Death in Disguise (54 page)

‘Vanity publishing is strictly
verboten
,' said Brian. ‘We want real writers or none at all.'

‘It's only four times a year,' said Honoria Lyddiard, picking up the last pimento-and-cream-cheese vol-au-vent. There were two flaky frills resembling the wings of infant angels sticking out. She placed it on her large tongue like a pill and swallowed it whole. And that makes eight, observed Amy quietly to herself.

‘I would have thought,' continued Honoria, ‘that between us we could manage that.'

Between us was stretching it. Although quick to deride most of the names mentioned, Honoria rarely suggested anyone herself. The people who did come she nearly always deemed unworthy and was often extremely rude about them, not always waiting till after their departure.

‘We could ask Frederick Forsyth,' said Rex, who was writing a thriller about a hit man, code name Hyena, and his attempt to assassinate Saddam Hussein.

‘No point,' said Brian. ‘These people always pretend they don't have time.'

This was demonstrably true. Among the people who had not had time to address the Midsomer Worthy Writers Circle over the past few years were Jeffrey Archer, Jilly Cooper, Maeve Binchy and Sue Townsend although she had sent a very nice letter and a signed paperback.

Only once had they had any sort of success. A poet, garlanded with prizes and praise and visiting the Blackbird bookshop in Causton for a signing session, had agreed to come and talk to them on the same evening. It had been a disaster. He had only stayed an hour, which was spent drinking, reading out his reviews and telling them all about the break-up with his boyfriend. Then he burst into tears and had to be driven all the way back to London by Laura, the men in the party having declined the honour.

And so the group perforce had had to be content with far lesser luminaries—a journalist from the
Causton Echo
, an assistant producer (tea boy really) from the town's commercial radio station and a local man who published from time to time in
Practical Woodworking
and consequently thought himself too grand to attend on a regular basis.

‘What about that idea you had at breakfast, dear?' Sue Clapton smiled timidly across at her husband. She was as neat and smooth as he was untidy, with long stringy hair the colour of milk chocolate tucked behind her ears and large round glasses with multi-coloured frames. She wore a long wrapover skirt the colour of clover printed with tiny daisies and her feet, in unlovely leather clogs, were placed just so. ‘The one—'

‘Yes, yes.' Brian flushed with annoyance. He had planned to introduce his suggestion coolly; absently, almost throw it away when the usual bickering had reached its nadir. ‘I do have a contact who might—repeat might—just come and talk to us.'

‘What does he write?'

‘He doesn't.' Brian gave Gerald an amused smile. ‘He's a devisor.' He chuckled and his ironic glance spread to include them all. Plainly no one knew what a devisor was. Typical. ‘Mike Leigh?'

‘Now that would be a coup,' said Laura, crossing elegant silk-clad honey-coloured legs. The friction produced a whispery hiss that had an effect on all but the man it was meant for.

Sue wished she had legs like that. Brian wished Sue had legs like that. Honoria thought the movement extremely vulgar. Rex boldly fantasised a wisp of lace and a suspender. And Amy smiled at Laura in simple friendliness—paying for it later over the Horlicks.

‘I didn't say it
was
Mike Leigh.' The colour on Brian's cheeks deepened. ‘I was merely making a comparison. Last week the school had a visit from Nuts N Bolts—theatre in education?—who gave this really brilliant account of a day in the life of a comprehensive—'

‘Bit coals to Newcastle, what?' said Rex.

‘Oh dear, oh dear.' Brian shook his head and laughed. ‘You just don't get it, do you? Bouncing their own experience back to these kids but in a new dynamic form gives their lives a thrilling authenticity.'

‘Pardon?'

‘They recognize the grammar of the narrative as being identical with their own.'

‘I see.'

‘Anyway,' continued Brian, ‘I caught up with Zeb, the guy who runs it, while they were loading the van and asked if he'd come and give a talk. We'd have to pay—'

‘Absolutely not,' said Honoria. ‘We never pay.'

‘Just expenses. Petrol and—'

‘Honoria's right.' Rex struggled to inject a note of regret into his voice. ‘Once we start doing that sort of thing…' He tailed off, wondering, as he had often done, if such parsimony wasn't perhaps counterproductive. Maybe if they'd offered John le Carré his expenses? Honoria was speaking again. Loudly.

‘Of course if you'd like to fund a visit from this person yourself?'

Honoria regarded Brian coldly. He really was an absolute mess of a man. Straggly hair, straggly beard, straggly clothes and, in her opinion, an extremely straggly political viewpoint.

Sue watched apprehensively as her husband retreated into a sulk, then started to play with her hair. Beginning at the scalp she lifted a narrow strand and ran her nails down it, pulling the hair taut before letting it go and starting on the next piece. She did this for the rest of the evening. It was only half an hour but all present felt by then that they had, at the very least, entered the next millennium.

And so, eventually, through many digressions and much argument, the conversation described a full circle and Max Jennings' name came up again.

‘I really feel we might have a chance with him,' said Amy, ‘living nearby. Also he's not a hundred-percent famous.'

‘What on earth's that supposed to mean?' said Honoria.

‘I think,' said Sue, ‘Amy means just quite well known.'

‘I've never heard of him,' said Brian, drumming his fingers on the arm of his chair. Whilst having no time for the rich and famous he also had no time for the not really all that rich and only very slightly famous. Truth to tell, if you were not at the very bottom of society's dung heap and being ground further into the primeval sludge by every passing jackboot, Brian would almost certainly be giving you the complete kiss off.

‘I heard an interview with him on the radio,' said Amy. ‘He sounded really nice.' Too late she remembered it should have been ‘wireless' and waited for Honoria to click her tongue. ‘I'm sure it's worth a try.'

