Dead on Cue (23 page)

And the looks on the faces of the three men showed that they knew he was right. He
didn't
need to make threats. Now that
Madro
was riding high again, he had the power to do whatever he liked.

A loud bell, suddenly screaming out its warning from the corridor, made them all jump.

‘That was the fire alarm going off,' Paddy Colligan said, unnecessarily.

‘It wouldn't be the first time that some idiot's accidentally set it off,' Houseman said indifferently. ‘The safety officer will stop it in a minute or two.'

But the bell continued to ring insistently, and through the office window they could see a stream of people making their way down the corridor in a manner which suggested that while they knew the whole thing was only a drill, it was still a welcome break from routine.

‘Should we leave ourselves?' Ben Drabble said.

‘You might as well,' Bill Houseman told him. ‘I've said everything that I wanted to say.'

‘Well, I certainly haven't!' Jeremy Wilcox retorted.

‘That may possibly be true,' Houseman replied. ‘But you've said all I'm prepared to
listen
to.'

The bell droned on. The flow of people past the office window was starting to decrease.

Ben Drabble rose uncertainly to his feet. ‘Well, I suppose we'd better go, like we've been instructed to,' he said.

‘Yes, get out,' Bill Houseman said. ‘Get out the lot of you.'

Jeremy Wilcox stood up so violently that his chair fell over behind him. ‘I'm going now,' he said, ‘but you've not heard the last of this.'

Houseman smiled again. ‘Did you catch that?' he asked Paddy Colligan. ‘It's quite a good line – in a clichéd sort of way. Maybe you could use it in one of the scripts. It would sound just right coming from the mouth of an old harridan like Madge Thornycroft.'

For a moment, it seemed as if Jeremy Wilcox would lash out at Houseman across the table. Then the director flicked his hair back haughtily, and stormed out of the door. After a second's hesitation, Ben Drabble followed him.

Paddy Colligan had stood up, too, but instead of joining the others, he looked down at Bill Houseman. The producer appeared to be studying the revised script in front of him – though how he could concentrate with all that racket going on was a mystery to the Irishman.

‘Are you coming, too, Mr Houseman?' Colligan asked.

The producer looked up. ‘What was that?'

‘The fire bell's still ringing. I was wondering if you were planning to leave, like everybody else.'

Houseman shook his head. ‘A good captain does not abandon his ship,' he said, ‘and I am a
very
good captain.'

‘If it turns out to be a real fire—'

‘Then I will probably be burnt to death – which, I should imagine, would do nothing but delight several people who are already living in trepidation of the axe falling on their unworthy necks.'

‘You shouldn't talk that like,' Paddy Colligan said quietly.

‘I'll talk how I damn well please,' Houseman told him. ‘Now why don't you take yourself off, like a good little scriptwriter? And drop the blind on your way out. Now I've got the building to myself, I might finally be able to get on with some real work.'

I
t was a long time since he'd been involved in a case which he so much wanted to see the back of, Woodend thought, as he drove through the village towards the old mill which had once provided it with a livelihood.

He really wanted it over! Done with! Wrapped up!

And he wanted the man who had taken another human being's life simply for the sake of his own ego to be safely behind bars, so that he himself could have a few days clear to try and sort out his own life.

He caught his first sight of the mill from some distance away, but it was not until he turned a bend in the road that he got a clear view of the car park and saw that it was full of people.

Something out of the ordinary had happened, he realised, something which had meant the mill had had to be evacuated – and he felt a sudden chill of misgiving run down his spine.

You're worryin' unnecessarily, he reassured himself. It's nothin' but a fire drill. What else could it be?

In a way, it was a stroke of luck. With all those people around, it might just be possible to slip into the building without being noticed by the gentlemen – and one very unscrupulous lady – of the press.

It was as he parked that he saw the man in the grey suit standing in front of the main entrance to the studio. The suit was so severe that it could almost have been a uniform, and that fact – combined with the megaphone that he held in his hand – was enough to identify him as the security officer.

The man raised the megaphone to his mouth. ‘Can I have your attention, please!' he called.

The mechanically distorted voice travelled across the car park, and the small knots of people who had been chatting to one another turned to face him.

‘The entire building has been thoroughly checked out, and it is now safe to enter it again,' the security officer said. ‘Please return to your posts in an orderly fashion. Thank you for your co-operation.'

The moment the announcement was finished some of the people began walking back towards the building, but there were others who preferred to linger a little, while they finished their cigarettes or their conversations.

Woodend looked around for Bill Houseman, but there was no sign of the producer anywhere. If he was going to avoid being spotted by the reporters, he had better make his move now, the chief inspector thought, joining the stream of traffic flowing back into the studio.

As Woodend walked past the Actors' Garden, he glanced beyond it to the dressing room where Valerie Farnsworth had met her lonely, terrifying death. He would get Bill Houseman for that, he promised himself – whatever it took.

But as he had told Paniatowski and Rutter the previous evening, it would not be easy. Houseman was nobody's fool. Without any witnesses to place him at the scene of the crime, he probably thought he was going to get away with it, and as long as he was confident of that, he would not put a foot wrong. So the trick would be to undermine that confidence – to suggest that he might have left behind one telling clue which would betray him. He would fight off the instinct to check he had completely covered his tracks at first, but in the end he would surrender to it. And when he did that – when they caught him in a suspicious circumstance he could not explain away – they would have him.

Woodend passed the scenery workshop and the technical store, and drew level with Houseman's office. The blind was down, but since it was only thirty-six hours to the next show, it was probable that the producer was inside. Perhaps he had been inside all through the fire drill. Perhaps that was why the chief inspector had not seen him in the car park.

Woodend knocked on the door. There was no answer, but the door was not properly closed, and his knock made it swing open just wide enough for him to see part of the office – and to wish that he hadn't!

