The Cinderella Killer Read online

  In spite of the rain through which he splashed, the front at Eastbourne still retained the Victorian elegance which had once seen it called ‘the Empress of Watering Places’. Lights still shone from the pier, with its blue and white paint, its Victorian Tea Rooms, its Atlantis night club at the end. Charles loved the tacky charm of English seaside towns out of season.

  He felt sure he’d come to Eastbourne with his wife Frances when their daughter Juliet was tiny. Hadn’t they travelled on the trackless Dotto train with her along the seafront? Or was that in Hastings? Whichever, it had been a good memory. Mixing an actor’s life and marriage had seemed very simple then. That reminded him – he must ring Frances.

  By the entrance to the pier he turned away from the front, towards the shabbier hinterland of the town where his digs were. And as he did so, Charles thought about the scene he had just witnessed outside the Sea Dog. He felt pretty sure that the handover of the pistol followed on from what Lefty had said to Kenny, ‘I got what you asked me to get you.’

  Charles also remembered Kenny saying on The Johnny Martin Show that he felt naked without a gun. Maybe there was more to it than that. Maybe, as someone with such a high public profile, Kenny Polizzi was genuinely worried about crackpots and stalkers and carried a gun for self-protection.

  Charles concluded that there probably wasn’t anything sinister about what he had just witnessed. And it wasn’t his business, anyway. But he couldn’t completely clear his mind of the memory.

  The tuna sandwich he found when he got to his digs wasn’t very nice. Though the label carried that day’s date, it tasted like it had spent rather longer on the refrigerated shelf than it should have done. It had certainly had time to get very soggy. Hard to tell where the brown bread stopped and the tuna started.

  Perhaps he should have stayed in the Sea Dog after Kenny and Lefty went, ordered something to eat there. It was a decision Charles had to make quite often in his life. Though some of his meals were boozy, boisterous affairs with other actors, his chosen lifestyle meant that he usually ate on his own. Over the years he’d had a lot of sad sandwiches and melancholy microwaving in his Hereford Road flat or in anonymous digs all over the country.

  Of the bleak alternatives, he actually preferred eating alone in a pub, with only the Times crossword for company. Being with other people – even other people he didn’t know or talk to – was better than being contained within the all too familiar parameters of what he rarely called ‘home’. But he couldn’t do it too often. Even lowly pub food was getting increasingly expensive, and he wasn’t being paid that much as a Broker’s Man.

  In his capacity as a Broker’s Man it had been a bad day’s rehearsal. The Broker’s Men don’t have a lot to do in Cinderella. Indeed in many pantomime versions they don’t even figure. But in the Empire Theatre version they were involved in all the big scenes and had a few moments to themselves. The biggest was near the beginning of the show, when they appeared at Baron Hardup’s shabby castle, threatening to turn him and his daughters out on to the street for non-payment of rent.

  But since this scene also involved the first entrance of Baron Hardup, Charles’ and Mick ‘The Cobra’ Mesquito’s parts had been severely truncated. By the time Kenny had come on, done his routine about Dwight Bredon with all his catchphrases from The Dwight House and sung the show’s signature tune, there wasn’t much time left for the Broker’s Men. Or for much of Cinderella’s plot, come to that.

  In some ways this was a relief to Charles. Though no actor likes having his lines cut, having to be on the stage for less time with Mick ‘The Cobra’ Mesquito was a definite bonus. Charles had worked with quite a few actors who weren’t very good, but never with one who had as little sense of the theatre as Mick Mesquito. Maybe it was a legacy of the cauliflower ears he had received from boxing, but he certainly had a tin ear for dialogue.

  To Charles, having been an actor so long, intonation and emphasis were second nature. He also had an instinctive sense of the rhythm of a line.

  Mick ‘The Cobra’ Mesquito lacked all of these qualities – particularly the sense of rhythm. Which mattered more in the Empire Theatre’s Cinderella than it might in other shows because most of the script was written in rhyming couplets. Which Mick Mesquito drove through like a bulldozer.

