Текст книги "An Expert in Murder"

Автор книги: Nicola Upson

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happened to them, but not afraid to embrace it wholeheartedly and turn it into something uniquely theirs. Aubrey shuddered when, by contrast, he thought of the poor murdered girl in that train and the passions which the papers were speculatively blaming for her death. There was a lot to be said for a simple life, undistinguished by any extreme emotion. He would help Elspeth and Hedley in any way he could and that would give him a deeper satisfaction, he suspected, than any of the success he had enjoyed up to now, if only because they had never asked for it.

If he had known the weight of responsibility that would follow him through life, he would perhaps have chosen another path.

Most men were relied upon by a family and he had provided more than adequately for his, but financial support had proved the easiest to give. Every day at the theatre, and throughout those four long years underground, people had looked to him to make things different, to change their fortunes, to keep them alive; the cost of getting it wrong varied, of course, but the pressure was always there, the emphasis was always on him to provide what was missing, be it money, recognition or simply hope. And now, at sixty-five, he was exhausted, so exhausted that he longed to disappear altogether. Perhaps one day he would just give up and leave, but there was something he needed to do first and tomorrow, when he had the building to himself and his mind was more settled, he would consider the most appropriate path to his own redemption.

It had been a long time coming and it would be all too easy to snatch at it in sheer relief, but the stain of damage must not spread.

The innocent must not be made to suffer again.

He emptied the bottle and walked over to the bookcase, where a woman in a silver frame looked out at him from a backdrop of Bennett and Walpole. The picture had been taken forty years ago or more and, until death brought its miraculous peace, the face had aged in that time more starkly than he cared to admit, but this was how he always remembered her. ‘We’re nearly there,’ he said, raising his glass in acknowledgement of the silent pact that ran between them. ‘We’re nearly there.’

*

107

Hedley White stood across the road from the New Theatre in the rain, trying to understand how his world had fallen apart so quickly and knowing it was all his own fault. He had been there for an hour now, huddled against the iron gates that divided the courtyard of 66 St Martin’s Lane from the busy street beyond, and taking advantage of the shadows to watch the comings and goings opposite. Since mid-afternoon, people had been queuing along the draughty passage which ran down one side of the New but there had been no sign of impatience or bad humour, just excitement and the companionship that always characterises a crowd with a shared objective. The queue tailed back as far as he could see, following the passage round past stage door – where he had first set eyes on Elspeth – and on to Wyndham’s, eventually emerging into Charing Cross Road. All reservable seats were long gone, and had been since the play’s last few days had been announced, but hopefuls still turned out in force for the pit and gallery entrances and, even now, when the doors were thrown open and the lucky frontrunners admitted, there was no indication that the line was anything but infinite.

He had liked Elspeth from the moment he set eyes on her, standing patiently at the stage door with an older man whom he later learned was her uncle, waiting for Rafe Swinburne’s autograph.

With no thought in his mind other than to be helpful, and knowing that the actor would be occupied for some time with the blonde who had arrived halfway through the second act with a bottle of gin and some maraschino cherries, Hedley offered to take the programme backstage and get it signed for her. ‘Is she pretty?’

Swinburne had asked, after taking careful note of the name and covering his photograph with the usual flamboyant scrawl.

Blushing as he described her, Hedley laid himself open to some merciless teasing. ‘You have this one, then,’ Swinburne had said, casting a sly glance at the blonde. ‘As you can see, I’ve got my hands full tonight – but don’t let me down. Make sure she says yes.’ And much to Hedley’s astonishment, she had said yes. His tentative request that she might meet him for a cup of tea one day had been met with a smile of disarming pleasure and a blush that 108

matched his own. The last two months had been the happiest he had ever known.

And now he was paying for that happiness with a misery deeper than he could have thought possible. Just for a moment, he allowed himself the foolish luxury of playing out the evening as it should have been: their joyful first glimpse of each other and the endless conversation that always followed an absence; more talk inside the theatre – in all their meetings, he could not remember a single silence – where they would go first to the sweet kiosk so that Elspeth could choose a box of toffees to see them safely through the first half, and then to their seats. He would take her hand the moment the curtain went up and, from then on, would steal secret glances at her, smiling to himself as her lips silently formed the lines she knew by heart and watching as she leaned forward in her seat to anticipate scenes she particularly enjoyed. Then the walk, arm in arm, to the restaurant and dinner, before he saw her safely home. Unable to bear it any longer, Hedley brought the fantasy to an abrupt end and sank to the pavement in despair, bowed by a twin grief because he knew then, in his heart, that he would never want to set foot in a theatre again.

