A Deadly Habit

by Simon Brett

  So, it was no surprise to him to meet Baz, smellier and more trembly than ever, holding a bottle of vodka, which was easier to manage than a glass.

  ‘Bad news about Gideon,’ said Charles.

  The little man looked up at him suspiciously through the glaze on his eyes. ‘Who are you?’

  ‘Charles Paris.’ The name did not register. ‘We met before. I’m in the play at the Duke of Kent’s.’ Still no recognition. ‘The one with all those bloody monks maundering on, and Justin Grover poncing around in a cassock.’

  Having his own words quoted back to him did spark something in Baz’s memory. ‘You came with Gid.’

  ‘That’s right. I was just saying, bad news about what happened to him.’

  ‘Oh, it was his own fault,’ Baz went on in pious tones. ‘People who drink too much must accept the consequences.’

  ‘Do you know anything about how he died?’

  ‘He drank too much. He choked on his own vomit. That is why,’ said Baz, still mocking, ‘on the rare occasions when I have had too much to drink, I am always very careful to go to sleep lying on my side.’

  ‘I found Gideon in here,’ said Charles.

  ‘Did you? And were you the one who called the police?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Somebody did. We only just had time to get the body out on to the street. Otherwise the police would have been all over this place, asking unhelpful questions about licensing and that kind of nonsense.’ Baz took a long swig of vodka to restore his equilibrium.

  ‘Did you see Gideon the night he died?’

  ‘“Night he died”?’ The eyes had glazed over again. ‘When was that?’

  ‘A few weeks back. I reckon Gideon must’ve come in here out of normal opening hours.’

  ‘Ah. That could be right. He had a key.’

  ‘Did he often come in out of hours?’

  ‘Not often. Sometimes.’

  ‘Ever with you?’

  Baz nodded sagaciously, and took another pull on the vodka bottle.

  ‘Recently?’

  ‘I can’t remember when. Dates, not very good at dates. Not very good when I went on dates, either. Brewer’s droop.’ He seemed to find this very funny. His laughter set up a bout of coughing, which he pacified with vodka.

  Charles shifted the point of attack. ‘Last time you came here out of hours with Gideon, was it just the two of you?’

  ‘Just the two of us.’ Baz nodded vigorously.

  ‘And anyone else?’

  He nodded again. ‘And someone else.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘A pal. A drinking pal.’

  ‘And did you all leave at the same time?’

  ‘What time?’

  ‘The same time. Did you all leave together?’

  Baz pondered this question. ‘Out of hours. Did we all leave together?’

  ‘That’s it.’

  Charles waited, not very hopefully, but then Baz said, in a tone of some bewilderment, ‘Gid didn’t leave. Gid died.’

  ‘Here?’

  ‘Yes.’

  So at least that probably meant they were talking about the right date. Charles persevered. ‘Were you here when he died?’

  ‘No, no. He lay on his back. Always sleep on your side.’

  ‘So, when you left, Baz, was Gideon alone?’

  ‘Don’t drink alone. Bad thing to drink on your own. Drinking should be a social activity. “Hail, fellow, well met”, and that kind of thing. Don’t drink alone.’

  ‘But did you leave Gideon on his own?’

  ‘No, no. Drinking companion. I had to go. Pressing appointment, can’t remember what. They went, I stayed. No, no. I went, they stayed.’

  ‘Gideon?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And who?’

  ‘Well, the person we came here with.’

  Charles tried not to let his exasperation show. ‘And who was that?’

  Baz raised a quivering finger and pointed across the room. ‘He’s over there.’

  ‘I thought you were a Guinness man?’

  ‘Needs must when the devil drives. Nothing on draught here. Just bottles.’ Seamus Milligan had one of Jameson’s in front of him. ‘Do you want to fetch a glass, Charles?’

  ‘No, I’m fine, thank you.’

  ‘Good. Nice when we’re all fine, isn’t it?’

  ‘Kell said you weren’t going to be in today.’

  ‘I wasn’t in. To the theatre. I’m here.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Anyway, where I am and what I do there, I would have thought is my business.’

