Smoke and Mirrors (10 page)

‘It’s a hell of a coincidence though,’ said Edgar. ‘Denton McGrew was appearing in a pantomime and a young girl was murdered. Forty years later, he’s in a pantomime again and two children are killed.’

‘Coincidence could be all it is, of course,’ said Max.

‘Yes,’ said Edgar. They were in his office, another basement room with only a narrow strip of window showing feet going past. A WPC had brought tea, which Max had accepted with a charming smile. Now he looked at it dubiously. ‘Haven’t you got any coffee?’

‘No.’

Max took out his hip flask and added something to both cups. Edgar took a sip and almost choked.

‘How much did you put in here?’

‘Just a splash of brandy. It’s medicinal. Do you mind if I smoke?’

‘Yes.’

They sat in silence for a moment, Max tapping his cigarette case meditatively.

‘Tell me about Denton McGrew,’ said Edgar at last.

Max looked up at the pockmarked ceiling. ‘He’s all right, I suppose. He’s been in the business for ever. I wasn’t surprised to hear that he used to be a child actor. He was a straight actor for a time – I heard that he even went to Hollywood before the war – but he never made it really big. He’s really made his name as a Dame. He’s one of the best and a good Dame can make a lot of money. It’s the Dame who makes or breaks a pantomime.’

‘Not the Demon King?’

Max grinned. ‘Anyone can twirl a moustache but the Dame carries the show.’

‘Is he married?’

‘No. I’ve always assumed he was homosexual but that may not be the case. Lots of happily married men make their living dressing up as women.’

They might do in your world, thought Edgar. His own upbringing had been rather more sheltered.

‘What does Diablo think of him?’ He had underestimated Diablo once before when it came to judging character. He wouldn’t do it again.

‘They insult each other all the time, the ways pros do. Denton can be very waspish – some of the younger cast members are quite scared of him – but Diablo says he’s pleasant enough underneath it all. They go drinking together.’

‘Diablo would drink with the devil if he knew a members-only club.’

‘That’s true.’

‘I’d like to talk to McGrew,’ said Edgar. ‘Nothing official, just a chat. Do you think you could set it up?’

‘I’m sure I could,’ said Max. ‘Why don’t you come backstage tomorrow, before the evening show?’

Edgar had never before interviewed a man who was wearing full make-up, a hairnet, tweeds and a false bosom. Of course, it wasn’t, strictly speaking, an interview. It was just a friendly chat, brokered by Max, who had told Denton McGrew that Edgar wanted some background on past cases. What Denton made of this, Edgar couldn’t tell. He was a hard man to read, even without the barrier of several layers of pancake make-up.

‘It’s very good of you to see me,’ said Edgar. ‘Especially just before a show.’

McGrew shrugged. ‘It’s the best time. I have to come early to get all this on.’ He gestured at his outfit, which was half pantomime Dame, half man about town. It was odd seeing him at this stage, like watching a creature halfway through transforming. Edgar thought of the bagpipe-playing hedgehog in his red trousers. Did Denton too shed his skin at the beginning of the performance?

‘I’m interested in a production of
Babes in the Wood
that was performed on Hastings Pier in 1912,’ said Edgar. ‘I understand you appeared in the show as a child actor.’

Denton turned his mascaraed eyes in Edgar’s direction. ‘Max said you wanted to talk about that. I can’t think why.’

‘It’s simply a line of enquiry,’ said Edgar. ‘One of the cast was murdered. What do you remember about that?’

‘Betsy Bunning,’ said Denton. ‘She was a prize bitch but she didn’t deserve to die.’

‘You and Betsy played the Babes?’

‘Yes. I was ten. It was my first pantomime. My parents were both in the business and it was just accepted that we’d all follow them. My sisters were dancing snowdrops in the same production.’

‘Was Betsy a professional child actress?’

‘God, yes.’ Denton laughed harshly. ‘She was a pro to her fingertips, was Betsy. She was fifteen and hard as nails but she had the whole little-girl thing off pat, skipping around in her frilly dresses, making eyes at all the men.’

