The Grin of the Dark Read online

  By now I'm improvising, since Rufus is gazing at me as if he expects more or better. 'Maybe one about dubbing,' I say in some desperation. 'I could interview actors who've dubbed films and call it, call it Speaking for Ourselves. Or how does this sound, a book about films that were never made? Did you know the Phantom of the Opera Hammer made with Herbert Lom, they'd written it for Cary Grant? And Hitchcock nearly filmed Lucky Jim. Who knows how much unmade stuff there is if I can track it down.'

  'If anyone can, Simon, I'm sure it's you.' Rufus is petting his beard, a gesture that used to indicate that he was waiting for a student to add to a presentation. 'Right now we need whatever you can turn in quickest,' he says. 'I think you should publish your thesis.'

  I open my mouth to enthuse, but perhaps I'm assuming too much. 'You mean you'd pay me for it?'

  'Handsomely, so long as you revise it enough that we can call it a new work. May I suggest how you could?'

  'Go ahead. You're my editor.'

  'If you can make it more entertaining, don't hesitate. I'm not saying it isn't already, but the bigger the audience we can net the better. Expand wherever you see the chance if you have the material. I'd love to read more about – who was that silent comedian who's been written out of the film histories?'

  'Tubby Thackeray, you mean. I couldn't even find a footnote.'

  'That's the man. I thought your paragraph on him was fascinating, especially how he may have suffered from the Arbuckle case. People took against him just because they thought he sounded like Fatty, you think? There must be a chapter in him at least.'

  'I'm not sure how I'd find out more than I did.'

  'However you have to. Whatever you need to spend will be taken care of. Mr Tickell isn't going to question your expenses.'

  'Would I have to spend it first and claim it back?'

  'That's the usual way, I believe.' Rufus searches my expression while I try not to look too mendicant. 'But you'll see an advance as soon as the contract's signed,' he says. 'What would you say to ten thousand now and twenty when the book's delivered?'

  It's more than I would earn in two years from both my present jobs. 'I'd say thank you very much.'

  'Maybe we can raise the stakes for your next book,' Rufus says, perhaps a little disappointed that I wasn't more effusive. 'I don't want to go too mad too soon. Give me your email and I'll attach a contract to you tomorrow.'

  He produces a pen and notebook from inside his jacket. Dozens of wiry hairs spring up on the back of his hand as he tugs off his glove. 'It's [email protected],' I tell him. 'Would you like me to use a pseudonym on the book?'

  'Most decidedly not. It's restoring reputations. Let's see what it can do for yours.'

  A Triumph has pulled up on the forecourt. Like every customer for petrol, the driver ignores the sign that asks him to pay first. He waves the metal nozzle at me, and I step behind the counter to push the button that starts the pump. 'I'll leave you to your duties,' Rufus says and extends a hand across the ageing headlines of the newspapers on the counter.

  His hand feels very little less plump than it did in its glove. As I lock the door behind him he leaves me a grin that's by no means negated by its hairy frame, and mouths 'You'll be hearing from me.' I return behind the counter and don my widest smile as the Triumph driver saunters to the window. I'm going to enjoy my shift. My only regret is that it's too late to tell Natalie my news tonight, but tomorrow's on the way. It can be the first day of my real life.

  FOUR - LISTS

  Tubby Thackeray

  Date of birth (location)

  1880?

  England

  Date of death (details)

  ?

  Mini biography

  Thackeray Lane began his career in English music hall. After he (show more)

  Actor – filmography

  1. Leave 'Em Laughing (1928) (uncredited) ... Driver in traffic jam

  2. Tubby Tells the Truth (1920, unreleased)

  3. Tubby's Trick Tricycle (1919)

  At once I realise something is wrong, though not with the Internet Movie Database. I scroll down the list and try to ignore my neighbour at the adjacent terminal, who is humming under his breath a bunch of notes with which a pianist might accompany a chase in a silent film.

