The Word Is Murder

Three Chapter One

Hawthorne did not like my first chapter.

I’m jumping ahead here because I didn’t actually show it to him until a while later and even then it was only with reluctance. I remembered all too well what had happened with Injustice and would have preferred to keep it under wraps – but he insisted and since this was meant to be an equal partnership, how could I refuse? But I think it’s important to explain how the book was written; the rules of engagement, so to speak. These are my words but they were his actions and the truth is that, to begin with, the two didn’t quite fit.

The two of us were sitting in one of the many Starbucks that seemed to punctuate our investigation. I had emailed him the pages and I knew I was in trouble when he took them out of his case and I saw that he had printed them, covering them with red crosses and circles. I am very protective of my writing. It’s fair to say that I think about every single word I write. (Do I need ‘single’? Would ‘true’ be better than ‘fair’?) When I had agreed to work with Hawthorne, I had assumed that although he was in charge of the case, he would take a back seat when it came to the actual narrative. He quickly disabused me.

‘It’s all wrong, Tony,’ Hawthorne began. ‘You’re leading people up the garden path.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘The very first sentence. It’s wrong.’

I read what I had written.

‘I don’t see what’s wrong with that,’ I said. ‘It was about eleven o’clock. She went into a funeral parlour.’

‘But not the way you say.’

‘She took the bus!’

‘She caught it at the top of her street. We know that because we’ve got her on CCTV. The driver also remembered her and gave the police a statement. But here’s the problem, mate. Why do you say she crossed the road?’

‘Why shouldn’t I?’

‘Because she didn’t. We’re talking about the number 14 bus, which she picked up at Chelsea Village. That’s the stop marked “U” exactly opposite Britannia Road. It took her to Chelsea Football Club, Hortensia Road, Edith Grove, Chelsea & Westminster Hospital, Beaufort Street and finally Old Church Street, stop HJ, where she got off.’

‘You have a terrific knowledge of London bus routes,’ I said. ‘But I don’t quite get the point.’

‘She didn’t have to cross the road. When she left the bus, she was already on the right side.’

‘Does it really make any difference?’

‘Well, yes, it might. If you say she crossed the road, it means she must have gone somewhere else before she went into the undertaker’s – and that might be important. She could have gone to the bank and taken out a load of money. She could have had a row with someone that very morning and that could have been the reason she was killed. That same person could have followed her across the road and seen where she was going. She could have stopped in front of someone who was driving a car and that could have led to an altercation. Don’t look at me like that! Road rage murders are more common than you think. But the facts of the matter are that she got up in her house, alone. She had breakfast, then she got on a bus. It was the first thing she did.’

‘So what would you want me to write?’

He had already scribbled something on a sheet of paper. He handed it to me. I read:

‘I’m not writing that,’ I said. ‘It reads like a police report.’

‘At least it’s accurate. And what’s the bell doing there?’

‘What bell?’

‘In the fourth paragraph. Right here. You say there’s a bell on a spring mechanism leading into the funeral parlour. Well, I didn’t notice any bell. And that’s because it’s not there.’

I tried to stay calm. That was something I would soon learn about Hawthorne. When he put his mind to it, he could annoy me more easily than anyone I’d ever met.

‘I put the bell in for atmosphere,’ I explained. ‘You’ve got to allow me some sort of dramatic licence. I wanted to show how traditional and old-fashioned the business was – Cornwallis and Sons – and that was a simple, effective way.’

‘Maybe. But it makes a big difference. Suppose someone followed her in there. Suppose someone overheard what she said.’

‘You’re talking about the man she had the altercation with?’ I asked, sarcastically. ‘Or maybe someone she met at the bank? Is that what you think?’

Hawthorne shrugged. ‘You’re the one saying that there was a link between Mrs Cowper arranging her funeral and her getting murdered the same day. At least, that’s what you’re suggesting to your readers.’ He lingered on the first syllable of ‘readers’, making it sound like a dirty word. ‘But you have to consider the alternatives. Maybe the timing of the funeral and the murder was just a coincidence – although I’ll be honest with you. I don’t like coincidences. I’ve been working in crime for twenty years and I’ve always found everything has its place. Or maybe Mrs Cowper knew she was going to die. She’d been threatened and she arranged the funeral because she knew there was no way out. That’s possible, but it doesn’t make a lot of sense because why didn’t she just go to the police? And a third possibility: somebody found out what she was doing. It could have been anyone. They could have followed her in off the street and listened to her making all the arrangements because there’s no sodding bell on the door. Anyone could come in or go out without being heard. But not in your version.’

‘OK,’ I said. ‘I’ll take out the bell.’

‘And the Mont Blanc pen.’

‘Why?’ I stopped him before he could answer. ‘All right. It doesn’t matter. I’ll lose that too.’

He pushed and prodded the pages as if trying to find a single sentence that he liked. ‘You’re being a bit selective with the information,’ he said, at length.

‘And what do you mean by that?’

‘Well, you say that Mrs Cowper only used public transport but you don’t explain why.’

‘I say she was eccentric!’

‘I think you’ll find there was rather more to it than that, mate. And then there’s the question of the funeral itself. You know exactly what she requested for her service but you haven’t written down what it was.’

‘A psalm! The Beatles!’

