I paid no heed.

  ‘Yes,’ I piped up. ‘It’s from the Greek “mono” and–’

  ‘It’s all Greek to me,’ Bridget snapped.

  ‘One bit is actually Latin,’ I said. ‘It means—’

  She squared off to me. I’d like to say I towered over her, which, theoretically, given I’m six-foot, four, I did. But at this moment think of me as Nick Pisa (Leaning Tower of) rather than my actual daft name, Nick Madrid.

  ‘Why can’t you guys speak normal English?’ Bridget said. ‘Why do crime authors feel they have to come over as bright and high-falutin’—I’ve read the crap you write.’

  There was a collective gasp and not a little tutting (there were ‘cosy crime’ fans among us). There was also nervous laughter, not least from me, but then Bridget always has made me nervous.

  ‘You’re not a fan of the genre?’ asked the American woman with knitting needles sticking out of her shoulder bag.

  ‘Genre—see, there you go again,’ Bridget harrumphed. ‘What’s wrong with using an English word? Like rubbish, for instance. Are you a fan of this rubbish, Bridget? I mean it almost becomes a rhetorical question then, doesn’t it? Why would I want to read made-up stuff with all the real stuff going on in the world that you just couldn’t make up?’

  ‘But of course you’ve read Nick’s stuff,’ the Canadian said. ‘True crime—and featuring you, after all.’

  ‘Best not to go there,’ I said quickly.

  Bridget Frost, the Life Force embodied in one feisty, promiscuous, hard-drinking, vulgar, loud-mouthed, loving, irresistible woman, with whom I had stumbled over various crimes in the course of our friendship. Stumbled over far too frequently, frankly, but, hey, I’ve got six books out of them.

  I’ve been promoting the books at crime fiction festivals around the world with some success and a lot of pleasure for the past ten years. Every year, here at Bristol CrimeFest. Although, prior to this, Bridget has never accompanied me to any other festival, even though she loomed large in the books (and my life).

  The truth is I hadn’t seen Bridget for almost ten years, because she finally got round to reading the first of my books based on our adventures. She wasn’t happy.

  ‘We could walk up the four floors,’ I said as the lift doors remained closed and there was no movement on the floor indicator above.

  As if I’d said abracadabra, the lift door slid open. And there was a collective gasp as we all looked at the spread-eagled body of Randall Spear, on the floor of the lift, a knitting needle sticking out of his throat and an enormous pool of blood soaking into the carpet around him.

  Not a totally collective gasp. Bridget sniffed. Then tottered away (in her usual unfeasibly high heels), muttering (loudly): ‘So that event isn’t happening. Let’s go back to the bar.’

  And the woman with the knitting needles said: ‘That looks like my number three!’

  ‘Who would want to murder Randall Spear?’ I said as we settled at a table on the terrace so she could smoke one of many cigarettes.

  ‘You’ve obviously not been to bed with him,’ Bridget said, blowing smoke in my face.

  True. Hang on.

  ‘Bridget?’

  She just looked at me. Well, I suppose we had been here two days.

  Bridget’s shoulders suddenly slumped.

  ‘What is it?’ I said.

  ‘I can’t believe you would describe me like that in your books. What have I ever done but given you love and affection?’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ I said meekly. ‘Are you okay?’

  ‘I’m managing,’ she said, her voice breaking.

  ‘Bridget,’ I said, putting my arm around her, ‘it must have really got to you.’

  ‘Another triple vodka and a bowl of pistachios, handsome,’ Bridget said, as the barman walked by. Emphasising the request by nipping his bum.

  ‘Really got to you,’ I muttered.

  The barman returned with her drink. He smiled; she smiled; I paid. Life, as I know it. When the barman had gone, she said: ‘Saying I have no dress sense—how fucking dare you?’ Given it was through gritted teeth, the volume was impressive. She saw my look. ‘And don’t think that coming over all meek is going to make any difference.’

  Coming over all meek? I am meek. That’s a good thing…isn’t it? But actually my ex
pression was bemusement. I’d been worrying about describing her promiscuity, drunkenness, and vulgarity and she was more concerned about a throwaway remark about something she was wearing.

  ‘What was Randall Spear like?’ I said, attempting to shift the subject.

  ‘That’s a bit personal, isn’t it?’ she said, looking over my shoulder to see if someone more interesting was around. ‘The usual disappointment,’ she added absently.

