Offstage in Nuala

by Harriet Steel

  ‘You must have been tired, dear,’ she said, smiling. ‘You didn’t wake when I came in, or when I got up this morning.’

  ‘I expect I needed to catch up on the sleep I lost the other night.’

  He sat down and took a piece of toast from the toast rack.

  ‘That will be cold. Wait for one of the servants to bring some more.’ Jane rang the little brass bell beside her cup and saucer.

  ‘It’s alright, I’m hungry. I’ll eat this piece while I wait.’

  He began to spread butter liberally. ‘How was your evening?’

  ‘Oh, very entertaining. Florence arranged a pleasant supper, although it wasn’t one you would have enjoyed all that much. We had creamed tomato soup followed by roast lamb and mint sauce, then rice pudding.’

  De Silva chuckled. ‘Sturdy British food.’

  ‘And very filling.’ Jane patted her midriff. ‘I’m only having a light breakfast.’ She indicated the neatly sliced mango on her plate. De Silva sniffed appreciatively at the sweet, honeyed aroma.

  A servant entered and Jane ordered more toast. ‘And two poached eggs for me,’ de Silva added. He smiled at Jane. ‘I think I’ll have a light breakfast too. No curry today.’

  The servant bustled off. ‘Now,’ said Jane as the door closed, ‘I’m longing to know what you’ve found out about poor Mr Danforth’s murder.’

  ‘Not nearly as much as I would like. So far, I’ve interviewed the men in the company but Archie still hasn’t agreed to my seeing Mrs Danforth or Miss Watson.’

  ‘Why ever not?’

  He shrugged. ‘I’ve no idea. It’s as if he deliberately wants to obstruct the investigation.’

  Jane forked up a slice of mango. ‘On the other hand, it is less than two days since it happened. Mrs Danforth must still be very shocked and Emerald Watson is so young. I saw Peggy Appleby last night and she says she’s terribly distressed. Peggy has become quite a good friend of hers, you know. The Applebys were one of the couples from the Amateur Dramatic Society who helped with the production of Hamlet.’

  De Silva forbore to mention that there might be a more specific reason for Emerald Watson’s distress, but he hadn’t reckoned with Jane’s sharp eye.

  ‘Is there something you’re not telling me?’

  ‘One thing I’ve been told is that she and Alexander Danforth were having an affair.’

  ‘Gracious me! But she’s so much younger than he was, and right under his wife’s nose too?’

  ‘Apparently.’

  Jane finished her mango and pushed away the plate. ‘True or not, I hope the story doesn’t go any further. Mrs Danforth has just lost her husband and it would be unforgiveable to add to her misery.’

  She broke off as the servant reappeared with the eggs and toast and set them down in front of de Silva.

  ‘But then,’ he said when the servant had departed, ‘if one believes it, Kathleen Danforth was also having an affair. It seems the Danforths were fundamentally happy together, but had an unconventional attitude to marriage and both of them turned a blind eye when the other strayed.’

  ‘You say if one believes it.’

  ‘You’ve hit on the crux of the matter.’

  Jane listened carefully as he expanded on what he had been told. ‘You’re right, of course,’ she said with a frown when he had finished. ‘If Mrs Danforth wasn’t as forgiving of her husband’s behaviour as you’ve been led to believe, jealousy would be a powerful motive. Even if she was unfaithful herself, she might have thought her husband’s affair was more of a threat this time. But all the same, it’s horrible to think she would get this man Mayne to kill him.’

  ‘If I remember rightly, you were of the opinion that scissors are a woman’s weapon. You also pointed out that feminine scruples didn’t deter Lady Macbeth from urging her husband to commit murder.’

  ‘Yes, I know.’ She shivered. ‘But I wasn’t being entirely serious. You don’t really think that it’s true, do you?’

