The London Blitz Murders

NINE





SMASHING SUCCESS





FOR AGATHA, FIRST NIGHTS WERE misery.

She attended the dreaded events for two reasons and two reasons only.

First, after weeks of rehearsal and the building of sets and the gathering of props and costumes and the efforts of so many… the time had finally come; and the poor actors had to go through with it, didn’t they? And she, as the author, felt it only fair to share their misfortune, should things go awry. She was, after all, the instigator of the crime; and one should pay for one’s crimes.

On the opening night of Alibi, for example, the script enjoined the forcing open of a door to reveal a murder victim; but the door had jumped its cue and swung open prematurely, revealing said victim in the act of lowering himself to the floor. Such agonies (and the anticipation thereof) were heightened on first nights and the playwright felt a responsibility to share the torture with her accomplices.

The second reason was far less noble: the thing that killed the cat… curiosity.

Even though she had attended a number of rehearsals, Agatha had only a disjointed sense of the play as performed. Even attending a dress rehearsal—which she had not, in this instance, sitting instead with Inspector Greeno at the Golden Lion, for the interviews that had followed Nita Ward’s murder—did not give an author the full sense of a play.

An audience was required for that—an audience who might laugh in the right or wrong places, an audience who might respond well or in a lukewarm manner or even in sheer walk-out-of-the-damned-thing hostility.

Right now she was just one of that audience, seated unobtrusively to one side, about ten rows from the orchestra. Aware of eyes upon her, and of murmurs of recognition (“There she is,” “That’s her”), she sat quietly with her invited guests on her either side—Sir Bernard Spilsbury and Stephen Glanville—waiting for the lights to go down, to provide her with the anonymity she so craved.

Such sentiments considered, she was not quite sure why she adored the theater so, why in her heart of hearts she preferred the role of playwright to that of novelist. In her youth, before she had developed this miserable, horrible shyness, she had performed in plays and given piano and vocal recitals without a care. Perhaps now, in her self-conscious adulthood, she was performing through the actors, personal appearance by proxy.

Or perhaps it had to do with her propensity for living in a world of fantasy, at the center of a self-created, interior stage suited for drama, comedy and her own particular brand of melodrama. She’d had imaginary friends as a child, and even now she heard her characters speak within her and often merely felt the recording secretary of their thoughts and discourse.

She had been accused, by reviewers, of using dialogue as a sort of crutch, of short-changing the art of narrative by leaning so heavily on what the characters said to each other. This technique, she’d been lectured, was simplistic.

Her only defense was the work itself—that publishers and readers accepted this approach. To her, dialogue was the engine of a story, and perhaps she was not a novelist at all; perhaps she was a dramatist who occasionally staged her productions within the covers of a book.

Tonight, however, the play would be staged at the St. James Theatre, and she must endure all of the attention and folderol attendant with any opening night. The after-party would be held at the Savoy, and the procession of Rolls Royces that would carry “celebrities” such as herself and the director and producer to the theater began there, as well.

(The publicity-averse Sir Bernard had chosen not to participate in this indignity, and arranged to meet her later at the theater; he’d even offered to give Stephen a lift, and Agatha savored with pixie-ish glee the thought of cool and collected Professor Glanville being subjected to a wild ride with the Mr. Toad who was Sir Bernard Spilsbury.)

A West End opening, like everything else in wartime, required adjustments. The play would begin at seven p.m., not eight, and the caravan of celebrities had begun at six, prior to nightfall and the blackout. This allowed the event to include flash photographers and an illuminated marquee and a general emulation of the giddy hysteria of a pre-war premiere, even though the bombed-out remains of Willis Sale Rooms next door, and the ravaged Christie’s Auction House across the way, provided stark reminders of reality.

Often scavengers, poor things, were seen digging through the rubble of these buildings, the once-grand Willis in particular. The bobbies had no doubt chased any such unfortunates away, before the red carpet and velvet ropes were put in place at the St. James; the war-zone reminders of the Willis site and Christie’s across the street could not be banished, but the ragtag homeless, the war refugees of London, could be chased away, temporarily, at least.

