Tag: creativity

Motive, means, and opportunity – Episode 2

…

Detective Bryson interviews Stacey Bergman

…

If there was one thing Bryson hated, it was informing the next of kin of a death.  And particularly when that next of kin hated the victim.

He had to admit, going up in the elevator in what was a sumptuous and expensive building of apartments, that the ex, in this case, had done very well out of the marriage breakup.

A quick search of the internet, as background, he discovered she was to battle him over what appeared to be hidden assets, and endure some rather terrible disclosures on her post-separation behaviour, in the process, but 20 million plus a penthouse worth 10 million more could make that humiliation bearable.

As for Bergman himself, and his role in the divorce proceedings, Bryson was not expecting much cooperation.

He had also called ahead knowing that unless he had a purpose to be there, he would not get inside the front entrance, let alone get up to the apartment to see her.  Security, in the wake of the divorce revelations, made getting into the building the same as entry to Fort Knox.

That advance call told him almost everything he needed to know about her.  If this was in medieval times, he would be wearing a full suit of armour.

He steeled himself, then rang the doorbell.

The door was opened by a maid, dressed in a maid outfit.  Who insisted on that convention these days?

“Detective Bryson to see Mrs Bergman.”

“You might want to rethink how you address her.  It’s now Ms Hollingworth.”  A look of disdain on the maid’s face told him the weather inside the apartment was cold, with a wind chill factor of minus ten.

“Right.”

The maid stepped to one side and let him pass.

Just inside was a small vestibule, and a second set of concertina doors now open, displaying a rather ornate living space with marble floors, spectacular views of the city, and scattered works of art that screamed expensive.

Bergman was paying dearly for the divorce.  One article suggested he needed better lawyers.

The maid closed the concertina doors leaving him alone in the room.

For about three minutes.

Mrs Bergman, no, get it right, Ms Hollingworth, no, damned if he was going to call her Ms Hollingworth, swept into the room, nothing short of a grand entrance.

Stacey Bergman, now Hollingsworth, was a chorus girl before she became a trophy wife.  Yes, the trashy press still ran stories like that, and Bryson still read the trashy press, not only for the salacious stories but for information that could prove useful when dealing with society.

But that fanciful group were, he concluded a long time ago, the same as everyone else except they had money to burn.  But like everyone else, they still had the same failings, jealousy, greed, and the one difference to the common man, they could afford to hire someone else to commit the crime, and then hire the best lawyers to divert the blame.

This woman before him was everything that was wrong in the world.

She stopped by the settee, put her hands on the back-head rest and surveyed him, a look of distaste on her face.

He told himself not to be fazed by such intimidation.

“What is it that couldn’t be said on the telephone?”

“I regret to inform you that your ex-husband, James Bergman is dead.  I am sorry for your loss.”

He had expected some form of an emotional response, but she didn’t even blink.  He had a feeling she probably never felt anything for him.

“Don’t be.  I’m glad the bastard is dead.”

“Be that as it may, we are treating his death as suspicious, and in doing so we will be interviewing everyone he has been in contact with recently.  Can you tell me where you were between 10pm yesterday and 5am this morning?”

“I don’t have to tell you anything.”

Defiance.  He’d expected as much.

“No.  Not here.  But I could have an arrest warrant issued and we could do it downtown after a discreet call to certain members of the press, but I think you’re more reasonable than that.  Be assured, this is a murder investigation, and I will do what I have to.”

He wasn’t initially going to go hard on her, but she was typical of the over-privileged who believed the rules were different for them.  He could also feel the intense dislike for him in her unblinking stare, while she considered his words.

“I was here, at home.”

“Can anyone corroborate that, like your maid?”

“No.  You have my word.”

He tried hard not to let his contempt for her position show though.

“When was the last time you saw your ex-husband?”

“About a week ago at my lawyer’s office.  Another round of talks that fell on deaf ears.”

“No communications since?”

“One phone call two days ago with another ridiculous offer so I told him he could go to hell.”

There was hostility in her tone.  The hostility could fuel a motive for murder.

