Murder in the Limelight (15 page)

‘Auguste,’ said Maisie, offhandedly, ‘then he put his hand on my thigh—’

‘He was the maître of salad dressings and he would not include so harsh a taste as anchovy. The tarragon, chervil, but not—’

‘And moved it till it was stroking both thighs and his other hand on my bosom, the left one, that is—’

‘Even that of the Maître Ude was too subtle for his master, your Duke of Wellington—’

‘And slid it between my—’

‘Who sacked –
what
did you say?’ Maisie had Auguste’s full attention. He was purple with indignation and not from the ingredients of Sydney Smith’s sauce. ‘He did
what
?’

‘No, he didn’t. I just wanted to see whether you were listening to me.’

‘But you wore your yellow dress,’ said Auguste suspiciously. ‘And you know it is my favourite.’

‘And I shall wear the second favourite tomorrow when I go to Romano’s with Johnny Beauville,’ said Maisie serenely, extricating herself at long last from the corset, removing her chemise and clambering into bed where she settled herself on the pillows. ‘Now come on, my old Sherlock Holmes, you can talk to me of clues and motives and all sorts of things.’

‘I have no wish to talk of clues and motives,’ said Auguste with dignity, settling in beside her. ‘It is not
comme il faut
in the circumstances.’

‘What circumstances are those?’ enquired Maisie interestedly.

‘These circumstances,’ said Auguste, turning to take her into his arms.

‘And another thing,’ he added, some considerable time later, ‘I wish to inform you,
chérie
, that you are not in the least like Dr Watson.’

At first, Sergeant Wilcox was disinclined to let Auguste in. He was disbelieving of Auguste’s claim that the inspector would wish to see him. Inspector Rose was well known for his dislike of casual callers. Moreover, this one was clearly foreign, and it was them foreigners that tried to blow up Scotland Yard. Or was that Fenians? Much the same thing anyway. Only the name Galaxy produced a positive response, and a constable was despatched to escort the Froggie to the hallowed sanctum.

‘Come to confess, most like,’ the sergeant consoled himself.

Auguste found Egbert Rose, hands clasped behind his back, standing at the dormer window of the cubby hole of his office high up in Scotland Yard, staring out over the River Thames.

‘Ah, Didier.’ An informal greeting that impressed the accompanying constable, who threw Auguste a look of respect before scuttling off to spread the report below that Rose the Nose was going all Frenchified.

‘Look at that river,’ he went on, ‘just been thinking to myself there’s a tidy lot of villains depend on that river. What it could tell us! Always fancied being with the river police. That river hides more crime than the Nichol. Look at that down there: pleasure boats, cruising along as happy as mudlarks, not knowing what’s underneath them. Found out anything, have you?’ he continued without pausing for breath.

‘Some things, Inspector, but I have had many thoughts also. I think the Galaxy is like a splendid dish of toad in the hole.’

‘I thought it would be, somehow,’ said Rose gloomily. ‘You see everything in terms of food, Mr Didier, that’s your trouble. I don’t doubt you see me in terms of food.’

Repressing the temptation to compare Egbert Rose to a Herodotus pudding, Auguste continued: ‘It presents to the world an harmonious whole, pleasing and simple.’ He paused for effect, while Rose listened indulgently. ‘Inside, however, what a mass of complications! This toad in the hole prepared from so many ingredients, not always harmonious – where else could salt beef stand side by side with guinea-fowl? – and yet within this toad, they rejoice together.’

‘And now you’re going to tell me someone has tipped the balance of ingredients and, pouf, the recipe is ruined.’

‘Indeed, Inspector, it is a fact that Monsieur Hargreaves is at odds with Percy Brian; Herbert no longer follows Florence as a King Charles spaniel, and that the Manleys do not get on as once they would. And it is not the mere fact of murder which makes everyone uneasy. It is true that Edward Hargreaves, Percy Brian, Herbert Sykes and Thomas Manley all had some reason to wish Florence Lytton harm.’

‘But not those two chorus girls surely?’

‘But,’ said Auguste, ‘I was discussing a leg of mutton with Miss Wilson—’

‘I’ve heard you Frenchies have a way with women,’ murmured Rose.

Auguste tried to quell him with a look and, having failed, continued hastily, ‘And we believe Miss Lytton is
not
the intended victim. We believe he is a maniac, or someone who hates all women, or –’ he paused, ‘someone who hates the Galaxy.’

