Murder At The Music Hall: (Auguste Didier Mystery 8) (18 page)

‘As we shall find the murderer of Will Lamb.’

‘I ’ope you’re a better rozzer than cook,’ she said lugubriously.

‘Lizzie, I am indeed a cook, even though you do not approve of my pies. We are both artistes, you and I, in our own way. But I also assist Inspector Rose in some of his cases, like this one. So I cannot be present to assist you,’ he put it diplomatically.

‘Mibow will.’

‘Who?’

‘Me beau. I’m allowed to have followers, ain’t I?’ She stuck her chin out aggressively. ‘I’m a woman.’

Auguste looked at Lizzie, the new dress nowhere to be seen, the new apron carefully shielded by the ragged old one. Hair stuck out in lumps under the cap and above the shining hopefulness of Lizzie’s eyes.

‘You are indeed a woman, Lizzie,’ he informed her. ‘And if the follower is the gentleman you met last evening, you have my full approval.’

Lizzie giggled. ‘Garn.’

Horace Brodie and Harry Pickles glared at each other outside what had been Percy’s office, and was not commandeered by the law. The rapport of the previous evening was over. They had virtually collided on the doorstep, summoned by Grey’s men to attend the Old King Cole this morning. Brodie took it as a natural tribute that his presence was requested. He had seen the news of Will’s death blazoned in his morning newspaper, and was thus hardly surprised at the summons.

‘My movements, Inspector. Certainly. My humble turn is usually fourth on the bill here, but due to exceptional
rowdiness last night, I decided to play earlier.’

‘Isn’t that Mr Jowitt’s decision?’

Brodie frowned his displeasure. ‘Normally, yes. At the Old King Cole, however, we tend to fix such matters ourselves. Old Jowitt tends to have money on his mind,’ he added confidentially.

‘So you were at the theatre early?’

‘I usually am. It is my first engagement of the evening. I then leave for the Lyle in Cable Street immediately after my turn.’

‘Did you have any reason to see Mr Lamb in his dressing-room before or during the performance?’

Brodie looked surprised. ‘No. I remained in the dressing-room so far as I recall.’

‘Anyone see you in there?’

‘I’ve no idea.’ He looked supremely bored. ‘Various people wandered in and out. You could ask Mr Pickles.’

‘I will.’ Rose didn’t take to Brodie. ‘And you weren’t here when Mr Lamb was killed?’

‘No. Usually I take a cab to my next engagement, timing being right, but with more time at my disposal I decided to walk. This is my good-bye to the dear old place, my last week here. Percy will see me no more. The thorn in Mr Pickles’ side is about to be removed.’

Rose began to see Pickles’ point of view.

Until he talked to Pickles. He’d met the type many times before. Hail fellow well met, but a shifty look in the eye that made you hang on to your wallet.

‘Did you go to see Will Lamb before the show started, Mr Pickles?’

‘How could I do that?’ he snarled. ‘I were on first.’

‘He was alone for some time before the curtain rose.’

‘What would I want to see him for? Couldn’t stand the bloke.’

‘So you weren’t in favour of his coming back here?’

A silence while Pickles mulled this over. ‘I was,’ he said at last. ‘Thought Nettie’d come too.’

‘She was very friendly with Will Lamb, then?’

‘She weren’t that friendly,’ her loving husband snarled, ‘and he’s a liar that says so.’

Rose changed tack. ‘And what time did you leave yesterday?’

‘Same as normal. After my turn. Or a bit later, maybe. In time for my turn at the Shadwell Palace, anyway.’

‘Anyone
vouch
for your movements before the curtain rose?’ Rose asked mildly.

‘Yus. Nettie.’

‘For all the thirty minutes or so Will Lamb was alone?’

‘Probably.’ He grinned.

Fernando was a refreshingly straightforward change after Brodie and Pickles. ‘Me no like Will Lamb,’ he told Rose confidingly.

‘Why’s that, Mr Fernando?’

‘He take Mariella away.’

‘Only with her consent, I’m sure.’

Fernando’s face darkened as he grappled with this idea. ‘No,’ he decided.

‘Did you visit Will Lamb in his dressing-room before the performance yesterday?’