‘What do you remember about her murder?’

‘I wasn’t there that day. We weren’t supposed to rehearse in the afternoon. I heard about it later, how Alice Dean had hysterics and Stan – the Great Diablo – was sick in the sand bucket.’

‘Did you know Ezra Nightingale, the man convicted of the murder?’

‘Oh, we all knew Ezra. He used to hang around the theatre all the time. You always get people like that. They’re harmless, most of them. He was a writer, I think. Used to write poems to some of the girls in the cast. Always going on about the true sources of fairy tales like “Babes in the Wood”. How they were all very gruesome really and we shouldn’t make them all sweet for the audience. He said that’s why he killed Betsy, to show that the story wasn’t meant to have a happy ending. He was a nutter, of course. They still hanged him though.’

‘Did you ever speak to him?’

‘Maybe just hallo and goodbye. He wasn’t interested in little boys.’

‘Was he interested in little girls?’

Again the mirthless laugh. ‘That’s what they claimed in court. That he was obsessed with Betsy and that’s why he killed her. But I don’t think so. Betsy made up to him, calling him “Uncle Ezra” and all that, but I think she was just playing him for all she could get. He gave her a fur jacket and she was always prancing round the place in that. But he had a wife and child. I don’t think he was interested in her sexually.’

If Denton thought having a wife and a child precluded a man from being interested in young girls, then he was more innocent than he looked, thought Edgar. Also, a fur coat is the kind of present that you give to a mistress, not to a child.

‘I’ve been looking at the newspaper reports,’ he said. ‘It seems that Ezra confessed.’

‘Oh, I don’t think they even looked for anyone else,’ said Denton. ‘Story was that Ezra was sitting in the stalls with blood on his hands. Like I say, he was a nutter.’

‘Must have been awful for you all.’

Denton shrugged, causing the false breasts to rise alarmingly. ‘Yes, it was awful. The show had to come off. A whole panto season wasted. My parents were furious. It was a nice little earner for them, with three children in the cast. Tony Billington, Bert’s father, you know, was the producer and he wanted to press on with a new girl in the part but the rest of the cast, led by your mate Diablo, didn’t want to.’

‘Did you keep in touch with any of the cast over the years?’

‘Oh, I saw some of them on the circuit,’ said Denton. ‘But I was in Hollywood for years, you know.’

‘I know you were a big star there,’ said Edgar. If he had learnt one thing about pros over the years, it was that you could never go wrong with a bit of flattery.

It certainly seemed to do the trick now. Denton positively preened himself, stretching his painted lips in the first genuine smile Edgar had seen from him.

‘I did have rather a success, yes. This’ – again he gestured at his outfit – ‘is just a bit of fun really. I don’t need the money.’

Of course you don’t, thought Edgar. He couldn’t imagine that anyone would cover themselves in greasepaint and squeeze themselves into a corset twice a day just for fun. But then, he wasn’t an actor.

‘Thank you,’ he said. ‘You’ve been very helpful. I don’t suppose you’ve got a picture of Betsy, have you?’

He expected Denton to say no – after all, he didn’t sound as if he had been particularly fond of his co-star – but the actor said, with surprising alacrity, ‘I might have one somewhere. I’ll dig it out and give it to Max.’

‘Thank you. That would be very kind.’ Edgar stood up to leave. ‘Break a leg tonight. That’s what you’re supposed to say, isn’t it?’

Denton turned and, rather alarmingly, switched into an entirely different voice. His Widow Twankey voice, Edgar presumed.

‘Ooh, you’re a cheeky one. Take care, dear. It’s always the cheeky ones that get into trouble.’

And, with a regal wave, the Dame dismissed him.

