Classic Calls the Shots

by Amy Myers

  Len and Zoe should have been slaving away in the Pits on my behalf when I reached home, as there was a Riley RME to finish by the end of the working day. In fact only Len was there. Zoe was going to be late as she had to run Rob somewhere. Luckily she and her Fiesta arrived in a haze of blue mist before I got too involved in my story.

  ‘Physician, heal thyself,’ I remarked drily to her.

  She looked puzzled. ‘I’m fine.’

  ‘But your car isn’t,’ I said patiently. ‘So why not fix it?’

  She wasn’t fazed. ‘I would if I knew a good garage. What are you doing here, anyway? We thought you were set on a movie career.’

  ‘I am, but I’ve had an idea about why I was duffed up the other day.’ I proceeded to tell them my Biddington theory, but they both looked unimpressed.

  ‘Soooo . . .’ Zoe began doubtfully. ‘What do we do?’

  ‘Keep your ears open when you’re out and about in car circles,’ I said firmly.

  ‘For what?’ Len grunted. He isn’t exactly a socialite.

  ‘Who the big hitters insure with. Who’s had cars nicked. Possible spotters. Anything that might tie in with Shotsworth Security.’

  Len grunted again, from which I understood that he was far too busy doing things that mattered, such as adjusting a throttle linkage. Zoe looked distinctly disapproving.

  ‘What about Rob?’

  ‘Rob?’ I couldn’t remember mentioning him.

  ‘Are you suggesting he’s bent too?’

  I’d clean forgotten lover boy was a chum of Nigel’s. ‘No,’ I said firmly, hoping to goodness I was right. I have little time for Rob but even so I couldn’t see him being energetic enough to be a crook. Then I remembered that it had been Rob who first offered to take me to see Clarissa at her Gladden home, and that had led me to finding the car park and the Auburn. Had he had some sneaky reason for doing so? Or was it yet another case of Rob blindly barging into trouble? I was prepared to go with the latter – for the moment.

  ‘You might be doing him a favour,’ I pointed out. ‘If Nigel’s clean no problem.’ (And Ferraris can fly, I thought meanly.) ‘If he is mixed up in this racket then Rob would be well out of it.’

  Zoe thought this through. ‘OK,’ she said reluctantly. ‘You’re on.’

  ‘Len?’

  A further grunt which I took as a yes. ‘Good,’ I said. ‘Remember, folks, it’s all in the cause of our classic car heritage.’

  A wet cloth flew over the Riley RME and caught me mid-T-shirt.

  Somewhat cheered by this partial success, I drove up to Syndale Manor the next morning in happier mood not least because it was Friday and the weekend offered some promise of time with Louise. As I turned in through the gates, however, the mood began to evaporate, for no reason that I could deduce. I parked the car and began to walk up to the house. There had been few cars in the car park, so I guessed that meant that today we were down to the cast, crew and catering staff without extras.

  It felt somewhat creepy on my own, as though I were in one of those old ghost films where buildings suddenly vanish and trees close in for the kill. True, it was early morning, damp and even drizzly, but that did not fully account for it. Even the catering area was deserted as I passed it, and there was no one around on the manor forecourt. No, I was wrong. The front door was opening and out came my old friend Nigel, who looked as pleased to see me as though I were a long lost friend come for the weekend. It was good to see me, he told me, and even looked as if he meant it, which made it hard to remember that this was the man whom Dave and I were investigating as a possible major player in a car-theft gang.

  ‘Where is everyone?’ I asked. ‘Filming inside?’

  ‘No. Up at Nemesis.’

  ‘What?’

  He laughed. ‘Sorry, that’s our family name for it. The old folly built like a Greek temple – it’s behind the house up on the hill.’

  So that’s what Joan had meant when she referred to Nemesis. It was I who had put the thought of revenge into her mind.

  ‘Why Nemesis?’ I asked. ‘Is it dedicated to him – or is it her?’ I knew the old myth of course, but had never associated a sex with the name. Perhaps that was as it should be. The avenger of the gods, the child of night, needs no further identification.

  Not Nigel’s field, either. ‘No idea,’ he replied. ‘It was built ages ago. Want to join the fun? I’ll take you over.’

