Murder by the Book (18 page)

‘He should have taken your advice,' Langham said, ‘though one or two of his books in the thirties were OK.'

Charles peered at him over his pince-nez. ‘Your judgement shows the same failings as your reviews, Donald. You are just
too
kind.'

Maria said, ‘Do you know why he took his life, Donald? He left a note?'

‘Nigel didn't say. He did mention that Pearson was living in squalor towards the end, drinking too much and churning out cowboy books.'

‘A sad final chapter to a sad life,' Charles said.

‘Anyway, the reason Nigel rang was to twist my arm to go to Frankie's memorial service in the morning. I said I'd attend, to make up the numbers.' He looked at Charles. ‘I don't suppose …?'

‘Do you know,' said Charles, ‘I think I might just do so. It will take my mind off things, and I might bump into a few old faces.'

‘From what Nigel said about the likely attendance, we might be the only faces there. Frankie didn't have many friends towards the end.'

‘All the more reason to attend,' Charles said gravely. ‘Now, who is for another drink?'

While Charles swanned off to the bar, Maria moved her chair closer to Langham's. She took his hand and smiled into his eyes. ‘Thank you for the flowers, Donald. I've been meaning to ring you, but I've been so busy in the office.'

He squeezed her hand, wishing they had the evening to themselves.

‘I'm looking forward to the weekend at Charles's,' she said.

‘I'll pick you up around eleven on Saturday morning. We could always stop somewhere for lunch.'

‘That would be magnificent.'

They pulled apart as Charles approached with the drinks, and his agent proposed a toast. ‘To friends!' he declared.

‘To friends,' they laughed.

A
dozen sombre individuals – Langham found it hard to think of them as mourners – kicked their heels outside St Mary's Church the following morning. It was a better turnout than he'd expected and he wondered if the majority had attended because, like him, they felt sorry for Frankie Pearson and harboured not a little residual guilt. He recalled his acerbic review of Pearson's novel
Death on the Farm
and wished he'd shown the same disinclination to lambast bad novels then as he did now.

He was entering the church when he saw Charles's silver Bentley pull up with a jolt. Charles struggled out and hurried up the path, puffing and sweating like the last runner across the finish line in a particularly gruelling cross-country marathon.

‘Nearly didn't make it, my boy,' he panted as they filed through the porch. ‘Roadworks in Knightsbridge, would you believe!'

Langham felt solemnity descend on him as they passed into the cold environs of the church. Morning sunlight exploded through an enfilade of stained-glass windows, sending a display of polychromatic light dancing across the pews. Organ music droned mournfully.

He glanced around at the men and women quietly seating themselves. There were three representatives from Frankie Pearson's last publisher, Hubert and Shale, and a writer from the same stable. Langham recognized Pearson's agent Dorothy Crawley, her mouse-like assistant, and three other mystery writers. He was surprised to see the eminent crime writer and critic Justin Fellowes in attendance, and wondered at his association with Pearson. The Grand Old Man of crime smiled at him sadly and murmured, ‘Good to see you here, Donald. Frightful business.'

Everyone present, Langham thought as he slipped into a pew beside Nigel Lassiter, knew Pearson through his work. There was not one mourner here who wasn't in some way associated with the trade – no family member or loved one. What a send off: not a loved one in sight and a gathering of stage mourners who'd rather be elsewhere. It seemed morbidly appropriate that even Frankie Pearson himself was not present.

Langham leaned over and whispered to Lassiter, ‘Why a memorial service and not a funeral?'

Lassiter said, ‘Police haven't released his body yet.' His breath reeked of beer.

Langham thought of Pearson's cold corpse, lying in a mortuary somewhere, while thirteen reluctant mourners acted out this meaningless charade.

A palsied, geriatric clergyman climbed into the pulpit, gripped the oak rail and declared in a frail falsetto, ‘We are here today not to mourn the passing of Frank Edward Pearson but to celebrate his life …'

The service was a travesty, and like others he'd attended seemed to be a false representation of the life it purported to commemorate. He looked around at the stony faces and wondered if they, too, were embarrassed on the dead man's behalf. The parson, clearly knowing nothing about the quality of Pearson's work – only that he was a published writer – commended the man for his contribution to the hallowed literature of the land.

