The Festival Murders

by Mark McCrum

  ‘These things do happen.’

  ‘I know they do. But how likely was it that Bryce would have died so suddenly? Is there a family history of heart disease? That you know about? I know he’d had his cholesterol checked out recently, hadn’t he?’

  ‘Who told you that? Priya?’

  Francis nodded; he didn’t think it would be tactful to mention Anna too.

  ‘Very thoughtful of her to care,’ said Scarlett sarcastically. ‘Well, he had a high count of LDL, low-density lipoprotein, bad cholesterol as it’s called. Which, being Bryce, he did bugger-all about. Despite my nagging. At one point a couple of years ago I almost got him to start taking statins, then he read some blog that was dead against them, so he decided not to.’

  ‘Forgive me for being nosy,’ Francis asked, ‘but until recently you lived together most of the time. Or all the time?’

  ‘All the time. Your informants have clearly told you it wasn’t a conventional partnership. So what else did they say? That I was some downtrodden little mouse who sat waiting for him to waltz home from his latest mistress?’

  Francis smiled. ‘Nobody seemed to understand the dynamic at all.’

  ‘It’s good to know that we kept them guessing. The simple truth is that we’re both quite headstrong people. A couple of years after the twins were born we just woke up one day and realised that we’d stopped having sex. We discussed it and there seemed to be a few limited options: we went to some kind of therapy and tried to work things out; we did what a friend of mine in LA did and spiced things up with naughty accessories; we became celibates; we split up; or we stayed together, but took other lovers as and when.’

  ‘Highly logical.’

  ‘Practical, I suppose. Bryce was always that. The bottom line was that neither of us wanted to leave the girls. We didn’t want some bossy outsider telling us how to fancy each other. Then Bryce brought home some bits and pieces from a sex shop in Soho, but once I’d handcuffed him to the bed and got the whip out I got the giggles, so that was a no-go.’

  Francis wasn’t sure how literally to take this scenario. Was this woman always so open? Or perhaps this was just a reaction to the shock of her ex’s sudden death.

  ‘So you chose the last option?’ he said. ‘How did that work?’

  Scarlett smiled; almost nostalgically, Francis thought. ‘It was fine for a year or two. Novelty factor, I suppose. We both had quite a bit of fun and for a while it actively improved things, gave us back our frisson. But the problem with that sort of set-up is that, Sod’s law, things never happen at the same time. One of you has always got the hot new thing going while the other’s just been dumped or whatever. Inevitably, you get jealous. So the temptation not to be honest creeps in. Then it becomes impossible, because you can’t trust each other …’

  ‘Which is where you got to?’

  ‘You’re a very sympathetic man, Francis, and I’ve no idea why I’m telling you all this, but basically Bryce started fibbing to me. Lying, actually. About Anna. The one before Priya. She had started as one of his little summer flings. Then she became more and for some reason he couldn’t give her up …’

  There was a shriek from the kitchen and the twins were upon them. ‘Mummy, Mummy, Perdita won’t get off the swing.’

  ‘I just got off, you total spastic.’

  ‘Perdita! I’ve told you never to use that word.’

  ‘But I did get off the swing.’

  ‘Mummy, when are we going to have supper?’

  ‘Girls, please! I’m having a talk with Mr Meadowes. As soon as Nurjan gets back, we’ll eat.’

  ‘She might be ages.’

  ‘If she isn’t back in fifteen minutes I’ll start cooking. How does that sound?’

  ‘Six thirty?’

  ‘Six thirty, yes.’

  ‘We’ll hold you to that, Mummy.’

  ‘OK.’ Scarlett rolled her eyes at Francis. ‘Hold me to it then. But only if you run off and play right now. And never use that word again.’

  ‘Daddy uses it.’

  ‘I know he does. He’s being silly.’

  ‘When are we going to see Daddy?’

  ‘Tomorrow, darling.’

  ‘OK!’

  They were gone, back out into the garden. Scarlett sighed deeply and picked up her BlackBerry.

