by Myers, Amy
His thoughts turned to happier events. The new Czar’s marriage to dear little Alix. Nothing could go wrong there. And Mama was delighted with the success of her matchmaking. So why was she in such a bad mood now? One-thirty. It was time for luncheon. And Alexandra was late again. It was clearly not going to be a good day at Sandringham House.
It was not a good day at the Yard either. The painfully written, tart words of the latest edict from Windsor lying across the Commissioner’s desk from Rose did not bode well.
‘We’re looking for a madman, sir.’
‘Should be simple enough. It must be someone at that theatre.’
‘Or connected with it. The theatre’s closing, which will give us a chance to investigate every single man concerned with the theatre. We’ve several lines to follow up.’
Rose spoke more confidently than he felt.
The case they had built up against Summerfield had been a strong one, though based on circumstantial evidence only. Still, most murders were. Very few villains stayed around to be witnessed in the act. But something had been wrong. Rose tried to be grateful that Maisie had blown their case to smithereens.
It was not a good day in the Galaxy restaurant either. Othello’s occupation gone, thought Auguste, gazing idly from his window across the road to the Lyceum. What was the use of a theatre restaurant without a theatre? It was deprived of soul. He thought of the time he had seen Mr Irving, his noble features blackened for the Moor. Quelle majesté, comme un grand filet de boeuf. What dignity. Of course his Othello did not compare with his Macbeth. Or, in Auguste’s opinion, with his Lear. Though there few would agree with him. It had generally been reckoned a failure and after that short run two years ago he had never attempted it again. He would never forget Mr Irving full in the limelight at the rear of the stage: ‘How sharper than a serpent’s tooth it is to have a thankless child’. He had been moved to tears at the end of the play when he carried on the dead Cordelia in his arms. Ah, that was tragedy. Now, la belle Sarah – a tragedienne, too, but of what different type. As Phèdre – magnifique, superbe.
Tiens! he had almost forgotten the matelote sauce for the eels. For himself, he was not sufficiently enamoured of this fish, but it was popular with Londoners. It was like the conclusion that he was gradually coming to – it must be the answer, there was no escape from it. There was no other explanation. And what would happen when it was revealed – what would that do to the Galaxy?
‘It’s Scotland Yard, Mr Didier.’ Gladys broke into his thoughts.
Fresh from the Commissioner’s office, Rose had arrived at the restaurant in search of reassurance and food. After one glance at his face Auguste went so far as to sit with him, leaving the kitchen in the nervous hands of Annie.
‘What’s this, Didier?’
‘That, monsieur, is an aspic of chicken à la reine.’
‘Rain?’
‘Queen, monsieur.’
Rose did not wish to talk of queens, and glared morosely at the unfortunate dish in front of him. He seemed to have lost his appetite for it somehow.
‘All right, so it’s not Summerfield – or probably not,’ he added darkly. ‘But I still wager it’s rejection. Disappointment in love. Does strange things to people. Even quite normal people. Ever noticed that?’
‘Indeed, monsieur. Why, I—’
‘Ophelia,’ interrupted Rose, warming to his theme, ‘went and drowned herself. Constance Kent murdered her little brother. Thought she’d been rejected by the family.’
‘Indeed, monsieur. I—’
‘Now, now, Didier, let me speak. You Froggies do love the sound of your own voices. So our Florence rejects our fellow quite properly—’
‘Unless—’
‘Didier! He shows his displeasure, by giving a fright with the dolls, but because he worships her he won’t touch or harm her. Instead he kills her attendants. What do you think of that?’
‘But why, monsieur,’ asked Auguste meekly, ‘the crossed hands?’
‘Why not?’ said Rose. ‘If he is mad?’
‘He is but mad nor-nor-west,’ said Auguste, ‘to quote your Hamlet. There is purpose in his madness. It may be, monsieur, that he is not mad as your Ripper was mad but like our friend Mr Robert Louis Stevenson’s hero, Dr Jekyll – and Mr Hyde. That one side of him does not know what the other side does. In order to produce the stock you have the scum which must be removed. It is necessary to distil, to purify, like Dr Jekyll, and then one is left with the scum, Mr Hyde. Dr Jekyll did not know of the actions of Mr Hyde.’
