Night at the Vulcan

by Ngaio Marsh

  ‘Really, sir? Am I allowed to ask what it is?’

  ‘You’re getting on in the service, now. What have you spotted on your own account?’

  ‘Is it something to do with Bennington’s behaviour, sir?’

  ‘It is indeed. If a man’s going to commit suicide, Mike, and his face is made up to look loathsome, what does he do about it? If he’s a vain man (and Bennington appears to have had his share of professional vanity), if he minds about the appearance of his own corpse, he cleans off the greasepaint. If he doesn’t give a damn, he leaves it as it is. But with time running short he does not carefully and heavily powder his unbecoming make-up for all the world as if he meant to go on and take his curtain-call with the rest of them. Now, does he?’

  ‘Well, no, sir,’ said Mike. ‘If you put it like that, I don’t believe he does.’

  By half-past twelve most of the company on the stage seemed to be asleep or dozing. Dr Rutherford on his couch occasionally lapsed into bouts of snoring from which he would rouse a little, groan, take snuff and then settle down again. Helena lay in a deep chair with her feet on a stool. Her eyes were closed but Martyn thought that if she slept it was but lightly. Clem had made himself a bed of some old curtains and was curled up on it beyond the twisting stairway. Jacko, having tucked Helena up in her fur coat, settled himself on the stage beside her, dozing, Martyn thought, like some eccentric watch-dog at his post. J.G. and Gay Gainsford were summoned in turn and in turn came back, J.G. silently, Gay with some attempt at conversation. In the presence of the watchful Mr Fox this soon petered out. Presently she, too, fell to nodding. Immediately after her return Parry Percival suddenly made an inarticulate ejaculation and, before Fox could move, darted off the stage. Sergeant Gibson was heard to accost him in the passage. Fox remained where he was and there was another long silence.

  Adam Poole and Martyn looked into each other’s faces. He crossed the stage to where she sat, on the left side which was the farthest removed from Fox. He pulled up a small chair and sat facing her.

  ‘Kate,’ he muttered, ‘I’m so sorry about all this. There are hare’s-foot shadows under your eyes, your mouth droops, your hands are anxious and your hair is limp though not at all unbecoming. You should be sound asleep in Jacko’s garret under the stars and there should be the sound of applause in your dreams. Really, it’s too bad.’

  Martyn said: ‘It’s nice of you to think so but you have other things to consider.’

  ‘I’m glad to have my thoughts interrupted.’

  ‘Then I still have my uses.’

  ‘You can see that chunk of a man over there. Is he watching us?’

  ‘Yes. With an air of absent-mindedness which I’m not at all inclined to misunderstand.’

  ‘I don’t think he can hear us though it’s a pity my diction is so good. If I take your hand perhaps he’ll suppose I’m making love to you and feel some slight constabular delicacy.’

  ‘I hardly think so,’ Martyn whispered and tried to make nothing of his lips against her palm.

  ‘Will you believe, Kate, that I am not in the habit of making passes at young ladies in my company?’

  Martyn found herself looking at the back of Helena’s chair.

  ‘Oh, yes,’ Poole said. ‘There’s that, too. I make no bones about that. It’s another and a long and fading story. On both parts. Fading, on both parts, Kate. I have been very much honoured.’

  ‘I can’t help feeling this scene is being played at the wrong time, in the wrong place and before the wrong audience. And I doubt,’ Martyn said, not looking at him, ‘if it should be played at all.’

  ‘But I can’t be mistaken. It has happened for us, Martyn. Hasn’t it? Suddenly, preposterously, almost at first sight we blinked and looked again and there we were. Tell me it’s happened. The bird under your wrist is so wildly agitated. Is that only because you are frightened?’

  ‘I am frightened. I wanted to ask your advice and now you make it impossible.’

  ‘I’ll give you my advice. There. Now you are alone again. But for the sake of the law’s peace of mind as well as my own you must take a firm line about your blushing.’

  ‘It was something he said to me that morning,’ she murmured in the lowest voice she could command.

  ‘Do you mean the morning when I first saw you?’

  ‘I mean,’ Martyn said desperately, ‘the morning the photographs were taken. I had to go to his dressing-room.’

  ‘I remember very well. You came into mine too.’