Agatha, sharing her Rolls with Larry Sullivan, frowned at this bitter irony—again, she could only wonder if the homicidal frivolities she dispensed had any place in this war-torn world.

A surprising crowd awaited them, held back by constables, and timidly she smiled and waved at the blur of people who shouted, “Agatha! Agatha!” at her, as if she were a film star; oddly, the real star of stage and screen at her side, portly Francis L. Sullivan (looking rather like a head waiter in his evening dress), received fewer of these complimentary catcalls than she.

Certainly Agatha did not feel like a film star. She felt like an overweight middle-aged woman, rather embarrassingly stuffed into a navy chiffon pleated evening gown that had been purchased several seasons (and two stone) ago. Her fur coat, however, hid a multitude of sins, and the passage down the red carpet and into the lobby was blessedly brief.

The lobby was closed off to the public, and a small cocktail-party-style gathering of the principals—excluding the actors, of course, who like brides before the wedding must not be seen—was under way, the night’s nervous participants milling about sharing best wishes (including the quaint American admonishment that they should all “break a leg”) and shaking hands and kissing cheeks and calling each other “darling.”

She sensed a chilliness, however, from several of those who had participated in the recent interrogation at the public house next door.

The cold front had first moved in at the Savoy when Larry Sullivan barely spoke to her. In the backseat of the Rolls Royce, she asked her actor friend if he was miffed with her.

“Miffed?” the portly actor asked, arching an eyebrow. “That hardly states it. How, Agatha, could you participate in that inquisition?”

“If you mean Inspector Greeno’s questioning, I thought it was polite and perfunctory. Really, Larry, we’d all come in contact with a victim in the most notorious murder case of the war. Police queries were inevitable.”

He huffed. “Surely you don’t suspect me of indiscretions.”

So that was it: Larry was not worried that he might be considered a murder suspect, but that his lovely bride, Danae, might hear tales out of school.

“Of course not,” Agatha assured him. “I really don’t believe the inspector has his eye on the St. James bunch at all, at this stage.”

“You mean, because of the other two killings.”

“That’s right. This seems a murder spree, clearly, and any thought that the Ward girl was someone’s murdered mistress has fallen by the roadside.”

Larry’s eyes popped. “Is that what the inspector thought?”

She touched the black sleeve of his tuxedo. “Larry, please. The inspector doesn’t think anything. Let’s save the melodramatics for the stage, shall we?”

Embarrassed, Larry rode in silence for a while, then turned to her with a child’s little smile. “I would just hate for you to have a bad opinion of me, Agatha. I think the world of you.”

“I’m sure you do, darling,” she’d said.

The coldest of them was probably Irene Helier Morris. The actress-turned-director had traded in her mannish rehearsal togs for a lovely black gown that showed off a figure that managed to be willowy and curvaceous at once. Her makeup was perfection, her dark blue eyes highlighted beautifully, her lipstick a bold crimson.

“I’m surprised you didn’t bring your inspector along,” Irene said, with a chilly smile.

“I asked him,” Agatha said, realizing the woman had been trifling with her, “but this loathsome case has him working evenings.”

In a rather premature display of celebration—the curtain had yet to go up, after all—waiters in red jackets threaded through the little party with silver trays of champagne in glasses. Irene plucked one off. Agatha did not—she did not indulge in alcoholic beverages.

“If I didn’t know you better,” Irene said, “I’d think you pulled us into this wretched affair for the publicity.”

“You do know me better.”

“Well, there hasn’t been any press, it’s true. Don’t think I haven’t considered it myself—plays in this climate can use any boost they can get.”

Not sure whether the director was trifling or not this time, Agatha smiled her most winning smile and said, “If you do turn this into a publicity stunt, my dear, neither you nor your husband need approach me again about producing one of my plays…. Excuse me.”

“Agatha,” the director said, touching Agatha’s shoulder—she had already turned away, “forgive me. Opening night jitters.”

