Offstage in Nuala Read online

Clutterbuck shrugged. ‘As you wish. The men are assembled in the green room. Do you know where that is?’

  De Silva shook his head. He wasn’t even familiar with the term, but he wished Clutterbuck had observed the elementary precaution of keeping the men apart. At this stage, they were all suspects. His superior’s judgement really was questionable tonight. He wondered how many times the port had passed after the ladies withdrew from the dining room at the dinner he had attended.

  The room that Clutterbuck led him to was painted a grimy beige rather than green. The term must be another of those strange British expressions, reflected de Silva. As they entered, five men of varying ages stopped their conversation and looked up. The scene had an incongruous air for they were all dressed in eighteenth-century costume, presumably on account of the planned rehearsal. Clutterbuck’s brusque introductions gave the impression that he didn’t consider any of them to be his equal, but de Silva resolved to treat them with respect.

  ‘As you are aware, gentlemen,’ he began, ‘Alexander Danforth was found murdered in his dressing room earlier this evening.’ He nodded to the man who had been introduced as Frank Sheridan. ‘I understand that it was you who found the body.’

  There was a wintry expression on Sheridan’s narrow face, its anguish accentuated by a high-bridged nose and thin lips. ‘Yes,’ he said grimly. He jabbed a hand through the dark hair that was plastered to his head. Presumably, he had only recently discarded one of the powdered wigs that de Silva saw lying on a low table nearby.

  ‘It must have been a terrible shock.’

  ‘It was. We were due to begin our final rehearsal, and everyone was assembled here. It was unlike Alexander to be late. He was always the consummate professional.’

  ‘So you went to his dressing room to see what was wrong.’

  ‘Yes. I found him dead and came straight back here to get help.’

  ‘And then what happened?’

  ‘There was confusion for a while. None of us were sure what to do. Morville told the caretaker to contact the police station but there was no reply. Unsurprising, I suppose, as it was nearly eight o’clock. It was Mrs Danforth who said we should telephone the Residence, but I was told the Clutterbucks were out.’

  That was one little mystery cleared up, thought de Silva. ‘And how did you fill the time until Mr Clutterbuck arrived here?’

  ‘Mrs Danforth and Miss Watson went to lie down. The rest of us just stayed here. We didn’t talk much. I think we were all in shock.’

  ‘Are you saying that no one went back into the dressing room and disturbed anything?’

  ‘Not quite. Raikes came back in with me but we were careful to leave everything as we found it.’

  ‘Thank you, sir. And is that how the rest of you gentlemen remember it?’

  Paul Mayne, the actor who had played Hamlet’s friend, Horatio, snorted impatiently. ‘It was only a few hours ago, Inspector. I think you can safely assume that.’

  De Silva regarded him coolly. ‘In my line of work, sir, I find it advisable never to assume anything.’

  Mayne had the grace to mumble an apology.

  ‘All our nerves are on edge, Inspector,’ Michael Morville interposed. De Silva recalled that he had played Polonius, Ophelia’s bumbling father, who came to a sticky end behind a tapestry after being mistaken by Hamlet for the villain, King Claudius. ‘Sheridan’s account matches what I remember. It was just before six when he went to the dressing room to call Alexander. He was gone less than a minute when we heard him shout, then he rushed in and told us the terrible news.’

  ‘You were quite certain Mr Danforth was already dead?’

  ‘Dead as a doornail,’ one of the other men said. ‘I saw enough of it in the war to be sure of that.’

  ‘Thank you, Mr Raikes,’ Clutterbuck said dryly. ‘You will have realised Mr Raikes was not one of the actors, de Silva,’ he added.

  ‘Stage manager, and jack of all bloody trades, that’s me,’ said Raikes gruffly.

  ‘Thank you, sir. Can you tell me who the last person to see Mr Danforth alive was?’

  ‘Me and Sheridan.’

  ‘And what time would that have been?’

  The two men looked at each other. ‘Around four o’clock, Bert?’

  ‘Sounds about right.’

