Cast in Order of Disappearance (16 page)

‘Yes. And that is exactly what I meant to do.'

Ten days passed. In America, with the tide of Watergate rising around him, President Nixon celebrated his sixty-first birthday. In England wild storms swept the country, and commuters were infuriated and inconvenienced by the ASLEF dispute. Housewives started panic buying of toilet rolls. And in a churchyard in Goring, the body of Marius Steen was moved from its grave after a stay of only four short weeks. Then it was opened up and samples of its organs were taken and analysed.

All of these events, international and domestic, seemed unreal to Charles. Since sobering up after Christmas he had degenerated into a deep depression. Inactivity and introspection left him lethargic and uninterested in anything. His usual solutions to the problem—drink and sex—were ineffectual. He drank heavily, but it gave him no elation, merely intensified his mood. And his self-despite was so strong that he knew reviving an old flame or chasing some young actress would only aggravate it. He tried to write, but couldn't concentrate. Instead he sat in his room, his mind detached, looking down on his body and despising what it saw. Forty-seven years old, creatively and emotionally sterile. He thought of going to see Frances, but didn't feel worthy of her warmth and eternal forgiveness. She had sent him four stout dependable Marks and Spencer shirts for Christmas, nursing him like a mother who respects her child's independence. He'd sent her Iris Murdoch's latest novel. In hardback, which he knew she'd think an unnecessary extravagance.

His only comfort was that the following Monday he was to start filming
The Zombie Walks.
Though he didn't view the prospect with any sort of enthusiasm (he'd been sent a script, but hadn't bothered to read it) he knew that activity of some sort, something he had to do, was always better than nothing. Eventually, if enough kept happening, the mood would lift without his noticing its departure and he would hardly remember the self-destructive self that went with it.

But as he walked through the dim streets of London to Archer Street on the Friday evening, the mood was still with him. He felt remote, viewing himself as a third person. And he had a sense of gloom about the findings of the inquest.

When Jacqui opened the door of her flat, he knew from her face that his forebodings had been justified. She was silent until he'd sat down. Then she handed him a glass of Southern Comfort and said, ‘Well that's that.'

‘What?'

‘According to the coroner, Marius died of natural causes.'

‘A heart attack?'

‘They had some fancy medical term for it, but yes, that's what they said.'

‘Well.' Charles sighed. He couldn't think of anything else to say. Jacqui looked on the verge of tears, and, as usual, converted her emotion into a violent outburst. ‘Little Arsehole's been clever, the sod. He must have given Marius an electric shock, or injected air into his veins, or—'

‘Jacqui, you've been watching too much television. That sort of thing just doesn't happen. I'm afraid we have to accept the fact that Marius did die from natural causes, and that all our suspicions of Nigel have been slander, just based on dislike and nothing else.'

‘No, I don't believe it.'

‘Jacqui, you've got to believe it. There's nothing else you can do.'

‘Well, why did he go down to Streatley on the Saturday night, and make such a bloody secret of it?'

‘I don't know. Perhaps for the reasons he said. He was worried about his father, so he went down, they had a few drinks, then he came back to London.'

‘Oh, for Christ's sake, that won't wash.'

‘Why not?'

‘He and Marius didn't get on at the time. We know that from the new will and the letter to me and—'

‘Perhaps they had another reconciliation.'

‘Piss off, Charles. There's something fishy and Nigel's behind it. Marius was murdered.'

‘Jacqui, the most sophisticated forensic tests have proved that he wasn't.'

‘Well, they're wrong. They're all bloody wrong. Nigel paid them off. He bribed them.'

‘Now you're getting childish.'

‘I am not getting bloody childish! ‘Jacqui stood up and looked as if she was about to hit him. Charles didn't respond and after a frozen pause, she collapsed into a chair and burst out crying. When he had calmed her, she announced very coolly. ‘I'm not going to stop, Charles. I'll get him. From now on there's a war between Nigel and me.'

‘Well, you certainly nailed your colours to the mast by setting up the post-mortem.'

