Espedair Street

any length of time. The album didn't do very well, anyway. Not by Frozen Gold standards. Personal Effects was my second choice for a title; I'd wanted to call it Looks Like Shit To Me, but ARC — Rick, in other words, because he was boss by that time — had vetoed that.

'What?' Rick looked amazed. 'Don't you read the music press at all? Listen to the radio? It's been in the forty for the past six months; a bit of publicity and you'd be in the twenty at least. Make a come-back and I'd guarantee top ten. God damn it, Dan, don't you check your royalty statements?'

'No.'

Rick shook his head. 'You're an exasperating man, Daniel. Don't you get any thrill from... from playing music? Don't you miss the applause, the lights? The people?'

'I keep my hand in,' I said defensively.

'What?' Tumber snorted derisively. 'Jingles for adverts and TV series? Big deal.'

'And film scores.'

'Ha; you've done one. So the music was the best part of it; so what?'

'There were two, and there's another couple in production,' I said. I didn't like having to defend myself like this, but I couldn't let Rick twist the truth that way without setting him straight.

'So there were two. And as for the two in production; I've talked to those people; to Salmetti, and Grosse; they like the music all right but they don't like the way you work; they're both thinking about paying you off and getting somebody else. You expect them to write the films around the music, not the other way round. That's crazy. They expect you to take scenes and write stuff specially for those bits, not just send completed tapes and scores and expect them to cut what they've got to suit. The most they'll do is use your stuff as themes up front, but even that's unlikely. And don't bother telling me you didn't know any of this, Danny boy, because I know you didn't; that's another thing they're not very happy about; even film people expect letters to get answered eventually. Besides all of which, the big money in film music these days isn't the sort of stuff you're writing at all; they want rock bands singing three-minute singles. You're out of date.' Tumber sat back, drank his brandy.

This was Rick talking tough. I nodded thoughtfully.

'Well, I don't care. I don't need the money.'

'I know you don't need the money; I do look at your royalty cheques. But what about you, Danny? Don't you need to know who the hell you are? Don't you need something else besides sitting around in that fucking ... tomb up there feeling sorry for yourself and emptying crates of commie booze? Christ, man, you're an artist. You're a fucking piss artist at the moment, but you're still a clever man; you could be doing things, you could be making a difference, you could be taking part. That's what you should be doing; taking part, showing some of these spotty fucking brats how it's done, for Christ's sake.' Rick sat back, then leant forward again, jabbing the cigar towards me. 'You're just the guy to do it, too. People have only half-forgotten about you; you're a legend now, the whole band is, even more so now that ... what? What is it? I say something funny? What?'

'Legend,' I said, shaking my head. 'Bullshit.'

Rick reached over and touched my arm. 'It's been four years, Danny boy. You forget what industry you're a part of. You make a small fortune in a couple of months in this business; you make enough to last you all your life in a year, and you're yesterday's newspaper in eighteen months. Show me Adam Ant now.' He sat back, shaking his head, apparently thinking he'd proved his point. 'Four years is just right to become a legend; long enough so a lot's happened, not long enough for people to forget about you. All that stuff about you living on a Caribbean island, or in a monastery in the Himalayas, or being dead... that's just perfect. You'd be crazy not to make a come-back. You've got the material; you've told me so yourself. Jesus Christ, Danny; you're thirty years old...'

'Thirty-one; you forgot my birthday again.'

'Oh well, pardon me...' Tumber shook his head, looked pained. 'Aw, come on, Dan; you're still a young man; you going to vegetate up here for the rest of your life? Drink yourself to death? Fucking hell; forget about the money; give it all to Geldof for all I care...'

'What, your share too?'

Rick looked wounded, as though this was an unfair departure from decent negotiating behaviour. He sighed heavily, burped lightly. 'I'd sooner do a no-profit deal with you than none at all, Danny. I'm not saying I'd be happy, but I'd rather you just... worked, even if it doesn't do anything to improve our year-end figures. I don't like to see waste, Dan. I don't like to see people just throwing away what they've got. There are enough people in this country who'll never even get a chance to work, who can't make anything of themselves, who can't use whatever kinda gifts they've got. But you could if you wanted to; you've got the choice. You're just... I don't know; lazy, too sorry for yourself. We've all been hurt by what happened to Christine; it's a tragedy, we all know that; a tragedy... but...'

He talked on for a bit, and a couple of times, when he waited for answers, I nodded, or grunted, or shrugged, and did whatever was appropriate, but I didn't hear what he said.

My eyes filled, briefly, at one point, but I blew my nose in the stiff napkin, and sniffed, and I don't think he noticed. I stared at his face without seeing him, listened — apparently avidly without hearing him.

So it was her .

It was Christine. Oh, Christ Jesus, what had happened? I didn't want to think about it and I couldn't stop thinking about it.

What had they done to her? Was she dead? Was it that bad, was it the worst? I thought back to the way Rick had talked when he first arrived that afternoon, the things he had said, the tone he had used, the way he had sat... and I couldn't tell. It might be something less than that, but I didn't think it was. She might have been pregnant and lost a baby, or been hurt in an accident, or... my imagination failed.

Most of the things I could think of were either just not severe enough for Tumber to have acted the way he did towards me, or things he might have followed up on, like if she'd been badly injured he'd have said something about me going to visit her or sending something. No, I couldn't think what it might be... prison? I latched on to that, like a drowning man. She'd been done for drugs in the States in some place with crazy penalties and locked up for a couple of years... but he would still have said something about going to see her, writing to her... Oh, Jesus, Jesus, Jesus...

'... Dan? You all right?' Rick Tumber looked more concerned than I could ever remember him looking. I sniffed, nodded.

'I, ah... I'm sorry. I was thinking about Christine.'

'Oh,' he said. 'Yeah.' He looked away, and slowly brushed some crumbs off the tablecloth.

God forgive me; this was terrible, but even now, even now I was trying to cover up, trying to not let on how little I knew; even now I was pretending I knew something, even if not all; 'What ... exactly happened?'

Rick's brow flickered, as though he disapproved of my ignorance. I shrugged. 'I only... heard,' I told him. 'No details. Can you tell me?'

Tumber cleared his throat, took a slightly shaky breath. We both watched his right hand stub out the stump of the fat cigar.

'It seems...' he said, after a pause, and a sigh, '... the guy was... some moral majority freak... I dunno; one of these fundamentalists or... some fucking nutcase; I didn't hear what church... sect or whatever...' Tumber shook his head again, still addressing the hand delicately tapping out the cigar. 'He just turned up at the hotel, in Cleveland, with a Saturday Night Special. He'd travelled up from Alabama, apparently, specially. Ah... like, they'd had tighter security in the South when they were playing there, just because they had all the demonstrations and such, and death threats, but I guess they didn't think Cleveland was so much of a threat. Anyway; he was waiting in the lobby, and when she came out the lift, he... he shot her. Got her bodyguard, too; blew the guy's brains out. Wounded Chris in the side and head; she got as far as the sidewalk outside, screaming for help, but the guy just followed her and put another two shots into her, on the ground, before a hotel guard shot him.

'She died on the way to hospital. The guy's trial probably won't be till the summer. They can't decide whether he's mad or not; usual story. Said God had told him to do it, because of... the act; you know; the guitar, at the beginning...'

Rick's voice altered suddenly, and he said, in a sorry, pained voice, 'Jesus, man, I didn't want to be the one to tell you all that. I really didn't. I'm sorry. I can't tell you how sorry. I don't know what more to say, Dan.'

'Yeah... excuse me.'