Ruddy Gore (9 page)

Bernard explained the layout of the theatre.

‘Two staircases, one on either side,’ he pointed.

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‘First level up are the chorus’s dressing rooms, one for the ladies and one for the gentlemen. Then up another flight is wardrobe and storage. Down from here is the stage carpenter’s shop. And of course you can go under the stage. You can do that later. Come along.’ He opened a plain door and said sympathetically, ‘Hans, my dear chap, how are you?’

A kneeling man with grey hair was shovelling a number of small flat bottles into a shoebox. He sat back on his heels and croaked, ‘Just cleaning up.

You’ll . . . ’ he paused, looked away, and said flatly, ‘You’ll want the room again and I can’t bear the idea of anyone handling any of Walter’s things but me.’

‘Yes, yes,’ said Sir Bernard soothingly, ‘leave it for the moment, Hans. This is Miss Fisher and I’ve employed her to find out what’s been going on.’

‘But the police . . . ’

‘Yes, we’ve got them as well. We’ll find out who did it, don’t worry.’

‘I don’t care who did it.’

Phryne took a good look at his face, which he kept turned away, unaware that she could see him in the large lighted mirror. It was a weak face, she decided, prematurely old and marked with lines so deep that they were almost like scars across the high forehead and gashes down each cheek. He was now hunched in the actor’s chair, one shoulder higher than the other. His knobbed arthritic hands were clasped together as if for comfort.

Tears were trickling unregarded down his face.

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‘We were together for twenty years,’ he said in his soft, cracked voice. ‘Twenty years, Walter and I, in theatres all over the world. London and South Africa and New Zealand and Australia. Such a long time and now it’s all over. Walter’s gone.’

Sir Bernard laid a hand on the crippled shoulder.

‘I know, my dear chap.’

Phyrne saw the reflected Hans twist away under the consoling touch.

‘He was going to retire,’ mourned Hans. ‘We

. . . he was going to live in Bendigo, he owns . . .

owned a house there. And now, he’s gone. I can’t believe he’s gone.’

‘What happened last night, Mr Hansen?’ asked Phryne briskly. This wreck of a man was going to collapse altogether under any more sympathy. The dresser pulled himself together.

‘It was just as usual. He came in about six, we had a cup of tea, then he put on his costume, that’s the shepherd’s smock for Robin Oakapple. He had a touch of sore throat, he used to suffer terribly with his throat. I made him a lemon and honey drink and he did his make-up.’ He gestured at the wastepaper basket, which contained a squeezed lemon and pads of cotton wool stained with greasepaint and powder.

‘Did anyone come in?’ asked Phryne. Hansen thought about it, passing a shaking hand over his eyes.

‘No . . . I don’t think so . . . yes. Mr Evans came in and said something nasty about Walter clipping his lines. He was smoking a cigarette, the insolent 83

puppy. Walter ordered him right out. Cigarette smoke made him ill. Evans knows that. Welsh wretch! And Miss Webb popped in to say good luck. She is a nice girl, Walter asked her about his indigestion and she suggested the blue pills. No one else, but I slipped out to get him some cough medicine about six thirty. I was only away half an hour, less than that. Oh, Lord. Could someone have come in and given him the stuff? While I wasn’t here to protect him?’

Phryne asked, ‘Did Mr Copland eat or drink anything you hadn’t prepared?’

‘No, he never even got to take the medicine.

There it is.’ Hans began to cry again as he picked up a red-sealed chemist’s packet. ‘He only took tea and the lemon and honey. My Grandma always swore by that for throats. Oh, except his indigestion tablets. He always took a few of those before he went on. He had an acid stomach, and stage fright made him worse.’

‘Stage fright? After twenty years?’ asked Phryne.

Both Sir Bernard and the dresser looked at her.

‘Phryne darling, you never lose stage fright. It can happen to a veteran just as easily as a beginner. It’s good. It gives an edge to a performance. I always think that when you’ve lost the butterflies, you’ve been on the stage too long.’ The dresser nodded. ‘Yes, but it has been getting worse lately.

He was almost sick before he went on, ever since he got Sir Ruthven. He was getting on, you know, for an actor. Nearly forty. It’s a strenuous part and he used to get very tired.’

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‘He was a great actor,’ said Sir Bernard. ‘Well, we must find you another position, Hans, old chap. Can’t waste a good dresser.’

‘Oh, no . . . no, Sir B, I can’t. I can’t do this again. I’m too old. Just let me go away.’

The grasp on Sir Bernard’s hand was unexpectedly strong. He enfolded it in a warm clasp, saying, ‘Well, well, my dear man, we shall see.

