The Opening Night Murder (25 page)

Daniel’s response was immediate. In less than two hours he arrived by coach and disembarked, and Christian escorted him to Suzanne’s quarters straightaway. The relief of seeing him was like a cool breeze wafting over her. She greeted him
with a hug, which he returned. Tears welled and her heart clenched. For a moment she remembered how it had been when she was young and had believed he would be her protector in life, and she grieved for the loss of that time.

“Daniel, that evil little constable is spreading it about that I killed William.” She drew him to a chair near her writing desk, then sat herself in her work chair.

“You didn’t, did you?”

“Didn’t what?”

“Kill him.”

“Daniel!” She choked a little and swallowed her terror. “Daniel, how can you think I might? After all, I haven’t murdered you yet, have I?”

He laughed, and that seemed to make everything a little lighter. Even Suzanne had to chuckle some and she found it easier to breathe. “So,” he said as he settled back in his seat and crossed his legs, one arm draped across his lap and the other hand fiddling with a tassel on the hilt of his dagger. “What is being said, and by whom?”

“It’s bandied about I murdered him out of jealousy.”

“Bandied about? It’s mere rumor, then.”

“A friend of a friend of the constable.”

Daniel gave his head an equivocal tilt. “That could mean something, or it could mean nothing at all.”

“It is said there was a third party involved.”

“William was cheating on his mistress? With his wife, I suppose. He was, after all, a Puritan and therefore a right stick. Perhaps she killed him?”

“Hardly. She was as surprised as anyone to learn he’d died. Further, Constable Pepper didn’t even ask what we’d done with the body and didn’t appear terribly concerned about us having let her take the corpse. As far as I know, she’s suspected
of nothing. And by her past behavior, I’d say she had no interest in him at all beyond his support of her household.”

“Most wives are like that.”

His bitter tone alerted her. She thought he might have meant his own wife, and that made her curious. But instead of asking, she fell back on her habitual attitude. “Having never been one, I would have no idea.”

The edge to her voice likewise caught his attention. His tone sharpened in his reply. “I was already married when you met me.”

Suzanne sighed, for it was true. For a moment she closed her eyes to calm herself, then continued. “In any case, William’s wife cannot be involved. I, however, am. Apparently it’s all over town that I’m the murderess, and it’s but a matter of time until Pepper has me apprehended. You’ve got to help me, Daniel.”

“What can I do?”

“Tell the king I didn’t do it!”

Daniel snorted. “The king doesn’t give a damn who killed William Wainwright.”

“Well, I do! And I must be cleared of it!”

“You haven’t been charged with it.”

“I will be.”

“And then, perhaps, there will be something I might do. But until then, bringing this excitement to the attention of Charles will only run you the risk of him deciding you did do it. He might say,
The lady doth protest too much, methinks
. You will defeat your own purpose.”

“Daniel, you were in the audience that night. You saw what happened, and you know I didn’t do it.”

He went silent for a moment, taken by surprise. His mouth opened as if to speak, but he said nothing and shut it.

“I know you were there, Daniel. I saw you. I would know your form from half a mile away, so don’t try to deny it. The way you move, your every gesture, are as familiar to me as…as Piers’s. You and your friends sat in the third gallery, directly over the entrance doors. You must have seen William fall.”

Daniel thought for a moment, deciding whether to admit he was there, then finally said, “Very well. I was there. But I saw nothing. At that moment I was talking to a friend who sat next to me. I wasn’t even looking at the stage, never mind the rest of the ’tiring house.”

“But before the fall. Did you see him before? You sat directly across from the stage galleries. Did you see William at stage right before he was shot?”

Daniel shook his head. “I can’t say I did. To the best of my recollection, the gallery opposite the musicians’ seating was empty. However, inside it was dark and I wasn’t paying any attention to the shadows across the way. My friends and I were attending to the play, as it was quite enjoyable indeed. Your little troupe does well, and I would hardly have missed a moment.”

Suzanne thanked him somewhat distractedly, mildly surprised at the compliment in the midst of her distress. Then she had an idea. “Come, Daniel. Come with me.” She leapt to her feet and hurried from the room with Daniel behind her.

They climbed the backstage stairs to the stage level and went to the green room. At that moment it was occupied by the three musicians, who were going through their paces, cue to cue, for that afternoon’s play. Another corner of the room was being used by actors rehearsing. The mummers had gone for good, so their part of the program had to be filled in temporarily by humorous skits the rest of the actors already knew. Small roles filled by Arturo and members of his family would
have to be covered by other actors or simply left out. Big Willie and the others stood in the presence of the earl.

Suzanne addressed Willie, who set his fiddle on his three-legged stool to listen. “Dearest Willie, may I ask you something? In fact, all of you. None of you were watching the play. Did any of you see William fall from the gallery?”

All three shook their heads without having to think about it. Willie said, “I saw naught, Suze. Near as I could tell, he wasn’t even in the gallery. That is, when I did look, which was a bit before he fell. If he were there, he weren’t there long, I’d say.”

Suzanne looked at the other musicians, and they both agreed.

“Perhaps he was running from his killer? Could he have been fleeing, found himself cornered, and fell over the banister when he was shot?”

The musicians all shrugged, and Willie said, “That sounds as good an explanation as any, Suze. As I said, I never saw him until I heard that great crash and screaming from down in the pit.”

“Thank you, fellows,” said Suzanne. “I’ll leave you to your rehearsal now.”

They all gave awkward, nodding bows to the earl, then waited for him and Suzanne to move toward the door before seating themselves again.

Just outside the door, Suzanne stopped to think. She looked around at the narrow corridor that led in one direction to the stage and in the other toward the staircase that connected all three stories at the rear of the ’tiring house. A question was rising in her mind, and she found herself drawn toward the stairs.

