‘How was the second run of the last scene?’ asked Jude tentatively.
‘Terrible,’ Davina replied. ‘I didn’t think anything could be worse than the first run at it, but that lot proved it was possible.’ She didn’t seem upset. The outburst seemed to have given her increased confidence. There was even a slight twinkle in her eye.
Catching this, Jude said, ‘Did you stage it?’
‘My tantrum? Yes, of course I did.’ The twinkle had now become a grin, which Davina was having hard work suppressing. She didn’t want her secret to be known to the rest of the company.
‘It’s a very effective tactic,’ she went on. ‘I know enough about acting to control when I do it. And because I’m normally sweet and chummy to everyone, the effect is devastating.’
‘So you don’t do it often?’ said Carole.
‘Ooh no. It wouldn’t work if I did it often. I ration myself to one tantrum per production – sometimes not even one. The longer I go without throwing my toys out of the pram, the more effective it is when I do. And everyone in The Devil’s Disciple really did need a kick up the arse. They’re all getting very lazy and lackadaisical.’
‘I suppose that’s the effect of the long rehearsal period,’ suggested Jude.
Davina nodded. ‘Yes, it can seem to drift on forever. Then suddenly you’re within days of the Dress Rehearsal and it all gets very scary.’
‘Yes,’ said Carole, wanting to move the conversation into investigative mode. ‘Do you think the production would have been in as bad a state if you still had Ritchie Good playing Dick Dudgeon?’
The director shrugged. ‘We might not have to stop as often as we do when Olly cocks up another line, but I don’t think it’d make a great difference. There’s a kind of rhythm to a production, you know. About a month before the show actually opens, rehearsals always tend to get a bit ragged and chaotic. But the thing with Olly and his words, that is quite serious. I was wondering, Carole, if you wouldn’t mind doing a bit of “one-on-one” with him.’
‘I’m sorry?’ said Carole stiffly. ‘I don’t know what you mean by “one-on-one”.’
‘Just line-bashing.’
‘What?’
‘A sort of extension of your job as prompter. If you could spend an evening with Olly, one night when we’re not rehearsing, just going through the text line by line. That might make some of them stick to the Teflon interior of his brain.’
‘Oh. Well, I’d be prepared to have a go, I suppose … if you think it might help.’
‘I can guarantee it would help. I’ll tell him to have a word with you. See if you can sort something out.’
‘Very well.’
Jude, also keen to move on to what they really wanted to talk about, said, ‘By the way, Carole and I were honoured yesterday.’
‘Oh yes?’
‘We got invited to one of Elizaveta’s “drinkies things”.’
‘Did you? Maybe she’s trying to keep up the numbers.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘You may have been invited to replace me.’
‘Oh?’
‘Yes, I used to be a regular at those, certainly always went when Freddie was alive. But recently I’ve become persona non grata, so far as Elizaveta’s concerned.’
‘Do you have any idea why?’ asked Jude.
Davina grinned enigmatically. ‘I have a few thoughts on the subject.’
Carole went for the bald and bold approach, asking, ‘Do any of them have anything to do with the star pendant that Freddie Dalrymple gave you?’
There was a silence. Davina looked calculatingly from one woman to the other. ‘What do you know about that?’
‘You were wearing it when I met you in the Crown and Anchor.’
‘Ah yes. So I was. Normally, if I’m doing anything to do with SADOS, I keep it covered.’
Jude chipped in, ‘Len here told us what was engraved on the back of it.’
‘Hm.’
‘Just like, presumably, what is engraved on the back of the one he gave to Elizaveta?’
‘Yes. And to who knows how many other of Freddie’s “little friends”.’ Davina looked rueful, but she made no attempt to deny anything. ‘Freddie Dalrymple was basically rather a dirty old man.’
‘Was he?’
‘He had a flat in Worthing, on the seafront. That was where he used to go, as he used to tell Elizaveta, to “plan his productions”.’
‘So she never went there?’
‘No. Which was probably just as well.’
‘But you did go there?’
Davina nodded. ‘I, and, as I say, who knows how many others.’
‘Elizaveta told us that, as a director, Freddie took you “under his wing”.’
‘Yes. Not just his wing. Also his duvet.’
‘Oh.’
‘I did love him.’
‘Right.’
‘My father died when I was in my early teens. I think the older man always …’
Just like Hester Winstone, thought Jude, a pattern of going for the older man.
‘Presumably,’ said Carole, ‘Elizaveta had no idea anything was going on?’
‘No, I really think she didn’t. She was wedded, not only to Freddie, but to the image of the perfect marriage that she and Freddie shared. I think it suited her not to know what Freddie got up to in Worthing.’
‘But when she saw your pendant …’ said Jude.
‘Yes. I realized I’d lost it, but I didn’t know where. The clasp’s loose – or it was, I’ve had it repaired. It must have slipped off in here during the post-pantomime cast party. And then when Len showed it to Elizaveta after the Devil’s Disciple read-through …’
‘I remember. You said you didn’t wear that kind of jewellery.’
‘Well, I couldn’t claim it right then and there, could I? In front of Elizaveta?’
‘But you came back a few days later to get it?’ Davina nodded. ‘And Len told Elizaveta who’d claimed it.’
‘I think, Jude, to be fair to Len, it was his wife who told her.’
‘And was that why she stormed out of the production?’
‘Yes. The flare-up with Ritchie was something she staged. She provoked him into being so rude to her. It gave her an excuse to stomp out. But the real reason was that she couldn’t stand being around me once she knew that Freddie and I had … it must have hit her quite hard.’
‘Do you think,’ asked Carole, ‘that she hoped her departure – and the departure of all her supporters – would totally screw up your production of The Devil’s Disciple?’
‘That may have been at the back of her mind. She doesn’t think that anything can happen in SADOS if she’s not involved. And whereas that might have been true while Freddie was still around, I don’t think it is any longer. Thanks to you, Jude, for stepping in to play Mrs Dudgeon.’
‘But of course,’ said Carole stepping deeper into investigative mode, ‘Elizaveta’s departure wasn’t the only disaster that struck your production, was it?’
‘What? Oh, you mean what happened to Ritchie?’
‘Yes. That was a big setback.’
‘By the way,’ said Jude, ‘did Ritchie ever come on to you?’
‘Oh, when we first met, yes, of course. He had a kind of knee-jerk reaction to chat up any woman he met. He didn’t get far with me, though. Freddie was still alive, and I was far too caught up with him for anyone else to get a look-in.’
‘And what about Ritchie’s death?’ asked Carole.
‘What about it?’
‘Did you think it was an accident?’
‘Well, of course it was. And entirely typical of Ritchie, the way it happened. Like most actors, he was a total show-off. He’d done his show for everyone at the end of rehearsal, but Hester Winstone hadn’t been there, so he had to do a command performance for her. I mean, of course I don’t want anyone to die, but it did serve Ritchie bloody right, didn’t it?’