At Midnight in Venice

by J C Briggs

  ‘Did he now? Let’s hope that Inspector Maxwell finds this Lilian. We’ll be off then.’

  Jack Marchant was brought into in Jones’s office by Rogers at exactly nine o’clock. Jack Marchant was respectably dressed — without his cloak and in his black frock coat, he looked like any other young man, though his face showed his anxiety. Dickens wondered if there was a touch of defiance in the black and white waistcoat. He would not shed his Magpie identity entirely.

  ‘Mr Sabatini is not with you?’ asked Jones after the introductions were made.

  ‘No, Mr Jones, he is in a dreadful state. I fear for him so — I — took him in a cab first thing to — my mother’s. Mr Dickens knows her — she will look after him. If you need to question him — he will be there. You have my word.’

  ‘Very well. Now Mr Dickens has told me about Miss Jianna. You know her full name?’

  ‘Jianna Rizzo.’

  ‘You must tell me everything you can remember about this artist whom you believe she is with.’

  ‘I do believe it — she has nowhere else to go. I have thought about him — he is tall, about my height, slender, a short beard at his chin, very dark hair. I saw him with Jianna — he seemed fascinated, but then she is beautiful. I wasn’t surprised when — she left me — we were not bound —’ he looked at Jones half defiantly like a boy who feared a schoolmaster, or a disapproving father. Dickens thought how young he was for all his careless adventuring — ‘but I did — do care — that she may be —’

  ‘But you did speak to him?’

  ‘No, I never did. I passed them in a passage way a few times.’

  ‘How did you know he was Italian if you did not speak to him?’

  ‘The name — I just assumed — he looked Italian. Jianna is Italian and she’d known him before when she was an artist’s model. She seemed to like him. He hardly seemed to see me at all — his eyes were only for Jianna. I hoped that she — his being Italian, I thought they might be suited — I should have — what must you think of me? Just to let her go —’

  Jones gave him a hard look. ‘This is not a time to think of yourself, Mr Marchant. You can help me by coming to Drury Lane with Mr Dickens and me. Ask everyone you know about Antonio Polidori. Mr Dickens and I will talk to the manager. You know that Miss Pout and Miss Curd were both connected to an artist and both are dead, and Miss Fane is in an asylum. I need to find him urgently. Someone might know where he lives.’

  ‘Mr Dickens said that there might be other girls.’

  ‘I have other leads to follow, but I do not wish to waste time in explanation. I will tell you that my enquiries centre on St John’s Wood, and I have Inspector Shackell in Clerkenwell, and I have one of my men watching at Rarx, the pawnbroker’s shop — some stolen jewels connected to this case were found there. Now, I suggest that we go over to the theatre.’

  Jones’s tone was firm. Dickens saw Jack Marchant blink at Rarx’s name, but he said nothing. Jack Marchant was a young man used to his own way and doing as he pleased — he had a certain arrogance where the police were concerned. Clearly, he knew better now. Sam Jones could be very formidable.

  Constable Feak came in as Rogers took Jack Marchant out. ‘Message from Inspector Maxwell, sir. Says he’s found a Lilian Judd.’

  ‘Send Sergeant Rogers back in and wait with Mr Marchant.’

  ‘Alf, I’ve to go to Marylebone. You go with Mr Dickens and Scrap to the theatre and keep that young man under your eye. Charles, you talk to the manager and whoever else is in charge. Scrap, use your eyes and ears.’

  ‘You don’t think Jack Marchant…’

  ‘A young man whose been missing from home for several years, who seems to have more than one identity, and who is connected to Miss Fane and knew about Jemima Curd and Violet Pout — it does make me think.’

  Dickens felt as if he had been struck in the face with ice cold water. Not Jack Marchant, not Dolly Marchant’s son.

  37: Vanishing Act

  James Anderson, manager of the Drury Lane theatre and fine actor in his own right, was a man with much on his mind. He looked at Charles Dickens as a man might look at a famous man suddenly gone mad, one eye expressing a kind of humouring deference — the other on the door.

  ‘Polidori,’ he repeated nervously, ‘the vampire man?’ Doctor John Polidori had been dead for nearly thirty years. In any case what would that author of The Vampyr be doing at Drury Lane? There were tales of ghosts, of course, but nothing about vampires.

