A Moment on the Edge:100 Years of Crime Stories by women

  “Canning Cumberland. He’d locked the door of his dressing room. There’s a gas fire. Your young friend dragged him out, very pluckily, but it was no go. I was in front. Gosset, the manager, had asked me to supper. It’s a perfectly clear case of suicide as you’ll see.”

  “I’d better look at the room. Anybody been in?”

  “God, no. It was a job to clear it. They turned the gas off at the main. There’s no window. They had to open the double doors at the back of the stage and a small outside door at the end of the passage. It may be possible to get in now.”

  He led the way to the dressing-room passage. “Pretty thick, still,” he said. “It’s the first room on the right. They burst the lock. You’d better keep down near the floor.”

  The powerful lights over the mirror were on and the room still had its look of occupation. The gas fire was against the left-hand wall, Alleyn squatted down by it. The tap was still turned on, its face lying parallel with the floor. The top of the heater, the tap itself, and the carpet near it, were covered with a creamish powder. On the end of the dressing-table shelf nearest to the stove was a box of this powder. Farther along the shelf, grease-paints were set out in a row beneath the mirror. Then came a wash basin and in front of this an overturned chair. Alleyn could see the track of heels, across the pile of the carpet, to the door immediately opposite. Beside the wash basin was a quart bottle of whiskey, three-parts empty, and a tumbler. Alleyn had had about enough and returned to the passage.

  “Perfectly clear,” the hovering doctor said again, “isn’t it?”

  “I’ll see the other rooms, I think.”

  The one next to Cumberland’s was like his in reverse, but smaller. The heater was back to back with Cumberland’s. The dressing-shelf was set out with much the same assortment of

  greasepaints. The tap of this heater, too, was turned on. It was of precisely the same make as the other and Alleyn, less embarrassed here by fumes, was able to make a longer examination. It was a common enough type of gas fire. The lead-in was from a pipe through a flexible metallic tube with a rubber connection. There were two taps, one in the pipe and one at the junction of the tube with the heater itself. Alleyn disconnected the tube and examined the connection. It was perfectly sound, a close fit and stained red at the end. Alleyn noticed a wiry thread of some reddish stuff resembling packing that still clung to it. The nozzle and tap were brass, the tap pulling over when it was turned on, to lie in a parallel plane with the floor. No powder had been scattered about here.

  He glanced round the room, returned to the door and read the card: MR. BARRY GEORGE.

  The doctor followed him into the rooms opposite these, on the left-hand side of the passage. They were a repetition in design of the two he had already seen but were hung with women’s clothes and had a more elaborate assortment of greasepaint and cosmetics.

  There was a mass of flowers in the star-room. Alleyn read the cards. One in particular caught his eye: “From Anthony Gill to say a most inadequate ‘thank you’ for the great idea.” A vase of red roses stood before the mirror: “To your greatest triumph, Coralie darling. C.C.” In Miss Gay’s room there were only two bouquets, one from the management and one “from Anthony, with love.”

  Again in each room he pulled off the lead-in to the heater and looked at the connection.

  “All right, aren’t they?” said the doctor.

  “Quite all right. Tight fit. Good solid gray rubber.”

  “Well, then—”

  Next on the left was an unused room, and opposite it, “Mr. H. J. Bannington.” Neither of these rooms had gas fires. Mr. Bannington’s dressing-table was littered with the usual array of

  greasepaint, the materials for his beard, a number of telegrams and

  letters, and several bills.

  “About the body,” the doctor began.

  “We’ll get a mortuary van from the Yard.”

  “But—Surely in a case of suicide—”

  “I don’t think this is suicide.”

  “But, good God!—D’you mean there’s been an accident?”

  “No accident,” said Alleyn.

  At midnight, the dressing-room lights in the Jupiter Theatre were brilliant, and men were busy there with the tools of their trade. A constable stood at the stage-door and a van waited in the yard. The front of the house was dimly lit and there, among the shrouded stalls, sat Coralie Bourne, Basil Gosset, H. J. Bannington, Dendra Gay, Anthony Gill, Reynolds, Katie the dresser, and the call-boy. A constable sat behind them and another stood by the doors into the foyer. They stared across the backs of seats at the fire curtain. Spirals of smoke rose from their cigarettes and about their feet were discarded programs. “Basil Gosset presents I Can Find My Way Out by Anthony Gill.”