‘Then we don’t have to restrict the field to those who had
a grudge against Florence Lytton,’ observed Rose somewhat drily. He had covered all this ground in his own mind some time earlier. ‘If you ask me, Mr Didier, we’re making this all too complicated. My thinking’s along these lines: we’ve got Summerfield and Beauville, both acquainted with the young ladies, Mr Sykes who seems to have been a great favourite with all the girls, Mr Manley whose eye roves further than it should, and even more obviously, there’s Props and Bates. Who better placed to know all the girls’ comings and goings than those two?’

‘Bates?’ said Auguste. ‘As well suspect Mr Archibald himself. He adores those girls.’

Rose shrugged. ‘Just pointing out the possibilities, Mr Didier. Nice and handy for him. He can look up when he likes, for instance.’

‘You are right, of course,’ said Auguste. ‘But if it were Obadiah then he would have to be a madman. And why, when he has worked at the Galaxy so long, does he suddenly take it into his head to start murdering girls? In fifteen years there would have been a sign of unnatural interest in them, and I have never heard one word against him from the girls. Even a madman needs a motive. And poor Props – what reason?’

‘Props is interesting,’ said Rose. ‘A sort of fanaticism there already, wouldn’t you say, Mr Didier? Didn’t you tell me he works there just to be near Miss Lytton? Never speaks to her. Just gives her flowers every day.’

‘Yes,’ said Auguste unwillingly. ‘He is gentle. He finds it difficult to speak to Miss Lytton, let alone touch her.’

‘All the more likely that, if he were sick in his mind and thought himself spurned, he might turn the other way. Take it out on innocent chorus girls first, then summon up the courage to attack Miss Lytton.’

The two men looked at each other. ‘It is possible, yes,’ said Auguste. ‘They are good ingredients, Inspector. But will they make a good
plat
?’

Gabrielle Lapin (or Lepin as she preferred to be known, in case her escorts were acquainted with the French language) entered the underground train in thoughtful mood. She was also thinking of food, of the dinner she would have on Tuesday evening with Lord Summerfield. She wondered whether she were taking a risk. After all, the other two girls had disappeared. But she, Gabrielle, knew how to look after herself, and the chance of ensnaring Lord Summerfield could not be missed. If she had refused, then he would not have asked her again. They were proud, these
aristos.
She drew her coat around her. It was an expensive one, for Archibald expected his girls to be well dressed and paid them extra to do so. He also expected them to travel by hansom cab. But a rumour had run round the dressing room last evening that the murderer was a hansom cab driver whose post was on the Strand.

Gabrielle was not an over-imaginative girl. She was pert-faced with an elfin charm that would not last past her thirtieth birthday, and she was clever enough to be aware of it. The puckish smile and kittenish appeal would settle all too quickly into ageing lines and vixenish frowns. She had only three years left to fulfil her ambition – and that of her parents – of making a suitable marriage. Archibald was generous to his girls, but even he had to face the fact that age overtook them, and gradually their faces, their figures and their dancing abilities fell below Galaxy standards. The call to his office would come. The increase in salary to show how valued they were – and then, a week or two later, an embarrassed chat with the stage manager.
Fini.

Gabrielle glanced at the kid boots peeping out from under her blue merino wool skirt and thought of the price she had paid for them at Messrs J Sparkes Hall & Son of Regent Street, Bootmakers to Her Majesty. It was unthinkable that she should not be so shod for the rest of her life.
Yes, she was glad she had accepted Lord Summerfield’s offer of dinner.

By Tuesday evening, the theatre seemed to have settled down to a permanent state of edginess. There was little general conversation. Ignorant of their starring roles in Inspector Rose’s surmises, Obadiah was busy with callers and messages in his cubby hole, Props was organising his team in the props room. Obadiah Bates was also sorting out the tributes for the Galaxy Girls. Not many tonight – the mashers scared off by the publicity. It was all bad for the Galaxy and that worried Obadiah. Worried him very much. Mr Didier had said he should tell the Inspector everything he knew, that any little detail might be important. That the future of the Galaxy might be at stake. For the umpteenth time he wondered what he should do.