‘That’s as may be, Mr Didier,’ said Rose, ‘but to the poor lass lying there strangled with her tongue bulging out, it doesn’t matter too much for what reason she was killed. Dead is dead, and it’s my job to find out who did it. And I still think our Florence is at the heart of it. Yet I admit, Mr Didier, it’s odd that there have been no further attacks on her.’
‘Love gone putrid, monsieur. He does not wish to kill Miss Lytton. He does not have the courage. But the dolls were a threat, a message that she should not regard his love lightly.’
‘Our Props, you’re thinking of.’
‘Florence just never noticed him.’
‘She notices him now,’ said Rose. ‘Screams every time she sees him. Natural enough since she’s convinced he’s responsible for those dolls. Said he told her so. Yes, it fits all right.’ he went on. ‘The dolls are like the violets. A message. Bobbing up like a jack in a box on the stage. He’s got some special way in, that’s for sure, for all he denies it. Bates insists he didn’t come past him last night. And the rope came from his room. He’s just the type we’re after. Quiet, inoffensive. That’s what I find down Brick Street – it’s not the big loud-mouthed villains, it’s the quiet softly-spoken ones that stay in the background.’
‘But I think, Inspector, we should see whether Lord Summerfield had made improper advances to Miss Lytton,’ put in Auguste innocently. He liked Props. ‘There was something strange, did you not think so, when he spoke of her?’
‘Your Miss Maisie’s cleared him,’ pointed out Rose unkindly.
Auguste glared at him. ‘Or Monsieur Beauville, or Mr Sykes.’ He was not to be deterred. ‘Perhaps we do not yet know quite enough about Miss Lytton. We think of her as the glorious centre of the Galaxy around whom things happen. But suppose, monsieur, instead, she is the cause – like the pole in the carousel. No maypole, whose strings are pulled hither and thither by others, but the centre of power that controls. She makes these players dance to her command.’
‘The lady can’t help being popular,’ pointed out Rose. ‘And after all, she’s married. She might be thinking: if they want to be foolish enough to fall in love with me, I’m not to blame. No harm in being admired, is there, Monsieur Didier?’
‘Devotion is pleasing until it curdles. Then, like mayonnaise, it is difficult to put back together again.’
‘Humpty Dumpty,’ said Rose diverted.
‘Pardon, monsieur?’ Auguste looked blank.
‘Just an old nursery rhyme,’ said Rose hastily.
‘And Monsieur Beauville,’ went on Auguste, ignoring him, ‘is well known for his admiration of many ladies, of whom Florence was one. And of course there is Mr Manley. It is not always improper advances that one rejects. Perhaps proper ones also. And Miss Lytton has been observed not to be on good terms with her husband recently.’
‘Of them all,’ said Rose consideringly, ‘Beauville’s most likely – or Props, to my mind. Because Bates would have been in the best position to observe their movements, and for them to think he was a threat to them. I think perhaps,’ he added, ‘our friend Bates had better have another think.’
Obadiah Bates was slumped in front of his fire and a stalwart police constable guarded the front door, to the great indignation of his highly respectable landlady.
He looked up hopefully as they entered. ‘Theatre opening again, is it?’ he asked. His face looked thin and drawn. He was an old man, a fact brought home to
them by the photograph of a younger Bates in a photographic studio, stiffly posed in uniform. It was a very old photograph.
‘Not yet, Mr Bates, we’ve still got to find our murderer,’ said Rose soberly. ‘And we need help. You don’t want another bang on the head, do you?’
Bates clearly took this to be a rhetorical question for he did not answer, merely touched his bandage in puzzled fashion.
‘No one attacked you after the death of Miss Walters, so I think we can assume that whoever hit you thought you saw something dangerous to him on the evening of Miss Purvis’s death.’
‘Mr Beauville came in in a cake,’ said Bates firmly.
‘No, Obadiah, that was the evening before. This was the next night when all the girls’ beaux came to collect them as usual.’
‘Yes,’ said Obadiah considering. ‘That’s right. Young Captain Starkey – him as is going to marry Miss Birdie, was round. Miss Purvis, she liked him. Yes, I remember. Mr Beauville was there too. Ah, it were that evening.’
