Play to the End (16 page)

The Colborn family was clearly no warm and harmonious unit. Syd raised an eyebrow at me as I pocketed the note. A brief silence fell.

Then Gavin said, "There's something else you could mention to your wife. Walter's death .. . left a lot of unanswered questions."

"Car smash, wasn't it?" Syd asked with a frown.

"Walter was hit by a car while walking along a lane near Wickhurst Manor. The driver was charged with manslaughter."

"I never knew that," said Syd. "I thought it was just ... an accident.

But .. . manslaughter!"

"The case never came to court. The driver died while awaiting trial."

"How does that help me convince Jenny that Roger covered up the cancer connection?" I asked.

"The driver died of cancer," Gavin replied. "He was a former employee of Colbonite. And he was terminally ill when he drove Walter down. If you want my opinion, he held Walter responsible for his illness."

"You mean ... he murdered your brother?"

"In effect, yes."

"Good God."

"I can't say I blame him."

"Maybe not. But.. . when did this happen?"

"November, nineteen ninety-five."

"Was their .. . working relationship .. . reported at the time?"

"I don't recall. I knew of it. As did others. Whether it made the pages of the Argus .. ." Gavin shrugged. "Roger's a great puller of strings."

"You could check that, though, Toby," said Syd. "They'll have the Argus back to eighteen hundred and God-knows-when up at the Library."

"Yes," I mused. "So they will."

"I hope I've been of some help," said Gavin.

"You have. Yes. Thanks." My mind drifted to the contents of Derek's book. How had the introduction concluded? "The closing chapters will analyse the circumstances leading to the closure of the company in 1989

and the fate of those who found themselves out of work as a result."

The word 'fate' took on a sharper meaning in the light of Gavin's revelations. Derek had to know about the cancer. He couldn't very well have avoided writing about it. His history of Colbonite amounted to a charge sheet against Sir Walter and Roger Colborn. No wonder Roger didn't want to help him get it published. I could only wish in that moment that I hadn't sent it off unread to Moira. I could get it back from her, of course. And even sooner I could speak to the author himself.

"Did Colbonite have a pension scheme?" Syd suddenly asked.

"I don't know," Gavin replied brusquely. "What does it matter?"

"I was just thinking it could have been a bargain operation for Sir Walt and Roger the compensation dodger. Half the staff claimed by the big C before they could make any inroads into the fund? Sounds like one long contributions holiday."

"It has to be said, Gavin," I remarked, 'that your brother doesn't seem to have been any more scrupulous than your nephew."

"Walter didn't cheat me out of my shares."

"No. But he cheated a lot of his workers out of a long and healthy retirement."

"Under Roger's influence. He thought the boy could do no wrong. He never saw his true nature. Besides .. ." Gavin took a long pull on his cigarette. "Walter didn't have a long and healthy retirement himself, did he? He was made to pay for what he'd done."

"Unlike Roger."

"Yes. Unlike Roger." Gavin stared morosely into his glass, then looked up at me. "So far."

Inventing an appointment at the theatre in order to extricate myself, I left Syd and Gavin to chew over old times if they had a mind to and headed for the taxi rank in East Street. A cab was soon speeding me north to a tower block beyond the station, a lower floor of which houses Brighton Central Library.

Where I discovered, to my chagrin, that my taxi driver wasn't a regular patron of the library service. Either that or he was singularly bloody-minded. Because, after paying him off and mounting the steps, I found the door firmly locked. Brighton Central Library is closed on Wednesdays.

I sheltered in the porch, cursing the bureaucrat responsible for such a stupefyingly inconvenient arrangement. Then I noticed the soaring roofline of St. Bartholomew's Church to the south and realized just how close I was to Viaduct Road. Maybe, I thought, this wasn't a wasted journey after all.

There was no immediate response to my knock at the door of number 77.

But the top sash of the ground-floor window was open by several inches.

Derek surely wouldn't have gone out leaving it like that. I knocked again, more firmly.

I thought I heard Derek's voice from the other side of the door. But a lorry thundered by, drowning out every other sound for several seconds.