  4. Tubby's Tremendous Teeth (1919)

  5. Tubby's Tiny Tubbies (1919)

  6. Tubby's Telephonic Travails (1919)

  7. Tubby Turns Turtle (1918)

  8. Tubby Takes the Train (1918)

  9. Tubby's Terrible Triplets (1918)

  10. Tubby Tackles Tennis (1917)

  11. Tubby's Table Talk (1917)

  12. Tubby Tattle-Tale (1917)

  13. Tubby Tastes the Tart (1916)

  14. Tubby's Telepathic Tricks (1916)

  15. Tubby's Telescopic Thrill (1916)

  16. Tubby's Tinseled Tree (1915)

  17. Tubby's Trojan Task (1915)

  18. Tubby's Troublesome Trousers (1915)

  19. Tubby Turns the Tables (1915)

  20. Tubby Tries It On (1914)

  21. Tubby the Troll (1914)

  22. Tubby's Twentieth-Century Tincture (1914)

  23. Just for a Laugh (1914) ... Avoirdupois the Apothecary

  24. The Best Medicine (1914) ... Pholly the Pharmacist

  Writer – filmography

  Leave 'Em Laughing (uncredited gag writer)

  Archive footage

  Those Golden Years of Fun (1985)

  The biography button on the sidebar brings me a reference to Surréalistes Malgré Eux (Éditions Nouvelle Année, 1971). That's all, and in one sense it's more than enough, because the dates in the list are wrong. Whatever ended Thackeray's career, it couldn't have been the Arbuckle scandal. The party at which Fatty caused Virginia Rappe's death began on Labor Day in 1921, the year after Tubby last starred in a film.

  Where did I get the idea that the events are connected? From somewhere on the Internet or here in the harsh light of the British Film Institute's reading room? It surely doesn't matter, though I'm irritated that so recent a memory is stored beyond retrieval. I click on the biography link to be shown more. Thackeray Lane began his career in English music hall. After he put on so much weight that a stage collapsed beneath him – after he was banned from theatres for making suggestive jokes about telescopes and tarts – after he turned out to be incapable of uttering a sentence that didn't contain at least a trio of Ts – For all I know, any of these could be the case, because the link doesn't work. I abandon it and search the web for Thackeray Lane.

  It's at least two places in England. The name also belonged to a professor of mediaeval history whose papers are archived at Manchester University, but I can find no reference to a comedian. A search for Tubby Thackeray brings me no results at all, and he isn't listed in the library catalogue. The Institute's Summary of Information on Film and Television database lists his films, but the National Film and Television Archive has none of them, not even Those Golden Years of Fun.

  I can't quite restrain a sigh, which apparently draws the man who was humming an old tune. He keeps his breath and its burden to himself as he leans over my shoulder. When I glance up, sunlight through the blinds behind him sears my vision. I have the impression that his face is very pale, at least in part, and unnecessarily large, perhaps because he's looming so close. As I blink like an unearthed mole he shuffles out of view beyond the only bookcase, and I head for the counter, above which a screen announces that a copy of Silent Secrets is awaiting a reader called Moore. 'Did you find what you wanted?' the librarian says.

  'I was hoping for more, to be honest.' When she tilts her long face up as though her interrogative smile has lifted it I say 'You won't have heard of Tubby Thackeray, by any chance?'

  'He does seem to ring a bell.' She ponders and then shakes her head, displacing her smile. 'I must have someone else in mind. I don't think I've heard of him.'

  'Some of us have.'

  I turn but can't identify the speaker. No
ne of the readers at the tables is looking at me, nor at anyone else for having spoken. I'm not even sure how close the man's voice was. 'What was that?' I ask the librarian.

  'I said I haven't heard of him.'

  'Not you, the other person.' When she looks perplexed I murmur 'The one who just spoke.'

  'I'm afraid I'm not able to help you there.'

  How could she have been unaware that someone was talking so loud? I'm about to wonder when I realise that every time I've addressed her she has gazed straight at my lips. 'Sorry, you're, I see,' I babble and swing around to question our audience. 'Tubby Thackeray, anybody?'

  Do they think I'm inviting someone to reveal he's the comedian? Nobody betrays the least hint of having spoken earlier. Was it the man who craned over my shoulder? He isn't behind the shelves now. He must have made the comment on his way out. I sprint past the security gate, which holds its peace, into Stephen Street. He isn't there, nor can I see him from the junction with Tottenham Court Road. He should be easily identifiable; he was bulky enough, or his clothes were. Once I tire of gazing at the lunchtime crowds I retrace my frustrated steps. It's the quickest route to meeting Natalie for lunch.

