Murder At The Music Hall: (Auguste Didier Mystery 8) Read online

  Auguste studied the most visible of the new clothes, the new brown print gown, fitting over the young breasts and modestly sinking beneath stocking-clad ankles. He compared her briefly with the ladies who strolled the Empire Promenade. ‘No,’ he said. Then, ominously, ‘What is that bundle under your arm, Lizzie?’

  ‘Me working clothes, of course,’ she said in surprise. ‘I can’t work togged up like this, can I?’

  None too gently he wrested the package from her, and threw it in a zinc bin destined for the adjoining wash-house.

  ‘What you doing?’ she howled in anguish.

  ‘Lizzie,’ he said, ‘cook for me, watch for me, help me, and you shall have enough to buy yourself twenty such dresses. Will you do that?’

  Lizzie considered, rather too long to please Auguste entirely. ‘Yus,’ she told him eventually.

  ‘Excellent, ma petite.’ So pleased was he at this non-acrimonious agreement, so filled with dreams as to what he could teach this young disciple, and then so taken with the wares of the elderly woman at the kerbside selling hot pig’s trotters, that he failed to notice Lizzie had reclaimed her precious bundle, as she dutifully climbed up after him to the open-air deck of the bus.

  ‘You enjoy your work, ma fille?’

  Enjoy? Lizzie looked at him blankly, and he tried another tack.

  ‘The Old King Cole is a happy place?’

  ‘Old Jowitt’s a rum cove.’

  ‘That I see, but the artistes? You like them?’ He perceived from the blank expression that he was getting nowhere. The Lizzies of this world had no time for reflecting on their lot. He changed tack. ‘Tell me about them, those that come to the eating-room.’

  ‘Mist’rill.’

  Auguste’s turn to look blank.

  ‘Max Hill,’ she repeated, ‘old cove. Does impersonations. Eats chops.’ She peeped at him to see if this was what he wanted and encouraged, swept on: ‘Mr Brodie, big he is. Jolly. Pats me bum, beefsteak man, hates Harry Pickles, he’s a one. Eels and bangers, don’t like Brodie, Brodie don’t like him. Miguel, he’s a juggler, smarmy, thinks he’s a swell, but he ain’t, ’cos he eats his eels jellied and whelks. Mariella’s pretty – and don’t she know it.’ She giggled. ‘You’ll be meeting her,’ she added mysteriously.

  ‘You like her?’ Auguste inquired, interested at the mention of Will Lamb’s former love. Seeing her look of doubt, he added hastily, ‘And what does she eat?’

  ‘She won’t eat nothing of ours,’ Lizzie said crossly. ‘But I reckons she’d be a shrimps-and-pie lady.’

  Auguste regarded her in wonder. ‘Mapetite, you have the makings of a true connoisseur of cuisine.’ To find someone after his own heart in such a place cheered him immensely.

  ‘Gam,’ snorted Lizzie, not understanding a word.

  A brief reconnoitre backstage told Auguste much about the financial state of the Old King Cole. It looked and smelled of failure. There were two large dressing-rooms at the rear of the building next to the stage door, and a series of cubby-holes opposite the cramped wings and backstage area, two of which, according to hastily pinned notices, had been allotted to Nettie and Will; the others spilled ancient props and lighting paraphernalia out of their doors. The performers, he understood, arrived in most cases only for their particular turns and for the moment he had the place to himself. Or so he thought.

  ‘Ah. How good of you, my dear chap, to keep a lookout for bailiffs.’ Percy Jowitt descended on him, beaming.

  Auguste surrendered. ‘Could any bailiffs get in here undetected?’ he asked.

  Jowitt looked nonplussed. ‘People come and go,’ he said vaguely.

  ‘Is the stage door kept locked?’

  ‘No. But bailiffs get in anywhere, you know.’

  Auguste abandoned bailiffs. Was it your idea to ask Will Lamb to play here?’

  ‘Certainly.’

  ‘The idea stemmed from you.’

  ‘Naturally. I am the proprietor.’ Percy puffed out his chest.

  ‘What put the idea in your head?’

  ‘Do you know, I really can’t say. It might,’ Percy acknowledged, ‘have been Pickles.’

  ‘You mean faggots and pickles?’

  ‘No, no. Our loveable Cockney chappie, Harry Pickles. Nettie Turner’s husband. Rather surprised me when he suggested it because he doesn’t like Will Lamb. Jealous, I think. But then all my regulars have the good of the Old King Cole at heart,’ he explained complacently.