  ‘No, no, Mr Anderson, though I must say I hadn’t thought of Doctor Polidori. The man I am seeking is an Italian, a Mr Antonio Polidori who, I was told, worked here some weeks ago, painting scenery.’

  ‘I’m sure I would have remembered the name. Vampires were quite the thing a few years ago — not that we go in for them.’

  ‘No, indeed. Shakespeare, I see, for your opening season.’

  ‘The Winter’s Tale, and of course it’s the pantomime season: Harlequin and Humpty Dumpty to follow Leontes and Hermione. You should go along to the painting shop — you know Mr Cuthbert.’

  ‘I do — he did the scenes for Mr Macready’s Hamlet.’

  ‘We’ve a lot on for the new season. They’ll have taken on a number of assistants — some don’t stay, of course, but he’d remember the name. You’ll have to excuse me, Mr Dickens, I’ve the whole company on stage in a while — if they all turn up.’

  Dickens went down some stairs which led to the stage behind and then up again to the huge painting shop where the enormous painting frames were fixed to the walls. On these, the scenery was mounted for painting. They could be raised or lowered through slots in the floor so that the artist could reach all parts of the work. The smell was of size, paint, turpentine, glue and sawn wood.

  He stepped gingerly across the floor strewn with glue pots, brushes and scale drawings to find himself gazing at London Bridge. Moonlight cast a mysterious glow on the river where the water, touched by light, seemed to ripple. In the background the dark shape of the Tower loomed menacingly. He might have been standing in that very darkness, feeling the chill of the east wind.

  Mr Cuthbert, who was gazing, too, with some satisfaction, turned round. ‘Mr Dickens. What brings you here? Not that you are unwelcome. Always a pleasure.’ Mr Cuthbert put his brush and mahl stick in his pocket and wiped his hands on his apron.

  Dickens shook his hand. ‘That’s quite marvellous. I feel the cold just looking.’

  ‘Much obliged, sir. Euston Station over yonder —’ Dickens saw the familiar Doric Archway which led into the station and the great hall — ‘and the Crystal Palace. Mr Anderson wants a spectacle. They’ve a Boulogne steamer at The Prince’s Theatre — seems to sail across the stage. The Haymarket have the Crystal Palace as well —’

  ‘Not as fine as that, I’ll wager,’ Dickens said, looking at the representation of the shining plate glass, an uncanny replica of that which he had seen in Hyde Park.

  ‘We’ll see what the critics say. We’ve a fairy bower, too. Lot of new work this season and a lot of assistants I’ve had to take on. Some worse than useless.’

  ‘That’s what I came about. Did you take on a Mr Polidori a few weeks back?’

  Cuthbert looked surprised. ‘I don’t think so — I’d have remembered the name.’

  ‘That’s what Mr Anderson said. He is an Italian — tall, thin fellow, short beard and dark eyes. Not much to go on, I know.’

  ‘Sorry, Mr Dickens, I don’t remember him. Artist, is he?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Well, as you know, we might take on a good painter as an accessory principal — he’d be paid on a piece-work basis. I’d remember that. We have colour grinders, apprentices, labourers, but no one of that name. What about the property shop? He might have been taken on in there — all sorts of things to be painted. Mr Perkins will know.’

  Dickens left him at London Bridge and made his way by Euston Station, through the fairy bower, up another staircase to a long corridor which ra
n above the stage where were situated the property shops and carpenters’ shops. Mr Perkins seemed to stand in an Aladdin’s cave, surrounded by an extraordinary variety of articles: a cow, full size, a calf, a slightly wonky church steeple, a balloon and its basket, Britannia’s trident, an assortment of chimney sweep’s brushes, a chimney to go with them, and a comically grotesque, monstrous head to which he was attaching an equally monstrous nose.

  Dickens stood still while this delicate operation was performed. How the lights, the music, the scenes and the actors would transform all this by the magic of the theatre into something rich and strange — art to enchant, he thought.

  But Mr Perkins had no magic to conjure up Antonio Polidori. He had no recollection of the name or the man. Dickens asked about Jianna Rizzo and was directed to the mantua makers’ along the corridor — Miss Mantalini might know the lady. If not, then he should go to the seamstresses’ shop.