‘What evening, Obadiah,’ said Auguste eagerly. ‘What was special?’
‘She were late down,’ he said slowly, ‘on account of her prettying herself up. Paint and all,’ he explained disgustedly. ‘They nearly always comes down together, but that evening she were nearly last. I was watching for her, ’cos I knew she was going out with Lord Summerfield, yet Mr Sykes had been enquiring for her and Mr Manley came hurrying down earlier to send up a note. ’Allo, I says. Hallo. Very popular, Miss Purvis. Nice young lady. Sad,’ he added. ‘Very sad.’
‘Was Props there when she came down?’
‘Props? I expect so. I can’t rightly remember.’ His brow furrowed. ‘He allus came out of the door when he heard the ladies descending. He likes Miss Lytton best, of course. Likes to see her before he goes home. Or did, I should say. Liked to watch the girls coming down, too. ’Course, he’s only young really. But strange. You think he’s the one then?’
‘He wasn’t at the theatre the evening Miss Lepin was killed.’
‘Hanging around outside though, weren’t he?’ said Obadiah. ‘I heard that afterwards. Like last night.’
‘Are you positive he didn’t come in the stage door last night?’
Obadiah looked mulish. ‘When I says no one gets past me, I mean he never came in. Pathans, Fuzzie Wuzzies. They don’t get past Tommy, oh no.’
‘And that’s all you have to say?’
Obadiah glared at Rose, folded his arms. Enough had been said. No reason these police fellows had to know everything.
‘I’m getting too old for this game,’ said Rose, doubling up to clamber across a lowered grave trap, every other available space in the cellar seemingly taken up with machinery or mess.
‘There must be an entrance down here somewhere,’ said Auguste, gazing hopefully upward. ‘The entrance to the Royal Box and the gallery and so on are all locked at night, and he could not rely on finding one of them accidentally open. The only other entrance is to the restaurant, to which only Archibald, myself and Watch have a key. Even Bates has no key. And then he would have to know about the secret entrance to the theatre. No, it is not possible. Yet it must be.’
‘Does it matter?’ grunted Rose, falling over a gaspipe and regarding it severely.
‘It cannot be up,’ said Auguste thoughtfully.
Rose shut his eyes and prayed that Auguste would not invent an entrance through the roof. He didn’t think he could face the grid again. If there was another world up there aloft, he preferred not to know about it.
‘So it must be down,’ Auguste went on. ‘It cannot be right under the stage here in the cellar – it – where does that lead to?’ he demanded of one of the cellarmen who had been working industriously away greasing machinery and traps, attending to floats, sinks and rises. From above came the sound of pounding feet. A rare understudy rehearsal was in progress, taking advantage of the theatre’s closure to the public, and the sound of girlish voices rose and fell, with the occasional shout interspersed by Edward Hargreaves. Auguste pointed to a smaller corner door.
‘Gas room, meter room – and an odd props room,’ answered the cellarman indifferently.
They looked at one another in sudden hope.
The narrow stone cold passage was dimly lit by a solitary gas jet, with two doors leading off it. The first proved to be the odd props room. Junk room was more like it. Dusty, cold, forlorn paraphernalia of revels past. Moth-eaten animal heads regarded them sorrowfully from a pile of grinning demon masks. A sad-looking fairy coach waited disconsolately for another hour of glory. Paper flowers strewed the floor haphazardly. A cardboard cloud patiently awaited a summons to Mount Olympus.
The next room was the gas room – occupied by the gasman, that all important gentleman who glared at them for interrupting his serfs’ work. Bunches and tee lights stood in one corner, an electric carbon arc fan producing sunrise, Bunsen cells littered tables, gas piping crazed the floor like a maze.
‘Way out?’ grunted the gas man. ‘No way out of here. Only to meter room.’
‘Meter room?’ asked Rose.
‘Where the oxygen and hydrogen tanks are kept for the limelight,’ said the gas-man pityingly. ‘See it if you like. If you can crawl, that is.’ He opened the half size door in the far wall. A short tunnel led to a small brickbuilt room.
‘But it has an outside door?’
