The Girl at the Bus-Stop (18 page)

 
‘You can’t go on like that indefinitely,’ she said, ‘what about your own happiness?’

Rudge looked at her and smiled warmly.

‘Not being funny, but since teaming up with you, Becky,’ he said softly, ‘I’ve been the happiest man on the planet.’

‘Yeah, right,’ she scoffed.

‘No I’m being serious, Becky,’ he replied, ‘if I’d had to continue working for Dave Banstead, and going home to old misery guts every night, I don’t know how much longer I could have lasted.’

‘Well we all feel like that sometimes.’

‘I’m only in my forties, but I had nothing left to look forward too.’ he said sadly, ‘I have no family, apart from my wife.’

‘What about your parents?’ asked Becky, ‘Are they still around?’

‘I left home at sixteen. We never really saw eye to eye,’ he said, ‘they died a long time ago, but I hadn’t seen them for about ten years. ’

‘What about brothers and sisters?’

‘I had three elder brothers.’

‘Had?’

‘Yes, they’re all dead now,’ said Rudge looking down, ‘two committed suicide.’

‘You’re kidding,’ she replied looking shocked, ‘what about the third?’

‘He was killed in a car accident,’ replied Rudge, ‘whilst driving to Beachy Head.’

‘No wonder you escape into a fantasy world of sci-fi,’ said Becky, ‘life’s not exactly showered you with good luck.’

‘Not until all this happened with the book,’ he said, ‘I was already visualising a miserable retirement on a paltry pension. Nothing to look forward to apart from a cheap coach trip to North Wales for an out of season B&B holiday. Being entertained in a dreadful pier theatre matinee by long-forgotten has-beens, and not forgetting the joy of buying beige trousers with an elasticated waistband.’

‘Goodness, you were in a bad way.’

‘I used to have this recurring nightmare where I’m being talked about by a matron of a geriatric finishing school and my wife, as if I wasn’t even there.’ said Rudge, ‘They’d leave me sitting in a day room in an upright armchair which stinks of piss. It has wooden arms and a matching footstool, and daytime TV is blaring out of a badly tuned set in the corner of the room. I’m surrounded by dead people sitting in similar chairs, their faces covered in cobwebs and maggots crawling out of every orifice. I need to pee but I can’t move, and the unqualified healthcare assistant from Rumania tells me to piss in my pants. She’s far too busy sweeping up maggots to take me to the toilet.’

‘You’re weird’ said Becky.

‘You wait until you get a bit older,’ replied Rudge, ‘when just about every minute of the day is filled with thoughts of how your old age will pan out, and how your life will end.’

‘You are in a bad way,’ she said, ‘you ought to see a shrink.’

‘I don’t need to, I feel like I have a future now,’ he said with a warm smile, ‘if I want to go to North Wales for a holiday, which is pretty unlikely, I’ll travel there in style. I’ll also stay in its top hotel, if they have one because this money has bought my freedom. Twenty four hours a day belongs to me, and I don’t have to put up with any of the crap that went before.’

‘It’s not so bad for you playing my secretary, but sometimes being Raspberry Caine can have its drawbacks.’

‘I meant to ask you what happened with Gale Buckingham last night,’ said Rudge, ‘the human coffee table told me you’d gone off somewhere together.’

‘Yes, I had her re-enacting chapter fourteen at the party.’

As Rudge lit another cigarette, Becky filled him in on Gale’s Faye Delahaye role playing.

‘I wish I’d been there to see her get her come-uppance,’ he said ‘at least she won’t be pestering you anymore.’

 
‘I had a text from her this morning. Apparently those two women are incredibly wealthy, and early this morning they took Gale with them to their chateau in the South of France. They went by private helicopter, and guess what?’

‘What?’

‘Gale flew there completely naked,’ said Becky. ‘not a stitch on, not even her apron.’
 

‘Good grief,’ said Rudge, ‘now that’s what you call role playing.’

An hour later Rudge was sitting at the table in the living area, tapping out nothing very productive on his laptop. Becky wandered in freshly showered and changed, and pulled up a chair alongside him

‘How’s it coming along?’

‘It’s not,’ he said, frowning, ‘I start off trying to write BDSM, and soon drifted off into the world of sci-fi. I’ve created a Dominatrix android with a passion for whipping astronauts.’

‘Male or female?’

‘It had to be both,’ he replied, ‘its only set a hundred years into the future. So I thought having an all female crew on a star ship was pushing credibility just a bit too far.’

‘Cheeky sod,’ said Becky, ‘I’ll report you to Kat Katkins if you don’t watch it.’

Rudge reached over and lifted an envelope from the coffee table.

‘I almost forgot, I found this on the bench at the party, is it yours?’

‘No, it’s Gale’s,’ Becky replied taking the envelope, ‘she’d scribbled down some ideas for
Disciplinary Attraction –the movie
last night.’

‘A movie, eh,’ said Rudge with a grin, ‘now that would be fun.’

 
‘I think it was just a ruse to get me to re-enact chapter fourteen with her,’ said Becky, ‘I bet she didn’t think I’d call her bluff right there and then.’

‘It all seems to have worked out for the best,’ said Rudge, ‘she obviously enjoyed it.’

‘Hang on there’s something inside the envelope,’ said Becky.

She pulled a sheet of printed card and quickly read it.

 
‘If it’s the suggested cast for the film, I hope she’s not on the list,’ said Rudge.