  ‘I’m going to have to tell them tonight,’ she said, looking down as she tapped out a text. ‘God knows how they’ll take it. They adore their father.’ Francis said nothing, as Scarlett wiped the corner of her eye with the end of her little finger, then looked down at the painted wooden princess that sat on the glass table next to her, as if contemplating the blue, green and magenta beads implanted so delicately into her cuffs and trousers, the smile on her lips that was so artfully rendered. ‘Beautiful, isn’t she?’

  ‘She is.’

  ‘That one’s Burmese. Bryce and I found her at a magical place called Inle Lake, where all the hotels are on stilts over the water. That was one of our happiest trips. Before the girls were born. Now where were we?’

  ‘Bryce had started lying to you about Anna.’

  ‘Oh yes. He lied to me. And from what I can gather, he lied to her too. Started to tell her that he was about to leave me and shack up properly with her. Which was terribly mean of him, because she was over forty and wanted a baby and I don’t think he ever had any intention of giving her one. Actually, by the end it suited him pretty well. Family weekends at home. Social life and sex with Anna in the week. And me still doing all his bloody laundry.’

  ‘But then, in the end, he did leave you – all.’

  ‘He did, didn’t he?’ Scarlett swallowed hard and for a moment Francis thought she might be about to break down; but then the steely calm reasserted itself. ‘And I never thought he would. Have the guts. Or the ruthlessness. Because he loved the girls. So much. But she gave him an ultimatum, pushy little Priya, didn’t she? All or nothing. And he was so cunt-struck he couldn’t bear the thought of nothing. But perhaps you knew that already?’

  ‘She did say something along those lines, yes.’

  Scarlett sighed. ‘These young girls going for these middle-aged men, I really don’t get it. When I was that age I never fancied anyone more than five years older, max.’

  ‘There are other factors, though, aren’t there. He was a big cheese. She’s ambitious.’

  ‘I guess that must be it. What fools women are.’

  ‘And what about Anna?’

  ‘What about her? I’m afraid I thought it served her right. She knew we had kids. Her stated ambition was to split up this family. If she lost the chance of a family of her own then tough titty.’

  ‘Did you hate him after he left?’

  Scarlett turned and met his eye. ‘I’m not sure “hate” is quite the right word. I thought Priya would soon tire of him and he’d come running back. It wasn’t the first time Bryce had fallen for an Asian bird. There was another one when he was teaching at Birkbeck a while back. One of his students, naughty man. He had to let her go in a hurry when her brothers found out.’ She laughed. ‘I suppose at the back of my mind I thought something similar might happen with Priya, but I guess the world has moved on since then. Anyway, I really didn’t see how it could last. Once she realised what a crusty old shit Bryce could be on a day to day basis, she’d wake up and want someone of her own age. At that point I would have the luxury of deciding what to do with him.

  ‘But yes, at the same time, when I thought about it, I wondered whether all along I hadn’t been a fool. Agreeing to an open marriage when we weren’t even married. My trouble is that I always see the best in people. And Bryce and I go back such a long way. I know him better than almost anyone else. I know his weaknesses, his ambitions, his phobias.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Francis; he was thinking of Virginia, another woman who claimed to have known Bryce better than anyone else. ‘I didn’t see you at the Sentinel party last night, did I?’ he asked.

  ‘You most certainly didn’t.
My alibi is firmly intact.’

  ‘I didn’t mean …’

  ‘I’m sure you didn’t. But no, I was here with the kids all evening. NFI, I’m afraid.’

  ‘NFI?’

  ‘Not Effing Invited. Why would Laetitia want me now? I only ever got asked because of Bryce. I was aware of that. But to be off the list on my first year as a dumpee. There’s female solidarity for you. Have you met the silly bitch?’

  ‘Briefly. She came to a talk I did this afternoon.’

  ‘Lucky you. She must rate you. She’s basically the most appalling intellectual snob. Made worse by the fact that she’s so stupid herself. But because she does her festival and mixes with all these top literary types, she’s kind of half-kidded herself that she’s on the same level as them. When she’s basically a failed actress who was lucky enough to inherit a festival. You know about her dad?’

  ‘I heard something …’

  ‘Henry was the brains behind all this; and, I may say, the charisma. Unlike her, he believed in the writers.’

