Death Of A Diva

by Derek Farrell

  Chapter Twenty

  I’d delivered Lyra’s ice and lemon and she’d theatrically opened a bottle of Perrier, inhaling the vapours and rhapsodising on the purity of the water, whilst failing to pour a drop of eau minerale till I’d left the room.

  None of her sad little entourage had returned and I actually felt sorry for the woman. Until I remembered what would happen to me if she failed to perform. Give her twenty minutes, I thought, then pop back up and catch her in the act of necking the voddie.

  The bar was empty, but a pounding was shaking the door as I re-entered it.

  “Come on,” Liz Britton’s voice called through it.

  I slid the bolts and opened the door. She looked hearty, raring to go and displayed no trace of the sobbing basket case that had fled the joint a short time ago.

  “More blusher,” she announced dramatically, waving a Boots bag above her head. “I think we’re going to need a lot of blusher. And mascara!”

  “She’s a bit of a mess,” I told her and Liz grinned.

  “Mess? See these hands?” and she held up a pair of slabs with fingers. “These hands are magic.”

  “I think she’s been drinking.”

  Liz’s face changed, her eyes becoming flinty. “We’ll bloody see about that,” she muttered and with that, headed up the stairs.

  All was quiet...

  I resumed my seat at the bar, nursing my soda and lime. As the winter light faded, the night stole in, the bar staff (Ali and my scantily clad family) worked their magic in transforming the place into a public house capable of presenting a welcoming space to two hundred pre-ticketed punters and slowly, individually, the clearly mental headliners husband/manager, stepdaughter and would-be biographer drifted back in.

  Morgan headed straight up to the dressing room, whilst Jenny and Dominic took up places on opposite ends of the bar and proceeded to soundly ignore each other.

  Caz came down at one point, swathed in a small fortune’s worth of Marc Jacobs, which I recalled seeing in the last mood board before we both got the boot from Glamrag. She dragged me off to be embedded in the Prada suit she’d procured for me and, as I rested my butt on the squat bulk of the antique safe in the office and she zipped up my Kenneth Cole boots, I heard Lyra’s sound check below me and had to admit that she sounded good.

  “I didn’t dance,” her voice echoed up, as the track for Give ‘n’ Take, one of her most famous disco-Lyra hits kicked in, with the strings swirling around, “Preferred to stand aside,” I looked down at Caz and she smiled back at me as if to say: This night is going to go down in legend.

  “Then took a chance, and now I’m open wide,” Lyra’s voice boomed, as she reached the songs bridge and the wah-wah guitar kicked off, “You’re such a mover, I feel such a fake, well if you’ve love to give boy, then I’m on the take...”

  Everything would be OK. I’d been fazed by the sheer weight of what was riding on tonight. I minced down the stairs to the sound of Lyra Day performing I hope you’re happy (But I wish that you were dead) from ‘Lyra in Memphis’ and stepped into the bar as she reached the key change. As she winked at me, her eyes sparkling, her lungs belting out the song, I knew that everything would be OK.

  Then, the sound check over, Lyra, accompanied by Liz and Morgan, swept past me. Ms Day snarled “We need to talk” at me, and my heart sank.

  Moments later, the doors opened and everything became confused...

  Chapter Twenty-One

  “Fuck me!” Christie sniggered “What’s that called?”

  I glanced across the bar and blanched slightly. Across the bar I could see Caz and Jenny, heads together, engrossed in conversation. And, standing next to them was what can only be described as a wrestler the size of a wardrobe, dressed head to toe in a tight fitting black Lycra pseudo military uniform, a pronounced pair of tits detracting only slightly from the oversized wig and black trucker cap perched on top.

  Bang goes my Vogue/Tatler opening I thought.

  “He,” said Ali as she poured heavily watered vodka into the shaven headed goon’s glass, “is called Hugo and it’s called Janet Jackson Rhythm Nation 1814. What’s that called?” she slammed the drink down, fizzed some soda into it and glared at the female company that Christie had arrived with.

  “Ooh,” the fourteen – fifteen at a push – year-old giggled, “a Bacardi and Red Bull.”