  And so we set off together, the best of chums, through the gate leading to the gardens and lake at the rear of the house, which I had not yet fully explored.

  ‘Perhaps it got its name from dark doings in your family way back?’ I joked.

  Nigel looked unconcerned. ‘Maybe. My father is a bit of a stickler for kids obeying the rules – maybe his father was too. The temple seemed to glare down at us as it’s fairly high up on the hillside, so Dad used to say that Nemesis was keeping an eye on us making sure we were good, otherwise we’d reap the gods’ vengeance.’

  Some way of parenting, I thought, beginning to dislike Sir John Biddington, even though I hadn’t yet had the pleasure of meeting him. ‘Nemesis’ reeked of medieval discipline. Be good or be whacked by the Devil – or alternatively in this case by your father. As we reached the terrace of the house overlooking the gardens, I could see Nemesis far off on the hillside to our right. It looked harmless enough from here, just another small stone building with a few pillars, like the one at Godmersham Park, in which Jane Austen must once have enjoyed sitting. There was something off-putting about Nemesis’s position, however; it was surrounded by guardian trees that looked ready to march in force to repel invaders. I could see figures moving around up there, but at this distance they looked dwarfed as if conceding that nature had the last word.

  ‘Is the name one of the reasons Bill was so taken with it,’ I asked, ‘as the theme for his film is revenge behind and darkness ahead?’

  ‘Louise thinks so. Not my field,’ Nigel said dismissively. ‘I hate the place. I know it’s only a building but I’d pull it down if I got a chance.’

  Only a building, I thought. But buildings have atmospheres, and atmospheres often have good cause behind them. I was still battling to consider that Nigel might be mixed up with major car crime, and had to bear in mind that I might be his Nemesis. Liking him was an increasing nuisance, although I reasoned that even Al Capone must have been liked by someone.

  ‘Maybe we’d better forget revenge and talk cars,’ I said lightly. ‘What’s your car at present?’

  He brightened up. ‘A Merc 280SL.’

  ‘Great. Did you know there’s a good parts supplier in south London?’ Then I broke off, as I could see Louise coming to greet us. She was costumed, clad in a shimmering slinky green evening gown and her evening make-up shouted at me, but apart from that she was Louise, not Julia Danby. Either way, she looked worried.

  ‘Did Nigel tell you?’ she asked.

  I didn’t like the sound of this. ‘About what?’

  Nigel had been caught on the wrong foot. ‘Thought it better not,’ he muttered.

  ‘It’s no secret,’ she said impatiently. ‘One of the cars was vandalized last night, Jack.’

  I definitely didn’t like what I was hearing. ‘The Auburn?’

  ‘The Fiat,’ Nigel said.

  Louise’s car in the film. ‘What happened?’ I asked sharply. Another in the dirty tricks campaign, I wondered, or some new problem? There could be no question of its being merely passing vandalism here.

  ‘Nothing much. Just graffiti,’ Louise said. ‘Nigel cleaned it off easily.’

  ‘What graffiti?’

  ‘In lipstick. It read “whore”,’ she told me evenly, then as she saw my expression added, ‘Nothing personal, Jack. Don’t worry about it.’

  Personal was exactly what it sounded like to me. Very personal. Not just a general expression of dislike. It could be very much directed at Louise and me, now that news had crept out, no doubt given a hefty shove by Pen. It was either anoth
er episode in the dirty tricks campaign showing that it had not stopped with Angie’s death, or it was someone who disliked the idea of Louise and myself as a couple. Such as, I couldn’t help thinking, Nigel.

  I glanced at him, and caught him off-guard. The hail-fellow-well-met look had vanished from his eyes. ‘Pointed eh?’ he said.

  Louise considered him only a friend, but how did he think of her? And what might be coming next in the way of dirty tricks.

  ‘Here,’ Nigel said, waving a hand at the temple ahead of us. ‘Welcome to Nemesis.’

