Star Struck

Chapter 10 MERCURY IN VIRGO IN THE 5TH HOUSE

She can turn her hand to anything. She has a discriminating intellect but tends to be overcritical of herself and others in times of stress. She analyzes problems with tenacity and is capable of painstaking research. She is logical, skeptical and can be obsessive.

From Written in the Stars, by Dorothea Dawson

Divorce may have deprived Richard of most of the last five years of his son Davy’s life, but because a lot of his work is done at night, he did most of the daytime childcare for the first three. Thankfully the old skills hadn’t deserted him. That meant I didn’t have to take any responsibility for the most remarkable child on the planet (if you believed Alexis and Chris). I watched with a mixture of relief and astonishment as he spooned greyish-pink mush into the eager mouth of his nine-month-old girlfriend. He managed it almost without looking, and without ever breaking off in mid-sentence. He’d already changed a nappy without flinching, which was a long way away from my idea of getting the day off to a good start.

I remember when northern men would have died rather than admit they knew how Pampers worked. Now, they pin you to the wall in café bars and tell you it’s possible for men to produce tiny amounts of breast milk. Certainly, Jay’s arrival had already achieved the seemingly impossible task of ending the superficial hostilities between Alexis and Richard. Before Jay, Alexis maintained she was a real journo and Richard a sycophant; Richard that he was a real journo and Alexis a police lackey. Work never entered their conversations any more.

As he did about once a week, Richard had taken Jay for the night to give Chris a chance at a straight eight hours. Oddly, when Jay

“So what are your plans for today?” Richard asked as we sat in the conservatory watching wet snow cascading from the sky.

“I’ve got Donovan minding Gloria, so I probably don’t need to go over there. I’ve told him she’s to stay indoors, but looking at the weather, I don’t think there’ll be much temptation to leave the fireside. I’m going to do some background research in the Chronicle library so I can start asking sensible questions about Dorothea Dawson.”

“Great,” he said enthusiastically. “You can take Jay in with you. I was supposed to drop her at the Chronicle crèche so Alexis can pick her up, but if you’re going in anyway, I can stay home and get on with some writing.”

Time for the application of the Kate Brannigan irregular verb theory of life. In this case, “I am diplomatic, you are economical with the truth, s/he is a lying little gobshite.” “No problem,” I said. Why should I mind drumming my fingers on the table while Richard finished feeding her, changing her, swaddling her for the outside world, swapping the baby seat from his car to mine then strapping her in? It wasn’t as if I had anything important like a murder to solve, after all.

I eventually tracked Alexis down in the office canteen. “Your daughter is in the crèche,” I told her. “So’s her car seat.”

“That’s great,” she said. “I’ll bob along in a minute and say hello. We really appreciate it, you know. It’s the only time we get a decent night’s sleep. She been OK?”

“As far as I know. She screamed her socks off when I got home last night, but that’s just because she can’t stand any competition for Richard’s attention. So I left them to it. She probably had a better night’s sleep than I did.”

Alexis shook her head, smiling. “I know you love her really.”

She knew more than I did. I smiled vacantly and said, “Dorothea Dawson.”

“She didn’t see that coming, did she?”

I love journalistic black humor. It always comforts me to know there are people more cynical than me around. “What’s this morning’s story?”

“What’s your interest?” she asked, instantly on the alert. Her cigarettes came out and she lit one for real.

“I found the body.”

Alexis ran her free hand through her hair so it stood up in a punk crest. “Shit,” she said. “The bizzies never said anything about that at the press conference. They said the body had been discovered by a member of staff, the lying gets.”

“You’re surprised?”

“No. Cliff Jackson would superglue his gob shut before he let the name ‘Brannigan’ pass his lips. Unless the sentence also contained the words, ‘has been charged with.’ So give, KB. A first-person color piece, that’s just what I need for the city final.” Her notebook had appeared on the table.

“What are they saying?”

“That she was killed in her camper van in the car park of the NPTV compound by a blow to the head around six last night. And that’s about all. What can you give me?”

I sighed. “It isn’t exactly something I want to dwell on. I needed to talk to Dorothea about the warning she’d given Gloria the last time she’d done a reading for her. I’d arranged to see her after her final client of the day. When I got there, I knocked but there was no reply. I knew she was expecting me, so I opened the door and walked in. She was lying face down on the table with her head caved in. It was obvious she was dead. Her crystal ball was lying on the carpet at the end of a track of blood. It looked to me as if that’s what the killer used. It’s much bigger than the usual crystal ball. It must be nine, ten inches across.”

Alexis nodded as she took notes. “She was famous for it. Claimed it came from some mystical mountain mine. Me, I reckon it came from Pilkington Glass at St Helens.” She gave me an apologetic grin. “Sorry about this but … How did you feel?”

