Curtain Call Read online

  Madeleine blinked at him, hearing the amusement in his words. She might have told him she was a friend of Roddy’s, but in the light of what was happening that could no longer be true. She was silent. Eventually she lifted her eyes to Brevett, who was glowering at her. ‘Nothing? Let me put it another way. What exactly are you doing in a private residence, at this hour of the night, in the company of a man who has just paid for your supper?’

  ‘I didn’t – I thought it was – Roddy was –’ she stuttered, the drink scrambling her tongue. It was true: she had presumed on a stranger’s hospitality, had let someone else pick up the bill in exchange for – what? Her charming company? The company, it turned out, was a basic requirement, and her charm was neither here nor there. It was humiliating that she could be so naive, so unknowing. She had actually believed Roddy was fond of her . . . Her eyes had begun to glisten, but she bit back tears, sensing how much they would irritate him. Brevett stood up, and with an exasperated harrumph stalked off to the adjoining room. She heard him on the telephone, muttering angrily to someone she presumed was Roddy, for the only words she made out distinctly were ‘. . . for the sake of a silly tart who won’t drop her drawers’. So that’s what she was – not ‘fast set’ after all. His voice grumbled on for a few minutes more. When he emerged he was holding her coat.

  ‘Here,’ he said, throwing it on the couch next to her. ‘Looks like our Mr Astill sold me a pup. Well . . . you live and learn.’

  She sat there for some moments, not daring to raise her head. Brevett had planted himself squarely in front of the picture window, absorbed in its panoramic view west. She heard him light his cigar again. When he turned back to the room he looked surprised to find her still there.

  ‘Go on, then,’ he said wearily. ‘Buzz off.’

  Two days after this Roddy had called on her. This time he didn’t even bother taking her to a cafe. They just sat in the car, his unsmiling gaze fixed on the windscreen as he recounted his terrible disappointment in her. There was a glint in his eyes that she hadn’t seen before, and even his voice sounded different. It was still a businessman’s voice, only now she understood what business he was in.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘I just can’t . . .’

  He let a silence stretch out, then said, with slow deliberation, ‘Madeleine, it’s time to be honest. Aside from a pretty face, you have nothing of interest to anyone. I mean, nothing – no professional skills, no connections, no friends, no money. You are behind with your rent. You can barely afford to eat. You’re not the type to go begging. So how do you propose to live?’

  She swallowed hard. ‘I – I could work in a shop, somewhere.’

  ‘You’ve tried that one. Wouldn’t call it a roaring success, would you?’

  The salt sting threatened behind her eyes, and again she blocked it. The shame of it. The shame of it would kill her. But then, who would know? Her parents were long gone. She had no friends – he was right about that – and nobody at her boarding house had a clue about her. She could return to Chertsey, to her aunt, but what promise of a life did that hold? It would crush her to go back there.

  ‘So what’s it to be?’ said Roddy presently. He craned his head round to look at her. ‘Shall we say eight thirty, tomorrow night?’

  She stared dead ahead, and nodded.

  ‘Good,’ he said, and took out his wallet. He peeled off two five-pound notes and handed them to her. ‘Buy a dress, a low-cut thing. Get two, one in black, one in red. Also stockings, and a bottle of perfume – something expensive. You can use what’s left over for the rent.’ He leaned across her suddenly, and for a moment she thought he was going to strike her, but he caught the handle and pushed the passenger door open. ‘Off you go. Oh, and do something with your hair, for God’s sake. It looks like a bloody sheepdog’s.’

  That was in May. She had learned the routine in the months since – Roddy had provided an efficient and unsentimental education. She had learned what to say, and what not to say; when to stay, when not to stay. It surprised her how quickly she got used to it. She had imagined it would be disgusting, and it was, but not often, and not to the degree that she couldn’t face it again. Roddy didn’t treat her badly, and he paid enough for her to afford better digs, on Bayham Street. Most of the time she barely impinged on his notice; he had other girls – a whole stable, it seemed – to look after.