  ‘Certainly. So long as Justin approves.’

  ‘And what the hell do you mean by that, Charles?’

  ‘I mean that you and Justin seem to be quite close.’

  ‘If you’re insinuating that he and I—’

  ‘I’m certainly not insinuating anything of a sexual nature. More of a mutually backscratching nature. You both have reasons for doing each other favours.’

  ‘What are you talking about?’

  ‘Let’s start with one very simple question, Seamus. Would The Habit of Faith be currently running in the West End if Justin Grover wasn’t involved in it?’

  ‘Quite possibly. It’s a play which I’m very proud of, and I’m sure with another actor …’ The playwright wasn’t even convincing himself.

  ‘No. “With another actor”, it might get a few weeks at some regional theatre, a brief tour, but West End? No. You know that as well as I do, Seamus. But with Justin Grover’s name attached, a West End run is guaranteed. A reading of the Yellow Pages with Justin Grover’s name attached would get a West End run.

  ‘So why, when Justin sees a break coming in his Vandals and Visigoths schedule, a break into which he could fit three months in the West End, why doesn’t he go for a classic play, or a new one by one of the vibrant young playwrights who keep being discovered? Why does he go for The Habit of Faith? It has to be because he owes you a favour.’

  ‘Justin has admired my work for a long—’

  ‘Or, of course, because Justin knows that you could do him a disfavour.’

  ‘Meaning what exactly?’

  ‘Meaning that you know something from his past, something which might rather discredit his image in these hypersensitive times. Something like the fact that Justin Grover enjoys a little voyeurism.’

  The expression on the playwright’s face told Charles that he was on the right track, and emboldened him to go on assembling his theory out loud. ‘Some years back, you were down at Bridport, being shown round the theatre by Damian Grantchester, because one of your plays was in rehearsal there. The previous production had been Hamlet, in which Justin and I had given our Rosencrantz and Guildenstern – or possibly the other way round. You were with Damian when he was shown the hole that Justin had drilled through from our dressing room into Ophelia’s. You saw the evidence that Justin Grover was a Peeping Tom.’

  Seamus’s face still gave Charles no discouragement from continuing, ‘Well, you sat on that information for a long time, didn’t you? I’m not sure why you suddenly decided the moment was right to use it. Was it the change in the world of showbiz, the new climate in which big names were being exposed for long-ago “inappropriate behaviour”? Was it the ever-increasing international profile of Justin Grover? Or was it some decline in your own personal circumstances that meant you needed the money? I don’t know, and the details aren’t really important. But the outcome was that The Habit of Faith, written by Seamus Milligan, appeared in the West End, starring Justin Grover.’

  There was a silence. Then the playwright said, ‘You have no proof of any of this.’

  ‘No? Maybe not. But that’s the history. Let’s move up to the present, shall we? What about the death of Liddy Max? Shall we talk about that now?’

  The boisterous noise-level around them should have made conversation difficult, but in the two men’s cocoon of concentration they might have been alone in the room.

/>   ‘And what about Gideon’s? Let’s deal with Liddy first. Shall I tell you what Justin’s version of events is?’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘He’s fingering you as her murderer.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘He said you pushed her down the stairs backstage at the Duke of Kent’s.’

  ‘Why would I do that?’

  ‘According to Justin, because you were in love with her.’

  ‘What!’ That was clearly not the answer Seamus had been expecting.

  ‘Yes. You’d had your eyes on her right through rehearsal, apparently. And when you saw her making love with another man, you flipped your lid and killed her.’

  ‘Is that what Justin said?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And did he say how I happened to see Liddy and Grant making love?’

  ‘No, he didn’t,’ said Charles, salting away the useful nugget of information that Seamus knew the identity of the girl’s lover.

  ‘I’ll tell you how it happened, Charles. That Monday evening, I went round to Justin’s hotel room, by arrangement. I knocked on the door, got no response and went in. The reason he hadn’t heard my knock was that Justin was in a … state of some excitement, watching a live transmission on his laptop of Liddy and Grant having sex!’

  ‘So he was lying when he told me you loved her?’

