“So far as I am concerned, enough is a great deal too much,” said Anne. “Thanks, Alix. I’d love to come. I’ve got Dr Hirsch turning up any minute. I’ll tell him I’m coming.”
“That’s right.” Alix’s warm laugh was approving. “So—eight o’clock tomorrow. And, Anne, the others are coming by car, but Winkler wants you to take the walkway.”
“Walkway?”
“It’s a well-kept secret. Father’s idea. Well, there’s always been a lift down from the palace to the town—to a private room in the Golden Cross. Very handy for incognito dinners. In the old days, that is; when diplomatic guests always stayed there. When they planned the conference centre and the hotel, Father insisted he must still have his private way in. It took some engineering, I can tell you: a kind of moving stairway up sideways through the rock. But useful for tomorrow; we don’t much want our prima donna out on the roads. Herr Winkler said he’d send someone to escort you up. He didn’t really want you to come at all, but he agrees it would seem odd if you didn’t. There will be a couple of journalists at dinner, by the way, friends of Mother’s who’ve turned up early.”
“Not so small a party as all that,” said Anne.
Alix laughed. “Small in palace terms. And I promise you the food will be good. No ipecac. You sound as if you could do with an outing. What’s the matter, Anne? Aren’t you feeling well?”
“Just bored,” said Anne. “We’re all a bit overtired and edgy. A night out will be lovely. Thanks, Alix.” Replacing the receiver, she felt slightly sick. If the Prince had invited her out to the Golden Cross again, she had meant to go. And there was a lift up from there to the palace. Melodrama? But here in Lissenberg anything was possible.
A knock at the door heralded Dr Hirsch, and, letting him in, she cast a regretful glance at the untidy room.
“A bad day, I hear?” After the first greetings, he put his hat and raincoat tidily on a chair as she swiftly gathered up her abandoned fur coat and shoes. “I’ve just given John Fare an injection,” he told her. “Good thing you warned Josef or there would have been trouble tomorrow. I think he’ll do as it is. I thought I might just drop in and thank you.” His glance was friendly, enquiring.
“I’m glad you did.” Curiously enough, the pain—absent when she was thinking those mad thoughts of suicide—was back now, full strength. And—she had thrown away her pain-killers. Absurd. Just part of the general melodrama. “Dr Hirsch.” He was taking her pulse, and she got it in fast before he could silence her with the thermometer. “I’ve done something stupid.”
“Yes?” He sat down comfortably beside her on the sofa.
“I threw away my pain-killers.”
“Oh you did, did you?” He turned to give her a very sharp look. “Not, I take it, because there was no more pain.”
“Well… no.” She could not meet his eyes.
“A very bad day,” he summed it up. “I think perhaps I am a little proud of you, Miss Paget. But you would never have done it, you know. Not with Marcus to sing. Not with Carl Meyer and the others depending on you.”
“I … I suppose not.” She blessed him for his quick comprehension.
“I know not. So—how wasteful to throw away the good painkillers.” He opened his black bag. “Which I will replace. Only— too many of these would make you very sick indeed, my child. So …”
“Thank you. But you’re right, I don’t think it will happen again. Or, anyway, not till after … not till I’m off your hands. I suppose, at the end, one might have the right …”
He was shaking his head at her. “I do not propose to let you ‘off my hands’ as you put it. You are my patient, child. I have taken, as a doctor, a great responsibility in letting you sing in this opera. Do you think, when it is over, I will send in a fat bill, kiss your hand, and say goodbye?”
“Do you know, I hadn’t really thought.”
“That is good. Then go on not thinking, and let me do it for you. If all goes well, when Regulus closes, you will be Lissenberg’s new star. I do not think it will be difficult to find somewhere pleasant for you to stay.”
“You mean, to die. Will they give me a state funeral, do you think?”
“That’s no way to think—or to talk. But I will forgive you this time, because I can see it has been a very bad day. I only wish it was the Princess’s party tonight. You are going, of course.”
