As Andrew neared the writer’s flat
in Queen’s Road he saw an ambulance, light flashing but no siren, pulling away
from the kerb, followed closely by a police car.
At first he thought nothing of it,
but the closer he got to the house number, the more anxious he became.
When he found the address he was looking for,
he realized the ambulance had been parked at the same spot.
The
writer’s flat was in a large house, and was accessible via concrete steps at
the side. Andrew rang the bell and
waited. There was no reply.
He rang again.
After a moment he heard heavy footsteps
clumping down the hall towards the door.
The door was flung open by a tall, bulbous-nosed man with a mop of curly
ginger hair.
‘I
think we’re ready to...’ he began, then stopped when he saw Andrew.
‘Yes?’
‘I’m...um...looking
for Alan Hartswood.’
The
man stared, his face expressionless.
‘I
have got the right address?’ Andrew asked.
He fumbled in the back pocket of his denims for the writer’s business
card.
Calmly,
the man lit a cigarette. You a
relative?’
‘No,
I only met him the other day, but...’
‘Well,
I’m sorry, you’re too late.’
‘Too
late?’
‘Yes.
He’s dead.
That was him in the ambulance.’
‘Dead!
But I spoke to him last night...on the
phone.’
‘It
was very sudden.’
The
man started to close the door. Andrew
stopped it with his hand.
‘Hang
on. What happened to him?
Was it an accident or what?’
The
man shrugged. ‘We don’t know yet. He was
found...dead. That’s all we know at the
moment.’
‘Who’s
we?’
The
man inhaled deeply on his cigarette and let out a thin stream of smoke.
‘Sorry about your friend, but...’
‘Last
night, when I spoke to him,’ Andrew persisted, ‘he said he’d got a copy of his
latest book for me. That’s why I’ve come
round.’
‘I
wouldn’t know anything about that.’
‘If
there’s a copy in his flat, can I have it?’
‘You
know as well as I do, nothing can be touched.’
‘Isn’t
that when someone’s been murdered?’
The
man regarded the tip of his cigarette closely, then said, ‘Forget it.
Just be a good boy and clear off.’
‘You
got any identification?’
‘You’re
trying my patience, son.’
Andrew
started to back off, saying, ‘Yeah, well, it’s a funny way to behave when a
bloke’s been carted off to the morgue.’
‘Morgue!’
The man laughed. ‘You’ve been watching too many movies, kid.
Now push off.’
The
door slammed. Andrew stared at it for a
moment, feeling confused more than angry.
He had spoken to the writer little more than twelve hours ago, and
now...
Determined
he was going to do something to unravel what was fast becoming a mystery, as he
saw it, but having no idea what to do next, he ambled slowly towards St. John’s
Road. He thought he’d buy himself a
beer, perhaps in the same Camden Road
pub where he had met the writer. Thought
he might drink a toast to his passing.
He
caught himself grinning at his foolishness.
Maybe that bloke had been right.
Perhaps he’d seen too many movies.
He had only met the writer once, and he already saw himself as some Mel
Gibson character in a film, toasting a dead buddy.
*
Jackie was looking at holiday
brochures when Vanessa came downstairs.
‘Someone’s
had a nice lie in,’ she said, with abundant cheerfulness.
Vanessa
gritted her teeth. She started to fill
the kettle. Her mother hummed tunelessly
and turned the brochure pages noisily.
‘Do
you have to?’
Her
mother looked up with wide-eyed innocence.
‘I’m sorry, darling?’
‘That
humming noise. It’s irritating.’
‘Someone’s
got out of the wrong side of the bed.’
‘You
don’t know you’re doing it half the time.
It drives me and Nicky mad. We
got any proper coffee?’
‘Only
decaffeinated. It’s much better for
you.’
Vanessa
slammed the coffee jar onto the work surface.
Jackie began humming again.
‘For
God’s sake!’ shouted Vanessa. ‘You’re doing it again.’
‘There’s
no need to shout. My goodness me, you
walk in here when it’s nearly lunchtime...I thought you were supposed to be
finishing your project.’
‘It’s
too sunny today. I couldn’t be arsed.’
Jackie
tutted. ‘The devil makes work for idle hands.’
‘You
don’t look exactly busy yourself.’
‘I
like that!’ Jackie said indignantly.
‘I’ve only this minute sat down.
It may have escaped your notice...that pile of ironing...’
‘Oh,
not that again.’
‘Somebody
has to do it.
‘Yeah,
yeah, yeah!’
‘What
on earth’s got into you today?’
Angrily,
Vanessa spooned coffee into a mug. Her
movements sharp and jerky, she felt she was about to explode in the atmosphere
which was of her own making.
‘Have
you had a row with that boy you were going out with?
What’s his name?
Terry?’
‘Tony.
And, no, we haven’t had a row.
We were never really serious about each other
anyway.’
Jackie
shook her head disapprovingly. ‘I don’t
know,’ she sighed. ‘Young people these days.’
‘And
you oldies behave as if you’re in your second childhood.
Look at you and Nigel, can’t wait to get off
to some little love nest on the Mediterranean.’
‘Oh,
so that’s what this is all about. You’re
jealous.’
Vanessa
laughed sarcastically. ‘Jealous! Of you
and Nigel? Don’t make me laugh.’
‘You
can’t bear to think of me going off on holiday and enjoying myself for a
change.’
A
cruel thought struck Vanessa. ‘No, it’ll
be a change to have the house to ourselves,’ she said with a glint in her eye.
‘Nicky and I can have a really wild party.
I can invite half the students at WestKentCollege.
It’ll be great.’
IN EPISODE TWENTY-EIGHT ON TUESDAY
Mary moves in with Dave, and
Marjorie takes Ted by surprise.