‘It’s not a cast list,’ replied Becky smiling, ‘it’s a guest list from last night’s party. Look it’s got ‘Confidential’ printed at the top and the bottom.’

She showed Rudge the card and they read through some of the names.

‘See, I was right,’ said Rudge, ‘that tightrope walker was that Olympic swimmer, oh, and that bloke you thought was off
News at Ten
it was him, look.’

He pointed the name out before moving his finger eagerly down the list.

‘There look’ said Becky, ‘it’s got Nikki’s name on there, and Gale’s and me, well, Raspberry Caine’s. They’ve put you down as ‘Mr R Sludge’, see.’

‘Typical,’ he replied, ‘still, at least I’m anonymous which can’t be a bad thing.’

‘Do you remember that nice looking woman we stripped,’ she said, ‘I knew I’d seen her somewhere before, it’s Jilly Genevieve the celebrity cook.’

 
‘Good heavens,’ replied Rudge, ‘you’re right. Somehow I can’t quite imagine her scrubbing out someone’s garage. But if she cooks in the nude as well, then it’s no wonder she doesn’t approve of fried food.’

‘Her old man’s voice sounded familiar, is he famous as well?’

‘Sort of, he’s Norman Crabtree the bit-part actor. He always plays petty officials in sitcoms.’

Rudge picked up a pencil from the table and began scribbling down all the masked antics they could remember next to the relevant name on the list.

‘There are two women listed here together, Samantha Sussex and Juliet Cabot,’ said Becky, ‘I wonder if they were the two lezzers who took such a shine to Gale?’

‘Juliet Cabot was a glamour model,’ said Rudge, ‘she married Conrad Corvette the record producer. There was a big thing in the newspapers about their divorce a couple of years back. He was having an affair with a member of a boy band, and Juliet was photographed by the paparazzi with her sister-in-law on a nudist beach in the South of France.’

‘It must be them, but what about that poor skinny old man?’ asked Becky, ‘Have you worked out his identity yet?’

‘Hmm,’ replied Rudge, ‘I can’t make my mind up whether it’s Lord Kelling or the playwright, Dougal Throop.’

‘Have a quick look on Google,’ suggested Becky, ‘we can probably work it out by their build in the photographs.’

Several images of Throop were displayed, along with photographs of his namesakes around the known world. Most were head and shoulders views, but eventually Rudge found one of him bending in front of a rostrum to receive some sort of medal from Tony Blair.

‘It’s got to be him,’ said Rudge, ‘look at his skinny arse. I remember his buttocks looked like a pair of deflated cat lungs.’

‘It could be, but try the other geezer anyway.’

Rudge searched for Lord Kelling and the results displayed a smaller selection of images, including one of his seven year old namesake in Bolivia.

‘Nah, he’s much too fat,’ said Rudge, ‘look at this one here sitting astride a horse wearing hunting clobber. His thighs are quite chunky and his tunic looks very tight on him.’

‘How old is the photograph though,’ said Becky, ‘he looks relatively young in that compared to the poor decrepit old sod we saw last night.’

Rudge followed the link to the photograph’s website.

‘It was taken in 1997,’ he said, ‘what about this other one down here.’

He moved his cursor down the results page and selected another image.

‘This is a recent one on board his yacht in swimming trunks,’ he said, ‘big spare tyre and a fat arse.’

‘So it’s definitely Throop then,’ said Becky, ‘the leading playwright who likes nothing better than two young women shoving a .....’

‘I don’t want to know the details thank you,’ he said, ‘but what a marvellous thing the Internet is. Twenty years ago we’d have had to go to the library and wade through hundred of books and periodicals just to find any sort of picture of him. Now we can just Google Dougal.’

 
‘Twenty years ago I’d have been at nursery trying to pushing triangular shapes through round holes.’

‘A bit like those two young women with Throop,’ Rudge said with a smile.

‘You’re disgusting, Rudge,’ she replied, punching his arm.

Rudge studied the list again, and did another Internet search before scribbling next to another of the guest’s names.

‘Philippa Vernon,’ he said, ‘she was the woman I saw getting clamped, and I don’t mean her car.’

‘Who’s she?’

‘She was the Home Secretary in the last government,’ he explained, ‘she wanted to introduce corporal punishment into women’s prisons.’

Rudge stood up from the table and stretched out his arms,. He let out a loud sigh and checked
 
his watch.

‘I’ve got my two hundred lengths of the pool to do now, Becky,’ he said, ‘d’you fancy coming down?’

Becky slid the laptop round to face her and stared at the screen.

‘No thanks, but I might pop down for a sauna later,’ she replied, ‘but I’ve got my e-mails to catch up on if you don’t mind me using your machine. The publisher is supposed to be organising a meeting with the US distributor. Nikki Blandford was going to let me know the details.’

‘Help yourself,’ he said walking away, ‘and if you fancy writing a sequel while you’re at it, feel free.’

 
Becky awoke from an afternoon nap on the huge sofa, and glanced across at Rudge who was seated at the table staring intently at the screen of his tatty old laptop.

 
‘Written anything yet?’ she asked, yawning.

‘No,’ Rudge replied, ‘and time is really against me to deliver this bloody sequel. I’m using my old laptop for luck, but it’s no use. I even thought about getting drunk again like with
 
first book, but somehow I don’t think that’ll work either.’

‘I reckon it’s this place,’ Becky said, ‘you’ve become so accustomed to luxury and living the good life, it must be stifling your creativity.’