I knocked once more. Then I did hear his voice, pitched at a panicky falsetto.

"Go away. Leave me alone."

"Derek," I shouted. "It's me. Toby Flood."

There was a silence. Then: "Mr. Flood?" Panic seemed to be subsiding.

"Please let me in, Derek. It's wet out here."

"Are you ... alone?"

"Just me and fifty cars a minute."

The door opened and Derek peered out at me like a water vole apprehensively observing a river in spate. "Sorry, Mr. Flood," he said. "I didn't .. . well, I thought ... he might have come back."

"Who?"

Derek ushered me hurriedly in and closed the door. He pushed firmly against the latch to make sure it had fully engaged, then pointed me towards the sitting room, my question having apparently escaped his attention.

"Who did you think might have returned, Derek?"

"Mr. ... C-Colborn."

"Roger Colborn's been here?"

"Y-yes." The stress of a visit from his former boss had evidently introduced a stammer into Derek's already hesitant delivery.

"What did he want?"

"Please ... go through." He was still pointing to the sitting room.

I went in and nodded towards the lowered window. "If you're worried about a return visit, shouldn't you close that?"

"Oh God, yes." He moved past me, yanked the window shut and turned to me with a wavering smile. "Sorry. I'm a l-l-little ... on edge."

"So I see."

"Mr. Colborn shouted at me. I don't like .. . shouting."

"I'm not going to shout."

"No. Of course not. Please ... sit down." For the moment at least, the stammer had subsided. We sat down either side of the fireplace.

Derek kneaded his hands together, frowning down at them. Then he looked across at me and said, "Is it true .. . that Mr. Maple's dead?"

The question was oddly phrased. He could either not know or be in no doubt on the point. "Yes," I replied cautiously.

"Oh. God. I am ... sorry."

"You say that as if it's your fault."

"P-perhaps ... it is."

"He died of a heart attack, Derek. It was nobody's fault."

"I'm not sure."

"Why not?"

"The way ... Mr. Colborn talked about it."

"What way was that?"

"He, er, mentioned it... and said ..."

"What did he say, Derek?"

Derek took a deep breath to steady himself. Then he said, "He came here and told me to stop causing trouble for him. To forget my history of Colbonite. To leave his ... your wife .. . alone. And to leave you alone too. He said I should go away for a few days. Until Lodger in the Throat had finished its run. I told him I didn't want to go anywhere. That's when he mentioned Mr. Maple's .. . death. He said it was an example of what happened when people got out of their depth.

He said ... it should be a warning to me."

"A warning?"

"Yes. How did ... Mr. Maple die, Mr. Flood?"

"I'm not sure. I think he was being chased when his heart gave out. He wasn't a well man. After Monday night's show, he met someone who seemed to think he was actually me. They didn't realize he was the stand-in. I think they had something nasty planned for me. When they realized their mistake, they sent Denis packing. But last night, according to a phone call he made to me, they came after him again."

"Do you think ... they were working for Mr. Colborn?"

"What do you think?"

"I don't know."

"Tell me, Derek, did you manoeuvre me into missing Monday night's performance to save me from whatever was planned?"

He looked at me blankly and shook his head. "No. I had no idea ...

anything was planned."

"That letter you wrote to Leo Gauntlett..."

"Did it help?" he asked eagerly.

"Not exactly."

"I wanted him to understand that you weren't being irresponsible."

"Really? Wasn't it just a little ... tongue-in-cheek?"

"Well.. ." Derek flushed coyly. "Maybe .. ."

"It reminded me of an Edna Welthorpe missive."

At that he beamed. "They're gems, Mr. Flood. Absolute gems. Do you remember her exchange of correspondence with Littlewoods?"

"You aren't going to write to any more of my associates, are you?" I'd have been sterner with him, but so fragile was the state Colborn had left him in that I felt I couldn't risk even hardening the tone of my voice. "It's got to stop, Derek."

"Yes. Of course." He hung his head like a guilty schoolboy. "I'm sorry."