  ‘Does everyone here wish it well?’

  ‘Good heavens, yes,’ Percy declared. ‘They all love the place. And each other.’ He paused. ‘Mostly, that is.’

  Chapter Two

  Heat hit him like the full force of Jem Mace’s heavyweight fist. Auguste observed that the hell that had the presumption to call itself a kitchen did have outlets to the outside world, but it felt to him like a sealed Turkish bath. The idea of murder within these steaming walls did not seem so preposterous now. He remembered Will would be arriving with Nettie just before or soon after the performance started. Time was running short, with only two hours to sum up what he was dealing with, and whom he was dealing with. At the moment the ‘what’ was taking precedence. He recalled the London particular, the thick fog through which he’d once battled his way, only to find murder awaiting him at the end. Heat was like fog. It confused, it drummed in upon you, numbing the senses. He listened to Lizzie’s monologue as she rushed hither and thither from stove to gridiron. ‘I got the pies, mutton and eel. I done the pickled eels and faggots . . . I fries the fish, you broils yer chops.’ You? Him! He was the chef in this nightmare surrounding him and in half an hour’s time the customers would be pouring through the door.

  Panic spurred him to action, as he raced through the furnace of the underground kitchen after the quicksilver Lizzie, averting his eyes from the grease, crumbs and vegetable detritus that liberally gave witness of her endeavours during the day.

  ‘What is this horrible mess on the floor, Lizzie?’ A white gooey mess that looked like frozen porridge.

  ‘’Ere’s yer faggots, Mr D. Cockroaches.’

  This was hell indeed. ‘You serve cockroaches here?’ he asked faintly. ‘Soup, perhaps?’

  Lizzie stared at him. ‘That what you do in France, is it? I kills ’em here. That’s what the white stuff’s for. Oatmeal and Plaster of Paris.’

  Auguste opened his mouth and shut it again. Time enough for hygiene tomorrow. Tonight he must survive as best he could under Lizzie’s mercurial management; he needed all his antennae trained on Will Lamb.

  At least, nearly all his antennae. One must be spared for this horrible astringent smell from one of the cooking pots.

  ‘What is that, if you please, Miss Lizzie?’

  ‘Pickle for tomorrow’s eels. Want to see ’em?’ She led the way to a larder, and flung open the door with pride. Hanging in rows from hooks were what appeared to be a dozen ladies’ stockinged legs.

  ‘Eels boiled in cloth,’ Lizzie said proudly. ‘And there’s your faggots too. Good, ain’t they? Pig’s caul and liver.’

  He duly praised her. These were the delicacies of which he had heard so much? He tried hard to ignore a murmur of protest in his stomach. After all, was not much of the exquisite charcuterie of France the result of similar cooking processes? It was merely the unfamiliar made these appear so unappetising. This is what his brain told him, but his stomach began to contradict it vigorously, and with Lizzie in anxious pursuit, he hurried back to the upper floor in the hope he might track down the last few gulps of oxygen available before customers began to arrive. There would then be, so he had understood, a brisk trade in pies and potatoes. Potatoes! Where were they?

  Even as the thought rushed through his mind, Lizzie, faithfully on his heels, cried, ‘Where you bin, Fred?’

  Auguste glanced up from his frantic inspection. At the window he saw faces pressed to the glass like Oliver Twist’s in the workhouse. Through the door loped a skeleton in ragged evening dress, which ha
d obviously started in Jermyn Street and found the journey to the East End hard in the extreme. On top of the skeleton’s six-foot frame was a top-hat which it raised politely.

  ‘Good evening, Miss Lizzie,’ it replied humbly in a hoarse voice. ‘Business detained me, for I am performing my tasks on the cans to which I must speedily return.’

  ‘Fred’s a sword-swallower for the queues outside, Mr Didier,’ Lizzie informed him, ‘but he does the spuds as well. He’s a dab hand at ’em.’

  Of course, Auguste thought resignedly, what more natural than to have a sword-swallower as an assistant cook?

  ‘He cooks ’em on the spikes over the fires in the cans – and we keep ’em hot here.’ She indicated the filthy range.

  Auguste did not doubt it – what he doubted was if anything in this hell-hole could be kept cool.

  Mr Frederick Wolf regarded his new temporary superior apologetically. ‘I fear there is little profit in sword-swallowing nowadays. I entertain the queue with my act, for it is my duty, but the rewards for my art are insufficient for my continued survival,’ he informed Auguste gravely. ‘I trust, sir, you have no objection to my continuing my tasks here? I assure you I turn a most delightful floury potato, it positively floats to the plate beneath, so light and airy is its nature. And I am most judicious in my seasoning. I am also dexterous with a poached egg,’ he added hopefully.

