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  When Dr Jeanne-Marie had collected her sons, and Rosamund and Edmund had been sent to play in the garden, Marcus Lynn called to confirm that his demolition squad would be coming next day and, under the eye of their employer, would make short work of the clearing up. Marcus stayed for sherry. He was gloomy.

  “That was one hell of an ending to the show,” he said. “I’ve been to the hospital and it seems it was simply one of those things. If the poor chap had struck on a rib instead of the dagger going between two of them, there might have been some chance of saving him. As it was, there was no hope at all. Emma is terribly distressed and I suppose there will be every sort of a hooha about how the daggers got changed over.”

  “That reminds me,” said Jonathan. “Is it known what happened to the theatrical dagger?”

  “Oh, yes. It was the first thing I thought of when it was obvious that the poor chap was dead, so when Yorke and I gathered up the properties after the police surgeon had authorised the removal of Bourton’s body, I checked, with Yorke standing by. The retractable dagger must have slid out of the belt as the props were placed on the tables. I can’t think why none of the three of us noticed—Jasper helped Yorke and myself to carry the stuff down—but, of course, the lights were not put on until the performance began. Anyway, the dagger had got kicked under the table and all I can think is that some well-meaning busybody (who, of course, will never own up to it now) noticed that the belt was empty and shoved a dagger into it.”

  “The one and only objection to that theory,” said Deborah, “is that whoever did it must have been able to lay his hands on another dagger, unless he had brought one with him and the whole thing was done out of malice aforethought.”

  “In which case the dagger couldn’t have been meant for Bourton, but for Rinkley,” said Jonathan, “but all this is idle speculation. All the real evidence will come out at the inquest. Have you spoken to any of the others, Marcus?”

  “No. I think better not. It will be better to leave all that to the police. No blame can attach itself to anyone. Nobody could possibly have known that Rinkley would have been taken ill and an understudy put on, and if Rinkley had accidentally got the wrong dagger, he would have known as soon as he drew it out.”

  “Or perhaps even before that, because of the weight of the thing when he slung the belt over his shoulder,” said Deborah. Later she added to her husband, “I’d like to get Rosamund and Edmund out from here for a bit, away from all the publicity. There won’t only be the police. There will be the reporters and the sightseers, as I said before.”

  “I don’t think you need worry. The death will be declared accidental and the papers won’t give it more than a mention, if that. Besides, where should we put the kids? Everybody must have had a bucketful of minding them by now.”

  “Try Aunt Adela and Laura. They only had them for a week instead of the promised fortnight. A week will see us in the clear, I should think.”

  So Deborah telephoned the Stone House which was on the edge of the New Forest and contacted Laura.

  “Deborah here.”

  “Hullo. How did the last night go?”

  “That’s why I’m phoning. I’d rather tell you about it when we meet. A dreadful thing happened and I want the children out of here for a day or two. Could you possibly have them again while we get things sorted out?”

  “I’ll ask the boss, but I’m sure we can. Are you and Jonathan all right?”

  “Oh, yes, perfectly all right, the children, too.”

  “Good show! Hang on while I contact the fountain-head.” Laura was back on the telephone in less than a minute with an assurance that Dame Beatrice would be delighted to have the children again. “She says would it help if we came over and fetched them? She thinks you may be in a bit of a spot. Would it help?”

  “Oh, Laura, it most certainly would! Could you make it quite soon? I want them out of the house before all the fun begins.”

  “The fun being what?—or mustn’t I ask until we meet?”

  “The police, we think, and the reporters, will be here.”

  “We’ll be right over.” Laura was as good as her word and her arrival with Dame Beatrice coincided with that of the police. While Jonathan was interviewed by them, Deborah presented the children. They were ready to leave, Rosamund clutching the Victorian posy which she had been given for her performance and from which she refused to be parted, Edmund with the dog-collar Peter Woolidge had begged from Tom to give him.

