Glass House (The Falconer Files Book 11)

by Andrea Frazer

  Darren Worsley now took up the baton, and ran with his side of this rectangular story. ‘We always watched The Glass House, and I hate to admit it, but we were rooting for Chad McMurrough. It was inevitable, I suppose, with both us and him being gay.

  ‘Looking back, I can see that Bailey was rather more interested in him as a contestant than was healthy, but I must admit, I thought nothing of it at the time. Then the slime-ball won, and the next thing I knew, Bailey started burbling about him having a short contract on Cockneys.

  ‘That was what started me worrying. Bailey seemed to be lit up at the idea, which was not like him at all. He was normally such a calm person. Then he started having a lot of out of normal hours meetings, and I began to feel very uncomfortable.

  ‘The next big event was him arriving home in a taxi, utterly off his face and clutching a half-empty bottle of champagne. That was the day that McMurrough signed the contract for his chat show, and they’d decided to give things a go together. Never mind about old loyalties: pleasure, now, seemed to be their motto.

  ‘He dumped me in a very drunken manner that night, called another taxi, and sped off to some hotel to spend the night with his new love. I was in the past: gone, and probably forgotten, too. Why I got an invitation to this charade I have no idea. Maybe it’s in place of an apology but, if that’s the case, it’s too little, too late, and I don’t accept it. I hate him. And I’m going to drink his new palace dry tonight, if I can.’

  ‘Just how I feel about Chad,’ echoed Gareth gloomily into his glass. ‘But that’s not going to stop me going for a burger and a sausage. I might even take a few snaps with my phone, if an opportunity presents itself.’

  ‘Get me something to eat, too, will you. After all, it’s not your ex cooking the food, is it?’ pleaded Darren, ‘and I’ll refresh the glasses.’

  ‘And it’s not you who’s got a dossier on this despicable pair to leak to the press when the opportunity presents itself,’ muttered Gareth. And he did, indeed, have a lot of dirt on the couple. His dossier included candid shots taken with a long lens since they had purchased their present home, shots of them outside the studio in each other’s arms, and shots of Gareth with Chad before he had become famous; a lot of old stuff too from when they were a couple.

  Hell hath no fury like a queen scorned, and Gareth was hoping to make a nice little packet out of what he had put together, in some ways as compensation for the lifestyle which he considered had been stolen from him by Bailey. But he’d have to pounce while Chad was still flavour of the month, in case he proved just to be a nine days’ wonder.

  Like so many other people who had emerged from reality shows as great celebrities, many found themselves, three months later, queuing back at the benefits office, back where they had come from, fame and fortune just a distant memory. He must do something positive with what he had while Chad was still hot property.

  Darren wandered back into the house with a dim thought in his befuddled brain that maybe there was a way to get revenge. Maybe he could blackmail Bailey in some way. Or maybe there was another way to get his own back?

  Chapter Five

  Still at the party

  Dean Westbrook was next in to the kitchen after Darren Worsley. It had taken him up to now to gather the necessary courage to confront his old bully. He was still a young man, and his schooldays didn’t really seem that far off to him. It took a great deal of screwing himself up to actually enter the kitchen and confront Chadwick about his behaviour in the past.

  ‘How’s it going, Dean?’ asked Chadwick, as the timid figure entered the room from the garden.

  ‘I n-need to speak to you about s-something,’ Dean stuttered nervously.

  ‘Can’t get you into “the business”, dearie,’ declared McMurrough. ‘I don’t have that kind of influence just yet. But give me time.’

  ‘No, no, it was nothing like that. It was about when we were at school together?’

  ‘Oh, do carry on. You intrigue me greatly.’

  When Dean left the kitchen with his now full glass, he was as white as a sheet. He didn’t remember. The shallow slime-ball had absolutely no recollection of his past unspeakable behaviour. That cruel scum simply didn’t remember bullying him. In fact, he had no recall of picking on him whatsoever, and seemed to think that they had co-existed quite happily together in the same classroom. He was so angry that he took himself off to a quiet corner where he could seethe in peace, and collect his thoughts.

