Entertaining Death Read online

  ‘I’m afraid I can’t tell you that, Miss Alexander.’

  ‘Surely this is not on the basis of what two spiteful women have to say?’

  ‘I’ve already told you, Miss Alexander, I can’t tell you any more. Good day.’

  Dorinda had an almost overwhelming urge to say ‘you called me Dorinda last time we met’, but before she’d had the chance to open her mouth, he was gone. She stood for a moment in thought, then knocked quietly on the office door.

  Inside, Mariah leapt up from Dorinda’s own chair, while Amy sat where she had before, looking pensive.

  ‘The Inspector apologised, Amy, and has gone. I think he’s going back to London.’

  Amy sighed. ‘I was just sayin’ to Mariah, it really wasn’t his fault. Nobody knew about the baby except Harry and Mariah – oh, and Doctor Hargreaves – so ’e couldn’t have known.’

  ‘What about your stepdaughters?’

  ‘Oh, don’t call ’em that!’ Amy shuddered. ‘I dunno. Harry might have told ’em. ’E was so delighted, and quite sure it was going to be a boy.’

  ‘That wouldn’t have pleased them.’ Mariah’s voice was like a steel trap closing.

  ‘No, you’re right, Mariah.’ Dorinda nodded at the woman, who ignored her.

  ‘Yes, but I lost the baby,’ said Amy miserably. ‘They didn’t ’ave anything to worry about.’

  ‘You said you were hoping for another?’ This was delicate territory, and Dorinda knew she had to be careful.

  Amy looked up in horror. ‘But they wouldn’t kill their own father to stop that! They’d be more likely to kill me!’

  Dorinda had to agree that this would be more likely, if either of the sisters were of a murderous inclination, but she couldn’t, in all honesty, see either of them committing parricide.

  ‘Too late now,’ said Mariah. ‘They have to live with it. Anyhow, having a baby’s no fun.’

  ‘I’d have liked to find out, though,’ said Amy wistfully.

  ‘Come on, now.’ Mariah was bracing. ‘Better off without, my Lady. Shall we go and see if that Maude’s got the kettle boiling again?’

  Dorinda wondered what “that Maude” felt about being referred to thus. ‘I’ll come with you,’ she said. ‘I could do with a cup of tea.’

  By this time, the other girls had all arrived and obviously been told what was going on. Neither Ted nor Algy had put in an appearance, so Maude packed Will off to buy himself a pie for lunch, and Amy recounted her sad story to the company.

  ‘Gawd, what girls have to put up with!’ said Phoebe.

  ‘Did it ’urt, Amy? The baby?’ whispered Maisie.

  ‘Maisie!’ came the chorus.

  ‘I don’t mind,’ said Amy. ‘Yes, it did, Maisie, but not as much as ’aving ’im would ’ave.’

  ‘Him?’ gasped Betty. ‘You know what it was?’

  ‘No – I just always thought of ’im – as ’im. I dunno why.’

  ‘Don’t dwell on it,’ said Mariah, wielding the big brown kettle. ‘That Inspector ought to be taken down a peg or two, upsetting you like that.’

  ‘I’ve told you, Mariah, it wasn’t his fault.’

  ‘But why was he asking all them questions anyway?’ said Maisie. ‘I don’t understand. When did he die? Your husband, I mean.’

  ‘Maisie! Don’t be so nosy!’ Maude was sharp.

  ‘I don’t mind,’ said Amy. ‘Really, I don’t. I’ve kept everything inside for so long – the baby, Harry dying and all the London gossip – it’s a relief. I feel as if I’ve come ’ome.’

  There was an instant rush of young women to give Amy a hug and assure her of their undying affection. Dorinda, amused, stood aside with Maude.

  ‘That’s what I told the Inspector when he asked why she’d “run away” from London. She’s come back home.’

  ‘She has, that. Poor chick. Always sad, to lose a baby like that, but it happens all the time. Worse when there’s no chance of another one to make up for it.’ Maude gave a little sniff, and Dorinda wondered if she, too, had lost a child.

  ‘It makes you think, though,’ said Dorinda. ‘It was lucky for the sisters, in a way.’

  ‘Except our Amy has got a lot of what they thought was coming to them,’ said Maude.

  ‘And I wonder,’ said Dorinda, ‘what the Honourable Jeremy Coutts has to do with all this?’

  Maude gave her a sharp look. ‘Not your trouble this time, Dolly. Don’t go getting involved.’

