Barker favoured the women with what Banks suspected was a well-practised Clark Gable smile.
‘Delighted,’ he said theatrically, taking Sandra’s hand. ‘I never imagined a policeman’s wife could be so charming and so beautiful.’ Banks was irritated; David simply looked on, a vacant grin on his face.
It was not only Barker’s charm and social finesse that annoyed Banks. It was all very well socializing in the community, but to be seen with his wife openly fraternizing with a suspect jarred against his deepest instincts as a detective. It made him feel conspicuous, for one thing, and that was a feeling he disliked. Gristhorpe’s advice – get in there and let them talk to you – was all very well, but a line had to be drawn. He was off duty, and the whole thing was just too pally for his taste. He was sucking on his dead pipe, glowering and contributing monosyllables only when necessary.
‘How do you manage to fit in here?’ Sandra asked after Barker had told her his occupation. ‘Aren’t writers usually regarded with a good deal of suspicion?’
Barker nodded. ‘True. They didn’t like me being here at first,’ he replied. ‘Not one bit. You’re right – people don’t trust writers in small communities, and they’ve good reason not to. Some communities have had bad experiences with chaps who live among them, fit in, then go and write devastating critiques, hardly even bothering to disguise names and identities. It’s like the way some Indians see photographers – people who steal their souls. Quite right too, in my opinion. The kind of writers they have in mind are unscrupulous. They give us all a bad name.’
‘But don’t you think writers have to be a little ruthless?’ Harriet asked. ‘Especially if they’re to tell the truth.’
‘Perhaps. But the ones I’m talking about accept your hospitality, then strip you naked on the page. Some writers even worm their way into people’s confidence and set up situations, manipulate events just to see how their “characters” will react. I knew one chap, for example, who used to throw regular parties. This was in London. Real lavish dos they were, no expense spared – champers, single malt Scotch, beluga caviar, quail – more than anyone could hope to devour in an evening. When everyone got sozzled and started arguing, crying or pawing other people’s partners, there he was, sober as a judge, sitting in a corner making mental notes. It took people a long time to figure out what was going on – after all, they were having a good time – but sure enough, they’d appear, thinly disguised, in stories published in magazines, and their friends and colleagues would recognize them. A couple of marriages broke up, reputations were destroyed. All in the name of “art”. After a while, attendance dropped dramatically.’
‘What happened to him?’ Harriet asked, sitting on the edge of her chair.
Barker shrugged. ‘Moved on, I suppose. I’ve no idea where he is now. Pastures new. He still publishes regularly.’
‘And is that what you do, Mr Barker?’ Sandra asked. ‘Move in on people and steal their souls.’
Barker laughed. ‘Please, call me Jack,’ he said, and Banks felt his upper lip begin to curl. ‘No, that’s not what I do at all. At first everyone was suspicious of me, but then they always are like that with incomers, as they call us. After a while, out of curiosity I suppose, someone read a couple of my books, then someone else, and their comments got around. As soon as everyone realized I wrote hard-boiled private-eye stories set in southern California in the thirties, they decided I wasn’t a threat. Believe it or not, I even have a few fans here.’
‘I know,’ Harriet said. ‘I’ve carried enough of your books around in the mobile library.’
Barker honoured her with a smile. ‘As soon as they get to know you’re harmless,’ he went on, ‘you’re as close to being accepted as you’ll ever be. It was the same with Harry.’
‘What about Harry?’ Banks asked, trying to sound casual but failing miserably. Sandra frowned at him for being a killjoy.
‘All I meant,’ Barker explained, ‘was that Harry was a writer too, in his way, but nobody ever worried about him because he wrote about the Romans and old lead mines. I mean, only people like Penny and Michael Ramsden were interested. That stuff’s as dry as dust to most people.’ He looked back at the ladies and smiled again, clearly hoping to get off on another track.
‘Do you know Ramsden well?’ Banks asked, unmoved by Barker’s discomfort and Sandra’s piercing glances. Harriet and Sandra began to chat between themselves, and David looked on, lost.