“Come,” she said to Daniel. “I want to look at something.” She grabbed his hand and pulled him along with her.

He grunted with a bit of impatience, but followed her, probably out of curiosity more than anything else. She led him up the stone spiral stairs two levels to the rear of the stage right gallery. The bright afternoon sun lit up every corner of it. There were no benches here, for this area had not yet been prepared to seat an audience. The space was open, occupied only by a few pillars down the center holding up the roof. Suzanne went to the railing and looked over it to the stage below, where a short pantomime was being performed, heedless of the ever-darkening bloodstain that still marred the boards. Suzanne made a mental note to have that sanded clean.

She examined the railing and the floor alongside it.

“What are you looking for?” asked Daniel.

“Nothing.”

“Then why—”

“I mean, I think I’ll find nothing.”

“Should you find something?”

“If there were someone here. There’s no indication that anyone was ever here.”

“The place was recently restored. Of course there were people here.”

“The area is clean. The workers cleaned it up, and there’s nothing to indicate anyone has been here since.”

“Again, I ask, should there be?”

Suzanne thought hard. “Well, I suppose William could have fallen over the side without leaving a mark, but I don’t see any blood.”

That piqued Daniel’s interest, and he came to look at the railing and the floor beside it. “No blood?”

“I don’t see any. Do you?”

“Indeed, I do not. I find that disquieting. Wainwright was
pierced in the throat with a crossbow bolt. There should be blood everywhere. I don’t see even one drop.”

“It couldn’t have spattered out over the stage?”

“Dear Suzanne, I’ve been in battle, and have seen many men’s throats cut or pierced. The force of blood leaving a body from such a wound sends it in a spray that would not only have reddened the entire area, but would also have marked the killer, were he standing within the confines of this gallery. I’ve spat out enough of my enemies’ blood to know it can’t be avoided.”

Suzanne looked down at the stage and its dark stain, then around at the floor beneath her feet. “Not a drop up here. Not anywhere.”

T
he very next afternoon they had another visit from Constable Pepper. Again he appeared as if from nowhere, and nobody noticed his presence until Suzanne came across him poking around in the ’tiring house. Some costumes hanging outside the stairwell interested him, and he was examining some moth-eaten wool that had been put back together with tiny stitches.

“How may I help you, constable?” Suzanne was breathless with terror that he must have come to arrest her, but she held her voice even. She could fake calmness. Panic would only make her appear guilty.

He fingered the fabric, and said, “This cloak is filled with holes.”

“Moths. They’re a scourge for the costumes. They make holes in the wool. Much cheaper to sew it than to replace it, and nobody more than a few feet away from the stage can know the difference, particularly if the fabric is a dark color.”

“Illusion is your business.”

“We’re here to tell a story.”

“Tell lies.”

“To entertain, if you please. The difference between a lie and a story is that when one tells a story the audience is in on the fiction. A story can have holes, like this cloak, so long as they’re small, not obvious, and the audience is willing to overlook them. Just as with the cloak. A lie, on the other hand, unravels completely the very instant the listener detects a single, tiny flaw. A lie is much, much harder to construct, because it must be perfect or it’s worthless. I far prefer telling stories to lies, for lies require far more effort than I generally care to spend.”

Pepper peered at Suzanne, thinking. Then he said, “You’ve thought this over.”

“Not really. I should think it would be patently obvious to anyone with any sort of intelligence.”

Pepper’s lips pressed together, as if he’d been insulted, and Suzanne realized he may very well have felt she’d meant to insult him. She bit her lip, realizing a perverse impulse may have caused her to unintentionally insult him. She now worried she’d annoyed him. Not for the first time in her life, she mentally kicked herself for saying too much.

He let go of the cloak and turned to face her directly. “Remind me where you were when the body of William Wainwright fell to the stage.”

“I was in the stage left gallery. I sat with the musicians that night.”

“Was anyone else with you there?”

She blinked, wondering whether he had even heard her mention the musicians. She answered the question again. “The…musicians. Big Willie, Warren, and the Scottish fellow.”

“Are they willing to vouch for your presence in the gallery at the time of the murder?”

“I expect so.” They would be foolish to tell him anything other than what she’d told them, for she was their employer.

“Are any of them gentlemen? Landed, perhaps?”

“They’re musicians. I believe Warren also has a position with St. Paul’s Cathedral. Keeping books, or some such, I believe. Each is an upstanding Christian, and as honest as anyone, but not landed, I’m certain.” Suzanne knew “honest as anyone” to be faint praise, for most people she knew were habitual liars. But at least she didn’t lie when she said it, for Big Willie and the others were no worse than most people.

Pepper made a disappointed face Suzanne didn’t believe in the least. He’d surely known none of the musicians were gentlemen, and couldn’t have been disappointed at the news. “Terrible shame. Hardly an adequate alibi. Had a person of repute seen you there…”

“Why ever should I need an alibi? Am I under suspicion?”

“You had motive.”

“I wished him gone, but never dead. He was once my lover; I couldn’t hate him enough to kill him.”

“He was your lover? You didn’t tell me that last time we spoke.”

“You didn’t ask. In fact, you asked me no questions at all. Had you done so, I would have told you exactly what I saw and from whence I saw it, and why I could not possibly have killed William. A good Christian woman could not wish any man dead for any reason.”

Pepper tilted his head and peered into her face as if examining her eyes for a lie. “Good Christian woman? How do you reconcile that with your long history of prostitution? Your years of fornication with Wainwright? Your”—he glanced
around him at the theatre building—“your current occupation as a purveyor of…fiction?”