Stay on for a few days, will you, until all this is sorted out?’ Hans nodded, overcome. Phryne and Sir Bernard closed the door on the crooked man, once more on his knees, sweeping up broken glass.

‘Bernard, if it wasn’t in the pills, where was it?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘Did you see all those little bottles? They were brandy flasks, weren’t they?’

‘And rum. Oh, dear. No one told me he had a tippling problem. Well. I can’t see that it has a bearing on his death.’

‘Yes, you can. The drug may have been in the latest of those little bottles and Hans there is busy destroying the evidence,’ said Phryne impatiently.

‘So he is,’ said Sir Bernard helplessly, ‘but I can’t just go in and demand them, can I?’

‘Herbert,’ called Phryne. The boy shot out of his post at the head of the stairs.

‘Yes, Miss?’

‘Help poor old Hans with the rubbish, will you?

Find a sugar bag and load all the stuff into it and leave it in Sir B’s office, sealed up. Can you do that?’

The shrewd face knotted in concentration, then 85

cleared. Herbert knew what was going on, but all he said was, ‘Yes, Miss.’

‘You seem to have had a remarkable effect on the call boy, Phryne. He’s a bright little person, Herbert is. I expect him to be a good actor, if he is not distracted early by the Actor’s Enemies.’

‘What are they?’

‘Alcohol and women,’ Sir Bernard grinned.

‘Where next?’

‘Let’s talk to Gwilym Evans.’

‘Oh, very well.’ Sir Bernard knocked on the next door, opened it, and revealed Gwilym Evans in the arms of a pretty blonde girl. She gave a squeak of dismay and exited at speed, her hair streaming behind her.

‘I told you, Mr Evans, the chorus are out of bounds,’ said Bernard sternly.

‘What can I do, when the dear girls come and throw themselves at me?’ asked the actor plaintively. ‘I’m persecuted by the female sex,’ he added complacently, glancing slyly at Phryne. She instantly resolved never to be added to this attractive man’s harem.

But she could not help smiling. He had turned back to the mirror, smoothing on greasepaint with long, practised strokes across a straight nose, over the contours of a youthful cheek and down into the hollow of a columnar throat. His hair was a little too long, entrancingly wavy, and the pale make-up made his dark blue eyes glow like sapphires. He looked at the mirrored young man with deep pleasure.

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‘A bit darker, for that weathered look, and cherry cheeks for Richard Dauntless the sailor,’ he commented. ‘To what do I owe the pleasure of this visit, Sir B and delightful lady?’

‘This is Miss Fisher, she’s a detective.’

‘I’ve already talked to all those policemen,’

drawled Gwilym.

‘What did you have against Walter Copland?’

asked Phryne sharply. He raised his reflected eyebrows. The painted mouth curved childishly.

‘I didn’t like him. He clipped my lines and tried to upstage me, which he couldn’t do. Not on
my
stage. My audience.’ His voice was precise, the only remains of a Welsh accent being a pure vowel sound and a habit of pronouncing the whole word – ‘de-light-ful’, ‘po-lice-men’. It was a very sure voice, with no cracks or hesi-tations. Gwilym Evans, however unreliable with the persecuting female sex, was deadly serious about his craft. ‘He was too old for Ruthven, anyway, and he tippled.’

‘He did?’

‘He always carried a little flask with him.’

‘Do you know it was alcohol?’

‘What else could it be ? He was frightened. Stage fright. He corpsed three times on Thursday in
Pinafore
. Ask Prompt.’

‘Corpsed?’ asked Phryne.

‘Forgot his lines and froze to the spot,’

explained Sir Bernard. ‘I had no idea that it was so bad. Why didn’t someone tell me?’

‘What, tell tales to Management?’ mocked 87

Evans. ‘He was bound to make a complete ass of himself and get caught out. All I had to do was wait. I mean,’ he backtracked hastily, ‘I’ve sung Sir Ruthven before, and you’ve run out of understudies. And my understudy is Eric Parry and he’s word-perfect. I’ve been rehearsing him a little bit, see, on the side.’

‘In preparation for Copland’s collapse and disgrace?’ Sir Bernard eyed the actor narrowly. ‘Mr Evans, you are incorrigible.’

‘I am,’ he agreed, smoothing one finger down the perfect cheek. ‘Do I get the part?’

‘Before you get the part, my boy, I’ll play it myself,’ said Sir Bernard in a tight whisper.

‘Who’ll play him, then?’ asked Evans, really wanting to know.

‘We’ll do another show,’ seethed Sir Bernard through his teeth.