  “It’s awfully good of you to take them off our hands,” said Deborah to Dame Beatrice, leading her relative by marriage out of earshot while Laura was coping with an enthusiastic account of the play from the children. “We had a serious accident here on the last night, and there will have to be an inquest and the children will be far better out of the way.”

  “What happened?”

  “There was a mix-up of props and the stand-in who was playing Pyramus picked up the wrong dagger and stabbed himself to death. Jon says it’s the sort of accident which can easily happen, but in this case I don’t think that’s true.”

  “How would it be if we sent the children off with Laura and I stayed to hear the details of the story? I was present at the first performance of the play, as you know, so I shall have no difficulty in following your account of what occurred.”

  “Oh, if you would stay and help us out, it would be a tremendous relief to me.”

  “So what happened exactly?” asked Dame Beatrice again when Laura had gone off with the children.

  “Mr Rinkley, the man who played Bottom the Weaver, was taken ill about three-quarters through the play and was rushed to hospital with suspected food poisoning. I must ring them and find out how he is.”

  “So the understudy took his place—”

  “Well, we don’t have understudies the way the professionals do. We have to find somebody else in the cast who can fill in, and in this case it had to be Donald Bourton. He was playing Oberon and was off-stage when Rinkley collapsed, so he was free to play in the Pyramus and Thisbe scene.”

  “But surely Oberon comes on again at the end of that scene?”

  “Yes, but we cut the fairy ending. As it was, we were running late, so nobody minded. We wouldn’t have had the fairies, anyway, because the children were all in bed or asleep on their parents’ laps in the auditorium, so the scene would have lost a lot of its attraction, anyway.”

  “Yes, I noticed the absence of the fairies at the end of the performance I attended. So you had to substitute Mr Bourton for Mr Rinkley.”

  “Yes. What happened after that is still a mystery, but perhaps the inquest will clear it up. Well, actually, of course, we know what happened, but we don’t know how such a mistake could have been made. You remember that Pyramus is supposed to stab himself? Well, in some extraordinary way the daggers got mixed up. Instead of using the retractable thing which had been provided, and which was harmless, poor Donald pulled a real dagger out. Where it came from and how it got into the pocket in the sword-belt is an absolute mystery. Somebody put it there, but I doubt whether there is going to be any owning-up.”

  “Could any of the children—there were a dozen or more in the fairy scenes, I noticed—have had access to the properties and played with them?”

  “Well,” said Deborah, “of course I’ve thought of that, but, honestly, I don’t believe it’s the answer. Yolanda Yorke, the eldest of the children—she took Philostrate—was with her parents all the time except when she went to the summerhouse to see that the bloodhounds were all right, but the summerhouse is in a clearing in the woods and quite a long way from the tables on which the props and things were laid out.”

  “But she was not under her parents’ eye the whole time.”

  “I’m sure Yolanda wouldn’t have meddled with anybody else’s things. She is a most serious, responsible little girl, although she is only nine. In any case, as I say, I can’t see that she would have had the opportunity. There were people in the wings all the time.�
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  “And the younger children?”

  “Oh, dear!” In spite of the gravity of the situation, Deborah laughed. “If they could have escaped from Signora Moretti’s eagle eye I should be the most surprised woman in Europe. She assumed complete charge of them. They had cushions they were made to sit on and no chance whatever to escape her vigilance. She had a couple of mothers to help out, and young Peter Woolidge, who was Puck and a wizard with children, was there, whenever he was off stage, keeping them amused and happy.”

  “And were Rosamund and Edmund under the same surveillance as the rest?”

  “You bet they were, and Ganymede and Lucien, too. When they and the other fairies were not on stage they were all under the very strictest supervision. It’s impossible that they could have tampered with anything on the actual nights of the play.”

  “And before the play?”

