‘I’m so terribly sorry,’ Posie lied, if not smoothly, then she hoped convincingly. ‘I’m a friend of Silvia Hanro’s. I was invited onto set and I got the most atrocious headache. She gave me a headache powder and told me to come up here to her room to lie down for a bit. She gave me her key but perhaps it works for all the doors? I’m sorry – do I have the wrong room?’
‘Oh,’ said the cook. ‘I see.’
The mention of the movie star’s name had worked its usual magic and the cook stopped looking quite so fearsome. She indicated along the corridor with a great paw of a meaty hand.
‘Yes, you have got the wrong room, Miss. Mere lowly mortals like me reside along this side. Miss Hanro and Mr Fontaine have suites down there. Her suite is on the left.’
The woman gestured along the corridor. The anger had gone from her manner but curiosity and nosiness had ebbed their way into the woman’s voice, for she had seen a rare chance to take a brief look into the rooms of the famous movie star.
‘Want me to show you, Miss? Won’t take a minute of my time.’
‘No, no. I’ll be quite all right. Thank you, and a thousand apologies.’
Posie hurried away, very aware of the time now. She saw on the other side of the corridor that just two doors stood together, rather than row upon row of them. She opened the door on the left first, well aware of the cook still watching her back. Posie dipped inside.
This was an entirely different set-up altogether: a single room, but big enough for about eight of those smaller single rooms to fit into. A kitchenette and a small bathroom were included here, together with a bedsitting room furnished in luxurious white furs and glass bookcases. A perfectly round bed was raised on a dias in the centre of the room. An open window gave onto a calm view over the back of Worton Hall: the fields, the farm, the greenhouses.
Picking her way around the room Posie saw that there was nothing remotely personal here.
Don’t these people live at all? Posie thought to herself unbelievingly.
Is there anything to learn here?
A silver-framed studio portrait of Robbie Fontaine leaning nonchalantly against a wall was placed strategically on the bedside cabinet next to a glass vase containing a mass of the same red and pink orchids as in the dressing room downstairs. Next to this was a large ceramic jar of Pond’s Cold Cream.
Going over to the bedside cabinet, Posie saw that a tiny slip of carbon paper, no bigger than a thumbnail, was sandwiched tightly under the jar of cream, together with its counterpart, an orange piece of paper which looked like it had included signatures before it got ripped apart. It looked very much like the carbon paper and its original had been weighed down by the jar of cream, perhaps to prevent the document from fluttering away in the wind, and then snatched up again in a hurry at some later point. Hurriedly Posie took the snippets of paper and put them in the pocket of her carpet bag. There was nothing stocked in the kitchen and nothing to be seen in the bathroom, either.
Dashing away again with only a few minutes to spare, Posie locked Silvia’s door. She had no time to go inside Robbie Fontaine’s room, but she swore she could hear some low rumblings, like a radio or music on a gramophone, coming from inside.
Cursing to herself for her bad management of time, she hurried over to the dark studio.
****
Posie found things much as she had left them back at the dark studio, although everyone was on a five-minute cigarette break. Most of the crew had taken the chance to stand outside, smoking as if their lives depended on it, clustered around the doorway. The two leading actors were sat smoking together in the scant shade, Silvia sitting on Robbie Fontaine’s lap, the famous blonde head and the dark dipping and moving together in perfect unison.
Annoyingly, there was simply no chance for Posie to speak to either of them.
Robbie Fontaine looked over at Posie as if she had ushered in a particularly horrible smell and looked away again shiftily, his arms still circled tightly around Silvia’s waist. Posie sighed. What was it with him, anyway?
And Tom Moran was simply nowhere to be seen.
Posie found Dolly inside the studio, squatting on the floor, happily re-stocking a large black make-up case.
Brian Langley was pacing around the stage area on his own in the darkness, checking the lighting. He looked like he wanted to thump someone, so Posie steered well clear. She called across to her friend:
‘Dolly! Come here, I need you. It’s important.’
‘Can’t move, lovey. I’m at a crucial stage with these lipsticks. You come here.’