Fernando stared at him, puzzled, and shook his head. ‘Fernando no remember.’ He thought about Will Lamb with some pleasure. Now he was dead, Mariella would
stay here where he could see her. That was all he cared about.

Down below, Percy Jowitt sat miserably in his new temporary office, which he was sharing with a ventriloquist’s dummy left behind by some performer years before and never reclaimed. He left it there, because it might come in useful some day, you never knew. That’s if he had a theatre left, which looked increasingly unlikely. No Wednesday takings and no Will Lamb on the programme tonight. Suddenly there came the sound of the stage door opening and a booming female voice shouting. ‘Anyone here?’

He had to play butler in his own theatre now. Percy gloomily went out to investigate. From outside came the sound of a carriage rattling away, having disgorged its occupant. But the sight before him occupied his whole attention. Waving a threatening umbrella was a tall middle-aged woman of commanding physique, richly dressed in a Worth gown, covered in expensive furs. Moreover she was a familiar-looking woman.

‘Where’s the manager?’

He pulled himself together and straightened up. ‘At your service, ma’am.’ Didn’t he know that voice? ‘Percy Jowitt.’

‘Well, Mr Jowitt, I’ve come to step into the breach, as you might say. I shall do Will Lamb’s turn.’

His eyes glazed over. ‘Very good of you, ma’am,’ he said weakly. One Evangeline was enough; as he would hardly expect this grand lady to do a comedy act with a dagger, it seemed likely grand opera was her forte.

‘Don’t you recognise me, man?’ she asked impatiently.

‘Naturally, madam, but my programme is full,’ he ad-libbed hastily.

‘Nonsense. It’s got a huge hole, you’re going bankrupt, man, and I’m stepping in. No two ways about it.’

‘But who—?’

‘I’m the Magnificent Masher.’

Percy’s rheumy eyes almost wept at his good fortune, as he speedily vacated his office, ceding it to Lady Westland. He bounced with every excited step, as optimism returned. Almost dancing, and certainly humming in his joy, he set out first to find himself a new office, and then instantly to design a new poster: The Return of the Magnificent Masher. At last, the true potential of the Old King Cole would be appreciated by the press. He spared a passing thought for the unfortunate occurrence that had given rise to this happy event, and salved his conscience by persuading himself that Will, as a man of the theatre, would be spurring him on. He
owed
it to Will to make the most of the increasing presence of newspapermen outside his beloved theatre.

Now, where should his office be? A small props cupboard somewhere? The water closet? He stopped abruptly. Standing inside the front door were two gentlemen identically clad in brown bowler hats, green checked trousers and jackets, and brightly coloured spotted waistcoats. His mouth dropped open.

One swept off his hat. ‘We’re your new turn,’ he growled.

‘I don’t need any new turns,’ Percy cried faintly.

‘Yes, you do, laddie.’

Percy Jowitt gazed at them. What was the world coming to?

‘We’re bailiffs, you see,’ his companion added.

Percy Jowitt saw immediately. ‘I’m delighted to welcome you to the Old King Cole,’ he told them despairingly.

Auguste sniffed the air appreciatively. It was not, he admitted, the best air in London, being rather full of the less inviting riverside smells, but after the gloom of the Old King Cole this morning, it was like Escoffier’s Carlton kitchen. Moreover, as he turned into a narrow street leading to Cable Street, enticing smells of luncheon from the terraced houses on both sides of the street beguiled him. Were he to investigate further, he consoled himself, those smells, once traced to their source, would probably be of far less interest. When he returned last night, he had not been hungry – fortunately. John had not left a
fricassee
, nor even his soup
de Crecy.
He had left a selection of cold meats, left over, he suspected, from the servants’ roast luncheon. The Duke of Davenport had obviously been a long-suffering man.

In Cable Street, he passed a small Italian eating-house in which, as he peered curiously in, Signora was doing the cooking, and the array of ingredients lined up suggested a visit might well be worthwhile – if unconducive to detection work. Egbert had once again left the Old King Cole, and this was a good opportunity
to follow up an idea of his own. True, Twitch would be on the same trail too in the course of routine, but this did not concern him greatly.