  She spoke with such passion that Francis began to wonder how objective her view of the flame-haired organiser was. Don’t say that Bryce had been involved with her too? It was hardly a question he could ask directly. ‘You don’t think she believes in the writers?’ he said.

  ‘She believes in success. In putting her long slimy tongue as far up the sphincter of the latest award-winner as she can. Booker, Costa, Baileys, she’s not fussy. What she’s not interested in is the grubby struggles of writers per se. While they’re suffering in their garrets to produce their marvellous confections. It’s actually funny. Because when people are obscure they get ignored and then they don’t know how to deal with her when they become flavour of the month and she’s all over them like a rash.

  ‘The sad thing is that when Henry was running the festival, it was a great week. Not only did he love writers, he under-stood what insecure egotists they all are. If anything he preferred failure to success. I think he thought that winning gongs was rather vulgar. Not that there were so many gongs back then. No, in the old days you’d find yourself in the pub with all kinds of people. The latest Booker Prize winner alongside some midlister who’d been jogging along quietly for years.

  ‘And people talked about ideas, not who’d won this, and who’d won that, and have you heard about this huge advance with this amazing agent? The party was a writers’ party. Not guarded at the door by dolly birds with clipboards asking you which TV company you work for. I remember when my girls were tiny, taking them along in their double buggy and letting them run around while we enjoyed ourselves. Julian Barnes feeding them crisps, Margaret Drabble patting their curly heads. But every year since Henry died it’s got worse.’

  ‘The party or the festival?’

  ‘Both. Half the people in the programme are off the telly, as far as I can see. She’s even got Family Man this year. Did you see that?’

  ‘Hard to miss, since he’s on the cover. But I suppose he is pretty famous, and he does sell an awful lot of books.’

  ‘That’s it, isn’t it? Where our culture has got to. Volume equals quality. Come to our literary festival and load up with recipes and gardening tips.’

  ‘If you hate it so much, why do you still bother to come?’

  ‘A good question. One I was starting to ask myself. But we have this place. And I love it up here at this time of year – whether I go into Mold or not. It’s like the end of term, start of the summer hols. We always used to stay on for a week or two. While Bryce tried to do what he called his “serious writing”.’

  ‘Bryce was out here with you?’

  ‘Of course. It was always a good time for the two of us. We’ve done it for so many years that in a way we used to relapse into a happier mode. Bryce’s girlfriends never came to Mold.’

  ‘And then this year was different?’

  ‘Certainly was. He and Priya even stayed here for a few days last week.’

  ‘I don’t imagine you were happy with that.’

  ‘Bugger all I could do about it, but no, it was pretty thoughtless of him.’

  ‘Was this the first year he hadn’t been at the cottage for the festival?’

  ‘It was. And look what happened. To tell you the truth, Francis, I so nearly didn’t come this year. But then I thought: stuff it, it’s my house too, why shouldn’t I? And I suppose I wanted to prove something to him as well. That he couldn’t just trample over all our memories like that.’

  There was the sound of a car drawing up outside. Scarlett rose to her knees on the sofa to look out of the window. ‘It’s only Nurjan. Our au pair. I sent her into town to get some bits and pieces.’

  Francis rose. ‘I must leave you in peace. It’s been good talking to you. One final little question, which only someone who knew Bryce intimately could answer.’

  ‘Shoot.’

  ‘When he took out his contact lenses at night, did he generally do it in the bathroom or the bedroom?’

  ‘In the bathroom, why?’

  ‘Always?’

  She paused for a moment. ‘Yes. I guess so. I never really thought about it.’

  ‘Thanks. I don’t suppose I’ll see you in Mold.’

  ‘Not tonight you won’t, certainly. I’ve got to wait in for the police. If they ever turn up.’

  Francis reached inside his jacket for his wallet. ‘May I give you my card?’

  She looked at it, then made as if to toss it away. ‘What am I supposed to do with this?’

  ‘Keep it. You can always call me if you need to.’