“A word of advice.  You might want to keep your legal team on standby because you’re high on the list of suspects.  Given the hostility you’re harbouring, you have a motive.  Not having corroboration of your movements at the time of the murder doesn’t help your case.  I suggest you try to be less hostile and more cooperative.  Don’t leave the city, I will have more questions.”

The man opened the concertina doors. His interview was over.

Or was it. 

“Something else that comes to mind, Detective.  He had a girlfriend, I didn’t hear what her name was, or who she is, other than once when I heard him making a date at a restaurant in the city, in one of the Hilton’s.  Probably got a room too.  If he cheated on her too, maybe she had a good reason to kill him.  I didn’t care that much because I needed him alive so I could take him for everything he owns.”

Succinct, and quite possibly the truth, Bryson thought.  He wouldn’t be much good to her dead if she was in it for the humiliation.

“If you do think of a name, call me.”  He left his card on the table, then remembered something else he needed from her.  “Do you have your husband’s phone number, and the name and location of his business?”

Another long stare at him, a withering glance to a lesser man he thought, then she went over a desk by the far wall, pulled out a monogrammed piece of notepaper from one of the drawers and scribbled on it.

She held it out and he came over to collect it.  A phone number and a business name.  “Don’t know the address?”

“Brooklyn somewhere, I think.  Didn’t really care.  I have no head for business, and he had no interest in telling me.”

An odd arrangement, but then, some wives were like that.  “Thank you.”

…

© Charles Heath 2019-2023

Searching for locations: The Jade Factory, Beijing, China

The first stop is at a Jade Museum to learn the history of jade. In Chinese, jade is pronounced as “Yu” and it has a history in China of at least four thousand years.  On the way there, we are given a story about one of the guide’s relatives who had a jade bracelet, and how it has saved her from countless catastrophes.It is, quite literally ‘the’ good luck charm.  Chinese gamblers are known to have small pieces of jade in their hands when visiting the casinos, for good luck.  I’m not sure anything could provide a gambler with any sort of luck given how the odds are always slanted towards the house.

At any rate, this is neither the time of the place to debunk a ‘well-known fact’.

 On arrival, our guide hands us over to a local guide, a real staff member, and she begins with a discussion on jade while we watch a single worker working on an intricate piece, what looks to be a globe within a globe, sorry, there are two workers, and the second is working on a dragon.

At the end of the passage that passes by the workers, and before you enter the main showroom, you are dazzled by the ship and is nothing short of magnificent.

Then it’s into a small room just off the main showroom where we are taken through the colors, and the carving process in the various stages, without really being told how the magic happens.

Then it’s out into the main showroom where the sales are made, and before dispersing to look at the jade collection, she briefly tells us how to tell real and fake jade, and she does the usual trick of getting one of the tour group to model a piece.

Looks good, let’s move on.  To bigger and better examples.

What interested me, other than the small zodiac signs and other smallish pieces on the ‘promotion’ table, was the jade bangle our tour guide told us about on the bus.  If anyone needs one, it is my other half, with all the medical issues and her sometimes clumsiness, two particular maladies this object is supposed to prevent.
Jade to the Chinese is Diamonds to westerners, and the jade bangle is often handed down to the females of the family from generation to generation, often as an engagement present, to be worn on the left hand, the one closest to the heart.

There are literally thousands of them, but, they have to be specially fitted to your wrist because if it’s too large, you might lose it if it slips off and I didn’t think it could be too small.  
Nor is it cheap, and needing a larger size, it is reasonably expensive.  But it is jadeite, the more expensive of the types of jade, and it can only appreciate in value, not that we are interested in the monetary value, it’s more the good luck aspect.

We could use some of that.

But, just to touch on something that can be the bugbear of traveling overseas, is the subject of happy houses, a better name for toilets, and has become a recurrent theme on this tour.  It’s better than blurting out the word toilet and it seems there can be some not so happy houses given that the toilets in China are usually squat rather than sit, even for women.
And apparently, everyone has an unhappy house story, particularly the women, and generally in having to squat over a pit.  Why is this a discussion point, it seems the jade factory had what we have come to call happy, happy houses which have more proper toilets, and a stop here before going on the great wall was recommended, as the ‘happy house’ at the wall is deemed to be not such a happy house.