  ‘I didn’t actually mean that, I meant what kind of person was he?’

  ‘I would know that how?’ she said.

  ‘Well, you must have had a conversation with him. How did you meet him?’

  ‘In the underground car park. He helped me with my luggage.’

  ‘Did you know who he was?’

  More smoke in the face.

  ‘I still don’t know who he is. Then I saw him later out here. He was with that enthusiastic man full of conspiracy theories. Who in turn was sharing a water bottle with a Cockney geezer who writes Westerns—the bottle was full of gin and tonic.’

  ‘How did you know it was gin and tonic?’

  She looked at me.

  ‘Good gin too. Twelve quid for a glass of Sauvignon Blanc in this place? No wonder people bring their own.’

  ‘And Randall was with them?’

  ‘There was a gang of people. He left when that very tall man who is played by a midget in films…’

  ‘I think you mean his character is played by a midge—Bridget, we don’t use that word these days.’

  ‘You just did.’

  ‘I meant horizontally challenged,’ I said.

  Bridget smirked.

  ‘I think you mean vertically challenged. But let’s agree on “that short Scientologist,” shall we?’

  ‘And you mean Lee Child. Any of the organisers?’

  As I said this, the CrimeFest team—Adrian, Myles, Donna, and Liz—came onto the terrace and fanned out. Individually, they went up to each group of crime writers and readers in turn.

  ‘Tell Bridget who Randall Spear is,’ I said as Adrian, the organiser with the shaved head, came over to us. ‘It’s her first time at a crime festival.’

  ‘Was,’ he said. ‘And it’s a convention not a festival.’

  ‘He’s Dutch,’ I said to Bridget by way of introduction. Both looked at me bemused. ‘You know…so a stickler for accuracy,’ I added weakly.

  ‘Why is it called CrimeFest if it’s a convention?’ Bridget said. Adrian frowned but ignored the question.

  ‘Anyway, I just want to reassure you that events will continue as soon as possible but when they do, people will have to use the lifts at the back of the hotel as police have cordoned off the lifts at the front as a crime scene. But in the meantime we all have to stay in the bar. They’re going to want to interview everyone who had any dealings with him.’

  ‘That’ll take hours,’ Bridget said. ‘Are the drinks on the house?’

  ‘We’re working on that,’ Myles said as the other three CrimeFest folk joined us.

  ‘Tell Bridget who Randall Spear was.’

  ‘I thought I saw you with him,’ Donna said cautiously.

  ‘So?’ Bridget said airily.

  ‘Randall Spear wasn’t his real name,’ Adrian said. ‘Though that’s the name his books are marketed under. Probably the most successful crime writer in the world, though it has never been clear whether he was one man or an army of writers all writing under the same brand. And, of course, nobody could be sure he was a he at all.’

  ‘Bloody gender fluidity,’ Bridget muttered.

  ‘I just meant he might be a woman writing as a man,’ Adrian said.

  ‘Theories abound,’ Liz chipped in. ‘He’d hidden behind anonymity for years. No photographs, no interviews until he turned up here. This would have been his first interview. At least we know now he wasn’t Stephen King writing under another name.’

  ‘Or a literary author slumming it, as John Banville says he does,’ I added.

  ‘I always thought that rather than a posse of writers, he was two writers,’ Myles said. ‘Relatively common in crime and mystery fiction.’

  ‘So why didn’t both of them come, like Michael Stanley?’ I said.

  Bridget looked puzzled. ‘I met Michael Stanley. I’m pretty sure he’s one person.’

  ‘You met Michael not Stanley.’

  ‘How many Lee Childs are there?’ Bridget said. I recognised that predatory glint in her eye.

  ‘Is that a metaphysical question?’ Adrian said.

  ‘He’s married,’ I said.

  ‘There’s nothing metaphorical about it,’ Bridget said.

  ‘Metaphysical,’ I murmured.

  ‘Let’s just keep it at physical, shall we?’

  ‘So when did Randall Spear arrive?’ I said, trying to get the investigation back on track.

  ‘Yesterday midday,’ Liz said. She turned to Bridget. ‘I liked you on Countdown.’

  Countdown was a long-running UK afternoon show involving two contestants making words out of random letters and adding up long strings of numbers. It was news to me that Bridget had been on it.

  ‘I don’t know why they took such offence,’ Bridget sniffed.

  ‘Unprecedented number of complaints,’ Myles said.

