Bitter Water

by Douglas Clark

  “Entirely? I ask because I want to be absolutely sure.”

  “She was perfectly fit. The performance she gave proves it. You must know. You saw that her role called for no end of movement on stage, and it called for a lot of good timing in all the business.”

  “I certainly saw no signs of anything but superb fitness and timing. But I didn’t read the notices last Friday. Were they good?”

  “Couldn’t have been better. Of course, it’s a commercial piece rather than great drama, but the indications are that it will run.”

  “Even without Miss Sanders?”

  “Oh yes. As I tried to convey to you earlier, basically Carla had no illusions about herself. She knew that, given the chance, there would be scores of girls in London who could equal her for face, figure, movement and so on. Now one of them has that chance and, from what I hear, is making the most of it.”

  “Could I have her name, please, Mr. Collier,” asked Tip, playing her role of Masters’ immediate assistant and making sure she had a note of all names mentioned.

  “Her name? Whatever for?”

  “The record, sir.”

  Collier stared at her, and then said, “Look here, I know you lot are taking a few soundings to see if there’s anything fishy about Carla’s death, but I don’t like the idea of you wanting to know about the girl who took over.”

  “Why not, sir? Only her name. But if you feel there is some reason why you shouldn’t supply it, I can get it from the billboards or by ringing the box office.”

  Collier scowled. “You know damn’ well what I mean. If it turns out there was some monkey business you’ll start looking at the girl who has benefited by Carla’s absence from the cast.”

  “Most certainly we will,” agreed Tip. “And at you, of course, as the only member of her most immediate family, if you don’t mind my calling your set-up here a family. And at others, too. Former boyfriends, for instance.”

  “All right, all right.” He turned to Masters. “Do you allow your junior officers to carry on like this?”

  “Like what, Mr. Collier? Has Sergeant Tippen been anything less than frank with you? I would have said she had been perfectly open. Those she mentioned are people we shall have to consider, if we have to consider anybody. It is by no means certain that we shall decide there was any foul play or anything of that nature to be investigated, but we have always to be prepared for the worst, as Sergeant Tippen very kindly pointed out to you in a manner which I consider was perfectly frank and open.”

  “So frank and open as to be tantamount to an overt threat.”

  “Nonsense, lad,” grunted Green. “Be your age. You don’t imagine a team such as this is sent out to ask questions everytime anybody trips over a matchstick and knocks themselves out on a tram ticket, do you? There’s concern about your girlie. Genuine concern, because the doctor can’t sign her certificate, and the Coroner and pathologist are worried, too. And it’s when people die unexpectedly and people like coroners and pathologists get concerned that we appear. Unexpected deaths are our job. To find out why they happen. And when we start asking questions, we do it as gently and honestly as possible, but we also do it comprehensively, because we always have to bear in mind that unexpected deaths can have all manner of causes from wasp stings to murder. And that is what Sergeant Tippen has been telling you. Straight out. No cover-ups. If there was monkey business, then everybody close to Miss Sanders will be looked at closely. But only if there was monkey business. So now, lad, what’s the name of the understudy who’s taken over?”

  “Viola Young,” replied Collier and then, after a short pause, he said to Tip, “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have taken offence as I did. I suppose I feel a bit edgy.” He spread his arms. “Look at me. Only just out of bed, unwashed, unshaven. And it’s mid-afternoon.”

  “What time did you go to bed, sir?” asked Tip.

  “Five o’clock this morning,” said Collier shamefacedly. “Somehow, after the show last night I couldn’t face coming back here alone so I … I stayed out till dawn.”

  “Understandable,” said Tip, maternally. “But you’ll be all right from now on.”

  “I managed Tuesday and Wednesday nights, but last night, no. It was too much.”

  “Last night was the low point,” said Tip, sapiently. “From now on it will get better. Of itself, I mean. And I even think that talking things over with Mr. Masters and the rest of us will help, you know.”

  Collier nodded.

  “Tell us about Miss Sanders’ accident. When she was leaving the stage, she fell didn’t she?”

  “Yes.” Collier turned to drain the coffee pot into his cup before addressing Masters again. “I don’t suppose you’ve ever been backstage at the Victory? No?”

  Masters shook his head.

  “It’s old-fashioned. The stage itself is big. So big that on the prompt side there’s a hole cut in it, in the wings, to take the head of the stairway to the dressing rooms. It’s an iron semi-helix, actually. Safe enough from the point of view of fire precautions, because it is just like a fire escape. Safe enough, too, I suppose, if you hang on to the bannister, but you can imagine the shape of each step.”

  “Triangular?”

  “Exactly. And bloody difficult to negotiate at the best of times, but nigh-on impossible for somebody like Carla weighed down with flowers, wearing high heels and drunk with success after umpteen curtain calls. Anybody is liable to be a bit less than ultra-careful at such a time, turning round to chat excitedly to somebody instead of watching where they put their feet. Fortunately for Carla there was somebody in front of her who broke her fall, otherwise she could have done in her back.”

