Murder in the Limelight (3 page)

Auguste Didier, interrupted in the midst of a
boudin de volaille
, followed Thomas up the steps, his curiosity for once overcoming the exigencies of his art.

Florence was standing at the door of her room, her dresser in mild hysterics by her side. She was staring at the mantelshelf, where a goodwill offering had been placed ready to greet her as she came into the room.

One of the missing dolls was found. But Props would have his work cut out before she could adorn the set of Mr Hoggis’s toyshop once more. For the doll had been neatly strangled, its china head split open and half twisted from its torso. Its arms had been torn out of the flimsy muslin dress in order that they might be neatly crossed and tied across its breast.

‘It’s just a nasty practical joke, my dear,’ said Robert Archibald comfortingly to a distraught Florence, who was sitting with Thomas’ arm around her shoulders and taking calming sips of Auguste’s camomile tea.

‘Yes,’ he repeated, as if convincing himself, ‘that’s what it was, a practical joke.’

‘But why me?’ wailed Florence afresh. ‘Why me?’ She looked piteously at Thomas, then at Archibald, then at Auguste.

None of them could supply the answer.

A thoughtful Auguste made his way downstairs, leaving Robert Archibald surreptitiously regarding the pocket watch he held in one hand, and patting Florence ineffectually on the back with the other. Seeing Obadiah still standing at the doorway of his cubbyhole, Auguste instinctively paused, the detective in him coming to the fore. Then he reconsidered. He was a chef, a maître, not a
detective, good though he was at solving mysteries. On the other hand, just one or two questions perhaps . . .

‘Could anyone have come in from outside, Obadiah?’ he asked, having explained the reason for the commotion.

‘No one gets in past that door without my seeing. You know that, Mr Didier. And you, Miss Maisie,’ he added, seeing her come up behind Auguste. Maisie was a particular favourite of his, hence this sign of favour in addressing her by her Christian name. Invalided out of Roberts’ army in the Khyber Pass, he was now, at sixty, a veteran of the Galaxy, having manned the stage door with a fierce pride for the last fifteen years.

He was as much an institution as the Galaxy Girls themselves. No stage door Johnnie escaped his gimlet eye. No trick they might invent for entering the forbidden precincts escaped him. He would sort out the good ’uns from the bad ’uns, give the girls invaluable advice about their escorts, rid them of unwanted admirers, and tactfully deal with broken hearts both sides of the stage door.

‘But are you sure, Obadiah? No errand boys, no outside people at all since this morning?’

‘No, Mr Didier. No one at all.’

‘So this – joke – must have been played by one of us. One of the company.’

‘No one would play a wicked trick like that,’ said Obadiah reprovingly. ‘Not at the Galaxy. And at a dress rehearsal?’

‘I thought we only held second place in your heart, Obadiah,’ laughed Maisie. It was an established theatre joke that Obadiah’s heart belonged principally over the road at the Lyceum, and that he had been broken-hearted when the opening of the restaurant had necessitated the moving of the Galaxy’s stage door to Catherine Street which meant he could no longer hope to see his idol, Henry Irving, walk along Wellington Street by the sacred portals of his theatre.

‘I’m part of the Galaxy, miss,’ said Obadiah with dignity.

‘But you don’t like the plays.’

‘I saw this new one on Saturday, miss. Saw Miss Lytton singing away: “If only you could hear . . .” I remember that. Then I had to get back – can’t trust these youngsters on the door for long.’

‘Did you enjoy it, though, Obadiah?’

‘You all looked very nice, Miss Maisie,’ he said carefully. ‘But give me something classical.
King Lear
now. “Howl, howl, howl, howl, howl”.’ His eyes strayed longingly in the direction of the Lyceum.

Auguste laughed. ‘Half the doorkeepers in London would exchange places with you for no wages at all, just to be amongst the lovely ladies of the Galaxy.’

Obadiah eyed him gloomily, then said kindly, ‘Of course, you’re French, Mr Didier,’ as though that explained it. ‘We’re like a family here, Mr Didier.’

‘Of which one member has a perverted sense of humour,’ observed Auguste thoughtfully.

‘Five minutes, Miss Lytton. Five minutes, ladies.’

A concerted shriek went up from the dressing rooms, followed by: ‘My hare’s foot, where’s my hare’s foot?’

‘My osprey!’

‘My button hook!’

The dovecote heaved under the turmoil as the Galaxy Girls fluttered into position.