  As I turn corner after narrow corner the wind blows away my misty breath. An awning flaps beyond an alley, a sound like footsteps keeping pace with me, except that they would be absurdly large. I dodge across Oxford Street behind a bus full of children with painted faces and sidle through the parade of early Christmas shoppers to Soho Square. In the central garden, around which the railings look darkened by rain that the pendulous sky has yet to release, a loosely overcoated man is opening and closing his wide mouth in a silent soliloquy or a tic.

  The Choice Cuts restaurant is across the square, next door to the film censor's offices. Three steps up lead directly into the bar, which is decorated with photographs of people who have had problems with the censor, a signed portrait of Ken Russell beside one of an equally fat-faced Michael Winner. Natalie is at a table in a semicircular booth halfway down the darkly panelled room, under a poster that repeats IT'S ONLY A MOVIE. As soon as she sees me she slides off the padded bench. 'Simon, I tried to call you.'

  I forgot to switch my mobile on when I left the library. The table bears two drinks besides hers, and at once I know why she looks apologetic. Her greeting might be the cue for the door marked CENSORED next to the bar to open, revealing her parents. 'Was this place your idea?' Bebe says, perhaps before noticing me. 'Oh, hello, Simon.'

  'It was mine,' I say. 'What's wrong with it?'

  'I could do without the pictures in the comfort station. Warren says his was just as bad.'

  'We were in the West End and we happened to call Natalie,' Warren says, closing a hand around my elbow. 'We can leave if you want to celebrate by yourselves.'

  'Don't feel you have to leave when you've got drinks.'

  'You'll have one for sure.' When I admit to it and identify it Warren tells the barman 'White wine for our guest.'

  'I'll join you in a minute.' I feel driven to discover what offences the Gents may be concealing. The white-tiled room proves to feature framed stills from old sex comedies, of performers whose nakedness is obscured by their embraces. There's even the odd nipple, but nothing to hinder my using the nearest urinal. I'm distracted only by a flapping beyond the high window. Is it an injured bird? It sounds more like someone with outsize flat feet repeatedly leaping to try and peer through the grille of the window. I zip myself up as soon as I can and am nearly at the door when something behind me lets out a harsh rattling breath. Of course I strayed too close to the hand dryer.

  Natalie's parents are next to her on the plump bench. Bebe pats the space beside herself. 'We ordered for you,' Warren says. 'We have to be out of here relatively fast. Natalie said what she thought you'd like.'

  Does he see any connection between his last two sentences? As I take a mouthful of whatever the house wine is meant to be, his wife says 'So do you think that magazine will give your publisher a problem?'

  'He's going to make sure it doesn't. He's my old film tutor.'

  'He won't be working for the university any more, then.'

  'He is, but now he's editing for them as well.'

  'I guess relying on the state is safest.'

  'We won't be doing that. An old boy has left them all his money to publish art books that'll sell.'

  'Let's hope they do. Here's to his memory.' Warren clinks his glass against his family's and at last mine, at which point he asks 'What's the series you're planning?'

  'It isn't a series as such, but I've got quite a few books in my head.'

  'We thought you'd been commissioned to write a whole series, didn't we, Warren? Tell us what they're about, then, Simon.'

  'I'm working on one about people in film who've fallen from grace.'

  'You'll know about that.' Bebe finishes her drink and brandishes a finger and her glass for any waiter to respond, then lowers both in my direction. 'Didn't you write about it for your degree?'

  'I did, and now Rufus wants me to expand it for publication.'

  'You'll need to change it as much as you're able, I suppose.'

  'I don't know why you should say that,' Natalie intervenes. 'I thought it was a good read, and Simon's tutor certainly did.'

  'Your mother means he'll need to so the university don't think they're getting stuff they already paid good money for.'

  'They won't be,' I say and take advantage of the arrival of a waiter to order another drink. 'I'm researching someone they'll never have heard of.'

  'Researching,' Warren says. 'What's that going to cost in time and money?'

  'As much as it has to, I should think. They'll be paying my expenses.'

  'So long as your grant covers it,' Bebe quite unnecessarily says.

