Kill My Darling

  But she said, ‘There’s something else.’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘If I do go for it, and I don’t get it – I don’t know how I’ll cope with that.’

  ‘Why shouldn’t you get it? You’re good enough, aren’t you?’

  ‘It isn’t always a matter of that. There’s style, too, and personality – getting on with people.’

  ‘You get on with everyone.’

  ‘And age.’

  ‘Ah,’ said Slider.

  ‘Music’s getting to be more and more a young person’s field. They don’t value experience and knowing the repertoire and all the rest of it. Not above youth and looks, anyway. Suppose I went for the audition, and I didn’t get it. You know how I hate to fail.’

  ‘You can’t let that stop you trying things.’

  ‘Yes, that’s the point isn’t it?’ she said, giving him another amused and rueful look. ‘Would I feel more of a failure for failing, or for not trying?’

  He made a helpless gesture with his hands. ‘I can’t tell you that. How can I tell you that? You really want Atherton for these abstruse, philosophical discussions. I’m just an ordinary, common-or-garden copper.’

  Another silence. She resumed: ‘I’ll tell you one thing, though.’

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘It made you forget Melanie Hunter for a while, didn’t it?’

  He looked indignant. ‘Was that what it was all about? This whole job thing was just a ruse?’

  ‘Wouldn’t you like to know?’ She grinned.

  What was it she had said – toothache to take your mind off stomach ache? And yet . . .

  While he was still thinking it out, she said, ‘Those snacks weren’t very substantial, I must say. Fancy some fish and chips? It’s not too late, is it?’

  ‘Never too late for fish and chips,’ he said.