  In the manager’s office Alleyn said: “You’re sure of your facts, Mike?”

  “Yes, sir. Honestly. I was right up against the entrance into the passage. They didn’t see me because I was in the shadow. It was very dark offstage.”

  “You’ll have to swear to it.”

  “I know.”

  “Good. All right, Thompson. Miss Gay and Mr. Gosset may go home. Ask Miss Bourne to come in.”

  When Sergeant Thompson had gone Mike said: “I haven’t had a chance to say I know I’ve made a perfect fool of myself. Using your card and everything.”

  “Irresponsible gaiety doesn’t go down very well in the service, Mike. You behaved like a clown.”

  “I am a fool,” said Mike wretchedly.

  The red beard was lying in front of Alleyn on Gosset’s desk. He picked it up and held it out. “Put it on,” he said.

  “She might do another faint.”

  “I think not. Now the hat: yes—yes, I see. Come in.”

  Sergeant Thompson showed Coralie Bourne in and then sat at the end of the desk with his notebook.

  Tears had traced their course through the powder on her face, carrying black cosmetic with them and leaving the greasepaint shining like snail-tracks. She stood near the doorway looking dully at Michael. “Is he back in England?” she said. “Did he tell you to do this?” She made an impatient movement. “Do take it off,” she said, “it’s a very bad beard. If Cann had only looked—” Her lips trembled. “Who told you to do it?”

  “Nobody,” Mike stammered, pocketing the beard. “I mean—as a matter of fact, Tony Gill—”

  “Tony? But he didn’t know. Tony wouldn’t do it. Unless—”

  “Unless?” Alleyn said.

  She said frowning: “Tony didn’t want Cann to play the part that way. He was furious.”

  “He says it was his dress for the Chelsea Arts Ball,” Mike mumbled. “I brought it here. I just thought I’d put it on—it was idiotic, I know—for fun. I’d no idea you and Mr. Cumberland would mind.”

  “Ask Mr. Gill to come in,” Alleyn said.

  Anthony was white and seemed bewildered and helpless. “I’ve told Mike,” he said. “It was my dress for the ball. They sent it round from the costume-hiring place this afternoon but I forgot it. Dendra reminded me and rang up the Delivery people—or Mike, as it turns out—in the interval.”

  “Why,” Alleyn asked, “did you choose that particular disguise?”

  “I didn’t. I didn’t know what to wear and I was too rattled to think. They said they were hiring things for themselves and would get something for me. They said we’d all be characters out of a Russian melodrama.”

  “Who said this?”

  “Well—well, it was Barry George, actually.”

  “Barry,” Coralie Bourne said. “It was Barry.”

  “I don’t understand,” Anthony said. “Why should a fancy dress upset everybody?”

  “It happened,” Alleyn said, “to be a replica of the dress usually worn by Miss Bourne’s husband who also had a red beard. That was it, wasn’t it, Miss Bourne? I remember seeing him—”

  “Oh, yes,” she said, “you would. He was known to the police.” Suddenly she broke down completely. She w
as in an armchair near the desk but out of the range of its shaded lamp. She twisted and writhed, beating her hand against the padded arm of the chair. Sergeant Thompson sat with his head bent and his hand over his notes. Mike, after an agonized glance at Alleyn, turned his back. Anthony Gill leant over her: “Don’t,” he said violently. “Don’t! For God’s sake, stop.”

  She twisted away from him and gripping the edge of the desk, began to speak to Alleyn; little by little gaining mastery of herself. “I want to tell you. I want you to understand. Listen.” Her husband had been fantastically cruel, she said. “It was a kind of slavery.” But when she sued for divorce he brought evidence of adultery with Cumberland. They had thought he knew nothing. “There was an abominable scene. He told us he was going away. He said he’d keep track of us and if I tried again for divorce, he’d come home. He was very friendly with Barry in those days.” He had left behind him the first draft of a play he had meant to write for her and Cumberland. It had a wonderful scene for them. “And now you will never have it,” he had said, “because there is no other playwright who could make this play for you but I.” He was, she said, a melodramatic man but he was never ridiculous. He returned to the Ukraine where he was born and they had heard no more of him. In a little while she would have been able to presume death. But years of waiting did not agree with Canning Cumberland. He drank consistently and at his worst used to imagine her husband was about to return. “He was really terrified of Ben,” she said. “He seemed like a creature in a nightmare.”