  How could he have forgotten? How could he just not remember? It had caused him sleepless nights at the time: almost driven him to suicide, and haunted him ever since, and Chadwick McMurrough simply didn’t remember. He had no conscience whatsoever about ruining a teenage boy’s life, and he’d never even had the grace to feel sorry.

  This simply wasn’t good enough. When he thought of all the agony he had gone through at this bully’s whims, he felt physically sick, and all McMurrough could say was that he didn’t recall anything of that sort. Well, he’d have to pay now; now that he, himself, was stronger – an adult. He’d find a way to make the sadist pay for all those tears and all that fear he had suffered. And the nightmares: he’d pay for those, too. How bold alcohol makes us.

  Christopher Warren re-appeared in the garden. After stalking off with the rest of his family, he had evidently decided to come back to make his real feelings felt in a little more detail, and used the side gate. Bailey saw his approach and made a mental note to get bolts for this handy entrance and exit, which was already proving more trouble than it was worth.

  ‘Sorry to bother you,’ apologised Warren. ‘I’ve come back, really, on behalf of the wife. You know how they like to have their say – oh, I say, I am sorry, but of course you don’t.’

  He was starting to get a bit tongue-tied with embarrassment, and Bailey put him at his ease and bade him continue. If the man was going to make a complaint, he might as well get it over with as quickly as possible.

  ‘It’s not so much about during the day,’ Chris Warren began. ‘I know I’m out at work and Christine’s at home with the kids, and they do miss their afternoon naps, the younger ones, but, the main problem is in the evening and at night.

  ‘We used to have a charmed existence – if such a thing exists – with how quiet life was in Fairmile Green. Then, you bought this place, and the workmen moved in.’ Here, Warren tried an ingratiating smile that didn’t quite come off.

  ‘I mean, that wasn’t too bad, because at least they went home after the working day, but now you’ve got these exotic birds, and I fear they’re making our lives hell. I wouldn’t bother if it was just me, I’d simply wear earplugs. Chris takes it so much harder, you see, what with the kids and everything.

  ‘You can hardly put earplugs into a six-month-old baby’s ears, now can you? Nor can you explain to him why he doesn’t get enough peace and quiet to have a couple of hours’ kip in the afternoons. And that applies to Karen, our two-year-old, as well. I’m sorry to come round complaining like this, but Chris – my wife – insisted that something be said on behalf of the whole family.’

  Chadwick, who was not very fond of children, being the second of four, himself, was not very sympathetic, having wandered out from the kitchen to have a word with his partner. He had been quietly but steadily quaffing gin and tonic while he served others with drinks, and found that he was already rather sloshed.

  Instead of the quiet courtesy that Bailey would have shown this neighbour, Chadwick sent him off with a flea in his ear about ‘live and let live’, and promising to get him some prospectuses for boarding schools to relieve his wife’s burden of care. Had they not, as new residents, had to put up with the squalling of his tribe of brats on a daily basis? He was feeling really ‘bad’ this evening.

  McMurrough, in a bit of a huff that after all their spending and preparation all he was going to reap from their party tonight were complaints, went through to the telephone and rang all the members of the Chadwick’s Chatterers productio
n crew and asked them to come round. If it was turning into war, then he needed troops for his side, to counteract those in the opposing army.

  Then, deciding that their hostile guests were perfectly capable of working out how to pour their own drinks, he went back to the kitchen for another drink, grabbed his newly refilled glass, and stomped off out into the garden to join Bailey again. At least they were on the same side together.

  As they stood together in solidarity at the barbecue, the side gate creaked again, and a woman came into view, her arms filled with the figure of Dipsy Daxie, her face a mask of fury.

  ‘I suppose this is your damned dog,’ she called from nearly the other side of the garden.

  ‘His name’s Dipsy,’ called back Chadwick, with no idea what the problem was.

  ‘I don’t care if his name is Winston Churchill. He’s evidently slipped through your security somehow – unless, of course, you let him run loose, which is most irresponsible – and he’s got under my fencing and had it off with my Darling.’

  This most confusing conclusion to her complaint gave both Chad and Bailey visions of Dipsy making eyes at the woman’s husband. ‘My Darling is a pedigree and she’s in season, waiting for a visit from a stud to cover her tomorrow. Now your damned animated sausage has got in first, and God knows what the outcome will be.’