  ‘He said something, then. He was very odd in his manner. They’ve asked us to try and remember anything at all unusual.’

  ‘Are you going to tell me what it was?’

  In a few words and under her breath she did so.

  Poole said: ‘Perhaps you should tell them. Yes, I think you should. In a moment I’ll do something about it but there’s one thing more I must say to you. Do you know I’m glad this scene has been played so awkwardly—inaudible, huddled up, inauspicious and uneffective. Technically altogether bad. It gives it a kind of authority, I hope. Martyn, are you very much surprised? Please look at me.’

  She did as he asked and discovered an expression of such doubt and anxiety in his face that to her own astonishment she put her hand against his cheek and he held it there for a second. ‘God!’ he said. ‘What a thing to happen!’ He got up abruptly and crossed the stage.

  ‘Inspector,’ he said, ‘Miss Tarne has remembered an incident three days old which we both think might possibly be of some help. What should we do about it?’

  The others stirred a little. J.G. opened his eyes.

  Fox got up. ‘Thank you very much, sir,’ he said. ‘When Mr Alleyn is disengaged I’m sure he’ll—Yes? What is it?’

  PC Lamprey had come in. He delivered his message about the dressing-rooms being open for the use of their occupants. At the sound of his brisk and loudish voice they all stirred. Helena and Darcey got to their feet. Jacko sat up. Clem, Gay and Dr Rutherford opened their eyes, listened to the announcement and went to sleep again.

  Fox said: ‘You can take this young lady along to the chief in three minutes, Lamprey. Now, ladies and gentlemen, if you’d care to go to your rooms.’

  He shepherded Helena and the two men through the door and looked back at Poole. ‘What about you, sir?’

  Poole with his eyes on Martyn, said: ‘Yes, I’m coming.’ Fox waited stolidly at the door for him and after a moment’s hesitation Poole followed the others. Fox went with them.

  Mike Lamprey said: ‘We’ll let them get settled, Miss Tarne, and then I’ll take you along to Mr Alleyn. You must be getting very bored with all this hanging about.’

  Martyn, whose emotional processes were in a state of chaos, replied with a vague smile. She wondered disjointedly if constables of PC Lamprey’s class were a commonplace in the English force. He glanced good-humouredly at Gay and the three dozing men and evidently felt obliged to make further conversation.

  ‘I heard someone say,’ he began, ‘that you are a New Zealander. I was out there as a small boy.’

  ‘Were you, really?’ Martyn said and wondered confusedly if he could have been the son of a former governor-general.

  ‘We had a place out there on a mountain. Mount Silver it was. Would that be anywhere near your part of the world?’

  Something clicked in Martyn’s memory. ‘Oh, yes!’ she said. ‘I’ve heard about the Lampreys of Mount Silver, I’m sure and—’ Her recollections clarified a little. ‘Yes, indeed,’ she added lamely.

  ‘No doubt,’ said Mike with a cheerful laugh, ‘a legend of lunacy has survived us. We came home when I was about eight and soon afterwards my uncle happened to get murdered in our flat and Mr Alleyn handled the case. I thought at the time I’d like to go into the Force and the idea sort of persisted. And there you are, you know. Potted autobiography. Shall we go along and see if he’s free?’

  He escorted her down the passage to the greenroom door past Sergeant Gibson who seemed
to be on guard there. Mike chatted freely as they went, rather as if he was taking her into supper after a successful dance. The star-bemused Martyn found herself brightly chatting back at him.

  This social atmosphere was not entirely dispelled, she felt, by Alleyn himself, who received her rather as a distinguished surgeon might greet a patient.

  ‘Come in, Miss Tarne,’ he said cordially. ‘I hear you’ve thought of something to tell us about this wretched business. Do sit down.’

  She sat in her old chair, facing the gas-fire and with her back to the table. Only when she looked up involuntarily at the sketch of Adam Poole did she realize that young Lamprey had settled himself at the table and taken out a note-book. She could see his image reflected in the glass.

  Inspector Fox came in and went quietly to the far end of the room where he sat in a shadowed corner and appeared to consult his own note-book.

  ‘Well,’ Alleyn said, ‘what’s it all about?’

