Sins of the Father

by David Harrison

  Smirking, they watched him make for the bar, where he sent them a lazy over-the-shoulder glance.

  “How very suave!” Alex said.

  “He can’t be more than twenty-five.”

  “So what? Don’t you fancy a toy boy?”

  Sarah shrugged. It was going to take some getting used to, the idea that she was available.

  “Not tonight, eh?” Alex reading her mind again.

  “No.”

  “Have you eaten yet?”

  “Don’t really feel like that, either.”

  “We could just get a bottle of wine and take it up to the room?”

  “Good idea.”

  The Romeo at the bar turned and grinned as they approached. Sarah asked for a Chardonnay and two glasses.

  “Found somewhere better to go?” he asked.

  Alex put her arm through Sarah’s and leaned close. “Something like that,” she purred.

  “Why not stay for a while?”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “Put this on the room, can you?” Sarah said to the barman.

  “Or maybe I should tag along with you?”

  Nothing if not persistent. Alex ignored him until Sarah had signed the bill and they were ready to go. Then she faced him and said, “To be honest, you’re not what we go for.” And she darted the tip of her tongue into Sarah’s ear.

  Romeo went red and turned away.

  “Sorry about that,” Alex said when they reached the lobby. “Sometimes you have to shock.”

  “Certainly shocked me.”

  “It was worth it, wasn’t it? I think I heard the clunk of his jaw dropping.”

  Sarah laughed. Suddenly she felt exhilarated. The boundaries were dropping away, and if anyone could offer a few pointers to a more exciting life, it was Alex.

  ***

  Diana opened the door and read it all his face.

  “What happened?”

  “Sarah’s gone. She’s left me.”

  Nick stepped inside and they hugged. His sister leaned back as if assessing him, then slapped his face.

  “Ow! What was that for?”

  “Throwing away your marriage. I could throttle you.”

  Nick rubbed his cheek. “Thanks for the sympathy.”

  “Just being my brother doesn’t entitle you to sympathy.”

  “All right, but don’t hit me again. I’ve had enough of that for one day.”

  He followed her through to the kitchen. Diana lived in a detached three-bedroom house in Seaford. In the extended breakfast room her husband Patrick was feeding yoghurt to their baby daughter, Chloe. Their four-year-old son Ryan was in the living room, singing along to the Bob the Builder theme tune.

  Patrick raised the messy plastic spoon in greeting. He was a tall black man with a slight build and a soft-spoken, public school manner. He wore tiny rimless glasses which lent him an air of studious charm. He was a partner in a firm of estate agents but, Nick often joked, still managed to be a likeable human being.

  “Sarah’s walked out on him,” Diana announced, her plump arms folded across her chest. “And you can’t really blame her, can you?”

  Patrick raised his eyebrows in a gesture that said, “Uh-oh.” Nick grinned and put his arm around his sister.

  “She loves me really.”

  “Someone has to,” Diana said. “Do you want a coffee?”

  “Cheers.”

  Nick chatted with his brother-in-law for a minute or two, and then Patrick wiped up the remains of the yoghurt and lifted Chloe out of her highchair. “Come on, let’s see what havoc your brother’s creating. Leave these two to talk.”

  “Thanks, Pat,” said Nick.

  “And no fighting!” Patrick admonished as he left the room.

  Nick grinned and sat down at the kitchen table. Spotting an errant dollop of yoghurt, he scooped it up with his finger and ate it, then grimaced.

  “Serves you right,” Diana said as she set a mug of coffee in front of him. “I suppose you’ll be wanting dinner now?”

  “Not really hungry.”

  “I can’t tempt you with these, then?” She picked up the cake tin from the unit, opened the lid and wafted the aroma of newly baked buns in his face.

  “Well, maybe just a couple.”

  She handed him the tin, then fetched a plate and sat down opposite him. “What will you do?”

  “She said she wants some time to think. I have to respect that.”

  “But you’ve also got to think about it. Do you really want the marriage to succeed? Are you willing to have children, if that’s what Sarah wants?”

