Page 88 of Marble Hall Murders

‘You met Frederick Turner.’

‘He happened to be in the house when I was there and he invited me for a coffee.’ Eliot had put me on the defensive, even though there was absolutely no reason for me to feel that way.

‘And Dr Lambert just happened to be at home when you called in on him?’ he continued.

‘I don’t see what your problem is, Eliot. You’ve turned all these people into characters in your book. You’re obviously writing about Marble Hall and your grandmother, and you’re doing exactly what I warned you against: mixing fiction and real life to settle a score. That’s what got Alan Conway killed, and what nearly did for me too. So why should you be surprised that I spoke to the people involved with your family? I’d say I was protecting you from yourself, although given what you did to Gillian, I’m not sure why I should bother.’

It was as if he hadn’t heard me. ‘My uncle Jonathan rang me. You saw him, too, and you met my brother. I can’t believe you talked about me with mybrother!’ He sounded disgusted. ‘I thought I could trust you, but you’ve been creeping around behind my back, digging into things that are none of your business.’

‘The book is my business.’

‘Exactly, Susan. The book. Not me, not my family and not my sodding private life. You know what? I’m not so sureI need your help with my book either. So far, everything you’ve said about it has been completely unconstructive. You didn’t like the title. You didn’t like the opening. You didn’t like the setting.’

‘I wouldn’t have said anything about your great masterpiece if you hadn’t shoved it into my hands, Eliot. You also insisted I give you my thoughts. But as I told you at the time, my comments were suggestions, not criticisms. If I’d known you had such a thin skin, I wouldn’t have said anything.’

‘What you did was you undermined my self-confidence and …’ he jabbed a finger against the side of his head ‘… you screwed up my thinking. All I wanted was encouragement. You gave me the exact opposite.’

I knew exactly what he was doing. He’d steered the conversation away from himself and what he had done to Gillian. Instead, he was turning the tables, as if I was the one throwing the punches and he was the victim. Looking at him lolling in his worn-out armchair in this shabby excuse for a club, I was disgusted.

I stood up.

‘There’s no point talking to you when you’re like this, Eliot, and I’m not sure I want to work on your book, if you really want the truth. You should go home and look after your wife.’

‘My wife has got nothing to do with you.’

‘And if she’s got any sense, she’ll have nothing to do with you either.’

‘Go to hell, Susan.’

‘Drop dead, Eliot.’

I walked out, angry with myself for losing my temper butstill glad that it was over. I didn’t want to work with him. I had been right from the start. He was trouble and so was his book. I should never have got involved.

As I left, I noticed that the other club members hadn’t moved. The chess players were still not playing chess. Bruce, the barman, had started wiping another glass. It was as if none of them had heard the conversation between Eliot and me.

But they had.

Front Row

Transcript of the interview between Samira Ahmed and Eliot Crace, broadcast onFront Row, 21 June 2023.

SA:

This year marks the twentieth anniversary of the death of one of the UK’s best-loved children’s authors. Miriam Crace was the creator of the Little People series of books about a miniature family who are devoted to helping ‘the bigguns’ – which is how they describe the rest of humanity. She wrote sixty-three adventures during her lifetime and Netflix have announced a deal reputedly worth two hundred million dollars to bring the characters to the screen. Eliot Crace is her grandson and a published writer himself. He has just been named as the author of three continuation novels that will feature the detective Atticus Pünd, created by Alan Conway. Eliot is with me in the studio now.

Eliot, we’ll come to Atticus Pünd in a minute, but first I’d like to ask you about your grandmother. You grew up in Marble Hall, near Devizes, which was the house whereshe lived and worked. I imagine you must have had quite an unusual childhood?