audience. ‘In a gentleman’s family highly genteel,’ he began again, ‘Where ’tis hoped that the lady will try to conceal—’ when ungovernable laughter made it impossible to continue. How a simple ballad gave rise to such guffaws defied the imagination.
‘Excuse me.’ Mrs Body got up decisively from her chair, crossed the room to the connecting door and marched into the uproar, which stopped almost at once. Only the hammering from a room on the opposite side continued.
‘Look at the gasman quick!’ ordered Cribb, striding to the door Mrs Body had used. ‘I’ll stand watch.’
Thackeray reacted instantly, almost upending W. G. Ross’s chair in the process. He opened the door, and looked into a long, panelled dining-room. Several tables were laid for dinner. Silver candelabra stood among the table-ornaments. At the near end, in a fine mist of dust, was the gasman, in overalls, standing knee-deep in the foundations, half-a-dozen floor-boards prised open around him. He turned, hammer in hand, and winked. Major Chick!
‘Slap bang in the enemy camp, eh?’ said the Major in a stage-whisper. ‘I’m full of surprises, Constable.’ Thackeray closed the door and gave a long-suffering nod in answer to Cribb’s uplifted eyebrows.
‘You will excuse me, rushing out like that?’ said Mrs Body, re-entering. ‘They were quite unaware that their little concert was disturbing us.’
‘Are your guests exclusively masculine?’ asked Cribb, fingering a pair of ballet-shoes that were attached to the side of the mantelpiece with several others, reminiscent of shot rats on a barn door.
‘No, no. I take anyone who is temporarily incommoded. As it happens, I have nine ladies in residence at present. But there has never been a breath of anything improper at Philbeach House, you understand.’
‘That goes without saying,’ said Cribb.
Thackeray nodded too.
‘How charming. You know, Mr Cribb, you remind me so strikingly of Mr Body, my late-lamented husband, except that he was not so tall as you and wore spectacles. Your sight is quite in order, is it?’
‘I believe so, Ma’am.’
‘Do not count on it. Nusquam tuta fides, as Mr Body used to tell me often. “Our confidence is nowhere safe”—and he lost his spectacles in Hyde Park, and drowned in the Serpentine. How can I help you, Mr Cribb?’
‘Do you keep a register of your guests, Ma’am?’
‘A register? Nothing so formal, I am afraid. I can tell you who they are, however.’
‘Very good. Thackeray, you’ll need your notebook. Perhaps you would begin with the ladies, Mrs Body?’
She clapped her hands to her cheeks. ‘Oh dear, a notebook! That is enough to make me forget my own name, quite apart from the names of guests.’
‘Just forget Thackeray’s here, Ma’am,’ suggested Cribb. ‘Think of him as one more painted face on the wall. You can remember the names for me, can’t you?’
She wriggled with pleasure in her large chair. ‘Now that you put it that way, I think I can. Well, there are my longest residents, Beatrice and Alexandra. They are singers, you know.’
‘Surnames, Ma’am?’ requested Thackeray.
Cribb glared at him. ‘When did they arrive?’
‘Oh, eighteen months ago, at least,’ said Mrs Body. ‘They are sisters, you know. Their name is Dartington. I have two sets of sisters here at present. The others are trapeze artistes, Lola and Bella Pinkus. If it were not making an old music hall joke I would describe them as highly strung. Decent girls, but spirited, you know. I think they miss the exercise they used to get.’
‘They’re out of work, then?’
‘Yes, poor waifs. One small mishap at the Middlesex and they were asked to leave. They couldn’t pay their rent or find other work so we offered to let them come here. It was the same with most of the others—Miss Goodbody, Miss Archer, Miss Tring—’
‘The Voice on the Swing?’ said Cribb.
‘But yes! How thrilled Penelope will be when I tell her you know her name! She was in a dreadful state when she arrived here—an unendurable experience on her swing, you know—but we are trying to laugh her out of it in our cheerful fashion.’
‘I’m sure you are,’ said Cribb. The noise in the next room, already reasserting itself, was evidence of that. ‘That makes seven ladies. Who are the others?’
Mrs Body made a rapid inventory of her guests on her fingers. ‘Ah! Miss Harriett Morris, the song and dance artiste—such deplorable misfortunes that poor child has suffered—and then there is my latest guest who arrived after lunch, and I must confess that I don’t yet know her name. She is the mother of a strong man who was savaged by a dog and brought here this morning.’
‘The great Albert,’ said Cribb. ‘Who brought him to you, then?’
‘Why, the Undertakers! I haven’t surprised you, have I gentlemen? You must have heard of the Undertakers, George and Bertie Smee, one of the most whimsical comic turns in London until their accident two months ago? They’re frightfully good company and so helpful. They went all the way to Lambeth in a cab to persuade Albert to come here and convalesce.’
‘Really? And how did you come to hear of Albert’s injury?’
Mrs Body produced a beatific smile. ‘There are more Good Samaritans in the music halls than you would believe, Mr Cribb. When an artiste suffers an injury, you may be sure that someone in the same company or in the audience will have heard of Philbeach House. In this case it happened to be a personal acquaintance of Sir Douglas Butterleigh.’
‘Your benefactor?’
‘The very same. We see very little of Sir Douglas, but he has many friends, and some of them like to associate with our philanthropy. They prefer to remain anonymous.’
Cribb nodded in a way that showed he had expected as much. ‘Did your informant give you Albert’s address as well? You got him here uncommon fast.’
There was a pause while Mrs Body twisted one of her curls around her left forefinger. ‘Mr Cribb, you ask such suspicious questions. Do you think that you will trap me into saying something indiscreet? I believe I rather relish the prospect of being trapped by a real policeman. What would you like me to say?’
Thackeray’s pencil slipped from his fingers and rolled across the floor. He muttered an apology and recovered it. How could you behave like a wall-painting when your superior was being subjected to moral danger?
‘I merely inquired how you got Albert’s address, Ma’am,’ said Cribb.
‘From his agent, of course,’ said Mrs Body. ‘Every artiste makes sure that his agent has his latest address. Do you know, Mr Cribb, I have something upstairs that would interest you, as a lover of the variety stage. You must have visited the old Alhambra in Leicester Square before it lost its music and dancing licence? Well I have a small sitting-room furnished as a perfect replica of a box at the Alhambra, complete with hangings and chairs that I bought from the owner.’
‘I don’t know that I’ve time today, Ma’am—’ began Cribb.
‘Perhaps on a future occasion, when you desire to interrogate me further,’ ventured Mrs Body. ‘You can understand my wish to escape from my responsibilities from time to time. That is when I retreat to my little box upstairs.’
Thackeray blew his nose stridently.
‘But you will want to know the names of my male guests,’ Mrs Body said, her thoughts evidently deflected by the interruption. ‘I doubt whether I can remember all of them. I accommodate most of the old Alhambra orchestra, you see.’
‘I understand you, Ma’am,’ said Cribb, with conviction. ‘But they wouldn’t feature on my list. Would you have an Italian barrel-dancer—name of Bellotti?’
‘Yes, yes!’ She opened her arms expansively. ‘How splendid! You can cross him off your list! He is a missing person no longer.’
‘And a comedian named Fagan?’
‘Sam Fagan! That is Sam’s voice you can hear in the next room.’
‘That’s very good news,’ said Cribb. ‘Could we go in?’
Mrs Body lifted a hand. ‘Not this afternoon. Rehearsal, you know. They insist on private rehearsals.’
‘What are they rehearsing for, Ma’am?’