  “All the properties and costumes were locked away and Jon gave the key of the room to Marcus Lynn. When they were taken out, instead of being distributed to the cast in the dressing-rooms, they were put out on the trestle tables at the side of the stage so that they could be picked up by the actors as and when they were needed. It was thought better to keep all the props together until people had to use them. There was just time, you see, for Pyramus to get into his armour and Thisbe her skirt and Wall to hitch on the cardboard fore-and-aft thing representing the lime and roughcast, and all Moonshine had to do was to pick up her lantern, dog and bush of thorns, and Lion only needed to assume the tatty bit of synthetic fur complete with lion’s-head cap. This was all done while the court party were discussing what their evening entertainment was to be.”

  “It sounds as though the daggers were changed over before the play began. So far as I remember, there was no point during the actual scenes when only one person was off the stage and so in a position to have sole access to the properties, was there?”

  “I can’t think of one. When the court party was ‘on’ at the beginning, the fairies and the workmen were ‘off’, and it went on in a Box and Cox sort of way right through the four acts, but surely nobody would have done such a thing deliberately, although I did have doubts at first. Of course Rinkley himself would not have made a mistake, but somebody unaccustomed to the daggers might have got them mixed up. The theatrical dagger looked very realistic. Marcus Lynn had it copied from a valuable one, I believe.”

  “Where did the lethal dagger come from?”

  “Oh, Marcus Lynn has rather a good collection of swords and daggers. He brought along a number to the first full rehearsal and let people choose their own. He took the rest away with him, I thought, but there must have been one left over. He himself had the only key to the props cupboard, so I suppose he would know.”

  “The police, I suppose, have the dagger with which Mr Bourton killed himself. Is it possible that he committed suicide deliberately?”

  “I suppose it’s possible on the grounds of ‘what private griefs they have, alas! I know not’, but I should consider it most unlikely. It’s true that his wife was away from home a good deal—she’s a professional actress and was only ‘between shows’ when she consented to lend herself to us for The Dream—but from what I’ve heard, Donald Bourton usually managed to console himself during her absences. This I’m sure she knew, and, apparently, she did not resent it.”

  “How well do you know her?”

  “I had never met her until rehearsals began. I mean, she and her husband and the other married couples have been here for drinks, of course. We had to ask the Bourtons because we were having Brian and Valerie Yorke and Marcus and Emma Lynn, so Donald and Barbara seemed the obvious couple to make up the party.”

  “What makes you think that she did not object to her husband’s amusing himself while she was in London or on tour?”

  “Oh, they were the modern style of husband and wife, you know. ‘You go your way, I’ll go mine, and no hard feelings.’ That sort of thing.”

  “Have they any children?”

  “Not so far as I know.”

  “Did she maintain him out of her earnings?”

  “Good gracious, no. He was a partner in a firm of turf accountants with betting shops all over the place. I should think he was doing very nicely. Barbara showed me a bracelet she was wearing and I’d hate to guess what it cost. She said, ‘Donald gave it me when the favourite blew up at Doncaster and came in fifth, and an absolute outsider cantered home’.”

  “I suppose the bookmakers take certain risks, though.”

  “Minimal ones, I’d say. It’s the punters who drop the money.”

  “Like Priscilla Wimbush in Crome Yellow, who dropped it in handfuls and hatfuls on every racecourse in the country.”

  “Oh, yes, and then she turned to the occult and the casting of horoscopes and all that kind of thing, didn’t she? Oh, here’s Jon. Have the police gone, darling?”

  “Yes, I’ve just seen them off.”

  “What did they have to say?”

  “Oh, the usual things—how, when and why—but of course I couldn’t really tell them anything. They wanted to see the props, so I’ve sent them round to Marcus Lynn. He collected everything up when he left here this morning. They didn’t seem too pleased about that.”

  Chapter 8

  Speculations

  “First, good Peter Quince, say what the play treats on.”

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  We would like to have kept our costumes,” said Rosamund to Laura.

  “But they belong to Mr Lynn, don’t they?”

  “Yes, but he told Signora she could have them for the dancing class. She asked for them, I expect. She always asks our mummies and daddies for things, so I expect she asked Mr Lynn. Whenever we are in a dance display she asks if she can keep the costumes, and the mummies and daddies always say yes, because, if they said no, their children wouldn’t get nice parts next time. My daddy calls her ‘that old squirrel’, but Mummy says she can’t make much money out of that dance class and think of the bonus every Saturday morning. What’s a bonus?”

