Martyn Pig Read Online Free Page A

read the whole lot in two days. Then I read them all again.
    And that’s how I came to love mystery stories. Murder mysteries, crime novels, whodunits, thrillers, detective stories, call them what you like, I love them.
    After I’d put all the shopping away then tidied up a bit and done the washing-up and made Dad some cheese on toast, I went up to my room and lay on the bed and tried to read for a while.
The Big Sleep
by Raymond Chandler. In case you don’t know, Raymond Chandler is the best detective writer ever. Philip Marlowe, that’s who he writes about. Marlowe, Private Investigator. Cool, tough, bitter and funny. A man of honour. Mean streets. Mean villains. Mean city. Bad girls, good girls, crazy girls. Good cops, bad cops. Snappy dialogue. Blackmail, murder, mystery and suspense. And a plot with more twists than a snake with bellyache. I’d read all the other Marlowe stories and I’d been looking forward to reading
The Big Sleep
for ages. It’s supposed to be his best. But when I opened it up and started to read, I just couldn’t get going. The words wouldn’t stick. I’d get to the bottom of the page then realise I couldn’t remember anything I’d just read. So I’d start again, concentrating, making sure I read every line, every word, one at a time, nice and slow, and then halfway through I’d lose it again. I don’t know. It was like I had no control over my thoughts, they’d just drift off somewhere without my knowing. So, I gave up on the book and just lay there on the bed, staring blindly at the ceiling.
    I thought about Alex. I was looking forward to seeing her later that evening. She came round most evenings. Sometimes I’d go over to her place, but mostly she came to mine. We didn’t do anything, just sat around talking. I remember the very first time she came round, about a week after we’d first met, I didn’t know what to think. I was in a right state. Why was she coming? What did she want? Did she fancy me? What should I do? I was a quivering wreck. But when she showed up it was as if we’d known each other for years. No problem. No uneasiness. No awkward undertones. She didn’t even seem too bothered about Dad.
    â€˜Is he always drunk?’ she’d asked, after he’d stumbled through the bedroom door, eyed her up, winked at me like a lecher then stumbled out again.
    â€˜Just about.’
    â€˜Mine was like that,’ she said matter-of-factly. ‘That’s why Mum got rid of him.’
    Her mum was an actress. She’d had a part in a daytime soap about fifteen years ago. I don’t remember the name of it. It was something about a clothes shop, or a factory or something. Anyway, she was in it for about a year.
    â€˜She was quite well known for a while,’ Alex told me. ‘Not famous, exactly, sort of semi-famous.’
    â€˜Like what’s-her-name from thingy?’
    â€˜Who?’
    I smiled.
    â€˜Oh, right,’ she said. ‘Yeah, like that. People used to come up to her and say: You’re that one off the telly, aren’t you? You’re ... no, don’t tell me, it’s on the tip of my tongue ... don’t tell me ...’
    â€˜And what was it?’
    â€˜What?
    â€˜Her name.’
    â€˜Shirley Tucker!’ she laughed. ‘A sexy young blonde with a heart of gold. Mum had to wear this great big wig, you know, with loads of mak-eup, short skirts and everything. She looked great. Anyway, a couple of years after I was born Shirley and her boyfriend were
tragically killed
in a motorcycle accident ... and since then Mum’s found it really hard to find any steady work. She still gets the odd acting job now and then – local theatre, adverts, the occasional bit part on TV, that sort of thing – but it’s not enough to pay the rent, so she’s had to go back to part-time nursing. She hates it.’
    â€˜Why did they kill off her