From where he crouched, scarcely noticing how cold and wet the iron railings felt against his back, he saw Lydia walking quickly down the passage towards stage door, arm in arm with the other lady and laughing as the two of them struggled with an umbrella that stubbornly refused to close. If she had been on her own, he might have approached her and asked for her help – she had been kind to him from the moment she found out that he shared her joy in music and old songs – but he was shy in front of her friend. In any case, a gentleman soon sacrificed his place in the queue to force the umbrella into submission and the moment was lost as they disappeared into the theatre. There was no safe haven for him there: Aubrey was furious with him and he, in turn, cursed the older man for his interference, without which Elspeth might still be alive and he would not be standing here with no idea what to do next. With all that the papers had implied, he knew the police would be looking for the dead girl’s boyfriend 109

and it would not take them long to find out who he was. They were probably at his digs now, waiting for him to come home, but he would not risk that, no matter how tempting it was to collect a change of clothes and the small amount of money that he had managed to save each week from his wages, carefully stored in a tin under the bed.

A coin fell to the ground in front of him. Instinctively, he picked it up and stood, ready to return it to its owner, to explain that he was not one of the beggars who lined the West End streets on a Saturday night and that the shilling should go to someone who really needed it. Instead, he just watched as the man disappeared into the crowd, suddenly aware that he faced a stark choice: he could give himself up and take what was coming to him, or he could run – and for that he needed money, not a conscience. As the dreaded ‘House Full’ sign was placed on the pavement outside, the queue began to disperse. Before he could change his mind, Hedley pulled his collar up and strode quickly across the road after a couple who were walking away in disappointment.

‘Excuse me,’ he said, touching the young man’s arm. ‘I was supposed to be going to the play tonight with my friend but she . . .

she can’t be here.’ From his coat, he took the tickets that Aubrey had given him, two front-row dress-circle seats, the most expensive that money could buy. ‘It’d be a shame to let these go to waste.

I’ll sell them to you if you like, just for the cost price.’

The boy looked at him in disbelief. ‘Are you sure?’ he asked.

Hedley nodded and took the money, embarrassed as the girl gave him a spontaneous hug. ‘We’ve just got engaged,’ she said, smiling in delight, ‘and we so wanted to celebrate at the theatre.

Everybody’s talking about it. You’ve no idea how much this means to us.’

The money weighed heavy in his pocket as Hedley turned away, knowing more certainly than the couple could have realised exactly just how much it meant.

For an actress in a hit West End play, Saturday was usually the most gratifying day of the week but, by five o’clock, Lydia 110

Beaumont had had enough. An unsettled air hung over the theatre as the tension which already existed among cast and crew was intensified by the shocking events of the day before; everyone seemed out of sorts because of it, herself and Marta included. As a rule, Lydia enjoyed the occasions when Lewis Fleming stood in for Terry because he brought a strained anger to the role of Richard, a rawness which gave her something different to respond to. This afternoon, however, she felt that both their performances had been distinctly below par and would not have blamed the audience for reflecting this at the end of the show. But matinee crowds were always the easiest to please and the applause was as rapturous as ever. One day they would be found out, but not today.

‘Come on, let’s go for a walk,’ Marta said, watching as Lydia wiped the last of the make-up from her eyes. ‘We both need some air and it’ll do you good to get away from this lot, if only for an hour. If you’re lucky, I’ll even buy you a sausage roll from that coffee stall on the Embankment. You need to keep your strength up –

the plague can take it out of a girl.’

Lydia smiled and took her coat from the back of the door, needing no further persuasion to indulge in a little normal living before she had to return to the stage to die all over again. ‘You know, I’ll actually be quite glad to leave this behind after next week and get out into the country for a bit,’ she said, as they climbed the narrow stairs to ground level and came out into the scene dock.

