Inspector Alleyn 3-Book Collection 6: Opening Night, Spinsters in Jeopardy, Scales of Justice

‘I’m sorry,’ Alleyn said, ‘not yet. Not just yet.’

IV

‘Well,’ Alleyn said when J.G. had gone. ‘What have you got at your end of the table, Br’er Fox?’

Fox turned back the pages of his note-book.

‘What you might call negative evidence on the whole, Mr Alleyn. Clearance for the understudies who watched the show from the back of the circle and then went home. Clearance for the two dressers (male), the stage-manager and his assistant and the stagehands. They were all watching the play or on their jobs. On statements taken independently, they clear each other.’

‘That’s something.’

‘No female dresser,’ Mr Fox observed. ‘Which seems odd.’

‘Miss Tarne was the sole female dresser and she’d been promoted overnight to what I believe I should call starletdom. Which in itself seems to me to be a rum go. I’ve always imagined female dressers to be cups-of-tea in alpaca aprons and not embryo actresses. I don’t think Miss Tarne could have done the job but she comes into the picture as the supplanter of Uncle Ben’s dear little niece whom I find an extremely irritating ass with a certain amount of low cunning. Miss Tarne, on the other hand, seems pleasant and intelligent and looks nice. You must allow me my prejudices, Br’er Fox.’

‘She’s Mr Poole’s third cousin or something.’

‘The case reeks with obscure relationships – blood, marital and illicit, as far as one can see. Did you get anything from Bennington’s dresser?’

‘Nothing much,’ said Fox, sighing. ‘It seems the deceased didn’t like him to hang about on account of being a silent drinker. He was in the dressing-room up to about 7 p.m. and was then told to go and see if he could be of any use to the other gentlemen and not to come back till the first interval when the deceased changed his clothes. I must say that chap earns his wages pretty easily. As far as I could make out the rest of his duties for the night consisted in tearing off chunks of cotton-wool for the deceased to do up his face with. I checked his visits to the dressing-room by that. The last time he looked in was after the deceased went on the stage in the third act. He cleared away the used cotton-wool and powdered a clean bit. In the normal course of events I suppose he’d have put Mr Bennington into the fancy-dress he was going to wear to the ball and then gone home quite worn out.’

‘Was he at all talkative?’

‘Not got enough energy, Mr Alleyn. Nothing to say for himself barring the opinion that the deceased was almost on the DT mark. The other dresser, Cringle, seems a bright little chap. He just works for Mr Poole.’

‘Have you let him go?’

‘Yes, sir, I have. And the stage-hands. We can look them out again if we want them but for the moment I think we’ve just about cleaned them up. I’ve let the assistant stage-manager – ASM they call him – get away, too. Wife’s expecting any time and he never left the prompting book.’

‘That reduces the mixed bag a bit. You’ve been through all the rooms, of course, but before we do anything else, Br’er Fox, let’s have a prowl.’

They went into the passage. Fox jerked his thumb at Bennington’s room. ‘Gibson’s doing a fly-crawl in there,’ he said. ‘If there’s anything, he’ll find it. That dresser-chap didn’t clear anything up except his used powder-puffs.’

They passed Bennington’s room and went into Parry Percival’s next door. Here they found Detective-Sergeants Thompson and Bailey, the one a photographic and the other a fingerprint expert. They were packing up their gear.

‘Well, Bailey?’ Alleyn asked.

Bailey looked morosely at his superior. ‘It’s there all right, sir,’ he said grudgingly. ‘Complete prints, very near, and a check-up all over the shop.’

‘What about next door?’

‘Deceased’s room, sir? His prints on the wing-tap and the tube. Trace of red greasepaint on the rubber connection at the end of the tube. Matches paint on deceased’s lips.’

‘Very painstaking,’ said Alleyn. ‘Have you tried the experiment?’

‘Seeing the fires are back to back, sir,’ Fox said, ‘we have. Sergeant Gibson blew down this tube and deceased’s fire went out. As in former case.’

‘Well,’ Alleyn said, ‘there you are. Personally I don’t believe a word of it, either way.’ He looked, without interest, at the telegrams stuck round the frame of Parry’s looking-glass and at his costume for the ball. ‘Very fancy,’ he muttered. ‘Who’s in the next room?’

‘Mr J.G. Darcey,’ said Thompson.

They went into J.G.’s room which was neat and impersonal in character and contained nothing, it seemed, of interest, unless a photograph of Miss Gainsford looking insouciante could be so regarded.

In the last room on this side of the passage they saw the electric-machine, some rough sketches, scraps of material and other evidences of Martyn’s sewing-party for Jacko. Alleyn glanced round it, crossed the passage and looked into the empty room opposite. ‘Dismal little cells when they’re unoccupied, aren’t they?’ he said and moved on to Gay Gainsford’s room.

