She was in high spirits. One play, An Inspector Calls, had ended and Candida would shortly open. She was sure of a success. She called down the table to stage manager Chris. ‘By the way, why do we have to have a perambulator on scene for the first act of Candida?’
She made a production of the word perambulator, stretching out the syllables, modulating the vowels.
Joan pricked up her ears, recognizing the echoes of Rachel Esthart’s unique voice. She hoped Rachel was not going to be too much for the girl. It had always been a gamble sending the child there. Good for Rachel, taking her out of herself, giving her an interest, but bad for Stella? It would be fine if Stella could take all Rachel had to offer without getting swallowed up by her.
Joan’s anxieties extended to Eddie Kelly whose effect on young women she knew only too well. And not only women.
‘Parson’s house. There would be children around. Albie thought it in character. Makes a point,’ said Chris.
‘I thought it was because we happened to have a pram around.’
‘There is an element of that in it. It was Widow Twankey’s pram in our Christmas Aladdin. Eddie pushed.’
Yes, Eddie would make a good Widow Twankey, thought Stella, having just the right mixture of malice and ruthlessness.
Eddie grinned at her from across the table. ‘You should have seen my boots.’
‘Nothing to do with left-overs,’ said Joan sharply. ‘With Albie, it’s an æsthetic matter. And I’d like to know who’s been messing about with the pram. Flithy. Poor Chris has had a terrible time with it.’ Joan was careful with her properties. ‘I wish you lot would remember how hard it is to get things. You can’t just go out and buy them.’
‘There’s a war on,’ they chorused.
Watching them, Coffin thought what a closed world they were. The death of the girl, her murder, did not really touch them. Today they had played a success so they were happy, tomorrow they might play a failure, then they would be sad.
Coffin had a sudden vivid inner picture of Eddie Kelly as Widow Twankey wearing big boots, pushing his pram. Eddie acting his head off. Wasn’t there a murderer who had pushed his victim in a pram?
The Padovani waitress, affectionately known as Shirley Temple because of her tightly curled pale hair, planted a plate of sandwiches in front of Coffin. ‘That’s your lot. Beef’s off now. But I can do you spam. If we’ve got any bread.’
Bread was in short supply. Spam, however, at the moment, was plentiful but on ‘points’.
Chris wandered across from the theatre table, sat down opposite Coffin, and took a sandwich. ‘I’m starving. They eat like wolves, that lot, don’t they, but never put on an ounce. Hard work being an actor, I suppose.’ He sounded detached as if being a musician and stage manager put him in a different category.
Coffin ate a sandwich, better get one quick before the wolves moved over here too. Alex muttered something about talking to Stell and crossed to the big table.
Chris took the opportunity to talk.
‘About the girl that was found in the river. Just a kid?’
Coffin nodded.
‘I know one of the reporters on the Mercury. He told me the girl had one long fingernail on a little finger.’
‘That’s right.’
‘Gave me an idea. Could have played the guitar. Guitar-players like to have a bit of extra length in that way. Might help identify her. Try the Music Conservatory on the hill. They might have heard of her. Or a school. She might teach music.’
‘Thanks. I’ll do that. Have you told anyone else?’ Chris shook his head.
‘Well, don’t.’
He drank some coffee, which was strong and hot, the coffee at The Padovani restaurant was always good. Mrs Lorimer provided a paler, weaker brew. He’d be away from his attic as soon as he could find a place.
‘You don’t know a girl who plays the guitar?’
‘I did know one,’ said Chris softly. ‘Played with her once in a little orchestra.’
‘When?’
‘Our last panto,’ said Chris reluctantly. ‘Christmas 1945. I did the music. An economy effect. I was just out of the army.’
‘Aladdin?’
“That’s right. Ask Joan and Albie. They should have some record. They paid her wages. She was a bit stage-struck, poor kid. Hung around.’
‘When did you last see her?’
Chris shook his head. ‘Can’t remember. Not for some time. Ask Joan and Albie.’
Coffin said calmly: ‘What you’re really telling me, Chris, is that you were a friend of the dead girl.’
‘Might have been.’