‘I see, can’t wait to get away from me already,’ Marta said in mock offence, but her playful tone was not reciprocated as Lydia stopped and looked at her.

‘Don’t be ridiculous,’ she said, gently stroking her hair. ‘You know how badly I’ll miss you, but I still haven’t given up hope of talking you into coming with me, at least for some of the time.

What do you say? We could find a little guest house by the sea . . .’

‘In Manchester?’

‘All right, perhaps you’d better skip that week, but how about Brighton? We can walk on the pier if it’s nice or stay in bed all day if it’s not, then smile over dinner as the landlady frowns her 111

disapproval on us in spite of the fact that she’s only got one set of sheets to wash at the end of the week.’ Marta laughed as Lydia warmed to her theme and lapsed into melodrama. ‘Then, as the day dwindles, I’ll show you all the glamour of life on tour,’ she continued. ‘Scratchy grey blankets and shared bathrooms with no hot water, smelly dressing rooms, half-empty theatres and restaurants that close five minutes before the performance ends, leaving you no choice but to go home to cocoa from an old chipped mug. Are you really going to let me go through all that on my own? It’s tantamount to abuse, particularly for a queen of delicate disposition.’

Marta took her arm as they joined the throng of playgoers in St Martin’s Lane and headed south towards the river, taking the sight-seeing circuit which they always enjoyed whenever she met Lydia from the theatre between shows. ‘Don’t make me doubt my decision on this one,’ she said, more seriously this time. ‘I could easily be persuaded to come with you because I don’t want us to be apart any more than you do, but I’ll just be in the way.’ She held her fingers to Lydia’s lips as they started to protest. ‘You know I’m right. It’s your world, and I can skate around the edges and drag you up for air occasionally, but it’s better for both of us if we keep you and me separate from all that. At least that way you have some sanity to come home to, and thank God nobody’s thought of opening the theatres on a Sunday yet: we’ll have a lot of time to make up for on your days off.’

Lydia smiled wickedly back at her and, sensing that the crisis had passed, at least for now, Marta changed the subject. ‘Talking of delicate queens, has your lord and director found you a Bothwell to return to yet?’

‘I don’t know for sure but we’ll find out from Josephine later –

she went to the meeting with them. However, judging by the mood he was in when he came out, I don’t think he got his way so we’re probably safe in assuming that it’ll be Lewis rather than Swinburne.’

‘How miserable for you! From what I saw of him at lunchtime, he’s not exactly going to be a laugh a minute in rehearsals, and 112

there was a gaggle of adolescent girls panting over the other chap’s photograph as I came past Wyndham’s. Wouldn’t he have been a bigger draw?’

‘Possibly, but I’m hardly in a position to argue at the moment.

Bernie made it quite clear the other day that I’m lucky to have a job at all at my advanced age, let alone a leading role.’

‘Don’t be daft. Look at the success you’ve had this last year –

he’d be mad to drop you. You’ve always said before that he values your opinion. He must have been having an off day.’

‘Yes, I know. He has been acting strangely recently and I’m sure he wouldn’t normally have been as blunt in the way he put it, but even I have to face up to the fact that what he said is absolutely right. I might be able to talk Josephine into writing me another role or two, but make the most of these weeks of peace without me

– you’ll be seeing a lot more of me until I’m of character age.’

‘Well I’m hardly likely to complain about that,’ Marta replied affectionately, opening an umbrella to protect them from the strengthening rain. ‘You never know – I may even scribble something for you myself one of these days, and I’m slightly more ancient than you.’

‘It’s all right for you writers, though: you can start as late as you like and go on until you drop, and no one thinks anything of it. In fact, we don’t even chide you for being lazy in not getting around to it sooner. I don’t know how you get away with it. I’ve been doing this since I was fifteen – no wonder I’m exhausted!’

‘Oh I started on and off a long time ago but if I read now what I wrote then, I’d probably be horrified. When you’re young, you only ever write romantic nonsense.’

‘And now you’re so cynical and worldly wise, I suppose? How does that tally with the woman whose idea of a first date is to take me tobogganing on Hampstead Heath to seduce me in the snow, or the one who leaves a single flower at stage door before every performance even though I’ve told her it’s bad luck, or . . .’