Florence, fingers still slightly trembling, adjusted a strand of hair and rose to her feet purposefully. The play depended on her. She must not give way.

On the gentlemen’s side, Herbert Sykes averted his gaze from the mirror that told him remorselessly how unattractive he was, and that he could be of no interest whatsoever to Florence Lytton. But he made her laugh, he reminded himself stoutly. Manley never made her laugh.
And, somewhat cheered, he left for the stage.

In the orchestra pit Edward Hargreaves smoothed his sleeves nervously over his impeccable cuffs. He wished he didn’t have this horrible feeling that everything was going to go wrong. He enjoyed dress rehearsals normally as he enjoyed everything at the Galaxy – that is, when he could forget his awful fear that their secret might be discovered. It was all very well for Percy. He liked living dangerously.

Robert Archibald had taken his seat in the stalls. He gave the signal to Hargreaves. The baton came down, the orchestra struck up and, at the piano, Percy Brian moistened his lips excitedly. Soon his fingers would be on the keys again, swept away in the wonder of his music – or rather Edward’s music. But it would be interpreted as only he, Percy Brian, could interpret it.

Another dress rehearsal at the Galaxy was under way, and no one spared a thought for Christine Walters.

‘I’ve come to London town, my fortune here to seek . . .’

A simply-clad girl in white bought a bunch of violets and placed them with a charming gesture in her bosom, before turning winningly to the ‘audience’ in order to confide that: ‘My fortune is not gold, but the love of a true sweetheart’.

Thirty ladies and gentlemen of the chorus, resting their voices after their lusty opening, ‘Piccadilly Parade’, melted tactfully into the background, and thankfully away from the direct heat of the gas battens above them, to leave Florence to her discovery of the toyshop.

In the wings Thomas Manley fell in love anew with his wife as she tripped lightly across the stage. Behind the backdrop Herbert dedicated himself once more to her service. In the stalls Robert Archibald nodded approvingly and thanked the gods for the lucky day that had sent him Florence.

Waiting for her cue Edna looked jealously at Florence. She was lucky. She had everything, including Thomas
Manley. Not that Edna wanted him. She was far too shrewd to waste time on a married man, and was determined to marry a peer. There was always the Honourable Johnny, of course, if the worst came to the worst, but he was only a younger son so there would be no title for him. Summerfield was a much better prospect. Summerfield – a slight feeling of unease took hold of her. Wasn’t there something –? Yes, Christine Walters. Christine and Summerfield. And afterwards Christine had gone away – to Paris, it was rumoured. Strange how unexpectedly she’d gone, after only two performances of
Lady Bertha.
Edna dismissed the thought and concentrated on funny old Herbert’s caperings on stage.

‘Quickly, young woman, her ladyship’s waiting. Get on with you.’

Herbert was in the midst of displaying his comic genius as Mr Hoggis, the toyshop owner for whom Lady Penelope (in disguise, of course) works.

Florence tripped lightly across the stage once more.

Swept away by the tension and excitement of a new Galaxy play, no one was prepared for what they heard next. Not the dainty strains of one of Edward’s best tunes but yet another scream and gurgle from Florence’s pretty throat as she stared aghast at the thing in her hand. It fell to the floor with a thud. She turned as if in appeal to the darkened auditorium, her hands outstretched, then burst into tears and ran off the stage.

Thomas reached the object first. The doll had its head half twisted off, a scarf viciously twisted round its neck, and for good measure a stage dagger stuck into its bosom in the V left between the two bound, crossed hands.

For once Auguste was not concentrating solely on the exciting task in hand: preparing a sauce for the chicken
à la belle vue
to be served at the banquet after the first night that evening. He was thinking back to the previous night. Not so much of Maisie – delightful though that had been – but of their conversation after they had returned to his small suite of rooms in lodgings at the end of Wellington Street.

‘I don’t like it, Auguste,’ Maisie had said, sitting on the bed and easing her feet out of their purple satin slippers with a sigh of satisfaction.

Auguste looked at her worried, honest brown eyes and sat down beside her, taking her hand in his own.

‘Nor I,
ma mie.
Perhaps it is as Mr Archibald says, a practical joke.’

‘That’s all smoke, gammon and spinach! We’ve never had practical jokers before. Why now? Why that? Why Miss Lytton? She hasn’t any enemies. Everyone likes her. You should see some of the leading ladies I’ve worked with. More temperament than a pepper pot. But not Miss Lytton.’

‘Jealousy perhaps?’

