by Simon Brett
The Earnshaws’ house was on the borders of Hove, all very middle class and discreet. So middle class and discreet that the setting up of cameras and lights elicited not the slightest reaction from the neighbours. This was in marked contrast to what would have happened in most residential locations. Anything to do with television usually draws an instant crowd.
Still, nobody was complaining. This middle-class restraint of curiosity made Geoffrey Ramage’s job a lot easier, and rendered redundant Greg Marchmont and the other policemen delegated to guard the location.
When they arrived at the house, Charles was interested to notice the detective sergeant give a tiny nod of acknowledgement to an apparently empty van opposite. No doubt inside it some of his colleagues were maintaining twenty-four-hour surveillance on Martin Earnshaw’s widow.
Chloe, as ever in equal parts fragile and tactile, was expecting them and let them into the house. She neither welcomed the intrusion nor resented it, apparently resigned to the necessity of turning yet another knife in the wound left by the murder. Again she greeted Charles, identically dressed to her husband when last seen, with a piercing, anguished stare. And again his response was unworthy.
Geoffrey Ramage took them quickly through the required actions, with Chloe occasionally interrupting to correct some detail of what was to be reconstructed. Charles found this a new, and rather unnerving, experience. To have Martin Earnshaw’s actions described to him by the director was one thing, but to be taken through them by the dead man’s wife was something else entirely. Charles was made very sensible of that element in Public Enemies, the blurring between fantasy and reality, which Bob Garston so prized.
They were only going to reconstruct what could have been seen from the street. Charles found himself wistfully – and it must be said, again unworthily – dwelling on what Chloe and her husband might have got up to inside the house in the moments before his departure. Why was it this woman always brought his thoughts back to sex? He didn’t exactly fancy her, and yet he could not ignore her strong erotic aura.
Still, even the bit seen from outside involved her giving him a goodbye kiss and, as they rehearsed this, Charles realised gleefully that he would be fulfilling a national fantasy. When the reconstruction appeared on Thursday’s Public Enemies, men all over the country would be envious of Charles Paris.
The kiss, though Chloe insisted on proper lip contact and even a hug and a little pat on the bottom from him, was strangely asexual. It wasn’t just because of the circumstances, the lights, the camera crew. Charles had rehearsed enough stage kisses not to be expecting any major excitements. But he was still surprised at how cold and positively antaphrodisiac Chloe Earnshaw’s lips proved to be.
Oh dear, he berated himself, another unworthy thought. The woman had just been widowed in appalling circumstances. What was he expecting – that she’d suddenly demonstrate seething passion to a total stranger? He felt guilty and chastened by his reaction.
Charles Paris’s latest performance as Martin Earnshaw did not involve much. He had to open the front door, succumb to the kiss from Chloe, and walk off down the road, turning once to wave as she closed the door.
This action, it was hoped, would be the latest prompt to the collective television-viewing memory. Had anyone out there witnessed the scene? Had anyone who had witnessed it seen some other significant detail . . . like, say, a couple of heavies with butcher’s knives lurking in the shadows? Given the apparently total lack of interest in the affairs of others manifested by the Earnshaws’ neighbours, it looked unlikely that anyone would come forward.
Still, audience research had shown flashbacks of the living Chloe with her dead husband likely to prove a popular ingredient in Public Enemies, so, regardless of their likelihood of advancing the investigation, the scenes would definitely be shown.
A couple of run-throughs and Chloe and Charles were set to go. Then suddenly the heavens opened. Geoffrey Ramage quickly decided they’d delay shooting until the cloudburst had passed. Much as his film noir instincts were drawn to dark moody shots through the falling rain, he knew that it hadn’t been raining on the evening Martin Eamshaw really left, and it was his brief to reconstruct those events as closely as possible. The director comforted himself with the thought that, after the rain had stopped, he’d still be able to get some pretty damned dramatic effects with light reflecting off the wet pavement.