  I watched the filming for the rest of the day, chiefly because Louise was on set much of the time. It was a scene between Julia Danby and her former lover Lord Charing, in which he has soused out Julia’s plan to seduce his son away from his fiancée Cora, but his fury turns to passion and they end up in each other’s arms. Lucky chap. I could do with more of that myself. There were more people here than I had expected from the number of cars, and I could even see a few extras. Von Ribbentrop (Chris) was having a quick smoke with the Prince of Wales (Graham), and Joan was chatting to Tom and Eleanor.

  Nemesis itself consisted of one small room, presumably the ‘temple’, and a columned platform outside with stone seating along the wall by the entrance to the room for people to admire the view. The love scene was taking place inside the temple but Bill was filming outside it as well. There were clearly lighting problems with both, judging by the deteriorating tempers as the day wore on. Particularly Bill’s. He never lost control, but we were all aware of rising tension, especially in him. There was take after take, and even Tom came in for criticism over the storyboards which Bill said were misleading, even though he must have passed them in the first place. He ordered Tom to adjust them and bring them to him before the end of filming that evening.

  I found it hard to watch as Louise’s performance, which seemed perfect to me, was torn to shreds time after time and then painfully reconstructed. It wasn’t just her. When at last Bill was satisfied, the next scene went just as badly. This one featured Lord Charing and his son, but with a glimpse of von Ribbentrop, the Prince of Wales and an attractive woman no doubt playing Mrs Simpson behind them. None of the trio had speaking lines and Lord Charing and his son had come upon them unexpectedly. It worked for me, but Bill found fault with all of them, demolishing the performances of all five.

  ‘Don’t worry, Jack,’ Louise said, seeing my set expression. ‘It’s pretty routine.’

  ‘In that case, I’m glad I’m not in the film business.’

  As the day wore on Brian and Joan also came in for the full Wade treatment. Joan seemed the most relaxed, but also distracted. At the brief break after hours of filming, she sought me out at the canteen to ask whether there had been any follow-up on Pen.

  ‘Bill seems out of sorts today,’ I said once we’d put that subject to rest. ‘What’s wrong?’

  ‘The attack on Louise’s car, I expect,’ she said.

  ‘Louise herself doesn’t seem worried.’

  ‘Maybe not. But Bill is.’

  ‘Why should that be?’

  Joan hesitated. ‘It meant something to Bill. Someone scrawled “whore” on Margot’s car during the filming of Running Tides. Her husband we thought. It caused a stir, and it was after that things seemed to go wrong between Bill and Margot. So he might . . . You see—’

  Whatever she was going to say she thought better of, however, as the runners recalled the cast to Nemesis.

  ‘Will filming go on much longer?’ I asked, as I walked with her back to Nemesis. I hoped not, for her sake. She still looked under strain.

  She shivered. ‘I hope not. I really do. It’s that place. Nemesis. Bill’s got us in such a state that we’re all beginning to think in terms of revenge and footsteps in the dark.’

  Bill eventually called it a day about seven thirty and Louise rejoined me in the catering area after changing. She was tense and so was the rest of the cast. I tried my best to soothe her but without success.

  ‘I hate that place,’ she said. ‘We all do. It seems like stepping into a nightmare from the past. I know that’s ridiculous, because I wasn’t even in Running Tides, but I can’t help feeling it’s there all the time.’

  ‘Sweetheart, remember how you told me that what’s going on now couldn’t be relevant to something that happened over ten years ago?’

  ‘I do remember. But suppose I’m wrong? All I know is that the sooner this film’s in the can the better.’

  ‘For us as well?’

  She looked at me appalled. ‘That’s a separate issue. You’re the one good thing that’s come out of this job.’

  That shook me, not for myself, but on behalf of Dark Harvest. ‘Don’t you think it will be a success?’

  ‘I’m sure it will be,’ she said bitterly. ‘One can never tell during the filming itself. To me it seems as if it’s all ragged, no unity, as though we’re groping our way through but only towards something that seems to disappear as soon as we get anywhere near it. But Bill seems happy with it that way.’

  ‘Can he see things straight, given what’s happened? The film is an escape route.’

  ‘Granted, but I don’t think that affects his judgement. And nor does Running Tides or Margot Croft. They really are in the past for him. Bill has this new dream in his head now, and he has to get it on film. It happens with every film of his, not just this one, according to Joan. What I’m afraid of, Jack, is that . . .’