‘All right, all right – you win. I’m a different woman since I met you and I’ll probably never write another word because of it.

Books aren’t built on happiness, but I know what I’d rather have.’

113

‘Then we shall be old and poor and illiterate together,’ said Lydia, turning to give her a kiss. ‘Now, what about that sausage roll?’

The Salisbury public house was known to its advocates for liveli-ness and companionship, and to its detractors for noise and interference. Rafe Swinburne was not bothered enough to subscribe to either party, but Terry had suggested the Salisbury as a meeting place convenient for both of them before their evening shows and he had willingly agreed, eager to discover what the future held for him. He bitterly regretted having arrived on the scene too late to make his mark in the biggest success of the year, but his debut in Sheppey –which Terry was directing at the same time as he starred in Richard –had been moderately praised by the critics and keenly welcomed by the audience, and his hopes for Queen of Scots, should he get the part, were high. He had known from the moment he met him that Terry was the future of theatre while Aubrey was the past. Always blessed with a remarkable nose for his own advantage, Swinburne had watched with interest the cooling of their part-nership, which – or so rumour had it – had been particularly tense of late. If a parting of the ways was on the horizon, he had decided very early on which horse he was going to back, and what his stage presence could not get him with Terry, he suspected his face could.

He was ten minutes late for his rendezvous, but there was no sign of Terry in the crowds that lined the long, curved bar. The Salisbury’s clientele was made up almost exclusively of actors, playwrights and the odd agent or two touting for talent, and a dramatic heritage of sorts could no doubt be traced through the various owners of the heavy pewter tankards that hung from the ceiling. Early evening was always one of the busiest times: as the half approached, glasses would be collectively drained and three-quarters of the trade would disperse to one stage or another, gradually drifting back in twos and threes to resume where they had left off. By last orders, the bar would be full again, triumphs mixing leisurely with disasters amid the warm fog of smoke and beer but, at this earlier hour, with the most important performance of the week still to come, the 114

atmosphere was one of nervy expectation. Swinburne bought a glass of beer and found room on the end of one of the hard, horse-hair settees that bordered the room, casually taking in the conversations that came and went around him. He counted seven copies of the evening paper lying around on the brass-topped tables and, for once, none of them were open at the situations vacant pages, but rather at the latest account of the King’s Cross killing. It never ceased to amaze him that the murder of a complete stranger could be so tirelessly fascinating to so many. What difference could the loss of some girl they had never met possibly make to the ponder-ous old man in the corner or the powdery-faced redhead behind the bar? Sensation might be the public face of grief, but Londoners were a fickle bunch: there’d be a new headline along tomorrow and the world would carry on as normal through it all.

As he finished his beer, still on his own, Swinburne began to worry that Terry had been and gone without waiting for him.

Perhaps he should go and look for him? If he walked straight to the New Theatre there was no chance of their missing each other, so he gave up his seat to a pretty but excessively grateful young girl who had spotted an agent she needed to charm at his table, and headed out. He arrived at stage door without encountering anyone he knew on the way, gave a cheery greeting to the chap on duty and went downstairs. Even before he reached Terry’s dressing room he could hear raised voices behind the closed door.

Carefully, he went a little nearer until he was close enough to make out the words beneath the anger. It was Lewis Fleming speaking –

there was no mistaking that dour northern bravado – and he listened intently, confident that both men were too absorbed in the row to think about leaving the room. No one in the business would have been surprised to find the actors at each other’s throats

– their mutual hatred was common knowledge in the West End –

but this particular exchange ran deeper than professional differences. Swinburne was loath to tear himself away but, by the time Fleming began to shout again, he had heard enough. He left as quietly as he had arrived, a faint smile playing on his lips.

*

115

Fleming waited until Terry was on his way out of the theatre before making his move. He was deathly tired, but the rain and the cool evening air that ran through St Martin’s Court refreshed him a little and helped to focus his thoughts. It was all for her, he reminded himself, fixing her image – well and happy, as she used to be and as she would be again – firmly in his mind’s eye so that by the time the familiar figure emerged from stage door and moved briskly, head down, towards St Martin’s Lane, he was ready. When he stepped defiantly in Terry’s path, that famously sensitive face looked up at him impatiently, then, at the realisation that he was not merely a clumsy passer-by, the impatience turned to anger.