‘I can't stand these poncy nom de plumes. No doubt for Max we are meant to read Maximilian. Probably born Bert Bloggs.'

‘I read his first novel,
Far Away Hills
. He was brought up in absolute poverty in the Outer Hebrides. His father was a terribly cruel man and drove his mother to her death. She killed herself when he was still quite young.'

‘Really.' Brian sounded more cheerful. ‘We could give it a try, I suppose. Not as if we have anyone else in mind.'

‘There's Alan Bennett.'

Brian sniffed. He was rather off Alan Bennett. At the beginning Brian had been very much under the writer's influence. He had hung around outside the village shop and the Old Dun Cow with a tape recorder, talking to the villagers, hoping to unravel the rich and poignant complexities of their inner lives as he understood was the great man's way. It had been a dead loss. All they talked about was
Neighbours
and football and what was in the
Sun
. Eventually a drunk had called him a nosy piss pot and knocked him down.

Laura said, ‘I thought we were keeping him for an emergency.'

‘Let's take a vote shall we?' said Rex. ‘Asking Jennings?' He put his hand up as did the others, Honoria last of all. ‘Gerald?'

Gerald had turned his still damp trousers back to the fire. He looked over his shoulder at the six raised hands then back to the artificial blue and yellow flames. However he voted it could hardly affect the outcome. Yet he could not let this terrible suggestion pass without some form of protest.

He said, ‘I think it'll be a waste of time,' and marvelled at the neutrality of his voice. At the even tone. The regular and unhurried spacing between the words. The words themselves so mild in contrast to the torment raging in his breast.

‘Sorry, Gerald. You're outnumbered.' Brian was already pulling on his knitted hat.

‘Even so,' (he couldn't just give up) ‘I don't think there's a lot of point—'

‘If you won't write I will,' said Brian. ‘Care of his publisher, I suppose. In fact I might ring them up—'

‘No, no. I'm secretary. I'll do it.' At least that way matters would stay in his own hands. ‘No problem.' Gerald stood up, wishing only to be rid of them. He saw Laura covertly watching him and managed to stretch his lips in the semblance of a smile.

He did not sleep that night. He sat at his desk for the first hour quite motionless, drowned in recollection. His head felt as if it were being squeezed in a vice. To see the man again. Max.
Max
. Who had stolen his most priceless possession. To have to speak words of welcome and no doubt be forced to listen to hours of self-aggrandisement in return. Gerald knew he would not be able to bear it.

At three o'clock he started writing. He wrote and wrote and wrote again. By six he was exhausted and the waste basket was overflowing, but he had the letter. One side of one sheet of paper. He was as sure as he could be that the balance was right. It was out of the question that he should beg Max not to come. Even at the time—even at the very moment of that terrible betrayal—Gerald had not begged. Victorious Max might have been but that was one satisfaction he would forever seek in vain.

Now Gerald, gripping his pen hard in his right hand and holding the paper down firmly with his left, started to address the envelope. Necessarily he began with the name. M.a.x. J.e.n.n.i.n.g.s. The pen slipped and twirled in his sweating fingers. It was as if the very letters had the power of conjuration. He could hear the man breathing, smell the fragrance of his cigar smoke, look into the brilliant blue eyes in that bony, sunburnt face. Feel the old spell being cast.

He read the letter again. Surely no one comprehending the emotional turmoil from which such an invitation must inevitably have sprung would accept.

Gerald affixed a first-class stamp, put on his muffler and overcoat and left the house. As he set off for the post box the milkman's float materialised out of the dark.

‘You're up early, Mr Hadleigh.' The man nodded at the white square in Gerald's hand. ‘Making sure you get your pools off.'

‘That's right.'

Gerald strode off, his spirits curiously lightened by this mundane encounter. The real world rushed in, familiar and banal. It was the night now that seemed unreal. A hothouse of unhealthy imaginings.

He quickened his pace, filling his lungs with fresh winter air. By the time he was starting back towards the cottage the bitter reflections that had so tormented him just a short while before now began to seem no more than over-heated fantasies. He was projecting his own wretched memories on to someone else. For all he knew Max had practically forgotten about him. And in any case, even if he hadn't, Gerald could not somehow see him driving nearly thirty miles just to talk to a bunch of amateur scribblers. He was successful now. Each new epic in the
Sunday Times
Top Ten without fail. No, the more Gerald thought about it, the more insubstantial and unfounded his previous fears now seemed.

There were streaks of rose pink, lemon and silver on the horizon as he let himself back into the house and put on the coffee pot. And by the time the sun's scarlet rim had appeared he had persuaded himself that writing such a careful and painstaking letter had been a waste of time and effort. Because there was no chance in the world that Max would come.

Almost a month to the day after the group meeting Laura stood by her kitchen door, knowing what she was about to do even as she entertained the delusion that she might yet change her mind. In her hand she held an empty sealed envelope. Laura did not own a dog and had more sense than to walk around an English village in the dark for no apparent reason.

On her last excursion (just under a week ago) she had met the Reverend Clewes coming out of the vicarage with Henry, his basset hound. They had all walked along together and Laura had been compelled to post her envelope before being accompanied all the way back home and seen safely inside. She had not dared to venture out again and had gone to bed fretting miserably with deprivation. But tonight Henry had gone trotting by with his master, and trotting back, a good half hour ago.

Laura buttoned her dark reefer jacket up to the neck. She wore jeans, strong leather gloves, black boots and a sombre head scarf concealing distinctive coils of hair that glittered like copper wire. She stepped out into the still, silent night, locked the door, turned the key very gently and stood for a moment listening.

There was no sound from either of the houses flanking her own. No cats being put out or let in. No chink of milk bottles or rattle of dustbin lids. Or friends being seen off the premises. She set off, hushed on rubber soles, turning left without even having to think.