I, Partridge (23 page)

People have suggested I bottled out of taking the BBC’s breach of contract to the highest court in the land. Others say that have heard whispers that there were ‘discrepancies’ with Chris’s page of the contract.

Neither is true. I’d just had enough. I could easily have seen out the contract, made a cool million and given them half a decade of my life. But I had bigger fish to fry. That day, I left the BBC, the BBC didn’t leave me.

So the BBC had reneged on my new TV deal in a way that shredded any remnants of honour or integrity they may have had. I had racked up substantial debt, and cash flow meant that I defaulted on the rental agreement of my London apartment and was asked to leave. I was homeless.

I’d only just left the Travel Tavern, and even though I could definitely have gone back to a warm welcome, £49 for room and breakfast was now out of my budget. I had nowhere to turn – and forlornly tramped the streets in my Rover 800.

Night was beginning to fall and, with a seriously heavy heart, I was about to drive to the modest bungalow my assistant shared with her racist mother … until I remembered something! A solemn promise, a vow that had been made to me more than three decades before. The words had been intoned by my (
metaphorical
) guardian angel Trevor Lambert. He’d looked into my seven-year-old eyes and made me a rock-solid pledge: ‘You can come and stay any time you like.’
¹⁶⁹

‘Hello?’

It was Sheila who answered the door, now a bit mumsy, like Fran had been. There was a raised inflection at the end of her greeting but these days you don’t know if that’s because it’s a question or because the speaker mistakenly thinks they’re cool.

Quite reasonably assuming it was the latter, I replied ‘Hello’ and kissed her on the cheek. She recoiled a little bit and then tried to shut the door on me. She made a kind of yelping noise, which is when Kenneth appeared. He looked older because he was 35 years older than he used to be.

‘Alan?’ he said. Again, I wasn’t sure about the question/cool thing. But this time I said, ‘Yes it’s me.’

He smiled a bit and put his hand on her shoulder to reassure her. (It could be that she had a poor memory for faces and didn’t have access to a television set, I thought.) She didn’t demur so he said, by way of explanation: ‘Alan Partridge!’

‘Ahaaaaaaaa!!’ I boomed and Sheila bolted down the hall.

I strode in and dropped my hold-all neatly to one side, before walking into the lounge and warmly greeting them all. They looked astonished – but then, it occurred to me, you would be. They’d not seen me since I was about 17! I’d not been in the house since I was seven!

Trevor’s asthma was now something to behold, and he had some of the most severe breathing difficulties I’ve ever shared a room with. He was rigged up to breathing apparatus with an oxygen mask strapped over his mouth and nose. The guy was still audible though and, when reminded who I was, politely asked, ‘What can we do for you?’

I reminded him of his invitation to come back and stay ‘any time’. At first I was embarrassed that he had no memory of it, but then I reasoned that he was old which explained why it might have slipped his mind. If not for that: awkwaaaaaard!!!!

My timing couldn’t have been more perfect. A few months earlier and I’d have returned to a pretty empty nest with just Fran looking after her wheezing husband. But as luck would have it, Sheila and Kenneth had moved back into the family home quite recently because Fran had had a stroke and now needed round the clock care. For her part, she seemed a little diffident and didn’t say much, but then she was still a long, long, long way off a full recovery.

After a quick cup of tea, I bade them good night and bounded up to my room, lying on the bed with my hands behind my head. (Lying on my back I mean, not my front. I was in a state of relaxation rather than internment.)

Yep, it felt good to be in the home when I’d been at my happiest – and to be back among the family, although Emma no longer lived there (she was dead). Her space was filled, if you like, by Sheila’s husband Tim, a pretty nice bloke who had seen my shows and said he quite liked them.

Staying there was just the tonic. My three months at the Lamberts’ were just enough to get me back on my feet. I referred to them frequently on
Norfolk Nights
, and my listeners took their trials and tribulations – Kenneth’s continued unemployment, Fran’s slurred speech – to their hearts.

We each had to make compromises, of course we did. I had to store my property in the garage even though it was cold in there. For their part, the Lamberts knew if I was going to manage a solid morning of show preparation, I needed the kitchen to myself between 9 and 12 – I had to insist on that.