  “An extra. A free gift.”

  “But Signora doesn’t give them anything, ever, not every Saturday morning or any other time.”

  “Isn’t it every Saturday morning that you and Edmund go to dancing class?”

  “Yes, but that’s a bonus for Signora, not for Mummy and Daddy.”

  “I wouldn’t be too sure about that. When I was a little girl we were always packed off to Sunday School. I expect the principle is the same. Do you like going to dancing class?”

  “Oh, yes, it’s lovely.”

  “Well, I didn’t like going to Sunday School, so perhaps you get a bonus, after all.”

  “We would rather have kept our costumes.”

  “They were very pretty, I thought. Whose toy dog was it?”

  “I didn’t see any toy dogs. I didn’t take a toy dog, only the real ones.”

  “Somebody called Moonshine had a toy dog. She also had a bush of thorns and a lantern.”

  “We didn’t see that part of the play. I expect the things belonged to Yolanda. She has lots of toys.”

  “What happened to the grown-up people’s costumes?”

  “I don’t know. Perhaps Mr Lynn gave them to Mr Yorke for another play.”

  “More likely they were hired and went back to the shop.”

  “No, they were all made specially, I think. Daddy hired a car once when ours was at the garage, and I think Mr Lynn hired the dogs, not the costumes.”

  “Dogs are ‘props’. Mustn’t touch ‘props’,” said Edmund. “Mrs Yorke very cross. Not to go near them. Must not take dogs into bed. Dogs have fleas.”

  “The toy dog was a prop, too,” said Laura. “Surely you saw it? It must have been somewhere where Moonshine could pick it up when it was needed. Where would that be?”

  “Oh, the things were on tables, but nobody except Yolanda and the grown-ups could go near them,” explained Rosamund. “Yolanda could look at them because her l
ittle knife was a prop, but Mr Yorke was there all the time when Yolanda was, and so was Mrs Yorke, because they were all in the same part of the play.”

  “Mrs Yorke was very cross,” said Edmund reminiscently.

  “We were with Signora and the fairies,” said Rosamund. “We didn’t mean to be naughty when we took the dogs to bed. They liked it and we liked having them.”

  “I expect you did. They were lovely creatures. You said you thought they were hired.”

  “I think they were, because I don’t think Mr Lynn or Mr Yorke have any dogs of their own.”

  “Who do these belong to?”

  “Mr Woolidge. He breeds them. Do you know why they’re called bloodhounds?”

  “Because they used to chase runaway slaves, I believe.”

  “No, that’s not true. That’s what people think, but it isn’t true. They’re called bloodhounds because they’ve got bloodshot eyes. Peter Woolidge told me, and it must be true because he knows everything. He is my favourite, not like Mr Rinkley. Mr Rinkley has bloodshot eyes, but that’s because he drinks too much, then it makes him sick.”

  “Who told you that?”

  “Yolanda Yorke. She heard her daddy say so. Yolanda was given the dogs to mind when she was not on the stage. I wish I could have been given the dogs to mind.”

  “ ’Ark, ’ark, the dogs do bark,” said Edmund, “only it was a bird in the long grass.”

  “Do you like Yolanda?” asked Laura.

  “Oh, yes. She is called an only child, so her mummy and daddy give her lots of things. She was a page-boy called Phil something and she had a knife, but her mummy only let her have it for one scene because it was a real knife and very sharp, although it was only a little one. She showed it me.”

  “When?”

  “At the dress rehearsal, when the fairy bits were over. When Edmund and Lucien and Ganymede were in bed and Cook and Carrie were in the kitchen doing their oojah board, I put on my dressing-gown and went down to the woods. Then I took the dogs upstairs after Yolanda showed me her knife. Then Mrs Yorke came and was cross and took the dogs back.”