Episode 3: Everything Is Of Interest

(upbeat music) (upbeat music) Murder of a famous bastard. Episode three, everything is of interest. I grew up reading a volume of Sherlock Holmes, my uncle gave me, pouring over the tiny print when I was meant to be asleep. I think the reason my eyesight is so shitty now, is that I'd worn them out by the time I was about 10. The big man, Holmes, liked to speak in axioms in words of wisdom. The Victorian world was a very unsettled one. He represented certainty. When you have eliminated all which is impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth. It was true, taken literally. But I'd never experienced a case where you could eliminate everything that was impossible. We live in the age of the impossible, both for good and ill. We can find out anything we want in less than a second, but objective truth means less than it ever has. Holmes didn't have to worry about the internet. If he could prove someone had been in the room when the diamond was stolen, if he could prove he had a reason to steal it, chances were, they'd done it. Motive and opportunity. Those were still the things you look for in the murder mystery, everyone knew that. But in this hotel, there were any number of people with some sort of a motive for killing Stevie Chase. And potentially, a lot of people with some kind of opportunity too. I had neither. And yet, here I was, sitting opposite the police constable, the phone, picking up my every clearance of the throat and shuffling the seat. - So you'd receive the invitation, you say? - Three weeks ago, something like that. - And previously to that, you'd only ever met Stevie Chase once. - Yeah, I was working on something for him. And that's something I wanted to talk to you about. That job was to do with an obsessive fan, basically, stalker Kevin McGee, was his name. I was the one who tracked him down. There was a restraining order all this. But last night, he was there. I saw him. I wasn't sure the first time. I mean, it didn't seem possible. But it was him. I was once again, 95% sure. 95 was all I could have. I'd glimpsed him when I was milling around. He was wearing a dinner jacket in jeans, 'cause easily if possible, the Chase's showbiz friends. But I'd recognise the slight stoop of his shoulders and the way his hair stuck up at the back, like a cockatoo's. It was the man I'd been appointed to find and protect Stevie from several years ago. What was he doing here? How could he be here legitimately? Before I'd been able to get my head even half around it all, he was gone. - You're saying this man who you helped to put away? - Well, he didn't go to jail. He was just ordered to stay away from Chase. - Okay, well, you could leave that with us. Let's get back to you, Mr. Flander. Were you not a wee bit surprised to get the invite if it's true that you'd only ever met Stevie Chase once? - Of course I was surprised. Yeah, I didn't answer it first. I couldn't look out if it was some sort of mistake. - What made you decide to come in the end? - I, a few days ago, I got a text from a number I didn't know. It said that Stevie would really like me to come. - And who was it from in the end? - I don't know, I still don't know. I asked once and they didn't say. - He weren't tempted to investigate that any further. - Oh, I mean, I had an invite. I don't think I need to justify being out of the party. I assumed it had just been sent to loads of people. - I thought why not my partner's away any way in? - Can you show me the invitation? - I haven't got it with me. I didn't think I'd need to bring it. I mean, I didn't need to bring it. I got in no problem, so I must have done some sort of list. - Mm. - I can show you the text if you want. - I don't think that's necessary for the time being. Let's move on to last night itself. - I still didn't particularly like the direction of this. I didn't form Katrina that someone legally classified as a threat to Chase had shown up at the party. And she'd more or less brushed it off. Meanwhile, she seemed to be casting that on whether I'd had the right to be there. As for my hopes of getting her on-side and getting involved with the investigation, they were diminishing by the minute. Katrina Angus didn't seem to be taking me seriously at all. It wasn't the first time I'd struggled to get someone to take me seriously. Callum would probably say I had a complex about it. - So you arrived at the hotel when? - About five, I got the train out. - You checked in straight away? - Yes. - Did anything unusual about your room? - Well, the ensuite had a separate door leading somewhere. It was a bit alarming, but it was secured. You couldn't open it. - Jack and Jill door, as they call them. Don't name Mr. Flander. - Yeah. - Then you went