  As Scarlett stuffed the card into her front jeans pocket, the au pair appeared, though she wasn’t carrying any shopping bags. Nurjan was stocky and dark, with muscly arms either side of her sleeveless black T-shirt, and breasts like poached eggs. Francis wondered if Bryce had ever had a dalliance with one of her predecessors; unless he had a taste for the Amazonian, there was little temptation for him here.

  EIGHTEEN

  The Black Bull was quite a find. Down through a sloping garden a creaky wooden door opened onto a tiny, stone-flagged bar. There were other rooms off to left and right, with low ceilings and real beams. A bell hanging by the crisp packets summoned a teenaged barmaid with spiky black hair and an uncomfortable-looking bolt through her nose. There was a blackboard with a good list of draught beers chalked on it, along with strength and price. And there was the promised Gaggia machine, authentic if somewhat ancient.

  Francis had fancied a coffee, but the early evening sun was shining, so he thought he’d treat himself to a proper drink. Strangely for a Sunday – and during the festival – the place was all but deserted. Three stout women in wind jackets sat around a table on the little terrace by the door. At the far end of the lawn a young couple were visible in silhouette, canoodling behind the backlit fronds of a willow tree. Having ordered himself a pint of Headbanger and a packet of goat’s cheese crisps, Francis found an empty bench at the top of the garden. Below the hedge at the bottom the hill dropped away sharply; beyond was the perfect patchwork of countryside that he’d seen in the rear-view mirror earlier. His iPhone had lost its signal, which was a relief; no one could bother him and he had time to think.

  Hmm. If this had been a George Braithwaite mystery, now would have been the point at which the detective paused to consider the suspects in the case. With his beer in front of him, Francis took out his notebook and jotted down a few thoughts. George’s list, perhaps, would have looked something like this:

  Dan D – most obvious susp – with real reason to hate B. But: no clear motive bar literary revenge, best satisfied through print anyway? Despite his fearsome rep, seemed nice enough in a one to one. Then again: most obv, least likely character turns out to be a double bluff??

  Conal O’H – threatened publicly to kill B. Since said he’s happy he’s dead. No secret that he hates him for stealing (as he sees it) Priya. Vanished at critical time last night. Nobody saw him return to room. Could have been pretending to be dr
unk, driven to Mold, done deed, and got back before 4 am, which was when Fleur saw him again. But likely? Hardly.

  Priya K – in textbook theory, prime suspect, in that she discovered B and apart from taxi driver (and maybe random guest at hotel?) was last to see him alive. But why would she want to do away with brand new boyf + key patron at Sentinel? Also: Cathy saw her come into WH at 4 am. Would have had to bump off B v. quickly indeed, with zero resistance, because 2 minutes later was screaming on the stairs. 2 niggles tho: why did she switch laptop off when she went back to the room? What happened to pillow choc?

  Scarlett P-J – ex non-wife! Definitely a poss, esp if she’s going to inherit B’s money and property. ‘It’s my house too,’ she said of cottage. What about London gaff?Must be worth £££s. And what would have happened if Priya’s claim on B had got stronger – as in, say, marriage? Scarlett stood to lose everything. Has alibi in that someone had to be there to look after the twins last night – but what about Nurjan?

  Anna C – dumped cruelly after several years of waiting for B to leave S. Furious when she found out, but quickly found replacement. Does that mean she stopped hating him? Even if she didn’t, is that enough of a motive? On other hand, new boyf Marv certainly has experience to do away with someone. And he didn’t seem at all amused when I was quizzing her. Also staying at White H, so easy access. Joint alibi down to anyone who saw the pair of them out at Wyveridge last night – how late did they stay?

  Virginia W – dark horse ex-love of a million years ago. Quite obviously never got over B. Resents him deeply, for all her talk of enjoying travel and other boyfriends etc. Has clearly been struggling with career and is hanging everything on latest offering. Is it credible that part of a (deeply twisted) motive could be that she didn’t want B to slag her off again in review? And what about that pen?

  That was it, then. And under the unwritten rules of classic detective fiction, in a George Braithwaite mystery it would have had to be someone the reader had been introduced to reasonably early on (i.e. one of those six) – unless of course this was a Roger Ackroyd style story, and for as yet undisclosed reasons, it was I, Francis Meadowes, what had done him in, ha ha ha.