  ‘Absolutely. I’ve never had any interest in Liddy. Apart from anything else, I’m still a Catholic, so far as marriage is concerned. I may no longer be faithful to the Church, but I have been faithful to my wife since the day of our wedding!’

  ‘So,’ asked Charles, ‘if it wasn’t the passion of a jealous lover, what was the reason you killed Liddy Max?’

  ‘I didn’t go near the Duke of Kent’s after lunchtime that day.’

  ‘Oh, you did. A witness saw you entering the stage door some half-hour after Grant left the theatre.’ There was no response. ‘Shall I suggest something that might have happened, Seamus?’

  ‘I can’t stop you.’

  ‘I think Justin told you to do it. I think Liddy had somehow found out about the secret filming and had called him, probably while you were still in his hotel room. A call was definitely made from her mobile after Grant had left. She threatened to expose Justin to the press. He couldn’t risk that, so he sent you round to deal with her.’

  ‘And why would I do that? According to your analysis of my motivation, all I wanted to do was get The Habit of Faith into the West End. I’d achieved that. Why would I agree to do a favour for Justin?’

  This was not a question for which Charles had been prepared, but he quickly improvised a response. ‘I think he was holding out some other offer for you. A nice writing berth on Vandals and Visigoths, maybe? I’m sure he has the power to recommend new writers to the producers. The money you’d get for that kind of screenplay would come in handy, wouldn’t it? Nice pension for a writer your age.’

  The playwright said nothing, but something in his eyes told Charles he was very close to the truth.

  ‘So, Seamus, shall we move on to Gideon’s death? Again, I think you did that under orders from Justin. Gideon was a loose cannon, particularly when he’d got a few drinks inside him. Maybe he even threatened to tell the police about Justin paying him to set up the spy camera. He was a risk, anyway, and also a very easy person to kill. Given his weight, given his general state of health, given his alcohol habit … someone just had to sit with him for long enough, ply him with vodka for long enough; see that, when he passed out, he was lying on his back … and let nature take its course …’

  ‘And you think I did that, Charles?’

  ‘Yes. Right here. In this very room.’

  ‘Nonsense!’

  ‘What’s more, I have a witness.’

  ‘Who?’

  Charles pointed across to where his witness, overcome by excess, lay crumpled on the floor.

  ‘Baz?’ said Seamus contemptuously. ‘Who’s going to believe someone like him?’ Then he turned back to Charles and said, ‘Well, I feel congratulations are due. You’ve got a lot of things right. I did cause the deaths – I’m not going to say “murdered” – of both Liddy Max and Gideon. And do you know why I have no anxiety about telling you that, Charles?

  ‘It’s because I know for an absolute fact that you haven’t a hope in hell of proving any of it.’

  TWENTY-ONE

  The infuriating thing was that Seamus Milligan’s words turned out to be true.

  Charles Paris knew exactly what had happened. Seamus had admitted that he was right, and yet the only proof he could put forward depended on the testimony of a street-dwelling alcoholic prone to memory lapses, and an underage prostitute. If Charles had had the full power of the police force behind him, the Crown Prosecution Service would still never have taken to court a case based on such flimsy evidence.

  So, all he could do, for the remainder of The Habit of Faith’s run, was to continue to work with a man whom he knew to be a Peeping Tom. And whom he knew to have ordered the killing of two people.

  To call the situation frustrating would have been an understatement.

  And having to act with Justin Grover every night, particularly in the role of Brother Benedict, The Monk Who Just Listened To All Of The Other Monks Who Maundered On In Long Speeches About Their Own Internal Conflicts, did not improve Charles’s mood.

  Adding to his woes – and, incidentally removing another link in his frail chain of investigative logic – Charles discovered from an obituary in The Times that Damian Grantchester had died. He would not have thought any more about it, had he not met Trevor Race again on his next visit to Gower House.

  ‘Heard about Damian, did you?’

  ‘Yes. Saw it in The Times.’