*

Outside, Edgar took a deep breath. He wasn’t sure whether the conversation had got him any further but, on the other hand, he had learnt a few things: Ezra Nightingale had been obsessed with fairy tales, Denton resented Diablo for insisting that the pantomime closed after Betsy’s death, Denton still kept a photograph of Betsy. There were other things too, details that floated queasily through his subconscious. Betsy had called Ezra Nightingale ‘Uncle Ezra’. Nightingale killed Betsy to show that stories shouldn’t have happy endings. Denton McGrew could switch personalities in the blink of a false eyelash.

Max had invited him to stay for the show but, after Denton’s memories of
Babes in the Wood
, he didn’t really feel like watching a pantomime. Backstage, the atmosphere was heating up. Men in overalls carried props to and fro. A flock of dancers in short Chinese tunics pushed past him in a multicoloured whirl of silk. He passed a man wearing a dragon’s head and a harassed-looking musician carrying a double bass.

‘Broken my bloody E string,’ he said to Edgar.

Edgar wasn’t sure of the correct response but the musician didn’t wait for an answer. He hurried on through the twisting corridors, like the White Rabbit in search of a burrow.

Edgar knocked on Max’s dressing-room door.

‘Come in.’

Max was sitting in front of a mirror. He was wearing a poison-green robe with matching cloak and elongating his eyebrows with a black pencil. Edgar could never get used to seeing his friend in this environment. The face in the mirror, its handsome contours enhanced so as to seem almost grotesque, was Max and yet it wasn’t. The voice, though, was the same.

‘Get anything out of Denton?’

‘It was interesting but there’s really nothing concrete that links that case to this one.’

‘Except Denton and Diablo.’

‘Who’s the producer of
Aladdin
?’

Max raised a villainous eyebrow. ‘Bert Billington. Why?’

‘His father produced
Babes in the Wood
, all those years ago.’

‘Well, they’re a theatrical family. Bert owns a string of theatres across the country. He lives in Lancashire, rarely comes south. He was down in Brighton for a night a week or so ago. Roger was summoned for a meeting. We won’t see him again for the rest of the run.’

‘I’d better go,’ said Edgar. ‘You’ll be on in a minute.’

‘Are you staying to watch the show?’

‘I don’t think so.’

‘I don’t blame you,’ said Max, adding a streak of white to his cheekbone. ‘I’ve had enough of it myself.’

Edgar didn’t believe him. He could tell that Max was itching to go on stage, to become the creature in the mirror.

There was a knock on the door and a voice shouted, ‘Fifteen minutes, Mr Mephisto.’ Edgar judged that it was time to go.

*

The foyer was full of jostling crowds. A jukebox was playing ‘Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer’. Edgar passed families clutching programmes and bags of nuts. There were also a few over-made-up women who had clearly come for a glimpse of the great Max Mephisto. Then, just as he had almost reached the doors, he saw a face he recognised: Daphne Young, very chic in a fur coat. Edgar looked to see if she was being followed by a crocodile of excited schoolchildren but she was on her own.

Rather to Edgar’s surprise, Denton delivered the picture of Betsy Bunning the very next day. It was handed in at the station in an envelope addressed to ‘The good-looking detective inspector’.

‘I’m assuming this is you, sir,’ said the wooden-faced desk sergeant.

‘Of course it’s me,’ said Edgar. ‘Who else could it be?’

‘Could be almost anyone, sir.’

In the incident room Edgar slit open the envelope. A black-and-white starlet grinned up at him. Edgar remembered Diablo’s description:
She was fifteen, looked ten and acted like a thirty-five-year-old.
Betsy’s hair was arranged in elaborate ringlets, and she was looking over her shoulder in a manner which was either charming or deeply disturbing, depending on your viewpoint. For some reason she was wearing Tyrolean costume and posing against a painted backdrop of snow-capped mountains.

Bob came to look over his shoulder.

‘Who the hell’s that?’

‘Betsy Bunning, the girl killed by Ezra Nightingale in 1912.’

This made Emma come over. The three of them stared at the photograph.

‘How old was she?’ asked Bob.

‘Fifteen when she died.’

‘She looks very knowing for a fifteen-year-old.’