Not even this dragon was within my price range.  Thank heaven they had smaller more affordable models.  The object of having a dragon, large or small, is that it should be placed inside the main door to the house so that money can come in.

It also seems that stuffing the dragon’s mouth with money is also good luck.  We passed on doing that.

After spending a small fortune, there was a bonus, free Chinese tea.  Apparently, we will be coming back, after the Great Wall visit, to have lunch upstairs.

           

Ideas come from everywhere

I have an electronic note book on my smart phone and writing pads at the ready at home in my office/writing room/library.

As soon as one hits, I get it down, either on paper, or on the phone app. I use SomNote as it’s easy to export the text to an email, or have a version of the app running on my computer and just copy and paste. SomNote is great because I can used it anywhere.

Of course, it doesn’t work so well in the shower, so I’m still waiting for a waterproof phone. Or perhaps it can wait for a few minutes until I’m finished.

But, the trouble with that it, these ideas come so quickly and are sometimes so vivid that they need to be put down as quickly as possible. I have come up with the perfect dialogue for a tricky scene, and played it all out in my head, and by the time I got to the paper, it was almost gone.

Perhaps a whiteboard and a permanent marker on the wall.

Or is that going to far?

A long time ago, I received a portable tape recorder for a present, you know, the one you can hold in your hand, and the tapes so small you wonder how much will fit on it. The gifter said that when ideas came to me, all I had to do was speak. It was also voice activated.

Needless to say that conjured up a few ideas right there.

But, I used it, but I found it quite weird to be talking, ostensibly to myself, in the car whilst driving home, or go to, work, and the curious looks I’d get from others. One thing it did teach me was that when a conversation was repkayed, it would sound ok or like most of the time, hardly what one expected a conversation would really be like.

So, because of that device, I learned to read out all conversations, and if they sounded stupid, they were.

SO, ideas come in the shower, ideas come while driving, ideas come when reading the newspaper, ideas even come when reading books.

Which leads me to another point that I learned early on. Writers must read. Not only novels of their chosen genre, but any reference books that go with it. Research was, a friend and more successful author than I told me, was mandatory.

So too was the reading to the classics, old English, and sometimes American, literature, to gain an appreciation for the written word. We might not follow those styles, but we can learn the majesty of the English language.

That author taught me a lot, though at the time I didn;t realise it. Perhaps I thpought I was already smart enough to write, but I’m guessing that it took a long time before I felt my writing was worth reading before publishing it.

I don’t profess to have a fully understanding of the language. I might have loved that school subject called English, and later in University, creative writing and literature, but not all of it soaked in. But writing is one of those odd things, that it can take many forms and styles, but at the end of the day, if the reader understands where the story is going, and when at the end, is satisfied that it was ‘a good read’, then the author’s work is done.

The only trouble is, getting the next idea, and then the were withal to write a second book, or third. It is said everyone as one book in them. For those who can write more, well, that might be what might be called, a gift.

My trouble is, I have too many ideas, too many starts and brief outlines to work with, I don’t know which story to start on next. I guess being spoinlt for choice is a good thing, yes?

Motive, means, and opportunity – Some background

I’m working on a novella which may boringly be called “Motive, Means and Opportunity” where I will present a chunk of information from which you if you want to, can become the armchair detective.

This might give some clues to the players, and the events.

…

So, the question is, how did I find myself in such a situation.

It came down to choices, as it always does.

And, from the very moment I met Wendy Mauson, I knew life with her, if it came to pass, would be interesting.

She was a popular girl; one of the cheer squad that made their presence felt at most sports.  Her usual boyfriend was Garry Frobish, star quarterback and mainstay of the football team.  I played basketball, after a fashion, because I had not had the necessary growth spurt in those vital teen years, I found myself relegated to guard, of which there were many.