  “Wiv a cherry,” Christie leered, “but only if I can have it afterwards.”

  I moved off, heading towards where Morgan Foster was nursing what looked like a scotch. “Are we set?” I asked and he jumped like a scalded cat.

  “Hmmm? What?” He asked when he’d calmed down.

  “Lyra,” I prompted, “all OK?”

  “Your presence is commanded,” Liz Britton, interrupted from nowhere. “Upstairs,” she added, rather unnecessarily, as she nodded her red hair – teased now into a towering pillar of curls that perfectly offset her catlike eyes and high cheekbones.

  I looked towards the ceiling as the DJ – “His name’s Kunsthook and he’s going to be huge next year,” Caz had informed me – suddenly launched what sounded like a drum ‘n’ chainsaw version of Carmina Burana.

  Then, swallowing my fear and wincing as my beautiful but too-tight boots pinched my feet, I headed up to smile, reassure and comfort my diva.

  Who then, swaying slightly on her fourinch heels, demanded that I supply her with class A illegal drugs.

  “You see the shound check?” She asked, a slight slurring evident.

  “You sounded great,” I answered honestly.

  She shook her head, the towering wig of brunette curls waving as the immaculately made up face screwed up, the bright green rimmed eyes tearing up. “I can’t do it.”

  “What?” I asked, as she lifted a glass to her lips and swallowed from it.

  “Thought I could,” she said, taking another swig, before resting the glass behind her. “Can’t.”

  “Lyra,” I began, “you have a full house downstairs and I know this is scary, but I’ve heard your sound check. Believe me, you can do this.”

  She laughed then, tipping the head back only so far as to not dislodge the wig. “Oh, the barman at a shitty boozer in up-and-coming Elephant and Castle considers me capable of performing a PA. Listen–” she flipped her head forward. “I played some of the biggest arenas on the planet, you know? Don’t,” she held up a hand to silence my response. “In Sicily, I had a separate police escort for myself, my gowns and for my flowers. And you know what I always had – unspoken – in my contracts? A no snow, no show clause. Do you know what that means, barman?”

  “It’s November,” I vamped. “Cold outside. Might snow at any time.”

  “Fuck that shit,” she growled. “I want coke.”

  “Rehab,” I cried.

  “Bollocks,” she snarled back, resting her behind on the dressing table and lifting the glass of ‘Perrier’ to her lips. “It goes like this, little man: you deliver four grams of best South American powder to me in the next half hour, or the only show you’ll be seeing is the one when your full house tears this shitty pile to pieces around your pathetic little ears, capiche?”

  Which was why, moments later, I barged through the now extremely festive crowd in the bar, slammed my way up to Morgan Foster, informed him of his wife’s demands and told the clearly upset, but quite frankly useless, manager/husband that “You’d better sort this shit out, get her sober, straight and on that fucking stage, or so help me Morgan I’ll strangle the bitch with my own two hands.”

  Which, in hindsight, may not have been the smartest line ever to issue from my lips.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  At no point were the words “Don’t leave town without telling us” uttered, but the fat sweaty bulk of DI Frank Reid made it very clear that the only reason I was being released was because he was too busy to do the paperwork necessary to ship me off to the Chateau D’If.

  “We’ll be talking again, Danny,” he growled at me.
“Only next time, once the forensics are back, we’ll be talking seriously.”

  Dorothy Frost rolled her eyes, shook her head and tutted. “Jesus, Frank: you’re only a hook and a cloak short of being a panto villain. Call me if this nasty tub of lard comes anywhere near you,” she said, handing me her business card.

  And then I was alone, in the lobby of the police station.

  I’d hoped Caz might be waiting for me. Then I remembered the Marq; somebody would have had to stay behind, clear it out, wait while the forensics did whatever they needed to do and then shut the place down.

  For good, probably: Reid was so gonna get me for this. All his evidence – as the brilliant Mrs Frost had pointed out – was entirely circumstantial, but that didn’t matter. He’d work out something.

  Outside, the sky was a prison grey and the cold wind howled around the streets – deserted at five forty-five am Still, I thought, at least it’s not raining.

