The White Room
Page 16
Gregson’s attention-attracting clearing of the throat made him look around.
“I thought it best to remind you of the time, sir. It’s half past six. Would you like me to help you dress, sir?”
“No, Gregson. Gregson”—as the manservant turned to go—“have you ever heard of a place called Bridford?”
“I’ve heard of it, sir, but I’ve never been there. For many years I’ve been promising myself a trip to Devon. Isn’t Bridford the market town where Mr. Ibbetson stayed a few years back?”
“Littledene?” Axel said.
“Indeed yes, sir! You have a better memory than I. I was trying to recall the name of Mr. Howard Nolan’s house, where your brother-in-law stayed. Littledene. Yes, sir.”
“One last thing,” Axel said, “and then I promise to go and get ready to meet my sister and you won’t have to suffer trying to find excuses for me. Have you ever come across a firm called Mosaic?”
“Mosaic …” The other half closed his eyes with the effort of concentrating. “No, I can’t say I’ve heard the name before, sir. Would it be one of your companies, Mr. Champlee?”
“More than likely,” Axel said. “And if it is, the last thing it will be, will be a television company.”
“Pardon, sir?”
“I’ll go and get dressed,” Axel said.
Carla arrived as he was fastening his tie. Her clear, high voice carried all the way to his bedroom. He went to greet her. Gregson, waiting for her to remove her loose blue coat, had lost much of his dignity, being encumbered by and almost hidden behind a huge green and white sheaf of irises.
“The Green Ladies I promised you,” Carla said. “A large deep container, plenty of water and somewhere cool and shady, Gregson. How are you, Axel?”
“A veritable harvest festival.” He smiled. “You are looking well, Carla.”
She wore a pale-blue dress of some soft, clinging material. Her hair was its usual piled marvel of shining white coils.
“Gregson tells me you slept all through the afternoon.”
“So it seems.”
She studied his face. “He’s worried about you, Axel. So am I.” Taking his arm she propelled him towards the windows, to the same two seats they had occupied at the start of the dream. “He says you didn’t sleep too soundly, that you were shouting.”
“I had a dream. A particularly vivid dream.”
He waited for her to ask him about it and was oddly disappointed when she didn’t.
“Before I forget, Axel …” She crossed her slim legs. “I would like to bring some more people here. Would Thursday of next week be convenient?”
Was it only his imagination, or did she seem less self assured than usual, less confident, less aloof and cool?
“And what do you intend foisting on me this time?” he asked. “Another bunch of society do-gooders?”
“Something different for a change. Not that you will have much in common with them. I did mention the society to you the last time I was here. Knowing you, you probably put it out of your mind the moment I’d gone. The Mosaic Arts Group, Axel.”
“Snap,” he said.
“What was that?”
“Nothing.” He shook his head. “Have you heard from Kendall lately?”
“This morning.” She opened her handbag. “No, I forgot to put it in. He’s in Palm Springs. He suggests it might be a good idea if you were to join him there. I don’t usually agree with my husband’s ideas, but this time I do. You need a break, Axel. You’ve been working far too hard.”
It was pleasant, warming and pleasant, to hear the concern in her voice. It was good to have someone worrying about him.
“We’ll talk about it later,” he said, relaxed, completely at peace with the world and himself.
“I’ll think about it seriously,” he told her over dinner, when she brought the subject up again.
She was very persistent. “It’s plain common sense,” she said later, when they were back in the lounge again, Gregson hovering with coffee. “You simply can’t continue driving yourself in this fashion forever. Gregson”—with a trump card to play she glanced up at the impassive face of the servant— “tells me he thinks you didn’t so much fall asleep after lunch as collapse where you stood. He even had to undress you.”
Gregson’s cough was the one he reserved for those occasions when an apology was in order. “I thought it best to phone madam while you were sleeping, sir.”