As the W.E.T. crew busied themselves covering their equipment against the downpour, Charles found himself invited into the house by Chloe Earnshaw. She led him through to a spotless kitchen and offered tea. Just as she was filling the kettle, the telephone rang. Chloe did nothing and after a moment the ringing stopped.
‘Ansafone,’ she replied to Charles’s quizzical look. ‘Get lots of calls – most of them from cranks.’
‘Couldn’t you change the number?’
She looked at him, appalled. ‘No! All right, most of them are nonsense, but one of them might be important. One of them might be able to give me some information about Martin.’
‘Yes, I’m sorry. Wasn’t thinking.’
‘It’s all right.’ She stared searchingly into his face and Charles felt himself transfixed by the intense beam of her dark blue eyes. ‘You do look like him,’ Chloe Earnshaw murmured. ‘Not really like him, but there’s something . . .’
‘Ah. Well, sorry . . .’ said Charles lamely.
‘Not your fault. And indeed, if your likeness to Martin leads to us getting more information about the murder, then it will have been a very good thing – certainly nothing to apologise for.’
‘No.’ Still her eyes bored into him, making Charles uneasy. ‘It must be awful for you,’ he stumbled on, ‘just sitting waiting for something to happen, having nothing to do.’
‘Nothing to do?’ she echoed incredulously. ‘But I’m unbelievably busy.’
‘Yes, of course you’ve got the house to look after and –’
‘No, not that. I’m busy setting up this support group.’
‘Support group – what for?’
‘I’m setting up a national support group for the spouses and partners of murder victims,’ Chloe Earnshaw replied sedately.
Well, yes, you would be, wouldn’t you? Even as he had the thought, Charles knew it was yet another unworthy one.
After the filming, Charles changed out of his Martin Earnshaw kit and handed it over to the pretty Wardrobe girl. ‘Anyone going out for a meal this evening?’ he asked hopefully. ‘Well, um . . .’ The girl blushed. ‘I’m not sure. I mean, I’m kind of committed.’
Geoffrey Ramage appeared in the doorway behind her and Charles instantly understood the nature of her commitment. The director, given overnight freedom from wife and small family, was going to make the most of it. Judging from the eye contact between him and the Wardrobe girl, it was a set-up job. He’d probably fixed for her to be allocated this particular duty. Some television traditions, like extramarital screwing on location, die hard.
‘Oh, fine. Well, probably see you back at the hotel.’
‘In the morning, Charles,’ said Geoffrey Ramage firmly, emphasising the exclusivity of his and the girl’s plans for the evening.
Charles felt a momentary pang of wistfulness – even jealousy – in the car back to the hotel. He thought back to previous location filmings, when he’d set up similar arrangements for himself. In retrospect, none of them had been particularly successful. Indeed, given how rare it was for one to be successful, he wondered why the image of a one-night stand still retained any magic at all.
Charles Paris looked back gloomily on his sex life. There had been some wonderful moments, delirious, peaceful moments of pure pleasure, but their memory was hard to recapture. Something so perfect at the time does not make for good recollection, particularly when recollected in less cheerful mood. Thinking about such moments in the past only prompts mourning for their current absence.
Anyway, sexual highs never last. It’s only the continuing relationships
that count, he thought morbidly, picking at the scab of his self-pity. Awareness of his cooling relationship with Frances ached like a bruised bone.
There was a message for him back at the hotel. From Louise Denning. ‘POSSIBILITY OF FURTHER FILMING TOMORROW (WEDNESDAY). STAY AT HOTEL UNTIL CONTACTED.’ She managed to get the same peremptory tone into all her communications.
Oh well, might mean another fee, thought Charles Paris morosely, as he ambled through into the bar.
A small Brighton hotel in late November is not likely to be doing much business, and there was only one other person drinking. A substantial figure sat hunched over the counter with his back to the door. Geoffrey Ramage was off with his quarry for some restaurant foreplay – or maybe they had gone straight up to the bedroom. And the rest of the W.E.T. crew were probably off bitching at everyone else in the business and milking their expenses over a rowdy Italian meal. I suppose I should eat something at some point, Charles reminded himself. Still, couple of large Bell’s first.
