Murder on Show (3 page)

‘I've never seen a cat quite like her before,' Penny said admiringly.

‘There aren't
too
many around,' Helena Keswick agreed cordially. ‘She's a pure-bred Burmese. Top of the Class.'

‘I should think so,' Penny said. She hesitated. ‘May I stroke her? I won't disturb the kittens.'

As Helena Keswick smiled. Mother Brown arched her neck to the outstretched hand, inviting the caress. ‘Oh, you lovely thing,' Penny cooed, and dissolved into hopeless mush. It quite amazed me – I never would have thought Penny could get so soppy over a cat.

I mean, she seemed a nice enough cat – especially after Precious. This one was a sort of housecoat-and-slippers homely type; warm and friendly, but a bit too maternal for my taste.

I backed away slightly and hit against the rail separating Mother Brown's boudoir from the ersatz-Hollywood set next door.

‘
Do
be careful,' a waspish voice said, ‘you'll knock it down.'

I turned to apologize. The tall, thin woman, who must be Betty Lington, was cradling what looked at first like a silver fox muff. It wouldn't have surprised me, for she had a 1930's type face, with the thin arched-line brows and thinner, widened mouth. It was coming back into style these days, but one had the uncomfortable impression that, for her, it had never gone out of style.

The muff stirred and raised a head, becoming, unquestionably, a cat. Another type of cat. (It was beginning to worry me, the way they were all assuming personalities.) I had always thought a cat was a cat was a cat. But this one was a chorus girl cat, you could see it in her lovely face and empty eyes. She was beautiful, vapid, and hopelessly stupid. She would photograph like a dream, and never spoil a shot – but only because she was too basically inert to consider moving from wherever she had been set down.

‘Silver Fir is upset enough with all this excitement, without your knocking the stand to pieces,' Betty Lington scolded. Silver Fir yawned. There was solid bone beneath that glorious platinum fur and between those pretty ears. It would have taken a bomb explosion before any intimation of disquiet penetrated her limited intelligence.

Nevertheless, the usual suitcase was in a corner of the stall. Like a fond parent, the cat owner was obviously the last to admit to any shortcomings of her darling. Betty Lington had decided that Silver Fir was an artistic and temperamental creature, therefore, she was going to stay with her and cosset her, even though Silver Fir couldn't care less.

The blue-white flash of Gerry's camera exploded behind us. Silver Fir merely blinked, but Betty Lington was instantly aquiver. ‘They're taking photographs,' she snapped. ‘Why are they taking that cat? Why aren't they taking Silver Fir?
She's
a film and television star!'

Stage Mother to a cat – now I'd seen everything. I should have picked up the clue when Rose Chesne-Malvern was showing me around earlier. It gave me a strange feeling of impending doom – the last Stage Mother I'd met had been murdered.

‘Do I scent publicity?' A low, purring voice sounded behind me, and I turned to face Kellington Dasczo. ‘Doug, my boy, you
might
have started with an old friend if you were going to start photographing. Ah, I see Gerry's doing the honours –
and
you have the ravishing Penelope with you.'

He bowed, in his usual pseudo-courtly manner, to Penny, who nodded and smiled. We encountered him only occasionally, but that was often enough. He had obviously settled himself in his room first, and was now going to settle Pearlie King. He carried the famous three-legged high stool, which was Pearlie's favourite perch, under one arm, and a large black alley cat with a collar of little pearl buttons under the other. I wouldn't have given him credit for being so fond of his pet. No one would have – he was so fond of himself there was little love left over for any of God's other creatures. Still, Pearlie King represented a considerable investment already, and there were probably still several books and a good many articles left in him and his adventures. He certainly looked a lot more virile than his master.

‘
You
get enough publicity,' Betty Lington said. ‘Even if you
do
have to write most of it yourself.'

‘Temper, temper, dear,' Kellington admonished. ‘
Some
people can be jealous without showing it. Much cleverer, really.'

‘Jealous? Of you –?'

‘Helly, Silly.' Ignoring her, Kellington stretched out a hand and patted Silver Fir's head. ‘That's what they all call her, you know,' he confided to me. ‘Silly. You can see why, can't you?'