  'It isn't a grant,' Natalie objects before I can.

  'Grant, expenses, whichever. Money the university will be paying to keep him afloat. Do you have a title, Simon?'

  'It's They Made Movies Too.'

  'That's what you called your thesis, is it?'

  'That was Forgotten Filmmakers,' Natalie says. 'This sounds like a real book.'

  Though her parents are no more than silent, it feels discontented. I've no idea what I might be provoked to say if I weren't inhibited by the approach of waiters, one bearing glasses, the other with a tray of lunch. I was expecting an appetiser. I know we would have to be seated at the bar to share Canapé Apocalypse, but I thought the Hallorans might have ordered the mixed starters, In the Realm of the Senses. My kebab platter is called I Spitted Your Fave, while Natalie has ordered Duck à la Clockwork Orange and her father has chosen Last Grouse on the Left. Bebe inhales the aroma of her Mardi Gras Casserole and lifts her face prettily towards the waiter. 'Smells good, but why's it called that?'

  'I couldn't say, madam. I'll have to ask.'

  'Don't go anywhere,' Bebe says and turns to me. 'Here's the guy who can tell us.'

  'I don't know either, sorry.'

  'Oh dear. Maybe you don't know as much about the movies as you think.'

  However irrational my reaction may be, the presence of the waiter makes Bebe's comment almost physically unbearable. I blank out for a moment as if my brain has crashed. At least when I regain my awareness, nobody seems to have noticed. Natalie's expression includes sympathy and a plea that I shouldn't lose my temper. I unload a skewer with my fork and lay the pointed shaft along the edge of the plate. I won't be responding to Bebe's challenge here or now, but I'll remember it. I'm all the more determined to put myself and Tubby Thackeray back where we should be on the map.

  FIVE - LOST

  Mardi Gras Massacre is a 1981 film set in New Orleans, though reportedly you mightn't know until the final reel fills up with carnival footage. Earlier a maniac removes the hearts from three naked women, or rather from the same rubber body double thrice. The film was banned in Britain the year it was made, otherwise even fewer people would have heard of it. Perhaps the management at Choice Cuts shoul
d explain the names of dishes to the staff.

  While I'm consulting the Internet Movie Database I revisit Tubby Thackeray's page. All the titles are dead and black, with no links to further information, and he doesn't have a message board. I move to abebooks, an assemblage of booksellers, and enter Surréalistes Malgré Eux in the search box. Three shops have the book. The cheapest copy, described as annotated in pencil, is at Le Maître des Livres in Quebec. I send the details of my credit card and pay for express delivery. Now I just need to be as lucky with Those Golden Years of Fun.

  A site called Silents Entire reveals that besides famous names, the compilation includes less-remembered stars – Charley Chase, Tubby Thackeray, Max Linder, Hector Mann, Max Davidson. The trouble is that Amazon shows it's deleted, and nobody is offering it secondhand on the site. There's always eBay, where a seller called Moviemad has listed a copy. The auction ends in three days, and two people are bidding. The top bid is £2.50, but I can buy the item now for a penny under fifteen pounds. I click on the option, only to be told I have to register and choose a screen name and password. The name can be Restorer, the password Esteem. As soon as an email confirms this I put in the winning bid, and my sigh of relief mists the screen. I reach out to wipe it with my handkerchief, and it turns blank as slate.

  My room and the view of squat twin houses weighed down by a grey sky disappear in sympathy. I've gone as good as blind with panic. Then I can see, though it restores nothing to the screen. I send the mouse skating all over my desk and hit enough keys to spell at least one nonsensical word, but the screen remains featureless. I thumb the power button and hold it until I hear the computer shut down, then I release it and switch on. The initial test appears and vanishes, followed by the usual flurry of system details. They've never meant much to me, but the word that terminates each line does. Lost, it says they are. Lost. Lost.

  I let out a sound too furious to contain syllables and bruise my elbows on the desk while I blot out the sight of the relentless word so that I can think. I've copied all my work onto discs, and I have a printout of my thesis. The crash is surely no worse than inconvenient. I'm trying to find the phone number of the computer shop among the bills and invoices in my desk drawer when the door rattles with a knock and then with several. 'Simon?' my neighbour Joe calls. 'Was that you?'