“The business could surely run itself for a while,” Carla said. “Or, if you like, Norville could take over. Not Kendall.” Pier tight-lipped smile was almost a sneer, “I wouldn’t trust him to look after a corner store. I don’t need to be reminded that it’s only because he is my husband that you gave him a seat on one of your boards. About the only thing you could say in his favour where business is concerned is that he’s honest. And that’s only because he hasn’t the intelligence to be anything else. I know that Romaine dislikes him, but you needn’t take her with you. In any case, she’s not due back from Spain for some weeks yet.”
“Will that be all, sir?” Gregson asked deferentially.
Carla waved him impatiently away.
“There’s really nothing to keep you here, Axel,” she said. “You could fly out tomorrow.”
Palm Springs. He had never been there, but he saw it as a place of sunshine, perfumed breezes and golden sands. It was very tempting. He came to his feet. Carla followed him over to the sideboard, shaking her head when he laid his hand on the decanter. “No. And I don’t think you should either, Axel.”
He smiled a little. “Big Sister always knows what’s best.”
“What are you going to do?” she asked him.
Without replying, he walked slowly across the lounge and into the study. Picking up the gun from his desk he pointed the barrel at his forehead and pressed the trigger. The sharp crack of the explosion echoed through the house. Axel Champlee died instantly.
13
Julius Sibault came out of the White Room, his bulk almost filling the narrow doorway as he paused for an instant before closing the door quietly behind him. His coarse, mottled features were greasy with sweat; a string of grey hair had become plastered to his forehead, almost touching the rims of his spectacles.
“It’s all right,” he said.
The tension that had hung in the room for so long collapsed rather than flowed away. One of the occupants— the woman with the piled silver hair—exhaled a long sigh of relief.
Moses Coxby leaned back in his chair, his eyes closed, his head of blue-grey hair resting against the wall. “Thank God,” He breathed softly, fervently.
“Doubtless he played his part,” Sibault said drily.
“And now?” wondered the woman with the white hair.
“We wait.”
“And tonight?” Coxby asked, opening his eyes.
“That’s what I said.” Sibault took out a pack of cigarettes and selected one with care, setting it between his thick lips while his eyes looked into space. “We wait and see. No doubt we’ll be able to come up with something. But so far as Axel Champlee is concerned, Axel Champlee is dead. I can tell you that now without having to wait.”
“The police?” Coxby wondered, unhappiness taking over from relief.
“That’s something we’ll have to talk about.”
*Keep it in the family,” said the thin, dark-haired man with the appearance and manner of a gentleman’s servant. “A private investigator. Discreetly. If anything does come up, then we work it out ourselves. But not the police. Not just on assumption.”
“It’s more than just assumption,” Coxby said.
“No wife,” said the woman with the white hair. “No relations. Outside these four walls, very few friends. No enemies that we know of. Who, for God’s sake, would he want to kill?”
“One of us, perhaps.” Coxby smiled without humour. “Fictional parricide—if that’s the word. His domineering sister. Had you thought of that, Greta?”
/> “The girl’s here,” Howard Nolan put in timidly from his quiet corner.
“The girl?” Sibault peered at him through smoke. “What girl?” His mind was on other things.
“Salter’s niece.”
“I’d forgotten about her. Damnation. When did she show up?”
“About twenty minutes ago,” Nolan told him. “I left her in reception.”
“Salter?”
“He’s out getting himself something to eat,” said the blond Miss Kilby from her seat in the opposite corner to Nolan.
“No”—impatiently—“did Salter bring her?”
“She came by herself,” Nolan explained. “From what I could make out she spent the night at a farm somewhere. The farmer or one of his family told her about ‘Midas’ and she came right here.”
“She can wait,” Sibault said.
“You’d better talk to her, Julius,” Coxby suggested. “She deserves that. And as soon as possible. They must have got to know each other pretty well.”
“And go through the whole damned thing again?” The big man shrugged resignedly. “What sort of mood was she in, Howard?”