“Sick. Can we talk about something else?”

“What, like Cliff Jackson’s marital problems?”

“He’s got marital problems?”

Alexis nodded, a grim little smile on her face. “In spades. His wife’s run off with another bloke.”

“What took her so long?”

“She probably couldn’t find the key to the handcuffs. The best bit, though, is who she’s run off with.” Alexis paused for effect. I rotated my wrist in the classic “get on with it” gesture. “His oldest lad’s in his second year at Liverpool University. His wife’s only run off with the lad’s best mate.”

“You’re kidding!”

“Would I lie to you?”

“How long have you been sitting on this?” I demanded.

“I only found out this morning. I was trying to get a comment from Jackson and he was going totally ballistic. I know one of his DCs from way back, so I cornered her and asked why Jackson was being even more of a pain than usual and she told me. So don’t expect any favors.”

“I’ll bear that in mind.” I grinned. “Couldn’t happen to a nicer bloke, though. By the way, did you get anywhere in tracking down who was the source of your story about me minding Gloria?”

Alexis savored her last mouthful of smoke and regretfully crushed the stub in the ashtray. “One of those things. Every Friday, the news credits book goes up to accounts so the payments can be processed. It doesn’t come back till Monday morning. I was too late getting to it yesterday. Sorry.”

“I’ll just have to possess my soul in patience,” I complained.

“So who was Dorothea’s last appointment with? Which member of the Northerners cast was the last person to see her alive?”

“You’ll have to ask Jackson that one.” I didn’t have much hope that I’d be able to keep Gloria’s name out of the papers, but the longer I could, the better for her. “Any chance I can pillage the library? I could use some background on Dorothea.”

“You digging into this, then?”

I shrugged. “If he’s not made an arrest overnight, the chances are Jackson’s stuck. Which means he’ll be wasting time making my

I could see from her eyes that Alexis didn’t believe a word of it, but she knew better than to try to push me in a direction I didn’t want to travel. “You’ll tell me when you’re ready,” she said. “Come on, I’ll sort you out.”

Ten minutes later, I was beginning to wish I hadn’t asked. A stack of manila files six inches deep contained the Chronicle’s archive on Dorothea Dawson, newly returned from the news reporters who had been writing the background feature for that day’s paper. Another two ten-inch stacks contained the last year’s cuttings about Northerners.

I tore a hole in the lid on the carton of coffee I’d brought up from the canteen, took the cap off my pen and began to explore Dorothea Dawson’s past.

I’d got as far as her early TV appearances when Alexis burst in, a fresh cigarette clamped between her teeth. The librarian shouted, “Crush that ash, shit-for-brains!” Alexis ignored him and grabbed my arm, hustling me out into the corridor.

“Where’s the fire? What the hell’s going on, Alexis?”

“Your mate Dennis has just been arrested for murder.”

I understood each of the words. But together they made no sense. “They think Dennis killed Dorothea Dawson?” I asked uncomprehendingly.

“Who said anything about Dorothea?”

“Alexis, just explain in words of one syllable. Please?”

“Some villain called Pit Bull Kelly was found dead early doors in one of the underground units in the Arndale. The place was empty, but apparently it had been squatted. According to my contact, they had a tip-off that it’d been Dennis who’d been using the place, and when they checked his fingerprints with records, they found them all over the place. So they’ve arrested him.”

I still couldn’t get my head round it. Dennis was a hard man, no stranger to violence. But for a long time, he’d not lifted a hand in anger to anyone. The crimes he’d committed had all been

“Calm down, KB,” Alexis said pointlessly as I passed her.

“I don’t want to be calm,” I shouted over my shoulder. “Sometimes I get fed up with calm.” I half ran down the corridor and, too wound up to wait for the lift, started down the stairs. I could hear Alexis’s feet pounding down behind me. “He’s not a killer, Alexis,” I shouted up at her. “He loves his wife, he loves his daughter too much. He wouldn’t do this to them.”

Her footsteps stopped. I could hear her gasping for breath. “Phone me,” she managed to get out.

I didn’t bother to reply. I was too agitated. Alexis would forgive me, I knew that. Specifically, she’d forgive me when she got the inside story. At the bottom of the stairwell, I pushed open the door to the car park and got into my car. My breath was coming in deep gulps and my hands were shaking. I realized it was probably delayed shock from the night before kicking in as soon as my defenses were down. I was close to Dennis, but not that close, I told myself.

