Play to the End (7 page)

"What did Colbonite do?"

"Made things, Mr. Flood. Anything and everything in plastic.

Kitchenware. Garden furniture. Radio and television casings.

And boxes. Lots and lots of boxes. Mr. Colborn's great grandfather founded the business in eighteen eighty-three. And his father wound it up one hundred and six years later. I haven't had a steady job since.

Thirteen years there. And thirteen years away."

"Well, I... '

"Not much to look at, is it?"

"No, but '

"Why should it be? That's what you're thinking. Companies come and companies go. Livelihoods with them. So what? Who cares?"

"Apparently you do, Derek."

He looked round at me in the darkness. I couldn't tell what sort of an expression he had on his face, couldn't tell if there was any expression at all. The traffic rumbled under the bridge behind us. A dog barked somewhere. The wind rattled a corrugated roof on the other side of what had once been the premises of Colbonite Ltd.

"How about coming to the point?" I said, trying to squeeze the impatience out of my voice.

"Yes. Sorry. Of course. Mind if we walk on?"

"Where are we going now?"

"Back towards Viaduct Road. My route home every working day for thirteen years."

The lane curved sharply to the left ahead of us and climbed between a high wall to one side and the Colbonite site to the other. There wasn't a soul to be seen. What exactly did I think I was doing prowling around such an area with a borderline head case for company, when I was supposed to be on stage at the Theatre Royal? So far, I'd gained nothing but unsought and unwanted information about Derek Oswin's one and only spell of regular employment. He'd worked for the Colborns. He no longer did. As he himself had said: so what?

"Since my parents died," he went on, "I've had a lot of time to myself.

Too much, I expect. Living on your own, you get ... set in your ways."

That was undeniable. But there are ways .. . and then there are Derek Oswin's ways. "You said you were going to come to the point."

"I am, Mr. Flood, I am. Colbonite is the point. I've studied its history, you see. I've become an expert on it."

"Have you really?"

"I probably know more about it than Mr. Colborn does himself. Do you want me to tell you about Mr. Colborn? Young Mr. Colborn, I mean. I imagine you do. Is he worthy of Mrs. Flood? The question must have crossed your mind."

"What would you say?"

"I'd say not. He has ... a treacherous character."

"But it was his father who closed down the business."

"Under pressure from his son. Roger Colborn wanted to close us down from the moment he first became involved. Colbonite held a valuable patent on a dyeing technique. He reckoned it was more profitable to sell that than keep us going. He was probably right."

"You call that treacherous?"

"I do, yes. The workforce didn't get a slice of what the Colborns sold the patent for. All they got... was redundancy."

"Even so '

"And there was more to it than that. A lot more. So, I decided to put my excess of spare time to some use. I compiled a detailed history of Colbonite. I wrote the whole story. From start... to finish."

The lane had turned another bend by now and brought us out onto a busy road leading down into the city. A brightly lit tanker was visible in the far distance, cruising across a wedge of darkness that was the sea.

We started down the hill towards it.

"This is Ditchling Road," said Derek. "It's a straight line of sight from here down to St. Peter's Church and out to the Palace Pier. It always was a lovely view to walk home with."

"I'm sure it was, but '

"I want the history to be published, Mr. Flood. That's the thing. I can't bear to think I've gone to all that trouble for nothing. I asked Mr. Colborn for help. He'd know the right people to approach. Or he could finance publication himself. He can well afford to. But he refused even to consider the idea. Of course, not everything in it is

... to his credit .. . but it is the truth. Isn't that what matters?"

"It should be, Derek."

"Not the whole truth, of course. I can't claim that. There are things I know things Mr. Colborn knows that aren't in it. He'd realize that if he read it."

"But he hasn't read it?"

"I don't think so. I've sent him a copy. More than one, actually. I thought the first might have gone astray. He doesn't respond to my messages. That's why I've been trying other ways to get his attention."