to the drinks reception and on from there to dinner. - Yeah, I was sitting with, well, am I allowed to mention your name or? - Just tell me everything you can remember, please. You're doing great so far. - I was sitting at a table with you, obviously. And Jack Solesbury, the lawyer. And then Jazz, who's apparently the producer, well, was the producer of 'shake it up'. - Why do you say 'was'? - Oh, I just imagine it. I thought the show would end now. - Is that something you've been told by someone? - No, I've literally not spoken to anyone except Anita. I just, I mean, he invented the whole show, didn't he? And he was the host. - Did you watch 'shake it up', Mr. Flander? - Not very often. We went through a recording once. That was the one time I met him. - What sort of thing do you like to watch? - Sorry? - Have you seen the traitors? - We, yeah? - Really brings at home how hard it is to work out if you can trust people. That's not news to me, of course. And it won't be news to you, Mr. Flander. Good show, though. I'd love Claudia Winkleman's fringe, but God didn't make me that way if you know what I mean. What about 'severance'? That's good, eh? - Yeah, we've just caught up. - Not watched at myself. I see enough of people with split personalities, but I'm glad people are liking it. Anyway, if we could move on to 'After Dinner' finished. - It was unclear what to make of this tonal shift back towards something like the person she'd been last night. I was starting to wonder if Katrina had a split personality, in fact. I tried to stay as emotionally detached as I could, to focus purely on the task of describing my memories of the night. Part of me was aware that I needed the recap myself, that I needed to get my own timeline in order. Holmes, or Ms. Marple, wouldn't have had to try and piece together the facts of a dinner at which Dave themselves had been a little bit toasted. But, well, God didn't make me that way. You work with what you've got. I, well, you and I, had a couple of drinks, and then I just kind of wandered around, trying to chat to people, I guess. I didn't know anyone. - And on your wanderings, did you see or hear anything that sticks out in the memory? Anything are we bit out of the ordinary? - There were a few things. Yeah. First, there was this big argument around the back of the kitchen. So I heard it on my way back from the toilet. I heard a guy with maybe a Spanish accent. He was shouting, he would never normally accept this, that it wasn't safe and need to. I think it was her. The manager was trying to get him to calm down. And someone else was getting involved trying to have their set, another man, but I couldn't make out anything he was saying. It must have been further away. - It wasn't safe. Did he say anything more than that? - Not that I heard. Obviously, I didn't want to be hanging around eavesdropping. - Oh, no, God, for a bed. Carry on. - Then later on, I heard someone been really sick in the toilet. I guess someone just drunk too much, or, again, obviously I didn't linger around. - So you went to bed, I think you said, at about midnight? - Yeah, I could have been a little bit later. I had had a few drinks. - Where are you drunk? - They're just sort of nicely relaxed, you know. My mind was sort of fluid like a river. - Are you saying any other evidence you give us likely to be inaccurate? - If you're going to rule out anything you get from anyone who had a couple of drinks last night, PC Angus, you're going to waste a fair bit of time here. - Not quite true, Mr. Flounder, but a fair point all the same. So once in your room, did you hear anything that you think might be of interest? - Well, it depends what you call of interest. - This close to a fatality, I think you can assume everything is of interest. (upbeat music) - I felt as if things were thoring between us, but once again, it might have been wishful thinking. Outside in the corridor, we both heard Anita's voice raise an alarm. Excuse me, excuse me. Maybe they're arriving already, the press. She certainly hadn't seen prepare for the insanity that was going to descend on this place. Well, I heard the noises of love making. - Love making. - Sex, fine. - And those noises were coming from. One of the rooms above me, I suppose, I could hear. - Yes. - A woman's voice was saying Jack, Jack. - Jack. - That's probably more detail than you need. - We never know what we're going to need until we need it, Mr. Flounder, I'm sure I don't have to tell you that. - Okay, well, there you go. I was trying not to think about it because, you know, I've only been at dinner with Jack a couple of hours before. - Did you hear any fighting? Any sort of struggle? - From them. - Well, from anywhere. - No, I don't think so. I was drifting off to