  ‘Pathetically short obit, wasn’t it? Guy like Damian, put his entire life into the theatre, gave their first break to some of our most distinguished actors, and what do we get? “Launched the meteoric career of Justin Grover.” There was more about Justin in the obit than there was about Damian. Bloody press – never been able to recognize real talent.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Anyway, will you be going, Charles?’

  ‘Where?’

  ‘To the funeral.’

  ‘Oh, I thought that would already have happened.’

  ‘No, the bodies stack up this time of year. Running up to Christmas, takes weeks to get a slot. It’s on Monday. Eleven a.m. in Dorking.’

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘I’m going. I’ve got the details. Do you want them?’

  ‘Yes, please,’ said Charles, suddenly making up his mind. ‘I do want to be there.’

  He mentioned the funeral to Justin Grover, and was unsurprised to be told that the star couldn’t attend. ‘Costume fitting on Monday for the next tranche of Vandals. But do give my best wishes to anyone who might appreciate them.’

  Tod Singer said he hadn’t known Damian Grantchester well enough to be at the funeral. And, as for the other member of The Habit of Faith who had a Bridport connection, Seamus Milligan had not been seen around the Duke of Kent’s since his encounter with Charles in the Techie’s Drinking Club.

  The Monday was cold, but still and rather beautiful. Frost outlined the twigs of trees in the Dorking graveyard. And the funeral was that contemporary rarity, a church service followed by a burial.

  It wasn’t a bad turnout. Damian Grantchester clearly had the knack of making friends, and Charles felt a twinge of guilt at not having seen more of him in recent years. Once again, it was that theatre thing of being very close to people during a production, and forgetting them the moment you stopped working together. Still, there were a few faces Charles recognized, and a few hands waved across the aisle.

  Damian had not apparently had a permanent partner, but there were a lot of middle-aged men, who had once been beautiful, snivelling in their pews.

  There is always one good thing about theatrical funerals. The eulogies have been worked on like play scripts. Both they an
d the readings are perfectly delivered. And the hymn-singing isn’t bad either.

  Charles felt quite a pang when Damian Grantchester’s coffin entered its last home.

  ‘You’re Charles Paris, aren’t you?’

  He admitted that he was, but looked without recognition at the dumpy woman who’d approached him. ‘I’m sorry. Got a dreadful memory for faces. I’m not sure—’

  ‘Eve Blanche. We worked together at Bridport.’

  ‘Of course we did! Imperial Theatre. Damian’s production of Hamlet. You were Ophelia.’

  ‘And you were Rosencrantz. Or was it Guildenstern?’

  ‘Can’t remember, but I was definitely in it.’

  They were in a private room in a pub near the church. The piles of sandwiches were diminishing at a rate of knots. (What is it about actors and food?) There were also tempting rows of glasses filled with red and white wine. Charles felt very virtuous nursing the tap water he’d asked for at the bar.

  ‘Anyway, it’s lovely to see you, Eve. Are you still “in the business”?’ If she was, she must have moved on from ingénue to character parts.

  ‘No. I didn’t do much after Bridport, really. I’m not sure if I had the necessary talent.’

  ‘I have great memories of your Ophelia.’ Charles hadn’t actually been that impressed at the time, but he knew the right thing to say to a fellow artiste.

  ‘Anyway, after a few years of waiting for the phone to ring and agonizing over whether I had any talent or not, I decided to go off in a completely new direction. Went into publishing.’

  ‘Did you? Ah. Are you the person Damian mentioned who was hawking round his memoir?’

  ‘That’s me. Beginners, Please. It’s an uphill struggle. Publishers are so obsessed by celebrity these days. I’ve hardly got a flicker of interest from anyone – except one publisher who had the nerve to suggest that, because Damian had known him, he should write an unauthorized biography of Justin Grover. He reckoned there was a market for that.’

  ‘How dispiriting.’ Then Charles couldn’t help asking the inevitable actor’s question: ‘Is there anything in the memoir about me?’

  ‘You get a mention, yes. There’s a lot of very interesting stuff in there.’ Her tone had become more purposeful.

  ‘I’m sure there is. I’d love to talk to you in more detail about it, Eve.’