For a while, things went smoothly, but soon Trevor’s breathing became a bit
too
loud. It was really off-putting. So I eventually decided to take my notes and Dictaphone to the public library and do my work there.

In fact, I became such a fixture there, I heard one member of staff quietly refer to me as Karl Marx. I don’t think so! I’d take his ideas about the redistribution of wealth and shove them where the sun don’t shine! The workers own the means of production – I ask you!

I was determined – absolutely adamant – that I wouldn’t outstay my welcome at the Lamberts. And so, after 14 weeks, I saddled up and hit the road.

‘Thanks for having me,’ I said.

‘Don’t mention it,’ Fran Lambert seemed to say with the good side of her face. ‘You can come and stay any time you like.’

167
He’s moved to America now so he won’t mind me talking about it, but his wife did used to beat him quite a lot. She’s still in the UK but I’m not naming her. Anyway, I think she’s reverted to her Polish maiden name. She’s a teacher in Nantwich.

According to Jim, she used to beat him with a plastic hosepipe then whirl it round her head so it made a futuristic noise. It may well be that she used to work for the BBC Radiophonic Workshop. (The BBCRW used to manufacture sounds in the pre-synthesiser days. It’s an open secret that the Tardis noise was made by a BBC engineer scraping his keys down the fat wires inside a piano. And I’m told the sliding doors on
Blake 7
were made by a clothes brush being swept across the back of a leather jacket.)

168
I’d prepared this in advance.

169
Press play on Track 32.

Chapter 23
Swallow

ON THE TITLE PAGE
of my pilot script for Norwich-based detective series
Swallow
, I wrote the words: ‘Dedicated to the memory of Stacy Morgan, 7.’

Stacy wasn’t dead – she never even existed actually – but I thought it would set a poignant tone for the episode and/or gain enough pity to sway the mind of a commissioner. But I’ve scrubbed Stacy’s name off now and replaced it with that of Pete Gabitas, who did exist and is now dead. He’s sorely missed.

I’m often asked if I have a manager or agent and, instead of answering with words, I used to take out a ten pound note, tear a quarter of it off and then scrunch that bit up and throw it in a bin.
¹⁷⁰
Never had one. Waste of money! And, as my career has proved beyond doubt, I’ve never needed one.

But if anyone came close to filling the role of agent/manager, it would have been Pete Gabitas. The MD of BlueBarn Media, Pete was a big-hearted, big-bellied guy, who liked nothing more than providing cut-price production facilities to the region’s most creative minds – and then rounding the day off with a pint or two! We were kindred spirits, each/both sharing a love of Norwich, quality music and hovercrafts.
¹⁷¹

Does he say the unsayable? You better believe it! He’s like Norfolk’s very own Jeremy Clarkson, but one who actually believes the stuff he comes out with. He’s
whip
smart.

He had his share of enemies, sure, but that comes with the territory when you’re hoovering up the lion’s share of corporate production and post-production contracts in the North Norfolk region. People were forever trying to topple him off his perch, something I found especially callous when he revealed he was suffering from a serious illness, the little-known ‘tall poppy syndrome’.

All healthy competition you might think. Until I tell you that Pete died in a car ‘accident’ on 1 April 2005. Look to your right and you’ll see I’ve put inverted commas around the word accident. There are many of us who suspect foul play. I’m no conspiracy theorist – although I often regale dinner parties blow-by-blow with the arguments advanced by
Capricorn One
and
JFK
¹⁷²
– but I am convinced that Pete was murdered.

It was around 11.30pm when his wife’s silver Peugeot 306 cabriolet with red interior careered off the road and into a primary school. Yes, he was way over the drink-drive limit – and ordinarily I’d agree that the alcohol could have been a factor. But knowing Pete as I do/did, I can assure you he’s a better driver when drunk. So much so that he’s often given me a lift home when he’s been drunk and I’ve been sober.

That night, he’d had six pints of lager and half a bottle of wine – pretty much the sweet spot for his driving capability. To the untrained eye, he looked very, very drunk. To the trained eye, my eye, I know that he was fine to drive.