When my pulse was back within the normal range, I took my phone out and dialled the number of Ruth Hunter’s moby. If being hated by the police and the judiciary is a measure of success in criminal defense work, Ruth must be one of the best solicitors in the North West. Behind her back, they call her firm Hunter, Killer & Co. A big woman in every sense of the word, she sails into court in her bespoke tailoring like an outsize catwalk queen and rips the Crown Prosecution case to rags. If she didn’t have clients, I suspect she’d do it anyway, just for the hell of it. She drives Officer Dibble wild by turning up to cop shops in the middle of the night in her millionaire husband’s Bentley Mulsanne turbo. She can park that car in streets where my Rover would be stripped to the chassis in ten minutes and know it’ll be there unscathed when she comes

“Ruth Hunter,” the voice said briskly.

“It’s Kate. I heard about Dennis.”

“What took you so long?” she asked drily. “It’s at least three hours since they lifted him.”

“Are they charging him?”

“I can’t talk now as I’m sure you’ll appreciate.”

That meant she was in a police station, probably with a custody sergeant breathing down her neck. “When can we talk?”

“Your office, three o’clock.”

“I’ll be there. Should I go and see his wife?”

“I’d leave it for now. Maybe tomorrow. Things are a little … volatile at the moment. I’ll see you later.” The line went dead.

I could imagine. Most of the contents of the glass cupboard were probably in bits. Debbie’s never had a problem expressing her emotions and Dennis was on his final warning following the twelvemonth stretch he’d recently done. She’d told him then, one more serious nicking and she’d file for divorce. She’d probably started shredding his suits by now, unless she was saving that for when they charged him.

The clock said half past eleven. I couldn’t face sitting in the Chronicle library for another three hours, and I didn’t want to kick my heels at home. It’s ironic. I spend half my life complaining that I never have time to do my washing or ironing, then when I get a couple of hours to myself, I’m too wound up to do anything constructive. I needed to find something that would make me feel like I was being effective. Then I remembered Cassandra Cliff. Cassie had once been one of the household names among the stars of Northerners. Then some creepy hack had left no stone unturned to find the slug who revealed that years before she’d been cast as Maggie Grimshaw, the bitch goddess gossip queen of Northerners, Cassie had been Kevin.

In the teeth of the hurricane of publicity, NPTV pointed out that they had an equal opportunities policy that protected transsexuals and that Cassie’s job was safe with them. They were using “safe” with that particular meaning Margaret Thatcher inaugurated when

She didn’t run weeping into the wilderness. She sold the inside story of life on Northerners to the highest bidder, and there were no holds barred. Cassie never featured in any of the show’s regular anniversary celebrations, but I suspected that didn’t keep her awake at night. She’d chosen not to be bitter and instead of frittering away the money she made from her exposé, she set up a shop, magazine and social organization for transvestites and transsexuals.

Cassie had been a key source for Alexis for years, and we’d met following the death of a transvestite lawyer I’d been investigating. I’d met her a couple of times since then, most recently at Alexis and Chris’s housewarming party. I knew she still kept in touch with a couple of people from Northerners. She might well know things Gloria didn’t. More to the point, she might well tell me things Gloria wouldn’t.

Energized by the thought of action, I started the car and headed for Oldham. Cassie’s shop, Trances, was in one of those weary side streets just off the main town center where some businesses survive against all the odds and the rest sink without trace, simply failing to raise the metal shutters one morning with no advance warning. There was little traffic and fewer pedestrians that afternoon; the wet snow that was melting away in Manchester was making half-hearted attempts at lying in Oldham, and ripples of slush were spreading across the pavements under the lash of a bitter wind. Anyone with any sense was sitting in front of the fire watching a black-and-white Bette Davis movie.

The interior of Trances never seemed to change. There were racks of dresses in large sizes, big hair on wig stands, open shelves of shoes so big I could have got both feet in one without a struggle, racks of garish magazines that no one was ever going to read on the tram. The key giveaway that this was the land of the truly different was the display case of foam and silicone prostheses — breasts, hips, buttocks. The assistant serving behind the counter took one look at me and I could see her

“Have you an appointment?”

I shook my head. “I was passing.”

“Are you a journalist? Because if you are, you’re wasting your time. She’s got nothing to say to anybody about Northerners,” she said, her Adam’s apple bobbing uncontrollably.

“I’m not a journalist,” I said. “I know Cassie. Can you tell her Kate Brannigan’s here?”

She looked doubtful, but picked up the phone anyway. “Cassandra? There’s someone here called Kate Brannigan who wants to see you.” There was a pause, then she said, “Fine. I’ll send her up.” The smile she gave me as she replaced the receiver was apologetic. “I’m sorry. The phone hasn’t stopped ringing all day. It’s always the same when there’s some big Northerners story. If it’s not that, it’s Channel Four researchers doing documentaries about TSs and TVs.”