Already exasperated and short on time, Posie explained in as calm a manner as possible and in a low tone of voice to her friend that Rufus had instructed her to bring Dolly home, with her, now.
‘What you goin’ on about, lovey?’ said Dolly, looking at Posie from the floor, a kohl pencil now jammed in her mouth, squinting up at her in the gloom. ‘Why do I need to come with you now? I don’t understand.’
Posie had sworn not to explain to Dolly about the grave danger she was in and she now felt a stab of well-contained anger at Rufus for putting her in such a ridiculous position. She had not been served a good hand, or any hand at all, come to think of it.
‘I can’t tell you I’m afraid. It’s top-secret. You just need to come now. You’ll just have to trust me on this.’
Dolly raised a painted eyebrow. ‘I’m jolly well not goin’ to. This is the best fun I’ve had in years. Years! You’ll have to drag me away from here kickin’ and screamin’. Literally.’
‘Right, then. I’m going to have to blow your cover.’
And marching over to where Brian Langley was standing adjusting a lamp, Posie tapped him on the shoulder.
‘Excuse me, Mr Langley?’
The Producer turned, his tiny eyes glittering menacingly.
‘What? Oh, it’s you.’
He stood up a bit straighter, as if remembering his earlier promise to help Posie, if necessary. He lit a cigarette and tried to smile.
‘Finding your way around okay, are you? Asked lots of questions? Any the wiser as to these daft threats, are you?’
‘I don’t think they’re so daft, sir. Miss Hanro should take great care. But I’ve definitely seen as much as I need to here. Please be assured that I’m going to carry on with this job when I get back to town; I’m going to pursue some other important leads, including investigating the stalker fellow you mentioned. I’ll be back here tomorrow, first thing. But that’s not what I wanted to tell you just now.’
‘Oh?’
‘You see your new make-up mistress over there, my friend from the car?’
‘What of her? She’s bally good as it happens. Better than that woman Samuelson insisted on supplying. Your pal’s quick. I like that.’
‘That’s as maybe. But it could spell trouble for you, sir. She’s actually Dolly, Lady Cardigeon, and her husband is Rufus, Lord Cardigeon. She’s happy as anything mucking about here, but I don’t think her husband will be when he hears about it. If he hears about it. So I’m just going to take her home with me, right now. Just so you know.’
Brian Langley looked thunderstruck for a split-second before recovering his usual angry stance.
‘That so?’
He looked over at Dolly who was obstinately continuing to match tubes of orange Leichner into different rows according to their shade, with a determined expression on her face, pretending to be oblivious to their conversation. A telephone had begun ringing somewhere in the background and its shrill sound went on and on. Brian Langley swallowed and then stamped out the butt of his cigarette on the linoleum floor with his heel.
‘Here, Dolly love,’ he shouted across the floor. ‘You happy working here, are you? Only your pal wants you to leave now with her.’ His voice dripped with sarcasm and he gave Posie a quick smile which was really a jibe.
Dolly looked from one to the other of them and gave a small moue of distaste.
‘I’m quite happy here, Mr Langl
ey,’ she called over. ‘Quite happy.’
‘Good. Well, carry on then. As you are. I don’t intend losing you. Only, forget going to pick up your pay packet from Reggie at six-thirty. We have a marriage bar in this industry, so by rights you shouldn’t be working at all. I don’t want to do anything illegal. But if I’m not paying you we can just say it was for the thrill of the experience, can’t we? And it means you can work late here, too, if we do it that way.’
Dolly nodded and grinned. Posie almost exploded with anger at the man’s cheek, but short of dragging Dolly out physically she couldn’t do anything. Humiliated, she glared at Brian Langley, who glared back at her and shrugged his shoulders as if he didn’t have a care in the world.
Outmanoeuvred, Posie spread her hands helplessly in one final plea. ‘You’re supposed to help me, sir. Remember? Not put obstacles in my path. You’re really not helping me here. Do you really dislike me that much?’
‘Boo-hoo. Poor you. There’s help and then there’s help.’ Brian Langley grunted and turned back to his lamp.