‘She didn’t know enough to stop herself getting murdered,’ said Edgar.

‘I think she looks sad,’ said Emma.

Bob snorted but, looking more closely at the photograph, Edgar thought that he could see what Emma meant. The professional smile did not meet Betsy’s eyes and there was something forced and unnatural about her pose. He thought of Denton, whose parents had been pleased because their three children were earning money on stage. Did Betsy have parents who had pushed her onto the boards before she could walk? Perhaps she was supporting them and a host of little brothers and sisters. She had called her murderer ‘Uncle Ezra’. Maybe she had been lonely for a little adult attention. But Betsy, the child who had swaggered around in a fur coat looking grown-up before her time, had never had the chance to become an adult. There was definitely something sad about the thickly made-up little face.

‘Do you really think there’s a link between this case and ours?’ That was Bob, who never gave up.

‘There are links between
Babes in the Wood
and
Aladdin
,’ said Edgar. ‘Denton and Diablo were in both productions. The 1912 pantomime was produced by Tony Billington, the father of the man who’s producing
Aladdin
. But I can’t see anything that really links our murders with Betsy’s death. Ezra Nightingale confessed. Denton said that he was literally sitting in the stalls with blood on his hands. Nightingale said he killed Betsy to show that fairy stories shouldn’t have happy endings. The original story of “Babes in the Wood” had a tragic ending.’

‘What happens?’ asked Bob.

‘It’s pretty horrible really,’ said Edgar. ‘The children’s uncle wants to kill them and claim their inheritance. He tells two ruffians to take the children into the wood and leave them there. One of the ruffians, “the ‘milder man’” it says in the story, promises to come back with food but he never does. The children die and birds cover them with leaves.’

‘Bloody hell,’ said Bob. ‘What happens in the panto version?’

‘The uncle becomes the Wicked Baron and Robin Hood gets involved somehow. The children are rescued and everyone lives happily ever after.’

‘Some people say the legend started in Wayland Wood in Norfolk,’ said Emma. ‘An uncle abandoned his niece and nephew in the wood so that he could claim their inheritance.’

‘Did they die?’ asked Bob.

‘Yes and their ghosts haunt the forest. It’s known locally as Wailing Wood.’

‘Remind me not to go there for my holidays,’ said Bob. He looked again at the photograph of Betsy Bunning, holding it up to the light as if expecting to see a message written in invisible ink. ‘I don’t see the connection,’ he said. ‘
Babes in the Wood
is English;
Aladdin
’s all Chinese and genies and flying carpets.’

‘Except that both stories feature a wicked uncle,’ said Emma. She took the photograph out of Bob’s hands and smoothed it protectively. ‘Do you mind if I do a bit of background research into the 1912 murder?’ she asked Edgar. ‘I’ve got a friend in the Hastings police.’

‘As long as it doesn’t take your attention off this case,’ said Edgar. ‘It’s been six days since the children were killed. The trail’s going cold. We’ve got to get back out on the streets, retracing Annie and Mark’s last movements, interviewing anyone who may have seen them.’

After Bob and Emma had left, determined to get back on the trail, Edgar stayed behind for a few minutes. He was looking at another publicity photograph, one which had been sent to him that morning. This one was in colour, showing an enchantingly pretty girl in a showgirl’s outfit. Even so, the similarities with the pathetically grinning ingénue in the fake mountain scene made him feel uncomfortable. This photograph had writing across it, in a bold slanting hand cutting through the feathers and the fishnet.

Edgar had a frustrating day. He sent a team of officers to follow the route taken by Annie and Mark on 26th November. He had gone back over the witness reports and Emma, who was good at that sort of thing, drew a map of Freshfield Road and the surrounding streets. A blue line traced Annie’s movements and a red line Mark’s. Edgar wondered if she’d deliberately tried to avoid ‘blue for a boy’. The two lines stopped though, a few inches from the square of green depicting Queen’s Park.