  Nick frowned. “You didn’t know this was on the cards, did you?”

  “Absolutely not.”

  “Only you’re doing a pretty good job of siding with her.”

  “It’s not about sides, Nick. The fact is, I’ve always thought Sarah was the right person for you. I hate to see you screwing up your life for the sake of...”

  “Yeah, okay.” He didn’t need it spelling out. “Anyway, the idea was to discuss these letters from Franks.”

  He thought she’d accuse him of dodging the issue, but she merely sighed and fetched the envelope from a kitchen drawer. They exchanged letters like two presidents signing a non-aggression pact.

  Diana’s was slightly different in tone, less confrontational than the one Nick had received. Evidently Howard Franks felt Diana was susceptible to persuasion.

  I have for many years held your father in the highest regard as an actor. It is precisely because I feel his talent has been overlooked that I embarked upon this project. However, it is my duty as a biographer to explore all aspects of my subject’s life, and that must include the unsavoury side.

  Eddie Randall was by no means the first celebrity to succumb to the temptations of the flesh. His weakness for alcohol and gambling is already in the public domain: your late mother herself referred to it in the Sunday Times interview shortly after his death in 1976.

  It’s possible that you and your brother know nothing of your father’s secret life. I would implore you to give me your full co-operation, and in return I will share the information as I uncover it.

  If I were to abandon this project now, I would be failing in my duty as a writer. And if I do not write this book someone else will, possibly someone who lacks my experience, my empathy and my integrity.

  Nick threw the letter down and gave a disgusted snort. “He wouldn’t recognise integrity if it asked for his autograph.”

  Diana’s eyes were glistening with tears. “But he’s right, though. And he’s got something really bad, hasn’t he?”

  Nick took a moment to reply. He wanted to offer some reassurance, tell her it was just a tactical manoeuvre, a bluff, but he knew it wouldn’t sound convincing.

  “I think so,” he said. “And whether or not we co-operate, we have to find out what it is.”

  TH REE

  Whether it was the newfound sense of freedom and independence, or perhaps just the wine, Sarah found herself weary from laughter. For more than two hours she and Alex had talked and joked about any number of trivial subjects, never straying near the dangerous territory of the real world. Instead they discussed soap operas, bitched about celebrities and generally acted like two teenagers on a sleepover.

  Suddenly it was ten o’clock, and Sarah realised she was exhausted. She got up from the bed and stretched. “I feel shattered. Do you mind if we call it a night?”

  Alex rose, a funny half-smile on her face. Sarah beckoned her for a farewell hug and the two women embraced. Then Sarah felt lips brushing against her ear, her neck. Startled, she looked up and Alex kissed her. The sensation of the other woman’s tongue in her mouth felt both outrageous and wonderful, and Sarah found herself responding. A few times she’d caught Alex regarding her strangely and wondered if she was bisexual, but she hadn’t liked to ask.

  It was a surprise to both of them when Sarah pushed her away.

  “I can’t do this.”

>   “Let’s go to bed.”

  Sarah laughed nervously. “No. I’m really sorry. I’m just not... I only walked out on him a few hours ago.”

  “I understand. It has to be your decision.”

  “Look, I’m really flattered.”

  “It’s okay.” Alex shrugged, apparently unconcerned. She picked up her bag and turned towards the door.

  Sarah cringed. “Now I feel dreadful. I hope this won’t damage our friendship.”

  “Not a chance.” Alex smiled. “I promise.”

  “I’ll see you in the morning.”

  As soon as the door closed, Sarah sank on to the bed and raised a hand to her mouth, gently touching her lips. There was a heaviness in her stomach, a kind of sick feeling, but whether it was repulsion or excitement she couldn’t tell.

  You’re free now, she reminded herself. You can do anything you want.

  “Anything,” she whispered.