‘But which psalm? Which Beatles track? Don’t you think it might be important?’ He took out a notebook and opened it. ‘Psalm 34. I will bless the Lord at all times: his praise shall continually be in my mouth. The song was “Eleanor Rigby”. The poem was by someone called Sylvia Plath. Maybe you can help me with that one, Tony, because I read it and it didn’t make a word of bleeding sense. The classical music was the Trumpet Voluntary by Jeremiah Clarke. She wanted her son to give the main address … what do you call it?’

‘The eulogy.’

‘Whatever. And maybe you should have mentioned who she had lunch with at the Café Murano. His name is Raymond Clunes. He’s a theatrical producer.’

‘Is he a suspect?’

‘Well, she’d just lost fifty grand in a musical he’d produced. From my experience, money and murder have a way of going hand in hand.’

‘Did I miss anything else?’

‘You don’t think it’s significant that Mrs Cowper resigned from the board of the Globe Theatre that very same day? She’s been doing it for six years and the day she dies, she decides to give it all up. Then there’s Andrea Kluvánek – the cleaner. Where did you get that stuff about her tiptoeing out into the street and calling the emergency services?’

‘It came from her interview with the police.’

‘I read it too. But what makes you think she wasn’t lying?’

‘Why would she be?’

‘I don’t know, mate. But she’s got a criminal record so maybe she’s not all sweetness and light.’

‘How do you know that?’

‘I checked. And finally, there’s Damian Cowper, the son. It might have been worth pointing out that he’s just inherited two and a half million quid from his old mum, which is going to come in handy as I’m told he has money problems out there in LA.’

I fell silent. There was a sinking feeling in my stomach. ‘What money problems?’ I asked.

‘From what I understand, most of them have gone up his nose. But there’s the house in Hollywood Hills, the pool, the Porsche 911. He’s got an English girlfriend who lives with him but she can’t be too fond of him either because there’s a load of other women knocking around … knocking being the operative word.’

‘Is there anything in the chapter that was any good?’ I asked.

Hawthorne thought for a moment. ‘I liked that gag about World’s End,’ he said.

I looked at the pages scattered in front of me. ‘Maybe this is a bad idea,’ I said.

Hawthorne smiled at me for the first time. When he smiled, that was when I saw the child he had once been. It was as if there was something inside him always struggling to be released but it had got trapped inside the suit, the tie, the pale features, the malevolent gaze. ‘Early days, mate. It’s only a first chapter. You can tear it up and start again. The thing is, we’ve got to find a way of working together, a …’ He searched for the right phrase.

‘A modus operandi,’ I suggested.

He pointed a finger. ‘You don’t want to use posh words like that. You’ll just get people’s backs up. No. You’ve just got to write what happens. We’ll talk to the suspects. I’ll make sure you have all the information. All you have to do is put it in the right order.’

‘And what happens if you don’t solve it?’ I said. ‘Maybe the police will find out who killed Diana Cowper before you do.’

He looked offended. ‘The Met are a load of tossers,’ he said. ‘If they had a clue, they wouldn’t have hired me. That’s what I explained to you. A lot of murders are solved in the first forty-eight hours. Why? Because most murderers don’t know what they’re doing. They get angry. They lash out. It’s spontaneous. And by the time they start thinking about blood splatter, car number plates, CCTV – it’s too late. Some of them will try to cover their tracks but with modern forensics they haven’t got a hope in hell.

‘But then there are the tiny amount of murders – maybe only two per cent – that are premeditated. They’re planned. They might be a contract killing. Or some nutter who’s doing it for fun. The police always know. They know when they’ve got a sticker … that’s what they call this type of murder. And that’s when they reach out to someone like me. They know they need help. So what I’m saying is, you have to trust me. If you want to add extra details, ask me first. Otherwise, just write down what you see. This isn’t Tintin. OK?’

‘Wait a minute!’ Once again, Hawthorne had managed to throw me off balance. ‘I never told you I was writing Tintin.’

‘You told me you were working for Spielberg. And that’s what he’s directing.’

‘He’s producing.’

‘Anyway, what was it that made you change your mind about writing this? Was it your wife? I bet she told you what was good for you.’

‘Stop right there,’ I said. ‘If we’re going to have rules, the main rule is that you never ask me about my private life: not my books, not my TV, not my family, not my friends.’

‘I’m interested you put them in that order …’

‘I’ll write about you. I’ll write about this case. And when you solve it – if you solve it – I’ll see if I can get my publisher interested. But I’m not going to be bullied by you. This is still my book and I’m going to be the one who decides what goes into it.’

His eyes widened. ‘Calm down, Tony. I’m just trying to help.’

This is the agreement that we made. I wouldn’t show Hawthorne any more of the book; certainly not while I was writing it and probably not even after it was finished. I would write what I wanted to write and if that meant criticising him or adding thoughts of my own I would simply go ahead. But when it came to the scene of the crime, the interrogations or whatever, I would stick to the facts. I wouldn’t imagine, extrapolate or embroider the text with potentially misleading descriptions.

As for Chapter One, forget the bell and the Mont Blanc pen. Diana Cowper had lunch with Raymond Clunes. And Andrea Kluvánek may not have been telling the truth. But be assured that the rest of it, including a clue which would indicate, quite clearly, the identity of the killer, is spot on.