  Ten feet away from the building, a vice-like grip was clamped onto my elbow, a vicious jab to my kidneys convinced me I’d not be pissing without wincing for a fortnight and Jimmy Christie’s voice snarled in my ear.

  “I was on a dead cert tonight, you stupid fucking queer. An’ now, because of you, I’ve had to sit outside this fucking place for the past five hours.”

  A car – some nondescript thing that looked like the living embodiment of every reason why British Leyland had long since ceased to exist – pulled up beside us and Christie reached over, tugged the back door open and shoved me inside.

  “Chopper wants a word,” he growled, “an’ if he doesn’t’ cut your fucking balls off, I will.” He threw himself in beside me and pulled a huge and very dark piece of metal from the inside pocket of his coat.

  It was only when he pointed the chunk of dark metal at me that I realised it was a gun and that my night wasn’t over yet.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  “Out!” Christie wiggled the gun at me as the driver opened the door.

  I half fell onto the pavement and gulped in the icy winter air.

  I stood beneath the only shop sign illuminated at this time of the morning. It was a dark blue background onto which – in canary yellow lettering – the words ‘THE POUND SHOP!’ had been pasted, with a number of small ‘£’ signs attesting to the artistic bent of the sign writer.

  The place was notorious, the inclusion of the exclamation mark seeming to attest to the number of people who, in the past, had – reportedly – been Pounded (!) to a pulp in its back rooms.

  Christie shoved me forward and the driver fiddled with some keys before swinging the shop door open. Christie twisted my arm once more and steered me into the place. The door was closed, locked from outside and I heard the sound of the motor driving away.

  Still silent, Christie shoved me past shelves laden with cheap shampoo, mobile phone cards, knock-off brand name bleaches, cheap Thai curry pastes, lottery scratch cards and piles of remaindered paperbacks.

  Eventually, I was dumped onto a plastic chair in a back room, with only a bare yellow bulb that seemed to flicker spastically in time with my heart. I glanced at the dull walls on either side of me and did not like the brown-black-red splashes on them. Blood? Brains? An explosion of some well-past-sell-before-date Thai curry pastes? I didn’t know and had no real desire to find out.

  In front of me, on the opposite side of tonight’s second cheap melamine table, sat a familiar, short, slightly podgy little man, his head bald save for a corona of fluffy white hair. His right hand was gripping a porcelain mug. His dark chocolate brown eyes glittered in a deeply tanned face and he smiled, displaying a set of the whitest dentures ever seen.

  His voice was soft and melodious and reminded me, for some reason, of Winnie the Pooh. “Give me two reasons why I shouldn’t have the blue shit beaten out of you right now,” he demanded.

  “Mr Falzone,” I started.

  Then stopped. What could I say?

  “I’m waiting,” he said. “Only I’m not hearing many reasons.”

  Behind me, Christie shifted his bulk and something kicked in.

  “I didn’t do it,” I yelped.

  Chopper leaned forward, placing both elbows on the table and widening his eyes. “Always a good opening line. Go on.”

  “I didn’t do it,” I repeated.

  “Yeah,” he leaned back in the chair, “I heard this one first time round. If the third chorus is the same as the first two I just might have to have Jimmy here do some damage to your head. Now: you have reason one – you say you didn’t do it. I ask you: what makes you think I give a flying fuck whether you did or didn’t do it? My business is the sort of business that doesn’t really benefit from having the filth sniffing round it and now, thanks to you, I’ve got a near riot instigated by a mob of shirt lifters, a dead tart and a fucking army of Peelers crawling very close to my gaping bloody arsehole. I am still waiting for a reason why I shouldn’t have you pounded to a pulp. And I ain’t hearing many.”

  I paused, tried to calm my breathing and avoided looking at the dubious splashes at head height on the walls opposite.

  “You seem like a nice kid,” Chopper opined, lifting the mug and sipping what looked like a Latte. “But today is my granddaughter’s sixteenth birthday. I’m supposed to be shipping her and fifty of her best mates into a fleet of pink stretch limos and transporting them all to a party with a fucking boatload of my family. So I really don’t need this shit.”