She looked at him in surprise. “I said I would. I thought you’d be cross.”
“Like the ogre in the fairy story? Lock you up in this palatial suite of yours to bore yourself into morbid thoughts. No, no. You will put on your best dress and go to the ball, Cinderella. Only— go carefully. Who is taking you?”
“The Princess is making arrangements. So—you think there is still danger?”
“With three murders unexplained? What do you think?”
“I think they have been most scandalously hushed up. Dr Hirsch, who owns the Lissenberger Zeitung?”
“I thought you didn’t read German.”
“I don’t. But Frau Bernz mentioned that it had said nothing about the murders for days.”
“So.” He said thoughtfully. “Yes, it’s true; they have kept remarkably quiet. But as to who owns it, which could be the explanation, I’m afraid I cannot tell you.”
“Cannot?”
“Just so. It’s about the best-kept secret in Lissenberg. It could be Prince Rudolf; it could be the Frensham empire. Or, of course—” he finally produced the thermometer—“it could be both of them. It’s one of the questions one doesn’t ask, by the way. Don’t go discussing it at the castle, if you want a pleasant evening. The pain has gone again?” he asked as he rose to his feet.
“Why, yes. So it has. But thank you for the pain-killers just the same.”
“Pain is a strange thing. If we only understood … But one thing I do know: the less you think about it the better. Now, Miss Paget, before I go, who do you think is spreading the poison through the opera cast?”
“Poison? Funny, it does feel like that. And—dangerous. But the answer is, I absolutely don’t know. John Fare is the obvious person to pick on, but he … he’s not strong enough, somehow.”
“Think about it, Miss Paget, and watch, and if you get an idea, come to me, fast. I don’t like it.”
“No more do I.” She thought of her own desperate moments earlier on, of John Fare’s injection. “At least it can’t be Michael,” she said on an impulse. “He’s not been near us.”
“And why in the name of madness should it be Michael?”
“There’s something very odd about that young man.”
“Of course there is,” said Dr Hirsch heartily. “And now, forgive me, I’m late at the hospital. Have a good party, Cinderella.”
10
Next day’s rehearsal went almost too quietly. Everyone seemed subdued, listless … It was a stage Anne recognised, when they were beginning to know their parts but were not yet quite into them, but also, she thought, everyone was tired. Gertrud and Hilde both had dark circles under their eyes, while John Fare was white as a sheet and shook a little. Even Carl, who had so far managed to seem a tower of confident strength, looked tired and anxious, and Anne wondered all over again at the change in him. She thought she preferred the shaggy Bohemian she remembered, so sure of himself and his music. It was that confidence that had infuriated poor Robin. And since when had she been thinking of her dead husband as poor Robin?
It was a relief when the rehearsal ended without disaster and they separated to dress for the Princess’ dinner. Twisting her Woolworth chain in the neck of the green velvet dress Mrs Riley had made for her, Anne thought for a moment of Prince Rudolf and his jeweller’s box. Did she actually regret not having looked inside? Ashamed of herself, she reached for the telephone to call Hilde and suggest a drink, but as she did so it rang.
It was Josef. “Your escort is here.”
“He’s early,” said Anne.
“He suggests a drink.” Michael’s
voice.
“Lovely. Oh, I am so glad it’s you, Michael!” But how absurd. Picking up her coat to hurry down and join him, she felt all her old doubts creeping back. While he had been so mysteriously absent, she had simply missed him. Now that he had returned, she could not help wondering what he had been doing. Helping the police—or hindering them? Searching, perhaps, or pretending to search, for himself? Because—she made herself face it, now she was thinking again—his complicity might help to explain the curious cover up of the murders. He had friends, powerful friends, in Lissenberg. Might they not be trying to protect him? She shook the doubts out of her mind and hurried downstairs.
“Stunning!” He was waiting at the lift door and led the way into Josef’s office. “I thought we’d hide peacefully in here.” He pulled out a chair for her and poured slivovitz. And then, drinking to her, “I’ve missed you.”