Noticing, in spite of Terry’s defiance, that the anger was tinged with fear, Fleming felt a surge of power that sickened him to the stomach, but he continued nonetheless.

‘Isn’t there a little something you’ve been meaning to give me?’

he asked, refusing to let the other man pass. ‘It’s a couple of days late, but everyone deserves a second chance.’

Terry looked at him and then beyond him down the passage, as if weighing up his options. ‘I told you on the telephone: you’ve had all there is to have at the moment. You can threaten me as much as you like, but it’ll get you nowhere.’

‘You don’t think so?’ Fleming gestured towards the queue which was building steadily behind him. It was just a slight move of the hand but proved enough to break Terry’s resolve.

‘All right, but come back inside. I don’t want to discuss this here.’

The bile rose once more in Fleming’s throat as he followed his victim through the backstage area, where McCracken was checking that the dice were in their box ready for the opening scene, and downstairs to the dressing rooms. He thought of his wife again, this time in that narrow bed, fighting silently, and he drew on her strength as an antidote for the conscience which made him so weak. It would be all right, he told himself, she would understand why he was doing this and she would forgive him. Then, when she was well, they would think of a way to make reparation, to Terry at least; God, on the other hand, was a different matter altogether.

116

As they reached his dressing-room door, Terry played for time by feigning difficulty with the lock. He really had no idea what to do, and the meeting that afternoon had left him without any hope of an immediate solution to his problems, without any easy way to make the sort of money he needed to get Fleming off his back.

He cursed Aubrey for his intransigence, but only because it was easier than blaming himself. His private life had always been a discreet matter – it would have been dangerous to allow it to be anything else and, anyway, it was of secondary importance – but he had believed himself to be safe in theatre circles, to be among if not like-minded people, at least tolerant ones. How foolish that now seemed! If Fleming did as he threatened to do, all he had worked for would be lost. He would have let everyone down – his family, his friends, the stage itself. Gossip and chatter would follow him everywhere until the worst was suspected of his most innocent friendships, until even he began to believe his behaviour to be wrong. He held Fleming in precious little esteem but he would be lying to himself if he said he was unaffected by the man’s evident loathing of all he was, so how would he feel when those he cared for turned away in disgust? When the police were brought in and he faced an exposure so public, so humiliating?

Since Fleming had made that first crude and unforeseen threat, his life had been a continuum of sleepless nights and days full of fear.

How was he expected to go on smiling and frisking about the stage as if everything were fine when he really felt wretched and despairing of the years ahead? He had to bring an end to it one way or another: violence he could cope with, but shame was more than he could bear.

Once inside the room, Terry took his crown from the chair and threw it on the floor, sitting to face Fleming with more nonchalance than he felt. ‘You’ve got no proof.’

The other man laughed. ‘I’ve got all I need. And you’d be surprised who’ll crawl out of the woodwork once the idea’s out in the open. Let’s face it – there’s no shortage of candidates.’

He was right, of course. Terry knew that no matter how careful he had been, he could not rely on everyone to protect him forever 117

and it would only take one loose mouth to ruin him completely.

‘How much do you want this time?’ he asked, defeated.

‘Oh, I don’t know. Another five hundred should do for now.

When you’ve got your new projects underway, we can renegotiate.

But hurry up: I haven’t got all the time in the world.’

‘Then you’d better learn some patience, because there aren’t going to be any new projects. At least, not immediately.’

‘What? Has Aubrey started to tire of his golden boy at last?’

Fleming sneered, his professional jealousy for a moment overcom-ing his other concerns. ‘Dear, dear. Well, you’ll just have to find another way because believe me – that little fall from grace will be nothing compared to the one you’re heading for if I don’t get what I need.’

‘Need?’ Terry retorted, suddenly raising his voice. ‘Are you seriously trying to grace that pathetic habit of yours with some sort of necessity? Look at you! You drink your nights away and turn up here to this stage – my stage – to sleepwalk through another performance, and then you expect me to fund your next . . .’

