Martin Edwards: I Remember You

She put her glass and the flowers down on the floor and stood facing him with her hands on her hips, challenging him to call her a liar. He didn’t much like Sophie Wilkins, but the misery in her expression touched him. He had to feel sorry for a woman so desperate for Frankenstein as to want to be his bride.

Rosemary Graham-Brown had found a microphone to welcome guests; she was promising them a night to remember. The phrase reminded Harry of the Titanic , which had sailed proudly from Liverpool to death and disaster.

‘We’re honoured that Radio Liverpool will be broadcasting live from here later tonight as we celebrate Hallowe’en in a very special way with that enormously popular disc jockey — Mr Baz Gilbert!’

As applause broke out, Sophie shook her head. ‘A guy with Baz’s talent reduced to this kind of crap! God, how demeaning.’

‘People say he’s been unlucky, and I’m beginning to believe it. But why did he never make it into the big time?’

‘Who knows? He looks the part and he certainly has more talent than half the kids on Radio One these days. I suppose he’s simply been in the wrong place at the wrong time. Perhaps it runs in the family.’

‘How do you mean?’

‘Haven’t you heard about his brother John? It’s a tragic story. They were identical twins: very close, by all accounts. John was in the Army.’

Harry cast his mind back to a conversation at the Russian Convoy and his appearance on Pop In .

‘I remember — he has a photograph in the studio.’

‘Right. John was on a tour of duty in Belfast when terrorists killed him. They lured the poor kid to one of their strongholds and tortured him before blowing his head off.’

Ireland again , thought Harry. Whichever way I turn, I find myself looking across the Irish Sea .

There were two questions he must ask. The first was one he’d kept forgetting to put to the Radio Liverpool crowd. To begin with, he’d had no more than idle curiosity about the answer; now he thought it crucial to the secret of Finbar’s death.

‘Can you cast your mind back to the morning Finbar appeared on Pop In ?’

Sophie looked baffled. ‘Will I ever forget it? I’d never met him until then. God, if only I hadn’t been there that day!’

‘He caused a fuss, didn’t he, over his choice of music?’

‘That’s right,’ she said. ‘He kept changing his mind about his favourite song. It sticks out in my mind, because he was behaving so oddly.’

‘What did he do?’

‘He’d opted at first for a track by the Dubliners — lively Irish stuff. After he got in the studio he suddenly decided he wanted something different. By Val Doonican, of all people! Not my idea of Finbar’s taste at all.’

‘And the song?’

‘An old one, called “Elusive Butterfly”. I sent Tracey out in a panic to check our library and we didn’t have it. So he laughed as if he was enjoying a huge joke and said he’d settle for an old Number One by Frank Ifield.’

‘I might have known,’ said Harry. ‘“I Remember You”.’

‘I don’t understand,’ said Sophie, when she had answered his second question.

Harry had anticipated her reply. No doubt was left in his mind that at last he knew the truth.

‘You don’t need to.’

‘Surely you can’t imagine that…’

‘Never mind my imagination.’ He spoke more harshly than he had intended. Sophie had confirmed his suspicions, but that afforded him no pleasure. All he wanted was to bring matters to an end.

‘I must be getting back to Baz,’ she said. ‘Oh — here’s Nick!’

Nick Folley approached them, blowing a kiss at Sophie, giving Harry a dismissive nod. His elaborate make-up failed to disguise the self-satisfaction of his features; he gave no hint of the loneliness and misery of Mary Shelley’s monster.

Harry tensed. Folley’s arrival gave him a chance to put another of his ideas to the test. He recalled that Frankenstein inspired loathing in anyone who saw it: in that, at least, he saw a point of resemblance between Folley and the creature created from the bones of charnel houses.

‘Doing any business tonight?’ asked Harry, not bothering to hide his contempt.

‘You never make much sense to me, Mr Devlin. What kind of business would I be doing?’

‘I suppose this kind of event is ideal for trade. Plenty of rich people looking for kicks.’

‘What in God’s name are you talking about?’

‘Cocaine,’ said Harry softly. ‘Easy money for a man with the right contacts. No wonder people reckon you have the Midas touch. Even if your media ventures run into trouble, there’s always a market for drugs in your crowd. Does Graham-Brown help you launder the cash?’

Folley gave him a hard unblinking stare: a form of cover whilst he thought fast. Harry pressed on.

‘When I appeared on Pop In , I heard the news about the haul made by Customs and Excise. Was that why you had to slip down to London last night: to pick up alternative supplies so you could be sure of keeping your customers satisfied?’

‘You’re off your head,’ said Folley.

‘Nick. …’ began Sophie.

‘Shut it!’

She made as if to voice a protest, then changed her mind and slunk away, dejected. Had she been aware exactly how her lover had made his fortune? Somehow, Harry doubted it.

‘What I hate about it all,’ he said, ‘is the way you treat people. Take Melissa. You make her dependent, then you cast her aside — you even sack her, so — ’

Folley leaned forward, his hands on the lapels of Harry’s jacket. ‘What has Melissa said?’

Harry remembered the man’s uncontrollable temper. On another occasion he would have welcomed the chance to hit him, to strike a blow on behalf of lives ruined by addiction. But not tonight. He had so much yet to do.

He squirmed out of Folley’s grasp. ‘She hasn’t betrayed you yet, though God knows why. I hope she’ll change her mind.’

With that, he headed off through a group of fiends and phantoms, towards the makeshift studio rigged up on the stage. A glance over his shoulder confirmed that Folley was not in pursuit. Ahead of him, the bearded engineer from Pop In was testing for sound levels, whilst Rosemary Graham-Brown chatted to a man with the head of a wolf.

‘Baz!’ he called. ‘I’d like a word.’

The disc jockey pulled off his savage mask, his mouth stretched in a smile that his eyes did not share.

‘Doesn’t he make a good lycanthrope?’ asked Rosemary, with a witch’s glee. ‘We ought to beware, of course — the werewolf is cursed by a horror that turns him into a murderous beast against his will.’

Baz raised his eyebrows in weary amusement. ‘Harry! We must stop meeting like this.’

‘I know you’re busy, but can you spare me a minute? I’d like to talk in private.’

After a second’s hesitation, Baz shrugged. ‘Okay. But I don’t have long.’

Harry led him to the fire exit at the far end of the room and lifted the bar. It gave onto a space floored with concrete at the foot of an emergency staircase: a cold and gloomy place, with one barred window barely letting through the dull glow from a riverside lamp outside. The echoing of their footsteps contrasted oddly with the muffled noise coming from the other side of the door; the antics of the party-goers seemed suddenly absurd.

Baz leaned against the wall, nonchalant. ‘So what’s all this about?’

‘Your twin. John.’

Baz gnawed at his lower lip. ‘What possible interest can you have in my brother?’

‘He was killed by Irish terrorists, isn’t that right? And specifically, I would guess, by a man called Pearse Cato.’