“Mr. and Mrs. Parr, I believe you are entered for the Couples’ Quiz? It’s beginning in a few minutes, down on the beach,” Nico addresses us pleasantly. He’s changed into a jacket with glittery braid, which makes me wonder if he’s quizmaster.
“We were just coming.”
“Excellent! Georgios will assist you.”
We don’t need bloody assistance, I want to retort, but I bite my lip and smile.
“Lead the way.”
“Bring it on, Sally,” mutters Ben in my ear, and I stifle a giggle. Maybe this will be fun after all.
They’ve really gone to town. There’s a wooden platform set up on the beach, decorated with a skirt of red foil strips. Clusters of red-heart helium balloons are anchored at each side. A massive banner reads COUPLES’ QUIZ, and a three-piece band is playing “Love Is All Around.” Melissa is pacing about on the sand in her orange caftan, followed two steps behind by a sandy-haired man in Vilebrequin trunks and an aqua polo shirt. I assume he’s her husband, as they’re both wearing prominent badges reading COUPLE ONE, along with their printed names.
“Stella McCartney,” she’s saying furiously as we approach. “You know it’s Stella McCartney. Oh! Hi! You made it!”
“Ready to do battle?” says Ben, with a mischievous glint.
“It’s just a bit of fun!” she replies, almost aggressively. “Isn’t it, Matt?”
Matt is holding The Couples’ Quiz Official Question Book, I suddenly notice in disbelief. Did they bring that with them?
“Oh, we happened to have that,” says Melissa, flushing as she sees me register it. “Put it away, Matt. It’s too late now, anyway,” she adds to him in a savage undertone. “I really think you could have made more effort.… Hello! You must be the other competitors! Just a bit of fun!” She greets an older-looking couple who are approaching hand in hand, looking a bit perplexed by the whole thing. They have graying hair, coordinated beige slacks, and short-sleeved Hawaiian cotton shirts, and the man has socks on with sandals.
“Mr. and Mrs. Parr, your badge.” Nico descends and gives us our COUPLE THREE badges. “Mr. and Mrs. Kenilworth, here are your name badges.”
“Are you on honeymoon?” I can’t help asking the woman, who it turns out, is called Carol.
“Bless you, no!” She’s fiddling with her lapel. “We won this trip at our bridge-club auction. Not our kind of thing, really, but you have to show willing, and we do enjoy a quiz.…”
Nico ushers all six of us onto the platform, and we survey the audience, which is a middle-size crowd of guests in sarongs and T-shirts, with cocktails in their hands.
“Ladies and gentlemen!” Nico has switched on his radio mike, and his voice booms round the beach. “Welcome to the hotel’s very own Couples’ Quiz!”
Actually this is quite fun. It’s just like it is on the telly. All of us women are led away to a nearby gazebo and given headphones which blast music into our ears, while the men answer questions onstage. Then we swap places and it’s our turn. As I write down my answers, I feel suddenly nervous. Did Ben stick to the plan? Did he really answer as Dirk? What if he chickened out?
Well, too late now. I scribble my final answer and hand in the paper.
“And now!” Nico says to an accompanying drumroll from the band. “Let us reunite our couples! No conferring!” The audience applauds as the men come back onto the stage. The men are on one side of Nico and the women on the other, and I can see Melissa trying to attract Matt’s attention while he resolutely ignores her.
“First question! What would your wife never go out without? Gentlemen, please answer clearly into the microphone. Couple One?”
“Handbag,” says Matt promptly into the microphone.
“And your wife said …” Nico consults the paper. “Handbag. Ten points! Couple Two, same question?”
“Fresh breath mints,” says Tim Kenilworth after some deliberation.
“And your wife said … Life Savers. Close enough.” Nico nods. “Ten points! And Couple Three?”
“Easy,” says Ben laconically. “She never leaves without her Smith and Wesson 59.”
“Is that a gun?” says Melissa, looking astonished. “A gun?”
“And your wife said …” Nico consults my writing. “My Smith and Wesson 59. Congratulations, ten points!” He turns to me, his eyebrows raised. “You don’t have it with you now, I hope?”
“I never go anywhere without it.” I twinkle back at him.
“A gun?” persists Melissa. “Are you serious? Matt, did you hear that?”
“Next question!” announces Nico. “You have no food in the larder. Where do you head for a spontaneous meal out? Gentlemen, please answer again. First, Couple One.”
“Er … fish and chips?” says Matt uncertainly.
“Fish and chips?” Melissa glares at him. “Fish and chips?”
“Well, it’s quick, easy.…” Matt quails at her expression. “Why, what did you put?”
“I put Le Petit Bistro!” she says furiously. “We always go there when we want a quick bite. You know we do!”
“I sometimes go for fish and chips,” mumbles Matt rebelliously, but I’m not sure anyone hears him except me.
“Zero points,” says Nico sympathetically. “Couple Two?”
“The pub,” says Tim, after about half an hour’s thought. “I’d say we’d go to the pub.”
“And your wife said …” Nico squints at the paper. “Madame, my apologies, I cannot read your writing.”
“Well, I didn’t know what to put.” Carol looks perturbed. “We never do run out of food. We’d always have a soup in the freezer, wouldn’t we, love?”
“True enough.” Tim nods. “We make it up in batches, you see. Every Sunday during Midsomer Murders. Ham and pea.”
“Or chickpea and chorizo,” Carol reminds him.
“Or plain old tomato.”
“And we freeze the rolls too,” explains Tim, “so it only takes a few minutes in the microwave.”
“Whole grain and crusty white,” puts in Carol. “We do half and half, usually.…” She trails off into silence.
Everyone seems slightly stunned by this domestic catalog, including Nico, but at last he springs back to life.
“Thank you for your wonderfully thorough answer.” He beams at Carol and Tim. “But, alas! Zero points. Couple Three?”
“We go to Dill’s Diner now,” I say. “Is that what he put?”
“Sorry,” begins Nico, “but that is not the answer—”
“Wait!” I interrupt, as a relieved smile spreads across Melissa’s face. “I haven’t finished. We go to Dill’s Diner now, but we used to go to Jerry and Jim’s Steakhouse, until it was blown up by the mob.” I glance over at Ben, who gives an imperceptible nod.
“Ah,” says Nico, peering at the paper. “Yes. Your husband wrote, We went to Jerry and Jim’s till Carlo Dellalucci’s lot blew it up; now we go to Dill’s Diner.”
“Where’s that?” demands Melissa. “Where do you live?”
“Apartment Forty-three-D, West Eightieth Street,” we say in unison. It’s part of the opening titles.
“Oh, New York,” she says, as though she’s saying, Oh, the rubbish dump.
“Blew up, as in exploded?” chimes in Matt, looking impressed. “Was anyone killed?”
“Chief of police,” I say, with a terse nod. “And the ten-year-old daughter he’d only just met, who died in his arms.”
It was the finale to season one. Absolutely major telly. I almost want to recommend it to them all. Except that would slightly defeat the point.