  ‘No, Maude.’ Dorinda leant over and gave a surprised Maude a kiss on the cheek. ‘What would I do without you and Will to take care of me.’

  ‘Go on with you,’ mumbled an embarrassed Maude, giving her a push. ‘I’ll get your tea.’

  The audience for the afternoon performance, though better than Saturday afternoon’s, was – it being a Sunday – slightly thinner than it had been, or would be for the rest of the week, and therefore, with marginally less lingering applause, it was somewhat shorter. Waiting backstage for the auditorium to clear, Dorinda was surprised to see Maude appear again from the auditorium and beckon her.

  ‘He’s not here again, is he?’ she whispered, as she followed Maude out.

  ‘No, it’s the other young feller,’ said Maude. ‘The one who was sitting next to him.’

  Dorinda’s eyebrows rose. The Honourable Jeremy Coutts? What was he doing here?

  Maude opened the office door. ‘Miss Alexander,’ she announced.

  The Honourable Jeremy’s surprise was laughable, thought Dorinda. She smiled slightly, circled her desk and held out her hand.

  ‘Good afternoon, sir.’

  ‘G-g-good afternoon,’ said Sir Jeremy, taking her hand as though it were a poisonous snake.

  ‘Do sit down,’ said Dorinda briskly, sitting down herself. ‘What can I do for you?’

  ‘I – er –’ He peered at her across the desk. ‘Are you really the – er – well, the – er –’

  ‘Proprietor? Yes. I own The Alexandria and direct the company. Did you enjoy the show?’

  ‘But you’re not …’ He cleared his throat, obviously embarrassed.

  ‘I’m not the sort of person who usually runs concert parties,’ Dorinda finished for him. ‘No. But here I am, so what, again, can I do for you?’

  He seemed to pull himself together. ‘I wondered if it would be possible to see Lady Amelia Washington.’

  Dorinda put her head on one side, which made her pointed hat wobble. ‘I can ask her.’

  ‘I know she’s staying at the Mansion House – I am myself – but I haven’t run across her there, so I wondered …’

  ‘She spends most of her time here,’ said Dorinda, and made up her mind. ‘I am trying to save Amy trouble at the moment, and this morning she was interviewed by Inspector Colyer from Scotland Yard. Can you tell me why you were with him yesterday evening?’

  ‘Yesterday –?’ He looked confused. ‘The man I was with last night?’

  ‘Yes. The man in the brown suit.’

  ‘He’s an Inspector? He didn’t tell me that.’

  ‘But he recognised you?’

  ‘Oh – yes. He said he was surprised to see me here in – um – Nethergate and was I going to the concert party in the evening. I said I was, so he suggested we come together.’

  ‘He didn’t mention Lady Washington?’

  ‘No. Why was he questioning her? Why didn’t he say he was a detective?’

  ‘You probably know why, Mr Coutts.’

  ‘You know my name?’

  ‘Of course. I know most of the story, and, as I said, at the moment I simply want to offer Amy a safe place – a refuge, if you like.’

  Coutts nodded. ‘I see that. But, you see, that’s exactly what I wanted to do, too. Only those damned – I beg your pardon, Miss –?’

  ‘Alexander,’ supplied Dorinda, ‘and please don’t worry about it.’

  ‘Thank you.’ Coutts shifted in his chair. ‘But those women!’

  ‘Amy’s stepdaughters?’
r />   ‘Oh, don’t call them that!’ Coutts unconsciously echoed Amy. ‘They turned everything sour, and poor Amy didn’t know what to do. So she ran.’

  ‘And what would you have her do?’

  Coutts looked surprised. ‘Why, marry me, of course!’

  Chapter Eight

  ‘Of course.’ Dorinda regarded him thoughtfully. ‘Now, when Amy first came to me, she said that wasn’t true.’

  ‘Why would she say that?’ the Honourable Jeremy said, aghast.

  ‘I put it badly,’ said Dorinda. ‘She said she didn’t want to marry you.’

  ‘Oh.’ Coutts sat back in the chair, looking dismal. ‘That’s what she told me, too.’

  Dorinda frowned. ‘Then why are you here?’

  ‘I wanted to make sure she was all right. And … Sir Harold’s daughters have been – less than kind.’

  ‘Spreading more gossip?’

  ‘I can’t prove it, but it’s going round that Lady Washington has run away because the police are investigating. I can’t think of anyone else who would bother to spread a rumour like that.’