‘Yes. And I'm going to win.' Thereafter she didn't mention anything about either of the Steens for the rest of the evening. She cooked another of her frozen meals (country rissoles) and Charles drank moderately (a rather vinegary Spanish Rioja). Then they watched the television. She had just bought (in anticipation of her legacy) a new Sony portable (‘I'll be sitting about a lot when I get very big'). There wasn't much on the box, but that night it was preferable to conversation. At ten-thirty, by Government orders, came the close-down. Charles rose and after a few mumbled words about thanks, and keeping in touch, and being cheerful, and seeing himself out, he left.

Jacqui's flat was on the top floor and the bulb in the light on her landing had long since gone and not been replaced. As Charles moved forward to the familiar step, he felt his ankle caught, and his body, overbalancing, hurtled forward down the flight of stairs.

The noise brought Jacqui to the door and light spilled out over the scene. ‘Charles, are you all right? Are you drunk, or what?'

He slowly picked himself up. The flight was only about ten steps down to the next landing, and though he felt bruised all over, and shocked, nothing seemed to be broken. ‘No, I'm not drunk. Look.'

And he pointed up to the top step. Muzzily outlined in the light was a wire, tied tightly between the banisters on either side. It was about four inches above the step. Jacqui turned pale, and let out a little gasp of horror. ‘Good God. Were they trying to kill me?'

‘No!' said Charles, as he leant, aching, against the wall at the foot of the flight. Suddenly he realised the flaw in the will Marius Steen had so hastily improvised in the South of France. ‘I don't think it was you they wanted to kill. Just your baby.'

XIV

Slapstick Scene

THE ZOMBIE WALKS was one of the worst film scripts ever conceived. The Zombie (played by a well-known Horror Film Specialist) had walked for a thousand years in a subterranean cavern which was broken open by an earthquake in Lisbon. By means not specified, from Portugal he arrived in Victorian England, where he got the idea that Lady Laetitia Winthrop (played by a ‘discovery' from the world of modelling, whose acting talent was 36-23-36) was his long-lost love from a world before the subterranean cavern. He therefore determined to seize her from Winthrop Grange where she lived with her father Lord Archibald Winthrop (played by a well-known character actor who did commercials for tea-bags). After the Zombie's travels through Victorian London (where, incidentally, he committed the crimes attributed to Jack the Ripper) he arrived at the Grange and enlisted the help of Tick, a deformed coachman of evil character (played by Charles Paris). As the Zombie progressed, he committed murder after murder, and his victims, rather than dying and lying down, became zombies too, until at the end Winthrop Grange was besieged by a whole army of the walking dead. Had it not been for the activities of Lady Laetitia's lover, bold Sir Rupert Cartland (played by an odious young actor who'd risen to prominence by playing a tough naval lieutenant in a television series) making with the garlic and the wooden stakes (a bit of vampire lore crept into the script), Lady Laetitia and her father would have been turned into zombies and carried back to the subterranean cave, where they would never be heard of again. Which, to Charles' mind, wouldn't have been a bad thing.

They were filming at Bloomwater, a stately home in Berkshire which had been built by Sir Henry Manceville, an eccentric nobleman, in 1780. Manceville had designed it himself as a great Gothic palace and even incorporated the specially-built ruins of an abbey into one wing. It was a monumental folly, which could have been made for horror films. In fact, had the cinema been invented at the time, it probably would have been. Sir Henry Manceville had been obsessed with ghosts and, in later life, when his eccentricity slid into madness, he used to terrify his servants by walking the Long Gallery, dressed in a sheet, dragging a length of chain and wailing piteously.

Bloomwater's present owner was a more prosaic figure, Sir Lionel Newman, the paper magnate. He was a man who, like Marius Steen, had risen from humble origins to immense wealth and had surrounded himself with all the symbols of the established aristocracy. His association with Marius Steen had been the reason why Bloomwater was being used for the filming.

Charles found that, as ever, making a film involved much more hanging around than actual work. The director, a little Cockney who glorified in the name of Jean-Luc Roussel, generated an impression of enormous activity as he buzzed around checking camera angles, getting the lighting changed, demonstrating the special effects and bawling out the continuity girl. But very little actually seemed to get done.