I'd found Roger Colborn out in a lie. He knows Derek Oswin. I suspect he knows him only too well. It's not much of a lie, of course. Why trouble your fiancee with such a tale? A half-cracked ex-employee with a no doubt unreadable company history he wants you to usher into the literary world is someone any of us could be forgiven for airbrushing out of our acquaintance. As for closing down Colbonite and flogging off a patent, some would construe that as good business practice.

Hard-headed, yes, but not especially hardhearted.

"It's become clear to me that I'm wasting my efforts where Mr. Colborn is concerned," said Derek.

"You may well be."

"I have higher hopes of you, Mr. Flood."

"Really?"

"Your agent, Moira Jennings, represents writers as well as actors."

"How do you know who my agent is?"

"It wasn't difficult to find out. It's not difficult to find out lots of things, if you have the time."

"You want me to get your history of Colbonite published?"

"It's called The Plastic Men. What do you think of the title?"

"Not bad. But '

"Anyway, I don't expect you to work miracles, Mr. Flood. I just want the book ... seriously considered. If it's not deemed marketable, I shall accept that."

"You will?" Derek's sudden ascent into realism had taken me aback.

"I'll have to."

"Weller yes, you '

"Would you be willing to ask Miss Jennings to take a look at it?"

"I might." I pulled up. Derek carried on for a few steps, then turned to look at me. "On one condition."

"I promise to stop bothering Mrs. Flood."

"You promised before."

"Yes. I'm sorry. I won't break my word again."

"How can I be sure?"

"Because I broke my promise and obliged you to miss tonight's performance for a very specific reason. It was to help you."

"Help meT

"Certainly."

"How in God's name do you reckon you've done that?"

"Can't you guess?"

"No, Derek. I can't."

"I'd better explain, then."

"Yes. You had."

"It's a little .. . delicate."

"I'm sure I can cope."

"What I mean is ... why don't we go back to my house and discuss it? I could ... make some cocoa."

Some offers are too good to refuse. Cocoa with Derek Oswin isn't one of them. But soon enough there we were, in his neat, tidy sitting room, two mugs of steaming un sugared cocoa and a plate of digestive biscuits between us. He'd obviously stocked up since my earlier visit.

I eyed him expectantly across the coffee-table.

"This had better be good, Derek."

"Don't worry, Mr. Flood. It's Cadbury's cocoa. Not some supermarket brand."

The man makes jokes. Not good jokes. And not often. But any humour's better than none, I suppose. Mine was veering towards the rueful, given that they'd be into the interval at the Theatre Royal by now.

"I didn't time our appointment to test your seriousness," he continued through a taut smile. "I didn't doubt that you meant to do all you could to help your wife."

"Why, then?"

"Well, what happened when I put in an appearance at the Rendezvous this afternoon?"

"She called me."

"And what will happen now we've met again?"

"That remains to be seen."

"You'll surely let her know the outcome, though?"

"Yes," I cautiously agreed.

"To achieve which you'll have let down your fellow actors and aroused the ire of Mr. Leo S. Gauntlett."

"I'm glad you appreciate that."

"I do. And so will Mrs. Flood, won't she?" His smile relaxed. "Don't you see? I've increased her obligation to you. I've put her further in your debt. I've made it easier for you to ... win her back."

"I don't believe it," I said. But I did believe it. Derek Oswin, Brighton's least likely matchmaker, had decided to punish Roger Colborn for scorning his manuscript punish him in every way that he could devise.

"I mean your wife no harm, Mr. Flood. None at all. But... if you want to let her think I might ... in the interests of spending more time with her ..." He pursed his lips and gazed benignly at me.

"That's fine by me."

I sighed and took a sip of cocoa. It was easy to get angry with this man, but hard to stay that way. "Broken marriages aren't so easy to put back together, Derek. They really aren't."

"You don't know till you try."

"OK. But look I pointed a finger at him. "From now on, you let me try or not as I see fit. Understood?"

"Absolutely."