  ‘You’ll probably think it’s about nothing,’ Martyn began, ‘and if you do I shall be sorry I’ve bothered you with it. But I thought—just in case—’

  ‘You were perfectly right. Believe me, we are “conditioned”, if that’s the beastly word, to blind alleys. Let’s have it.’

  ‘On my first morning in this theatre,’ Martyn said. ‘which was the day before yesterday…no, if it’s past midnight, the day before that.’

  ‘Tuesday?’

  ‘Yes. On that morning I went to Mr Bennington’s room to fetch Miss Hamilton’s cigarette-case. He was rather strange in his manner but at first I thought that was because—I thought he’d noticed my likeness to Mr Poole. He couldn’t find the case and in hunting through the pockets of a jacket, a letter dropped to the floor. I picked it up and he drew my attention to it in the oddest sort of way. I’d describe his manner almost as triumphant. He said something about autographs. I think he asked me if I collected autographs or autographed letters. He pointed to the envelope which I still had in my hand and said there was somebody who’d give a hell of a lot for that one. Those, I’m almost sure, were his exact words.’

  ‘Did you look at the letter?’

  ‘Yes, I did, because of what he said. It was addressed to him and it had a foreign stamp on it. The writing was very bold and it seemed to me foreign looking. I put it on the shelf face downwards and he drew my attention to it again by stabbing at it with his finger. The name of the sender was written on the back.’

  ‘Do you remember it?’

  ‘Yes, I do, because of his insistence.’

  ‘Good girl,’ said Alleyn quietly.

  ‘It was “Otto Brod” and the address was a theatre in Prague. I’m afraid I don’t remember the name of the theatre or the street. I ought to remember the theatre. It was a French name, Théâtre de—something. Why can’t I remember!’

  ‘You haven’t done badly. Was there something in the envelope?’

  ‘Yes. It wasn’t anything fat. One sheet of paper I should think.’

  ‘And his manner was triumphant?’

  ‘I thought so. He was just rather odd about it. He’d been drinking—brandy I thought—the tumbler was on the dressing-shelf and he made as if to put the flask behind his looking-glass.’

  ‘Did you think he was at all the worse for wear?’

  ‘I wondered if it accounted for his queer behaviour.’

  ‘Can you tell me anything else he said? The whole conversation if you remember it.’

  Martyn thought back and it seemed she had journeyed half a lifetime in three days. There was the room. There was J.G. going out and leaving her with Bennington and there was Bennington staring at her and talking about the cigarette-case. There was also something else, buried away behind her thoughts of which the memory now returned. She was made miserable by it.

  ‘He said, I think, something about the cigarette-case. That he himself hadn’t given it to Miss Hamilton.’

  ‘Did he say who gave it to her?’

  ‘No,’ Martyn said. ‘I don’t think he said that. Just that he didn’t.’

  ‘And was his manner of saying this strange?’

  ‘I thought his manner throughout was—uncomfortable and odd. He seemed to me to be a very unhappy man.’

  ‘Yet you used the word triumphant?’

  ‘There can be unhappy victories.’

  ‘True for you. There can, indeed. Tell me one thing more. Do you connect the two conversations? I mean do you think what he said about the cigarette-case had anything to do with what he said about the letter?’

  ‘I should say nothing. Nothing at all.’

  ‘Oh, Lord!’ Alleyn said resignedly and called out: ‘Have you got all that, Mike?’

  ‘Coming up the straight, sir.’

  ‘Put it into longhand, now, will you, and we’ll ask Miss Tarne to have a look at it and see if she’s been misrepresented. Do you mind waiting a minute or two, Miss Tarne? It’ll save you coming back.’

  ‘No, of course not,’ said Martyn whose ideas of police investigation were undergoing a private revolution. Alleyn offered her a cigarette and lit it for her. The consultation, she felt, was over and the famous surgeon was putting his patient at her ease.

  ‘I gather from Lamprey’s far-reaching conversation that you are a New Zealander,’ he said. ‘If I may say so, you seem to have dropped out of a clear sky into your own success story. Have you been long at the Vulcan, Miss Tarne?’

  ‘A night and three days.’

  ‘Good Lord! And in that time you’ve migrated from dresser to what sounds like minor stardom. Success story, indeed!’