Agatha turned and cast a sincere smile at the woman. “I understand. Do know that I think you’ve done a lovely job.”

“It’s a wonderful entertainment. I don’t believe I could have mucked it up if I’d tried.”

Now Agatha gave the director a smile to wonder about. “Oh, I’m sure you could have done, darling.”

Leaving Irene with a confused frown, Agatha found Janet Cummins and her cadet husband, Gordon, standing rather awkwardly against a wall—obviously feeling the outsiders. He was a most handsome boy in his blue uniform, and Janet was a knockout, proving the truth behind the cliché of a secretary turned raving beauty by taking off her eyeglasses. Janet’s full-bosomed figure was well-served by a pink off-the-shoulder gown.

“Well, Airman Cummins,” Agatha said and offered her hand.

He took it and half-smiled. “I’m afraid I don’t know whether to shake this or kiss it.”

“Entirely your choice.”

He shook it and all three of them laughed lightly.

“You are ravishing,” Agatha told Janet. “You belong up on that stage.”

The producer’s secretary beamed and all but blushed. Her complexion was peaches and cream and her brunette hair was nicely curled. The thought that Airman Cummins would have any need to go trolling among streetwalkers, with this pretty, voluptuous wife at hand, struck Agatha as absurd.

“I’m afraid,” Janet said, in belated response to Agatha’s compliment, “that my childhood ambitions to be an actress were quashed by a terrible strain of stage fright.”

“I suffer the same malady,” Agatha admitted. To the RAF cadet, she said, “I’m so delighted you could get leave for this evening.”

“Actually, I had picket duty again, but your friend Stephen Glanville, at the Air Ministry, arranged it for me. I have the whole night off to spend with Janet, don’t have to report in till nine a.m. He’s a true gentleman, Mr. Glanville is.”

“He is indeed. He’ll be here tonight. I’m expecting him momentarily.”

“I feel a fool, Mrs. Mallowan,” the cadet said, “not bringing a book for you to sign.”

“Did you forget?”

“Well… I thought it might be bad form, considering the occasion.”

“Nonsense. I’ll fix you up at a later date.”

His grin was infectiously boyish. “I’m so anxious to see how you’ve made this one into a play. The book ended so… finally.”

“I warned you before, young man—I’ve changed the ending. I hope you won’t be disappointed. Perhaps you can give me an honest appraisal, after the performance.”

“If I like it,” he said, “I’ll gush with praise.”

“And if you don’t?”

He shrugged. “I’ll gush with praise.”

They all laughed again and Agatha excused herself, to respond to Bertie Morris. The round producer with the matinee idol’s face stood off to one side, motioning at her frantically.

She joined him and said, “Why the semaphores, Bertie?”

“I need a favor. The critic from the Times desires the briefest of interviews.”

“Well, then, here it is: no.”

“But Agatha…”

“No. And if, at curtain, you try to ‘surprise’ me by requesting that I respond to the ‘author, author’ outcries with a speech, I will refuse… perhaps not graciously.”

“Not a speech… just a few words…”

“Bertie, must we have this conversation again? I cannot make speeches. I never make speeches. I won’t make speeches.”

“But Agatha…”

“And it is a very good thing that I don’t make speeches, because I should be so very bad at them.”

Bertie’s expression of disappointment melted into a warm smile. “Well, I had to try, didn’t I, darling?”

She returned the smile. “I suppose you did.”

“You’ve written a simply wonderful play.”

“I would settle for ‘good.’ ”

The producer chuckled, but the warmth in his eyes seemed genuine. “Agatha, in your quiet way, you are the most difficult prima donna of them all.”

“Bertie, you alone of the people I have called ‘darling’ tonight truly are… ‘darling,’ that is. And thank you.”

“Whatever for?”

“Well, for producing my play, for one thing, and selecting your lovely talented wife to direct, for another, as well as assembling such a fine cast in wartime. But also for being the only participant in those Golden Lion interviews, the other day, who hasn’t chastised me.”