On that Monday, the younger children had come home from school and played in the road, skipping and marking out a hopscotch grid. Then ‘the big ones’ came back at about four. ‘I always watched them walking up the hill,’ said old Mrs Rigby from number 11. ‘All dressed up in their grammar-school uniforms, carrying all those books. The boy sometimes carried a violin too. The girl was always just a little bit ahead.’ I bet she was, thought Edgar. Annie and Mark changed into old clothes and came back out to play with the others. ‘Annie seemed to be telling them what to do,’ said Tom Halloran, the butcher’s boy, who was passing with a delivery. ‘They didn’t seem to mind though. She was a caution, that Annie. Always made me laugh when she came into the shop.’

The children had played – or rehearsed – until about four-forty-five. Then Louise and Lionel had been called in for their tea. Annie had wanted to carry on, said Betty, but the others didn’t think it was much use rehearsing without Louise. Betty and Richard had gone back into their house. ‘It was cold,’ said Richard defensively. Kevin took his little sister, Agnes, home. Then Annie and Mark must have taken the fatal decision to walk two hundred yards down the hill. Had they been on their way to buy sweets? Betty and Richard thought so. ‘Mark always had sweet rations,’ said Betty. ‘His mum used to give him hers.’ Had they been planning to spend Mark’s money on gobstoppers from Sam Gee’s shop? If so, they never got there.

They were last seen in St Luke’s Terrace, a road that led from Freshfield Road towards Queen’s Park. The sweet shop was at the end of the road. Annie and Mark had been seen standing on the street corner, talking or arguing. Arthur Bates, passing by with his sister, thought he had heard Annie say that Mark should ‘go back to primary school’. If Emma was right and this was an intention rather than an insult, the quickest route to Bristol Road Juniors was back through the park. But no one had seen the children in the park. Admittedly it was dark but there had been a few dog-walkers around. Surely someone would have seen something? But the trail ended there, on the corner of St Luke’s Terrace and Freshfield Road. Could they have gone back up the hill to Uncle Brian’s house? Or back down towards Kemp Town? But none of the neighbours, all of whom knew the children by sight, had seen them walking up or down the steep hill.

Edgar felt as if he’d walked up and down the hill a hundred times that day. But they didn’t get any further in tracing the blue and red lines. Edgar wondered if he should get two similar-looking children to walk the route to see if it would jog any memories. He had heard of this working in other missing-person cases. Reconstruction, they called it. Betty could play the part of Annie, or would this be too distressing for her? He’d ask Emma’s opinion; she seemed to have got on well with the children.

It was dark when Edgar walked back to the station. He was passing the top of Upper Rock Gardens at five o’clock. Would Max be in? He said that he sometimes went back to his digs between shows. It would be extremely pleasant to have tea with Max and Mrs M. And he might finally be able to thank the landlady for her kindness last week.

As he approached the house, a man came out of the front door. At first Edgar thought it was Max but then he saw that this man was older, with grey hair visible as he adjusted his hat. Like Max though, this man was tall and well dressed, wearing a coat that looked expensive even from a distance. As Edgar watched, he descended the steps and got into a waiting car, not into the driver’s seat but into the back. Who could be visiting Mrs M in a chauffeur-driven car? Maybe it was an agent or someone from a big London theatre.

Rather to his surprise, Max himself opened the door. He was in his shirtsleeves and holding a cigarette. He looked, there was no other word for it, rattled.

‘Ed.’

‘Hallo, Max. I was just passing and . . .’

‘Come in. Mrs M would like to see you.’

‘Thank you.’ Edgar stepped into the hall and saw that the landlady was standing in the background. She, at least, was looking her usual insouciant self.

‘Who was your smart visitor?’ he asked Max.

‘My father,’ said Max briefly.

*

Max still couldn’t quite believe that he’d been there. Alastair, Lord Massingham, standing on the steps of a Brighton boarding house. Max and Joyce had been in bed. It was becoming his regular routine, to dash back to the house between shows for an hour in bed with Joyce. Sex, warmth, tea and biscuits afterwards. What could be better?