  For example, take a simple exchange like …

  FIRST BROKER’S MAN: If you don’t give your castle yard up …

  SECOND BROKER’S MAN: We will make you, Baron Hardup.

  It doesn’t sound so good if the second speaker ignores the punctuation and makes his line sound like a dire threat of infertility. ‘We will make you barren, Hardup.’

  But that was the kind of thing that came up constantly in rehearsal. If a line could be mangled, then Mick ‘The Cobra’ Mesquito would mangle it. Charles tried very gently to push him in the direction of the right intonation, but to no avail. The former boxer wasn’t offended by these attempts to help; he just clearly couldn’t hear the difference between the way Charles said the lines and the way he did. And, needless to say, their director Bix Rogers was far too busy staging another massive musical number to devote any attention to the spoken bits of the script.

  So Charles didn’t reckon being half of a double act with Mick ‘The Cobra’ Mesquito was going to be the most fulfilling role of his theatrical career. It reminded him of being part of another pairing in Hamlet at Hornchurch. And of the review that that performance elicited. ‘Charles Paris seemed unsure as to whether he was Rosencrantz or Guildenstern and, quite honestly, the way he played the part, who cared?’ Romford Recorder.

  After finishing his soggy sandwich, Charles poured himself a large measure of Bell’s. He’d have liked some ice in it, but although his self-catering digs did boast a fridge, he had omitted to refill the ice tray. He would have liked to settle down to the Times crossword, but there had been sufficient longueurs for him to have completed it at rehearsal.

  The digs boasted a television too, but a quick zap through the available channels told him that there was nothing he wanted to watch. That seemed to happen increasingly. Particularly with drama. The effort of engaging his interest in a new set of characters was becoming more and more difficult. Was that just a sign of age? Or was it the old thing of feeling jealous of actors who’d got lucrative television work when he hadn’t?

  He looked at the pile of books by his bedside, but nothing appealed. Charles was one of those people who’d always got a book on the go, but the last couple of weeks he’d started a few without finding one that commanded his attention. He found that was often the case when he began rehearsing something. Even when he was only playing a humble Broker’s Man, he found it difficult to focus on anything apart from the show.

  He remembered the thought he’d had walking back along the front. He could ring Frances. They were still married, after all, though the last time they’d spoken she’d sounded more distant than ever. Charles knew his track record as a husband wasn’t great. Young actresses were an occupational hazard of his profession, but it was a while now since he had even the mildest skirmish with anyone of the opposite sex. That made him feel almost virtuous.

  At times he wondered whether he really was past all that. The mornings he woke up alone with an arid hangover it seemed impossible to imagine that bed had ever been a place of such all-consuming pleasure. And he was getting older too. Maybe his libido was just fading away like the pain from an old injury.

  He’d have that thought for days, sometimes even weeks. Yes, it was all over. Charles Paris had made love for the last time. The thought made him walk around in numb despair.

  But then when he was on the tube he’d catch the swirl of a skirt or the wobble of a bottom … or he’d find himself after rehearsal chatting to some extraordinarily well-constructed assistant stage manager … and lust came surging back like a rainstorm in the desert, carrying all before it and enabling all kinds of hopes and fantasies to spring up in its wake. And he knew it wasn’t all quite over y
et.

  He still felt lust for Frances too, but that was more complicated. He’d let her down so many times. There had been many rapprochements and many heartfelt vows from Charles to mend his ways. And he always meant what he said when he said it, when he was with Frances. But somehow when he was somewhere else, when he was with someone else … the vows he’d made didn’t seem so important.

  He thought the chances of his ever re-establishing a permanent position in Frances’s bed were remote.

  Still, he did want to ring her that evening. He needed to talk to her. He still loved her, after all. In a way. Ernest Dowson’s most famous line came unbidden into his head. ‘I have been faithful to thee, Cynara, in my fashion.’ But he feared it wasn’t a definition of ‘faithful’ that Frances would accept.

  He was fairly confident, though, that she still felt something for him. But not confident enough to ask her to define what that something was.