  ‘But Dipsy’s too young to do that sort of thing,’ countered Chadwick in indignation.

  ‘Oh no he’s not, Mr High-and-Mighty. I’ve got footage of the very act itself, on my phone, if you want to see it.’ She was nearly in front of them now, but had not moderated the volume of her voice at all.

  ‘May I suggest that we converse a little more quietly madam, and that you introduce yourself. We’re, naturally, very sorry if Dipsy has disgraced himself, but we had no idea that he could get out. We’ve only had him for a very short time, and the situation hasn’t arisen before.’

  It was lucky that Bailey had spoken, because Chadwick had had such a volume of gin that he would have been decidedly less polite, and probably told them to go hang, or worse.

  ‘What breed is your dog, madam?’ Bailey was back on the diplomatic road to a peace treaty.

  ‘I’m Ellie Smallwood from Green Gates and darling Darling’s a little Shih Tzu.’

  ‘She must be, if she let my Dipsy raunch her, and them not even introduced properly.’ Chadwick had spoken this unadvised opinion before Bailey could stop him, and the face of their female guest, which had been clearing of its thunder clouds, suddenly darkened again, as she dropped Dipsy without any ceremony whatsoever.

  ‘If my sweetie, darling Darling gives birth to a litter of mongrel puppies, I’m going to sue the pants off both of you for canine assault and impregnation without permission,’ Ellie Smallwood positively roared into Chadwick’s face, and his became as storm cloud-ridden as hers.

  Ellie gave him no chance to retort, but turned away immediately and headed for the side gate again, while Dipsy took advantage of the opportunity of proximity to his owner to cock his leg with fear. The woman had scared him, and he didn’t feel up to walking over to a shrub to do what was necessary.

  Chadwick picked up the little animal in disgust and practically hurled him towards the shrubbery. ‘Dirty little bugger!’ he spat, and swayed back into the house to change his trousers, shaking his wet leg as he walked, and abandoning his glass on the table beside the barbecue.

  The owners of the house next door, towards Market Street, Riverbanks, took this opportunity to catch Bailey alone, and approached him to make their displeasure known at all the disturbance from their property since the husband had retired. Lucille Sutherland left all the talking to Gerald, as it was his retirement that had been disturbed.

  He spoke quite reasonably to Bailey, putting his grievance with simplicity and conciseness to him, but Bailey had been irked by the accusations of Mrs Smallwood. Dipsy may be Chadwick’s latest toy, but he was getting rather fond of the little dog’s personality, and in his present mood, stood up in his defence rather more vehemently than he would normally have done.

  After all, if ‘darling Darling’ was so precious, why wasn’t she penned in securely? – especially if she was on heat. She would attract every dog in the neighbourhood in this condition, and he was sure that innocent little Dipsy wouldn’t be the first or the only one to pay heed to his instincts. And he’d bet his shirt the little lady hadn’t said ‘no’, the canine tart.

  So he rode roughshod over all of Gerald Sutherland’s carefully worded plea for more peace in the future and, although God knows why, announced his intention of taking up the saxophone, as a final nail in the coffin of good neighbourly relations.

  As the side gate shut with a sharp clang, it was heard to open again immediately, and a babble of very show-biz chatter hit the party, as the production crew from Chadwick’s Chatterers entered in a bunch. After their invitation by telephone, they had made calls round, and come in as few cars as possible, so that there were not too many of them restricted to one drink and interminable ‘pop’.

  Chadwick was, unfortunately, button-holed by Roger and Rita Fairchild of Woodbine Cottage before he could greet them, or even reach the sanctuary of the house, so they made straight for Radcliffe.

  Meanwhile, this couple had a grievance to air and Chadwick McMurrough was their target of choice. Their son Rufus had also, by coincidence, been selected to appear in the reality programme The Glass House, but had been evicted from it by the public at the end of the first week.

  ‘It should have been him, you know, who won it,’ stated Rita baldly. ‘It was your fault – you, with your outrageous clothes and your waspish wit.’