  The mantua makers knew Jianna in passing, but knew of no Mr Polidori. The seamstresses were more forthcoming. Jianna had left a few weeks ago. She lived with a man they knew as Magpie — they all knew him. He’d left before her. The last play had finished — then there were Mr Julian’s concerts. They thought she might have gone with him to another theatre, Astley’s Circus, perhaps. Magpie was an acrobat as well as an actor — magician, too.

  ‘Vanished in a puff o’ smoke, p’raps,’ put in a pert, pretty girl who winked at Dickens. Black eyes like two shining beads and unruly curls lent her an appealing prettiness.

  ‘You’ve never heard the name “Polidori”?’

  ‘Vampire, ain’t ’e?’ The pert girl was enjoying herself.

  ‘That’s enough from you,’ the older woman was sharp. The pert girl gave Dickens another wink.

  ‘No, he was a scenery painter, I’m told.’

  ‘Tried Mr Cuthbert?’ the older woman asked.

  ‘I have, and Mr Perkins.’

  ‘Well, I’m sorry we can’t help — so many folk come and go, sir. If he’d been an actor we might have known. We might have fitted him. You’re sure, Maisie Bolton? I’ve seen you hanging about the painting shop.’

  Pert Maisie was sure. She had seen Jianna with Mr Magpie, but not with any other man. Her black bead eyes were suddenly serious. ‘Beautiful, she is, sir, Jianna, but she never said much to any of us. Quiet, she was — mysterious.’

  Dickens left them. He felt uneasy, remembering Jones’s words about Jack Marchant. It was odd that no one seemed to know anything about this artist. He ought to find Jack and Rogers — perhaps one of Jack’s fellow performers had seen Polidori. And where was Scrap?

  Scrap was having the time of his life, his ears alert and his eyes on stalks, especially now. He was at the side of the stage. Quite how he had arrived there, he wasn’t sure. The place was vast. Dawdling along, stopping to peer into rooms and boxes and alcoves, he had soon lost Sergeant Rogers and Mr Marchant. But Mr Dickens’s name had opened all sorts of real and metaphorical doors.

  ‘Catching up with Mr Charles Dickens,’ he had said to anyone who asked, ‘a matter of business.’ He surprised himself with the voice he had used — the voice of a toff. A boy, younger than himself, racing along a corridor, carrying a wig, had called him “Sir”. It was like that sayin’ in Ali Baba — Mrs Jones had read that to them — “Open sesame”, they said and the cave had opened to reveal the treasure of the forty thieves.

  But now, he was just a boy gazing in awe at another boy on the stage, a boy performing wonders, balancing on a globe which rolled beneath him — the whole world at his feet. And what was more remarkable was the fact that the boy held aloft two sticks with plates spinning on them — plates! The globe stopped rolling, the boy jumped lightly off, dropped the sticks, and caught a plate neatly in each hand. Scrap applauded and the boy turned to look at him and bowed.

  ‘’Ow d’yer do that?’ Scrap said as the boy came towards him. In his wonder he forgot to be a toff.

  ‘Practice. Ain’t seen you before.’

  ‘About some business fer Mr Charles Dickens — lookin’ fer someone.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Antonio Polidori — scene painter, or was, until a few weeks ago.’

  ‘Italian cove?’

  ‘Yes, know ’im?’ Scrap’s heart leapt.

  ‘No — just the name sounds Italian. Hundreds of people work here, though, and lots of painters, carpenters, property men.’

  ‘He is a painter — an artist.’

  The boy looked at Scrap with a hint of condescension in his eyes. ‘Oh, well, I might not know him. I’m an actor — performer, as you saw — Frederick Clarke’s the name. I wouldn’t necessarily know a scene painter — unless he was one of the principals like Mr Cuthbert or Mr Grieve. What you want this Polidori for?’

  Scrap didn’t give his name, feeling again the lack of a second one in the presence of this superior being. ‘We, that is me and Mr Dickens —’ asserting his own impressive credentials — ‘think he’s gone away with a lady — friend of Mr Dickens.’

  Frederick Clarke’s eyes gleamed, ‘A lady, eh? Think they’re in hiding? Lots of places to lay low here — tunnels, cellars — you can get down to a pit, right under, if you know your way about. Want to see? You ain’t afraid of ghosts, I suppose.’