‘Wait a bit.’ Phryne inserted a word into the promising quarrel. ‘Mr Evans, you went to see Walter Copland. Did you see him eat or drink anything while you were there?’

‘Yes, he was sipping at a concoction of lemon which that unpleasant dresser made for him. I didn’t stay long,’ said Gwilym, ‘just dropped in to wish him the worst of luck. But Sir Bernard – ’ the beautiful hand touched the manager’s sleeve –

‘who will play Sir Ruthven?’

‘Not you, Mr Evans. We may be rogues and vagabonds,’ said Bernard, removing the hand, ‘but we are not dishonourable and we will strive to be gentlemen.’

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He strode out of the dressing room. Phryne looked back at Gwilym.

The wavy head drooped onto the graceful hand, as though the neck was too weak to support it.

The blue eyes were screwed shut and the pale lip caught between the teeth to quell a sob. As Phryne watched, a tear dripped through the fingers. He was the essence of misery and it was clear that his heart was broken.

Phryne had no doubt that the emotion was quite genuine. She was also certain that it would not persist past the appearance of the next attractive female.

‘That chap,’ said Sir Bernard, biting into his cigar as though it was a stick of liquorice, ‘is an absolute bounder.’

‘Then who is going to play Sir Ruthven?’

‘Hanged if I know. It may have to be him, after all. It’s too late to change the show now.

But tomorrow we give
Pirates
, a little under-rehearsed perhaps, but I’m damned if an actor should begin to dictate to Management in this underhand way!’

‘Would he have poisoned Walter Copland?’

‘I wouldn’t put anything past the chap. Phryne, what have you in mind?’

‘That the next Sir Ruthven might be in danger, too.’

‘Oh, Phryne darling, you don’t mean it.’ He began to laugh heartily, then stopped when he saw her expression. ‘You do mean it. That’s insane. You mean that we may have someone 89

with a what-do-you-call-it – a monomania about
Ruddigore
?’

‘It’s possible, isn’t it?’

‘But – a monomania about G and S? If it was grand opera I could understand it, but comic opera?’ He began to smile, and relit the battered cigar. ‘But that solves the problem, doesn’t it? I can’t think of a fellow I would rather see poisoned.

Nip back, Phryne dear, and tell Mr Gwilym Evans that he is to find a costume. He’s going on as Robin/Sir Ruthven. I’ll go and have a slip prepared for the programme. Back in a tick.’

Phryne returned to the dressing room where Gwilym still sat mourning in front of the mirror.

‘Mr Evans? I’ve a message from the management.’ He looked up, like a man reprieved from death.

‘You’re to go on as Sir Ruthven tonight. Sir Bernard says to get fitted for a costume.’

She was not prepared for the dawning joy on the mobile face. He shone with an entirely authentic joy, caught up her hand, and kissed it. She felt his mouth open as he touched the palm, and shivered pleasantly.

‘I won’t forget this,’ he promised, then ran past her towards Wardrobe. She heard him call on the stairs, ‘Mrs Pomeroy, are you there? Mum dear, I need Sir Ruthven’s costume.’

Fascinated, Phryne walked up to the costume department.

It was full of steam. A sweating girl was pressing what seemed like a hundred miles of frilly 90

petticoats. A stately woman was stroking Gwilym’s head as he knelt at her well-shod feet with his face buried in her blue apron.

‘Now, Mr Evans, don’t take on. I’m sure we can manage, though I hope that there aren’t any more accidents, my pattern is getting worn out. No, don’t hug me, dear, I’m all stuck with pins. Sit down over there and Gladys will start the fitting.

The smock’s finished and the frock coat can be altered. Can I help you, Miss?’

‘Mrs Pomeroy, is it?’ Phryne held out her hand.

‘I’m Phryne Fisher, I’m investigating the problems in the theatre.’

‘Hope you can work it out, dear, it’s been very unsettling. And costume work is unsettling enough. One moment, Miss. Joan, you finish those petticoats and then help Gladys with Mr Evans.

Alice, can you deal with this,’ she handed over three dresses with long rips in the hems. ‘Those bridemaids are as clump-footed a gaggle as I’ve ever seen. Now, Miss, come in here.’ She led Phryne into a cubicle at the far side of the wardrobe, hidden by dress baskets and racks of ironed clothes.

She was a small, bright-eyed woman, with dark hair in a neat bun, her well-made clothes covered by a large blue calico overall which was, indeed, stuck with threaded needles and pins, making her embrace perilous in the extreme.

‘Well, I hope you can solve the problem. This company’s getting very nervous. Actors are always nervous,’ she said indulgently. ‘Spats and tantrums 91