  ‘I don’t think they should allow gays on that programme. It puts everything skew-whiff, and distorts viewers’ opinions,’ added Roger, with equal vehemence.

  ‘Oh, piss off, you homophobic old freaks.’ Chadwick was really losing a grip of his manners now, and responded without pause for thought.

  The couple immediately and, not surprisingly, took umbrage at this – what seemed to them – totally uncalled-for insult, and rushed away in the direction of Nerys and Vince Catcheside from Church Cottage, whom they knew to be of the same opinion as them, as far as Rufus went.

  Bailey Radcliffe was absolutely overwhelmed when the entire crew surrounded him at his chef’s task, and he greeted them all by name – something it had taken him some time to master, but seemed only polite in the circumstances.

  In all, he welcomed five new guests to the party, but was not able to name their partners. All were in attendance, all being Dominic Allencourt, Chadwick’s agent; Desmond Hunt-Davies, the programme’s director; Neil Summersby, its producer; Daphne Betteridge, its researcher; and finally Melody Crouch, who was responsible for the scripts.

  He had been slowly getting to know them since he had taken up with Chadwick, and took this opportunity to meet their other halves. He knew that not all of the crew were particularly fond of Chad, but he liked to feel that they were getting used to his funny little ways and eccentricities, but maybe that was only wishful thinking. Not all of the eyes turned in his direction were full of goodwill.

  The Catchesides were deeply involved in discussion with each other, when the Fairchilds pulled up beside them and, after telling the story of what had just occurred near the kitchen entrance, Vince sympathised with them. ‘I’m not at all surprised. Nerys and me were just discussing why we came here tonight at all.’

  ‘For me, it was to see how they’d done the inside,’ admitted Nerys, going slightly red at the thought that she might get interior design tips from a couple that openly batted for the other side.

  ‘I thought it’d be all pink lace and frills and furbelows,’ admitted Vince, with a nasty leer, ‘but I reckon they’ve had someone normal do it for them – sort of camouflage for the unwary, in my opinion.’

  ‘I wouldn’t be one bit surprised,’ agreed Roger Fairchild. ‘It was so unfair, putting our Rufus up against someone like that. If they’d
said it was fancy-dress,’ – this was a reference to the colourful and outrageous dress sense of Chadwick – ‘then he’d have taken fancy-dress into the house with him. That McMurrough had an unfair advantage, if you ask me.’

  ‘Bloody shirt-lifters!’ spat Vince Catcheside, nevertheless heading towards the bar area in the kitchen for a refill of his glass, while Nerys went across to the barbecue with both their plates for a refill of food.

  The production crew had all migrated to where there was a plentiful supply of booze, and as Bailey put pork chops onto the plates held out to him as if beseeching alms, he looked at Nerys Catcheside closely and recognised the all-too-familiar signs. She was sweating slightly, her hands were shaking, and there was real trepidation in her eyes – the typical signs of a homophobe confronting her fear.

  Realising that it really was fear of the unknown with her, rather than prejudice and loathing of the incomprehensible, he spoke to her kindly for a minute or two, but it made not a jot of difference to the look of terror behind her eyes, and she scuttled off with the plates, still in awe of the unknown and misunderstood. Here be dragons, indeed.

  With a sinking heart, he saw yet another couple approaching him with a zealous and determined look in their eyes, and steeled himself for a further verbal mauling.

  This time, his persecutors were the Trusslers from three doors away. Keith put his case for a bit of peace and quiet at night and during the weekends, very reasonably, given the aggravation and disruption to their lives they had put up with. Bailey, however, after his last encounter, and the way the evening was going downhill, in his humble opinion, was not feeling either hospitable or diplomatic.

  Just being a faggot, a queer, a gay boy, a figure of fun and derision for most of these people in their nice safe little bubbles, with nothing out of order or upsetting in their cosy little worlds, he was beginning to see red.

  He wasn’t a square peg in a round hole, and neither was Chadwick. They were square pegs in square holes. It was just that these bigoted, small-minded straights couldn’t bring themselves to acknowledge that there was more than one shape of hole. He could feel his anger begin to bubble and seethe.