  ‘I am delighted to welcome you to my staff.’ Auguste meant it.

  Another burden was lifted from him. He wondered idly whether those potatoes might be improved upon . . . a little cheese or cream adorned with a pickled nasturtium seed perhaps? There might be avenues to be explored here.

  But not now. In the next half an hour his stomach was put to the severe test of ordeal by piles of fatty mutton chops and, to his horrified eye, tough steaks and tired herrings destined for the gridirons. He reflected on the nearness of Smithfield Market with relief. Here was one instant improvement he could make. Whoever was responsible for the provision of these horrors would be subjected to a series of lectures on the art of choosing meat and fish. Huge canisters of pease pudding stood steaming on the range, side by side with dishes of saveloys and fish. Fresh fish, kippers and herrings, with a dish of something that might conceivably in the siege of Paris have passed for batter, stood by a heap of dull grey haddock. He eyed them unenthusiastically. There was, he gathered, a fish market at nearby Shadwell. Sturgeon was in season, oysters – like Alexis Soyer he, Auguste Didier, would make a contribution to the noble cause of spreading knowledge of food, no matter what the pocket that sought it. A stirring of something that might possibly be professional interest replaced the queasiness in his stomach.

  At five to seven the faces pressed to the glass began to disappear, as each straightened up on its body to prepare itself for the grand charge ahead. It was, Auguste realised with dread in his heart, time for his first customers. An aged gentleman who had apparently crept from the hearthside of one of Mr Dickens’ novels, judging by his attire, had now taken his place at the bar – presumably the ‘old Jacob’ to whom Jowitt had referred. It was conceivable, Auguste supposed, that he might move with lightning dexterity when customers appeared, but improbable. There would be fewer now than later, he understood, for it was more important to secure and defend one’s place than to feed one’s stomach for those who had paid their shilling for a fauteuil or ninepenny seat in the circle. And at any moment from now, he realised to his horror, Will Lamb might be arriving at the stage door, where he could be greeted by a crazed assassin or by the ghost of William Terriss. The fever pitch of excitement in the queue communicated itself to him through the window: his stomach now lurched again with something he did not at first recognise. When he identified it, he would not fully acknowledge it, but he recognised it as fear.

  Thomas Yapp prepared to haul himself from his slouched position over the bar at the back of the grand circle, and to face up to his responsibilities as chairman of the evening’s festivities. He pushed the second brandy aside. He needed all his wits about him tonight. It would be a full house, and keeping order was hard enough in the Old King Cole at the best of times. Audiences knew what they liked – and what they didn’t like, and were far from shy about letting the artistes know their opinions. This happened frequently for Jowitt couldn’t afford to pay the good acts, and had to rely on old stagers like Our Pickles and Max Hill – and, Thomas faced facts, his own wife Evangeline. Their one regular asset, Horace, the Great Brodie, had just told Jowitt he was going up West to the Alhambra. That was the last they’d see of him, even though it was the Old King Cole had made him. That was the way things went. One song caught the popular fancy, and the singer thought he was made. Horace had struck lucky with ‘Don’t Wait Up’, so off he’d trot on the golden path of West End audiences, publication, agents, pantomime work, and he’d never look back. Or would he? He was a good sort at heart. Like Nettie Turner and Will Lamb: they started here and now they were coming back – though not for long, thank goodness. He slumped over the bar again. Perhaps he needed a drink after all. The thought of Will Lamb and Evangeline would make anyone turn to drink.

  Not to mention the Shadwell Mob!

  Panic-stricken, he drained the brandy at one gulp, as Evangeline swept through the door.

  ‘Ah, Thomas, I’ve decided to render “I Dreamt that I Dwelt in Marble Halls”.’ She trilled happily and untunefully, her bosom heaving in passion. “‘That you loved me, you loved me still the same”.’ The top G missed, which was just as well. Thomas Yapp watched his brandy glass gloomily; he could swear it was shivering, and about to shatter. He sympathised. It did not escape his notice that Evangeline was wearing her red satin, choker and all. She looked enormous and undefiable. Yet as her husband he felt duty-bound to try.