“You’ve kept very quiet about it.” It came out more sharply than she had intended.
“I’ve been … busy.” He paused for a moment, as if that was all he was going to say, then went on. “Away part of the time. An errand for Winkler.”
“About which you don’t intend to tell me.” But then, think of all the things she probably would not ask him.
“Quite right.” His smile was teasing. “Anyway, I achieved nothing.”
“But you’re still working for the police?” Surely, if Winkler trusted him, so could she.
“Off and on. Here and there. Escort duty tonight. We’re taking no chances with our prima donna. Hence the trip through Rudolf’s folly.”
“Rudolf’s—”
“—Folly. You’ve no idea what it added to the expense of the whole opera project. But he would have it, and, then, he was boss. God knows it’s convenient enough tonight. They’re using the hotel taxis to take the guests up to the palace, and you know how I feel about them, even without Herr Brech.”
“Is there any news of him?”
“Not a word, I’m glad to say, since he was politely seen to the frontier and urged not to come back. Above all things, we are trying to avoid a scandal—the wrong kind of news story.”
“Cover up,” said Anne. “I don’t like it. It’s all wrong when it’s murder.”
“You and Winkler both. But ‘don’t like’ is a bit mild for the state he’s in. Cheer up, it’s not long now.”
“No. Only six days until we open. Michael, it terrifies me. It’s not together yet, that opera. I’m … worried.” And then, almost regretting having admitted it—even to him—she changed the subject. “What are you tonight?” He had discarded his jeans for a remarkably well-cut corduroy suit and turned, in the process, from shaggy student into—well, what? Professor? Poet? And— she had been right, he was older than he seemed.
“What am I?” He repeated her question. “Oh, I see.” He smoothed back unusually tidy hair and smiled at her. “Devil of a time with my tie. I’m clean out of practice, but, you sec, tonight I’m a guest.” The smile melted into a laugh. “Don’t look so horrified, Anne! We’re democrats here in Lissenberg, and besides, think how useful I’ll be if anything goes wrong with the service.”
“Or the lights,” said Anne. “Or practically anything else, so far as I can see. What can’t you do, Michael?” Perhaps, this way, she could work round to her questions.
“Oh, lots of things.” He looked suddenly harassed. “Drink up. It’s time we started.” He helped her into her coat and opened an inconspicuous door in the corner of the room to reveal a flight of dusty stairs, going steeply down. “Watch how you go.” He switched on a light and started down.
“It’s cold.” She was glad of her fur jacket.
“Yes. We’re right at the back of the building. These stairs are against the rock.” He pushed open a door at the bottom. “I came up this way,” he explained. “Left it unlocked.” He flicked a light switch and a series of naked, low-powered bulbs came on and revealed a long, drab passage stretching away to the left. “You could say this was the complex’s life line,” he told her. “It runs under the whole thing.”
“You mean you could get to the hotel this way?”
“That’s right. Or the conference centre, if you could get in. The locks on these doors are pretty special.”
“I should hope so! Where’s the entrance from the opera house?”
“That was a problem. As the corridor is at the back of all the buildings, it runs clear under the stage. We’re about there now.” He pointed to a door. “If you could get through there, which you most certainly cannot, it would take you up to the opera house.”
“It’s a bigger door than the others.”
“And a wider stair. Did you ever stop to think of what would happen if there was a fire in that opera house?”
“My God.” She thought of the chorus, stumbling off through the two narrow exits.
“The fire-proof curtain would come down,” Michael said, “and the cast would be trapped. That stair’s the answer. It leads from a concealed entrance, centre-back of the stage. The falling of the fire-proof curtain releases the locks on the doors at the top and bottom of the stairs so they can be opened by hand.”
“Pity we can’t use it for the opera,” said Anne. “The central exit. We could just do with it.”
“I know. But what it would have cost … Maybe one day when you’ve made our fortune for us, we’ll do something about it. Here we are.” They had reached another door. “Be a love and look the other way while I open it. What you don’t know—”
“Won’t hurt me.” She turned to look back down the long, bleak corridor and heard a noise like a telephone being dialled.