"No more tricks. No more stunts. Clear?"

"No more." He gazed at me earnestly. "I promise."

"Good."

"Is that why you came? Because of the letter?"

"Partly. I... found myself in the area."

"Not on your way to the Library, were you?"

"What makes you ask?"

"It's just that .. . when we met at the Rendezvous on Monday, you asked me for directions to the public library."

"So I did. And you told me it was in New England Street."

"That's right. But actually .. . it's closed on Wednesdays."

"I know. I've just come from there."

"Oh dear. That must have been annoying for you. What were you trying to find out? If I can help .. ."

"I wanted to look at back copies of the Argus."

"Ah. Actually, the Argus isn't archived at New England Street. You need the Local Studies Library in Church Street for that."

"Also closed on Wednesdays?"

"I'm afraid so. You'll have to wait until tomorrow."

"Not necessarily. You see, I think you can help, Derek. In fact, I'm sure of it. I wanted to read what the Argus had to say about the death of Sir Walter Colborn."

"Oh. That."

"Yes. That. I understand he was knocked down by a car, driven by a former employee of Colbonite, who was terminally ill with cancer at the time."

"Sounds like ... you already know all about it."

"Is it true a lot of Colbonite workers contracted cancer of the bladder after handling a carcinogenic curing agent used in a dyeing process?"

"Yes." Derek's reply was almost a whisper. "One of the chloro-anilines. Nasty stuff."

"No doubt you mention this in The Plastic Men."

"Oh yes, Mr. Flood. It's all there. Chapter and verse." He smiled weakly. "There was a sign on the door of the dyeing shop. Somebody spray-painted over the E in dyeing on one occasion. A pretty black sort of joke."

"Did you work with this stuff?"

"Good Lord, no. I was a filing clerk."

"But those who did are mostly dead now?"

"Yes. I checked on them all. They're listed in an appendix to The Plastic Men. Names. Ages. Cause of death."

"Which one of them murdered Sir Walter?"

"He was only charged with manslaughter."

"Who was he, Derek?"

"Kenneth Oswin." Derek stared at me. "My father."

It was as obvious now as it should have been before. He didn't blame Roger Colborn for closing Colbonite down. At least, not only for that.

There was something far worse to lay at his door. "Why didn't you tell me?"

"I thought it might... put you off."

"Because there's a feud between your families? Well, it certainly skews the perspective, that's for sure."

"There's no ... feud."

"In your book, do you accuse the Colborns of knowing how dangerous the curing agent was?"

"I don't exactly ... accuse them. But..."

"You lay it on the line."

"I suppose I do. Yes."

That's libel."

"He could sue me. I wouldn't mind."

"You asked Colborn to help you get the book published. Why? You must have known he'd move heaven and earth to stop it being published."

"I just wanted to ... get a reaction."

"Well, you got one, didn't you? More of one than you bargained for, if the state you were in when I arrived is anything to go by."

Derek squirmed in his chair. "I just don't see why he should get away with it."

"Take after your father in that, do you? He obviously decided Sir Walter shouldn't get away with it either."

"It wasn't like that."

"What was it like?"

"Dad went out to Wickhurst that day to plead with Sir Walter to help out the families of the men who'd died and those, like him, who were already terminally ill. He'd gone down with cancer shortly after Colbonite closed, but he'd recovered. Then it came back. He'd been a shop steward in his day. He .. . felt responsible. He thought he could talk Sir Walter round. He'd only bought the car a few years previously, so Mum could drive him back and forth to the hospital.

Anyway, he told me later what happened when he got to Wickhurst Manor.

Sir Walter refused to discuss the matter. Ordered him off his property. Then stalked off to take his dog for a walk. Dad sat in his car for a while, fuming, then decided to go after Sir Walter and make a last effort to talk him round. He'd seen him set off along the lane that leads north from Wickhurst towards Stonestaples Wood, so that's the way he went. He was going too fast. And he was never a good driver, anyway. He was in a lot of pain by then as well. He went round a sharp bend and saw Sir Walter too late to stop or swerve aside.