  Evangeline was built on generous proportions, five foot ten with a width to support it that left whalebone stays creaking in protest. Her voice, she claimed, demanded sustenance. Why she should have fallen for Will Lamb, a foot shorter than herself and half her width, when she already had a fine upstanding figure of a man in Thomas Yapp had left him puzzled. Will had fortunately departed ten years ago, but tonight he was coming back.

  ‘Why not sing “The Lost Chord”, my love?’

  She peered at him. ‘I do believe you’re jealous,’ she said archly.

  ‘It’s the Shadwell Mob!’ he shouted, irritated beyond endurance.

  ‘What of them?’ Evangeline was scornful of pit and gallery.

  ‘They’re sending a chirruping mob.’

  ‘My dear Thomas, a Hooligan gang! The police stopped that blackmail gambit years ago.’

  ‘And the Shadwell Mob have revived it. They’ll kill “Marble Halls” stone dead.’ And the chairman too probably, he thought wildly.

  Evangeline was used to barracking from those that did not understand or appreciate her art, and Will had to be told her true feelings. ‘Marble Halls’ it was going to be. She’d sing ‘The Lost Chord’ over her dead body, she decided confusedly.

  ‘“Marble Halls”. And,’ she added menacingly, ‘I shall not sing directly after the interval. Move me!’

  Yapp’s heart sank even further. True, to play the turn after the interval was the most unpopular since people wandered back late or even stayed in the bars, and when Evangeline’s number was put up on the boards nearly everyone stayed there. But didn’t she realise if it wasn’t for him, she wouldn’t have a spot at all? Oh, the unfairness of it.

  ‘Put young Orsini after the interval.’

  ‘I can’t,’ he moaned.

  ‘Oh, I think you can, Thomas,’ she replied, disappointed. ‘After all, it is for darling Will.’

  Thomas’s face went as white as his starched shirt front. Suppose she realised who had had this foolish idea of inviting Will Lamb back here? She would get entirely the wrong idea. No, the sooner Will disappeared, the better. ‘I’ll do my best,’ he told Evangeline listlessly. He lurched to his feet and blindly staggered towards his position of t
orture for the evening.

  Lizzie licked her thumb approvingly. ‘I does a good custard,’ she told Auguste proudly.

  Auguste looked at the stagnant yellow pile in the canister, now minus one thumbful, and shuddered. No self-respecting egg had lent itself to that horror. Outside the last defiant wail of the tinny violin ground to a halt, and the tap-tap of the hornpipe dancer ceased as the queue for the hall vanished entirely. Frederick’s raspy voice could be heard thanking his public for their valued custom and exhorting them to return tomorrow, and be further amazed and stupefied at his dangerous feats of sword-swallowing.

  From his office upstairs, Percy Jowitt beamed as he saw the crowds vanishing into his beloved hall, and congratulated himself on being such a good employer that he could attract the likes of Nettie Turner and Will Lamb back to it. Even the threat of bailiffs ceased temporarily to worry him. Everything was lovely in his garden. He did not notice the Shadwell Mob staggering towards his kingdom.

  ‘Ain’t it exciting?’ Lizzie shrieked blissfully to Auguste, eyes shining.

  ‘This?’ Auguste lifted his head from frying battered cod with one hand and grilling mutton chops with the other. ‘Not precisely exciting. An experience.’

  ‘Nah. Nettie Turner coming here. “Whoa, Nellie, don’t you go too far . . .” That Donkey Song, I luvs it.’ Lizzie wriggled her non-existent hips in a way that suggested the Old King Cole music hall was not above pirating songs on occasions, since Auguste doubted whether Lizzie had ever visited the Empire or the other West End halls.

  A flying skeleton in the form of Frederick Wolf rushed in to take up his interior position on the potatoes. Chairs scraped against floor, mutton pies passed in an endless chain to two harassed barmen who doubled as waiters, or passed direct to the clutching hands of impatient diners, the smell of mutton chops on the gridiron intensified, mingling with the smell of cooking kippers. Mutton chops and glasses of beer apparently flew through the air to their recipients with the same dexterity as the young man on the flying trapeze. Potatoes cascaded in white crumbly torrents on to plates. Tonight Auguste would dream of potatoes, wielded with the flashing dexterity of Frederick’s hands as he first slit it open, lifted it high in one hand, the plate in the other and shot the contents of the first onto the second, turned it out in a mound of succulent crumbs. Alump of butter followed it, a dash of pepper. . . yes, tomorrow he would try spices, curry powder and cream perhaps, a dazed voice at the back of Auguste’s mind promised, as he gazed down at the smelly ha’porth and ha’porth he’d just dished up from the unappetising pans.