  ‘Tell me,’ I urged, when she paused.

  ‘That it will catch up with him, and that he’ll collapse.’

  ‘His own Nemesis?’

  ‘No, just the effects of both Margot and Angie dying at the point of success.’

  ‘Even though Angie’s death has nothing to do with Margot’s?’

  ‘Yes, although we can’t be sure of that. But if the motive is rooted in today, not yesterday, who has one?’

  The name Tom hung between us but wasn’t voiced. There were other people around us now. Living human beings, not names on a list to be shifted from innocent to guilty at will. ‘Shall we get out of here?’ I asked her abruptly, as I realized that was exactly what I was doing to Nigel. ‘Leave right now?’

  She looked at me despairingly. ‘I’d love to, Jack, but I can’t. We or I at least have to stay.’

  I knew she’d say that, but I had to push on as gently as I could. ‘Why? Can you explain? The filming’s finished.’

  She hesitated, then said, ‘Yes, I can explain. We’ve been through such a ghastly day that I feel I should remain with the others for their sake, for the film’s sake. Who knows whether it matters or not, but I think it does. Do you understand?’

  Of course I did. I felt the same about Zoe and Len. If either of them go through troubled times I try to help. I looked round at the assembled company of which Louise was so fiercely protective. Conversation was muted; there was no sign of Bill, nor any of the other familiar faces, except for Justin and Eleanor. And then I saw Tom. He had only just arrived at the catering area, looking so unlike his usual self that it wasn’t only Louise who was worried.

  ‘Everything all right, Tom?’ she asked. ‘You don’t look too good.’

  ‘No one would after a bollocking like that from His Majesty. I got the storyboards back to him at Nemesis long before he finished for the day, and he still didn’t like them and let everyone know it. “Bring them over to the Manor before eight thirty,” he roared. Then I get a radio call telling me he and Joan were checking lighting up at Nemesis and don’t bother coming to the Manor.’

  ‘That’s odd,’ Louise said.

  ‘Too macabre, he told me. I should be keeping the dark stuff in the background, not pushing it to the front. He threatened to go digital again.’

  ‘He doesn’t mean that,’ Louise said comfortingly. ‘He’s been iffy all day long.’

  ‘We all have,’ Tom grumbled.

  ‘True enough,’ she said. ‘Don’t you feel the same, Jack?’

  I nodded.
I couldn’t wait to get moving and yet was anything so very different to other days on which I’d been present? I decided it was, but in a way I could not define. Perhaps that was how Nemesis worked.

  ‘Are you sure you can’t leave now?’ I pleaded with Louise as Tom went off to get some food.

  ‘No. I have to stay.’

  She looked past me, and I turned round to see Roger advancing on us – which perhaps explained why Tom had retreated so quickly. Wise move, I thought. Roger might have joined forces with Bill and banished his storyboards for ever. He didn’t look in a mood to take Tom’s side against Bill’s.

  ‘You seen Bill anywhere?’ Roger asked.

  ‘Sorry. No sign of him,’ Louise answered. ‘Ask Nigel.’

  ‘No point. Sir John was holding dinner for us, but Bill hasn’t turned up.’

  ‘Trying to sort out what went wrong today,’ Louise said perhaps unwisely.

  Roger immediately turned on her. ‘Wrong? What did?’

  Louise hastily backtracked. ‘Nothing serious. Just one of those days when you don’t quite hit top note.’

  ‘Bill doesn’t have those days,’ Roger said dismissively, which made me think the less of him. Everyone has those days.

  Louise tried again. ‘He told Tom he’d see him at the Manor but he cancelled it, so he might be up at Nemesis thinking about the blocking or lighting for tomorrow.’

  ‘Could be.’ Roger seemed unwilling to go alone and Louise offered to go with him. ‘Odd he didn’t let Sir John know though.’

  Something made me tag along too, and not just my love of Louise. On any other day it would have been a pleasant walk through the gardens at dusk. The lake was calm, the water lilies closing up for the night, and the scent of roses was in the air. Ahead of us, however, Nemesis looked ominous in the dying light and even threatening. Stupid, I thought. This was just another evening.