“Out for blood.” Nolan smiled at a memory. “Demanding to know what we’d done to him. Demanding to see him. Maybe she’ll have calmed down some by now.”
“Calm her down some more,Sibault said wearily. “I’m in no mood to cope with hysterics. Pat her on the head and tell her to try to be patient, that all will be made as clear as day to her. Tell her what I’m like when I’m interrupted in the middle of explanations. Do all that, Howard, and then trot her in.”
Nolan slipped out of the room. Sibault, his massive head wreathed in cigarette smoke, went to stand with his back against one of the control panels.
“You don’t suppose there’s any chance she’s been to the police?” the white-haired woman asked uneasily.
Coxby shrugged the notion aside. “We’d have heard from them before now if she had. From what Salter told us she’s not the type to panic. She’s probably intelligent enough to put two and two together by now.”
“And come up with six.” Sibault dropped his cigarette on the floor and trod on it. “God preserve us from overintelligent females.” He looked up as the door opened for Nolan to usher in a grim-faced Louise.
Sibault, turning on unexpected ponderous charm, went to greet her.
“Miss Salter!” Her hand was lost in his huge paw. “A great pleasure. Your uncle has told us much about you. My name is Sibault. My colleagues—”
Fatherly arm about her shoulders, he swept her away on a tour of the room and its occupants.
“Some of the names I think will be familiar to you by now. Greta Carson, better known as Carla Ibbetson.” The whitehaired woman smiled as she held out her hand. “Chester Hardie—” The gentleman’s gentleman was on his feet. “Better known as Gregson. Mary Talbot, otherwise, Hazel the maid. And here we have Miss Joan Kilby … The blond girl nodded unsmilingly, not offering her hand. “Joan, amongst other things, assistant producer and script editor.”
“And this is our producer himself—”
The bull-shouldered, squat-faced, blue-grey-haired Moses Coxby was already on his feet. He took Louise’s hand in both of his. “Please try to be patient with us, Miss Salter.”
“I was told to be patient,” Louise said in a strained monotone. “I’m trying to be patient. Where is he? What have you done to him?”
“All in good time.” Sibault removed his arm from her shoulders so that he could turn to survey the room. “I think that is all. No—Howard Nolan, whom you have already met. Cameraman and studio technician. And that is the lot. A chair—”
Chester Hardie offered his.
“I’d prefer to stand,” Louise said grimly.
“Yes.” Sibault took off his glasses and pinched the bridge of his nose with thumb and forefinger. “I can imagine what your feelings must be—”
“Then tell me where he is,” she said.
“That is something I’d rather not do at the moment,” Sibault said. “I could lie to you, to put your mind at rest, by telling you that Axel Champlee is alive and well. I would be equally untruthful if I were to tell you he was dead. You must have undergone what I can only describe as a disturbing experience. I don’t want to add to your confusion. Let me do this my way, Miss Salter. The thing I find surprising is that you managed to exist through—how many days?—four, is it?—without discovering the truth. Axel Champlee’s name and face must be familiar to almost everyone in the country. But then, to a great extent you have spent those four days in virtual isolation, first in Littledene, then at Green Ladies. You see”—he smiled down at her—“we have kept in touch with all your movements.”
“You made that very obvious,” she told him.
“Our midnight visit. Yes. Time was getting short, he had shown no signs of returning on his own, so we thought it worth a try. I think, but for your being in the house, he would have come with us. But that is over and done with. The outcome would probably have been the same. Now you are waiting for our explanation. To make it I must go back to the start, to when Mosaic first came into being. The company has been in existence since nineteen seventy-three—”
“I know something of your history,” Louise interrupted. “You were hoping to do a deal with ICN, but it didn’t work out.”
“I can see you have been busy, Miss Salter. Yes, our idea was to make a lot of money in a short time. I, to finance my research; Adrian Wolfax, for no other reason than to make money. When Moses Coxby brought his idea to us, we thought it would work. We both invested all our capital in his company. That was in nineteen seventy-seven, the year after ICN had come into being. Our idea, as you already know, was to make Mosaic a paying concern and then sell out to ICN.