The Green Room of the Galaxy was an oasis, a limbo between the outside world and the world of illusion. After the performance it became a place of relaxation where friends might gather to greet the cast, to bathe them in sweet adulation; here they were gods to receive their worshippers, only gradually metamorphosising once more into human beings – albeit larger than life human beings. Here they were cosseted, enshrined in their own immortality by the playbills, photographs, oil paintings and sketches adorning the walls.

Like all oases, it offered also more material comforts. Robert Archibald provided in the Green Room not only health-restoring refreshments after the performance, but pre-performance sandwiches, tea and coffee, with one of Auguste’s minions to serve them. Archibald was a keen observer of human nature, and percipient of its frailties. Far too easy for his ladies and gentlemen of the chorus, even for the principals, to wait until dinner for nourishment and not bother to eat before the performance. So here it was
for any that were too poor, too miserly or too lazy to partake of supper before they came. For all it had been meant as a democratic institution where Galaxy unity might flourish, and chorus eat with principals, it was noticeable that Florence Lytton and the other principals rarely indulged in Auguste’s best chicken pâté sandwiches.

Tuesday, however, was Herbert Sykes’s housekeeper’s afternoon off, and the sustaining qualities of the stale angel cake she had left for Herbert’s tea were not great. Thus he was alone in the Green Room – like all free offerings it was not patronised as it should have been – and was interrupted in the midst of a Roquefort sandwich, addressing a vicious and unrepeatable remark to the portrait of Florence Lytton painted by a latter-day Pre-Raphaelite who had seen her through rose-coloured spectacles as ‘Golden Innocence’.

‘Why, Herbert! What a thing to say!
Quelle bêtise
!’ There was a giggle behind him. They always called him Herbert, he thought, even as he spun round in alarm. They had no respect for him, these girls. They just treated him like an old slipper.

‘It was the sandwich I was talking about,’ he muttered. Luckily Auguste was not in earshot.

Gabrielle Lepin had come to partake of some food before the performance in order that her stomach might not rumble unbecomingly whilst in the confines of Lord Summerfield’s carriage. She could also thus pretend that she had a bird-like appetite. First appearances were important.

‘Ah, has the nasty Miss Lytton been unkind to poor little Monsieur Herbert?’ she twitted unwisely. His changed attitude had not gone unnoticed in the dressing room.

‘No,’ he said sharply. Then he looked at the little kid boots peeping out under her skirt. And thought about Gabrielle Lepin, not Florence Lytton.

‘But she’s not a patch on you, my dear,’ he said gallantly, though insincerely. ‘How about supper? Rule’s, perhaps?’

‘Ah, not tonight. I have an engagement. But perhaps one
day, I will. You are so funny, Monsieur Herbert.’ Quite why she should imagine this would endear her to Herbert was not clear. It did not. His face darkened, but he said nothing. She watched the shadows creeping over it and said uneasily, ‘I was only joking about Miss Lytton. I expect she’s ever so nice when you know her and ever so fond of you.’ Herbert was, after all, a principal.

He seemed not to hear her. Then his face grew red, and he burst out angrily, ‘Funny! You think I’m
funny
!’ Then he spun round and looked at ‘Golden Innocence’ again. ‘You think I’m funny too, don’t you?’ he said viciously, ‘Oh yes, funny old Herbert. Second best. You’re not worth it, none of you. Cock-chafers. Harlots.
Florence
!’

Unfortunately the lady’s husband was standing in the doorway. Florence had elected to travel separately. Futhermore there had been no supper for him at home. Florence had been served tea in her boudoir. It had been locked to him. Unwisely he took exception to his wife being thus referred to, however much he might privately agree with the bitterness with which the insults were hurled. But ladies were always ladies in public.

‘Florence is my
wife
, Mr Sykes,’ he said with dignity, one hand on the door handle, playing as he had in so many provincial melodramas the injured husband.

Cornered, Herbert went white, then lashed out: ‘And I’m sure you’re to be pitied.’

Manley’s eyes bulged. His repertoire did not allow for this retort. ‘Pitied!’ he exploded. ‘Are you mad, Mr Sykes?’

Herbert was not, so he claimed. ‘She’s a bitch. She leads people on. Look how she led that Lord Summerfield on, even Johnny Beauville. Didn’t you know? I did. Led me on too. Promised me everything, everything. Cock-tease—’

Gabrielle listened fascinated. They seemed to have over-looked her presence and she was not going to remind them. This was better than the day at the Folies when Gaby had attacked Jane with a knife.