‘Amongst us, you mean?’ she asked shrewdly. ‘The show girls and chorus girls? No. And even if one of us wanted to upset her, they’d choose something different. There’s a ton of tricks you can play, without being gruesome.’

‘There are many people in the theatre on a dress rehearsal
day: errand boys, telegraph boys, fitters. Any one of them might have—’

‘But why?’ Maisie asked practically.

‘A rejected lover?’

Maisie looked at him indignantly. ‘All round my ’at! You know Florence is devoted to Thomas. No one would get close enough to her even to be rejected.’

She stopped suddenly as an unpleasant thought struck her. ‘Except – Auguste, you don’t think Props might have . . .?’ Her voice trailed off.

Auguste considered. Props, with his well-known fanatical devotion to Florence Lytton. It was obvious he had only taken the job at the Galaxy to be near her, since he had been a furniture maker previously. Yet he never spoke to her, never approached her except to press a posy of violets into her hand. He was accepted as a harmless eccentric.

‘He is a little strange, you know. You don’t think he could have, well, turned against her?’

‘It is possible, yes,’ said Auguste. ‘He had the best opportunity to do it.’ He was beginning to tire of the matter of the dolls. The episodes had left him uneasy, but the day had been long and Maisie was very close. His arm tightened round her. But she had not finished talking, unresponsive for once to the eloquent message of his dark eyes.

‘Auguste, what
do
you think happened to Christine Walters? I know everyone thinks she just left for Paris to join the Folies Bergères like she always said, but something worries me . . .’

‘What,
chérie?’
asked Auguste patiently, removing his hand from her waist until its reception seemed likely to meet with more appreciation.

‘She left her rabbit’s foot behind.’

‘Her what?’

‘Lucky rabbit’s foot,’ repeated Maisie. ‘You wouldn’t understand but we all have something. A lucky handkerchief, a lucky scarf. We’re a superstitious lot. And
Christine had her rabbit’s foot. She swore she always had bad luck without it. She’d never have taken another engagement in Paris, leaving that behind. She’d have sent for it if she had really forgotten it.’

‘Then what do you think—?’

‘I don’t know. The Honourable Johnny said the police had come to see him when the Sûreté hadn’t been able to find her in Paris. I know he’s a joke, but he was quite worried. It was weeks since Christine had given him the “get off me barrer” – it was Summerfield she was seeing, and didn’t we know it? She was determined to end up under a coronet. Some hopes, with his mother!’

‘His mother?’

‘He’s a bachelor. Lives with Mama at the ancestral towers in Buckinghamshire. Every so often he sneaks a night away at their town house, and is round here quicker than a duke out of a jerryshop to take one of us to dinner. Doesn’t mind who it is, just has to be one of the famous Galaxy Girls.’ Her voice was scornful. ‘I feel sorry for him, poor old boy.’

‘And Christine disappeared while she was the reigning favourite?’

‘He told Miss Pearly Queen Purvis that Christine never turned up that evening. He couldn’t see her on the first night of
Lady Bertha
because of the party and so arranged to see her the next night. But no Christine. And being a lord and all that, he don’t like having a piece of wet cod slapped round his face, so he never bothered to find out why. He likes to be the only cock in the henhouse, does His Lordship?

‘And so, my love, do I,’ said Auguste, pulling her to him.

‘I tell you what, Auguste,’ she said after a pause, ‘English I might be, but I have to grant you there are still some things Frenchmen do better than Englishmen.’

‘The creation of a
timbale
, perhaps?’

‘And other things, other things . . .’

Auguste smiled at the memory as he stirred the liaison. Twelve dozen plovers’ eggs, three galantines of chicken, lobster salad of course,
poularde à la d’Albutera
, two hot dishes, Soyer’s
pièces montées
, the
croquantes
, the
nougats
, the
madeleines
, the
gaufres
, the
bavarois
, the
charlottes
, Maître Escoffier’s crawfish
à la provençale
.

Auguste, influenced by his English mother in his upbringing, usually inclined to English receipts, but for a first night celebration he knew the girls would not be impressed by English cooking. They would want the finest French delicacies of which his art was capable, and they would not be disappointed. He would create a centrepiece as magnificent as those of the great Soyer himself, though he would not go so far as had one maître and insist that the ceiling be removed to accommodate it. Instead he had created a sculpted masterpiece in spun meringue and fruit. He thought longingly of the moment when the curtain would be drawn back at the rear of the stage and his creation revealed to the ‘Oohs’ and ‘Aahs’ of the company.