How did we meet?  By accident.  Garry, Wendy, and I were all at the same party, Garry made a mistake, they had a huge fight, and I was there.  It was not one of those right time right-place events, she just picked me as the most level-headed of those on offer that night.  But, I had no illusions, and whilst it was on again and off again over the next year, her real interest, and love of her life was Garry.

So, how did I finish up with Wendy?  Wendy and Garry came together as a couple at the prom, and it looked like it was a perfect match.  Until he got her pregnant, she wouldn’t get rid of the baby and he dumped her.  Who was next, me.  Did I know she was pregnant?  No.  That I discovered much later, at a hospital in tragic circumstances.

But, blissfully ignorant, and universally loved by her family, we were married.  And not long after a son, Dale, was born.

I should have recognised the signs in the few months after the birth, where she was rather self-absorbed for a time.  Had I investigated it, I would have discovered that she had been seeing Garry again, but that, too, wasn’t discovered until much later too.

But despite the ups and downs, we managed to get along as a family once she settled into the idea of being a mother until Dale was old enough to go to school.  Then she went back to work, in the office of the company that was owned by Garry’s parents.

I thought it a coincidence, but, like I said, she managed to keep it all under a shroud of secrecy for many years.

Until the unlikely happened, as it always does.  Secrets are not secrets if more than one person knows about it, and if there are more, well, it doesn’t take long for it to become common knowledge.

One of Dale’s friends told him, under the category of ‘can you keep a secret’, that my wife and Garry were ‘old’ friends, and that it had been going on for years.  How this ‘friend’ knew about it was never explained, but it turned out to be true.

I spoke to her about it, and she assured me that, yes, they did meet, but it was not like ‘that’.  I gave her the benefit of the doubt but followed her a few times observing them together, and it seemed to be as she said.

Then Dale was killed.  It was a senseless accident that in any other situation would have seen him walk away with just a few scratches.   He was rushed to the hospital and since he was a rare blood type, they tested me, and his mother.  Neither of us was a match, which seemed odd.  But even when they found a donor, in actual fact Garry, though I didn’t know it at the time, it was too late.  In fact, when I identified the body, there was not a mark on him.  He had sustained a slight bump to the head which activated an aneurysm.

A week after, when we had the funeral, and everyone came, commiserated, and left, the doctor remained.  An old basketball friend, he gave me a piece of paper and told me to read it later.  I did.  DNA proved that Dale was Garry and Wendy’s son, not mine.

Even then, I was willing to let it go.  Wendy had taken Dale’s death hard and decided the only way she could recover was to go away for a while.  And not with me.  Not a surprise, because we had been arguing a lot, over money, and the way she spent it like it was water, and I thought she had found someone else, and that was who she was going away with.

But, taking her sister was supposed to throw me off the scent.

I guess if you were going to try and continue hiding a secret relationship, you would take steps to prevent the other from finding out.  Perhaps her grief had got in the way and clouded her thinking, or she was just in a hurry to leave.

Three weeks later, a phone bill arrived at home, for a phone I certainly didn’t have, so it had to be hers.  On it were calls and texts to two numbers, one was Garry’s, the other to a man who was simply a code name.  Whilst she had left me numbers of the places she was staying, and with instructions only to call if someone was dying, I did try once, and a man answered.

I put two and two together.

And kept it to myself.  Along with all of the evidence, which consisted of a number of accounts, one from a hotel, several from car rental companies and a rental agreement for a flat, one that cost a considerable amount each month, and, when I checked through the finances, which I left her in charge of, I discovered large discrepancies in what she said we had, and what was there.

And, with all the accounts from her recovery ‘holiday’ put on the ‘no limit’ credit card which had to be paid, it took what was left.  I was left with the choice of going bankrupt or selling assets.  I did the latter, first the condominium in Bermuda, and then the lakeside holiday shack by the lake up country.  We rarely used either, so I took the gamble she wouldn’t find out.

Then she came back, I handed the accounts back to her and said nothing.  As far as she was aware, the main accounts had sufficient funds to pay the bills, and any money I’d earned in her absence had been squirrelled away.

