Читать книгу About That Night - Elaine Bedell - Страница 12

Elizabeth took the bus to Paddington Green Police Station. She liked the unusual sensation of sitting up top on a bus and watching London crawl beneath her. She had a car, a Volkswagen Beetle Convertible, which she drove furiously and much too fast. (She once drove Hutch down the Embankment and around Parliament Square and afterwards he said he needed a brandy and a lie-down.) But in the trauma of last night she’d left it parked at the production offices, where it was currently acquiring the undesirable accessory of a sticky plastic parking ticket. It was Elizabeth’s fourth ticket in six weeks and on each occasion she’d made up her mind that she would renew her acquaintance with Transport for London. Her family had strong links with public transport: one grandad had been a linesman on the railways, the other a bus conductor, all his life on the same route – the 38. As Elizabeth’s nan had said rather bitterly after he died, ‘Never got promoted. Never got to do the 176 or the 55. Never got to go up Park Lane, or down Piccadilly. Never got to be a driver, neither. Always the same bloody route. Every day of his life.’ But her grandad hadn’t sought promotion, he’d been perfectly happy with his lot. And Elizabeth thought there was much to be said for being happy with your lot. You never know when it might all disappear.

As the 73 chugged and chewed its way down Euston Road and through the early morning rush hour, it shaved some overhanging horse chestnut trees, showering the roof with pale white blooms that fluttered down past the window like the ghostly remains of a bridal bouquet. Hutch once took her for the night to one of those five-star hotels that turns your towels into origami animals and scatters petals across the bed (the bed was the size of a small continent) and in the middle of the night, Elizabeth found pale pink petals stuck between her thighs and in her armpits. Later, in the waterfall shower, she found another one between Hutch’s buttocks. It was there that Hutch first told her he loved her and promised that he would leave his wife.

And in turn, she had finally told him about Jamie, and about the wedding that wasn’t.

Her wedding day turned out to be a perfect pink Magnolia May morning, just as she’d imagined it would be. It had been just four weeks since Jamie’s surprise proposal. They’d decided there was no point in waiting – after all, they’d waited ten years. Jamie didn’t want the full pomp and ceremony of a church wedding and thought it a waste of money, and Elizabeth had convinced herself they were just getting the right piece of paper before having children. So she’d approached the production of her rushed wedding as if it was a last-minute live television programme. She came up with a strictly limited guest list, she wrote out a running order and she had an Excel spreadsheet on which she eked out their wedding budget. Their honeymoon was to be a two-day mini break in a Cotswolds spa hotel. She would be back in the office on Friday. They bought her a wedding ring in Hatton Garden for £35 and every so often she took it out of the little blue velvet box and tried it on her finger. She’d never worn rings and the wedding band felt tight and restrictive. She couldn’t stop staring at it.

On the way to the register office, sitting with her mum Maureen and her sister Vic in the back of a London black cab clutching a hand-tied bunch of daffodils and irises (Vic had insisted she take something blue), Elizabeth realised she hadn’t heard from Jamie since the previous afternoon. They’d spent the night before their wedding apart and she’d assumed he was just sticking to tradition. In the end, she’d texted him a jokey photo of a bride in an enormous meringue dress with a smiley emoji. But he hadn’t replied. They’d gone for more than twenty-four hours without speaking and she couldn’t remember a time in the last ten years when they had done that.

She was wearing the vintage lace garter Vic had laughingly given her the night before (something old) and it was chafing the soft skin on her inner thigh. Elizabeth had scratched it irritably several times already and now as she surreptitiously lifted the hem of her dress, she saw that the flesh around the garter was red and angry. Her dress was a vintage 1960s sleeveless shift and was the colour of apricots. She thought it would be a statement dress – look at me, I’m in a fun, flirty, fruity frock – but now she regretted it. The dress was creasing terribly in the traffic jam on the Euston Road. The plastic comb of flowers she’d tried to weave through her hair wouldn’t stay in place and was now hanging drunkenly by a thread around her ear. The daffodils started to droop. She noticed her left hand (no engagement ring) was resting on the cab door handle and that she’d clenched it tight, as if about to open the door.