  ‘I think it’s questionable. Bert Raikes – he’s not one of the actors, he does odd jobs and makes scenery – told me he’s seen Mayne turn green at the sight of stage blood, so it’s doubtful he could cope with the real thing. Secondly, Mayne’s dressing room is at the opposite end of the theatre to Alexander Danforth’s. If the caretaker I spoke with is correct, no one can go between the two sides without passing his booth, and he insists that no one did at the time in question. He also told me that when there is no performance, anyone entering the theatre has to come in through the stage door and he would see them.’ He paused. ‘Kathleen Danforth’s dressing room, however, is on the same side of the theatre as her husband’s.’

  Jane frowned. ‘That means she had the opportunity to commit the murder, but would she have the strength to overpower him?’

  ‘It seems unlikely, but I’m waiting to find out whether Danforth was drugged before he was stabbed.’

  Jane shivered again. ‘It’s a horrible thought. Let’s suppose for now that Sheridan is wrong, and consider the rest of the company. What about Sheridan himself?’

  ‘He’s the one who found Danforth’s body. According to Raikes, and Sheridan’s own statement, he was very close to Danforth. There doesn’t seem to be any benefit to him from Danforth’s death, in fact quite the reverse. He told me, and Raikes corroborated it, that Danforth saved his life in the war. Raikes also told me that Sheridan was in very bad shape after it and Danforth helped him out. Sheridan’s an abrasive character too. Not the kind of man to make a success of the company on his own.’

  ‘That might not stop him from trying. Could he have gone to the dressing room without being spotted?’

  ‘No, for the same reason as Mayne. Then there’s Morville, the actor who played Ophelia’s father, Polonius, but he has no discernible motive and the situation is the same with his dressing room. That goes for Bert Raikes too and he gives the impression of having been devoted to Danforth.’

  He mopped up a puddle of egg yolk with some toast.

  ‘Charles Crichton, who played King Claudius, was the last of the men I interviewed, and I’d guess the oldest by quite a few years. I think he may have an alcohol problem. Both yesterday and this morning, there was a strong smell of whisky about him. Off the top of my head, I don’t see how he would benefit from Danforth’s death. According to Crichton, the first time they met was when he auditioned for a place in the company. If that’s the case, there would be no past history where they might have fallen out. He admitted that before he joined Danforth, his career was going badly so one would think he’d look on Danforth as a good man who gave him a helping hand.’

  ‘Danforth seems to have made a habit of extending helping hands.’

  ‘Yes, he did. If we discount the allegation about his wife and Paul Mayne, it’s difficult to see who would want him out of the way. And even if we thought there was a motive, we have the problem of opportunity with all of the men. Unless the caretaker is lying, none of them could have entered Danforth’s dressing room between four o’clock and just before six, the time when Sheridan found the body, without being noticed.’

  ‘Are you sure Sheridan didn’t have time to kill Danforth then raise the alarm?’

  ‘He was only gone from the green room for a few moments. Anyway, Morville confirmed there was no blood on Sheridan’s clothes or hands. It would have been impossible for him to attack Danforth without getting blood on himself.’

  ‘That does present a problem.’

  ‘Yes. And even if there had been time to change into clean clothes, what did he do with the bloodstained ones? I searched the dressing rooms and found nothing.’

  ‘The maid?’

  ‘Unlikely. She hasn’t been with the company for long and there’s no evidence she knew any of them previously. She was down on her luck when she joined. Her invalid mother who she’d looked after for years had died leaving her alone in Calcutta with no money. Presumably she still needs the job so it would be in her interest for Danforth to be a
live and the company to continue functioning successfully.’

  He paused. ‘Finally, we have Emerald Watson.’

  ‘But she seems such a sweet girl. Not a murderess by any stretch of the imagination, and she may have been in love with him.’

  ‘Appearances can be deceptive. All the same, she too would have to pass the caretaker to get to Danforth’s dressing room.’

  ‘So, they were in the green room shortly before the dress rehearsal was due to start,’ said Jane, half to herself. ‘Danforth didn’t appear and Sheridan went to fetch him; found him dead and raised the alarm.’

  She pondered for a few moments then clapped her hands. ‘I have the answer! They were all in it together, just like the plot in Mrs Christie’s novel that came out a couple of years ago. It was about a murder on the Orient Express. The victim was an American tycoon called Ratchett. He was found dead in his compartment, and he’d been stabbed twelve times. Hercule Poirot happened to be travelling on the train so he was asked to take over the investigation.’