  But she felt more alone than ever. During the day she would sit by the window in her bedroom and watch the people passing below, or else she would wander up Camden High Street and have tea in a cafe, mooching until her evening appointment. ‘Maddy the moocher’, Roddy called her. She was doing so right now, watching the old waitress on her rounds about the room. It was tempting to catch her eye and ask for a bun or a slice of cake, just so that she might chat with her for a few moments. But the woman was run off her feet – she didn’t have time to idle away with customers. Madeleine touched her hand to her neck again; beneath the scarf she wore a necklace of bruises. So far she had managed to hide them from Roddy. If he saw them he would want the story right away, and she wasn’t sure she could fool him.

  It had happened about three weeks ago. She had been in Russell Square and, it being a warm day, she had bought a penny ice from the little stall and settled on one of the public benches. An armada of ragged white clouds was heaving across the sky. She hadn’t noticed him approach, but nodded when the man asked her if he might sit down. He had a long-jawed sort of handsomeness, with eyes of a peculiar dark intensity. His hair had a youthful lustre – she wondered if he dyed it. They got talking, and she gathered that he was a commercial traveller down from the Midlands. He was rather well spoken. He asked some questions of her, intimating that he knew what line of work she was in. It seemed that he was staying at the hotel just over the way. Would she care to meet him up there in fifteen minutes? Madeleine had never done business with a client except through Roddy, and wondered if it was quite safe. But she had never been offered such money before. How would it be to earn something ‘off the books’? She watched the man walk away across the square’s garden and disappear beyond the perimeter railings.

  Twenty minutes had gone before she made up her mind. She stole through the crowded foyer of the Imperial without catching anyone’s eye and made for the lift. She got out at the fourth floor, unnerved by the sinister emptiness of the long corridor ahead, quite different from the teeming activity downstairs. Willing herself onwards, she gravitated past high arched windows and fire doors until she reached room 408. She knocked and entered, as he had instructed. The bedroom was empty, but he called to her from the bathroom that she should make herself comfortable. She looked about the room, drab and anonymous, with a nostril-twitching staleness from all the tobacco smoked by its previous occupants. The double bed’s quilted headboard offered a forlorn touch of homeliness.

  The first thing which struck her as odd was the absence of any luggage. Would a commercial traveller not have a suitcase lying about? She quickly peered into the living room, also empty. A minute or so passed before he emerged, jacketless, from the bathroom, drying his face on a towel. The second odd thing was that he closed the bathroom door with his hand sheathed by the towel, as though he feared contamination from the doorknob. The sleeves of his shirt had been rolled up to reveal meaty forearms, and he had removed his tie, which he was absently winding about his hands, trying different knots.

  ‘Take off your coat,’ he said in a voice that had lost the coaxing tone of earlier. He moved behind her, and she thought for a moment he was going to help her off with it. Instead he slipped his tie around her throat and spun her round to face him. ‘This suits your colour,’ he said, as he made a knot in the silk and fixed it about her throat. The colour of the tie was purple and black, which made her wonder why he thought it suited her. He was staring intently at her, his head very still like a snake’s, and she felt a tiny spasm of fear. He grasped the tail of the tie in his hand and jerked it up very suddenly, his arm a gibbet with h
er head caught in the noose. She gasped in surprise, and he laughed, letting his arm drop. He told her to lie on the bed. As she did so she began to loosen the tie from her throat.

  ‘Leave that alone,’ he said in a toneless command. He climbed onto the bed, straddling her. He bent his head over her, his eyes narrowing in enquiry. She noticed he had started to sweat – there were damp patches on his shirt and fine beads of moisture along his hairline. There was something unsettled, something ‘off’, about his expression, and she realised that her impulsive decision had been a mistake. She was beginning to see why he had not touched his hand to the doorknob – he would leave no trace of himself here.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ she said, trying to rise, ‘I really think I ought to go.’

  ‘What?’ he said distantly.

  ‘Please, I’d like to go. Please.’

