Peter Lovesey - The Circle

Maurice said, 'Anyone care to comment?'

'I couldn't take much more of it,' the outspoken woman said. She had deep-set, dark eyes that looked as if they could see right through you.

'I'm not sure if that counts as constructive criticism, Naomi.'

'No, I mean I'm not used to such excitement. I was there with him, climbing the castle walls. It's a tour de force.'

'Really? There's a tribute, Zach.'

The Welshman said, 'You could, perhaps, get him over the rocks and up the wall a little quicker. We all know he's going to sock it to the opposition.'

'Tudor, that's not the point,' Thomasine said. 'Zach is writing long. It's fantasy. They're big books. A fantasy writer can't get away with under six hundred pages.'

'There's more if you want,' Zach said, brandishing unread pages like banknotes.

'Unfortunately,' Maurice said, 'we'll have to deny ourselves until next time.'

'I'll be into another chapter by then.'

'Excellent. We can't wait. Thomasine, let's change the mood with something from you, shall we?'

'I can't compete with what we've just heard.'

'We're not in competition. Never were.'

'All right. I've written another erotic poem.'

There was a noticeable raising of the attention level.

'Good on you, Tommy, girl,' Tudor the Welshman said.

She took a small, black notebook from her bag. 'It's called "A Night with Rudolf".' She cleared her throat and began to read.

'Covent Garden, Nureyev alone upon the stage,

The music of Le Corsair rising to a great crescendo,

And I know, I know, I know, this is the one, the solo,

The thing he does so well, the reason I am here,

Two months' wages, a small fortune, my holiday in France,

For a seat in the stalls, front row. Close-up view

Of those stallion haunches in all their muscularity stretching the tights,

Gold tights, gold, gleaming, steaming, straining tights.

I watch him circle the stage with leaps as enormous

As the music, giving me sensations I should not have in a public place.

I cannot shift my eyes from his bulging masculinity. Wondering, wishing,

Dreaming, thrilled by the music and the man, in my memory I will hold

This experience for ever.'

'Oh, my word!' Miss Snow said. 'I'm all of a quiver.'

Anton was frowning. 'Was that erotic?'

Tudor said, 'If it was, it went over my head.'

'You men,' Miss Snow said. 'You have no subtlety. If it isn't in four-letter words, you don't respond at all.'

'I loved it,' Maurice said. 'Straight into our next anthology, if I have anything to do with it. Personally I never understood the appeal of Nureyev, but you've just opened my eyes, Tommy. Very telling, that stallion reference. What was it? "Haunches in all their masculinity"?'

'Muscularity.'

'Right. What a striking image. I would almost say rampant.'

'Whoa, boy,' Tudor said.

'I mean it. She promised us an erotic poem, and she delivered.'

'Don't. I'm getting embarrassed,' Thomasine said.

'This might be the right moment to have our break, then. Did anyone put the kettle on?'

It was good to stretch the haunches, muscular or flabby. Bob hadn't appreciated how tense he had got climbing up the castle wall and leaping around the Covent Garden stage. No one else seemed to know what to say to Thomasine after her reading, so he went over. 'That was high-tone. If the rest of this mob are up to your standard, I'm leaving right now.'

'Don't be daft. We're all beginners. You hear what someone else has done and it sounds kind of special because it's different from your own stuff. I bet you've got something really brilliant tucked away in a drawer at home.'

He was about to turn this into a joke about drawers, but decided against it. He was the newcomer. 'Can we light up in here?'

'The corridor. Wouldn't say no to one myself after opening up like that. Worse than a striptease.'

After they'd both taken their first drag he said, 'Will they all read to us?'

'About half of them. Sometimes the excuses are more inventive than the stuff anyone has written. Maurice is very good at helping the timid ones pluck up the necessary. You're not timid, are you?'

'Just ask me to read and see the state of me.'

'You'll get over it.' She gave him a sudden nudge. 'Hello. Looks as if you're not the only new boy.'

Two hunks in leathers and jeans edged past and into the meeting room. They were given the welcome treatment by Maurice.

'Young and beefy,' Thomasine said. 'Nice for our Sharon. Nice for all us girls.'

To Bob's eye, they didn't look like creative writers. He watched from the doorway. Maurice had gone through his welcoming spiel and it hadn't impressed. The newcomers were doing the talking. Maurice made a sweeping movement with his hand as if to show they'd got something wrong.

'They're cops,' Bob said.

'How do you know?'

'Something about the way they're talking to him. And they work in pairs.'

'What would they want with Maurice?'

'You'll have to ask him, but I don't think you'll get the chance.' One of them had grasped Maurice's arm just above the elbow.

Maurice turned and spoke to the little woman called Dagmar.

'Our vice-chair,' Thomasine said. 'He's asking her to take over. He's leaving us.'

She was right. They steered Maurice through the door. It seemed to be voluntary, even though his face was ashen.

Thomasine went straight over to Dagmar. 'What was that about, Dag? What's going on?'

'I've no idea. Maurice asked me to take over after the break.'

Tudor said, 'I heard it all. They're CID. They want to question him about the death of Edgar Blacker.'

The members of the circle had clustered around Dagmar.

She said, 'Maurice is no killer. He's got nothing to do with it.'

'How do you know?'

Miss Snow said, 'Oh, come on, Tudor! Edgar Blacker was publishing his book.'

This could have got nasty, but Thomasine steered them in a more positive direction. 'What are we going to do?'

'He asked me to take the chair for the rest of this evening,' Dagmar said.

'We can't go on as if nothing's happened, reading out our work. It won't be the same at all.'

'I second that,' Anton, the cliche-spotter, said. 'It would be unseemly.'

Basil said, 'Why don't we adjourn to the bar and talk things over in a more relaxed atmosphere?'

'Good thinking.'

Jessie, the writer of the letter in The Lady, announced that she didn't wish to be seen in a bar and was leaving, but the rest, including Bob, reconvened around two tables. An awkward situation was averted when Basil suggested it was too large a round for anyone to fund, so they bought their own.

'We've got to speak up for Maurice,' Miss Snow said when they were all around the tables again. 'We can't have our chair arrested and do nothing about it.'

'He was not arrested,' Anton said.

'Of course he was arrested if they took him away by force.'

'He went of his own volition.'

'They had him by the arm.'

'They didn't caution him. If they arrest a person, they have to issue an official caution.'

Dagmar said, 'Anton is right. Maurice agreed to go with them.'

Tudor said in an ominous tone, 'We don't know what's behind this. They must have some good reason for taking him in.'

'These days there's enormous pressure to make a quick arrest,' Thomasine said.

Anton said with a click of the tongue, 'He was not arrested.'

'It's a technicality, Anton. They can still charge him.'

Zach said to Thomasine, 'You think they're fitting him up?'