I nodded and made for the door at the back of the shop that I knew led to Cassie’s office and, beyond that, to her private domain. Cassie was waiting for me at the top of the stairs, immaculate as ever in a superbly tailored cream suit over a hyacinth-blue silk T-shirt. I’d never seen her in anything other than fabulous clothes. Her ash-blonde hair was cut in a spiky urchin style, her make-up subtle. From below, her jawline was so taut I had to suspect the surgeon’s knife. If I earned my living from looking as convincing as Cassie, even I’d have submitted to plastic surgery. “Kate,” she greeted me. “You’ve survived, then.”

I followed her down the hallway and into her office, a symphony in limed wood and gray leather. She’d replaced the dusty-pink fabric of the curtains and cushions with midnight-blue and upgraded the computer systems since I’d last been there. She’d obviously tapped a significantly profitable niche in the market. “Survived?” I echoed.

Cassie sat on one of the low sofas and crossed legs that could still give any of her former colleagues a run for their money. “I saw the story in the Chronicle. My idea of hell would be running interference for Gloria Kendal,” she said.

“Why do you say that?” I sat down opposite her.

“Unless she’s changed dramatically, she’s got a schedule that makes being Prime Minister look like a part-time job, she’s about as docile as a Doberman and she thinks if she’s hired you, she’s bought you.”

I grinned. “Sounds about right.”

“At least you’re not a bloke, so you’re relatively safe,” Cassie added archly.

I hoped Donovan was. “I expect you can guess why I’m here?”

“It’s got to be Dorothea. Except that I can’t think why you’d be investigating her murder when it’s Gloria you’ve been working for.”

I pulled a face. “It’s possible that the person who killed Dorothea is the same one who is threatening Gloria. I’m just nosing around to see what I can dig up.”

Cassie smiled, shaking her head slightly. “You’ll never make an actress until you stop pulling your earlobe when you’re stretching the truth.”

My mouth fell open. I’d never realized what my giveaway body language was, but now Cassie had pointed that out, I became instantly self-conscious. “I can’t believe you spotted that,” I complained.

She shrugged. “My business depends on being able to spot deception. I’ve got good at it. It’s all right, Kate, I don’t need to know the real reason you’re interested in who killed Dorothea. I’m happy to tell you whatever I know. I liked Dorothea. She was a worker, like me.”

“How did the connection with Northerners begin?”

Cassie frowned in concentration. “I’ve got a feeling it was Edna Mercer who first discovered her. You remember Edna? Ma Pickersgill?”

“She’s dead now, isn’t she?”

Cassie’s smile was sardonic. “Ma Pickersgill died of a heart attack when her house was burgled five years ago. Edna’s still alive, though you’ll never see her at an NPTV function.”

“She left under a cloud?”

“Alzheimer’s. Towards the end, it was touch and go whether she’d stay lucid long enough for them to get her made up and on

“You surprise me,” I said. “I’d have thought your feet were too firmly planted on the ground to care what’s written in the stars.”

Cassie smiled wryly. “Dorothea was very good. Whether you believed in it or not when you went in to see her, by the time you came out you were convinced she’d got something. After that first visit, we were all eating out of her hand. So it became a regular thing. The word spread through the cast, and soon she was coming more or less every week.”

“What kind of stuff did she tell you?”

“She’d cast your horoscope, and she’d kick off every session by explaining some little thing in your chart. That was one of the clever things about the way she operated — you had to keep going to see her if you wanted her insight into every element of your personal horoscope. Then she’d talk about the current relationships between the planets and how they might affect you.

“She did phenomenal research, you know. She knew everything there was to know about everybody she had dealings with. Dorothea made a habit of gathering every snippet, no matter how insignificant it seemed. You know how these things go — Edna would say something in passing about Rita’s son, then three months later Dorothea would say something to Rita about her son, knowing full well that Rita knows she’s never mentioned the boy to Dorothea. It all contributed to the myth of omniscience.”

“Making a virtue out of being a know-all. That is clever,” I acknowledged. “So was that it?”

Cassie shook her head. “She’d finish off by asking if there was anything bothering you that you wanted guidance with. You’d tell her and she’d gaze into her crystal ball and give you advice. She didn’t go in for the riddle of the Sphinx stuff — she’d say things like, ‘You’re never going to have emotional support from your husband

“More therapy than prediction, then?”

“A mixture of both. And actors are very gullible people.” Her smile reminded me that she’d once been an actor, and not just on the screen.

“So why would anyone have it in for her?” I asked.

“I haven’t a clue. I hadn’t heard that anybody had fallen out with her. She could be irritating when she was trying to impress you with how mystical and spiritual she was, but that’s no reason to kill somebody.”

Changing tack, I said, “What about Gloria? Has anybody from Northerners got it in for her?”

Cassie chuckled, a warm, throaty sound. “How long have you got? The only surprising thing about Gloria is that she’s still alive.”