The Lyle was built on a grander scale than the Old King Cole, its imposing turrets promising much that its interior failed to provide. It had obviously buried its ambitions and was content with the same standard of clientele as the Old King Cole, judging by the shabbiness, and, more importantly, its inferior eating-room. Auguste averted his eyes from the unappetising array of cold pies and tired sausages, and concentrated on his task. The system of music-hall bookings, and the lack of anyone at the Old King Cole, at least, to monitor arrivals, together with the chaotic comings and goings backstage meant that it was going to be difficult to work out who had and who had not been at the theatre in time to tamper with the dagger before the performance, and also be there to carry out the search of Will’s dressing-room while he was on stage. As difficult as disentangling the ingredients of a
tapenade
sauce from its taste.

The owner of the Lyle, a jollier version of Napoleon, Auguste decided, seemed to think it perfectly normal that a French cook working for Percy Jowitt should be dropping in for a chat about last night’s show.

‘Poor old Will Lamb.’ He shook his head. ‘Great loss, great loss.’

‘It is indeed.’

‘Leave a grieving widow, did he?’

That hadn’t occurred to Auguste. He supposed Egbert and Twitch would have it in hand, unlikely though it seemed that a widow would suddenly appear. Will’s life
was supposedly well known. A double-shuffler and patterer in the Canterbury music-hall queue until he was discovered by a young Nettie Turner who took him to Percy Jowitt, where she herself was relatively unknown. Nettie would surely have mentioned it to him if Will had a wife or family, even estranged.

‘I daresay Jowitt wants you to pinch another of my turns to fill the gap, eh? Cook, did you say you were? You’re not after a job, are you?’ Hope sprang into Napoleon’s voice.

‘No, sir. I—’

‘Or are you a turn? Funny cook on stage, that sort of thing. Tossing pancakes and missing.’

‘I am not a funny sort of cook.’ Auguste tried to keep indignation from his voice. ‘I am a very serious sort of cook.’

‘Oh.’ Napoleon’s face fell. ‘Don’t think I could use you. Pity. A cook
comique.’
He considered. ‘Might be something in that. I could ask old Bodge if he’d like a go.’

‘If Mr Bodge is your current cook, I think he would be excellent. Juggling pies, perhaps,’ Auguste suggested innocently.

Napoleon clapped him on the back. ‘Not a bad idea at all. Pity to waste the pies, though. They could go back on sale afterwards, I suppose.’ He ruminated, then recollected Auguste’s mission. ‘Can’t spare old Jowitt any of my turns, I’m afraid.’

‘He does not need one. In fact the Magnificent Masher has decided to return to the stage for a few appearances only, and has chosen the Old King Cole.’ Auguste had been surprised, to put it mildly, when Lady Westland
swept into the eating-room. She had explained she felt she had a duty to support him and the theatre, having persuaded Auguste to come there. He had been extremely gratified.

The manager was silenced with shock, obviously wondering what magic powers Jowitt possessed.

‘I believe the Great Brodie has a place on your bill this week? Did he play as usual last night?’

‘No one reported any hiccups to me,’ Napoleon told him without apparent surprise. ‘I heard him from the bar. He seemed to be going down rather well, I thought. Don’t wait up, don’t wait up,’ he trumpeted. ‘Good man that.’

‘He arrived on time for his appearance?’

‘Must have done. It’s always tight for him but he was there. A real pro. I’ll be sorry to lose him. They all seem to go in the end. Can’t think why.’

‘Are you sharing other performers with Mr Jowitt this week?’

Napoleon considered. ‘Max Hill – he’s a regular here. Just before the interval.’

‘And he appeared as usual last night?’

‘Must have done, my dear chap, or I’d have heard about it.’ He paused. ‘There’s Gherkin, of course.’

‘I beg your pardon?’

‘Harry Pickles. Gherkin is what my wife calls him. Green and skinny. We put him on in the second half to avoid trouble. Not much love lost between him and Brodie. But he’s a good man.’

It said very little for the Lyle if Pickles was a good man, Auguste thought, as he made his way back to the Old King Cole. His visit eliminated Brodie and Hill at
least, since Brodie could not have ransacked the dressing-room and arrived at the Lyle in time for his turn, and Hill would have been at the Lyle at the time the ransacking took place. Pickles, not on till the second half,
could
have done it.