  ‘Yes, but—’ Martyn hesitated. For the first time since she walked into the Vulcan she felt able to talk about herself. It didn’t occur to her that it was odd for her confidant to be a police officer.

  ‘It’s all been very eccentric,’ she said. ‘I only reached England a little over a fortnight ago and my money was stolen in the ship so I had to get some sort of job rather quickly.’

  ‘Did you report the theft to the police?’

  ‘No. The purser said he didn’t think it would do any good.’

  ‘So much,’ said Alleyn with a wry look, ‘for the police!’

  ‘I’m sorry—’ Martyn began and he said: ‘Never mind. It’s not an uncommon attitude, I’m afraid. So you had a rather unhappy arrival. Lucky there was your cousin to come to your rescue.’

  ‘But—no—I mean—’ Martyn felt herself blushing and plunged on. ‘That’s just what I didn’t want to do. I mean I didn’t want to go to him at all. He didn’t know of my existence. You see—’

  It was part of Alleyn’s professional equipment that something in his make-up invited confidence. Mr Fox once said of his superior that he would be able to get himself worked up over the life story of a mollusc provided the narrative was obtained first-hand. He heard Martyn’s story with the liveliest interest up to the point where she entered the theatre. He didn’t seem to think it queer that she should have been anxious to conceal her relationship to Poole or that she was stupid to avoid the Vulcan in her search for a job. She was describing her interview with Bob Grantley on Wednesday night when Sergeant Gibson’s voice sounded in the passage. He tapped on the door and came in.

  ‘Excuse me, sir,’ he said, ‘but could you see the night-watchman. He seems to think it’s important.’

  He had got as far as this when he was elbowed aside by Fred Badger who came angrily into the room.

  ‘ ‘Ere!’ he said. ‘Are you the guvnor of this ‘owd’yerdo?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Alleyn.

  ‘Well, look. You can lay orf this young lady, see? No call to get nosy on account of what she done, see? I don’t know nothink abaht the law, see, but I’m in charge ‘ere of a night and what she done she done wiv my permission. Nah!’

  ‘Just a moment—’ Alleyn began and was roared down.

  ‘Suppose it was an offence! What abaht it! She never done no ‘arm. No offence taken where none was intended, that’s correct a
in’t it! Nah yen!’

  ‘What,’ Alleyn said turning to Martyn, ‘is this about?’

  ‘I’m afraid it’s about me sleeping in the theatre that first night. I’d nowhere to go and it was very late. Mr Badger very kindly—didn’t turn me out.’

  ‘I see. Where did you sleep?’

  ‘Here. In this chair.’

  ‘Like a charld,’ Fred Badger interposed. ‘Slep’ like a charld all night. I looked in on me rahnds and seen ‘er laying safe in the arms of Morpus. Innercent. And if anyone tells you different you can refer ‘im to me. Badger’s the name.’

  ‘All right, Badger.’

  ‘If you put me pot on with the management for what I done, leaving ‘er to lay—all right. Aht! Finish! There’s better jobs rahnd the corner.’

  ‘Yes. All right. I don’t think we’ll take it up.’

  ‘Awright. Fair enough.’ He addressed himself to Martyn. ‘And what was mentioned between you and me in a friendly manner needn’t be mentioned no more. Let bygones be bygones.’ He returned to Alleyn. ‘She’s as innercent as a babe. Arst ‘is nibs.’

  Alleyn waited for a moment and then said: ‘Thank you.’ Gibson succeeded in removing Fred Badger but not before he had directed at Martyn that peculiar clicking sound of approval which is accompanied by a significant jerk of the head.

  When he had gone Alleyn said: ‘I think I’d better ask you to interpret. What was his exquisite meaning?’

  Martyn felt a dryness in her mouth. ‘I think,’ she said, ‘he’s afraid he’ll get into trouble for letting me sleep in here that night and I think he’s afraid I’ll get into trouble if I tell you that he showed me how the murder in the Jupiter case was accomplished.’

  ‘That seems a little far-fetched.’

  Martyn said rapidly: ‘I suppose it’s idiotic of me to say this but I’d rather say it. Mr Bennington very naturally resented my luck in this theatre. He tackled me about it and he was pretty truculent. I expect the stage-hands have gossiped to Badger and he thinks you might—might—’