“Oh, that! I thought it was exciting. A police inspector asking questions about a murder—rather like one of your plays!”

He seized a glass of champagne from a passing tray and moved on.

Twenty minutes later, Agatha was sitting in her inconspicuous seat off to one side between her two extremely handsome escorts—Stephen Glanville and Sir Bernard Spilsbury.

“Did you enjoy the ride?” she whispered to Stephen.

His eyes widened, and he whispered back: “I’ll have my revenge one day, my dear…. Didn’t you invite our inspector friend?”

“You’re the second person to ask me that. He’s working on the murders even as we speak.”

Stephen’s expression grew serious. “It still troubles me, you in the midst of that grotesque Grand Guignol. Tell me, are you having nightmares?”

“Not at all,” she lied. Well, sort of lied: the murder scenes had not turned up in her dreams; but the Gunman of her childhood nightmares had been with her every night this week.

She turned to Sir Bernard. “Thank you for accepting my invitation.”

“I had to miss a concert for this, you know,” he told her with a sideways glance that seemed vaguely reproving.

Agatha touched her bosom. “Oh, dear no…”

“Yes. It’s on the BBC this evening.”

And he smiled a little.

She chuckled. Those who considered Sir Bernard an aloof stuffed shirt didn’t know him very well.

“I feel privileged,” he was saying, “to accompany the author to a first night. And as possibly the only human being in the British Empire who has not yet enjoyed one of your thrillers, I look forward to the experience.”

Moved, she took Sir Bernard’s hand and squeezed it in thanks.

Stephen looked past Agatha to say to the pathologist, “A word of advice, Sir Bernard—if you figure out the mystery, don’t tell her. Annoys the bloody hell out of her.”

Agatha said, “Stephen,” sharply, but was amused.

Also, he was right. Max had figured out the novel tonight’s play was based upon, and she had never forgiven him.

The lights dimmed, and an expectant audience burst into applause. Bertie Morris came out on stage into the spotlight to welcome the first-night audience and Agatha did not hear a word of his speech, which wasn’t very long. She was nervous, as if about to go on stage herself.

But she needn’t have been. The performance—by a splendid cast that included Henrietta Watson, Linden Travers, Percy Walsh, Terence de Marney, Allan Jeayes, Eric Cowley and Gwyn Nichols—was letter perfect; no corpses were up and around (at least no unscripted corpses) and the audience tittered and even laughed at her occasional dark humor, gasping in collective fright and surprise at all the appropriate moments.

She was pleased. She liked the play and admired what Bertie and Irene had done with it. And the audience applauded long and loud, Agatha losing count of the curtain calls. At the end Bertie came out and introduced Irene, who bowed and spoke briefly; to the cries of “author, author,” Bertie gestured to Agatha in the audience and—reluctantly, terribly embarrassed—she stood and took a little bow.

The audience rose to its feet—her first standing ovation! How wonderful; and the applause ringing off the rafters was sheer music.

And Bertie, God bless him, had done no more than introduce her in the audience—no attempt to shame her into a dreaded speech.

When the lights came up, she did stand in the aisle and speak to a number of audience members, and consented to sign programs, novels and autograph books. She did not mind speaking, briefly, one person to another, with an intelligent fan. And anyone who liked her work qualified as that. Around such friendly, ordinary people as these theater patrons, her self-consciousness and nervousness were blissfully absent.

For that reason she became the last of the celebrity guests who would be chauffeured by Rolls Royce to the Savoy. Even the actors were able to remove their makeup and trade their costumes for evening wear before Agatha had finished tending to her adoring public (“Best you’ve written, dearie!” “First class—thumbs up, I’d say!” “V-signs for this one!” “Loved every minute!”).

The caravan of Rolls Royces had to make several trips, and Agatha waited in the theater lobby, away from the glass doors, for her ride to come. The fuss, thankfully, was over. The street outside the theater was empty but for Janet Cummins and her cadet; Janet had been assigned to look after Agatha, as the rest went on, Rolls by Rolls, to the party in a private room at the Savoy.