sleep by this point. - Did you hear, I've already had a couple of people mentioned, did you happen to hear anyone running past your door, loud footsteps, loud breathing? - Yeah, I did hear that. - Would you be able to see what time? - No, I'm sorry, it's just, I must have drifted off and then the fire alarm was going. - Did you go outside as soon as you heard that? - Of course, I just kind of jumped it out and back into the clothes I was wearing, even though it was cold and it felt gross. I mean, you don't have a lot of choice in that situation, do you? - You might think. Not everyone did leave straight away as my impression. In fact, not everyone did evacuate when the alarm went off. But continue. - What was this about? Why was she giving me information like that? Not even information, but what almost felt like calculated teasers? Who was she referring to who hadn't gone out the front when the alarm was screaming for 20 minutes, the electronic bell clanging? There was no way anyone could slip through that. Unless she meant Stevie Chase was already dead by then. Did she even know what time he died? It was hard for a pathologist to work that out. It's much harder than they make out on TV dramas. And I didn't even know if the post-mortem was complete yet. But above all, why was she dangling these little morsels in front of me? Did she, after all, think I might have something useful to contribute or was it some sort of trap? - Well, I went outside and stood around with everyone else, I guess. - But you didn't just stand around. Did you, Mr. Flounder? You went for a little straw. - Oh, yeah, yes, I did. I went to where there's that little wooded bit in the lake. There wasn't really anyone to talk to, anyone I knew. People were just kind of huddled, muttering. I did look for you, or jazz. But, and I liked from the move when I'm trying to claim my head, I'm not really one for standing around. Why did you, who told you that they saw me? - Well, do you recall seeing anyone on your little walkabout? - I saw Anita, the manager, and presumably, she's filled you in on that. - Can you describe the circumstances and what you saw her? - I was just, I was just walking towards the trees and she came out through a clearing, or whatever you'd call it, and she sort of rushed past me, head down, looking the other way, kind of thing. - But you're sure it was her? - 95% sure, 95%. - Yes, sure. - You didn't speak? - No, like I said, she just kind of kept on going. - Mm, and then you went back into the hotel when the alarm was over? - Of course, it was freezing. - You didn't, forgive me if this seems a strange question. You didn't, at this point, go up to the penthouse. - To the penthouse? - Yes. - Where Stevie Chase died? Yes, Mr. Flaunder. As I say, I'm sorry to ask. - Not of course I didn't. - Right. - I mean. - Yes. - I realise this is your investigation, of course I do. But are you going to ask all 50, 60 people whether they went up to the penthouse, or? - Now you are thinking a bit more like a detective. No, you're right to assume I am not carpet bombing all the guests with that inquiry. I'm asking because, according to more than one witness, a man closely matching your description was seen leaving the penthouse floor, getting in the lift. Sometime very shortly after guests were re-admitted to the hotel. - What? - But you were telling me it wasn't you? - I absolutely, I'm telling you that 'cause it definitely wasn't. - Thank you. Well, we'll leave that there. - The rest of it went by in a bit of a blur. There were a couple more routine questions. It was almost disturbingly routine as if Katrina had already got what she wanted out of me. It was now just playing with me like a cat with a ball of wool. Eventually she said, thank you, that would be all. I asked if I was now free to leave the hotel. Yeah, she said, she was sure I was aware that police couldn't actually detain anyone beyond a reasonable length of time. She was showing me out of the office. I felt a little bit like I was leaving a job interview, one of those where you already know you're not getting it. Where there, thanks very much for coming in. Sounds like pity. I didn't even try going back to the subject of Kevin McGee, the stalker, even though his presence at the party was surely a more pertinent piece of information than literally anything I'd done last night. As I went back into the lobby which was a lot more crowded now, I felt stupid. Having convinced myself that she might be interested in putting our heads together. Even during the parts where she seemed a little bit more cordial, there'd been no ambiguity. She was the police constable in charge of what was happening here, and I was a nobody. A person who couldn't even say why they'd been invited to