‘What are you doing?’ her sister asked sharply and Elizabeth’s hand dropped, lamely, back to her lap. Vic had got married in a country church wearing a long cream silk dress that melted over her curves like liquid silver. She’d looked stunning. ‘Won’t be long now.’ Her sister had smiled brightly at her, as Elizabeth imagined Vic must smile at her clients before she led them into the dock to be sentenced. Of course they should have known the traffic would be terrible, it was a Wednesday afternoon. A woeful workday Wednesday. Who gets married on a Wednesday? Vic’s face softened when she saw Elizabeth’s brimming eyes.

‘Mum, tell you what. You keep the taxi. We’ll walk. I feel a bit sick and could do with some fresh air and it would be good for Elizabeth to get a quick breather.’ Vic was all lawyerly efficiency. She was wearing a smart navy blue coat dress. (‘It’ll always do for court afterwards,’ she had told Elizabeth on the phone after she’d bought it. At the time, Elizabeth had felt hurt, as if her wedding wasn’t excuse enough for her sister to buy a new shocking pink dress, but now she couldn’t help thinking how wise it was.) Vic had inherited their mum’s fairer skin and hair – although she’d dyed it so many times during her flirtation with the post-punk revival that Elizabeth could barely remember its original shade – and she had it cut short and pixie-like, a style that served her even better now, when she was almost in her forties and the mother of two small children, than when she’d flirted with The Libertines.

Elizabeth tumbled out of the cab trailing her posy of wilting daffodils as Vic led her firmly to one of the round tables nailed to the pavement outside the Globe pub on the Euston Road. The few hardened drinkers still on their feet turned to stare at them over their pints. Vic put her Hermès bag on the table and Elizabeth noticed a yellow lawyer’s pad poking out of the top, as if her sister might find time during her wedding to catch up on a bit of casework.

‘What’s up?’ Vic had said briskly.

‘I don’t know… It just doesn’t feel right…’

‘Look, Lizzie, it’s just last-minute nerves. It’s fine. It’s Jamie! You’ve known him for ever! Being married isn’t any different.’

Elizabeth had torn unconsciously at the daffodil petals. She raised her panic-stricken face. ‘Vic, I know it’s ridiculous, but I feel we’ve rushed into this wedding. It was so lovely, being with your boys at the birthday party and in that moment, when Jamie proposed, I wanted that life so badly. The life that you have, Vic. A domestic life. Babies. So I organised the wedding really quickly, I thought Jamie was right, we’d waited long enough. But oh God…’ Elizabeth looked desperately at her sister. ‘I panicked, Vic. I panicked about Forever. About it being Jamie, and no one else, ever again.’ She lowered her eyes. ‘I met this man at a work party, just a few days after Jamie proposed. And, Vic, he was so unlike anyone else I’ve ever been with! He was funny, he made me laugh and he was so interested in me and my job – and I don’t know, just so different to Jamie! He made me feel so good about myself. I thought I could have one last fling, I thought it wouldn’t matter. But of course it does matter – and I’ve felt so guilty ever since. But Vic, I can’t stop thinking about him!’

‘Oh, Lizzie! But it’s just the once? Just this one time?’

‘Yes. You know there’s never been anyone else, Vic. I’ve been longing to find the moment to tell Jamie, but the days seemed to race past and I couldn’t find the right moment. And every time we confirmed another detail of this wedding, I didn’t see how I could tell him! But now it feels like we’ll be starting our marriage all wrong.’

‘Oh, hon.’ Vic hugged her. ‘Look, Lizzie, let’s try and be practical. There are ten people waiting in that building over there for you to turn up like a blushing bride. And one of them is Jamie. Jamie, the boyfriend you’ve been with since uni. Jamie, who’s trying to save the world and who’s good and kind. You do want to marry him, right?’ There was a long pause. ‘Hello?’

Elizabeth looked at her sister in desperation. ‘Yes, I do. But oh, Vic, it feels so final! And I’ve only had sex with seven people! I keep thinking – is that enough to last me a lifetime?’

‘Well, I’m not sure it’s all about the maths, Lizzie. But I bet lots of brides go through this. I’m sure it’s really usual to panic about committing yourself to one man, for better or worse. Look, I’ll do whatever you want, but are you sure now is the time to tell Jamie? You made a mistake and you regret it. Maybe he never needs to know? Or maybe you can tell him, in time. But now? I’m not sure.’