‘What?’ Fleming was shouting now, and his fury drowned out any level that Terry could manage. ‘You think I’d dirty my soul with your money just for a drink? Christ, you’ve got no idea what normal people have to live with, have you? Locked up here in your own little world, with nothing to care for but your own ego, nothing to lose but another role, another bit of make-believe.’ He picked up the discarded crown and threw it across the room, where it crashed against the dressing-room mirror and shattered Terry’s startled reflection. ‘It’s not just kings, you know. Real people suffer, too, and it would do you good to find out just for once how that feels.’ His voice dropped again, but the change in volume brought no respite for Terry. ‘So yes,’ he continued, ‘I do needthat money, and I do needit quickly. And for something much more important than a bottle, which makes things rather more dangerous for you.’

‘I can’t give you five hundred. Fifty’s all I’ve got – take it or leave it.’ He held the money up. ‘Anyway, it’s Aubrey you should be playing your dirty little games with. You’re going to need more than my money when you’re out of work.’

118

‘What?’

‘Hasn’t he told you yet? He’s going to sack you at the end of this run. Says he can’t rely on you any more, that you’ve lost whatever it was you had. I could never see it myself, but at least he’s come to his senses about something. So that’s you out of the running for the next show. You’ll have to think again.’

It was a cheap trick to buy himself some space and he knew it was only a matter of time before the lie was revealed. Fleming recovered quickly, but not quickly enough to prevent Terry from realising he had scored a small victory. ‘Then we’d better think of a way to make Aubrey change his mind about me, hadn’t we?’ he snarled, snatching the money and leaning close enough for Terry to feel the spittle on his cheek. ‘After all, two murders this weekend would look like recklessness.’ He stood up and went over to the door. ‘And in the meantime,’ he said mockingly, ‘we must stop meeting like this. You know how people talk.’

It was always at this time of the evening that Esme McCracken felt most at home in her life. Rather than take a break after the matinee like most of her colleagues, she preferred to stay behind and get the preparations for the evening performance out of the way immediately. Impatiently, she ran through costume and property plots which were automatic to her after more than a year, and made sure that all was in place by seven o’clock at the latest. It was then that she most needed time to herself.

Her one good coat – wool, in a daring blue, cast off by a woman her sister worked for and hardly ever worn – hung on the hook where it was always kept for these occasions. She took it down and put it on as quickly as possible, fastening the buttons firmly to cover a faded black jumper and skirt which felt as worn out and as undistinguished as she did, then slipped out of the stage door and round to the front of the New Theatre, eager to be where she belonged. From where she stood at the top of the steps, just outside those polished timber doors, she could watch the audience arrive without being seen from inside, offering a few words of welcome to any theatregoers who caught her eye and practising an air 119

of gracious humility for the future. As the foyer began to fill with expectation, she wondered what her own audiences would be like when Aubrey finally gave in and put her play into production; more discerning than this, certainly, she thought, looking dis-paragingly at a man in a drenched-through mackintosh and trilby, although she supposed she would have to settle for smaller numbers, at least in the early days. Never mind: what mattered was that those who did come would value her ideas, and of that she had no doubt.

On the dot of seven-thirty, Bernard Aubrey came down from his office into the foyer as he did every night, clad immaculately in evening dress which he wore with a casual elegance. He took up his usual position by the white marble chimneypiece and, ever the genial host, nodded to his Saturday night regulars, many of whom he knew well after several years of faithful attendance. He was still a handsome man, McCracken thought grudgingly, and the attractive coupling of compassion and determination in his eyes had not been dulled by age.

As she watched, Aubrey’s general smile of greeting took on a more personal warmth and she felt a sharp stab of jealousy when she recognised its recipient; in the crush, she had not noticed Josephine Tey arrive, but that was hardly surprising – her looks were as bland as her work. She returned Aubrey’s kiss on the cheek, and he lowered his head to allow her to speak privately into his ear, then the two moved slightly to one side, away from the main crowd. McCracken tutted impatiently as her view of the pair was blocked, and risked moving slightly forward; by the time she had them once again in her view, Aubrey’s expression had completely changed and Tey had laid a consoling hand on his arm.