Situation Tragedy by Simon Brett Page B

murder? Charles supposed that if
The Strutters
had been being made at the expense of
What’ll the Neighbours Say?,
then Bernard might be seen to have a motive for sabotaging production of the new series, so that it would have to be cancelled and replaced with the older one. But that motivation didn’t work, because the options on the next series of
What’ll the Neighbours Say?
had been taken up and, though Bernard didn’t know that at the time of Sadie’s death, he certainly did when Scott died. Nope, it didn’t work.
    But, as a theory, it did contain one attractive element, and that was the idea of sabotage to the production. If the violence was directed against the whole series rather than individuals, then the random nature of the murder schemes made more sense. Maybe the saboteur had fixed the railing on the fire escape to injure Sadie Wainwright
or anyone else
connected with
The Strutters
pilot. The dislodged urn, too, might have been a random act of violence.
    This idea answered a doubt that had been nagging at Charles ever since Scott’s death. Any theory that assumed murder directed specifically at the young director also assumed an enormous amount of luck. There was no guarantee that Scott was going to be the next person down the hill after Bernard. He might well have chosen to leave last of all and demonstrate the powers of his Porsche by overtaking everyone else on the motorway back to London. Even if the murderer could have predicted the bet with Peter Lipscombe, he couldn’t have known that the producer would offer the opportunity for the director to go first. (Unless of course the producer
were
the murderer . . . But no, that was a blind alley; it was Scott who had suggested the race.)
    And, as well as having no guarantee who his victim would he, the conjectural murderer had no guarantee that he would murder anyone. A more prudent driver than Scott Newton might have been going slowly enough to stop safely when he saw his path obstructed. And, even given Scott’s precipitous speed, he might well have survived his descent on to the main road. No murderer, however much of a criminal mastermind, could have arranged the simultaneous arrival of a Spanish juggernaut to finish off his victim.
    So, if any crimes had been committed, it looked as if they were just random sabotage. And the only person who had ever had a motive for such actions, Bernard Walton, had had his motive removed by the guarantee of a new series of
What’ll the Neighbours Say?
    Unless, of course, the acts of sabotage were the work of a psychopath. Oh dear, Charles did hope not. Psychopathic crimes offered no prospect of satisfaction; if their motivation was without reason, then no amount of reasoning was going to provide a solution to them.
    So what was he left with? Two deaths. Both, according to police findings, accidental. And nothing to make him disagree with those findings except for a few ambiguous overhead words relating to the first one.
    All he could do was watch and listen, and wait to see if anything else happened.
    On Monday, June 4th, Charles arrived at the Paddington Jewish Boys’ Club for the first
Strutters
read-through, and found Peter Lipscombe predictably cooing over Aurelia Howarth. She appeared just to have given him a brown paper parcel.
    â€˜Of course I’ll read them, Dob love, of course I will.’
    â€˜I don’t know, I just think there might be something there, darling. They’re old-fashioned, but might adapt into a rather jolly series. Just an instinct I have about them.’
    â€˜And when have your dramatic instincts ever been wrong?’ asked the Producer with a sycophantic laugh.
    Charles moved over to sit beside George Birkitt, who was reading the
Sun
. ‘How’s tricks, as the white rabbit said to the conjuror?’
    George brandished the newspaper. ‘Look at this – bloody Bernard Walton all over it.’
    Charles glanced at the page.