“But they weren’t interested. That soon became very clear. We found ourselves fighting for our existence. To maintain our advertising revenue we had to produce programmes that would induce the viewing public to watch our channel. In the October of nineteen seventy-seven, we produced a play called The Champlees of Barkley House, the story of a family engaged in big business, set in the year nineteen sixty-nine, with Adrian, a professional actor, playing the lead. The play was something of a success. So was the sequel we produced a few months later. Using the same characters, theme and setting we launched a biweekly serial called ‘Midas.’ The title was Adrian’s idea—the King of Commerce who turned everything he touched to gold. The serial was a success for a while, then viewing interest started to flag and our advertising revenue took a plunge.
“We were all worried, of course. Adrian took it worst of us all. In June of last year he showed signs of developing an anxiety neurosis. Being a psychiatrist, I undertook his treatment myself. It was, after all, nothing more than a question of restoring his self-confidence.”
Sibault paused for a moment.
“I am not trying to find excuses for myself when I tell you that what happened was not my idea, but Adrian’s. He even threatened to withdraw from the company if we didn’t agree. We had virtually no choice.”
“You must understand, Miss Salter,” Moses Coxby said, “that ‘Midas’ had become the focal point of our very existence, that for almost six months Adrian had been spending thirty hours or more of each week in the character of Axel Champlee—one hour actual transmission time—the programme went out live—the remainder in rehearsal. And Adrian Wolfax is a great actor. When he plays a part, he lives that part.”
“I put him under hypnosis,” Sibault said. “Part of the method of treating such simple neuroses. Under hypnosis he became Axel Champlee. I found myself listening to the problems of a man who had no real existence. I tried again, with the same result. Finally I had to tell Adrian what was happening. It was then he came up with his idea.
“Not a new idea, by any means. It had been tried in the States some years earlier, but their ‘matrix’ as they called it hadn’t been strong enough to hold the fictional character in place. But then they d
idn’t have a subject long indoctrinated in the role, who had problems in real life and was ready and willing to escape from reality the moment the door was opened to him.
“We ran two test episodes of ‘Midas’ with Adrian under hypnosis. It wasn’t easy for the supporting players. Scripts as such had to be abandoned. Instead, we gave the cast the story line, the way the story was to develop, suggested what speeches they were to make and then let them loose on the set to do the best they could. We were fortunate in that all our players were experienced actors.
“As soon as we felt confident the thing was going to work, we released the news to the press. Public reaction was staggering. We were pilloried by a minority, accused of tampering with a human mind in the cause of gimmickry. But now—
“Twice a week, every Wednesday and Saturday evening, almost the entire viewing population of the country switches to Mosaic to follow the adventures of Axel Champlee—not a part played by an actor who knows he is only playing a role, but a real man dealing with real problems, dealing with them unpredictably, believing himself to be back in nineteen sixty-nine, living in a real house, not an elaborate studio set, completely unaware that every move he makes, every word he speaks, is being picked up by cameras and microphones and relayed to millions of television sets.
“Axel Champlee has become a real person—not only to Adrian Wolfax but to most of the people who watch him. To further the illusion, we constructed Barkley Mews, a real street with real trees and pavements, with a real frontage to the house. The only fake is the canvas backdrop behind the trees. It is open to the public to come and go as they please, the sliding gates only closed at night, on Sundays, or when the set is needed for rehearsals or transmissions.
“Every Wednesday and Saturday evening at ten minutes to seven, Adrian would go through that door”—Sibault pointed —“into the White Room, there—” He broke off at her expression, misinterpreting it.
“A new name to you, Miss Salter. I used it unthinkingly. Adrian’s own name, in point of fact. Because it is indeed all white—floor, walls, ceiling. Because, as he once said, a theatre has its Green Room, so why should not our studio have its White Room.