As he approached the counter, he recognised the other drinker. It was Greg Marchmont, who gave him a deterrent sideways look and returned studiously to his whisky. The bleared look in his eye suggested it wasn’t the first of the evening.
The bar was unmanned. Charles’s repeated banging at the bell on the counter eventually produced a spotty waiter in a red jacket.
‘Large Bell’s, please.’ And, in spite of the resolutely turned back, he added, ‘Get you something, Sergeant?’
Marchmont turned to look at him and, after a moment’s hesitation, said, ‘I’ll have the same, please.’
He took his drink with a murmured ‘Thank you’, and the spotty waiter left them to it. Doesn’t look like being the most convivial evening since records began, thought Charles.
Still, better make some conversational effort. ‘Your boss not around then, Sergeant?’
Greg Marchmont looked at him appraisingly, as if undecided whether or not to respond. Charles Paris had seen that look many times before, and always from people who knew nothing about the theatre. It was what he thought of as the ‘all actors are poofs’ reaction.
But basic good manners just about triumphed. ‘No, God knows where he is. Maybe he’s found some Masonic function to go to down here.’
The detective sergeant remained surly and didn’t volunteer anything else. If the conversation was to be maintained, Charles would have to be the one to keep it going.
‘He seemed pretty sure of finding the murderer, didn’t he? You know, when he was talking in the car . . . Sounded very confident.’
‘Wankers always sound confident,’ Marchmont growled. ‘Goes with the territory.’
So his apparent deference to Roscoe only lasted while his superior was actually there. With the superintendent off the scene, Greg Marchmont showed as little respect as the rest of his colleagues.
‘And is Roscoe a complete wanker?’ asked Charles. Marchmont gave a bitter laugh. ‘You better believe it. One of those people who gets promoted for all the wrong reasons. Never done a single thing on his own, but always happy to take the credit for what his staff have done. He’s a bloody joke throughout the force.’
‘That’s virtually what Ted Faraday said, wasn’t it?’
‘It’s what anyone’d say.’
Since the subject had been raised, Charles couldn’t resist a supplementary question. ‘Why did Faraday actually leave the police? He implied it was because of some run-in with Roscoe . . .?’
Greg Marchmont gave him another appraising look, and Charles knew that this was a significant one. The detective sergeant was deciding whether to pull out now or to settle in for an evening’s drinking with an actor.
At the end of a long silence, Marchmont’s gaze shifted to their glasses, which were both empty. ‘Same again?’
Charles nodded. Greg Marchmont banged down on the bell. When they were resupplied with Bell’s, Charles got his question answered. ‘Ted Faraday was always an unconventional operator – tended to have a lot of criminal contacts and sailed pretty close to the wind a lot of the time. Coppers who work that way do sometimes set themselves up.’
‘You mean, by getting too close to the criminals they’re investigating?’
Marchmont nodded. ‘Right. You want something from them, they usually want something from you. So often there’s a trade-off for information.’
‘What kind of trade-off? Money?’
‘Not usually. No, a villain’ll tell you what you want to know in return for . . . well, it can be a straight exchange of information. He tells us about some job one of his mates is planning, we tell him how much we know about what he’s up to. Or maybe we agree to turn a blind eye to his next little effort . . . All kinds of different deals get done.’
‘You need them as much as they need you.’
‘Oh yes. But sometimes it goes a bit too far . . .’
‘In what way?’
‘Well, starts with a trade-off for information. I tell you this, says the villain – in return you don’t shop me for that. Only a small step then for the villain to say – you don’t shop me for that . . . in return for this . . . and he bungs the copper a few hundred.’
‘Is that what happened with Faraday?’
The detective shrugged again. ‘Don’t know for sure. But he was well on the way to it. He was investigating a loan-sharking operation, and getting bloody close to the villains who were running it. OK, in order to get that close, he had to pretend he was on their side, he had to look like he was bent . . . Maybe that’s all he was doing. Certainly that’s all he said he was doing.’
‘But he might actually have been bent?’
