Simon Brett - Situation Tragedy

‘Oh dear.’

‘No great rift. Just haven’t got round to it.’

‘Well, you should.’

‘I will.’

‘Anyway, about these deaths. . are you going to bring me up to date?’

‘No. It’ll keep. I’ll tell you when you get back. Probably be a few more by then.’

‘Good. I’m only away the fortnight.’

‘Just the fortnight?’

‘Yes.’

‘Right. I must say, as a Dr Watson, you’re hopeless. Sherlock Holmes never had this trouble. He didn’t have his faithful acolyte zooming off to the Seychelles whenever his assistance was needed.’

‘No, but on the other hand, he solved crimes.’

Charles thought about what Gerald had said when he put the phone down. Not the final gibe, that hadn’t hurt, such rudeness was well established between them; no, he thought about what Gerald had said about Frances.

It would be rather good to go on holiday with her. He was already getting bored with Jay Lewis. The sex was all right, but there was a limit to how much quotation from the luminaries of West End Television he could take.

Frances, though. . They’d always said, in the old days, that when they could afford it, they’d go to Greece. Just the two of them, without Juliet. Thanks to the cheque from Maurice, he now reckoned he could afford it. And Juliet, in her late twenties with a husband and twin sons, no longer presented a problem.

He rang Frances’s number. There was no reply. He’d try again.

He was just going back to his bedsitter when the payphone rang. The Swedes all being out, he returned to answer it. Some cock-eyed logic suggested it might be Frances ringing him back.

It wasn’t. It was a man s voice he didn’t recognise. ‘Hello, could I speak to Charles Paris?’

‘Speaking.’

‘Oh, hello, my name’s Gregory Watts. .’

‘Oh yes.’ It didn’t ring any bells for Charles.

‘I’m a bookdealer specialising in detective fiction.’

‘Oh yes.’ With more understanding.

‘Just talking to a friend of mine who runs a bookshop in Charing Cross Road and he said you’d been looking for an R. Q. Wilberforce. .’

‘Yes, I was. In a vague sort of way.’

‘Well, look, I’ve got this first edition of Death Takes A Short Cut. Very Good Condition. 1938 it is, but of course you’d know that.’

‘Um, oh, er, yes.’

‘If you do want it, I’m asking five pounds.’

‘Ah.’

‘I’ve got other collectors who might be interested, But I rang you first, because my friend said you only collected R. Q. Wilberforce.’

‘Well. .’ It rather appealed, the idea of being the nation’s specialist in Wilberforciana. Even if it wasn’t true.

‘Have you met the old boy, by the way?’

‘Which old boy?’

‘R. Q. Wilberforce. He’s still about. Must be in his eighties. I wrote to him to see if he’d got any old editions he wanted to get rid of.’

‘Ah.’

‘He said he’d got rid of them all. I didn’t believe him. Not many of these authors want to part with their private copies of their own works. Mind you, the widows often don’t care so much, if you come in with a reasonable offer.’

‘Really? No, no, I haven’t met him. Don’t know much about him.’ Anything about him, in fact.

‘Well, do you want to buy it?’

Charles couldn’t remember exactly why he had thought the book important. It was part of some train of thought that had been shunted off into a siding to make way for the Intercity express conviction of Barton Rivers’ guilt. On the other hand, he did feel fairly flush and this bloke had taken the trouble to ring up.

‘Yes, please, I would like it.’

‘Okay, well, if you can send me a cheque for?5.32 — that’s with postage — I’ll send the book as soon as I receive the money.’

‘Fine.’

Be nice to have something to read while he watched to see who Barton Rivers tried to eliminate next.

He felt a chill. Of course it was possible that the old madman might start on members of The Strutters cast.

‘Now please don’t worry. Everything’s going to be okay,’ Peter Lipscombe assured the cast at the read-through on the 27th July, ‘but I should just put you in the picture about the news on the industrial front. You’ll have heard that there was a one-day strike last Monday, and there have also been one or two other go-slows and things happening, but I think the atmosphere’s clearing now, and I don’t think we need worry about our recording next Friday. You may find odd things happening in the W.E.T. building — I mean, for instance there may not be any canteen service and the bar may suddenly be closed.’

A communal groan broke from the cast.

‘But I think basically everything’s going to be okay. We’ll get the show made, don’t you worry about that. Now one thing I should tell you — I don’t think it’s likely to happen, but we should be prepared for any eventuality — when we get into the studio, we may have to rehearse/record the show during the day. You see, at the moment — and I’m sure this will have changed by next Friday — at the moment the security men have got an overtime ban on, which means that they won’t work evenings, which means we can’t have an audience in the studio because of safety regulations. So if that ban hasn’t been lifted — and I’m sure it will have been — we’ll get the schedule changed and do the show during the day.’

‘And dub the laughs on afterwards?’ asked Bob Tomlinson.

‘Yes,’ replied the producer with distaste.

‘Good,’ said Bob Tomlinson.

‘Okay, sure it won’t happen, but thought you’d like to know. Oh, one other thing about the studio. We’re not in Studio A this week, we’re in B.’

‘The small one?’ asked George Birkitt, affronted.

‘Smaller,’ conceded the producer.

‘Why?’

‘Well, Wragg and Bowen are in the big studio.’

‘Why?’

‘It is a big prestige show.’

‘And what about us? Aren’t we a big prestige show?’

‘Of course, of course. But not quite as big a prestige show as Wragg and Bowen .’

‘Just because of the bloody money they’re being paid. .’ George Birkitt muttered darkly.

‘You finished?’ asked Bob Tomlinson, with his customary lack of grace.

‘More or less,’ said Peter Lipscombe.

‘Right, let’s get this rubbish read. You ready on the watch, girl?’

Jay Lewis was ready for the read-through, but George Birkitt wasn’t. ‘I’m sorry, before we start, there are a few things in this script we’ve got to change.’

‘Why?’ asked Bob Tomlinson belligerently.

‘Because they’re just wrong. I mean I’ve spent seven episodes of this series — not to mention all the What’ll the Neighbours before it — building up Colonel Strutter into a recognisable, rounded comic character, and now I’m handed a script in which not only does he have considerably less lines than in previous episodes, but the ones he does have are unfunny and out of character.’

‘Oh, but we’ve worked so hard to maintain the character,’ wailed Sam Tennison, dressed today in a Mister Men T-shirt and strawberry coloured jeans. ‘Haven’t we, darling?’

‘Yes, indeed, darling,’ concurred Willy Tennison, also dressed today in a Mister Men T-shirt and strawberry coloured jeans.

‘Then obviously you just haven’t worked hard enough,’ said George Birkitt. ‘I mean, I know Colonel Strutter, and these lines aren’t Colonel Strutter. I can’t learn lines that are out of character.’

‘You can’t learn lines that are in character,’ was the thought that went through every mind in the room. But nobody said it.