"You do not interfere."

"Mrs. Flood won't see me again unless we pass by chance in the street.

I won't go to the Rendezvous. I won't even walk past Brimmers."

"I'll hold you to that."

"Of course."

"I can get my agent to consider your book. I can also get her to un consider it."

"I do understand, Mr. Flood."

"All right. You'd better hand it over."

He jumped up, suddenly eager. "I ran off a copy for you this afternoon. Hold on while I fetch it."

He went out and up the stairs. I took another sip of cocoa, then turned round in my chair to inspect the contents of the bookcase, which was just behind me. I recognized my host's Tintin books by their phalanx of narrow red spines. He looked to have the full set. I pulled one out at random The Calculus Affair and opened it at the title page, where, next to a picture of the aforesaid professor pottering down a country lane, a fountain-penned inscription read, To our darling Derek, from Mummy and Daddy, Christmas 1967.

"Are you a Tintin fan?" The question came from the doorway. I turned to find Derek, photocopied manuscript in hand, staring quizzically at me.

"No. Just .. ." I closed The Calculus Affair and slid it back amongst the others. "Looking."

"That's all right." But it didn't sound all right. There was a tightness in his voice. He was still staring, past me now, at the row of books. He plonked the manuscript down on the table, circled round behind my chair and carefully removed The Calculus Affair from the shelf. Then, his tongue protruding through his teeth in concentration, he fingered aside two other books and pushed it into the space between them. "You put it back out of sequence, Mr. Flood," he explained.

"The

Calculus Affair is number eighteen."

"Right. I see."

"Order matters, don't you think?"

"Yes. I suppose so. Up to a point."

"But where does the point properly lie? That's the question."

"And what's the answer?"

"We must each find it for ourselves." He stood upright and retraced his steps. "And then we must preserve it. Or, if endangered, defend it."

"So, this is The Plastic Men' I said, leaning forward to inspect the manuscript, happy indeed to change the subject, given how hard I'd have found it to say what the previous subject really was.

"Yes. That's it."

The manuscript didn't look as bulky as I'd feared it might. No thousand-page epic, then, for which I was grateful, if only on Moira's behalf. But handwritten, to judge by the top sheet, which bore the words, THE PLASTIC MEN, a History of Colbonite Ltd and its Workforce, by Derek Oswin. There were traces of line markings in a rectangle in the centre of the page. As I leafed through the sheets, I saw each one was the same. Derek had written his book on feint-line A5, so that photocopying it onto A4 had isolated the words within wide, white margins. Not exactly conventional presentation.

"Will you read it yourself, Mr. Flood, or just send it straight off to your agent?"

"I imagine you'd like a swift response."

"Well, I would, yes."

"Best send it straight off, then." Neatly handled, I reckoned. Let Moira get somebody to flog through it. She's paid to do that sort of thing. "This way, you'll probably hear something before Christmas."

"Oh, good. That would be nice."

"I can only ask her to give you an honest opinion, Derek. You know what that means, don't you?"

"She may turn it down. Oh yes. That's clear enough. And fair enough.

It's all I'm asking for."

"If she says no, I don't want to hear that you've reappeared at the Rendezvous."

"You won't."

"I'd better not, Derek. Believe me."

"I do, Mr. Flood. I do." He looked so contrite that my heart went out to him, sentimental fool that I am.

"I know you thought you were acting for the best this afternoon and I'm grateful for your concern. It was still a stupid thing to do, though.

Nothing of the kind must happen again."

"It won't." He smiled, presumably in an attempt to reassure me. "I guarantee."

"Good."

"Although ..."

"What?"

"I just wondered ..."

"Yes?"

"Well, when do you next intend ... to speak to your wife?"

"That's none of your business."

"No. Of course not. But if I can help .. ." His wobbly smile reshaped itself. "Mr. Colborn's away at the moment, you know."

"I do know. But how do you know?" Stupid question, really. How does he come by any of his copious store of information?