  ‘And what did those famous little grey cells discover?’

  ‘Years before, under another name, Ratchett had kidnapped the young daughter of a wealthy family and demanded a ransom. The family paid, but he killed the poor child anyway. There were lots of clues and red herrings that led you to suspect different people in turn but, eventually, Poirot came to the conclusion that there were two solutions.’

  ‘And they were?’

  ‘All the passengers and staff were still on the train. The window in Ratchett’s compartment was open when his body was found, so the murderer might have been a stranger who escaped that way. The problem with that was that, due to an avalanche, the train was stuck in a snowdrift and there were no footprints in the snow.’

  ‘Hmm. Wind might have blown a fresh drift over them.’

  ‘Perhaps, but Poirot thought it more likely the murderer was still on the train. In the end he offered a second solution. It was that Ratchett’s fellow passengers had all been connected with the little girl and conspired to take revenge for her death. One of the passengers admitted to Poirot that was the truth.’

  ‘What happened in the end?’

  ‘He suggested to the director of the railway company that when the police arrived, they should be told the first version to protect the bereaved family and the director agreed.’

  De Silva nodded. ‘A fitting outcome, even if not exactly within the law.’

  ‘I thought so.’

  He smiled teasingly. ‘One problem with this ingenious theory is that there was only one stab wound on Danforth’s body.’

  ‘Then one of them struck the blow and the rest are protecting him.’

  The depressing thought occurred to de Silva that if Jane had hit on the truth, it had been a mistake to delay searching the bus. Using it to return to their hotel, the members of the company might easily have removed evidence and disposed of it straight away.

  No, surely this couldn’t be a case where life mirrored art any more than it already had. Those words written in blood on the mirror were enough.

  ‘Appealing as your solution is,’ he said resolutely, ‘it’s hard to see all the members of the company having a common purpose and that being to kill Danforth.’

  Jane sighed. ‘Oh, very well, I give in. There are no obvious leads.’

  ‘I’m afraid not.’

  ‘What will you do next?’

  ‘Finish my breakfast and read the paper for a while. I need a little respite from all this.’

  Jane rolled her eyes. ‘And after that?’

  ‘I’ll get in touch with Archie Clutterbuck. If I can’t speak to him in person, I’ll have to send a message.’

  He crunched his last fragment of toast and wiped a sticky speck of orange marmalade from the corner of his mouth. ‘I must press him for an answer about interviewing Mrs Danforth and Emerald Watson.’

  He stood up and came round to Jane’s side of the table to kiss her cheek.

  ‘You’ll be busy,’ she said with a smile. ‘I do hope Archie won’t be too difficult.’

  ‘So do I, my love.’

  Chapter 7

  At the station, he found Nadar on his own, doggedly typing up a report. The constable’s typing was of the two-finger variety and de Silva was frequently grateful to the man who had invented the noiseless typewriter. A muffled clunk was infinitely easier to ignore than an insistent clack.

  He gave Nadar the job of putting a call through to the Residence for an appointment with Clutterbuck, then retired to his office. A few minutes later, the constable tapped on the door and came in.

  ‘I’m sorry, sir. They say Mr Clutterbuck is out and they’re not sure what time he’ll be back. I’ve left a message that you would like to see him.’

  ‘Well done, Constable.’

  Nadar hesitated.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Have you any leads yet, sir? I’d like to be more involved in the investigation if that’s possible. It’s… well, the whole town’s talking about it. People keep asking me what’s going on and saying I must know more than I’m telling.’

  ‘And you’d like that to be true?’

  Nadar flushed slightly. ‘I suppose I would, sir.’ He gave de Silva a sheepish smile. ‘I hope I haven’t spoken out of turn, sir.’

  De Silva leant back in his chair. ‘Remind me how old you are now, Constable.’

  ‘Twenty-three, sir.’ He drew himself up to his full height. ‘As you know, sir, I am a family man. I want to advance in my work and do my best for them. I think I can do it.’