Actually, you could. Great, blank eyes blinking with pleasure, as though she had been paid a compliment, Silver Fir twisted her solid little head to direct the hand behind an ear which wanted scratching.

Kellington obliged. While Betty Lington bristled wordlessly, he massaged the empty, photographic head. From his arm, Pearlie King looked on with complacent contempt.

‘Poor old Silly,' Kellington crooned. ‘If only you had a brain, you might have learned a few tricks and gone on to character parts when you were too old to be just a pretty face.'

That was too much for Betty Lington. ‘I'll have you know,' she exploded, ‘that Silver Fir has just signed a new seven-year contract with Occasion Films.'

‘I'm glad to hear it,' Kellington said. He assessed Silver Fir through narrowed eyes. ‘Seven years – yes, that should just about see her out.
If
the Studio doesn't fold. There
have
been rumours ...'

Before Betty Lington could reply, a thunderous snarling roar sounded over the background noise. Kellington's eyes narrowed almost to slits as he turned his head. It was a curious thing – but the eyes of the two cats also narrowed to slits. They all stared in the direction of the sounds.

They were bringing in the Big Cats. Something of the jungle came with them. The fetid smell of sated carnivores, a wild projection of rage at captivity. We watched as the travelling cage rolled past us down the aisle to the Exhibition Cage. The workmen pushing it along were pale beneath their weatherbeaten skins.

A tall woman stalked beside the cage, chirruping encouragement to the animals. Ignoring her, they paced the cage, snarling their resentment, pausing occasionally to claw through the bars, trying to sideswipe one of the workmen.

Swooping ahead, as they reached the end of the aisle, the woman opened the sliding door of the Exhibition Cage. The men closed the other cage up against it and she pulled a chain hanging at the side. A door slid upwards and Pyramus and Thisbe darted through it into the Exhibition Cage, and the doors clanged firmly shut behind them. So far, so good.

‘I don't like it,' Betty Lington frowned. ‘I don't care what she says – those animals are wild. A child could see it. They shouldn't be here, they'll upset the cats. I don't know what Rose Chesne-Malvern was thinking of.'

For once, we were all agreed.

‘I hope she got good insurance coverage,' Kellington said. ‘If anything should happen –'

Deep in his throat, Pearlie King growled warningly. Silver Fir looked at him in surprise, although even she had twitched as the cage went past.

‘That's right, my beauty –' Kellington rubbed his chin against the top of the stubby head – ‘you tell them. Let them come near your bailiwick and
you'll
have a go, won't you?'

Pearlie King lashed his tail and growled again. From across the aisle an answering growl came from Precious. Pearlie King laid his ears back and made a determined effort to wriggle out of Kellington's arms and meet the challenge. Kellington held tight, only a faint rim of perspiration along his hairline revealing how much of a struggle it was.

‘You see,' Betty Lington said triumphantly. ‘I told you it would upset the others. It's started to already.'

We were all pretty jumpy. The sound of wheels rolling along the aisle towards us again made us all whirl about briskly.

This time it was a sculptor's stand on castors being pushed down the aisle. The gold Whittington Cat was atop, gleaming in the artificial light, emerald eyes glittering, looking back over its shoulder at its creator, Hugo Verrier. Deep in conversation, Rose Chesne-Malvern walked beside him as he trundled the stand to the platform, lifted it on to the platform, and pulled a lever, retracting the castors so that the stand stood firm.

The flash of Gerry's camera caught Rose Chesne-Malvern's attention briefly and she glanced his way. ‘You there!' She snapped her fingers. ‘Come over here and take some pictures of this!'

I watched Gerry react. It's not that he minds having a bird snap her fingers at him, it's just that he prefers to have been introduced to her first. Apart from which, there's a way of doing it without offence – and that doesn't include addressing him as ‘You, there.'

True to form, he ambled over to join us, turning his back on Rose Chesne-Malvern. ‘That Mother Brown is a very interesting cat,' he told me. ‘Do you know she starred in
Death Has Nine Lives
? The villain dipped the tips of her claws in curare and, when she scratched her victims, they died. I saw that film, but I didn't recognize her.'