‘You took your time getting out with it.’
‘You try doing it better sometimes. It’s not a thing you want to hurry with when the kid’s been murdered. Anyway, I’m not sure.’
‘There’s an easy way to find out. You’ll have to come down to the mortuary. See if you can identify her.’
‘I was afraid you’d say that.’ His hand trembled as he picked up his coffee. The cup rattled against the saucer.
‘What was her name?’
‘Lorna. Lorna Beezley.’
‘I’ll fix for you to get a look.’
‘Lovely,’ muttered Chris. ‘I’ll be looking forward to it.’
Stella came across, a glass in her hand. ‘You’re looking serious. Not to be. This is a party, my party, I’m celebrating.’
True child of the theatre, she could separate herself from the outside world in which murder could happen to a girl her own age, to concentrate on her own true world.
‘We’ve got two bottles of wine out of Ma Padovani and you’re to have a glass and wish me luck. I’m going to be the Lady in a masque we are going to put on before the King and Queen: when they come. Did you know they were coming?’
Coffin nodded: he knew. The royal visit, bringing with it, as it would, any number of spivs, pickpockets and con men, was adding to the work of the police. Just for a moment Stella seemed too bright, too heartless.
‘Don’t judge her,’ muttered Chris. ‘It’s that old witch she’s living with. God, I hate the theatre sometimes. It’s so blood-sucking.’
Stella was talking to Alex, then to Joan and Albie. Her little summer dress, tight-waisted, with a full skirt, her hair cropped short like a boy’s. For Candida she would wear a wig.
‘Mrs Esthart? Don’t you like her? I’ve only met her once, but I thought her quite a character.’
‘One day I’ll tell you why I dislike her. No. I’ll tell you now.’ Chris seemed high, he’d had a bit to drink. The Padovanis’ rough red wine (made in their backyard in a bucket, according to legend) was powerful stuff. ‘She ruined my old man. He wrote plays. Good plays. They got produced. Directors liked him. Then Rachel Esthart turned thumbs down on him. Said he was old hat, passé. People believed her. He died of cancer a year later, and he was still talking about her. Trying to defend himself.’ He was still looking at Stella.
Half way across the room Eddie Kelly slapped her, put his arm round her and kissed her bare shoulder.
It was a loving and intimate gesture, delivered with style, as if he was putting a label on a piece of his property.
Chris stood up abruptly. ‘I’ll be off.’ He got himself into his raincoat. Outside a cold summer rain was falling. ‘How’s Lorimer’s suiting you?’
‘I’ll be making a change. Nothing against the place; I just feel like making a move.’
‘Everyone does. You’d be surprised how many get stuck. Say goodbye to Stella for me.’
‘I’ll be in touch about the other thing,’ added Coffin after him.
Without a backward look Chris was gone. None too steadily, either.
‘Drunk again,’ said Joan sadly, to no one in particular.
Coffin moved his seat to sit next to her. ‘Do you know a girl called Lorna Beezley.’
‘Not really, dear.’ She too was mildly sozzled.
‘She worked for you. In the orchestra at the pantomime.’
/>
‘We didn’t have an orchestra. Just a trio.’
‘She was in the trio, then.’
Joan looked troubled. ‘Why are you asking? No, don’t tell me, I can guess. I saw Chris talking to you. He’s in love with Stella now, you know. He has these things. Love is all.’
‘Can you give me Lorna Beezley’s address?’
‘If I’ve still got it. I’m not a great keeper of paper-bits.’
Coffin waited, confident something was coming.
‘Oh, all right. I expect I can find it. I do know she worked in a nursery school in the day. Taught infants. But she was theatre-mad. Hung about all the time, even when she wasn’t working. I didn’t like her much, but I do hope she isn’t –’
‘You didn’t like her?’
‘She was so nasty about the children, dear. A flip little tongue, she had.’
Joan drained her glass of wine. ‘Well now, want a rundown on the whole company? I can tell who’s sleeping with whom.’
Coffin sat silent.
‘Oh, shoot me instead,’ she said.
‘You’ve been very helpful.’