‘I’m not going to remove a well-oiled cog from the machine, now, am I? Especially if it’s running for me for free. And no, I don’t dislike you: but you’re only here because your reputation precedes you and I thought you could fix things. I don’t really like many people, as it happens.’
Really, the man was just awful.
The telephone started up again.
‘Aren’t you going to answer that, Mr Langley?’
Brian Langley harrumphed. ‘What’s it to you, anyhow? I never answer the telephone on set, Miss Parker. It’s usually switched off. Some idiot has had it reconnected. Just sort out this mess of Silvia’s, will you?’
He strode over to another corner without a second glance at Posie and tugged the black telephone violently from its socket on the wall. Tiny blue sparks flew in the darkness. Then he started yelling at everyone to get back on set.
Speechless at Brian Langley’s bad manners, Posie turned on her heel in a barely-suppressed temper. It was almost inconceivable that it had been he who had called Posie in to Worton Hall in the first place: anyone would have thought it were she who had turned up as a thrill-seeker for the pure pleasure of the thing.
Posie found herself mentally advancing him up her list of current suspects into virtually pole position. She remembered that she had intended to visit his house on the way back to London, uninvited, and she decided now not to have any scruples about doing so.
As Posie passed Dolly she told her friend to make sure she got herself home to Chelsea safely, with a hired driver at the very least. Or else to phone Rufus and get him to collect her. But Dolly shook her head, determined.
‘You must be jokin’ lovey. I’m off the leash. And enjoyin’ every minute of it.’
‘Well, do me a favour then.’
‘What’s that?’
‘Keep your eyes and ears peeled for me here. If you need me I’ll most likely be at the office, but I’m meeting the Chief Inspector at nine o’clock at the Temple tonight. You can always find me there.’
‘Fine. Right you are.’
‘I’m sure nothing will happen before tomorrow but look out for anything odd.’
Dolly roared with laughter. ‘’Course I will, lovey. But this is the movies! Everythin’s odd here.’
Posie sighed and left: she couldn’t do more. And stamping across the grass and the cinder path and through the endless crowd of extras, towards Bertie Samuelson’s driver, she found herself feeling very happy to leave.
She simply couldn’t understand Dolly’s enthusiasm to stay.
****
Eleven
Posie sat in the silent agony of a strop all the way to Richmond. She hated it when a plan didn’t come together, still less when she was subjecting her good friend to some unknown danger she had promised to guard her against.
There was nothing for it but to continue on with her evening’s work. Posie had just taken out her notebook from her carpet bag and was studying it intently when she was interrupted by the driver:
‘Miss?’
They had stopped, and Fred was rapping urgently on the glass divide.
‘This is it, Miss. Brian Langley’s place – “Globe Garden”. I know it well: I’ve dropped Mr Samuelson here often enough. Shall I just wait here by the main gates? How long will you be?’
Posie looked through the window. They were parked up on a grass verge along the main road. On the right were shops and houses, all jumbled together, but on the left-hand side were more exclusive dwellings, all high-gated and with their own stretches of the river.
‘Globe Garden’, Brian Langley’s lair, squatted behind prohibitively high gates. It looked to be a large white bungalow in a very modern, deco style. Lush manicured gardens surrounded it on every side, green and verdant despite the scorching heat, and snatches of the glittering Thames were visible beyond.
Forced out of her simmering discontent, Posie focused hard. She had no idea what it was she was searching for here, or what it was that she wanted to find out. Despite her strong dislike for Mr Langley, and her suspicions, she had nothing concrete at all which proved he would wish any harm to Silvia Hanro. Nothing.
And how exactly had she expected to get into the house at all, uninvited?
Fred, the driver, was looking at her in the mirror. He took her silence and her refusal to get out of the car as an invitation to talk. He smiled under his black driver’s cap.
‘’Course,’ he prattled in his estuary accent, ‘I’m a gardening man meself. I’ve got a nice little garden attached to my property, just a terraced house, mind, in Isleworth itself. Nothing I love better than a free Saturday spent pruning my roses, or diggin’ potatoes.’
Posie frowned uncomprehendingly.