  He gave her a mock frown of disappointment. ‘Go? I’m just getting started.’ His weight pinned her to the bed. He had taken the tie in both hands and was tightening it again around her neck. She made a panicked grab at him and caught hold of his hair before he shook her off. His sinewy frame was far too strong for her. She heard herself pleading with him, but he wasn’t listening, only watching, his eyes twin black holes of ruthless compulsion. As she choked and struggled, she prayed to be spared, though no words could form in her throat. She hadn’t prayed in some time, since those nights she thought about her father, who was dead, and her mother, who was soon to be. Going, going . . . but suddenly the agonising pressure on her windpipe lifted. The man had raised himself up, his body tensed like a dog. It was a knock at the door. He clamped his hand fiercely over her mouth and whispered through clenched teeth, Not a sound.

  There was a pause, and then a voice came, a woman’s, clear and finely spoken: ‘Is everything all right?’ Madeleine felt her life trembling in the balance: if whoever was at the door decided to walk away, she would die in this room. A drop of sweat from the man’s forehead ploshed on her cheek. The voice came again, more urgently: the woman was going to call reception and ask the manager to come up. A furious twitch had started beneath his eye as he seemed to consider the situation, then he rolled off her. Madeleine, sobbing for air, clambered off the bed, dizzy from the lack of oxygen. She staggered a few steps, picked her coat off the floor, and looked round at him. He was rolling down his shirtsleeves, his dark eyes glistening and malignant, like a predatory animal driven off its kill. Yet all he did was raise a finger to his lips, as if it were understood that the price of her escape was silence: he seemed to know that she wasn’t the sort who would tell.

  She bolted out of the room, startling the woman outside the door, who jumped back to let her pass. Her heart was a wild cat pounding inside her chest as she ran down the corridor, eyes blinded by tears. She reached the lift and stabbed a frantic hand against the bell: she didn’t wait for it, too terrified to linger, and blatted through a nearby fire door instead. Not until she was outside on Russell Square did she slow down, keeping her head low: the shock of the experience thrummed in her blood, had set her limbs to trembling. She knew how lucky she had been, but every time she pictured his face – the face of a man who had wished her dead – she felt another helpless convulsion shake her body. Her throat ached. Halfway down Guilford Street she saw an old public drinking fountain, and she stopped, suddenly weary. Turning the little brass tap she splashed water on her face, and felt around her neck, tender, and throbbing in agony. The taste of bile in her mouth was bitter. The trembling wouldn’t stop, but she didn’t care: it meant she was alive.

  ‘’Scuse me, dear, someone’s waving at you.’ Madeleine looked up. It was the nice waitress, nodding towards the cafe window, outside of which Roddy now stood. He was pointing with theatrical impatience at his watch. She was on the clock.

  ‘Thank you,’ she said to the waitress, who smiled and moved away – she was on the clock too. Madeleine stood and shrugged on her coat. She counted out some loose change for the two pots of tea, and a tip. On her way out she didn’t notice the newspaper discarded at the next table, folded to a page featuring the story of a recent murder, inset with a reproduced sketch of a man’s face. So she remained quite unaware of herself as perhaps the only other person in London who could say whether that face belonged to the ‘Tiepin Killer’.

  5

  NINA HAD NEVER been inside the Nines, though she knew men other than Stephen who were members. It was a tall Regency terrace on Dover Street, its dark brick facade projecting an air of such unillusioned authority that no comment upon itself seemed necessary. As she made her way across the black-and-white-tiled floor she wondered at those men who passed the stations of their life – public school, university, club, boardroom – exclusively within wood-panelled interiors such as this. Hard to imagine what they would make of her landlady’s wallpaper.

  The wizened porter who took her coat and hat directed her up the balustraded staircase. She passed the critical gaze of grandees trapped in portraits from the previous century. ‘The Nine’s Club’ had been founded in the 1860s by a cabal of men prominent in literary and artistic circles, the most renowned of the eponymous nine being Dickens and Thackeray. One of the two had resigned (Nina couldn’t recall which) following a spat over a close friend who had been humiliatingly blackballed. The Nines had had its ups and downs since then – as well as Dickens (or Thackeray) it had also lost the apostrophe from its name – but was presently enjoying a period of fashionable loucheness. There was even a waiting list to join. Entering the bar, she spotted Stephen deep in conversation with a man of about his own age, whom she half recognised.