“There. You can turn round now.”
This door led not to a stair but to another corridor. “They certainly trust you,” she said, as Michael closed the door behind them.
“Which is more than you do. Right? You’ve been looking at me like Little Red Riding Hood and the wolf ever since I turned up. What’s the matter?”
“Oh, nothing … Everything. I’ve got the horrors tonight, that’s all.”
“Horrors general or horrors particular?”
“Oh, I don’t know. The rehearsals seem to go worse and worse. And nobody says anything about the murders. Michael, what would it do to the peace conference if the opera was a disaster?”
“Well, it would hardly be the best of omens, would it? Don’t fret, though; it’s always darkest before the dawn. As for the murders, the less said, surely, the better?”
“From the murderer’s point of view, certainly.”
His hard hand caught her elbow and pulled her to a standstill facing him. “Now I begin to understand. You think I—” He stopped.
“Michael, I don’t know what to think.” She was shivering now. With cold, with fear, with misery? “If you’d only explain …”
“How I wrecked Brech’s taxi while I was driving you just behind? How I killed James Frensham? But—why?”
“I don’t know.” It came out slowly, more of an admission than she had intended. She pulled her arm away. “Oh, please, Michael, let’s stop. I hate this.”
“Not a bit more than I do. But you’re right. We’d better stop. You’re shivering. And we can’t afford to risk that voice of yours. Not in idle chatter in a cold cellar.” He crossed the passage and pressed what looked like a rough lump in the wall. “Your magic carpet, my lady.”
“Good God.” For a moment she forgot the misery of their misunderstanding as the fake cement rolled back to uncover a sleek, modern lift door. Michael pressed a button at the side and it slid open, revealing the bottom of a moving stairway that sloped very gently away into the darkness.
Michael flicked a couple of levers and a string of lights came on, while one side of the stairway purred smoothly into life. “Miracle of modern technology.” He steadied her with a casual hand as she grasped the moving rail. Was it her imagination, or was the hand less friendly than before? Well, no wonder. Stepping on behind her, he let go her arm. “Damned e
xpensive, the whole thing.” His tone was impersonal. “Do you begin to see why this opera has to pay?”
“My goodness, yes. But Michael, was it really necessary?”
“Of course not. But have you ever tried to persuade our Rudolf that something he wants is not necessary? Well, don’t!” The cold rage in his voice made him suddenly formidable “And that’s something I’ve been wanting a chance to say to you. Don’t you kid yourself that he cares so much about the opera that he won’t do anything to upset its star. Because Rudolf doesn’t work that way. What Rudolf wants, he gets. Regardless. So, if he says, at dinner tonight, just suppose he says: ‘Come on, beautiful diva, one last drink at the Golden Cross, just with me.’ Don’t you go, Anne Paget. Don’t you be fool enough to go. There’s a lift from the Golden Cross to the castle.”
“I know. Alix told me. But, Michael, he wouldn’t!”
“Want to bet?” said Michael.
Since Princess Gloria was still in full mourning for her cousin, Alix was acting as hostess, and the party was held in her suite of apartments. Plainly, even austerely decorated, they were in remarkable contrast to the rest of the palace, and Anne liked them much better. The other guests were already assembled and she noticed a glance or two of surprise when Michael followed her into the room.
“Your bodyguard, I take it,” said Hilde, sotto voce.
“I suppose so.”
“You’d have thought they might have run to evening dress for him.” The other men were all in formal black and white. “Michael.” She summoned him over with an imperious gesture borrowed from the stage. “Fix my lighter for me, would you?” It was more command than request.
“Gladly.” He took it and returned to a window embrasure.
Hilde turned back to Anne. “Ghastly rehearsal, wasn’t it?”
“We are not talking of the opera tonight. Or—not in that tone.” Carl appeared from behind her and took an arm of each. “Come and meet the press and, for all our sakes, be cheerful. We’ve a great success on our hands, remember.”
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