  Scrap was torn. He did want to see, but — a murderer down there in the dark. He ought to get Mr Dickens, but then he thought that they couldn’t have been hiding for weeks, unless there was a body down there. He looked at Frederick Clarke’s waiting eyes — there was a challenge there. Ghosts — not likely. Scrap felt superior then. Mr Clarke knew nothin’ about murderers.

  ‘Might as well,’ he said, not wanting to seem too eager. He wasn’t a kid. He followed Frederick Clarke.

  Dickens caught sight of Scrap with someone else going off the stage. Who was he with? His glimpse of the leading figure showed only that it was a man. He crossed and saw them descending a narrow staircase which he knew led to the cellars, various storerooms and tunnels, and to the room where Jack Marchant had hidden Rolando Sabatini. Had Scrap met someone who knew that they’d been down there?

  He went down and saw them disappearing into the tunnel. It was dark down here — no wonder there was talk of ghosts. Legend had it that there had been a tunnel leading to the river in the old days. The theatre was an enormous place — he thought of the labyrinth of staircases, the boxes, the odd rooms for actors changing between scenes, the refreshment rooms, the water closets and the secret places down here. Anyone could come and go, pretend to be someone else, follow a girl in a green velvet dress. He remembered Jianna in Magpie’s fusty lodgings in her dark velvet dress — a silent, unspeaking face. Like a girl in a painting, he had thought then.

  He hurried into the tunnel and saw the shapes of Scrap and his companion ahead, in earnest conversation. The taller figure did not seem threatening. Nevertheless, he called out for Scrap and saw that the man with him was very young, not much more than a boy.

  ‘What brings you down here?’ he asked.

  ‘Mr Clarke knows all the secret places — thought it woz worth a look.’

  ‘I’ve seen you before, Mr Dickens. The name’s Clarke, Frederick Clarke. I do the spinning globe.’

  ‘Of course you do. I’ve seen you — most remarkable, Mr Clarke. Do you know the man they call Magpie?’

  ‘Course, I do — went to Astley’s I heard.’

  ‘You’ve not seen him since?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘And Miss Jianna who did needlework?’

  ‘His lady friend — went with him, I suppose.’

  ‘He doesn’t know Mr Polidori, either,’ Scrap put in.

  ‘Places down here a man could hide,’ said Frederick Clarke. ‘Thought I’d show your friend.’

  They went further down the tunnel. Frederick Clarke opened various doors, but there was nothing to see but lumber, old props, costumes, bits of old gas lights and pipes — just the same sort of thing they’d seen in the room to which Jack Marchant h
ad taken them. There was no one to be seen until they reached the end of the tunnel where a door led into a back yard. Here was the engine which worked the pumps providing the water from the underground reservoir constructed to deal with fire. Dickens thought of all the entrances and exits a man might use to slip in and out — just as Magpie had done. Polidori, or whoever he was, would not be found here.

  Scrap and Dickens went back up to Mr Anderson’s room outside of which they had arranged to meet Rogers and Jack Marchant.

  ‘What?’ asked Dickens as Rogers appeared, his usually cheerful face looking grim.

  ‘Gave me the slip, your Mr Marchant. Crowd of people on the stage — some kind of meetin’ with the manager was to take place and he was asking people he knew then he was gone and I’ve no idea where. Of course no one saw him. I tell you, Mr Dickens, I felt a fool standin’ gapin’ an’ a lot o’ folks laughin’. “Vanishin’ act”, some wag said. Course I looked in the wings and at the back o’ the stage. But it’s no use — he could have gone anywhere. Labyrinth this place.’

  ‘No one knew of Mr Polidori, I take it.’

  ‘No, an’ that’s what worried him. I could tell he was getting’ more and more upset. Suppose he thinks Mr Jones won’t believe him.’

  ‘Did you?’

  ‘Damned good actor, if he’s lyin’ — why go through all that pantomime of askin’ if he made it all up? He didn’t have to tell you about his lady friend bein’ missin’.’

  ‘No, I suppose not, and he was very distressed when I mentioned the possibility of a scenery painter as a murderer. I believed him — then. But no one we’ve spoken to has heard of Polidori.’

  ‘What’s Mr Jones goin’ to say — that’s what I’m distressed about.’ Rogers looked very glum.

  They went out into Little Russell Street to make their way back to Bow Street. Vanished in a puff o’ smoke, thought Dickens. So he had, Magpie. The bird had flown.