Maria-Alba put his overnight bag on the chair with something of a thump. ‘Fortunate for you there is someone of the family without feelings. Or you have no toothbrush.’ She sat on a chair beside the constable, folded her cape around her though the room was stuffy, and closed her eyes.
‘Is there anything I can do for you, Pa?’ I asked, still standing by the table, wanting but not daring to take his hand.
‘No, Harriet. These gentlemen,’ he waved in the direction of the constable, ‘have done their best to supply the few requirements a man can have in such unprosperous circumstances. My supper has been brought to me and simple though it was – and, let us be truthful, rather too early to be perfectly agreeable – it was wholesome and fresh.’
‘Well, sir,’ Inspector Foy brought a chair up to the table for me, ‘would you have any objection to running through a few details in the presence of your daughter? Informally, now, without Mr Sickert-Greene.’ Henry Sickert-Greene was our family’s solicitor. ‘No tape recorder. Nothing that’ll be used in court. While I understand Mr Sickert-Greene’s anxiety that you might incriminate yourself, his refusal to let you say anything doesn’t get us any further, does it? Sergeant Tweeter will write down anything you care to tell me and it needn’t go beyond the walls of this room. I want to get a clearer picture of what exactly happened this morning.’
I was pretty sure old Sickly Grin, as Bron had christened Mr Sickert-Greene years ago, would have disapproved strongly of this suggestion. I wondered if Inspector Foy was to be trusted. Looking at his nice straight nose and firm chin and intelligent grey eyes I felt almost certain that he was.
‘Do you mind a pipe, sir?’ Inspector Foy reached inside his coat.
‘Yes, I do. My voice is the chief tool of my trade, Inspector, and it is extremely susceptible to tobacco fumes.’
No one could accuse my father of trying to curry favour, at all events.
The inspector took his hand out again. ‘Would you tell your daughter what happened? Take as long as you like.’
‘Could you bear to talk about it?’ I asked timidly. Mentioning Sir Basil’s death seemed as insensitive as asking a stranger straight out how they had lost all their arms and legs.
‘Poor old Basil, do you mean? Oh-oh-oh!’ My father ran through two registers with the exclamation. ‘Murder most foul, strange and unnatural!’ He shook his head but there was a gleam in his eye I hoped Inspector Foy could not see. ‘Ha! What a lesson was there! Reduced from a strutting cock to a blood-boltered corpse in one tick – tock – of Time.’ He jerked his finger to imitate the minute hand of a clock. ‘Farewe-e-e-ll! A lo-o-ng farewell to all his greatness! Today he puts forth the tender leaves of hope, tomorrow, blossoms, the third day comes the killing frost.’
You had to hand it to him. The lightning change of expression from gentle introspection to malevolence as he spat out ‘killing frost’ was masterly. I did not dare to look at the inspector.
‘Oh dear! Was there much blood?’
‘Yes, Harriet. I was in blood stepped in so far that, should I wade no more, returning were as tedious as go o’er.’
‘Othello,’ I said automatically, then blushed, fearing the inspector would think I was trying to show off.
‘Tst! Macbeth.’
I could hear Sergeant Tweeter’s pencil, scribbling frantically.
‘What happened just before you found Sir Basil?’ asked the inspector.
‘There was the usual delay before the rehearsal. I generally use the time to warm up. I decided to run through the gouging scene – the one in which they put out my eyes – on my own. I was still undecided about the cry of pain for the second eye, whether to rise to a shrill scream or to stay in the lower register, a bellow of agony like a creature of sacrificial offering –’
‘Were you struck by anything unusual?’ the inspector put in. ‘Something about the stage that wasn’t quite as it should be?’
‘A theatre in rehearsal is always a mess.’ My father seemed irritated by the interruption. ‘Had the stage not been a clutter of heterogeneous objects then I might have thought it unusual. I expect there were props, flats, carpenters’ tools, scripts, paint pots, swords, lanterns, tea trays – the usual clutter of crude implements with whose assistance we actors conjure the illusion of man’s genius and depravity.’
‘Did you touch anything on your way?’
‘Nothing. Nothing at all. The auditorium was in semi-darkness, the stage lit by a single spotlight. I walked towards centre stage and, blinded by the light that was in my eyes – some fool had trained a single spot there – I stumbled across something that lay in my path and fell. I put out my hand. The thing was warm, unpleasantly sticky. It was poor Basil – his head quite crushed. I sprang to my feet with a cry of “Give me some light. Away!”’
‘Just a tick, sir,’ said Sergeant Tweeter. ‘When you said “away”, was you meaning one word or two? Away with the body or you was going away or you was hoping to find a way, sir?’
My father sighed impatiently. ‘It is a quotation from Hamlet. Doubtless had I been capable of thought at that moment I would have intended all three interpretations you put upon it. It was a horror, an abomination!’ He gave a shudder I was convinced was genuine. He was extremely squeamish.
‘What happened then?’
‘Several people came running onto the stage in response to my shouting.’
‘Can you remember who they were?’
‘Haven’t the least idea. The women were screaming at the tops of their voices and the men were nearly as bad. Wait a minute, I remember there was that little understudy among them – Sandra, I think her name is – who was flatteringly relieved to discover that it was Basil and not I who lay incarnadined and mute.’
There was a grunt of protest from Sergeant Tweeter but the inspector swept on.
‘Was there bad blood between Sandra and Sir Basil?’
‘It had nothing to do with poor Basil. She has a crush on me. Of course, I don’t take it seriously. She’s a sweet little thing, hardly out of school. You know how impressionable girls are at that age.’ If the inspector knew he wasn’t telling. He hummed up and down an octave. ‘But,’ continued Pa, ‘the theatre is an adder’s nest of jealousy and insecurity. And Basil, poor man, did not have the art of endearing himself to others. I dare say I could name several who actually hated him. But of course,’ he put on his noble Brutus face, ‘I shan’t.’
‘Very laudable, sir.’ The inspector’s voice was admiring. ‘But it might be in your own interest, as this is a case of murder, to put such scruples aside. This afternoon I interviewed several members of the cast. They none of them hesitated to mention a quarrel yesterday between you and Sir Basil.’
For a brief second Pa looked rather hurt by this treachery but then rapidly assumed a mask of world-weariness.
‘I have no secrets from you, Inspector. It was a childish row over a suggestion of Basil’s. He thought I should have my eyes gouged out offstage, to save messing about with blood bags.’
‘You didn’t think that was a good idea?’
‘Certainly