  ***

  It was past ten o’clock when Howard Franks considered his work for the day was finished. He saved everything to his back-up drive and then spent twenty minutes surfing the internet for references to his own name. Tonight he found one new item, a review of his biography of a hell-raising Formula One driver. It described his writing as ‘appropriately overwrought’ and ‘steeped in cliche, some of it frighteningly apt.’ Deciding that the overall tone was one of grudging approval, he resolved not to let it spoil his mood. After all, it had been a very productive day.

  Slowly but surely – another apt cliché – his portrait of Eddie Randall was taking on depth and colour and tone. Darkness and light. With the kind of information he was unearthing he was virtually guaranteed a lucrative tabloid serialisation.

  The book launch would be accompanied by the usual round of TV and radio interviews, the part of the job he loved most of all. Over the years he’d raised his own profile to the extent that, modesty aside, he was better known than some of his subjects. That was certainly the case with Eddie Randall at the moment, but it would soon change once Howard’s PR machine got to work.

  If only Randall had done more to establish his profile in the States. He’d had supporting roles in a couple of American movies, but nothing earth-shattering. By that stage of his career, the late sixties, he was taking any work he could get to keep the bookies at bay. A trophy second wife and a young family to support, but still drinking and partying as hard as ever, despite the warning of a minor heart attack in 1968.

  A very significant event, as far as Franks was concerned. Eddie had been admitted to the Royal Sussex County Hospital in December and released after five days with a warning to modify his lifestyle. A picture in the Brighton Evening Argus showed him mugging for the cameras, surrounded by adoring nurses.

  And now Franks knew that the small-time conman, Leslie Jones, had died just two months before, while Randall was working on a guest role in one of the Carry On films. It looked increasingly as though this phase of Eddie’s life would warrant a whole section of the book, and perhaps the lead excerpt in any newspaper serialisation.

  He studied his watch, a Cartier Roadster that had set him back nearly £3000. Lindsay was running late as usual. Completely unreliable. He was tempted to continue surfing, but made himself get up. Time to open a bottle of wine.

  ***

  Having refused his sister’s offer of supper, Nick drove home soon after nine o’clock, brooding over the letters from Howard Franks. In Wish Road the house was dark and already had a sad, neglected look to it.

  So Sarah hadn’t had a change of heart. Hadn’t lost her nerve and come home, unpacked her suitcase and agreed to give him another chance. And why should she? As Diana had made clear, he didn’t deserve it.

  Reluctant to enter the house, he lingered on the driveway and turned towards the sea, glittering in the light of a rising moon. He thought back to the warm June day when they’d moved in, eight years ago. It had been the middle of a heatwave, and on their second night they heard thunder rumbling far out at sea. They walked barefoot across the road, sat on the beach and watched an electrical storm rage on the horizon. How privileged they had felt. How content.

  He sighed. “No one to blame but yourself,” he muttered.

  Indoors, he checked for messages and tried Sarah’s mobile again. Then he searched the freezer and found a box of microwave chips. Setting the timer, he wondered if this was a symbolic moment: the resumption of his bachelor lifestyle, complete with stodgy fast food and too much beer.

  “Maybe,” he said, popping a tin of Carlsberg.

  He took the chips and the beer into the living room and sank on to the couch. With cable it took about ten minutes to examine all the TV channels on offer. He settled on News 24, the volume so low it was barely audible, and then realised he was only seeking the illusion of company.

  The chips were hot but tasteless, and fell heavily into his stomach. He shut his eyes and remembered that he had a couple of reports to write. And the reply to Franks that he and Diana had agreed on. Suddenly he felt too tired to think, let alone move.

  Where was Sarah now? There must be dozens of hotels in Brighton alone, not to mention all the other towns along this stretch of coast. If he wanted to track her down, he had no idea where to start.

  He contemplated another duty: ringing her parents. Gerry and Lisa Clarke had moved to France six years ago, shortly after Nick and Sarah married. He still remembered the disdain with which retired consultant Gerry had introduced Nick to one of his golfing buddies: “Eddie Randall’s son. You know, he was that actor.” Lisa was slightly warmer, but only when her husband wasn’t around.

  He fetched another beer, opened his briefcase and got as far as shuffling papers for a few minutes. He read Franks’s letter again, and then he selected a videotape and slipped it into the machine.