this thing, who hadn't even shown up on the guest list, and who had supposedly been seen in the vicinity of Stevie Chase's room somewhere around the time he died. Every time I revisited that sentence in my head, I felt a little bit sick. It wasn't true, of course, but even so. As I said, the foyer was considerably busier now. If you'd not known the situation, you would have taken it as things going back to normal. There was the hum of conversation. Fire was now ablaze behind the reception desk. I could smell the kitchens moving into gear, so someone had been pressed into working there. But the reality, of course, was the opposite of normal. At least a handful of people I saw had not been at the party. A couple of them were at the desk, making requests of a bewildered looking Anita. I glanced back at her with sympathy, wishing I could help. The nobody comes in or out thing had gone to shit pretty fast if it had ever been enforceable in the first place, which I'd added. There were a couple more uniform police here too, but they didn't seem to be doing much to keep order. In fact, one of them was sitting where I'd sat with Anita, looking up at the TV screens. Only hours ago, they had been chucking out trivia about flight delays and political contests. Now, they were broadcasting images of Stevie Chase, with his wife Hazel, with Rhapsody Britain, in the TV studio with Jonathan Ross, the weird, hastily constructed Google images montage, you see, when someone has died unexpectedly. With a nasty jolt, I'd recognise the exterior of the hotel itself. The sound was down, but the captioning was on. Glen Bell Manor, where he was celebrating his 16th birthday, it said, 44 years out, sure, but all the same. It was a still image, they would just have grabbed it from the internet, but I knew it was coming. Anyone could see what was coming. Within a couple of hours, there'd be cameras out the front, there'd be reporters with microphones. This place was about to become a TV set. If this was an ITV drama, you'd say something like, "But the star is dead." Cliché, notwithstanding, it was hard not to reflect on it a bit. The one man who truly belonged in the middle of a media sensation was gone. The entertainer who stood up and made all those rude jokes yesterday evening was now a dummy being cut open, later to be laid on a tray, and slid into a fridge. Me, I had not quite belonged here to start with, with the flies about to descend on the place that sense of not belonging intensified. I googled a couple of taxi numbers. The first was an immediate no. Thing is, we've only got Frank to the voice, apologetically, and Frank's got Lauren Jitis. An unpleasant feeling was going to be impossible to get away from here and started to berate myself for not having made these arrangements in advance, even for not driving up here instead of relying on the train. But the second voice I called was an unexpected cockney. This time my luck was in. He had another booking from the Glen Bell to air station, he said, in half an hour. If she was happy sharing, we could go together. I was prepared to exercise my limited powers of persuasion if it came to it. I had to get out. So, uh, you've been up the party? Um, yeah. Bad business, that. Urged it on the radio. I thought, bloody hell, that's the gaser from a telly. Was it cool? Shake it off? Shake it off? Yeah. Didn't really watch it myself. Well, they wrote that, I think it's too early to. Now, I saw people saying they wrote them as a sex thing. I think it's too early. Apparently, I found them naked with handcuffs on and some other get up, some in his mouth or some business like that. I don't know anything. I tried my best with, so you don't seem like you're from around here, but I wasn't much good at small talk, even in the normal circumstances and these were extremely far from normal. Jade, Stevie's PA, was staring through the out-ish glasses of her phone, looking at it so hard it seemed like she was hoping to be zapped right through the screen away from here. I'd seen her standing out at the front of the hotel with a green suitcase and gambled on asking if the taxi was for her, whether she'd mind sharing. She'd blinked through her specs and seemed to way up the question, then said, "Okay, that's fine." Her tone was so absent that I then thought she'd not been wearing it up at all, her mind was somewhere different entirely. Now here we were, still eight miles out of air. Jade's sudden contribution had taken the edge off the conversation and I hoped it might kill it off altogether. But sometimes taxi drivers behave exactly like the taxi drivers of stereotype. It was barely a minute later with light rain starting to mist the windows that he got back on the trail. Now I'll tell you what is a big