  Dorinda nodded. ‘I did worry that interpretation would be put on her actions.’

  ‘If she married me, I could protect her.’

  ‘And it would add fuel to the fire.’

  ‘Oh.’ Coutts frowned down at his feet, then looked up. ‘What do you suggest I do, Miss Alexander?’

  ‘I’m not equipped to give you advice, Mr Coutts. But I suggest you see Lady Washington, if she wishes, and do what she asks you.’

  ‘Very well.’ He rose. ‘Shall I wait here?’

  ‘Please do.’ Dorinda also rose and left the office.

  Amy was still in her evening dress from the last item on the programme, hands clasped tightly in front of her, Mariah and Maude standing guard either side of her.

  ‘Maudie told me,’ she said in a small voice. ‘Does he want to see me?’

  ‘He does, but it’s nothing to get alarmed about. I’ll take you to him, but this time, Amy, I’m not staying.’

  Amy nodded and stood to follow Dorinda back to the office.

  ‘All I would ask is that your conversation doesn’t take too long, Mr Coutts,’ said Dorinda, after showing Amy in. ‘We have another performance and Amy has to get ready for it.’

  ‘I don’t know if I’ve done the right thing,’ she said to Maude, returning to the backstage area and pulling off her hat.

  ‘You should of let me go with her,’ burst out Mariah. ‘She ain’t no good on ’er own!’ Her refined accent was slipping.

  ‘Mariah,’ said Maude, ‘you can’t be with her all the time. You weren’t when she was married to Sir Harold, were you?’

  ‘No, and look where that got ’er!’

  Maude and Dorinda looked at her in surprise. Even the other girls looked up.

  ‘What do you mean?’ said Maisie. ‘She got married. An’ she was happy – she said so.’

  ‘And rich,’ added Betty.

  But Mariah simply pressed her lips together and went into the dressing room.

  ‘What did she mean?’ Maude asked Dorinda.

  ‘Pregnant and lost the baby? Widowed?’ Dorinda shook her head. ‘It was a bit like saying that a person was born, lived life and died. So why go to all the trouble. Do you understand what I mean?’

  ‘I think so,’ said Maude, who wasn’t quite sure that she did.

  To Dorinda’s surprise, in only another five minutes Amy reappeared.

  ‘I showed him out and locked the door, Dolly,’ she said. ‘And it wasn’t too bad.’

  ‘That’s good,’ said Dorinda. ‘Mariah was cross that she hadn’t been allowed to go with you again.’

  Amy sighed. ‘She always thinks I need protecting, but I don’t know why. I’m quite good at being on my own.’

  ‘Obviously,’ said Dorinda. ‘So what did Mr Coutts have to say?’

  ‘’E wanted to marry me, silly bugger. I told ’im that folk would ’ave more to talk about then. ’E said you said the same.’

  ‘I did.’

  ‘So I said ’e should go back to London and put about that I was quite all right and staying with friends in the country, me and Mariah.’

  ‘That’s almost true,’ said Dorinda.

  Amy coloured a little. ‘I could’ve said I was staying with Ivy, but I don’t want no one bothering ’er and Sir Freddie.’

  ‘And is that all you told him to do?’

  Amy looked away. ‘I said ’e could – um – ask me again when it all blew over.’

  Dorinda smiled. ‘I’m glad.’

  ‘Mariah won’t be,’ said Amy gloomily.

  Dorinda led Amy to two vacant chairs as far away from the dressing room as possible. ‘I don’t see why she wouldn’t be pleased for you. She loves you being a “lady”, doesn’t she? Just think – if you married Mr Coutts you’d be the daughter-in-law of an earl.’

  ‘Oh, it ain’t – isn’t – that. She got ever so upset when I lost the baby. She said I oughtn’t to have been put through so much. It didn’t matter that I said women were going through it all the time!’

  Dorinda thought for a moment. ‘Are you absolutely sure she isn’t jealous?’ she asked eventually.

  ‘I told you, no! She was pleased when I got the job at The Gaiety and when Harry took a shine to me. As excited as I was meself.’

  Dorinda nodded. ‘Well, you’d better go and calm her down, she was quite upset earlier.’

  Amy sighed and stood up. ‘All right. I wish I could find something for ’er to do, though.’

  ‘Apart from looking after you?’

  ‘I don’t need much looking after, do I? I mean, she could quite happily stay at the ’otel every day, and after sorting me clothes out, she could ’ave the day to ’erself, couldn’t she?’

