Over the public address, Shearman made his announcement telling everyone where to assemble. There was a definite tremor in the voice.
The crime scene people arrived soon after and set up their lighting. Downstairs, more uniformed police reported for duty. Halliwell went off to supervise them.
From the dress circle, Diamond watched the actors and backstage staff respond to the summons and take seats in the stalls. A hierarchy was observed without any supervision from the police: actors in the front row, stage management behind them, the crew next, then the front-of-house team and finally the cleaners. Among the actors, Diamond spotted Gisella, Preston Barnes and the woman playing Fraulein Schneider. Kate from wardrobe was in the third row. A late arrival from backstage was Titus O’Driscoll and he was uncertain where to position himself until Shearman offered him a second-row seat. There must have been forty to fifty people there already.
Binns, the stand-in doorkeeper, was one of the last to arrive, having reluctantly been replaced by a policeman.
Still upstairs, Diamond opened the door of the box and asked Sealy if he’d found anything of interest.
‘Run away and play, will you? I’ve hardly started.’
Impatient investigating officers don’t cut much ice with pathologists. Diamond exchanged a long-suffering look with PC Dawn Reed. ‘Tell me when he comes out.’ He took the stairs down to the ground floor and was pleased to find most of his CID team already there: Ingeborg was helping Halliwell list the names of all present. Leaman and young Paul Gilbert were in the aisle and the man he thought of as the square peg, Fred Dawkins, was in conversation with one of his recent colleagues in uniform.
Diamond asked Shearman if anyone was missing.
‘I think not,’ the manager said. ‘There’s a spare programme here. If you go through the names you’ll find all the cast and crew are accounted for. How long will this take?’
This was brushed aside. ‘So where’s the big man?’
‘Who do you mean?’
‘Melmot.’
‘Francis? He’s not in the play.’
‘I’m not asking who’s in it. Was he in the theatre tonight?’
Shearman pressed a hand to his mouth as if the thought had just dawned. ‘He was, yes, doing the hospitality bit with our special guests. It was Francis who told me Clarion wanted to come. We decided between us that a seat in the box was the best way to keep her hidden.’
‘But has anyone seen him since the play ended?’
Nobody spoke.
Then Gisella said, ‘Did I hear right? Clarion was here?’
Titus O’Driscoll, seated next to Shearman, gave a gasp. ‘I knew it, we’ve been duped.’
Diamond glared. ‘What do you mean?’
‘The sighting.’
‘You’re not making sense.’
‘There was a sighting of the theatre ghost this evening, the same grey lady you and I discussed the other day. A manifestation would be a sensational event by any stretch of the imagination. That’s why I’m here. A reliable witness saw her in the Arnold Haskell box, the one with the drawn curtains.’
All the conversations around them had stopped.
‘This evening?’ Diamond said.
‘During the play. She was all in grey. Where’s Fraulein Schneider?’
‘Here,’ a voice answered from the front row. The big woman turned a stricken look on Titus.
‘Don’t be nervous,’ he urged her. ‘Tell them what you saw.’
‘They won’t believe me.’
‘Out with it, ma’am,’ Diamond said.
Her words soared melodramatically. ‘She was here tonight, I swear, staring at me from the upper box where she is known to materialise.’
‘Dressed in grey?’
‘Totally. In a hooded gown of exactly the sort a lady of fashion wore to the theatre two hundred years ago. Most of her face was veiled in some shroud-like material.’
‘She’s round the twist,’ a voice from the back said.
‘You see?’ she appealed, hands outspread.
‘What time was this?’ Diamond asked.
‘I don’t know. I was on the stage in performance. Before the interval.’
‘Was she there after?’
‘I can’t say. I was too petrified to look.’
‘She was not,’ Titus said. ‘I observed the box for the whole of the second half.’