Perhaps, by that time, I could see the end was nigh.

As it was when Garry was found murdered and set off the chain of events that saw me being implicated in his murder, by Wendy, but for reasons she thought I didn’t know about.

That was about to change when I was summoned to a meeting at her lawyer’s office.  I didn’t know she personally had one.  Then, there was a lot about Wendy I knew nothing about.

…

© Charles Heath 2019-2023

Motive, means, and opportunity – Opportunity

I’m working on a novella which may boringly be called “Motive, Means and Opportunity” where I will present a chunk of information from which you if you want to, can become the armchair detective.

Here’s the third part, the Opportunity

 

Where was I last night between 9pm and 3am?

Not with my wife, Wendy. She had gone out before 6 pm, about the time is got home from work. No, she didn’t really say where she was going, or if she did, given the list of the past, I didn’t believe her.

Where was I?

Home, alone.

Could anyone corroborate that?

Sadly no.  Isn’t that always the way, though?

But, the car I was driving was a company car. It had a GPS and tracking system, part of so-called security measures put in by the company I worked for, but in reality there to check after hours use.

The GPS would show I never left home.  Using the car, that is.

The only other car had been taken by Wendy so the reality was, I hadn’t left home. The other car, the off-road vehicle was in the workshop, still waiting to be repaired. It was the car out son had been killed in, and neither of us had the heart to do anything with it.

But…

Apparently, I had a visitor.

James Burgman had been seen outside my house at 10:30 pm, his car had been found two blocks away in the car park, away from the street, and he was found dead, shot by a gun that used 9mm bullets, at 4:45 am the next morning.

No. I had not been seen leaving the house, but it had been ascertained that it was possible to leave and not be seen, if I tried hard enough.

I hadn’t and had no reason to, but that didn’t seem to matter.

Sitting in the interview room, purportedly to help the police in their enquiries, Detective John Sanderson had detailed quite succinctly how I had a motive, the means, and opportunity.

Little else mattered, and particularly the fact I didn’t do it. It was only a matter of time before the gun was found.

So, there I sat in the station, waiting for a series of test results to come back, mainly gunshot residue on me and on my clothes, not just those I was wearing, but everything I owned.

In the end, there was nothing. They couldn’t prove I left home, or that I shot him. Not then. I was advised not to leave the city, that I was a person of interest.

When I asked either my wife, Wendy, had been subjected to the same interrogation, the atmosphere changed, and Sanderson had rounded on me quite savagely.

“Her innocence is not in question. In fact, you would not be here if it wasn’t for her statement. She honestly believes you shot him out of pure jealousy, and, quite frankly Mr Winters, so do I, and it will only be a matter of time before I find the evidence to convict you.  Now, get out of my sight.”

 

© Charles Heath 2019

A score to settle – The Second Editor’s draft – Day 28

The time has come to work on the second draft for the editor, taking into account all of the suggested changes, and there are quite a few. So much for thinking I could put in an almost flawless manuscript.

…

We’re near the end, and I have to say, it has been hard work.

Today I’ve been writing, revising and reading. There are aspects to the flow that are bothering me, and I know I’m supposed to let it mull for a while before I start editing, but I’m like that, I have to do something about it now, not later.

While I’m doing that, I’ve been working on a musical theme for the writing and hit upon the big band sounds of the 1940s and ’50s.

I have always been fascinated by that era of music, particularly Benny Goodman, but not so much the Dorsey brothers.

It then led to the final chapter, as I was playing Sing, Sing, Sing, I had the vision, in the ballroom, just our main character, and Teresa, with a few selected guests.

I’m also one of those people who like happy endings to the stories, or at least until the next book in the series starts.

Two days to go and I can rest.

Maybe. Maybe not. We’ll see.

A score to settle – The Second Editor’s draft – Day 28

The time has come to work on the second draft for the editor, taking into account all of the suggested changes, and there are quite a few. So much for thinking I could put in an almost flawless manuscript.

…

We’re near the end, and I have to say, it has been hard work.