‘You, there!' Rose Chesne-Malvern stormed over to us. ‘I told you to come and take some pictures.'

‘Mrs Chesne-Malvern –' I decided it was time to straighten out some of the confusion, or attempt to – ‘I'd like you to meet my partner, Gerry Tate.'

There was a flustered moment, while she tried to decide what this did to the pecking order. She put out her hand and murmured something, but seemed to come to the conclusion that a partner in a Public Relations Firm was still lower than the Organizer of a Show who had hired him.

‘Now, would you come over here, please?' She threw in a tight-lipped smile for good measure. ‘And take some pictures of Hugo with his Cat? They ought to go down well,' she turned to include me in the grudging smile as she taught me my business – ‘with the Press. The Cat is 18-carat gold, with emerald eyes. Hugo will give you the statistics, height, weight, and all that.' She turned and moved away, with the bland assurance that we would follow her.

She was right, of course. Whatever we thought of her personally, she was still the boss. Hugo watched her approach. So, out of the corner of a slitted eye, did the sleek Siamese, Pandora, in the next-door stall, seeming to wait for some acknowledgment from her owner of her existence, but too proud to make the first overture herself.

Rose Chesne-Malvern stalked past her without a glance. Pandora settled down on her haunches, swirled the tip of her tail around between her front paws, and became very busy washing it. I told myself it was lunacy to want to kick that well-tailored little rump on Pandora's behalf. Can a cat know that it has been snubbed?

Gerry dutifully began taking pictures: the Whittington Cat alone, Hugo with the Cat, Rose and Hugo with the Cat, and the Cat from different angles. The curtains were hanging in place now. As soon as the picture-taking was finished, the Whittington Cat would disappear behind them, until Kellington Dasczo pulled the satin cord to part them for the television cameras tomorrow.

After noting down the statistics Hugo had given me, I grew bored, and left them taking pictures while I wandered around some more.

People were beginning to settle their cats down for the night now. My watch said ten o'clock. Small blankets had appeared from suitcases and were being spread in the Exhibition pens. I counted three hot water bottles being carried to rooms to be filled from hot water taps. These were then placed under the blankets in the pens, even though the hotel boasted about its central heating.

On the whole, the arrangements for the animals looked quite comfortable, not to say luxurious. But this was England, and such a state of affairs was only to be expected. Remarks from passing tourists in the lobby had given me an idea, though. An American magazine might just go for an article about it, if I shamelessly slanted it so that it might come into the Quaint Olde Englande category.

I remembered seeing a not-too-uncomfortable-appearing couch in the Press Gallery overhanging the auditorium. It occurred to me that I might spend the night here myself. At best, I could get that extra freelance story out of it; at worst, Rose Chesne-Malvern would think that I was being a really zealous PRO. At least, that was what I thought then. Like a fool, I had no idea of what ‘the worst' could really mean.

I decided to reconnoitre the territory once more and make sure the couch was as free from lumps as it had seemed. (Not having an animal's comfort to worry about, I was damned well going to be concerned about my own.) At a stall opposite the staircase, I was halted in my tracks by a vaguely familiar face peering out through the branches of an unidentifiable shrub.

‘Hello, there,' I said automatically. ‘Nice to see you again.'

‘I say –' the face broke into a broad public-relations smile and advanced a bit farther out of the bushes – ‘how truly spiffing to see
you
here!'

Since he hadn't thrown it at me in the first sentence, I gathered he couldn't remember my name, either.

‘I didn't realize you were handling this Show.' A body, on hands and knees, began to emerge behind the beaming face.

‘That's right.' At least, he knew my occupation, so he was one ahead in the game, although I had a hazy notion he was probably in advertising. ‘This your stand?'

‘It certainly is. Best new product on the market.' He stood up and let me have it straight between the eyes. ‘Pussy No-Poo. The new, antiseptic, and guaranteed completely odourless once-a-week change for your litter box.'

I'll give him that, he said it with a straight face and without the trace of a wince or a smirk. I began to realize that this might be a boy to remember – if I could ever find out his name.