Play to the End

by Robert Goddard

  “You entered this house covertly this afternoon,” said Roger. “I have the CCTV footage to prove that. You hid until the staff had gone home. Then you emerged—and attacked me.”

  “What?”

  “You took me by surprise. It was a vicious and unprovoked assault.”

  “You’re mad. Nobody’s going to believe that.”

  “I think they are, actually.” He nodded to Sobotka. “I’m ready.”

  Sobotka moved back to where Colborn was standing and, to my astonishment, punched him in the face. The blow, landing near his left eyebrow, sent Colborn reeling, but he steadied himself and stood upright again. A second punch took him somewhere between the jaw and cheekbone. He yelped, staggered, shook his head, then held up his hand in a signal of surrender and sank slowly into his chair.

  Blood was oozing from the side of his mouth. He dabbed at it with a handkerchief and raised his other hand to the already reddening and swelling mark above his eye, wincing as his fingertips made contact. “I reckon a spectacular black eye’s guaranteed,” he said, lisping slightly. “And there’s a tooth loose as well. The split lip should look very impressive. Jenny’s going to think you’ve seriously lost it, Toby. And she’ll be right. You have lost.”

  I stared at him, unable for the moment to speak. The man was mad. He had to be. Mad and very dangerous. If he was willing to have this done to him, what was he prepared to do to me?

  “Let me sketch out your evening for you, Toby. After leaving me here to nurse my wounds, you went back to Brighton and killed a few hours getting seriously stoned. You didn’t show up at the theatre, or even bother to warn them you weren’t going to. Then you hooked up with a prostitute and went back to her place. Something went badly wrong there. Maybe you couldn’t get it up after all that booze. Anyway, you got angry and stuck a wineglass in her face. Nasty. Very nasty. And very stupid too. She’d recognized you from the poster outside the theatre. And you didn’t take the broken glass with you when you left. Fingerprints all over it, I’m afraid. Your fingerprints.”

  “You won’t get away with this,” I protested.

  “Jenny’s going to want to have nothing to do with you after she learns what you’re capable of, Toby. It’s not going to do a lot for your career either, is it? They won’t send you down for long. First offence, previous good character, etcetera, etcetera. You might even get away with a suspended sentence. But acting? Forget it. I’ve been in touch with your boss, Leo Gauntlett. I’ve offered to put some money into Lodger in the Throat. Enough to give it a chance in the West End. I’ve suggested he recast James Elliott, though. Bring in someone more reliable. Maybe you got to hear about that. Maybe that’s why you came here this afternoon. To have it out with me. If so, all you’ve done is make certain he’ll take up my suggestion.”

  “You bastard.” Anger finally won out over shock and fear. I launched myself at him. But Sobotka stepped between us and grabbed me, doubling one arm up behind my back, sending a lance of pain through my shoulder.

  “Let’s get him out of here,” said Colborn. “We’re done.”

  Pinning both of my arms behind me with such ease that I sensed the slightest resistance on my part could lead to a dislocation or worse, Sobotka frogmarched me out of the room and down the stairs. He paused at the bottom long enough for Colborn to overtake and open the front door. Then Colborn led the way across the terrace to where a Ford Transit had been backed up in position at the edge of the drive. He swung one of the rear doors open and turned to face me.

  “You’ll be dropped on the edge of town. What you do then is up to you. It won’t make any difference. You could try getting your story in with the police first, but they’ll see through it fast enough. The evidence is all one way. Denials and counter-accusations will count against you in the long run. You could make a run for it, of course. That’s another option. Gatwick’s only half an hour away by train. You might be able to get on a plane bound for somewhere exotic before they raise the alarm. Or you could just sit tight at the Sea Air and wait for them to come for you. They’re all losing bets, believe me. I’ve fixed the odds.”

  “What if I offered to leave Brighton now, tonight, for good?” The plea must have sounded as desperate as it truly was. “I could save you the bother of setting me up.”

  Colborn chuckled. “It’s too late for that.”

  “You don’t need to do this.”

  “Oh, but I do. You pushed me too far, Toby. It’s as simple as that.”