  ‘For what?’ I said.

  Bridget shrugged.

  ‘It was probably the first time either “fisting” or “rimming” had appeared on the Countdown board,’ Myles said. ‘And certainly never in the same show.’

  ‘It was the sums that let me down,’ Bridget said. ‘They’ve never been my strong point and when they confiscated my calculator just before the game started, I knew I wasn’t going to win.’

  ‘Your maths were very entertaining,’ Myles said drily. ‘And that randy comedian Russell Brand in Dictionary Corner was equally entertained by your word choices.’

  ‘That could have been interesting after the show but I was fourth on his list and I wasn’t having that,’ Bridget said. ‘Which, mind you, was a step up from sixteenth in the queue he proposed after I was part of the audience on Big Brother’s Little Brother years ago.’

  None of us could think of an answer to that. I knew something of Bridget’s various TV appearances. She had told me on the phone, when she agreed to come to Bristol to do an event with me about our adventures, that she’d surfed the zeitgeist of reality television as if it had been created for her. (Well, okay, her actual words were: ‘I decided that if all those D-list morons could make it work for them, so could I.’)

  She’d explained that she’d toyed with X Factor but decided she couldn’t figure out an angle. She had the ‘winning would mean the world to me’ stuff down pat (she’d already used it in four other shows) but the problem was that she had a perfectly pleasant singing voice. So she couldn’t steal the show as one of the self-deluded idiots who sound like cats in a sack or drone on as if their medication has kicked in big-time, but nor could she hope to win because her voice wasn’t fantastic. And the last thing Bridget would ever admit to being was average.

  She’d been trying to reach a tipping point where she could move into the celebrity versions of reality shows. She was eager to go into the Australian jungle for I’m a Celebrity...Get Me Out of Here and even to eat a kangaroo’s testicles if that’s what it took.

  Alas the opportunity never arose on screen, even though she had done something not altogether dissimilar in private with some Antipodean guy who’d claimed to be a TV producer and had promised her a shot on the show in return for a sexual favour. She was livid when she realised he’d conned her, but with age had come cunning, and she went through the procedure with him again. This time, however, he ended up in hospital. Percy would never be pointed at the porcelain in quite the same way again.

  ‘Did Spear arrive alone?’ I said, trying
to get the investigation back on track.

  ‘We’ve told all this to the police, you know,’ Myles said.

  ‘Of course he arrived alone,’ Bridget said. ‘I told you I met him in the car park.’

  ‘Oh, the police will definitely want to talk to you,’ Adrian said. ‘How long were you with him alone?’

  ‘Bit longer than usual but not by much,’ Bridget said.

  ‘He meant in the car park, Bridget,’ I said quickly as the four of them exchanged glances. Well, they had read my books and now they were meeting her in the flesh.

  ‘Men are a constant disappointment,’ Bridget continued. ‘As you ladies will know if you’ve ever wasted your time getting up close and personal with Nick here. But at least with him it hardly takes any time.’

  ‘Me with Nick?’ the women said in horrified unison. Which hurt really.

  ‘Can we get on with solving this crime?’ I said, trying not to harrumph. Bridget looked at me. Okay, so I’d harrumphed. ‘When you’re ready,’ I said quickly.

  ‘Why did he break cover here?’ Bridget said.

  Adrian shrugged. ‘He just e-mailed out of the blue. Said he was going to be over in the UK and could he come. Then he turned up.’

  ‘He got off to a flying start with the ladies,’ Donna said. ‘I suppose he had a kind of roguish charm.’ She nudged me. ‘Shame he wasn’t around long enough for you to learn a trick or two, Nick.’

  ‘I have charms for those who have eyes to see,’ I said.

  ‘I do need new specs,’ she said.

  ‘I did see him engrossed in conversation with Viz, that Found poet turned crime writer,’ I said. To protect Bridget’s feelings, I didn’t add that I’d seen them head off to the lifts with their arms around each other’s waists.

  ‘Just the word poet makes me want to vomit,’ Bridget said sharply. I remembered she rates poets about as highly as paedophiles, serial killers, and former boyfriends. ‘Is she the one who bills herself as a class warrior? I can’t decide whether to admire or pity someone in their forties who still bangs on about class war and the evils of capitalism.’ Bridget wasn’t one to keep up with politics so probably didn’t even know about the current Labour leader and his shadow chancellor. ‘So what is a Found poet anyway?’