factor to keep an eye on, and that is cholesterol. Now you've got to have an eye on your cholesterol, not my words or my doctor. He said to me, Ray, which is my name, he said, Ray, what is very important, even if you're very fit and healthy on the outside, so to speak, is your cholesterol. I'm sure. Long story short, he rains and checks. He said to me, Ray, nothing to worry about on a cholesterol front old man. I'm glad to hear it. Funny thing with cholesterol, of course, you can look out of yourself, as much as you like, but if it's in your genes, if it's a ticking time bomb, so to speak, well, you can be running marathons and you've gone like that. Now I'm not going to snap my fingers because I'm driving and safety is very important as you know, but you can imagine me doing it. Yes, okay. His health was good, there was nothing wrong with him. You friends, what's your? I'm his PA. Every time I thought I was having to carry this conversation, that Jay would rather die than wade into the chat between two middle-aged men, she came back in. I suppose two things can be true at the same time. The last thing she wanted was to talk to us, but the equal last thing she wanted was to hear his speculating freely about a man she'd known personally. And I assumed cared for, even if it was with the same caveats as everyone else. I'm his PA. I couldn't blame her for using the present tense, obviously. How quickly could anyone get used to saying was? It struck me that this was one of the most brutal ends, most violent adjustments that anyone among the nearest and dearest would have to undergo. From what I remembered of my dealings with her a few years back, Jay's day-to-day life had been absolutely defined by running Stevie's day-to-day life. Of course, there'd be legal stuff to deal with, but essentially her job, the whole thing, had been snuffed out, the second that the breath had left Stevie Chase's body. Very close now. When's your train? A three. Mine's 348. No. I'd assumed you was travelling. Never. No. We aren't. My apologies. Obviously, you see a gentleman in a lady travelling together and you can, so I speak, put two together and make four or five. We aren't. We don't know each other. No. As I say, my mistake. Also, of course, I mean, these days it's not always a gentleman in a lady, is it? You can be a geezer with another geezer or two women, or you get all sorts these days, people identifying as this and the other. Now, for what it's worth. That's it. We can get out here. I mean, I can get. No. I can get you right up to the entrance lap. Look, all I was going to say is, for what it's worth, I think it's excellent. Sorry? You know, the way things have gone, people free to love who they want, be who they want. It's a very different world in some ways than the one I grew up in. It can be confusing. You can go embrace the positive aspects of it, right? Allow yourself to be reeducated, so to speak. Right. That's going to be 22-pound, please. Oh, also about. Thank you. Make it 25. Very kind, obviously. Well, whatever's gone on there, if there's been any funny business, I like they get brought to justice. The truth without. I mean, yeah, yeah. I think so. Did I know what he meant? The idea of funny business hadn't come up in the entire conversation unless I'd missed some nuance, but there was no time to follow that up. The cabbie, after his surprising touching sermon on free love, was now on his way, probably with the radio back on as the breaking story continued to break. Jade, meanwhile, was ahead of me. She was far enough ahead that she didn't give the impression of wanting my company, but also walking slowly enough to suggest that maybe she was worried about being rude, especially as I'd paid for the cab. I felt like I had to talk to her. That's the only way I can put it. I was clinging by my fingertips to this case, if I could even call it that. I'd been politely dismissed by the constable who was investigating it, but I'd virtually no connection to anyone else there. Once I got on that train, I would be pretty much anyone else in the country, a gorker, speculating on the death from afar. Fine. Maybe that's all there was. But my heart urged me forward. Jade wasn't a chatty person, obviously. On the contrary, her average vibe was pretty close to please get the fuck away from me and doubly so right now. Understandably. But I had so many questions. I quickened my step. She was heading on to the footbridge. I followed. I suppose it doesn't sound great when you put it like that. I'd call up with her on the staircase down to the platform. There was a couple of steps above her. She looked around. You might imagine it in the alarm, but actually she sort of seemed like she'd been expecting it. This isn't your platform. No, I