Elizabeth nodded, numbly, and Vic was suddenly businesslike again. She found herself being propelled along the Euston Road towards Marylebone Town Hall. Large splashes of rain began to stain the apricot dress. Vic ran up the wide stone steps, half dragging Elizabeth behind her. At the town hall doors, she turned suddenly and said, ‘Who was it?’

‘What?’ Elizabeth was almost breathless. She tried to smooth down the damp creases in her dress.

‘Who was it? That you slept with?’

Elizabeth bit her lip. ‘Harry Hutchinson.’

‘Harry…? Wait. You mean Hutch? The guy who does that late night football show?’

‘Yes. And Vic, he’s married!’

‘Oh, Lizzie,’ was all that Vic said as she pushed open the doors to the town hall.

Elizabeth took two quick brisk turns around the block to pull herself together before walking into Paddington Green Police Station. The only time she’d been in a police station before was when she had to take in proof of her insurance after she’d been caught doing 89 mph down the A12 and sent on a National Speed Awareness Course (‘As if you need to be taught about speed, Miss Clumsy,’ Hutch had said consolingly, as she threw herself on to his bed, clutching a new copy of The Highway Code.) She was greeted by DS Rafik, the young sweating sergeant who’d been in the dressing room the night before. His eyes were like two brightly polished buttons in the fleshy cushion of his face. He walked quickly, despite the extra pounds, and she had to half run to keep up with him, down the bland, windowless corridors, doors all closed, walls devoid of any kind of decoration. She found herself babbling nervously. ‘You could do with some pictures. Maybe a cartoon or two. You know, something to help innocent members of the public, like me, who have to come in and give statements feel more at home.’

‘I hope your home isn’t anything like this.’ The sergeant opened the door to an office with two desks crammed together underneath a barred window. An uncovered light bulb was hanging from a ceiling rose. Someone had put a cactus plant on one of the desks, which simply added to the general feeling of dismal discomfort.

‘Wow!’ said Elizabeth. ‘Did you get your inspiration for interior design from Guantánamo Bay?’

A pink flush crept upwards from the folds of the sergeant’s neck, but he stopped himself from smiling. He moved a pile of folders from a hard-backed chair, dropping some papers as he did so, and flustered, gestured for Elizabeth to sit on it. He offered her a coffee, pointing apologetically at a kettle on the window sill and a box of Nescafé sachets.

Elizabeth grimaced. ‘No chance of a skinny double shot latte, I suppose? Maybe a basket of muffins? Haven’t you got a runner?’

He looked at her, bemused. She shrugged off her raincoat. ‘I’m sorry. I think I’m making terrible jokes because I’m nervous.’

He nodded, but before he could speak the door opened again and banged into Elizabeth’s chair. It was Detective Inspector Watson. She smelled strongly of apples. Her blonde hair was loosely swept up into a knot and fastened with a surprisingly girly pink scrunchie. She was wearing black trousers and a shirt the colour of cornflowers. Her arms were toned and tanned. She wore no make-up and, fresh-faced, looked younger than she had last night. Elizabeth guessed they must be about the same age.

‘Hello, DI Karen Watson. Sorry, not much room.’ The detective inspector went to sit at the remaining desk, the one with the cactus. She flipped open a notebook, picked up a pen, inspected it, and then lobbed it across the room, where it tipped neatly into a waiting wastepaper basket. She picked up another pen, inspected it again and wrote something on the open page. Finally, she looked up.

‘Good shot,’ offered Elizabeth.

‘County netball team. Wing attack.’ DI Karen Watson leaned forward, resting her elbows on the desk.

‘Still plays,’ added the sergeant proudly.

‘Tuesdays only,’ the DI said pointedly.

Elizabeth found herself saying, ‘What’s wrong with Saturdays? Or Sundays? I’ve heard weekends are good for sport.’

The DI looked at her sharply. ‘Well, you see, the women I play with mostly have husbands, some of them have kids, and so they can’t play netball at the weekend. Tuesday is their only opportunity to get out of the house.’

‘Gosh,’ said Elizabeth, genuinely struck. ‘And they spend their only evenings off playing netball? When they could be necking sauvignon blanc in the wine bar? That’s dedication.’

‘Ah, well you see, most of us don’t drink,’ the DI said, and the implication was clear.