‘In his industry down the years – and Frank Edward Pearson was publishing for almost thirty years – he was an inspiration to us all. He provided not only entertainment for tens of thousands of eager readers the length and breadth of Britain, and I daresay across the world, but an insight into the human condition and the working of the human mind …'

Lassiter grunted, ‘Obviously hasn't read
Ambush at Cooper's Gulch
.'

Langham closed his eyes and wished he was elsewhere. The clichés rolled on, and ten minutes later the parson culminated his eulogy with, ‘… and while Frank Edward Pearson's passing was by his own hand, and who knows what pressures moved him to the act, his life was in its own way heroic and he left us a corpus of work for which we can all be thankful …' He cleared his throat and said, ‘Please turn to page three hundred and fifty-two in the hymn book and be upstanding for
Weep not for a Brother Deceased
.'

The hymn was followed by an address by his agent, Dorothy Crawley, who stood hesitantly before the congregation. ‘I for one would like to echo the sentiments of the Reverend Jones. While it cannot be said that Frankie, as his colleagues knew him, was a great writer, what he lacked in talent he more than made up for in industry. It is a little-known fact that he published over a hundred books in his lifetime – many pseudonymous, it is true – but among the titles written under his own name one or two stand out as examples of excellent storytelling …'

A hundred books, many under pen names, alcoholism, death by suicide at the age of fifty-two, and a memorial service more farcical than commemorative … Langham stared at the beauty of the stained-glass windows and wished the service over and done with.

Crawley went on: ‘Frankie wrote me a letter just before his death, which I received shortly after I heard about his passing. It was not a suicide note as such, but certain passages do read like the musings of a man contemplating the end. I would like to read out a few lines.' She coughed decorously, unfolded a sheet of paper, and continued, ‘“I have never feared death,” Frankie wrote, “seeing it as the start of possibilities at which we cannot even guess. As a philosopher once said, Death is but a sleep and a remembering …”' She lowered the paper and smiled. ‘Thank you.'

Another hymn was sung, the Lord's Prayer intoned, and the parson uttered a final anodyne few words before allowing the captives to flee into the sunlight.

Charles breathed deeply of the fresh air. ‘Poor old Frankie. He even misquoted Gandhi. I think the line should have gone, “Death is but a sleep and a forgetting”.'

A representative from Hubert and Shale made the rounds and invited the mourners back to their offices for drinks. Charles accepted with fulsome thanks. Langham declined, citing the pressures of work.

Nigel Lassiter buttonholed him as he was about to slip from the gathering. ‘Donald. Fancy a quick pint? The Fox and Hounds is just around the corner. I'd like a word.' He lit up a Pall Mall.

Langham capitulated. ‘But just the one. Still haven't finished the bloody reviewing.'

He said goodbye to Charles, shook hands with Dorothy Crawley and Justin Fellowes, and left the churchyard with Lassiter.

‘Well, how did a man of your atheistical sensibilities find that, Donald?'

‘Meaningless and terribly sad, to tell the truth. I applaud Dorothy for her thoughtfulness. I thought her address struck the right note. But I should have ignored your arm-twisting and stayed away.'

‘I'll buy you a pint in compensation.'

The public bar of the Fox and Hounds was busy with lunchtime drinkers. Lassiter and Langham carried their pints out to a cobbled yard behind the pub. They sat at a table in the sunlight and Langham loosened his tie.

Lassiter tipped half the contents of his glass past his liverish lips. ‘There's something I'd like your opinion on, Donald.'

‘Fire away.'

Lassiter shook his head. ‘Who can work out what goes through the human mind?'

Langham smiled, eying Lassiter warily. ‘Are you turning philosophical in your old age?'

‘Hardly,' Lassiter grunted. ‘Just wondering what went through Frankie's head in the days before he topped himself.'

‘We'll never know, and it's probably just as well.'

‘Had a letter, arrived just this morning. From Frankie's solicitor. Frankie made a will and left me something.'

Langham lowered his pint and stared. ‘Left you something?'

‘I know, bizarre.'

‘I thought you parted on terms worse than acrimonious?'

‘You said it. Far worse. Did I tell you I had a phone call from him a couple of years ago, just after I won the Silver Dagger? He was pissed, almost incoherent. Ranted for a while, asking me how it felt, how Mr Big-Shot-Award-Winner felt while “the rest of us are swimming in piss in the gutter?” I just hung up on him and took the phone off the hook when he tried to call again.'