Only a handful of theater employees remained—even the ushers were gone; an assistant manager was tending to matters in the box-office booth. While she waited for her ride, she strolled back into the theater. The curtain was up, revealing the set of a lavish modern living room with balcony windows looking out on a painted sea.

A question had been answered for her tonight.

She had witnessed and heard the response of a wartime audience to her play, which was one of her most particularly bloodthirsty—seven murders and a suicide. And they had loved it—every blessed ghoulish minute of it.

These were terrible times indeed—from the atrocities of the war itself to the current spate of West End sex murders in which she’d allowed herself to become embroiled.

And never had the escapist fare she served up been more gratefully received, like much-needed nourishment. When the post-war world came, she would fit in just fine. She might make the books a little deeper, psychologically, to cater to a public not so innocent, as in golden days; and, thanks to her experiences with Inspector Greeno and Sir Bernard, she would take pains to make the police and legal procedures more accurate and realistic.

But other than that, the “sausage factory” (as she thought of herself) would stay in business, thank you very much.

Feeling as though a weight had been lifted from her shoulders, she walked back into the lobby and the explosion shook the building like a giant cannonball and threw her to the slanting floor, where she in her furs and finery went rolling into a corner between the box office and the stairwell, as the entire lobby caved in, the sounds of it beyond deafening, an avalanche of building materials raining down, sending up clouds of dust and powder.

Someone screamed—not Agatha; a woman on the street, probably Janet Cummins. Dazed, ears ringing, Agatha pulled into the corner even more, as the ceiling continued to pour down in unceremonious chunks, stirring pulverized brick and stone and mortar into cloud upon filthy cloud.

Then—a settling….

She took stock of herself, and her situation.

She could not stand—a portion of the ceiling slanted across, caught against the side of the box office, forming a little room four feet by five. She was covered in the filthy aftermath of the explosion, but did not seem to be injured. Using her nurse’s knowledge, she checked herself carefully, as the caved-in lobby continued to settle itself with groans and grating.

Perhaps her ankle was sprained.

Nothing more seemed wrong. She’d been flung to the floor and she’d rolled to a stop, but no bones were broken and she had suffered no concussion. Breathing was difficult, with the dust-filled air, and she covered her face with a handkerchief from the pocket of her fur coat, which had itself helped cushion her fall.

So in that sense she’d been lucky.

She could hear voices beyond the fallen slabs and wreckage of the former lobby, but could not make them out. No air-raid siren had preceded the blast, nor was one now cutting the night—that she would hear, despite the blockage.

If not an air raid, what could have happened?

And then, as she knotted the handkerchief around her face like a bandit, she remembered the rubble next door that had been the lavish Willis Sale Rooms, a favorite spot of scavengers and looters. Perhaps they had made an unintended discovery: an unexploded bomb.

That would explain her current situation.

She glanced overhead and saw that slanting slab, the remnant of the former roof that was her current ceiling, and it seemed to be shifting, ever so slightly, creaking like the ancient hinges of a door in a haunted-house film, spitting pebbles and grit.

Beneath the handkerchief, she smiled bitterly.

And so it had come to this: Agatha Christie (not Mallowan), the originator of so much mayhem, caught like a mouse in a trap, waiting for the ceiling to fall in and kill her.

What a terrible thing it was, possessing a heightened sense of irony: the only thing in all the world that truly frightened her was the thought of being buried alive. She had avoided the air-raid shelters for this very reason, staying in bed with a pillow over her face.

Well, she had no pillow here, did she? But she would remain calm. She would not give in to this phobia. She would not become a silly hysterical old woman.

Examining the pile of rubble before her, roughly parallel to where the street would be, she got on her hands and knees and, still in her fur coat, began to dig her way out. She had no trouble for a while, feeling good about the effort.

But then that slab ceiling shifted and dropped and she let out a little scream.