  The phone rang for a long time. He was about to ring off when Frances answered. She sounded very tired. Of course, Charles reminded himself, getting towards the end of the autumn term. Everything that needed to be sorted out running up to Christmas. Always tough for a headmistress. (It was strange, Charles never thought about it at any other time, but the minute he got back in touch with Frances, he reminded himself how the rhythm of her year was dictated by school terms and holidays.)

  ‘Hi, it’s Charles.’

  ‘Oh. To what do I owe this rare pleasure?’

  ‘Well, I just thought … we haven’t been in touch for a while.’

  ‘That is certainly true.’ Was Charles imagining it or did he actually hear his wife stifling a yawn?

  ‘So I’m making up for lost time.’

  ‘I sometimes think, Charles, that you have already lost so much time, there isn’t enough time left in the world for you to make it up.’

  He was rather afraid that what she’d said wasn’t a joke, but he laughed at it all the same.

  ‘Anyway, Frances, how are you?’

  There was a slight pause before she said, ‘Fine.’

  ‘Good.’

  ‘And you?’

  ‘Not so bad.’

  ‘Working?’

  ‘Yes, I actually am … so there’s a novelty.’

  ‘Doing what?’

  ‘Well, I’m in this … Surely I told you?’

  ‘You haven’t been in touch for three months, Charles.’

  ‘Three months? I can’t believe it’s as long as—’

  ‘Three months,’ Frances confirmed in a manner that excluded further argument. ‘So what is it you’re doing?’

  Charles gave a quick summary of how he ended up playing a Broker’s Man in Cinderella at the Empire Theatre Eastbourne. ‘And the star – well, the guy who’s playing Baron Hardup – is none other than Kenny Polizzi.’

  ‘Name’s vaguely familiar. Remind me.’

  ‘Star of The Dwight House.’

  ‘I’ve heard of the show, don’t think I’ve ever seen it.’

  Charles reminded himself that Frances had never watched much television. Too busy marking most evenings. And when she did watch something, it tended to be serious documentaries or drama. She’d never shared his taste for crap television.

  ‘Well, take my word for it – he’s a big name.’

  ‘Ah.’ Once again Frances sounded impossibly weary.

  ‘Are you all right?’

  ‘Yes. I hope so.’

  ‘What do you mean by that?’

  ‘Oh, it’s probably nothing.’

  ‘You can’t say that, Frances.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Well, you can’t just leave things in the air. “Oh, it’s probably nothing” is about the most worrying thing anyone can say to anyone. It opens out too many possibilities. What’s the matter? Are you ill?’

  ‘I hope not.’

  ‘What does that mean?’

  Frances sighed a long, weary sigh. ‘I had to go to the hospital last week for some tests.’

  ‘Tests for what?’

  ‘I’ve got a lump.’

  ‘A lump on your breast?’

  ‘Yes. As I say, it’s probably nothing. But they took a biopsy at the hospital and it’s being checked out, and I’m sure I’ll find out it’s nothing.’

  Charles felt terrible, as if everything solid in his life was suddenly crumbling away. ‘Frances, does anyone else know about this?’

  ‘Of course. I’ve told most of my friends. If it is breast cancer, then it’s good to have a network of support. And don’t worry, it’s a very curable disease these days.’

  ‘Does Juliet know?’

  ‘Of course she does.’

  ‘And Miles?’

  ‘Yes.’

  That seemed to hurt even more. The thought that his loathed son-in-law, the one who had the temerity to call him ‘Pop’, knew about the situation while he didn’t was extraordinarily painful.

  He couldn’t put off the question any longer. ‘Why didn’t you tell me, Frances?’

  She sighed again. ‘Because, Charles, there didn’t seem any point in worrying you unnecessarily. I’m doing quite enough worrying for both of us.’

  ‘But I am your husband.’

  ‘No longer a very good argument, Charles.’

  ‘But—’

  ‘I was going to ring you after I’d got the results of the biopsy.’

  ‘When will that be?’

  ‘They said it’d be about a week, so … Friday with a following wind. May take longer. You never know.’