Today I’ve been writing, revising and reading. There are aspects to the flow that are bothering me, and I know I’m supposed to let it mull for a while before I start editing, but I’m like that, I have to do something about it now, not later.

While I’m doing that, I’ve been working on a musical theme for the writing and hit upon the big band sounds of the 1940s and ’50s.

I have always been fascinated by that era of music, particularly Benny Goodman, but not so much the Dorsey brothers.

It then led to the final chapter, as I was playing Sing, Sing, Sing, I had the vision, in the ballroom, just our main character, and Teresa, with a few selected guests.

I’m also one of those people who like happy endings to the stories, or at least until the next book in the series starts.

Two days to go and I can rest.

Maybe. Maybe not. We’ll see.

Motive, means, and opportunity – Means

I’m working on a novella which may boringly be called “Motive, Means and Opportunity” where I will present a chunk of information from which you if you want to, can become the armchair detective.

Here’s the second part, the so-called Means

 

Everyone knew I had a gun.  It was locked away in a safe that was not in an obvious position in the dressing room at home.

Several years ago our neighbourhood had been subjected to several breaking and several people had been injured, prompting the rest of us to seriously consider getting protection.

I got a Glock 19, 9 mm along with several of my neighbours and then both Wendy and I got lessons so we knew how to use it properly, and avoid shooting either each other or in our feet.

The thing is, there had only been that one round of breaking, and since the gun was put away on the safe about eighteen months ago, it had not seen the light of day since.

Or so I thought.

When asked to check if it was still there, it wasn’t, much to my surprise.

Equally, to my surprise, the bullet that killed James Burgman was a nine millimetre.  Was that a coincidence, I didn’t think so.

 

© Charles Heath 2019

Motive, means, and opportunity – Motive

I’m working on a novella which may boringly be called “Motive, Means and Opportunity” where I will present a chunk of information from which you if you want to, can become the armchair detective.

Here’s the first part, the so-called Motive

So, here’s the thing…

I said it.  Not once, in the heat of the moment, but more than once, to several different people.  I wanted James Burgman dead.

Why?

Because I knew he was the man sleeping with my wife, Wendy.

I’d long suspected she was having an affair, you know the signs, not where you expect her to be, making excuses where none were necessary if she was doing what she said she was, and disappearing for hours without an explanation.

And I knew James Burgman was an old boyfriend, a discovery that was made quite by accident.  In fact, I followed her one night, not because I was suspicious, but worried for her safety.

That was where I saw her meet him with more than just a friendly handshake.

I had to say it made me feel gutted.

But would I kill him?

It was not worth the problems it would cause me to do so, and, when push came to shove, neither of them were worth it.  I knew, even if he was out of the way, she would not stay with me. 

That train had left the station about a year ago when our only son had been killed in a senseless road accident.

© Charles Heath 2019-2023

A score to settle – The Second Editor’s draft – Day 26

The time has come to work on the second draft for the editor, taking into account all of the suggested changes, and there are quite a few. So much for thinking I could put in an almost flawless manuscript.

…

There is a history of strong female characters. They don’t have to be the lead character in order to become a focal point in the story.

I’m reminded of the CIA agent in Cuba in the latest James Bond Film, No Time To Die, where she literally kicks ass. To my mind, that is a girl to be reckoned with, and no, I would not want to meet her in a dark alley or be her enemy.

I wanted one, and put her in the Zoe series, an assassin without a conscience, but has one of those life-defining moments that doesn’t take away anything from her character, just adds another dimension.

This story is going to have one too, Teresa, only she is a different kettle of fish, to quote an analogy.

She is just the sort of person our main character’s handler recruits in a heartbeat. The fact she is in jail when we first meet her just adds to the mystique.

And when the main character and her meet, it’s like water and oil. She had a role to play, even if it’s not the one our main character is led to believe is.

The trouble is, I’m having too much fun playing to the two off against each other, so much so, I’m beginning to like her, as much as I would, in real life (if such a person existed) fear her.

Interesting question: how would I react if my imaginary world suddenly became all too real?

I guess that’s another story.