The knock on the door had been loud and peremptory.

‘It’s probably Walter,’ said Joyce. ‘He always forgets his key.’

Max put on his trousers and looked out of the window. ‘It’s a man. Not Walter though. Jesus, I think it’s my father.’

‘Your father? I thought he lived miles away.’

‘He does. Yes, that’s him. His car’s parked on the road. What the hell does he want?’

‘I think you’re about to find out, darling. Give me a few minutes, will you? It takes me hours to get back into that girdle.’

‘I’ll go down.’ Max was buttoning his shirt. ‘It won’t take me long to get rid of him.’

The tattoo on the door was just starting again when Max flung it open.

‘What took you so long?’ That was his father’s greeting.

‘How did you find me?’ That was his.

‘I asked at the theatre.’

Wonderful. Lou Abrahams must have loved that. All the pros would know by tonight.

‘How did you know I was at the theatre?’

Lord Massingham snorted. ‘There are pictures of you all over the damn town. Can I come in?’

‘I suppose so.’ As his father stepped into the hall, Joyce was making her way downstairs. She paused on the bottom step, very much the landlady, despite the fact that she hadn’t got her stockings on.

‘Mrs Markham, my landlady. Alastair Massingham, my father.’ He was damned if he was going to add the ‘Lord’.

But he was pleased to see that Joyce was in no way overawed by the visitor. She looked him coolly up and down.

‘Yes, I can see the resemblance,’ she said. ‘Shall I make some tea?’

She ushered them into the snug, not the big room where the pros usually ate and chatted but a stuffy little parlour at the back of the house, crammed with photographs and ornaments. Max’s father examined a carved black elephant.

‘Jolly little thing.’

‘I’m sure she’d sell it to you if you asked her nicely.’

Alastair said nothing but he put the elephant down rather quickly. He sat opposite Max and took out his cigarette case.

‘Want one?’

‘Thanks.’

They smoked in silence until Max could bear it no more.

‘Why are you here, Dad?’

He used to call his father ‘Papa’, maybe a legacy from his Italian mother. After her death, when Max was six, Alastair had instructed his son to call him ‘Father’. When he was older, in retaliation Max had settled on the most déclassé appellation he could find. He had even considered ‘Pop’.

Alastair’s cheek twitched but he didn’t react to the name. ‘Came to see you. It’s been a long time, Max.’

‘Not that long.’

‘Two years.’

Christ, was it that recent? He remembered a flying visit to the ghastly old pile in Somerset. He’d had a girlfriend with him. Was it Vicky or Gloria? One of the chorus girls from the Shepherd’s Bush Empire. Even before then, contact had been sporadic: a few postcards, an occasional visit. Though his father did bother to check that he hadn’t been killed in the war. Max remembered the telegram clearly. ‘Have checked with war office. Stop. Understand you alive. Stop.’ Clearly Alastair’s paternal streak was making a reappearance.

Joyce came in with the tea tray. She put it down on the table between them but made no attempt to stay. Her blouse and skirt were neat but her hair was slightly disarranged at the back. She gave Max the shadow of a wink as she passed.

‘Seems a nice woman,’ said Alastair.

‘Very nice,’ said Max.

‘I suppose you’ve seen all sorts in your time.’

‘You suppose right.’

Another silence and then Alastair said, ‘The thing is, Max, I’ve heard a rumour.’

‘What sort of rumour?’

Alastair looked him full in the face for the first time. ‘A rumour that you have a daughter.’

‘How did you hear?’ asked Max. He was genuinely fascinated to know. He wouldn’t have thought that there was any place where his world and his father’s overlapped.

‘Shall I pour some tea?’ said Alastair.

‘Go ahead.’

At least neither of them mentioned being mother. Alastair drank his tea as though needing sustenance. Then he said, ‘Every year there’s a Christmas party at the golf club. Usually I don’t go. Lots of ghastly people playing golf these days. But Bertie asked me if I’d come this year. Make a speech, that sort of thing.’