  ‘She’d be lonely,’ said Dorinda. ‘And she’s been very helpful to Maude in the last few days.’

  ‘I suppose so.’ Amy gave a wan little smile. ‘Off I go, then.’

  Dorinda picked up her hat and went back to her office. She wasn’t sure that Mariah wasn’t jealous of Amy, and it worried her.

  Ten minutes later Maude knocked and came in with a hot pie. ‘Thought you’d need it,’ she said. ‘Been quite a day.’

  ‘Oh, yes, I do, thank you, Maudie.’ Dorinda leant back in her chair and stretched. ‘I’m bothered about Amy – and Mariah.’

  ‘Mariah? She can be a right sourpuss but she’s helpful when she puts her mind to it.’

  ‘I know, and I’m beginning to feel really sorry for her.’

  ‘Sorry for her?’ Maude looked surprised. ‘Why? She’s got a good job, hardly has to do nothing, roof over her head – what more could she want?’

  ‘It must be hard,’ said Dorinda, taking the pie out of the greasy paper and blowing on her fingers, ‘when your friend, who is prettier than you, and more talented, gets a really good job in the profession you both share, and then attracts a wealthy husband. Don’t you see?’

  ‘Yes, I suppose so,’ said Maude doubtfully, ‘but she always seems so angry.’

  ‘Perhaps she was jealous of the baby, too. If she doesn’t have suitors of her own it’s unlikely that she’ll ever have a child.’

  ‘And then she was upset when it – well, you know.’ Maude nodded. ‘It could be like that, couldn’t it?’

  ‘It could,’ said Dorinda, ‘but I’m sure she wouldn’t admit it. I wish we could make friends with her.’

  ‘I’ve tried,’ said Maude. ‘Yesterday, when she offered to come with me on the pie run, I thought she was beginning to be friendly, but then when she saw that Mr Whatsisname, she just sort of froze up again.’

  ‘I know. Dorinda leant her elbows on the desk. ‘I must think of something. Ask for her help, perhaps?’

  ‘Help for what?’

  ‘I don’t know yet, but I’ll think of something,’ said Dorinda. ‘Now I’d better eat this pie while it’s still hot.’

  It was halfway through the evening per
formance, watching a silly on-stage conversation between Algy and Ted, that the answer came to her. She couldn’t see how to talk to Mariah tonight, but tomorrow, she would make the opportunity.

  It was easier than she thought. An hour before the afternoon show was due to start, Mariah put her head round the office door.

  ‘Could I have a word, miss?’

  ‘Of course, Mariah. Come in – sit down. Is everything all right?’

  ‘Yes, miss. That’s to say – well, my lady’s all right, but …’ She had remained standing and now looked down at her polished boots.

  ‘You’re getting bored?’ suggested Dorinda, with a slight smile.

  Mariah went bright red.

  ‘Oh, don’t worry,’ said Dorinda, ‘and please sit down. I was going to ask to speak to you myself today, actually.’

  Mariah sat gingerly on the edge of the chair, looking uncomfortable.

  ‘Were you going to ask if there was anything else you could do to help?’ asked Dorinda. Looking even more uncomfortable, Mariah nodded.

  ‘It must be very awkward for you, now Amy’s working here,’ Dorinda went on. ‘After all, you’re staying at a hotel, so there’s not very much for you to do, and not much for you to do here, either.’

  ‘See, miss,’ said Mariah suddenly and in a rush, ‘I didn’t want to come away from London in the first place, but there was that much talk. Cook used to tell me what the girls heard from other houses. Then when she said we was coming here – well, I tell you, I never thought we’d be here above five minutes. So I thought we’d go home again and things would be back to normal.’

  ‘But there would still be talk.’

  ‘It’d die down, miss. That sort of thing always does. It’s not as if there was any truth in what those women was putting about, and when the Honourable Jeremy don’t call round no more, they’d soon see. I was that put out when he came here.’

  Oh, dear, thought Dorinda. Aloud, she said, ‘But Amy wants to stay, doesn’t she? And you’ll have nothing to do?’

  ‘Well, miss, I could do what I used to do at The Gaiety. You wouldn’t have to pay me, nor nothing. I always helped the girls with their dresses and make up and suchlike. I know they all do their own here, but they might like a hand now and then. And I can help Maude with the costumes, there always seems to be something wants mending.’