The cop didn’t seem convinced. He grunted the police equivalent of harumph, and turned back to the director. “What were they doing?”
“They were playing a scene. They were doing okay. Not great, but okay. This was the first rehearsal off book-that means without scripts-and they had to be prompted a few times. No more than average, still it’s hard to get any pace going when you keep blowing the lines.”
“That’s a fascinating inside look at theater,” the cop said dryly. “But I have this dead body.”
The director flushed. “Yes, of course. Anyway, they got to the point where Fletcher hands Stanley the silver samovar and he keeled over dead.”
“You say he handed Stanley the whatjamacallit?”
“Samovar. Yes, sir.”
“And that would be this gentleman here?” He fixed me with a steely gaze.
“That’s right.”
“Then you must have been rather close to him.” He tried to say it casually, without insinuation.
“I was standing right next to him.”
“And you two were the only ones on stage?” This time, the insinuation crept in.
“Were you thinking of fitting me for handcuffs?”
“This is no laughing matter, Mr. Hastings.”
“Yes, I know.” I tried to appear properly grave. Still, with the officer regarding me seriously as a suspect, it was all I could do to keep from giggling.
“Stanley wouldn’t do anything like that,” the actress playing Emily said. I found myself more favorably disposed toward her, wished I knew her name. The actress playing Charlotte, whose name I did know, said nothing. Emily was looking better, bra or no bra.
The author chimed in. “What’s going to happen to my play?” he wailed.
I was pleased. It distracted the officer from me. He wheeled on the unfortunate man like an elephant about to crush a bug. “That remains to be seen,” he said ominously.
THE COP COMMANDEERED the boys’ locker room and proceeded to interrogate us one by one. First up was the playwright, probably, it occurred to me, just to teach him to keep his mouth shut.
As soon as the cop was gone, all of the actors huddled together, as no one had been assigned to ride herd over us.
“What do we do now? What do we do now?” Charlotte shrieked. I found my opinion of her plummeting, even though her agitated state was causing her chest to rise and fall in a most appealing manner.
“Yeah,” the director put in. “You’re the big P.I., aren’t you? Why don’t you tell us what to do?”
I found the big P.I. remark uncalled for. If I had mentioned casually during some rehearsal or other that I worked as a private investigator, I am sure it was only in response to some direct question by someone in the production, and not an attempt to influence anyone with the fact I had an interesting job.
It annoyed me that I had to keep making such self-assurances.
The stage manager, as he was wont to do, totally misunderstood the director’s statement. “That’s right,” he said. “You’re a professional actor. How does something like this affect the show?”
The question was greeted with audible groans. Luckily, I don’t think the old boy’s hearing was keen enough to notice.
Up on stage, the doctor finished with the corpse, and nodded to the EMS crew to wheel him out.
I excused myself from the actors, hurried across the basketball court, and caught up with the doctor.
I reached in my jacket pocket, pulled out my I.D., flipped it open. “One minute, doc. You got a preliminary cause of death?”
The medical examiner was a thin man with a trim moustache and a languid look. He regarded me with amused eyes. “Nice try. Is that a real I.D., or did you make it yourself?”
“Very funny.” I pointed to the boys’ locker room. “The chief’s in there conducting interviews. It would probably help him a lot to know how the guy died.”
“Thanks for the hint.”
The doctor went out the gym door, following the gurney.
“So, what did you learn?” the director demanded as I rejoined the theater group.
I shook my head. “Doc’s not talking.”
“What does that mean?” Charlotte cried. She seemed particularly concerned.
“It means he doesn’t feel we have a right to know.” I shrugged. “In this assumption he is entirely correct.”
“Oh, hell,” the director sighed.
Charlotte was bouncing up and down in her pullover again. “What are the police gonna ask us? What do we have to say?”
I shrugged. “No big deal. Just tell the truth.”
“About what?”
“Whatever they ask you. Most likely, what were you doing when the guy dropped dead? Were you watching? What did you see?”
“Nothing personal?”
I frowned. “What do you mean?”
Charlotte had her face twisted up into a particularly unappealing knot. “I mean, like, you know. Relationships.”
Oh.
I must say it should have occurred to me. That the studly what’s-his-name and the curvacious Charlotte had been an item. I guess I’d chosen not to see it. Hadn’t wanted to acknowledge the fact that Fletcher was still a ladies’ man, while I was an old married fogey, a noncombatant, totally out of the running.
“If they ask you about relationships, tell them,” I said. “Don’t volunteer anything, but don’t hold anything back. And, for goodness sakes, don’t lie.”
“Even about something like that?” Emily said. “What difference could it make?”
“Police mentality,” I explained. “If they catch you in a lie, they’ll think you committed the crime.”
“Oh,” Emily said. She didn’t look pleased.
I blinked. Good lord. Emily, too? Wasn’t she married? I was almost sure she was married.
At a rumble of voices off to my left, I turned to find the director and playwright arguing hotly. The bone of contention was obviously the play, though what the dispute was I couldn’t imagine. It was, of course, recasting. The only reason I didn’t think of it was I was so caught up in the homicide.
“Dean moves up,” the director said.
“Not on your life,” the playwright told him. “No way Dean plays that part.”
“Well, who’s gonna do it, you?”
“At least I know the lines.”
“Yes, but you don’t look that part.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“Barnaby, give it a rest.”
“I look the part as much as Dean does.”
“I’ll get someone.”
“Who?”
“I’ll get someone.”
“Not without my approval.”
“You approved Dean.”
“Not for that part, I didn’t.”
My brain was having trouble catching up with the situation (which, as my wife could tell you, is a normal circumstance for me), but apparently while I was calming the fears of the two actresses, the playwright had returned from the locker room, and Dean, evidently the actor playing the part of Ralph, had been summoned to it. Which was why the two men felt free to disparage his acting talent so openly and bluntly. Besides having a very small part in the play, the actor Dean seemed by far the least likely murder suspect, but, hey, mine was not to reason why; if the police wanted him that was their business.
Dean was out about five minutes later and sent the director in.
The playwright immediately pounced on Dean, wanting to know what he’d been asked, what was going on, and whether the police seemed inclined to shut down the play.
Dean (I would say Mr. Dean, but I wasn’t sure whether it was his first or last name), wasn’t helpful. I saw at once why the playwright wouldn’t want him in the part. He was a tall, shy, nerdy man, with a particularly nasal voice. Dean hadn’t really established his presence in the few short lines his character had been given, but his vocal quality was certainly apparent now.
I had to sympathize with the playwright. Dean was younger, taller, thinner, and had hair, but throw in the voice, and Barnaby Farnsworth was an Adonis compared to Dean.