  I remembered the front page of the Sun when Chopper had gotten off his last murder rap: pictures of the blood-spattered wall of a lock-up he’d been renting, with the word ‘INNOCENT?’ in capitals above it.

  “Mr Falzone,” I started again, before he raised a finger to his lips, lifted the mug, removed the finger and sipped again from the mug.

  “I have such a fucking hangover,” he said. “Side effect of getting old. I used to be able to drink all weekend. Snorted up half of Peru in my time. Then I got out of drugs. No time for ‘em now – too many fucking wasters involved, know what I mean? Still like a little wildness, but I get a hangover after a few beers and a bottle of wine. I’m gettin’ old, Danny. But I ain’t gettin’ stupid; know what I’m sayin?”

  I knew. But what else was I supposed to say, other than I didn’t do it.

  “D’you remember that headline?” He asked, as though reading my mind. “Remember? The fucking question mark? Innocent? Yeah, I can see you do. Well, believe it or not, I was – in that instance – innocent. Isn’t British justice wonderful? But I’ve spent the last ten years trying to convince the world that the name Falzone is not synonymous with a blood-spattered wall in fucking Dalston. I’ve worked to become a proper legit businessman. So then you turn up: a nice, polite ponce who wants to use one of my venues to launch a new gay bar. A bar that I agree to, for a small fee.”

  “And then,” he sipped once more from the mug, “in the space of a single evening you turn the public perception of my good name away from a blood-spattered wall to a pub full of drugged-up perverts who strangled the Fucking Queen of Saturday Night Television.”

  The mug slammed down and my heart stopped beating.

  “So: a reason. Deliver.”

  “I had nothing to do with Lyra Day’s death,” I said, more calmly than my pulse seemed to permit. “I was doing what I said I would: making the venue a profitable addition to your portfolio. But I promise you, I will sort this out. I will find out who did this.”

  Chopper, lifted the mug to his lips and from the corner of my eye, I saw Christie slip the gun out of his pocket. Then Chopper put the mug down on the table.

  I half saw Christie’s shoulders tense.

  Chopper started to laugh. “Oh, mate, you’d better sort it out – before a lone copper pokes so much as a lone finger into my business. ‘Cos if you don’t, I’ll be sorting you out.” He learned forwards. “Listen – and listen good. Fix this mess – and fix it fast. Understood?”

  I nodded, as Christie slipped his armament ba
ck into the pocket of his ill-fitting suit.

  “Oh, and one other thing,” Falzone said, as I staggered to my feet, “I still want my money. First thing Monday. No exceptions. You need a lift? Jimmy can drop you off.”

  I declined the offer.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  “Christ almighty. You look awful,” Caz boggled and then flung her arms out to catch me.

  “I’m dead,” I said.

  “I’ve been calling your mobile all night,” she pulled me over to the sofa, my knees gave way and I dropped into it.

  “I’m so dead.”

  “Where’s your phone? Why didn’t you call me back? What happened to you? What’s going on with the Lyra thing?”

  I looked around her living room, the curtains still drawn against the winter morning and noticed a rather large selection of stuff from the pages of Glamrag strewn around the place.

  “I need to flee the country,” I said and, hearing myself, wondered if I could possibly sound gayer.

  “I’ll put the kettle on,” Caz announced. “Brandy or scotch?”

  She made to move away and I grabbed her wrist. “Really, Caz. I need to get away. Please...”

  Caz must have seen or heard something, because her whole demeanour changed. She sat down beside me, put her arms around me and pulled me tightly to her. “I don’t do touchy-feely,” she murmured in my ear, “so if you ever tell a soul what I’m about to say, I will tear your left arm off and beat you to death with it.”

  And she pushed me back so she could look directly into my eyes. “You will not go to prison for what happened to Lyra. Because you didn’t do it. I know that and anyone with any sense will know that too. We’ll get through this and you’ll be fine.”

  “Ali took all the money.”

  “The what?”

  “I’ve been back to the Marq,” I said. “The tills are empty. The safe is empty. And I can’t get hold of Ali. The takings. From tonight. Last night. They’re gone.”