  “What about Derek Oswin? What are you going to do with him?”

  “Don’t worry about Oswin. Worry about yourself.” He nodded to Sobotka. “Get going.”

  Sobotka levered me backwards, raising my feet off the ground until they were above the level of the floor of the van, then rammed me in through the doorway, giving a final shove that sent me on a bruising roll against a boxed-in wheel arch. The door slammed shut behind me. The lock clunked into position.

  I sat up and felt my way forwards until I reached the plywood screen blocking off the cab. The back of the van was empty. I was the only cargo.

  The van sagged to one side as Sobotka climbed into the driving seat. He started the engine, then paused to light a cigarette. I heard the click of the lighter through the screen. There were two thumps on the side of the van—a signal from Colborn. Sobotka ground the engine into gear and started away.

  Sobotka’s priority clearly wasn’t the comfort of his passenger. The journey into Brighton was a bone-jarring purgatory. All I could do was cling to one of the wheel-arch boxes and wait for it to end.

  I had no idea where we were when the van slowed, bumped up onto a verge and came to a halt. The engine was still running as Sobotka climbed out of the cab. A few seconds later, one of the rear doors opened. Sobotka’s gigantic shadow loomed before me.

  “Out,” he said. It was the first word he’d spoken to me. And the last.

  I made a stooping progress to the door. He stepped back as I clambered out. Then he moved swiftly past me, slamming the door as he went.

  I heard the driver’s door slam a few seconds later. The gearbox grated. The van lurched down onto the roadway and accelerated away. I stared after it as an awareness of my surroundings seeped into me. I was at the edge of an unlit single-carriageway road. Ahead of me was a roundabout, bathed in sodium light. The van crossed it, moving fast, as I watched.

  Then a dark-blue saloon car completed a slow revolution of the roundabout and took the same exit as the van. There was no other traffic in any direction. It was a strange, hypnotic scene. The van. Then the car. I didn’t know what to make of it. And my mind was too beset by other matters for me to dwell on it.

  I started walking towards the roundabout.

  Sobotka had dropped me just short of an interchange on the Brighton bypass. There was a roundabout either side of the dual-carriageway cutting. I glanced down at the surging traffic as I trudged across the bridge above it towards the amber dome of the city.

  I was on Dyke Road Avenue, heading south through empty suburbia, destination uncertain, determination undone. The choices Colborn had so generously set before me were each as poisonous as the other. If I went to the police, I’d lose the small amount of room for manoeuvre I had left. It wasn’t as if there was anything I could do to help the prostitute I was going to be framed for assaulting—Olga, presumably. The police were on to Sobotka, of course, which set me wondering again about the car on the roundabout. But that didn’t mean they’d believe me, given that to have any hope of convincing them I’d have to admit to lying when Addis and Spooner questioned me this morning. Making a run for it was crazy, though undeniably tempting. Yet where would I run to? What would I run to? I had to prove to Jenny that I was telling the truth. But how could I convince her? And how was I to survive until I got the chance?

  I walked for what must have been at least two miles past silent houses, to any one of which theatre-goers might soon be returning, complaining as they came about the last-minute change
of cast in Lodger in the Throat.

  It was well gone eleven o’clock by now. The Dyke Tavern was chucking out. I passed Dyke Road Park and the Sixth-Form College. I had my bearings in one sense, but in another not at all. I’d more or less come to the conclusion that going back to the Sea Air was about the best way to demonstrate my innocence. I might phone the police from there. I wasn’t sure, though. I wasn’t sure about anything.

  At Seven Dials, I took a squint at the timetable displayed on one of the bus stops, according to which there was an 11.50 service to the Old Steine. Cold, footsore and limping on account of my strained thigh, I decided to wait there.

  Fishing in my pocket for the pound fare, I winced as something sharp pricked my finger. I pulled out the offending article: Derek Oswin’s Captain Haddock brooch. I’d jabbed myself with the pin.