The wall and other debris caught the slab, preventing it from squashing her, but that “ceiling” was only a few angled inches above her head, now. She was in a coffin. Buried alive. A Poe-like death for Agatha Christie…

Praying (not for herself, for Max and Rosalind and any grandchildren who might one day be born), she kept at it, pawing at the rubble, clearing the way of little pieces, bigger pieces, and was making progress until she reached a larger block of sideways ceiling, not unlike the slab overhead. She could not get a grip on it; and had she been able to have done, she would not have had the strength to move the thing….

Breathing heavily under the handkerchief now, she slumped and exhaustion seductively whispered in her ear, fatigue stroking her every muscle, bone and sinew: rest. Sleep. Wait. Someone will come…

… death, perhaps.

And the impasse before her, the slab of ceiling, moved, as if of its own accord.

She could hear the grunt of a manful effort being made, and then that slab slid away, and for just a moment she had a glimpse of a face—the young cadet!—and the street…

… and then more detritus rained down and filled the opening.

But between the two of them, Agatha and her cadet savior, the way was cleared; another slab of ceiling provided shelter from the fragments above, making a passageway, and she reached out her arms to the boy and he grasped her hands and pulled her, ever so gently and yet firmly, through the aperture.

He helped her to her feet, saying, “Mrs. Mallowan, dear God, are you all right?”

She hugged the cadet and smiled into those boyish handsome features and said, “I have never been better… thanks to you, young man.”

A sudden lurching sound behind them, a crunching and crashing of shifting wreckage, drew their immediate startled attention: the passageway through which Agatha had escaped no longer existed.

But she did.

She touched the boy’s cheek and whispered, “Thank you, my dear.”

He lowered his eyes, chagrined. “My motive was selfish—I couldn’t abide the thought of this world without your books.”

The street was filled now, with spectators and constables and a banshee scream that was not an air-raid siren, rather the announcement of the impending arrival of firemen.

Janet Cummins was fussing over the rescued writer, and helping Agatha brush herself off; there was something comical, farcical about standing in a fur coat and evening gown, layered with powdery filth. The air out here was breathable, but also suffused with a dirty haze; the voices of the constables were raised, attempting to secure order.

Agatha, remarkably clearheaded, said, “Was anyone else in the theater? Wasn’t someone in the box office?”

“That was Clemens,” Janet said, “the assistant manager. He was in his office, locking the money box in the safe. He was unaffected by the explosion—the lobby took the full force of the blast. He was able to get out a side exit.”

“A UXB, probably,” Agatha said. “Some poor scavenger went to heaven in a hurry, I daresay.”

And at that moment, finally, her ride came, the Rolls Royce rolling up grandly. The liveried chauffeur emerged wide-eyed as Agatha approached.

“I am perfectly all right,” she said, “but I wish to be examined at University College Hospital. You will drive me there.”

The chauffeur said, “Yes, ma’am,” and held the rear door open for her.

Janet and her cadet helped Agatha into the backseat of the Rolls.

“We’ll go with you,” Janet said, leaning in, eyes wide with concern.

“Don’t be a silly goose. Take a taxi to the Savoy and report that any rumors of my demise are bound to be at least slightly exaggerated…. Young man… Gordon, isn’t it?”

The cadet leaned in next to his wife. “Yes, ma’am.”

“You remind me so of my first husband. He was a handsome hero, too. How ever can I repay you?”

Covered in filth, the boy’s smile was as white as the rest of him wasn’t. “A signed book would be more than sufficient.”

“Give me your address, then. Write it down.”

Frowning, Janet said, “That can wait. You’re dazed, Mrs. Mallowan.”

“No,” she said. “I will take care of this as soon as I’m home, which will be tonight, if I have anything to say about it. Any special title, Gordon?”

He had found a play program somewhere and was jotting down his address with a pencil. “This is at the receiving center, Mrs. Mallowan. Where I’m billeted… I could use the new Poirot, if you have an extra.”

“Evil Under the Sun,” she said, and smiled.

She reached out for the program, but the smiling airman was still writing.

With his left hand.