  End of the Peer was a dated but sharply observed comedy of class from the wonderful Boulting Brothers, filmed in 1959 and released the following year. What Nick liked about these films was their sheer Englishness, the thrill of seeing those streets and buildings of half a century ago, black and white, familiar but different, a world you could almost touch and yet was gone forever.

  It boasted the usual fine cast of comic talent: Ian Carmichael, Terry-Thomas, Dennis Price and the ubiquitous Irene Handl. Although Nick couldn’t recall meeting any of them, he’d watched them so many times over the years that they now seemed part of the family. His link to Dad.

  And here he is, twenty-one minutes in, playing a cheeky working class pub landlord in an unnamed suburb of London. An establishing shot of Eddie in the car park, wrestling a beer barrel into the cellar, and then we cut inside, probably to a studio at Shepperton some weeks later. Behind the bar, young and muscular in shirt-sleeves, tanned from his decidedly un-working class summer on the Riviera, Eddie is soon flirting with the Rank starlet playing a frightfully posh secretary, to the chagrin of her boyfriend, upper class twit Carmichael.

  Nick muted the volume and found himself unable to take his eyes off his father. In 1959 Eddie would have been, what, forty-one? Only four years older than Nick was now. How come he looked so young, so vital, when Nick felt old and tired?

  The camera cut to Ian Carmichael, and Nick found himself lip-synching, “Do you mind…?”

  Back to Dad: “I’ll talk to ‘er any way I like. Now ‘oppit!” And a lazy smile at the starlet whose name Nick always had to check in the credits. A glint in Dad’s eye that might not have been exclusive to the character. Did you employ your charms on her? Did she keep you amused in the breaks between filming?

  Had she gone running to Howard Franks with a tale to tell?

  “Oh Dad,” Nick whispered sadly. “What did you do?”

  ***

  It was nearly midnight when a flash of headlights between the curtains heralded Lindsay’s arrival, but by then Howard’s sense of exhilaration had slipped away. She should have been here hours ago, when he was still fresh and excited. He’d devoted a lot of thought to the kind of sex t
hey would have, but when he got up to answer the door there was barely a stir from his groin.

  Howard lived in a three storey, late Victorian terraced house in Highgate, on the edge of Queen’s Wood. It had four bedrooms, a games room and gymnasium, and a lap pool in the long rear garden. A few years ago he’d had the whole place refurbished by an interior designer who had since become a mainstay on a BBC makeover show. Although he tried not to keep track of such things, its value had now passed the million pound mark.

  Paranoid as any sensible wealthy Londoner should be, he checked the tiny monitor in the hall: Lindsay blowing a sarcastic kiss at the lens. He considered leaving her out there, make her wait for a change, but she was just as likely to turn around and go. A little more headstrong than he normally preferred, this one, but there were compensations.

  “I wondered if you’d gone to bed,” she said, stepping past him without so much as a peck on the cheek.

  “Getting my beauty sleep?” he said.

  “You said it, honey.” Putting her sexy American drawl to work.

  He followed her into the living room and watched her throw her jacket over the back of a chair, knowing it irritated him when things weren’t in their proper place. She was wearing a high-necked lambswool sweater and the sort of indecently tight jeans that normally did nothing to flatter a woman of her age.

  She caught him leering and grinned. As always when they first greeted one another, he was conscious of her height advantage. He was a neat, dapper man who paid considerable attention to his appearance, but there was little he could do about his stature: five feet six inches.

  “Come and sit down,” he said, leading her to a sofa. “I’ve been waiting for you.”

  “Why didn’t you call?”

  He shrugged. He hadn’t wanted to appear needy.

  “Mm.” She opened her arms to him and they kissed. He thought he tasted alcohol on her tongue, but it might have been the wine he’d had earlier. A fleeting thought that perhaps she was cheating on him, but then he pushed it away. His hands moved around her waist, but she took one and pressed it between her legs, where he could feel the heat even through the thick denim.