  Anthony Gill said: “This play—was it—?”

  “Yes. There was an extraordinary similarity between your play and his. I saw at once that Ben’s central scene would enormously strengthen your piece. Cann didn’t want me to give it to you. Barry knew. He said: ‘Why not?” He wanted Cann’s part and was furious when he didn’t get it. So you see, when he suggested you should dress and make-up like Ben—” She turned to Alleyn. “You see?”

  “What did Cumberland do when he saw you?” Alleyn asked Mike.

  “He made a queer movement with his hands as if—well, as if he expected me to go for him. Then he just bolted into his room.”

  “He thought Ben had come back,” she said.

  “Were you alone at any time after you fainted?” Alleyn asked.

  “I? No. No, I wasn’t. Katie took me into my dressing room and stayed with me until I went on for the last scene.”

  “One other question. Can you, by any chance, remember if the heater in your room behaved at all oddly?”

  She looked wearily at him. “Yes, it did give a sort of plop, I think. It made me jump. I was nervy.”

  “You went straight from your room to the stage?”

  “Yes. With Katie. I wanted to go to Cann. I tried the door when we came out. It was locked. He said: ‘Don’t come in.’ I said: ‘It’s all right. It wasn’t Ben,’ and went on to the stage.”

  “I heard Miss Bourne,” Mike said.

  “He must have made up his mind by then. He was terribly drunk when he played his last scene.” She pushed her hair back from her forehead. “May I go?” she asked Alleyn.

  “I’ve sent for a taxi. Mr. Gill, will you see if it’s there? In the meantime, Miss Bourne, would you like to wait in the foyer?”

  “May I take Katie home with me?”

  “Certainly. Thompson will find her. Is there anyone else we can get?”

  “No, thank you. Just old Katie.”

  Alleyn opened the door for her and watched her walk into the foyer. “Check up with the dresser, Thompson,” he murmured, “and get Mr. H. J. Bannington.”

  He saw Coralie Bourne sit on the lower step of the dress-circle stairway and lean her head against the wall. Nearby, on a gilt easel, a huge photograph of Canning Cumberland smiled handsomely at her.

  H. J. Bannington looked pretty ghastly. He had rubbed his hand across his face and smeared his makeup. Florid red paint from his lips had stained the crêpe hair that had been gummed on and shaped into a beard. His monocle was still in his left eye and gave him an extraordinarily rakish look. “See here,” he complained, “I’ve about had this party. When do we go home?”

  Alleyn uttered placatory phrases and got him to sit down. He checked over H.J.’s movements after Cumberland left the stage and found that his account tallied with Mike’s. He asked if H.J. had visited any of the other dressing rooms and was told acidly that H.J. knew his place in the company. “I remained in my unheated and squalid kennel, thank you very much.”

  “Do you know if Mr. Barry George followed your example?”

  “Couldn’t say, old boy. He didn’t come near me.”

  “Have you any theories at all about this unhappy business, Mr. Bannington?”

  “Do you mean, why did Cann do it? Well, speak no ill of the dead, but I’d have thought it was pretty obvious he was morbid-drunk. Tight as an owl when we finished the second act. Ask the great Mr. Barry George. Cann took the big scene away from Barry with both hands and left him looking pathetic. All wrong artistically, but that’s how Cann was in his cups.” H.J.’s wicked little eyes narrowed. “The great Mr. George,” he said, “must be feeling very unpleasant by now. You might say he’d got a suicide on his mind, mightn’t you? Or don’t you know about that?”

  “It was not suicide.” The glass dropped from H.J.’s eye. “God!” he said. “God, I told Bob Reynolds! I told him the whole plant wanted overhauling.”

  “The gas plant, you mean?”

  “Certainly. I was in the gas business years ago. Might say I’m in it still with a difference, ha-ha!”

  “Ha-ha!” Alleyn agreed politely. He leaned forward. “Look here,” he said: “We can’t dig up a gas man at this time of night and may very likely need an expert opinion. You can help us.”