  ‘I was discussing some theatre business with Alexander,’ Sheridan went on. ‘Bert came in to replace a couple of light bulbs on the dressing table mirror. Alexander was always meticulous about doing his stage makeup in a good light. After that, we left him to rest or go over his lines before he started to get ready for the rehearsal. No one, not even Kathleen, disturbed Alexander when he was resting. Company rule – we all knew that.’

  ‘Where did you go then?’

  ‘Back to my dressing room.’

  ‘And I had some props to see to down that side,’ Bert Raikes chimed in.

  De Silva turned to the fifth man, Charles Crichton. He remembered he had acted the part of King Claudius in the play. He was an imposing fellow with a deep, resonant voice. ‘What about you, sir? Do you have anything more to tell us?’

  Crichton raised his eyes to the ceiling. ‘A tragedy, my dear Inspector. A great soul has departed this mortal coil. A man I was proud to call a friend—’

  ‘Thank you, Crichton,’ Clutterbuck intervened testily. ‘But I think we’ve all had enough for one night. It’s nearly one o’clock.’

  Crichton looked nettled.

  ‘I suggest you go back to your hotel, gentlemen,’ Clutterbuck continued. ‘The inspector and I would be obliged if you would stay there until further notice. I’m sure he’ll have more questions for you in due course.’

  The men trooped out. When the door closed behind them, Clutterbuck gave a snort. ‘What a buffoon. That type can never remember they’re not on stage. As for the rest, Sheridan and Raikes seem decent enough chaps, and Morville appears to be harmless, but you’ll have to curb that puppy Mayne.’

  De Silva held his peace. True to his word, he preferred not to make assumptions.

  ‘Well, it’s a start,’ Clutterbuck went on. He smothered a yawn. ‘We’ll talk tomorrow, or rather later today. You should get off home now. I intend to.’

  ‘Thank you, sir, but if you have no objection, I’d still like to have a look round and speak to the caretaker before I go.’

  ‘As you wish.’ Clutterbuck headed for the door. ‘Goodnight, de Silva.’

  ‘Goodnight, sir.’

  Left alone, he went to find the caretaker. The man was sitting in his booth, calmly filling in a puzzle in a copy of the Nuala Times that looked several days old. His jaws worked steadily and de Silva smelt the oily odour of a betel quid, the little parcel of areca nuts, lime and spices wrapped in betel leaf that so many locals were fond of chewing for the lift it gave to their mood. He supposed there was no reason why the man shouldn’t take the night’s events in his stride. After all, what was a dead Britisher to him?

  ‘The front doors to the theatre have been locked since the last performance,’ he said in reply to de Silva’s question.

  ‘That would be the performance of Hamlet on Saturday night?’

  ‘Yes, sahib.’

  ‘Would anyone who wanted to get into the theatre have to come in by the stage door then?’

  ‘There is a side entrance to the foyer for deliveries to the bar.’

  ‘Could someone get from there to the auditorium?’

  The caretaker shook his head. ‘When there is no performance, the doors between them are locked as the owner wishes, and I have the keys.’

  ‘Do you see everyone who comes in by the stage door?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘But there must be times when you are not here.’

  ‘If I am elsewhere in the theatre, I lock up. Otherwise, if I cannot be here because I am sick, the old man will come and take my place.’

  ‘The old man?’

  ‘Prathiv. Before I came, he worked here as the caretaker for many years.’
r />   De Silva glanced around the lobby; two corridors led off it in opposing directions. He already knew that the one to the left when one entered by the stage door led to the Danforths’ dressing rooms and the green room. He asked about the one to the right.

  ‘It is the way to the rest of the dressing rooms, sahib. They are smaller than the ones belonging to Sahib and Memsahib Danforth.’

  ‘Was everyone except for them at the right-hand end of the theatre that afternoon, particularly after four o’clock?’

  The caretaker shrugged. ‘The one with the thin face who does not speak passed by, going to the left side, but I think he returned by four.’

  That sounded like Sheridan, thought de Silva. ‘Sahib Raikes went out for a time,’ the man went on. ‘He stopped to speak with me and said he was going to buy something in the bazaar.’

  ‘What was that?’

  ‘He asked where he might find nails and paint, sahib.’

  ‘Did you see him come back?’