So, having ruled out alcohol as a contributing factor in the crash, you have to ask who wanted Pete dead and how did they do it? I’m in the process of making a YouTube video about the case under the banner of ‘Alan Partridge scrutinises …’ (hopefully the first of many).

Funnily enough, it’s the kind of case that would be perfect for a regional detective like Swallow.
¹⁷³
Pete was a massive fan of Swallow, perhaps seeing a little of himself in the rule-breaking cynic.

I’ll give you the quick pitch now: Swallow is a cool 50. He’s works in Norfolk CID. Whereas most regional detectives drive a classic or unusual car, Swallow has saved up to buy a brand new five-door Audi A3 turbo diesel in metallic graphite grey with black fabric interior. He’s not interested in satnav, leather seats, or CD stacker systems. That, to Swallow, is just so much bullshit.

His vice? Well, booze has been done, so I thought it would be quite nice if he was bulimic. (I got the idea from seeing John Prescott cleaning himself up in the toilets of the Savoy.)

Fastidious but austere, Swallow always carries a checklist of items: a comb, two biros, Fisherman’s Friends (the mint, rather than people), and a faint smell of vomit. Plus an evidence bag which he never uses for evidence, but keeps folded in the right-hand pocket of his donkey jacket in case he has a big meal. Yes, Swallow’s always very well turned out, with pressed slacks, black leather tie, buffed-up shoes and a rich brown leather jacket.

His is a restless mind – even in his downtime he has to occupy himself. But rather than immerse himself in chess (been done), Swallow solves Dingbats and other word-related puzzles, including word searches. He likes nothing more than sitting down with a copy of
The Puzzler
in a wicker chair that looks out over the fens and
immersing
himself in puzzles.

He also has a weakness for doing 10,000-piece jigsaws. In case you hadn’t noticed, this is a metaphor for solving a case. And in the last episode, we’d see him put in the final piece and suddenly seeing that it depicts the face of the local conman. Quite how or why this would work isn’t yet scoped out. He’s also a keen cook, gardener and birder. He has no middle fingers on one hand, so he can’t swear but is permanently doing the heavy metal sign.

I see Swallow as something of an enigma. He has the largest collection of samurai swords in Europe, but no one knows where he got them from. And when not cooking or tending to his gardens or completing jigsaws or finding words or watching rare wetland birds, he plays kendo – the Japanese martial art with body armour and big sticks of bamboo (
shinai
). His sparring partner and friend is Chan, a Chinese widower who owns a laundry next to Wallis Shoes on Exchange Street in Norwich.
¹⁷⁴
He’s a useful foil to Swallow because, as a laundryman, he doesn’t
think
like a police officer.

Throughout the pilot episode, we see Swallow constantly harassing a circus even though left-wing university-educated police chiefs reprimand him for it. But at the end of the pilot episode, his right-wing views are vindicated when he blows the lid on a drug smuggling racket. He works out that drugs are being smuggled in the collective recta of circus elephants when he spots bags of drugs among the grassy balls of dung on the circus floor.

He lives alone. His marriage broke down because his wife was too selfish to recognise his cleverness.

Is he politically correct? Who, Swallow?? No chance. He’s old school, and is aware that a disproportionately high amount of crime is committed by the unemployed and asylum seekers so why not stop them and shake them down? The squares at Police HQ can swivel.

In the pilot episode, Swallow suddenly notices there are no black people in Norfolk. Have they been spirited away or were they never there? He has to crack the case.

Also in the pilot episode, he wages a war against the travelling community who almost never have the correct documentation for their vehicles. He frequently impounds them to get them off the road.

The pilot episode follows Swallow as he’s assigned a naïve young sidekick, DC Wide-Eye, a stickler for the rules. Together, this odd couple have to come together to find out who’s been fly-tipping in a residential area.

It goes without saying that the show will look terrific. The series will be peppered with skyscapes of Norfolk while the opening sequence will be shots of huge deciduous oaks intercut with two masked men playing kendo intercut with a drive-by shooting intercut with two hands playing a jigsaw. The reveal at the end is that the
kenshi
are Swallow and Chan and the jigsaw player is also Swallow.