Elizabeth shifted in her seat. She realised that the volunteering of some personal information by the detective must be a well-rehearsed ploy. She noticed DI Karen Watson’s body was taut, wired, finely tuned.

‘So, tell me, how long had you been working with Ricky Clough?’

‘On and off for seven years.’

‘Producing all his shows?’

‘Yes, this one and his Saturday night entertainment show…’

Elizabeth looked carefully at the DI to see how much of this television history she knew. Her face, however, was a perfect blank. But to her right, the sergeant said helpfully, ‘Saturday Bonkers.’

DI Watson looked nonplussed.

‘Yes,’ said Elizabeth. ‘Saturday Bonkers. Which was, well, a bonkers show! Partly a variety show but with other anarchic stuff going on in the studio, games and live OBs – um, outside broadcasts. And Ricky is – was – very good in it. You know, he’s probably best known for Shower? The secret camera pranks on celebrities. And the song and dance finales every week with Ricky and guest stars. We had the Shadow Home Secretary on once, that caused quite a storm… Anyway, it’s been running for years and last year it won Best Entertainment Show at the National TV Awards.’ Elizabeth looked at the policewoman, hopeful of a congratulatory nod, but DI Watson remained expressionless.

‘But, well, we’ve had some difficulties over the last few months. The show’s not been doing so well and Ricky was reluctant to try out new ideas. He couldn’t believe it was losing its audience, he blamed the viewers, not the programme. He’d become quite difficult – a bit, well, bonkers himself.’ Elizabeth smiled half-heartedly, but the DI’s face was serious.

‘Bonkers? How?’

‘Well, you know, he could be very unpredictable.’ Elizabeth twisted in her chair. How could she begin to describe, in this soulless office, to this ramrod straight policewoman, the sort of daily mayhem that had for the last few years passed for her professional working life? ‘Um, well, let’s see. He’d bring live animals into the office – I seem to remember there was a serious incident with some rats. And he’d wear clown’s trousers to production meetings and then let them drop. He liked holding meetings in his underpants. There was an occasion when he went to a meeting with the network’s chief, carrying a water rifle… He quite regularly used a water pistol during script meetings. And there were the late-night phone calls…’

The DI frowned and Elizabeth rushed on. ‘But you know, people loved working with him. It was exciting. He had a loyal team. I liked working with him. That’s why I agreed to produce this new chat show with him as well. I mean, you had to dismiss half his ideas, but at least he had some. And he could be very generous – he used to take the entire team out for lunch and pick up the bill. And he was very entertaining when he was on form… It was exhilarating to try and harness that sort of creative energy.’

‘Tell me about the recent difficulties.’

‘Well, I’d had to have words with him about his behaviour with the team.’

DI Watson nodded and Elizabeth got the feeling that despite the professionally blank expression, she knew more than she was letting on. ‘Yes, tell me about that. His bad behaviour.’

‘Oh, you know, he’d get stressed and angry and take it out on the researchers. He reduced a couple of them to tears. Nothing was good enough. He’d find fault with the guest bookings, the scripts, the props. In a way, it came from the right place – his ambition for the show – but it got to the stage where he was never going to be satisfied unless we booked Barack Obama and preferably got him to sing a duet on the show. He’d lost perspective somehow. He couldn’t understand why he was having to work with reality show contestants instead of the leader of the free world.’

‘Did he reduce you to tears?’ The DI looked at the pad on her desk and Elizabeth realised she’d made quite a few jottings.

‘Not in his presence,’ Elizabeth said truthfully. ‘But I must admit, I’ve had quite a few nights where I’ve been awake at 3 a.m., eating Marks & Spencer custard.’ She looked at the policewoman’s lean, netball-toned figure and doubted that Karen Watson had any nights when she succumbed to a tub of crème anglaise. But the detective looked up and half a smile played across her lips. Her eyes were lively and bright.

‘And who’s your boss?’

‘Matthew Grayling, the Controller. The man you met last night.’

The DI’s smile vanished. ‘Ah yes, the man with the limp. So he runs the whole network? He’s in charge of all the programmes?’

‘Yes. He’s been there fifteen years. He knows Ricky of old. He got him to do Saturday Bonkers in the first place. He recently gave him the chat show to try and ease him into a new slot – you know, it’s not on Saturday nights, it’s not live, so we can always go into the edit and cut out the worst bits.’