know. Can we talk for a second? I need to get the train. I know, I know. Just quickly. You were in charge of invitations, right? What? We had to RSVP to you. Like, did you give you a list of people to invite? Is there like a full. I've already spoken to the police. I'm not the police. No, exactly. Please leave me alone. She was moving further down the platform. There was now no getting away from the fact that I was chasing after her. To anyone watching it would have looked borderline sinister. But there was nobody else on the platform. Nobody at all. Her train was leaving in four minutes to give them. It crossed my mind to wonder why she was heading down there. She lived in London at the time I had dealings with her. But it wasn't really Jade herself who was my concern. It was the information she held. I had to go for broke. But how? I remember thinking try not to shout. I just want to talk, like some spurn lover. I just want to talk. Please. There's nothing to talk about. It's too late to talk. Please. Listen. The constable said to me that I wasn't on the list of attendees, I wasn't on the seating class. She basically implied that I shouldn't have been there, that I somehow sneaked in, which means I'm a suspect. So, I just need to know. Suspect for what? Well, I'm not saying there wasn't anything suspicious about it, but. But do you think that.? The train was a dot on the horizon, growing by a tiny amount each moment. It would be on the platform in less than two minutes. Jade has wrong-footed me, even though it was me coming after her. I tried to read what was in her face behind those huge glasses, which were like protective shields. Why would she ask a question like that, unless it crossed her mind, too? What did she know about the circumstances around Stevie Chase's death? It felt likely it was a lot more than I think. I mean, you said to yourself, he was healthy, the cop implied they were treating it as. As a murder? As a. as a possible suspicious case. Maybe we can help each other. I just. I want to know what happened if something did happen. I. I have to go. Picking up her case, she started to walk again, almost jogging, as if she was about to miss the train, although it hadn't even come to a stop yet. I called her name after her. Even that felt like an intrusion, we didn't know each other. I was just a weirdo, looking for drama, harassing a near-stranger station. I stopped where I was defeated. Got my phone out of my pocket. One notification. The BBC Newsfast told me that the TV personality Stevie Chase had been found dead at a hotel in Scotland. Give her a couple of days, I thought, it would even be on Facebook. Then, a voice cried out and I looked up. Jade's phone had gone spinning out of her hand as she hurried, sliding across the platform until it came to rest by a green-painted bench. Instinctively, I went to pick it up. The train had come to a stop, the doors were beeping as they slid open. I left my bag on the bench and walked hurriedly towards Jade. My own phone, in my left hand, hers in my right. Granting at hers for a split second, I saw the wallpaper was a picture of her and Stevie, eating ice cream somewhere. It seemed weird on a couple of levels, but it wasn't time to think. I handed her the phone. Thank you. The next ten seconds contained what felt like ten minutes of action when I looked back on it later. Jade's hand was suddenly inexplicably on mine. She whipped my phone out of my hand. I made some sort of noise in sheer bewilderment. She held my phone next to hers for a second, then thrust it back at me. She turned and charged through the doors of the train just as the guards started to whistle far along the platform. The train accelerated steadily out of the station. A bit stunned, I looked down at my phone. Jade's contact details were there. Her phone number, the email address I'd RSVP to or thought I had, even the photo of her and Stevie Chase, now as a little thumbnail. She had done it on purpose, right in front of me, shared her number, her contacts with my phone. I tried to work out what it might mean. For now, she was gone, and when I looked at the bench behind me, so was my bag. It seemed impossible. But as I said, very little truly belongs in that category. Murder of a famous bastard episode, free, was written by Mark Watson. It was performed by Sam Geyser, Mark Watson, also Jack Davies, 29. Adam Moulton and Susanna Hislop was an impassure production and his fellow Ralph Foster, he's edited. Music was by Matt Ryle, artwork was what you call him, "high-meanly". You can subscribe and do reviews and all this, and there's a whole thing on Blue Sky and Discord and all the rest of it. That's the world, now, shall I mean? I pull this business, gets clear that, that's all.