‘I had to be, hadn’t I? But don’t worry Albie. He’s got enough on his mind.’
Her husband was always protected by Joan.
‘Don’t tell anyone but we’re bankrupt, pretty well. Pay the wages. Just. Thank God for clothes rationing, it does keep the cost down.’
She was drunk.
‘But we’ll come through. Eddie’s going, damn him. Going into the new Rattigan. But Stella’s a great draw, so thank God.’
Despair and hope, the theatrical see-saw.
Stella was talking to Shirley the waitress, arranging to have the bill on tick. From what Coffin now knew, the look of doubt in Shirley’s face was justified.
‘I dunnow. Mrs P. Always says: No credit. Especially to theatricals.’
The two girls stood side by side. Stella’s summer dress was skimpy and short, her skin gleamed. Shirley in her blouse and tight black skirt looked overdressed, but she fitted into her uniform beautifully.
She was wearing thin, transparent stockings. Stella’s legs were bare, nylons not yet having come her way. They were black market material, unless you had an American friend. Shirley looked as though she could have both. A nice girl but not fussy.
‘A week to pay and I’ll tell you where they’re getting some Arden lipstick in.’
‘Where?’
‘Purvis’s in Powis Street.’
‘They’ll all have gone by the time I get there.’
‘I’ll let you have mine. And two tickets for Candida.’ Shirley was a keen theatre-goer, although Bernard Shaw was not her favourite choice.
‘I’ll be shot,’ she said, giving way.
‘Actually I’ve got a lipstick in my purse now. I’ll give it you.’
The girl’s face lit up with joy; she held out her hand.
On the way home to Angel House, Stella said: ‘I’m happy.’
She put her arm through his, and Coffin put his hand around hers: it seemed only polite.
‘I’ll tell you why I’m happy. Not just the Masque, although that’s part. Rachel is getting Nick Devizes down to watch me. He’s casting a new play. He might want me. In fact, I think he will. I’m right for the part. It’s my big chance.’
Poor old Joan and Albie, pooor old Repertory Company, lucky little Stella. If it came off.
He bent down and kissed her. For a moment her lips held back, then they parted gently and she kissed back.
‘I do love you, Stella.’ It was the sort of thing people said, people like him at that age and that way of life.
‘No, you don’t, but that was nice.’
They walked on.
‘You don’t have to tell lies to me. I can kiss you without being in love. I don’t want to be loved. Love can rot things up. Look at Rachel Esthart. She fell in love, married, had that child and it ruined her in the end. She knows it now, but it’s too late.’
The murder was casting its bleak shadow backwards and forwards, forcing from Stella this blunt honesty.
‘I think she’s giving up that son of hers. Stopping believing he’s alive, I mean. That card on the body sort of shook her. Who wants a son like that? She doesn’t. She’s not mad really, you know, just got into a state. A bit obsessive, but aren’t we all?’
‘I could be,’ he said, and kissed her again.
Behind them the door of Angel House swung open silently, a black note giving upon a greater darkness.
Stella gave a scream. Coffin drew her to him, covering her eyes. ‘Don’t look, love, don’t look.’
Two hours later he walked back to Mrs Lorimer’s establishment.
There was blood on his hands, on his suit, his best and only, the demob special. ‘Damn.’ Considering what he had been through, it was a moderate explosion.
He had held Stella in his arms while Florence appeared with a bucket and newspaper. It was she who had opened the door.
He shielded Stella into the house, pushing her off to see if Mrs Esthart was all right, then went back himself to take over. He took the bird down from the door where it had been nailed by its wings, then carried it off on a spade to bury. On the doorstep were the entrails of the creature in a pool of blood. He ordered Florrie off to make some coffee and cleaned up. Not a nice job.
Rachel Esthart slept through it all. She had not been disturbed by the banging on the door which had brought Florrie out.
He held Stella in his arms as he said goodbye.
‘I thought it was Rachel at first, when you wouldn’t let me look. Then I thought Punchy Pooh.’
Punchy was Rachel’s dog.
‘A bird, only a bird.’
‘What sort of bird?’