‘And you say he's left you something?'

Lassiter gestured with his cigarette. ‘When I read the letter, and the first line or so said I was a beneficiary of Frankie's will, I thought he'd left me his author's copies of his entire opus. Kind of an ironic parting shot. Typical spiteful thing he'd do.'

‘But?'

‘Frankie had a place in the country. Tiny cottage in Kent. Back in the thirties, when we wrote those three collabs together, that's where we wrote them. Get away from the rat race, hole up in solitude. Write during the day, go to the pub in the evening. Anyway, turns out Frankie left me the cottage.'

Langham blew in surprise. ‘That
is
strange.'

‘Exactly what I thought. Thing is, I can't accept it, can I? One, I really don't need a dilapidated cottage in the middle of nowhere, and two, without bragging, I really don't need the money if I were to sell it. And I don't want to keep it. Too many bad memories. Too many reminders of how I treated the poor sod.' He stared into his drink, morose.

‘So, what are you going to do?'

‘It occurred to me I could sell the place and put up the proceeds to fund some kind of award. I don't know – the Frank Pearson First Novel Award or something.'

Langham sensed a note of doubt in his voice. ‘Only?'

‘Only, Donald, to be honest what kind of credibility would an award have that bore Frankie's name? Let's face it – he was a fifth-rate hack of unreadable potboilers. No poor first-timer would want to be saddled with the bloody accolade!'

‘You're right. It wouldn't be a good idea. Why not just donate the proceeds to charity? The Writer's Hardship Fund.'

Lassiter laughed. ‘Is there such a thing? Well, it'd be appropriate.'

‘Just made it up,' Langham said. ‘But for what it's worth, that's what I'd do. Donate the lot to charity.'

Lassiter nodded. ‘Good idea, Donald. I'll think it over.' He sighed and drained his pint. ‘I'm meeting the solicitor down there tomorrow morning to sign a few papers and pick up the keys.' He smiled. ‘It'll bring back memories. The time we wrote those damned novels … To be perfectly honest, I quite enjoyed the fortnight we spent on each book. Frankie was tolerable company back then, before … Well, before I did the dirty on him.'

Langham clapped his friend on the shoulder. ‘Don't be hard on yourself. Anyone would have done the same thing. How about another pint?'

‘Thought you only wanted one?'

‘I'm in no real hurry, and that one slipped down without touching the sides.'

He collected the empties and made his way inside.

It was four o'clock by the time he arrived home, four pints worse off and wishing he'd never gone to the bloody service. He made himself a strong pot of Earl Grey and began reading the fourth review book. He found himself skimming, then skipping. Towards six o'clock he read the last ten pages to confirm that the dénouement was as predictable as he'd expected, then dashed off two hundred words commending the author's readable prose while criticizing the formulaic finale. Harsh, for him. Grenville at the
Herald
would be pleased. He'd deliver the copy in the morning before he picked up Maria.

The thought of her warmed his evening. He made himself a plate of beans on toast and ate it slowly, with a bottle of Double Diamond, while listening to the news on the Third Programme.

That night he slept badly, his dreams haunted by images of Charles. His agent was behind bars, striding back and forth and declaiming, with the eloquence of a thespian born, at the injustice of his incarceration.

O
n Saturday morning Langham woke late with a throbbing head and a sand-pit mouth. He told himself that he should never have indulged in the Double Diamond on top of yesterday's lunchtime session. He washed down a couple of slices of toast with three mugs of strong tea, then ran himself a hot bath.

That morning's post brought a pleasant surprise, which occasionally – very occasionally, he thought – befell the freelance writer. The proprietor of a hotel near Felixstowe was an avid reader of the Sam Brooke books. His late wife, he wrote, had also enjoyed the novels, and the last six months of her life had been ‘brightened by your expert storytelling'. In acknowledgement of the pleasure Langham had brought to her last months, the proprietor – he glanced at the letter heading – a Mr Sellings, would be honoured if he would accept an expenses-paid weekend for two at the hotel. Enclosed with the letter was a leaflet showing a white-painted Victorian building overlooking a picturesque cove.