  “Well, old boy, I was rather pining for a spot of shut-eye. But, of course—”

  “I shan’t keep you very long.”

  “God, I hope not!” said H.J. earnestly.

  Barry George had been made up pale for the last act. Colorless lips and shadows under his cheekbones and eyes had skillfully underlined his character as a repatriated but broken prisoner-of-war. Now, in the glare of the office lamp, he looked like a grossly exaggerated figure of mourning. He began at once to tell Alleyn how grieved and horrified he was. Everybody, he said, had their faults, and poor old Cann was no exception but wasn’t it terrible to think what could happen to a man who let himself go downhill? He, Barry George, was abnormally sensitive and he didn’t think he’d ever really get over the awful shock this had been to him. What, he wondered, could be at the bottom of it? Why had poor old Cann decided to end it all?

  “Miss Bourne’s theory—” Alleyn began. Mr. George laughed. “Coralie?” he said. “So she’s got a theory! Oh, well. Never mind.”

  “Her theory is this. Cumberland saw a man whom he mistook for her husband and, having a morbid dread of his return, drank the greater part of a bottle of whiskey and gassed himself. The clothes and beard that deceived him had, I understand, been ordered by you for Mr. Anthony Gill.”

  This statement produced startling results. Barry George broke into a spate of expostulation and apology. There had been no thought in his mind of resurrecting poor old Ben, who was no doubt dead but had been, mind you, in many ways one of the best. They were all to go to the Ball as exaggerated characters

  from melodrama. “Not for the world—” He gesticulated and protested. A line of sweat broke out along the margin of his hair. “I don’t know what you’re getting at,” he shouted. “What are you suggesting?”

  “I’m suggesting, among other things, that Cumberland was murdered.”

  “You’re mad! He’d locked himself in. They had to break down the door. There’s no window. You’re crazy!”

  “Don’t,” Alleyn said wearily, “let us have any nonsense about sealed rooms. Now, Mr. George, you knew Benjamin Vlasnoff pretty well. Are you going to tell us that when you suggested Mr. Gill should wear a coat with a fur collar
, a black sombrero, black gloves, and a red beard, it never occurred to you that his appearance might be a shock to Miss Bourne and to Cumberland?”

  “I wasn’t the only one,” he blustered. “H.J. knew. And if it had scared him off, she wouldn’t have been so sorry. She’d had about enough of him. Anyway if this is murder, the costume’s got nothing to do with it.”

  “That,” Alleyn said, getting up, “is what we hope to find out.”

  In Barry George’s room, Detective-Sergeant Bailey, a fingerprint expert, stood by the gas heater. Sergeant Gibson, a police photographer, and a uniformed constable were near the door. In the center of the room stood Barry George, looking from one man to another and picking at his lips.

  “I don’t know why he wants me to watch all this,” he said. “I’m exhausted. I’m emotionally used up. What’s he doing? Where is he?”

  Alleyn was next door in Cumberland’s dressing room, with H.J., Mike, and Sergeant Thompson. It was pretty clear now of fumes and the gas fire was burning comfortably. Sergeant Thompson sprawled in the armchair near the heater, his head sunk and his eyes shut.

  “This is the theory, Mr. Bannington,” Alleyn said. “You and Cumberland have made your final exits; Miss Bourne and Mr.

  George and Miss Gay are all on the stage. Lord Michael is standing just outside the entrance to the passage. The dressers and stage-staff are watching the play from the side. Cumberland has locked himself in this room. There he is, dead drunk and sound asleep. The gas fire is burning, full pressure. Earlier in the evening he powdered himself and a thick layer of the powder lies undisturbed on the tap. Now.”

  He tapped on the wall.

  The fire blew out with a sharp explosion. This was followed by the hiss of escaping gas. Alleyn turned the taps off. “You see,” he said, “I’ve left an excellent print on the powdered surface. Now, come next door.”

  Next door, Barry George appealed to him stammering: “But I didn’t know. I don’t know anything about it. I don’t know.”

  “Just show Mr. Bannington, will you, Bailey?”

  Bailey knelt down. The lead-in was disconnected from the tap on the heater. He turned on the tap in the pipe and blew down the tube.