‘A seagull.’ Seagulls were plentiful around the river, natural scavengers. This one had probably been dead or dying. Plenty of blood, though.
Stella gave a gasp and drew away. ‘A seagull? As good as saying an actress. Tchekhov’s play called The Seagull is all about a girl who is an actress: Nina. One of Rachel’s biggest successes was as Nina.’ She put her hands over her face. ‘Oh.’
With foreboding he said: ‘And what is the play you are being considered for?’
‘The Seagull. Nina.’
It would be very easy to love Stella. Real love, not just kissing love. But he wouldn’t do it. He was just like Stella herself, eyes forward, he wouldn’t take time off to fall in love – when he heard people say Stella was becoming a slave to Rachel Esthart he knew it wasn’t love: Stella was pursuing her own end. Stella was slave only to Stella.
Even as he decided this he realized that whatever his mind thought of it, his body had other views, and that he was strongly and perhaps permanently in love with Stella Pinero.
As he plodded home many different thoughts jostled in his mind. All mental roads were crowded with traffic. It reminded him of a scene during the war when he had sat in an armoured car with tanks, jeeps, cars and foot soldiers all jammed in one solid mass. Then all the elements in the jam had sorted themselves out and streamed away to their appointed positions. After the clearing came the battle.
The light was still on in Alex’s basement room, but he ignored it. He wasn’t going to talk to Alex.
No signs of Mrs Lorimer, one hardly ever saw her although her presence was strongly felt.
There was a note for him from her on the hall table: ‘Mr Coffin, you have not given me your points this month. I cannot give you a cooked breakfast unless you do.’
Dry toast, then? But even bread was rationed.
Policemen got extra rations, extra points. It was heavy work being a policeman.
Lady Olivia was quiet behind her door. He wondered if he’d ever see her, he never had yet, although he’d heard singing and distant bangings. Could she be the tall, prim woman with an Edwardian pompadour hair style he saw at supper sometimes?
He climbed on up to the attic. From the window he could see the lights of London; he opened
the window to catch the breeze blowing across Greenwich Park. A ship hooted as it went towards the estuary on a rising tide, and a passing ship replied. They were talking to each other.
Out there was the murderer of the girl, who now had a name and a bit of character for him to play with.
He had felt the presence of the murderer before, now he thought he knew his stance, the way he moved.
Aggressive, quick-witted, wayward. A proper bugger.
As he looked down from his eyrie he was frightened. The killer seemed that much closer.
He had another problem on his mind. He had to scratch around for a second to recall what it was: then he remembered Aunt Gert’s little legacy. His unknown sibling. But suddenly he realized he would know that one’s stance too. It would be like his own. They shared the same parent. He might know him or her by sight. It was a thought.
And somehow, cheering.
CHAPTER FOUR
The Feet of the Murderer
Did she walk or was she pushed? That was the thought that Coffin asked himself as he walked to work that next morning.
They had the forensic report in now and knew she had been strangled, then stabbed while moribund, then dropped in the river. The scientists were not clear as yet as to the weapon itself, but they could say it had a sharp point, a tapered blade sharp on both sides.
He took a quick look at Angel House as he passed. All fair and square there. No blood, no bird, its war-battered face looked as usual. Its time to get its windows in must come soon. The Lorimer hotel had glass again.
It was Alex Rowley’s late duty, and he had left him sleeping. Good luck to him and breakfast: one strange, small, yellowish egg, origin doubtful but probably a hen.
The first thing to do was to tell Tom Banbury about the possible identification of the dead girl. He would follow up with the story of the dead bird, crucified on the door of Angel House.
This morning the episode seemed even more bizarre and no less frightening.
Angel House was quite a sight, he thought. Not exactly cobwebs and dust-sheets but very nearly. Lots of clocks, all over the house, and not one going. Not Mrs Esthart’s room, though, that was all glass, bronze and white silk. Stella said it was designed by a man called Lobel from Paris and was famous. Nearly clean, he thought. It was no good pretending he was enjoying this investigation: it was a savage introduction to the job. Mentally he was dictating his aide-mémoire:
Coffin on the Water Page 7