  ‘Of course. He said he had to change a light bulb in Sahib Danforth’s dressing room, but he was not gone for long. Then he went back to the right. There is a room down there he uses as a workshop. After that it was quiet until it was time for everyone to move to the green room.’

  ‘Did Mr Raikes go to the green room too? Even though he’s not one of the actors?’

  ‘Yes. He stands in the wings, sahib, in case he is needed, and to remind the actors if they forget their lines.’

  ‘Is there any way someone could cross from one corridor to the other without passing here?’

  ‘I do not think so, sahib, but Prathiv would know for certain. As I told you, he has been here many years.’

  De Silva thanked him and returned to Danforth’s dressing room. There weren’t many drawers to look through and only one cupboard, which was empty apart from the costumes Danforth had worn in Hamlet and a few shirts and trousers, but a large trunk and numerous suitcases and boxes were distributed around the room. He looked at them despondently, with dawning awareness of the size of the task he had undertaken at such a late hour. Well, he might as well get on with it.

  Snapping open the metal catches on one of the smaller suitcases, he inspected the contents: scripts, posters, and playbills for future shows. Another case contained all kinds of footwear, from leather boots that made de Silva think of The Three Musketeers to two-tone Oxfords and smart brogues.

  Numerous suitcases, and nearly an hour later, he stopped to roll his stiff shoulders. Not many more to go now; the end was in sight. In the last but one case, a holdall really, he found a folder containing a thick wad of letters. Mainly, they concerned the company’s bookings and there was nothing interesting about them. Some were several years old and their relevance doubtful. He wondered why Danforth had kept them, but then he noticed that they all covered only one side of the paper they were written on. Danforth had used the blank, reverse sides for notes and lists.

  De Silva glanced at the silent, sheeted figure on the bed in the corner. It was strangely touching that this flamboyant man had possessed such a thrifty trait. A small thing that revealed an unexpected element to his character. His writing was neat too, taking up an economical amount of space. De Silva supposed he shouldn’t be surprised. It must have taken considerable powers of organisation to transport the theatre company halfway round the world. The combination of those organisational skills with an outgoing, warm personality and artistic flair was interesting. De Silva felt sorry that he hadn’t had the chance to know the man better.

  Next, he tackled the dressing rooms used by the other male actors and Miss Watson. Fortunately, they didn’t take him so long, even though he was scrupulously thorough. He moved on to adjacent storerooms that held decades of costumes and accoutrements from the theatre’s heyday. Delving into cupboards and chests, he found breastplates and helmets sharing space with crinolines and fans; Roman togas with flapper dresses; doublets and hose with tennis whites, and elaborate Elizabethan, Georgian and Regency gowns with saucy sailor suits. As he worked, he disturbed ghostly armies of moths and flourishing societies of dust mites.

  He had left Kathleen Danforth’s dressing room until last and found that there was also a small room beyond it that appeared to be a workroom for her maid. A daunting array of clothes, shoes, accessories, wigs, beauty preparations, and makeup met his eyes. Astringent scents mingled with musky and flowery ones. The musky aroma was particularly strong in the workroom. He wondered if Kathleen Danforth’s maid was fond of “borrowing” some of her mistress’s expensive perfume.

  Used to Jane’s practical approach to matters of feminine embellishments, he embarked on his task with trepidation. Nevertheless, in the pursuit of thoroughness, when he had finished with the rest of the room, he even cast a glance into the wastepaper basket, but there was nothing in it but wads of used cotton wool and a few withered stems of yellow roses with a small card on top of them. It was signed “Bunnikins” followed by two kisses. It might be a pet name she and Danforth used.

  He stretched: he’d done enough for tonight. It was time he went home and got some sleep. It wasn’t until he emerged into the parking area that he realised that the company’s bus had gone without a search. The men must have taken it back to their hotel. It wasn’t ideal, but he was too tired to follow now. It would have to wait.

  **

  Dawn was coming up by the time he reached Sunnybank. His beloved garden shimmered in the early morning light and crimson streaked the sky.

  Jane must have been listening for the car, for she greeted him in the hall in her dressing gown.

  ‘Shanti! What a night of it you’ve had.’