  I stared at the enamel face of the cartoon captain in the amber light of the nearby street lamp. I’d forgotten till then that I’d picked it up from the doormat at 77 Viaduct Road on Wednesday night. I must have dropped it into my pocket without thinking.

  Another memory floated back to me then, of Derek confiding in me that he’d nicknamed Wickhurst Manor Marlinspike Hall. He’d made a point of telling me that though Tintin lived at Marlinspike in Hergé’s books, Captain Haddock was the owner of the house. And there was some kind of coincidental connection with Roger Colborn’s ownership of Wickhurst Manor. I couldn’t remember exactly what it was—couldn’t be sure Derek had even told me—but he’d certainly mentioned one. Emphasized its existence, indeed.

  I imagined the scene as Derek was dragged down the stairs and out through the door of number 77, presumably by Sobotka. How had the Haddock brooch ended up on the floor? Had it simply been ripped off as they passed? Or had Derek deliberately torn it from his coat…and dropped it there…in the hope that I would find it? Was Captain Haddock his typically bizarre choice of messenger to me?

  The idea was absurd, yet irresistible. I was clutching at a straw. But, as a drowning man, what else was I to do? I had Derek’s keys. I could go to Viaduct Road easily enough and check whether there really was something I’d missed, some clue Derek had contrived to point me towards that would unlock the mystery. Besides, no-one would guess I’d gone there. As a hiding-place, it would take some beating. And, arguably, I did need a hiding-place.

  I left the bus stop and headed north-east from Seven Dials, downhill towards Preston Circus and…Derek Oswin’s home.

  Nothing had changed at 77 Viaduct Road, except for the arrival of an electricity bill. I moved it off the doormat and pinned the Haddock brooch back onto Derek’s abandoned duffel-coat, covering the tear. Then I went into the kitchen, hoping against hope that I might find something alcoholic to drink. I certainly needed something a lot stronger than cocoa.

  A search of the cupboards turned up a half-empty bottle of sweet sherry. Valerie Oswin’s tipple, perhaps. Or maybe Derek was a trifle addict. But I couldn’t afford to be choosy. I poured some into a tumbler and took it with me into the sitting room.

  The Secret of the Unicorn was the book in which his heroes finally moved to Marlinspike Hall. I dug it out of the slew of Tintin books on the floor and sat down to look at it. The blurb on the back referred to a sequel, Red Rackham’s Treasure. I dug that one out as well.

  The Tintin characters were vaguely familiar to me, but the stories hadn’t left the faintest trace in my memory, though I’d read a good few in my childhood. I began to flick through The Secret of the Unicorn, gleaning the plot that under-pinned the visual game-playing as I went. It didn’t take long. Soon, I was able to move on to Red Rackham’s Treasure. The story, as the titles imply, amounts to a treasure hunt, at the end of which Tintin and Captain Haddock are able to move from their humble lodgings to Haddock’s ancestral home, Marlinspike Hall. A voyage to the Caribbean in search of the buried riches of the pirate Red Rackham draws a blank and Haddock is actually only able to buy Marlinspike thanks to some money his friend Professor Calculus comes into by selling a valuable patent. Not until after taking possession of the house do Tintin and Haddock finally discover the treasure, hidden in a marble globe in the cellars.

  I sat back and took several sips of sherry, though, like Haddock, I’d much have preferred whisky. A sense of futility, and, worse, stupidity, swept over me. What in the name of reason and sanity was I doing poring over Derek Oswin’s childhood reading matter while my life was unravelling around me? Poor Olga had probably already had her cheek slashed to bolster the case against me, while Leo had doubtless decided to sack me from the production of Lodger in the Throat and never employ me again. I was staring scandal and disgrace none too steadily in the face. Maybe I should have taken Colborn’s offer when it was on the table. I didn’t like to think what had happened to Derek because of my refusal. I liked even less to think what was going to happen to me.

  The worst was that there was nothing I could do to prevent it. The idea that the Haddock brooch was some kind of message from Derek had been born of sheer bloody desperation. There was no message, no clue, no key, no hope, no globe waiting to spring open to my touch, revealing—

  “Bugger me,” I said aloud, sitting suddenly upright. “The globe.”