‘Well, someone’s got to fill the tanks,’ the gas-man pointed out reasonably. ‘Not like the old days when they came round with bags on their shoulders, straight up to the flies, press the bag, and hey presto, limelight. We’re too fond of our skins for that now.’
‘But that door—’
‘Leads on to the basement court and up to old Exeter Arcade as well. ’Course, no one ever uses it.’
Herbert Sykes savoured his soggy toast with a slow, suffusing sense of triumph. He had scored over Florence. He did not care any more. Oh, the power he had felt when he sided with Hargreaves over that song! True, the theatre was now closed, but it would open again. Now he felt he could face her again. He felt in command for the first time since he had met her, as though he, Herbert Sykes, held her destiny in his hands. Accordingly, when his landlady showed Inspector Rose and Auguste Didier in, he was, for Herbert, expansive. He bustled importantly, seats were brought forward, coffee was ordered, an air of smugness pervaded him. He had not even bothered to remove the photograph of Florence, smiling incessantly from her flower-decorated mount.
‘Miss Lytton, sir,’ said Rose, making himself comfortable.
‘What about Miss Lytton?’ said Herbert. A certain belligerence entered his voice.
‘Friend of yours?’
‘Everyone likes Miss Lytton,’ replied Herbert expressionlessly.
‘I understand you quarrelled with her though.’
Herbert went white. ‘It was a misunderstanding,’ he said, his composure faltering. ‘A misunderstanding. She actually thought,’ he managed a little laugh, ‘that I was threatening her.’ He swallowed. ‘As though I’d do that.’
‘And why should she think that?’
‘I – well – I heard someone in the ladies’ dressing rooms late. Thinking it might be an intruder, I naturally went to investigate, and found it was Miss Lytton. I suppose being alone in the theatre she might have wondered what I was doing there.’
‘But you told her—’
‘I was going to,’ he said quickly. ‘But she was very nervous. Those dolls – it was the dolls,’ he said eagerly, grasping at the lifeline. ‘She was upset.’
‘You didn’t touch her at all?’
‘Touch her, Inspector?’ He drew himself up theatrically. The gesture failed in its effect. ‘Are you implying – good heavens! Is that what she told you? Poor darling Florence. She must have been upset.’
‘Yes, indeed, sir. Now the other young ladies. Miss Lepin, Miss Walters, Miss Purvis. I understand you were by way of being a particular friend of all of them.’
‘An escort, an occasion
al escort.’ His composure, haltingly recovered, now faltered again. ‘I am a principal, Inspector. I do my part in looking after the newer young ladies. Take them out to dine. Introduce them to London.’
‘Very good of you, Mr Sykes,’ answered Rose woodenly. ‘A fatherly interest, you might say.’
‘Precisely, Inspector,’ said Herbert unhappily, looking at the floor.
‘And were you with any of these young ladies the evenings they got killed?’
‘No – Good heavens, no!’ He gave a high-pitched laugh. ‘Then who were you with, may I ask?’
‘I don’t remember,’ Herbert said, eyes blinking rapidly. ‘No, really I don’t. I don’t remember at all.’ He gave a slight gesture which this time did not puzzle Auguste. He had seen it before; once from Herbert a few days ago, and before that from Dan Leno. Grimaldi lived on, the eternal mischievous lovable thieving clown.
‘Miss Lytton, we are still gravely worried for your safety.’
‘But the theatre’s closed.’ Lying on a chaise longue in an elegant rose chiffon tea gown, Florence looked fragile, petite and entirely bewitching. Edward Hargreaves would not have recognised her.
‘That won’t stop our villain if he’s determined to get you,’ said Rose grimly. ‘I’m going to post a police constable outside your home till we’ve caught out man.’
‘But I’m not at risk.’ Nevertheless her eyes widened in alarm.
‘With a madman around you are. Those dolls—’
‘But it’s show girls he kills, not me.’
‘It may be you next time. Now he’s got up courage. That’s what we fear.’
‘Oh . . .’ Her hands fluttered feebly, but her brain was clearly not affected. Auguste recognised this gesture too. She had used it in Lady Bertha’s Betrothal, to great effect. ‘Then you know who it is?’