He stood there, his hands in his pockets, with Fox at his elbow. ‘This one suffers from the fashionable complaint, Fox,’ he said. ‘Schizophrenia. It’s got a split personality. On my left a rather too smart overcoat, a frisky hat, chichi gloves, a pansy purse-bag, a large bottle of one of the less reputable scents, a gaggle of mascots, a bouquet from the management and orchids from – who do you suppose?’ He turned over the card. ‘Yes. Alas, yes, with love and a thousand good wishes from her devoted J.G. On my right a well-worn and modest little topcoat, a pair of carefully tended shoes and gloves that remind one of the White Rabbit, a grey skirt and beret and a yellow jumper. A handbag that contains, I’m sure, one of those rather heart-rending little purses and – what else?’ He explored the bag. ‘A New Zealand passport issued this year in which one finds Miss Tarne is nineteen years old and an actress. So the dresser’s job was – what? The result of an appeal to the celebrated third cousin? But why not give her the understudy at once? She’s fantastically like him and I’ll be sworn he’s mightily catched with her. What’s more, even old Darcey says she’s a damn good actress.’ He turned the leaves of the passport. ‘She only arrived in England seventeen days ago. Can that account for the oddness of the set-up? Anyway, I don’t suppose it matters. Let’s go next door, shall we?’

Cringle had left Poole’s room in exquisite order. Telegrams were pinned in rows on the wall. A towel was spread over the make-up. A cigarette had been half-extracted from a packet and a match left ready on the top of its box. A framed photograph of Helena Hamilton stood near the glass. Beside it a tiny clock with a gay face ticked feverishly. It stood on a card. Alleyn moved it delicately and read the inscription. ‘From Helena. Tonight and tomorrow and always: bless you.’

‘The standard for first night keepsakes seems to be set at a high level,’ Alleyn muttered. ‘This is a French clock, Fox, with a Sevres face encircled with garnets. What do you suppose the gentleman gave the lady?’

‘Would a tiara be common?’ asked Fox.

‘Let’s go next door and see.’

Helena’s room smelt and looked like a conservatory. A table had been brought in to carry the flowers. Jacko had set out the inevitable telegrams and had hung up the dresses under their dust sheets. ‘Here we are,’ Alleyn said. ‘A sort of jeroboam of the most expensive scent on the market. Price, I should say, round about thirty pounds. “From Adam.” Why don’t you give me presents when we solve a petty larceny, Foxkin? Now, I may be fanciful but this looks to me like the gift of a man who’s at his wits’ end and plumps for the expensive, the easy and the obvious. Here’s something entirely different. Look at this, Fox.’

It was a necklace of six wooden medallions strung between jade rings. Each plaque was most delicately carved in the likeness of a head in profile and each head was a portrait of one of the company of players. The card bore the date and the inscription: ‘From J.’

‘Must have taken a long time to do,’ observed Fox. ‘That’ll be the foreign gentleman’s work, no doubt, Mr Doré.’

‘No doubt. I wonder if love’s labour has been altogether lost,’ said Alleyn. ‘I hope she appreciates it.’

He took up the leather-case with its two photographs of Poole. ‘He’s a remarkable looking chap,’ he said. ‘If there’s anything to be made of faces in terms of character, and I still like to pretend there is, what’s to be made of this one? It’s what they call a heart-shaped face, broad across the eyes with a firmly moulded chin and a generous but delicate mouth. Reminds one of a Holbein drawing. Doré’s sketch in the greenroom is damn good. Doré crops up all over the place, doesn’t he? Designs their fancy dresses. Paints their faces, in a double sense. Does their décor and with complete self-effacement, loves their leading lady.’

‘Do you reckon?’

‘I do indeed, Br’er Fox,’ Alleyn said and rubbed his nose vexedly. ‘However. Gibson’s done all the usual things in these rooms, I suppose?’

‘Yes, Mr Alleyn. Pockets, suitcases and boxes. Nothing to show for it.’

‘We may as well let them come home to roost, then. We’ll see them separately. They can change into their day clothes. The Gainsford has already, of course, done so. Blast! I suppose I’ll have to check Darcey’s statement with the Gainsford. She gives me the horrors, that young woman.’

‘Shall I see her, Mr Alleyn?’

‘You can stay and take your notes. I’ll see her in the greenroom. No, wait a bit. You stay with the others, Fox, and send young Lamprey along with her. Tell them they can change in their rooms, fan them before they go, and make sure they go singly. I don’t want them talking together. And you might try again if you can dig up anything that sounds at all off-key with Bennington over the last few days. Anything that distressed or excited him.’

‘He seems to have been rather easily excited.’

‘He does, doesn’t he, but you never know. I don’t believe it was suicide, Fox, and I’m not yet satisfied that we’ve unearthed anything that’s good enough for a motive for murder. Trip away, Foxkin. Ply your craft.’

Fox went out sedately. Alleyn crossed the passage and opened the door of Bennington’s room. Sergeant Gibson was discovered, squatting on his haunches before the dead gas-fire.

‘Anything?’ Alleyn asked.

‘There’s this bit of a stain that looks like a scorch on the hearth, sir.’

‘Yes, I saw that. Any deposit?’