‘I don’t quite follow you…’
‘I’m sorry. I meant that I’d give up a month of Saturdays off to spend just ten minutes inside Mr Langley’s greenhouse. They say he’s the number one collector of rare orchids in the British Isles. They’re his passion. He has quite the reputation among these posh gardening folks. Imagine!’
‘Imagine indeed!’ Posie recalled Silvia mentioning something about hot-house flowers, now she came to think of it.
‘Apparently he has some gardener fella he’s got in from the Orient to look after the flowers, the chap speaks to them and croons them lully-byes and what have you. Just like to little kiddies! I’d love to be a fly on the wall in that greenhouse! Mind you, someone’s got to do it, haven’t they? Old Langley’s never here. He’s probably here once a week at the most.’
‘I see.’ Posie stared at the gates again, her mind working sixteen to the dozen.
Fred nodded, warming to his theme, unaware of Posie’s wandering mind.
‘They say he gets written requests from dealers. And buyers for the big shops in London like Harrods, they all want to call and see his orchids. And buy some if they can. Apparently he turns them all away with a flea in their ear.’
Posie turned back to Fred in the mirror. He had unwittingly given her her entrance into the house. Or an attempt at one, anyhow.
‘I don’t know what you’re here for, Miss, but I’m glad that old Langley isn’t at home for you. I know I shouldn’t speak out of turn, but the man’s as sour as vinegar. Besides, I wouldn’t want to get on the wrong side of him in that house.’
‘Why not?’
‘They say that in addition to the imported orchids he keeps, he has whole borders full of Foxtrots.’
‘Foxtrot? Now you really have lost me.’
‘Aye. Foxtrot or Digitalis orchids. I can see you’re not a gardener, love. The most poisonous critters to be found. You’d just need to touch one of those beauties in the wrong way and you’d be making your way out of that house in a wooden box.’
‘Let me get this right. The man grows poisonous orchids? For pleasure?’
‘Aye. But to be fair to him, many plants are poisonous. But these are especially so, and they’r
e in bloom right now, as it happens.’
‘What should I look for?’
Fred smiled blissfully. ‘Beautiful pink and red blooms, maybe spotted like leopard skin if they’re feeling particularly healthy.’
‘Right. Well. Thanks for that. I’ll be about twenty minutes.’
‘You’ll let me know, won’t you? What his greenhouse is like? And watch that Housekeeper of his: she’s a sour old puss, and no mistake.’
****
The gate was unlocked, but the front door was latched across so many times that it took the Housekeeper a good couple of minutes to open it.
‘Yes?’ said a voice with a soft indistinguishable lilt, many years buried, through a crack of doorway. It still had a chain across it. There was a hint of a dark, watery-eyed woman lurking behind it wearing a plain black service dress and apron.
But the thirty-second walk up the drive had prepared her. Posie knew exactly what she was doing now.
‘This is Mr Langley’s house, isn’t it? It’s just that Mr Langley sent me over here,’ she said in an enthusiastic-sounding rush.
‘Oh?’
The voice was disbelieving and the slice of doorway didn’t get any bigger. ‘I don’t know who you are, Missie, but Mr Langley isn’t in the habit of sending people over anywhere, let alone here. So perhaps you could go on your own sweet way?’
‘Oh, he said you’d be like this: a first-class Housekeeper who keeps people away. It’s Mrs Cleeves, isn’t it?’
Somehow the unusual name which Silvia Hanro had mentioned had just implanted itself in Posie’s brain. It must have been the Henry the King connection and the thought of that tempestuous monarch’s doomed fourth wife.
The dark eye showed a second of nervous hesitancy, and Posie pressed on while the going was good.
‘He said you were to ring him up in the studio if you were at all concerned about my identity. How’s that? I’m quite happy to wait here while you do so.’
Posie was calling the woman’s bluff, and she saw Cleeves swallow nervously and open the door a fraction wider. If she’d worked for Brian Langley for any length of time at all she’d know that it was more than her job was worth to disturb him on the set of one of his precious films, and she’d know too that such an action was futile anyhow. The telephone would either be disconnected or unanswered.
Murder of a Movie Star Page 10