‘And was Matthew in the studio all evening?’

‘No, I rang him, once Ricky… once he’d collapsed.’ Elizabeth felt suddenly tearful. She bent her head and DI Watson sat silently for a moment before saying more gently, ‘And now you’ve had time to think about that night, time to think over everything that happened, you can’t think of anything that was unusual? Nothing about Ricky Clough that struck you as strange or different? He didn’t seem ill?’

‘No.’ Elizabeth reached for a tissue from the box on DI Watson’s desk. ‘If anything, the thing that was unusual was that he was actually in a good mood. He seemed upbeat. I thought we were in for a good show. He didn’t seem in any discomfort, wasn’t complaining.’

‘And you’d actually started recording the show, I think, when he fell ill?’

‘Yes, that’s right. We’d done the introduction and we were about to do Paolo Culone.’

The DI look across at the sergeant. ‘We’re seeing all the guests from the show later, is that right?’ Ali Rafik nodded and listed the names of a few minor celebrities. Elizabeth winced at the poor quality of the bookings, but the DI appeared to register nothing. Eventually, she said, ‘I don’t watch much television. There never seems to be anything on that I want to watch.’ Elizabeth nodded. It was true. There was a criminal lack of coverage of women’s netball in primetime.

‘So tell me about the chef – Paolo Culone?’

‘Well, he’s young, very brash. He’s just opened his third London restaurant and it’s all about smell. He puts a different scent around the restaurant entrance because he says it influences your mood and he wants his guests to be happy when they come in. So the week it opened, he made sure it smelled like an old-fashioned sweet shop – sugary and lemony – so that people coming in would feel nostalgic for their childhoods.’ Elizabeth took a deep breath. She’d been to Culone’s new restaurant a few weeks back. She’d gone there with Hutch and it had smelled of Curly Wurlys. Later that night in bed, Hutch had said she smelled deliciously of caramel and he’d licked her agonisingly slowly, all over.

The sergeant made a sound that was half cough, half giggle. Elizabeth recovered herself and nodded at him. ‘Ricky thought it was all bollocks, too. He wanted to take the piss out of Paolo. We were going to bring on some of his restaurant dishes hidden in boxes and get Culone to guess what they were by their smell.’

The DI wrinkled her nose and frowned, as if trying to understand how such an idea might constitute primetime entertainment. ‘And so it’s likely Ricky Clough might have eaten something before or during the show?’

‘Yes. We had some of Culone’s food in the Green Room, where we entertain guests before the show. Ricky went in to say hello. I think he was trying to put Paolo at ease. To praise his food and sort of lull him into a false sense of comfort.’ Elizabeth shrugged apologetically as if to distance herself from the sheer cynicism of the move, although it had actually been her idea.

‘And so others might’ve eaten the food, in the Green Room?’

‘I’m not sure. I wouldn’t be surprised if some of the team had some. We don’t pay our junior researchers much. They mostly live off scraps.’ Elizabeth pulled a face at Sergeant Rafik and was delighted to see him try to hide a smile. DI Watson’s expression was stony.

‘We’re running tests on all the food that’s been left over. We’ll have to interview everyone on your team as well.’

‘Really?’ Elizabeth sat up straight. ‘Is that honestly necessary?’

The DI put down her pen. ‘Yes, it is. But they don’t need to come in here. We’ll come to your offices this afternoon and talk to them individually.’

‘Well, I guess you’ll have to talk to Matthew about that…’ Elizabeth realised her boss’s attempts to keep the network out of this were hopelessly optimistic. ‘I guess he may want someone from Legal there.’ She looked at the DI anxiously. ‘Can I ask, do you know the results of Ricky’s hospital tests?’

The sergeant cleared his throat. The DI looked down at her pad, as if considering something, and then looked up at Elizabeth. ‘Not all of the results, no. But we’ve got reasonable cause for concern at this stage.’

Elizabeth felt sick. The colour drained from her face. ‘Concern about what?’

‘It would seem from all the tests so far that Ricky Clough did not die of natural causes. In fact, it appears that his seizure was the result of a highly toxic substance in his bloodstream.’

Elizabeth gripped the arms of her chair, her knuckles whitening.

DI Watson leaned back in her chair. ‘I’m afraid, Elizabeth, we have very good reason to believe that Ricky Clough was poisoned.’