  There was a moment of silence while the four from the Yard all wondered whether Collier had realised what he had said. Carla Sanders was fortunate not to have strained her back! Masters and his team, each in his or her own way, was speculating whether, had she strained her back, she might not still be alive. Whether events might not have pursued a completely different course had she been confined to a bed of pain for a few days instead of doing whatever she had done since that opening night. They had yet to discover her movements over the critical days, but each knew that Masters would be relentless in tracing her activities during the relevant time.

  At last Green spoke.

  “Or killed herself,” he said as a remark to follow on Collier’s observation.

  “Very possibly,” said the actor who apparently had not noticed the import of his own remark nor the silence which had followed it. “As it was, one foot slipped. She crocked the ankle and scraped the skin off her leg for a matter of eight or nine inches above the joint. And when I say scraped I don’t mean she just marked and bruised the flesh. She stripped the skin off so that the whole area started to weep and there were several gashes that bled. Just like a severe case of gravel rash, it was.”

  “So there were open lesions,” mused Masters.

  “If that’s the term for a bloody mess, yes. Of course, they got a doctor to her at the theatre, as you know. He told Carla she wouldn’t be able to go on next night, Friday, and not before Monday at the earliest—and only then if she was lucky. I wasn’t there when she fell but I’d arranged to rush round there from the Leader to join the party they were going to have. So I heard how Carla took it when she was told she’d be out of the show for at least over the weekend.”

  “She created a bit of a fuss, did she, lad?” asked Green. “Got the old hysteric temperament out to give it a bit of an airing?”

  “What do you think? I told her to cool it and an old boy in a wheelchair who’d put up most of the money for the show steered himself into the dressing room to have a few words with her. I must say he was pretty good. He can’t walk because of disseminated sclerosis or something like that, but he’s a jolly sort of chap and without actually drawing the comparison between Carla and himself he gave her to understand that even with her injuries she was a damn’ sight better off than he was. Anyway, he seemed to do
the trick and capped it by telling Carla that if she couldn’t appear on Saturday night she’d be free to go to his birthday party. She liked the idea, apparently.”

  “Why?”

  “Because Hugh Carlyle—that’s his name—is one of the bigger investors in our commercial theatre and so he’s a good chap to know.”

  “And to keep in with, presumably?”

  “You’ve got it. I’m doubtful whether our Angels, as we call them, have much say in casting, but as I said earlier, Carla wouldn’t miss a trick like that even though she was lame.”

  Masters looked at his watch and stood up, much to the surprise of his three companions. “It is getting on for four o’clock, Mr. Collier, so I think we had better stop there so that you can have time to get ready for the theatre and have a meal. I should hate to be the cause of the curtain going up late.”

  Collier looked a little surprised. “Oh, lord, is it that time?”

  “You have been so involved in telling us your story that you haven’t been aware of time. I’m glad of that, because I think that it means talking about things has done you a bit of good. But we shall want the rest of the facts tomorrow. What time do you normally get up in the morning, Mr. Collier?”

  “Normally? Oh, about nine. Yes, nine. I’ve just been skulking about these last few days.”

  “Understandable. We shall call on you at ten o’clock.”

  “I’ll be ready.”

  “Just one thing I’d like to ask, which you might not know the answer to.”

  “What’s that?”

  “The name of whoever it was—actor or actress—who was following Miss Sanders down the staircase.”

  “I don’t know,” admitted Collier, “but I could probably find out for you.”

  “Please don’t go about asking questions. I don’t want a probably innocent person to think that we suspect them of causing Miss Sanders harm. It was just one of those things that Sergeant Tippen mentioned. A fact we should have just for the sake of being thorough.”

  “I see.”

  “Good. Until tomorrow, Mr. Collier.”

  ***

  “Why pull us out at that point?” asked Green as they got into the car. “It was just going to get interesting. And it’s not like you to allow an appearance on stage to muck up an investigation.”

  “I would agree with that,” replied Masters, “if I was sure we have a criminal investigation on our hands. If, however, we are merely making enquiries of a general nature I can see no reason for upsetting Collier’s routine more than necessary. By the look of him he’ll need a hell of a lot of washing and brushing up before he’s fit to go to the Leader tonight, and you heard him say he likes a meal before he goes.”

  Green paused in the act of lighting a cigarette. “Now tell us the real reason,” he grunted.

  Tip turned in her seat. “What do you mean?” she asked. “The Chief has given us a perfectly valid reason for breaking off where he did. It was a natural place. The end of the business at the theatre. Tomorrow we can go on from there. Besides, as I understand it, and from his expertise with the coffee pot, I got the idea that Howard Collier prepared all the meals in that house, so he’ll be cooking whatever it is he’ll have to eat before he goes to the theatre. And even sausages take a few minutes to frizzle.”

  Green gazed at her for a moment or two before replying. “There’s a lot of things that are not in the books that you’ll have to learn in this job,” he said kindly. “Particularly in this firm.”

  “I’m listening.”

  “Good, petal. First off, in your own mind you must question every single thing that happens and that includes what His Nibs does, Sarn’t Berger does and what I do. Why? Because if we’re doing the job right we have to have a reason for our actions. You’ll find, as often as not, that you can think of several reasons for every move. Sometimes an ostensible reason and an alternative ulterior motive.”