  De Silva felt a twinge of self-reproach. Nadar was a conscientious young man, but it was easy to overlook him in favour of Sergeant Prasanna who gave the impression of having more pep. A good senior officer, however, ought to give all his staff a chance to shine.

  He smiled at Nadar. ‘Ambition is always laudable, young man. As long as you are prepared to put in the hard work that leads to success.’

  ‘Oh, I am, sir.’ Nadar’s round face was a study in solemnity.

  ‘I’m glad to hear it. I’ll bear this conversation in mind.’

  ‘Thank you, sir.’

  He hesitated once more.

  ‘Is there something else?’

  ‘I was wondering if there’s anything I can do straight away, sir.’

  ‘Not for the moment, but I won’t forget.’

  ‘Very good, sir.’

  When Nadar had gone, hopefully not discouraged, de Silva stood up and went to the window. Outside, the morning bustle was giving way to the quieter activity of the midday heat. His view of the bazaar showed stallholders lounging in the shade under limp awnings. At the nearest fruit stall, a few tardy shoppers browsed, inspecting the remaining offerings of mangoes, rambutans, pineapples, dragon fruit, and tamarinds before deciding whether to add more to the contents of their baskets.

  He thought back to his childhood. His father had loved their garden even though, home being Colombo, it had been small compared with the one he had now at Sunnybank. In spite of that, his father had grown many kinds of fruit and vegetables. He closed his eyes and recalled the soft, creamy, seed-speckled flesh of the scarlet dragon fruits with their subtle sweetness. They had been his favourites, closely followed by the tangy pineapples.

  His parents’ cook had let him help to make some of the teas, juices, and preserves that could be prepared from the fruits. He had liked it best when they made wood apple jam. His job had been to smash the apples against the garden wall to get to the pulp inside the tough brown shells. The aroma released by this satisfying procedure was very like coffee. Raw, the sweet-sour taste of the pulp had made the inside of his mouth pucker, but boiled up into jam, it was delicious. The cook at Sunnybank still made it according to the family recipe.

  The clock on the post office tower glinted in the sunshine as the hands crept towards lunchtime. His stomach rumbled but he hesitated to go home in case Clutterbuck telephoned. Perhaps he would send Nadar out to fetch him somethin
g. In view of their conversation this morning, it might be considerate to reassure him that being sent on the errand had nothing to do with his abilities, or lack of them.

  Later, as he ate, he ran over what he had unearthed so far and wished it wasn’t so unpromising. He only hoped that the way forward would be clearer once he had spoken to Emerald Watson and Kathleen Danforth.

  His thoughts returned to the words written on the mirror in Danforth’s blood: the rest is silence. He had checked and Jane was right, they were the last words Hamlet spoke before dying. By then, he knew he had accomplished the task of avenging his father that it had taken him the whole play to confront.

  Was there a clue there? The fact that the words were a quotation might indicate that whoever wrote them was an actor, but that wasn’t necessarily the case. Anyone who knew the play might remember them. Did the play hold the answer or was it just a distraction? Whatever the situation, he needed a stroke of luck, and he wasn’t sure where it was coming from.

  **

  Lunch over, he indulged in his customary nap – after all, how was the brain to function properly if the digestion was not treated with respect? He was absolutely sure that Jane’s beloved Monsieur Poirot would never have let a case interfere with the needs of the inner man.

  Fifteen minutes did the trick and he returned to consciousness reinvigorated. Picking up a pen, he started on a letter to Archie Clutterbuck. He decided to keep it simple and confine himself to asking about when he might interview Kathleen Danforth and Emerald Watson. He would send his report on the information he had gleaned from the men later. It was always hard to know how Clutterbuck would take things, particularly where his instructions hadn’t been followed to the letter. Best to read the signs before one spoke. Rushing in was like approaching an angry elephant without a handy tree nearby.

  He read the letter over and sealed it up. This time, he didn’t ring the bell for Nadar but went to the outer office and handed the envelope to him.

  ‘Do you have your bicycle here?’