The green cigar went up my left nostril. ‘What?’ I went. ‘What? What? What?’
‘You really should read all the small print.’
‘It’s gross,’ I said. ‘That’s what it is.’
Norman helped himself to a cigar. ‘If you think that’s gross,’ he said ‘wait ‘til you meet the human ashtrays.’
I auditioned the dwarves. It was a painful experience. Even though they were all prepared to submit to the humiliation of having their heads shaved, it didn’t make me feel any better about it. In the end,
I let their sex decide the matter for me.
There were seven men and seven women.
In the spirit of the Nineties, PC and positive discrimination, I dismissed all the men and chose the women.
An interior decorator called Lawrence had been engaged to spruce up the great hall for the party. Lawrence was famous. He starred in a very popular BBC television series, where neighbours were invited to redecorate each other’s rooms in a manner calculated to create the maximum amount of annoyance and distress.
I loved the show and I really liked Lawrence. He was all long hair and leather trousers and he would strut about in cowboy boots, getting bad-tempered and shouting that this wasn’t right and that had to be moved and that thing over there must be torn down and thrown away.
Lawrence didn’t take to the Doveston’s fine art collection. He hated it. He said that the Canalettos were far too old-fashioned and so he drew in some speedboats with a felt-tipped pen. I don’t know much about art, but I know I liked his speedboats.
I didn’t like it, though, when he told me that the two pillars supporting the minstrels’ gallery would have to be demolished.
‘We can’t do that,’ I told him. ‘The minstrels’ gallery will collapse.’
Lawrence stamped his cowboy boots and grew quite red in the face. ‘They ruin the lines,’ he shouted. ‘I want to hang cascades of plastic fruit over the gallery. Either those pillars go, or I will.’
I knew that I couldn’t lose Lawrence, but I knew the pillars had to stay. Luckily Norman stepped in and saved the situation. He suggested to Lawrence that he give the pillars a coat of invisible paint.
Norman’s invisible paint really impressed the volatile Lawrence and he soon had the shopkeeper trailing after him, painting over Rembrandts and Caravaggios and suits of armour that couldn’t be moved. And making doorways look wider and steps look lower and generally improving the look of the place.
I have no idea where the Doveston found the chef.
He was famous too, apparently, but I’d never heard of him. The chef was short and stout and swarthy and sweaty and swore a great deal of the time. Like all chefs, he was barking mad and he hated everybody. He hated Lawrence and he hated me. I introduced him to Norman. He hated Norman too.
‘And this is my chauffeur, Rapscallion.’
‘I hate him,’ said the chef.
The chef, however, loved cooking. And he loved-loved-loved to cook for the rich and famous. And when I told him that he would be doing so for nearly four hundred of the buggers, he kissed me on the mouth and promised that he would prepare dishes of such an exquisite nature as to rival and surpass any that had ever been prepared in the whole of mankind’s history.
And then he turned around and walked straight into an invisible pillar.
‘I hate this fucking house,’ said he.
Lazlo Woodbine kept in touch by telephone. He said that he and his associate, someone or something called Barry, were on the brink of solving the case and felt confident that they would be able to reveal the murderer’s identity on the night of the Great Millennial Ball. I really liked the sound of that.
It was just like an Agatha Christie.
Mary Clarissa Christie (1890-1976), English author of numerous detective novels. Too many featuring Hercule Poirot. And if you haven’t seen The Mousetrap, don’t bother, the detective did it.
And so the final weeks of the century ticked and tocked away. Lawrence had promised me that he’d have everything done in just two days. Which was all he ever took on the telly. But apparently these were special BBC days, each of which can last up to a month.
Norman marched about the place, taking care of business. He now wore upon his head a strange contraption built from Meccano. This, he told me, exercised his hair.
Norman had become convinced that the reason your hair falls out is because it’s unhealthy. So in order to keep it fit, you should give it plenty of exercise. He had invented a system that he called Hairobics. This consisted of a small gymnasium mounted on the head.
I did not expect Hairobics to rival the yo-yo’s success.
Then I awoke one morning to find it all but gone. The twentieth century.
It was 31 December. It was eight o’clock in the morning. There were just twelve hours to go before the start of the Great Millennial Ball.
I began to panic.
21
Party on, dude.
‘Wakey wakey, rise and shine.’ Norman came blustering into my bedroom, tea on a tray and the big portfolio under his arm. I gaped up at Norman. My panic temporarily on hold. ‘What’s happened to your hair?’ I asked.
‘Ah.’ Norman placed the tray upon a gilded bedside table. ‘That.’
‘That! I’ve seen thin hair before, but neverfat hair.’
‘A slight problem with the old Hairobics. I didn’t exercise the follicles for a couple of days and their new muscles have run to fat. I think I might sport a trilby tonight. Cocked at a rakish angle. Morning, Claudia; morning, Naomi.’
My female companions of the night before yawned out their good mornings. Naomi put her teeth back in and Claudia searched for her truss.
Norman sat down upon the bed.
‘Gerroff!’ cried a muffled voice.
‘Sorry, Kate, didn’t see you there.’ Norman shifted his bum. ‘I’ve brought you these,’ he said, handing me some tablets.
‘What are they?’
‘Drugs, of course. I thought you might be getting a bit panicky by now. These will help.’
‘Splendid.’ I bunged the tablets into my mouth and washed them down with some water. ‘Nothing I like better than drugs on an empty stomach.’
‘Naomi just took her teeth out of that glass,’ said Norman. ‘But never mind. I’ve brought you the guest list. It would be really nice if you’d have another go at trying to remember who’s who amongst the who’s whos. Oh and I’ve just spoken with Lazlo Woodbine on the telephone. He says that he will be unmasking the murderer tonight. And that you probably won’t recognize him, because he will be in disguise.
‘Why will he be in disguise?’
‘To make it more exciting. So I don’t want you to worry about anything. Everything’s under control. The transportation for the celebs. The food, the drink, the drugs, the music, the decorations, the floor shows, the lot. All you have to do is be there. Everything is exactly how it should be.’
I sipped at my tea. No sugar. I spat out my tea. ‘But will anyone actually come? I mean, the Doveston is dead, will people still want to come to his party?’
‘Of course they will. And it was written on the invitations: “In the unlikely event of the host being blown into tiny pieces in a freak accident involving dynamite and catapult elastic, the party will definitely still go ahead. Bring bottle and bird. Be there or be square.
‘He certainly was a class act.’
‘He was a regular Rupert.’
‘Bear, or Brooke?’
‘Bear,’ said Norman. ‘Definitely bear.’
Oh how we laughed. Well, it was a good ‘un.