He pushed the door open. Houseman was slumped over his desk. His arms were stretched out in front of him, so that the tips of his fingers drooped over the far edge. His head was resting between his in-tray and his out-tray.

John Dinnage had been found in a similar position. But it was not a heart attack which had reduced Houseman to this state, it was a large carving knife – buried in his back almost up to the hilt.

Woodend closed the door behind him, stepped forward, and placed his index finger against Bill Houseman's neck. There was no pulse. Bill Houseman, his main suspect in the murder of Valerie Farnsworth, was indisputably as dead as a dodo himself.

Woodend stepped back and let his gaze sweep the room, as if hoping to find the killer crouching in a corner. But apart from himself and the corpse, the office was empty.

He walked over to the door, opened it just wide enough to step outside, and looked at the stream of people making their way back to their posts. Any one of them could have used the confusion of the fire alarm to slip into Houseman's office and stick the knife in his back. Any bloody one of them!

The chief inspector took his packet of Capstan Full Strengths out of his pocket, and lit one up.

How was DCS Ainsworth going to react to the news of a second killing, especially when the officer in charge of investigating the first had been, if not in the building, then at least in the area?

How was the press – the pack of hungry jackals outside – going to report it the next day?

‘Shit!' Woodend said aloud – and realised that was exactly what he was in.

L
ike most of the windows in the studio, the one in the safety officer's room had a view of the central concourse and, looking through it, Woodend could see Bob Rutter's team organising the staff of
Maddox Row
into lines outside the conference rooms. It was probably almost an exact replay of the scene on Monday night, after Val Farnsworth's body had been discovered, he thought gloomily.

He turned to face the people in the room. One of them was the safety officer himself, the other a spotty-faced youth who looked as if he were about to soil his trousers.

‘Let's start at the beginnin', shall we?' Woodend suggested to the safety officer. ‘What was the first thing you did when you heard the fire bell ringin'?'

‘I checked on the panel on the wall over there, to see where it had been set off,' the other man replied, pointing with his finger. ‘The flashing light told me it was in one of the rehearsal rooms, so I went straight there. That's where I found young Brian.'

The spotty youth jumped at the sound of his own name.

‘Why did you set the alarm off?' Woodend asked.

‘B . . . Buildin' maintenance sent me there to sweep up,' the youth stammered. ‘There was, like, this big old tea chest in the corner of the room. I think it belongs to the props department. There was smoke comin' out of it.'

‘They use it for their rubbish,' the safety officer said. ‘I told them it isn't safe, but they never listen. My guess is that some idiot dropped an unextinguished cigarette end in there.'

‘So you saw the smoke, an' you set off the alarm?' Woodend said to the boy.

‘That . . . that's right.'

‘There was no need for it,' the safety officer said. ‘He could probably have stamped it out with this shoe. And if that had failed, there was a fire extinguisher on the wall.'

‘Why
didn't
you use the extinguisher?' Woodend asked Brian.

‘I p . . . panicked,' the boy admitted.

‘You're sure that's what it was?' Woodend demanded.

‘W . . . what do you mean?'

‘You're sure someone didn't pay you to set off the alarm?'

‘No! I . . . I just saw the smoke, an' then I broke the glass.'

‘All right,' Woodend said wearily. ‘You can go.'

Brian did not need telling twice. He took a quick gulp of air and fled from the room.

‘Do you believe him?' Woodend asked, when the boy had slammed the door behind him.

‘Yes, I do,' the fire officer said. ‘It was a stupid way to behave, but then half these kids haven't got the sense they were born with.'

‘I believe him, too,' Woodend said. ‘What happened after you'd located the source of the lad's panic?'

‘I gave it a quick squirt with the extinguisher, just to make sure it was properly out.'

‘So at that point you knew there was no real danger?'

‘That's right.'

‘Then why didn't you simply abandon the evacuation?'

‘A lot of people were already outside in the car park by then. Besides, we've been told it's dangerous to issue counter-instructions once an evacuation's actually in progress. And our procedures specifically state that, whatever the reason the alarm's been set off, we still have to check every room to make sure it's safe before we can allow anybody back in the building.'

‘An' that's what you did?'

‘That's what I did – starting with the studio and working my way towards the main door.'

‘So you checked Mr Houseman's office?'

The safety officer looked sheepish. ‘I called out to ask if anybody was in there, but there was no reply,' he confessed.

‘No, there wouldn't have been,' Woodend said dryly. ‘Dead people are
often
unnaturally quiet. So while you were doin' your checkin', did you see anybody else around?'

The safety officer looked down at the floor. ‘No.'

‘You're absolutely sure of that?'

‘Look, try and see it from my point of view,' the safety officer said. ‘As soon as your investigation's over, you'll be gone. But I have to keep on working here – and it won't make my job any easier if I've got anybody into trouble.'

‘So you'd rather shield a murderer than make your own life a little uncomfortable, would you?'

The safety officer shook his head. ‘Of course I wouldn't. But the people I found had anything but murder on their minds.'

‘Tell me about them anyway.'

The safety officer sighed. ‘There was this couple,' he conceded. ‘Well, they're not really a couple as such, if the truth be told. As a matter of fact, they're both married to other people.'

‘What about them?'

‘I found them in the props store. Her knickers were round her ankles, and he was just pulling his trousers up.'

‘I noticed Mrs Houseman, the producer's wife, in the car park,' Woodend said. ‘She didn't happen to be the woman you're talkin' about, did she?'

‘No. It wasn't her. The woman I'm talking about works in make-up, and the man who was with her is from props.'

‘But you weren't really surprised when I suggested it
might
have been Mrs Houseman, were you?' Woodend asked.