The Twist of a Knife

‘Oh, yes. I don’t know why it pissed him off so much. I mean, he had some big parts in American TV before he came here. He could have stayed and had a Hollywood career. Maybe it’s just because I’m so much younger than him. Some of the old-school actors are like that. They think you’ve got to spend years doing walk-on parts in the provinces and bit parts on TV before you get your big break. It’s happened to me faster, that’s all. And he doesn’t like it.’

‘You didn’t go to drama school.’ This was something that Jordan had told Hawthorne. He certainly hadn’t been happy about that.

‘Actually, you’re right. That’s definitely something Jordan resented. I never “learned my craft”. But it wasn’t my fault! I never even wanted to go into acting. The whole thing was as big a surprise to me as anyone else.’ Tirian had a little travel alarm clock on the table beside him and he twisted it round to check the time. ‘It happened when I was twenty-two. It’s funny, really. I just walked into it.’

‘Tirian is a Welsh name …’ Hawthorne said. It was one of his habits, throwing in observations that seemingly came from nowhere.

Tirian smiled. ‘Yes. I was born in Chepstow, in Monmouthshire. My mother called me Tirian because it means “kind”, which is what I always try to be.’

‘She must be very proud of you.’

His face fell. ‘She’s dead. I lost both my parents when I was very small. They were in a car accident. Their car was hit by a delivery truck just outside London.’

‘I’m sorry.’

‘I was only five years old. I hardly even remember them really. I moved up to Harrogate in North Yorkshire. I was brought up by an aunt.’

That explained the sense of otherness I’d felt when I was with Tirian, and perhaps the absence of many cards or flowers in his dressing room. He had no family and I’d never seen him go out with friends.

‘My parents were very ordinary people. My father was a doctor. My mother worked in the same surgery – she was the receptionist. I was an only child and they weren’t sure what to do with me after the accident. I’d probably have ended up in an orphanage or something except that my dad had an aunt, my great-aunt May, and she stepped in and said I could live with her. She was on her own and she was quite well off. She was everything to me growing up. She’s still close to me now.’

He reached out and picked up one of the three cards he had been sent. It showed a cartoon of a man reaching down to pick up a four-leaf clover … just missing an old-fashioned safe that was plummeting down from a building behind him. The words GOOD LUCK were printed in silver foil. Hawthorne opened it and we read the message, written in a cramped, almost childish hand. Hope the first night goes well. All my love. AM.

‘Nice of her to remember,’ I said.

‘She’s got dementia,’ Tirian replied. ‘She’s in a care home now and the nurses will have helped her with the card because she doesn’t remember anything very much.’ For a moment he was sad, but then he smiled. ‘I had a wonderful time living with her. She had a beautiful house, a two-up-two-down on Otley Road … just opposite the tennis club. I used to go there all the time. I wasn’t crazy about the sport, but mixed doubles was definitely my thing. That’s where I had my first kiss. And my first cigarette.’

‘Did you go to school in Harrogate?’

‘Yeah. I got into Harrogate Grammar School. It was only five minutes away from where I lived. I was there until I was sixteen. Funnily enough, there was a teacher there – Miss Havergill – who was always trying to get me interested in drama. She put me in The Pied Piper, playing the king of the rats. I enjoyed that. Maybe it should have told me something, but I was a lazy little sod. I didn’t do A levels. I couldn’t wait to start work.’

‘What did you want to do?’

‘I didn’t really care. I just wanted to have enough money to have my own place, a fast car, travel … that sort of thing. Aunt May managed to get me a job with the National Trust in York. I started as a programmes manager in the event-management department. Twelve thousand pounds a year – that was my first salary. It was pretty boring, to be honest with you, and I wouldn’t have stuck it very long, but then one of those weird coincidences happened and it sort of changed my life.’

He was talking faster now, aware of time ticking away.

‘They were shooting a TV series called Heartbeat in one of our properties near Leeds. You must remember it. It was a cop show set in the sixties. I was sent down there to act as a liaison officer – to make sure that everything went all right – and they asked me if I’d like to be an extra, just for a lark. I ended up playing a stable boy. The episode was about a farmer who shoots someone’s dog or something. Anyway, I was up to my knees in mud, hanging on to a horse, which terrified me because I’d never been near one before, and I loved every minute of it.