Peter Lovesey - Stagestruck

Pidgeon yelled, ‘Guv!’

He rolled left. The weapon whizzed past his ear, struck the upholstery and ripped a gash in the fabric. It was a claw hammer.

Diamond’s reflex action brought him crashing to the stage floor. All he could do from here was make a grab for his attacker’s legs. He got a hand on one leg, but the other kicked his arm away. Even so, he’d done enough to unsettle his assailant. He watched the legs step away, turn and run off the stage.

Now it was down to priorities: go in pursuit, or release Pidgeon? His right arm felt numb after the hammer blow. He was going to need assistance. Besides, he had to find out what he was dealing with. He got to his feet and worked at the tape around Pidgeon’s wrists.

‘Guv, you won’t believe who did this,’ Pidgeon started to say.

‘I don’t need telling,’ Diamond said. ‘Where’s Dawn?’

‘I can’t tell you.’

‘When did you last see her?’

‘I don’t know how long I’ve been here. He grabbed me from behind and put something over my face. I think it was chloroform. When I came to, I was lying here, trussed up.’ The last of the tape parted from his arms. ‘I can untie my feet.’

‘She phoned me,’ Diamond told him. ‘Said she was hiding somewhere between the seats, but she’s not there any more. He means to kill her if he hasn’t already.’

‘Dawn? Why?’

‘There isn’t time to explain. He must have got her backstage.’

‘He could have left the building.’

‘No chance. All the exits are covered. He’s in here somewhere. We need the house lights on. There must be a control room.’

‘Back there.’ Pidgeon pointed towards the auditorium. ‘I’ll see what I can do.’ He finished freeing his legs.

‘Right. I’ll check behind the scenes.’

‘You’re not armed. D’you want my baton?’

‘Keep it. After that whack on the shoulder I couldn’t lift it.’ He crossed to the prompt side, glanced up in the wings to make sure no one was in the DSM’s position, and moved along the passage towards the three main dressing rooms. He located a light switch and was relieved when it worked. On trying each of the doors, he found them locked. What next, then? He could dash upstairs to four, five, six and seven, but would a killer on the run risk being trapped up a staircase that led nowhere else? Anyone so familiar with the layout would surely have taken a route with more chances of escape.

He moved on to the fly floor. Faint beams of light leaking from the other side of the scenery allowed him to see his way at ground level but the vast space above his head could have been the inside of a coffin. For a moment he stopped and listened. There was no sound. It was wise to remember that if the killer was lurking here he, too, had just enough light to see. He edged forward with caution, primed for another hammer attack.

He’d just crossed to stage right when he was stopped in his tracks by a voice speaking his name immediately above his head.

Impossible. Nobody was there.

He heard the hiss of static. He squinted in the poor light and found himself looking at a loudspeaker.

The speaker boomed again. ‘You can stop charging around like a demented elephant. She’s been dead twenty minutes.’

‘You bloody maniac. Where is she?’ he shouted back, and got no reply except the click of a disconnection. ‘You gain nothing by killing her. You’re finished.’

The last word echoed back to him from the fly tower.

He turned and ran back towards the opposite side, thinking that the DSM’s console must be the source, but nobody was there. Obviously there were other points in the building linked to the loudspeaker system.

Dead twenty minutes : callous words spoken with the disregard he expected of this killer. If true, this was the worst outcome imaginable. Dawn Reed was young, inexperienced, brave. The killing of any police officer on duty is rightly treated as the ultimate crime. She’d been here obeying orders, his orders, his alone. He should never have sent her in.

He shuddered, more in horror than fear. Urging himself to concentrate on what he had to do, he accepted that some, at least, of the killer’s words couldn’t be denied. This was, indeed, a pointless pursuit. The building was too large for two men to search. Soon there would be reinforcements he could call on. The arrest would follow. The real urgency had been to save Dawn’s life. How much reliance could he place on the words of a murderer on the run?

In this case, enough for huge concern. This man picked his words with care.

The tannoy crackled again. This time the voice was Pidgeon’s. ‘House lights are on, guv.’

‘Okay, I’m coming,’ he said. His words weren’t going to be heard. He spoke them to release some tension. He moved fast around the outside of the set, pushed open the scenic double doors and crossed the stage. The curtain held none of those childhood fears now.

He parted the heavy lengths of velvet and stepped forward, and the horseshoe auditorium was before him in all its magnificence, the best view of the house you would get, every light now glowing, including the central chandelier. The great actors of seven generations had stood on this spot and delivered curtain speeches. But the significance was lost on Diamond. He was watching for a movement, and there was nothing. No one was in sight.

The sound of a handclap began, a slow, ironic slapping of palms. One pair of unseen hands was mocking his appearance in front of the curtain. He couldn’t tell where it was from, except that it seemed close, not the back of the theatre or the upper tiers. Presently it died away.

If nothing else, he knew for certain that the killer was out front and could see him. Some kind of resolution was imminent.

He decided to remain where he was. This was as good a vantage point as any. Staring out at the rows of empty seats, he tried to picture the sequence of events. Dawn had been out of sight crouching down in the stalls. Presumably she’d been discovered, attacked and taken somewhere nearby. Moving her upstairs would have been impractical.

A voice surprisingly close called out, ‘Do you want a prop? A skull would do nicely.’

He knew who it was. As ever, the words were spoken with deliberation and wrapped in some allusion he didn’t understand. ‘What did you say?’

‘What are you up to, standing centre stage? Is this an audition? You’ll never make a Hamlet, but you might get by as one of the gravediggers.’

He glanced right and left. No one was in front of the curtain with him and the voice hadn’t come from behind. It wasn’t amplified.

‘That’s a clue for you, the Hamlet reference. They always use the trap for the graveyard scene. Her body is below where you are standing, in the understage,’ the voice continued, relishing its advantage. ‘I don’t suppose you knew there was anything down there. You get to it through the band room. No need to hurry, however. You’re too late to make any difference.’

Now he could see the speaker – in the lower of the two boxes to his right: the Agatha Christie, a fitting place for a murderer’s last stand.

Fred Dawkins.

The traitor had been speaking just out of Diamond’s line of sight, masked by the near side of the box. Now he had stepped into view, close enough to shake hands if Diamond were to move along the front edge of the stage.

A handshake was not in the plans of either.

‘Keep your distance. I’m still holding the hammer,’ Dawkins warned. ‘I’ll pay you a compliment, superintendent. I was streets ahead of you before tonight. Now I’m a mere half dozen yards away and I don’t flatter myself that I’ll walk out of this theatre a free man. So let’s exchange some home truths. What changed your mind? You weren’t planning to come here when we last spoke.’