  “With my own colleagues?”

  “With everybody, flower. Now, tell me why you think His Nibs broke off that interview when he did.”

  “He’s given us the reason.”

  “What did you think his reason was before he gave you the easy one about Collier needing a shave and a meal?”

  “Well … I don’t think I thought about it.”

  “You just accepted what His Nibs said, but not until he said it. In other words, you didn’t think for yourself.”

  Tip admitted the impeachment.

  “If you had thought, and before hearing what His Nibs said, what would you have given as the reason for cutting short a fruitful interview?”

  “I think I would have supposed that the Chief had heard something during the course of the interview which caused him to want to break it off to do a bit of checking somewhere else.”

  “Good answer, lassie. But would you have discarded your own opinion in the face of the facile excuse you’ve just heard?”

  “It wasn’t facile, it was valid.”

  “The fact still remains you’d have thought up an alternative.”

  “Yes, I see that.”

  “Why not stick to your guns?”

  “I’m the junior sergeant around here, remember.”

  “And junior sergeants can’t have opinions, even if they don’t voice them? I thought His Nibs was teaching you to say what you thought at any time.”

  “So he is. If I’d heard something in the interview, as I said I thought the Chief did, I’d have mentioned it because I would have had a reason for questioning what you call his excuse. But I didn’t latch on to anything to spark off any idea so I didn’t suggest that what the Chief said was specious.”

  “All right, lassie. The other thing you’ve got to learn in this firm is a sort of mind reading. You’ve got to learn by His Nibs’ attitude or tone of voice or whatever when he’s trying to offer you a chunk of old cod’s wallop in place of the real baked haddock. When you’ve learned that, and learned to think up your own alternatives to what he says, you can then call his bluff.”

  “Like you are doing now?”

  “Yes. I reckon it was out of character to break off that interview just to give Collier time to fry a pound of sausages and have a quick shave and shower. And not only was it out of character, it sounded wrong as he said it. Facts you didn’t pick up. So you didn’t ask yourself why the interview was curtailed; when you had thought of a reason you discarded it for a less good one; and when the less good one was offered to you you didn’t suss it was phoney. To add insult to all those injuries you then turned on me when I did spot the bogus excuse and the phoney manner and said so.”

  “But that is monstrous,” flared Tip. She appealed to Masters. “Chief, I haven’t got to question everything you do, have I?”

  “A lot of the burden of what the DCI said is right. You must accept nothing blindly, whether it’s from one of us, a witness or a suspect. Not that I am suggesting we would mislead you, but if you are going to keep abreast of affairs you must ask yourself these questions at all times. And please note I said ask yourself. You don’t have to plague the rest of us with your doubts unless you really are out of your depth or think we are. There’s no telling when a word from you could put us right. So there’s another lesson to learn, which the DCI didn’t mention, and that is to know when to put in your oar at times when we are not brainstorming. And by that I don’t mean to save yourself embarrassment or to save you from feeling a nuisance, I mean for the good of the rest of us. If you’ve got a valid point, you must make it, whatever it is.”

  Tip looked crestfallen, so much so that Masters said: “Cheer up, Tip. You’re doing famously. But you can’t learn everything after being with us for only three cases. The DCI was right to give you this little lesson, because it was appropriate. He was right, you see, I had another reason for breaking off the interview. And that reason makes you right, too. I did hear something of interest. The DCI’s point is, you should have reached that conclusion right from the start even though a little late
r you decided to be kind enough to accept my reason.”

  “You mean I shouldn’t have defended it when Mr. Green disbelieved it. I know. His experience against my inexperience. There’s not much comparison, is there?”

  Green laughed. “No, love, but you’re prettier than I am.”

  Tip flushed. “What’s that got to do with it?”

  “Everything. And if you’re going to tell me that God-given beauty—in whatever area—should be ignored just for the sake of some idealogical whim, then I’m ashamed of you. Ashamed and sorry. A tree, a mountain, a beautiful sky or a beautiful woman should all be appreciated and their presence revelled in, if that’s the right word, and anybody who says otherwise is an immature clod.”

  “Hear, hear,” said Berger from the driving seat.

  “Oh, you!” Tip flounced to face front.

  “You’ve joined a man’s team, Tip,” said Masters. “There may be equality of sexes, but the male and female worlds are still miles apart. You and we are getting along very well together, but just as we must make them for you, you must make allowances for us, and not try to make us forget all our old shibboleths.”

  Tip turned again impulsively. “I do make allowances for you, Chief …”

  Her words were drowned in a peal of laughter from all three men. It reduced the tension in the atmosphere. Tip smiled and murmured: “You all know exactly what I mean.”

  “That’s right, petal,” said Green. “And now there’s another lesson you’ve just been taught.”

  “Oh! What’s that?”

  “You’ve just been treated to a perfect performance in the ducking of inconvenient questions. Here we are at the Yard, and you’ll notice His Nibs has managed to steer clear of giving us an answer to our question by the simple expedient of drowning everything in a foam of words.”

  “I had realised that,” said Tip. “And I suspect an ulterior motive, as instructed.”

  “Good girl, what is it?”

  “That he doesn’t want us to know about it—yet.”