  He sighed. ‘It has been rather a long one.’

  ‘Shall I get the servants to fetch coffee and something to eat?’

  ‘Yes please, anything will do.’

  As he ate, he recounted the night’s events. ‘Horrible,’ she said with a shudder when he told her of how Danforth had died. ‘I must say, I agree with you that he was probably drugged first. A strong man like him would surely have put up a fight – unless someone was very clever and surprised him completely.’

  ‘Like a cat burglar?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Whoever it was, I think he must have been a pretty chilly customer to risk killing Danforth when any of the company might have come in and disturbed him, in spite of the company rule I was told of.’

  ‘A cool customer, dear,’ Jane said mildly. ‘And are you sure it was a him? There are two women in the company, don’t forget.’

  ‘Three, if you count Mrs Danforth’s maid. But one of those women, Miss Watson, was at the other end of the theatre, so if the men couldn’t pass the caretaker without being seen, neither could she. As for Mrs Danforth—’

  ‘It’s hard to imagine anyone so beautiful committing such an ugly crime, but don’t forget Lady Macbeth. Often the wife is the villain. I’ve read dozens of novels where that’s been the case.’

  De Silva shrugged. ‘It’s true that the murderer is frequently someone close to the victim.’

  She poured him some more coffee. ‘Scissors are more likely to be a woman’s weapon than a man’s, too.’

  ‘And what is your evidence for that?’

  ‘Intuition.’

  ‘Another woman’s weapon? It would need more than that to convince a judge and jury.’

  She gave him an apologetic smile. ‘I’m sorry, dear. I know I’m not taking this seriously enough. It’s just it seems unreal somehow. These actors come to Nuala and perform a play about murder and revenge and then we have a real-life murder.’ She rested her chin on her hand. ‘Those words on the mirror—’

  ‘The rest is silence?’

  ‘Yes. Hamlet’s last words after he kills Claudius. There must be a clue there and, although I can’t really explain why, I don’t think it’s something a man would write. Did you ask anyone about them?’

  ‘No time. Archie Clutterbuck was too keen to wrap things up. As I said, he’d al
ready had Kathleen Danforth, her maid, and Miss Watson driven back to their hotel and he sent the men off too before I had time to question them in anything more than the most cursory fashion.’

  ‘That strikes me as strange. After all, a murder in Nuala isn’t exactly an everyday event. Perhaps he was tired out, but you always tell me you don’t like to delay your questions and he ought to have respected that.’

  ‘It’s something I was taught very early in my career. People forget things if there’s a delay. Little details that may be important. And the murderer has less time to compose himself, or herself. Sometimes immediate questioning draws out a clue as to the person who’s guilty. If it had been up to me, I wouldn’t have let the ladies leave before I had spoken to them, or permitted the men to be together before they were questioned.’

  He brushed a few crumbs from his tunic and stood up. ‘I need some sleep before I carry on trying to make sense of this.’ He kissed the top of her head. ‘I’ll leave you and your ingenious mind to puzzle over the problem.’

  ‘You’re teasing me.’

  ‘Not at all, you know I regard you as Nuala’s answer to Miss Marple. I expect you to have the solution by lunchtime.’

  Chapter 4

  ‘I’ve made arrangements for the men to come up here so you can interview them in private,’ said Clutterbuck.

  They were in the study at the Residence. Outside, sunshine bathed the garden in golden light but, thankfully, today the room was cooler than on de Silva’s last visit.

  ‘It’ll only cause a lot of speculation if they’re seen coming to the police station,’ Clutterbuck went on. ‘And their hotel will probably be no better.’

  De Silva was surprised but, provided he was allowed to conduct his investigations as he wanted, he saw no reason to object. ‘What about the ladies?’ he asked.

  ‘That can wait.’

  ‘I’d prefer it if there wasn’t too much of a delay before I speak to them.’

  ‘I appreciate that.’ Clutterbuck’s tone was irritable. ‘Everything will be done properly, I assure you.’

  De Silva didn’t feel particularly reassured but he nodded his thanks. ‘Very well then. If the gentlemen are already here, I’ll make a start.’