‘I’ve met him,’ Barker replied curtly.
‘What do you think of him?’
‘Pleasant enough fellow,’ he said, looking to the women for support in his levity. ‘But you can hardly expect a writer to say nice things about an editor, can you? I spend two days working on a fine descriptive paragraph, and my editor wants it cut out because it slows the action.’
‘Ramsden’s not your publisher, though, is he?’ Banks persisted.
‘Good Lord, no. He only deals with academic stuff.’
‘Did you know about Ramsden and Penny Cartwright?’
‘That was years ago. What on earth are you getting at?’
‘Just trying to sort out the tangle of relationships,’ Banks answered, smiling. ‘That’s all.’
‘Look, they’re starting again,’ Barker said, rising. ‘Please excuse me.’ He gave a brief bow to Harriet and Sandra, then made his way back to the front. It was almost eight thirty. As the lights dimmed, Banks saw him talking to Penny and glancing back over his shoulder. The last thing he noticed before it got too dim was Barker whispering in Penny’s ear and Penny looking behind her and laughing.
As the master of ceremonies began his rambling and incoherent introduction, Sandra leaned over to Banks. ‘You were a bit sharp with him, weren’t you?’ she said. ‘Was it really necessary? You did promise we were having a social evening.’
Banks muttered a sullen apology and busied himself with his pipe. It wasn’t a new situation, the job interfering with his personal life, but it never ceased to cause friction. Perhaps Sandra had expected the move to change all that. A new life. What rubbish, Banks thought. Different landscapes, same old people with the same old failings. He gestured to the waiter to bring another round. Bugger it, let someone else drive home. It was a social occasion, after all, he reminded himself ironically.
Penny Cartwright took the stage to much applause and several loud whistles from the back of the room. Banks was still furious with Barker for being so damn charming and witty, and with Sandra for encouraging him and with himself for spoiling it. He attacked the fresh pint of bitter with angry gusto and glared at his pipe as if it were at the root of all his troubles. It had gone out yet again and he was sick to death of tamping, emptying, cleaning, scraping and relighting it.
Penny began with an unaccompanied ballad called ‘Still Growing’. It was a sad tale about an arranged marriage between a woman and a boy on the edge of manhood. The husband died young and the widow lamented, ‘O once I had a sweetheart, but now I have none. / Death has put an end to his growing.’ The story was simply and economically told, and Banks found himself entering into the music as he did with opera, his recent irritation wrapped up and put away in a dim corner of his mind. Her voice had both passion and control – it was that of a survivor singing about the lost and the less fortunate with honest sympathy. She was an alto, pitched lower than Banks had expected, husky on the low notes but pure and clear in the higher range.
Banks clapped loudly when she finished, and Sandra turned to him with raised eyebrows and a smile of appreciation. Other songs in the same traditional folk vein followed, and sometimes Penny accompanied herself on guitar while another young woman playing the flute or the fiddle joined her. Mixed in with the stories of demon lovers and forbidden affairs were light-hearted jigs and reels and sensational broadside ballads, like ‘The Murder of Maria Marten’.
Despite his enjoyment of the music, Banks found his mind wandering back to Barker’s reaction to the mention of Michael Ramsden. There had seemed to be a dislike beyond the general lack of love between writers and publishers. Ramsden had been a close friend of Steadman’s and had known Penny Cartwright since childhood. Did they still see each other, despite what they said? Was Barker simply jealous? And if he was jealous of Ramsden, wasn’t he also likely to have felt the same way about Steadman?
Banks looked at Penny and noticed Barker’s finely chiselled handsome profile in silhouette. He was in love with her, of course. Ramsden had been right to suggest that possibility. And who could blame him? Her beauty was radiant; her talent was moving. But she and Ramsden had parted. Of course, it had happened years ago, before she had fully blossomed, and it could only have been puppy love. Still, such events endure in small communities. Perhaps to some of the more shrewish local gossips Penny would always be known as a wayward lass who lost that nice Michael Ramsden who had gone on and done so well for himself. And what did Ramsden