  It stood on the desk in Derek’s bedroom, in front of the window: a one-foot-diameter mounted globe, presumably given to him by his parents during his schooldays. Certainly the USSR hadn’t yet dissolved into its constituent republics in this representation. I revolved the globe slowly, wondering whether I really was on to something, or had just been suckered by meaningless coincidence.

  The Oswins hadn’t stinted their son. That was clear. The globe was an illuminated version. I noticed the wire trailing down to the plug behind the desk. I stooped to the socket and switched it on, but nothing happened. Then I spotted the rocker switch on the wire itself and tried that. Still nothing. The bulb inside the globe must have blown. Derek hadn’t bothered to replace it.

  But that, I knew, wasn’t Derek’s style. He bothered. He would have replaced it. Unless, of course, it hadn’t blown. Unless, that is, he’d removed it. For a reason. For a very good reason. Red Rackham’s treasure had been hidden inside a globe.

  I picked the globe up and shook it gently. Something inside was sliding to and fro. I noticed a catch of some kind on the spindle at the north pole. I prised at it, releasing a pin inside the spindle and allowing the globe to be lifted off its base. As I manoeuvred the globe out of its sickle-shaped mount, something fell through the hole at the south pole and landed on the desk.

  It was a microcassette, identical to those I’ve been using. But on this one there was a small paper label stuck to the front, with a date written on it in spidery ballpoint: 7/10/95. Whatever was on the tape had been recorded a month or so before the death of Sir Walter Colborn in the autumn of 1995.

  Where there was a cassette, there had to be a machine to play it on. That stood to reason. I checked the drawers of the desk. And there it was, at the back of the bottom drawer: a machine somewhat larger and probably a good few years older than the one I’d left at the Sea Air, but doubtless still working. The take-up spindle whizzed into action when I pressed the PLAY button. There was plenty of charge left in the batteries.

  I loaded the cassette, stood the machine on the bedside cabinet and sat down on the bed. Then I pressed the PLAY button again.

  There were two voices: a man and woman talking to each other. The man sounded old, gruff and querulous, the woman younger, softer-toned, more distant. At first, I couldn’t tell who they were. Then, as their identities became apparent, ignorance turned to disbelief. These two people couldn’t be conversing in October 1995. It just wasn’t possible, and yet they were. I could hear them. I could hear every word.

  MAN: Ann?

  WOMAN: Yes?

  MAN: Is that really you, Ann?

  ANN: Yes, Walter. It’s really me.

  WALTER: It doesn’t…sound like you.

  ANN: I’m speaking through another. Besides, it’s
been a long time for me as well as you. Well, not time exactly. But long. Yes, it’s been that. And I’ve changed. I’m Ann. But not the Ann you remember. Not quite. Although, of course…

  WALTER: What?

  ANN: I never was. Not really. Not the Ann you chose to believe I was. You know that, if you’re honest with yourself. As I hope you are. As I hope…contacting me like this…proves you are.

  WALTER: How can I be sure it’s you?

  ANN (chuckling): Still one for certainty, aren’t you, Walter? Plain and unvarnished facts. You can live by them. But you can’t die by them.

  WALTER: I just want…to be absolutely—

  ANN: I remember the look on your face when you came into my room at the maternity hospital and saw Roger bundled up in my arms. I remember it exactly. Do you?

  WALTER (after a pause): Yes. Of course.

  ANN: What do you want of me, Walter?

  WALTER (after another pause): The truth, I…suppose. ANN: The truth?

  WALTER: Yes.

  ANN: But you already know it.

  WALTER: No. I don’t.

  ANN: You mean you don’t wish to.

  WALTER: You left no note. No…explanation.

  ANN: A note would have become…public property. Studied by the coroner. Entered on the record. Would you really have preferred that?

  WALTER: All these years, I’ve wondered.

  ANN: What have you wondered?

  WALTER: Why?

  ANN: I couldn’t stand the pretence any longer, Walter. It’s as simple as that. It became…unendurable. It didn’t have to be.

  You made it so.