  ‘I’ll definitely ring you Friday,’ said Charles. ‘When I get a break in rehearsal. Promise I’ll do that.’

  ‘OK,’ said the tired voice. ‘And then hopefully I’ll just be able to tell you that everything is fine.’

  ‘Yes.’ He was silent for a moment, then couldn’t help asking, ‘But, Frances, why didn’t you tell me before?’

  ‘What would have been the point, Charles?’

  ‘But it makes me feel like I’m not part of your life.’

  ‘If you’re not, whose fault is that?’ He couldn’t supply an answer. ‘I’d have told you if you’d rung me, Charles.’

  FOUR

  NAUSEA: My sister and I are fastidious.

  DYSPEPSIA: Yes, I’m fast and she’s hideous.

  Charles Paris was preoccupied during the following day’s rehearsals. Nobody noticed anything different about him – he was normally one of the quieter members of the company – but his mind kept turning back to thoughts of Frances. He wasn’t by nature good at finding out positive scenarios, and had a tendency to think the worst. The worst he could think about Frances’s situation was pretty grim. The thought of the threat to her, the idea that she might not always be in his life, hurt like physical pain. And he could not lose the feeling that he was somehow to blame for what was happening to her.

  The Broker’s Men were not involved much in the day’s rehearsals, but Charles stayed around St Asaph’s Church Halls. He didn’t want to be on his own with his worries. Bix Rogers was off in the main hall, elaborating the choreography for Tilly Marcus’s ‘Dance With Your Body’ routine, and in the smaller hall the Ugly Sisters, Baron Hardup and Buttons were rehearsing their kitchen slapstick scene (which preceded Dandini’s arrival with invitations to Prince Charming’s ball).

  This was another area of the pantomime where virtually no script existed, but Danny Fitz had taken charge, trying to coach his fellow actors into a routine that might well have been a hundred years old. There was a lot of water, flour and dough involved, so it was one of those scenes for which a protective sheet had to be ceremoniously laid down on the stage.

  The participants were meant to be making a cake and Buttons kept being sent off to fetch the necessary components – or rather to fetch the wrong components. Thus, when ordered by Nausea and Dyspepsia to fetch the ‘ingredients’, he came back with a jar full of ‘greedy ants’. And when asked to bring ‘flour’, he returned with a single rose, prom
pting the following exchange:

  NAUSEA: What’s that?

  BUTTONS: You said get a little flower. So I got one.

  NAUSEA: Not that kind of flower. What sort is it anyway?

  BUTTONS: It’s a chrysanthemum.

  NAUSEA: No, it’s not, it’s a rose.

  BUTTONS: It’s a chrysanthemum.

  NAUSEA: It’s a rose.

  BUTTONS: It’s a chrysanthemum.

  NAUSEA: All right. Spell chrysanthemum.

  BUTTONS: Errrr … It’s a rose.

  Danny Fitz had an amazing memory for such sequences of crosstalk. He had been playing dames for over thirty years and was like a walking encyclopedia of the genre. The trouble was, though, that he had such respect for the ancient pantomime routines that he didn’t like to see a single detail of them changed.

  Which had been fine when he had been working with Bobby Crowther, who had been as well drilled in the tradition as Danny himself. But Bobby was dead and it wasn’t going so well trying to recreate the scenes with Kenny Polizzi, Tad Gentry and Felix Fisher. None of them could see why they should stick to the script that Danny remembered so exactly. And each of them thought they could make the routine funnier by adding jokes of their own.

  This was a particular problem with Buttons. With his background in outrageous stand-up, Felix had a lot of experience in holding an audience’s attention and in ad-libbing. But he had very little experience of working with other actors. Stand-ups are rarely team players. So he didn’t like having the creaky structure of an old-fashioned slapstick routine imposed on him. And he reckoned he could come up with better lines than the ones that Danny was trying to make him say.

  And although Buttons was meant to be a step on the way to becoming a family-friendly performer, Felix’s stand-up training told him he could always get a laugh by being crude.

  For example, Danny was trying to get him to say the following lines:

  BUTTONS: How can I tell when this cake’s cooked?