‘There was evidence which could have suggested that. Certainly enough evidence for Roscoe to get him out of the force so quickly his feet didn’t touch the ground.’
‘But there were no actual charges against him?’
‘No. Not enough evidence for that. I mean, opinion’s divided. I reckon Faraday was straight and still is, but Roscoe’d wanted him out for years and saw his chance. Ted never made any secret of his opinion of our beloved superintendent.’
‘Whereas you do . . .’
‘What do you mean?’ Marchmont demanded aggressively.
‘Well, I’ve noticed you show a lot of respect to Roscoe when you’re with him.’
The detective sergeant looked sullen. ‘Yes, well, I can’t afford to lose my job. Can’t see me setting up as a PI somehow.’
They drank on. The idea of getting something to eat faded from Charles’s mind. At midnight the spotty waiter said he was going to have to close the bar. They went up to Charles’s room, where, inevitably, he had a half-full bottle of Bell’s.
The room was bleak and impersonal. Charles tried to put from his mind all the other anonymous hotel rooms where he’d sat up too late drinking too much with people he hardly knew.
The remains of the bottle didn’t last long. ‘I’ll order another from room service,’ Charles announced when it was finished.
‘All right,’ said Marchmont, ‘but I’m afraid it’ll have to be on you. I’m bloody strapped for cash at the moment – shouldn’t really have spent all that in the bar – so, sorry, if you get a bottle, I won’t be able to return the favour – particularly knowing how much over the odds you usually pay for room service.’
‘Don’t worry,’ said Charles with the magnanimity of the very drunk, ‘I’m actually in work at the moment. I’ll be happy to pay.’
‘You get a good screw then, being an actor, do you?’
‘Oh yes,’ Charles lied.
The room-service bottle arrived – fortunately without notification of how much it was costing. That little surprise would be kept until Charles settled his bill.
The two men recharged their glasses and Greg Marchmont expanded on his financial problems. ‘It’s the bloody maintenance that kills. God, I should never have got into that divorce.’
‘Any kids?’ asked Charles.
‘Three of the l
ittle buggers. God, with what I have to pay for them and for her, I’ve hardly got a bloody penny to call my own. You divorced?’
‘No,’ Charles replied, wondering lugubriously how long he would be able to give that answer.
‘Keep it that way if you don’t want to be ruined for life.’
‘Have you remarried?’
Marchmont shook his head. ‘No, I’ve managed to end up with the worst of all worlds. Broke up my marriage to go off with someone else, then as soon as the divorce is all sorted out and definite, she pisses off and leaves me.’
‘Ah. It is supposed to put a lot of strain on marriages, isn’t it? Police work. I mean. Like the theatre, actually.’
‘Hm. Well, I don’t know if you can blame the police. I just met someone else and fell for her hook, line and bloody sinker.’
‘Someone else in the force?’
‘Oh yes.’ Marchmont’s glazed eyes focused on Charles for a moment. ‘You’ve met her actually.’
He knew immediately who it was. ‘Sam? Sam Noakes?’ A mournful nod confirmed it. ‘Uh-huh. And now she’s every telly viewer’s favourite bloody wank.’
‘Her and Chloe Earnshaw.’
‘Hm. Yes, I wouldn’t mind giving her one either.’ The detective looked dejectedly down into his dwindling drink. ‘Sodding women – why do we bother with them? Only leads to bloody heartbreak.’
‘Why did Sam leave you?’ asked Charles gently.
‘Why? Because I wasn’t good enough for her, I guess. I was just a DS and didn’t show much sign of ever getting above that.’
‘So you weren’t rich enough?’
‘It’s not money with her, no. Sam’s a control freak. She likes to feel she’s in charge. Sex for her is just another way of demonstrating her power. She wanted to prove she was powerful enough to break up my marriage and I guess when she’d done that, I ceased to be a challenge for her, so she moved on. It’s the same with her career – she’s very single-minded.’
‘And good, isn’t she?’
‘Oh yes, bloody good. Way out of my league. She was same intake as me, actually – came first in the class at everything. No, she can go right to the top.’