  ‘And here she is,’ said Stephen, rising from the table and dipping his head graciously to her proffered hand. He introduced his companion as Ludovic Talman, a smiling, slick-haired man with a pinkish complexion. He gave a little bow of acknowledgement, then glanced back at Stephen. Nina had the feeling that she had interrupted a conversation which they would prefer to keep private. At Stephen’s prompting – both men were drinking gin and it – she ordered a slightly reckless Martini.

  ‘Stephen said you’re having a great success at the Strand. The Second Arrangement?’

  ‘Yes, we’ve been lucky, it’s enjoying quite a run,’ she replied, still trying to place him.

  ‘Nina’s wonderful in it,’ said Stephen, gazing at her.

  ‘I’m sure she is,’ said Talman with an appraising gleam in his eye. ‘I hardly get to the theatre these days.’

  ‘You know that Ludo’s running things at Marlborough Studios now?’

  Nina experienced a tiny frisson of excitement, though she didn’t bat an eyelid. Of course. Talman was a film producer who turned out comedies and melodramas on a shoestring and then invested a fierce energy in promoting them. Nina, who took a lofty view of screen acting, was nevertheless alert to the vista of opportunities an introduction might throw open. She resolved right there to put on a sparkle for him.

  Talman noticed her gazing about the high-ceilinged room. ‘Your first time here, Miss Land?’

  ‘It’s Nina, please . . . Yes, it is. I’ve a feeling this place hasn’t changed much since Victoria’s day.’

  ‘Quite right,’ said Talman, with a sidelong glance at two elderly gents murmuring over their drinks at the next table. He dropped his voice. ‘One might say the same of our members. I’ve just been talking on that very matter with Stephen. I’m trying to secure his help.’

  Nina looked quizzically at Stephen, who gave a characteristic shrug to indicate that Talman should explain.

  ‘I’m on the club committee,’ he continued, ‘and we’ve recently come to an agreement that the Nines needs a bit of a spring clean – a dab of colour here and there.’

  Nina thought of the saturnine portraits she had passed on the stairs. ‘I can see why, but . . .’ Her eyes darted to the adjacent pair of old boys.

  Talman understood her look. ‘Oh, it wouldn’t be anything to frighten the fogeys, of course. My main idea is for a mural – along that wall –
a group portrait of the club’s great and good.’

  ‘That might be rather spiffy.’

  ‘I know! We’re aiming for a British version of that Fantin-Latour painting, Un Coin de Table, d’you know it? Unfortunately we’ve had quite a job persuading our designated portraitist.’ He nodded across the table at Stephen, who was at last obliged to speak.

  ‘I’m honoured to be asked, of course, but – I fear the amount of work it’ll involve. I’ve a fair few things to be getting on with.’

  Nina modulated her tone to a husky appeal. ‘Oh but you must!’ she said to Stephen. ‘Only imagine your work displayed in this setting. And, let’s be honest, nobody else will do it so well as you.’

  Stephen gave her a shrewd look, conscious of being soft-soaped. ‘I’ll have to think about it . . .’

  Talman seemed to twig a weakening in his reluctance. ‘D’you know, that’s most remarkable. Miss Land – Nina – may I congratulate you? I’ve been pleading with him this last hour and got nowhere. But the minute you show up he begins to yield –’

  ‘I’ve not yielded to anything,’ said Stephen quickly, but it was clear Talman had scented victory, for he resorted to a line few artists had ever been able to resist.

  ‘The fee would make it worth your while, of course.’

  Stephen offered a distracted smile, and said that his agent would need to be consulted – which he knew was tantamount to a surrender. Talman gave Nina a surreptitious wink, as though acknowledging a successful alliance. She sensed that this might be her moment.

  ‘I suppose you’re preparing a new film,’ she said airily.

  ‘Oh, I’ve always got something in the works,’ Talman said with a pleasant grin. ‘I’d read an outline for a murder mystery, but recent events seem to be outrunning whatever our scriptwriters could invent.’

  Nina, with a tingle of foreboding, said, ‘What events would they be?’

  ‘Why, the “Tiepin Murders” of course. A crazed killer on the loose – his signature a grisly violation – a city in terror! Now hasn’t that all the elements of a box-office smash?’