Vintage Murder

Everyone had stopped talking. Alleyn, in the sudden silence, received a curious impression of eager dimly-lit faces that peered, of a beautiful woman standing with one arm raised, holding the scissors as a lovely Atropos might hold aloft her shears, of a fat white-waistcoated man like a Blampied caricature, bent over the table, and of a red cord that vanished upwards into the dark. Suddenly he felt intolerably oppressed, aware of a suspense out of all proportion to the moment. So strong was this impression that he half rose from his chair.

But at that moment Carolyn cut through the cord.

Something enormous that flashed down among them, jolting the table. Valerie Gaynes screaming. Broken glass and the smell of champagne. Champagne flowing over the white cloth. A thing like an enormous billiard ball embedded in the fern. Red in the champagne. And Valerie Gaynes, screaming, screaming. Carolyn, her arm still raised, looking down. Himself, his voice, telling them to go away, telling Hambledon to take Carolyn away.

‘Take her away, take her away.’

And Hambledon: ‘Come away. Carolyn, come away.’

CHAPTER 5 Intermezzo (#ulink_c622865f-6b56-56e6-bb37-9c0517410125)

‘No, don’t move him,’ said Alleyn.

He laid a hand on Hambledon’s arm. Dr Te Pokiha, his bronze fingers still touching the top of Meyer’s head, looked fixedly at Alleyn.

‘Why not?’ asked Hambledon.

George Mason raised his head. Ever since they had got rid of the others Mason had sat at the end of the long table with his face buried in his arms. Ted Gascoigne stood beside Mason. He repeated over and over again:

‘It was as safe as houses. Someone’s monkeyed with it. We rehearsed it twelve times this morning. I tell you there’s been some funny business, George. My God, there’s been some funny business.’

‘Why not?’ repeated Hambledon. ‘Why not move him?’

‘Because,’ said Alleyn, ‘Mr Gascoigne may be right.’

George Mason spoke for the first time.

‘But who’d want to hurt him? Old Alf! He hasn’t an enemy in the world.’ He turned a woebegone face to Te Pokiha.

‘You’re sure, Doctor, he’s – he’s – gone?’

‘You can see for yourself, Mr Mason,’ said Te Pokiha; ‘the neck is broken.’

‘I don’t want to,’ said Mason, looking sick.

‘What ought we to do?’ asked Gascoigne. They all turned to Alleyn. ‘Do I exude CID?’ wondered Alleyn to himself, ‘or has Hambledon blown the gaff?’

‘I’m afraid you must ring up the nearest police station,’ he said aloud. There was an instant outcry from Gascoigne and Mason.

‘Good God, the police!’

‘What the hell!’

‘…but it was an accident!’

‘That’d be finish!’

‘I’m afraid Mr Alleyn’s right,’ said Te Pokiha; ‘it is a matter for the police. If you like I’ll ring up. I know the superintendent in Middleton.’

‘While you’re about it,’ said Mason with desperate irony, ‘you might ring up a shipping office. As far as this tour’s concerned—’

‘Finish!’ said Gascoigne.

‘We’ve got to do something about it, Ted,’ said Hambledon quietly.

‘We built it up between us,’ said Mason suddenly. ‘When I first met Alf he was advancing a No. 4 company in St Helens. I was selling tickets for the worst show in England. We never looked back. We’ve never had a nasty word, never. And look at the business we’ve built up.’ His lips trembled. ‘By God, if someone’s killed him – you’re right, Hailey. I’m – I’m all anyhow – you fix it, Ted. I’m all anyhow.’

Dr Te Pokiha looked at him.

‘How about joining the others, Mr Mason? Perhaps a whisky would be a good idea. Your office—?’

Mason got to his feet and came down to the centre of the table. He looked at what was left of Alfred Meyer’s head, buried among the fern and broken fairy lights, wet with champagne and with blood. The two fat white hands still grasped the edges of the nest.

‘God!’ said Mason. ‘Do we have to leave him like that?’

‘It will only be for a little while,’ said Alleyn gently. ‘I should let Dr Te Pokiha take you to the office.’

‘Alf,’ murmured Mason. ‘Old Alf!’ He stood there, his lips shaking, his face ugly with suppressed emotion. Alleyn, who was accustomed to scenes of this sort, was conscious of his familiar daemon which took little at face value, and observed so much. The daemon prompted him to notice how unembarrassed Gascoigne and Hambledon were by Mason’s emotion, how they had assumed so easily a mood of sorrowful correctness, almost as if they had rehearsed the damn’ scene, and the daemon.

They got Mason away. Te Pokiha went with him and said he would ring up the police. The unfortunate Bert, the stage-hand who had rigged the tackle under Meyer’s and Gascoigne’s directions, was hanging about in the wings and now came on the stage. He began to explain the mechanics of the champagne stunt to Alleyn.

‘It was like this ’ere. We fixed the rope over the pulley, see, and on one end we fixed the bloody bottle and on the other end we hooked the bloody weight. The weight was one of them corner weights we used for the bloody funnels.’

‘Ease up on the language, Bert,’ suggested Gascoigne moodily.

‘Good-oh, Mr Gascoigne. And the weight was not so heavy as the bottle, see. And we took a lead with a red cord from just above the weight, see, and fixed it to the table. So when the cord was cut she came down gradual like, seeing she was that much heavier than the weight. The weight and the bottle hung half-way between the pulley and the table, see, so when she came down, the weight went up to the pulley. It was hooked into a ring in the rope. We cut out the lights and used candles so’s nothing would be noticed. We tried her out till we was sick and tired of her and she worked corker every time. She worked good-oh, didn’t she, Mr Gascoigne?’

‘Yes,’ said Gascoigne. ‘That’s what I say. There’s been some funny business.’

‘That’s right,’ agreed Bert heavily. ‘There bloody well must of.’

‘I’m just going aloft to take a look,’ said Gascoigne.

‘Just a moment,’ interrupted Alleyn. He took a notebook and pencil from his pocket. ‘Don’t you think perhaps we had better not go up just yet, Mr Gascoigne? If there has been any interference, the police ought to be the first on the spot, oughtn’t they?’

‘I think I’ll go and see how Carolyn is,’ said Hambledon suddenly.

‘They’re all in their dressing-rooms,’ said Gascoigne.

Hambeldon went away. Alleyn completed a little sketch in his notebook and showed it to Gascoigne and Bert.

‘Was it like that?’

‘That’s right, mister,’ said Bert, ‘you got it. That’s how it was. And when she cut the bloody cord, see …’ he rambled on.

Alleyn looked at the jeroboam. It had been cased in a sort of net which closed in at the neck, and was securely wired to the rope.

‘Wonder why the cork blew out,’ murmured Alleyn.