Charles didn't find many sympathetic characters among the cast. The Horror Film Specialist was surrounded by an admiring coterie of lesser horror film specialists and most of their conversation referred back to previous triumphs. (‘Do you remember that
Dracula
when your fang got stuck in the girl's bra?'; or ‘I'll never forget that girl who had hysterics during that human sacrifice'; or ‘Do you remember that take as the Werewolf when you forgot your line and said “Bow-Wow”?') They all sat around, reminding each other of things they all remembered, each waiting his cue for the next reminiscence to be slotted in.

So Charles went off on his own most of the time. He sat in the Library (later to be the scene of the appallingly-written quarrel between Lord Archibald and Sir Rupert) and did the crossword or played patience.

On the Wednesday morning of the first week of the schedule he was sitting with the cards spread before him and feeling fairly secure. The film world still has an outdated generosity in its dealings with actors. The big-spending Hollywood myth retains its influence and the Zombie cast were well looked after by Steenway Productions, with cars organised to get them to and from the set. The early starts were a disadvantage, but Charles had minimised that by staying with Miles and Juliet and having the car pick him up at six. Then he could sleep through the drive and the laborious business of make-up. Quite cosy. And the money was good.

He also felt as secure as he could about Jacqui. The shock of the trip-wire incident had worn off and she was fairly well hidden. He'd wanted to send her off to some relative in the country, but she didn't seem to have any family. In fact, when they went into it, it was amazing how few people Jacqui had to call on. No family, or at least none she kept in touch with, no girl-friends. The centre of her life had always been men, either one at a time or many. A lot of girls end up promiscuous, when all they're looking for is friendship. Jacqui's lack of other resources explained both her desolation when Steen seemed to have dropped her and her reliance on Charles. (Even her leaping into bed with him again. She needed to keep up her continuity of male companionship, and humbly thought she had nothing to offer but sex.)

Charles had considered parking her on Frances in Muswell Hill, but the incongruity of the thought of the two women together was too great. So in the end he had given her his keys to the room in Hereford Road. He felt fairly confident that Nigel Steen, or whoever was mounting the campaign against her, did not know of any tie-up with Charles Paris. Hereford Road was dangerously near Orme Gardens, but it was only a short-term solution while the film lasted. Jacqui was likely to stay in most of the time with her portable television; her pregnancy made her quite content to do so. Obviously she'd have to go out to the shops from time to time, but she'd had her hair dyed black on the Saturday, bought a new winter coat and a large pair of dark glasses. That should keep her safe. Charles could imagine Jacqui quite happy in her enforced confinement. Hers was not a demanding character, and so long as she felt some evidence of a man's care (which living in Charles' room would give her) she would not need more. When the Zombie had finished his walk, a more permanent method of protecting her for the next four months would have to be found.

They'd considered going to the police, but agreed that, after the embarrassing debacle of the inquest, further accusations from Jacqui against Nigel Steen would sound more like the ramblings of a paranoid than anything else. It was safer for her simply to go underground. Charles rang daily to check everything was all right.

So he felt secure as he sat looking over the rolling lawns of Bloomwater. To add to his pleasure, the patience came out. He was just laying the cards down for another game, when he heard the door open behind him. He turned and the girl who had just come in let out a little scream.

For a moment he couldn't think what was worrying her, until he remembered his make-up. His own hair was hidden under a latex cap from which a few grey wisps straggled crazily. His eyes were red-rimmed and sagging, his nose a mass of pustules, and his teeth had been blacked out with enamel. The whole face had the unearthly green tinge of dead flesh, which Jean-Luc Roussel was convinced was the mark of a zombie.

‘I'm sorry,' said Charles. ‘I'm afraid I do look rather a fright.'

‘Oh, that's all right. I just wasn't expecting it.' The girl looked about sixteen and recently aware of her considerable attractions. Her black hair was swept back in the careless style that only the most expensive hairdressing can give. She was wearing check trousers and a red polo-necked sweater that accentuated the perfect roundness of her bra-less small breasts. For the first time in over a month Charles felt certain that he hadn't lost interest in sex.