The Singer (58 page)

TIME OUT, July 3, 2003

It has been a year now since
Time Out
contributor Eddie Bracknell went missing from his flat in Camden Town under mysterious circumstances. Eddie, who was a month short of his 30th birthday when he was declared a missing person, had been a valued contributor to this as well as many other London-based titles, writing with authority on music, film and popular culture.
He continues to be sorely missed by all those who knew him.

At the time of his disappearance, Eddie had been going through a split with his long-term partner and was believed to have been suffering from depression, although he had never indicated to his friends or family that he had any suicidal inclinations. Whether he had left his flat with a passport or any credit cards could not be properly
ascertained, as the place was found to have been ransacked when his anxious parents called round two weeks after he had last been in touch with them. His computer was taken and important personal documents could also have been stolen. No money was ever withdrawn from his account. His file remains officially open.

If you believe you have seen Eddie, or know of his whereabouts, please ring the
Missing Person’s Helpline on…

Donna put the magazine down on her coffee table and shook her head sadly. Poor Eddie, she thought. I bet I know what happened to him. I could have told him not to go following that Vince Smith around.

She sighed, fought the urge for a cigarette and picked up the magazine again. Studied the picture of Eddie’s face, his big brown eyes looking mournfully out of the
frame as if he knew all along that something bad was going to happen to him.

Kevin had told her all about this Blood Truth book months before he’d turned up on her doorstep. Kevin was the only one out of the old firm she still saw. They had met again, years later, at one of the clinics she’d been sent to, where some ropy old guitarist friend of his was getting counselling for methadone addiction.
They’d bonded over the dog-eared copies of
Tatler
, laughed at how all waiting rooms stocked the poshest titles, just to rub it in how low you’d sunk. Stayed in touch ever since.

So it had pissed her off to begin with, all that old bollocks about an article for
Cut Ups
Eddie and Ray had fed her, as if she couldn’t be trusted with the truth. Still, she supposed, she couldn’t blame Ray for that;
she had led him a pretty merry dance in the past. And as for Eddie, she couldn’t bring herself to be nasty to him either, not when he looked so much like Dave and especially not when he’d treated her so nicely.

Her last postcard from Vince had come almost exactly a year ago; that was when she realised she wouldn’t be seeing the journalist again. Pity, that.
But hold steady, Eddie, help is at
hand. You won’t be forgotten around here
.

She flicked onwards through the magazine until she came to the music section. The picture on the opening page put a smile back on her face.

Tony Stevens of Exile shakes hands with his new signings,
The Illuminated

read the caption. Underneath it went into the usual froth about how the band had attracted a massive following through their website and
the free CDs they burned themselves and gave out at gigs, how they were the way forward with their edgy, modernistic take on post-punk and all that waffle. Better still was the guff about Stevens, pioneer of the original class of ’77 and how he was so excited to be part of something so brave, so youthful and so full of energy all over again. It made her laugh, it really did.

But not as much as
the picture.

There they were, all standing on Shepherd’s Bush Green, in front of his office; she could just about see the exact spot from up here. Four skinny young men in black jeans, white shirts and black hair. One in particular stood out from the rest; he was taller and much better-looking, if she did say so herself. He didn’t need to dye his hair like the others did, his was all natural.
Had the eyes to match, the Spanish eyes.

Tone was looking at him with an expression she recognised well.

She wondered when he would realise there was something very familiar about his new signings and the spirit of ’77, something very close to home.

They had taken her baby away from her when he was born. That had been the worse time of her life. She had struggled over to Paris to try and tell
Vince about him, hoping desperately that if he would only recognise the child as his own they might give him back to her. But of course, he hadn’t. He’d just laughed in her face.

Donna had resigned herself to having lost her baby for good along with everything else. She didn’t even allow herself the fantasy that some day, he’d come looking for her.

But he had. As soon as he was eighteen. He
told her he always knew there was something missing in his life, that it had come as no surprise when his foster parents had told him.

Marcus, they had called him. It suited him. He was beautiful, more beautiful than she could have ever dared hope for. All of Vince’s height and slender limbs, but none of his arrogance. With her hair and eyes and olive skin. Something else from Vince they had
soon found out about, after they had reacquainted themselves and she had gradually told him about his real parents and what they had once done. His musical talent.

No wonder they were the hottest new band in Britain. And the most intelligent too. Donna hoped she had helped Marcus to avoid the pitfalls of being beholden to any cunt in the music business and this Internet lark had certainly helped.
Direct produce from the studio to your desktop, no fat, suited wankers in between. It had meant that, as soon as they had gate-crashed the charts – such as they were these days, you only needed to shift about fifty CDs to get in there now – the record companies had come slavering after them.

But Marcus had chosen wisely. He hadn’t gone for the biggest cheque. He had gone for the record company
that had the most history. History that he could relate to. History that he could use to build on, to assure himself a glowing future.

And there he was now, holding the hand of destiny, captured in a flash for all eternity by Tone’s faithful photographer, Gavin Granger.

All of them none the wiser.

For now, at least. All that was to come, and would come, in its own delicious time. She would
enjoy each minute of what was to come next, let it unfurl as slowly as it liked.

After all, Donna had waited a long time for this, almost a lifetime. But now she could see it at last.

A gift from the past. A future.

The Not Knowing

‘Those of us who mourn the loss of Derek Raymond and believe we will never see his like again have huge reason to celebrate…He is reincarnated in Cathi Unsworth…all the noir, the Black Novels we delighted in are restored to us in the guise of C. Unsworth…she has not only taken on his mantle but reinforced it with a freshness
and vitality that makes you gasp in sheer amazement…I haven’t been as excited by a new writer since I first read Ellroy or stumbled across the very first James Sallis…She is that good and better, that dark’ Ken Bruen

‘Brilliantly executed with haunting religious imagery, interesting minor characters, great rock ‘n’ roll references and a spectacular ending.
The Not Knowing
is a cool and clever
debut. Sleep on it at your peril’
Diva

‘Unsworth worked for music magazine
Melody Maker
as well as
Bizarre
, and her knowledge and love of music, fashion and London pours out of the pages…a lovingly observed, well-rounded and well-crafted debut novel’
Barcelona Review

‘Hugely entertaining debut from a future star of gritty urban crime literature’
Mirror

‘Unsworth’s debut ushers the reader into
an early ‘90s twilight world of Ladbroke Grove bedsits, dingy magazine offices and seedy Camden pubs – a louche, lovingly evoked milieu…Unsworth has concocted a powerful story’
Time Out

‘Cathi Unsworth is the new cool…Unsworth ups the tempo by way of a dark, pacey plot and perceptively witty metaphors, making this near perfect debut very hip indeed’
Buzz

‘
The Not Knowing
is Unsworth’s debut
novel but it reads like the work of a seasoned veteran…mystery lovers everywhere, take note of Cathi Unsworth’s name. I have a feeling she’s going to be around for quite a long time’
www.bookslut.com

London Noir: Capital Crime Fiction
edited by Cathi Unsworth

A-Z of everything that’s evil but inescapably seductive about the city. Just don’t go south after midnight’
Dazed & Confused