Smoke and Mirrors (2 page)

Max Mephisto hated snow. But then he liked to say that he hated all weather. He was happiest indoors, in a bar or a club or, best of all, in a theatre. When he dreamt of leaving the business (which was quite often these days), he knew that what he would miss most would not be the applause or the satisfaction of a neatly executed trick but that particular backstage smell – greasepaint and Calor gas and musty costumes – the same the world over. In a theatre the outside world didn’t matter. Rain or shine, it was always night-time in a theatre. But this winter it was hard to ignore the weather, and cold was what Max hated most. He wondered if this was a legacy from his long-dead Italian mother. Surely he was made for sun and fast cars and drinking Campari in roadside cafes, not for slogging through grey slush in his best shoes, sleeping with his overcoat on and, when he woke in the night, seeing his breath vaporising around him like the ectoplasm in Mamie Gordon’s fake medium act.

Max had chosen his lodgings in Upper Rock Gardens solely because they were the only theatrical digs available that boasted central heating. When he got to the thin, melancholy house with its shallow bay windows and aura of having seen better days, he discovered that the much-vaunted heating consisted of a single radiator in his attic bedroom. It was only on during the day, so when Max was rehearsing on the pier presumably the place was positively toasty but by the time he returned the radiator and the room were both icy cold.

On Wednesday morning Max looked out of his bedroom window and saw that the snow was still falling. The houses opposite – gracious Regency edifices like this one, now mostly flats and B&Bs – were barely visible and, at the bottom of the hill, the sea had merged into the grey sky. He surveyed the scene dourly, smoking his first cigarette of the day. Walking to the pier would be no fun in this weather but it was the technical rehearsal so he’d have to get there. The technical was important because he was performing several magic tricks in the show. It was the only thing that had resigned him to the role of Abanazar.

Max had always sworn that he would never do pantomime. It was the final straw, the end of the line, the graveyard of hopes. Ingénues past their prime, comedians who were no longer funny, acrobats getting a bit stiff in the knees – they were all to be found in the cast lists of
Cinderella
,
Jack and the Beanstalk
and
Aladdin
. Every summer the requests started coming in and every year Max refused them. He tried to take a break over Christmas, maybe even go abroad. Anything to get away from the men in drag, the baying children, the shouts of ‘Behind you!’ It was like some existential nightmare. Where’s the grim reaper? Behind you.

So why, this year, was Brighton’s Palace Pier Theatre advertising ‘for the first time ever’ Max Mephisto in
Aladdin
? Why were there posters all over the town showing him in a ghastly green robe waving a lamp that looked more like a gravy boat? Well, partly it was because the show was being produced by Bert Billington, a hugely influential show-business impresario. An invitation from Bert Billington was not to be turned down lightly, even if it involved wearing false whiskers and pushing an ageing Principal Boy into a papier mâché cave (crash of cymbals, green lightning, evil laugh). If Bert liked his performance, then he might book him for a tour of provincial Number Two theatres, maybe even a Number One. Then there was the appeal of Brighton itself. Max had always liked the town and now it was the home of his daughter, Ruby. Not to mention his old friend Edgar. But Ruby and Edgar presented an altogether different problem, one that he didn’t like to confront too often. Even so, a season in Brighton was not the same as Blackpool or somewhere in the frozen north. There were quite a few decent restaurants in Brighton.

Finally, the bitter truth was that work was thin on the ground these days, even for the great Max Mephisto. The new comedians were taking over and their baleful influence was everywhere. Magicians like Tommy Cooper were going on stage, getting the tricks deliberately wrong and – even worse –
showing the audience how they were done.
There was no mystique any more, no glamour. Then there was television. Apparently most families in America owned a set and, if TV’s popularity ever spread to Britain, variety would die quicker than you could say ‘abracadabra’. So, all in all, well-paid work from November to January was not to be sneezed at. And it was not as if he was playing Wishy Washy or Buttons. He was Abanazar, the Demon King, and the villain always had the best lines.

So Max dressed in his warmest clothes and prepared himself for the walk to the pier. He still had his beloved Bentley but that was locked in a garage in Kemp Town. Besides, cars would be no good today. In the hall he met his landlady, Joyce Markham, a dyed blonde with a head for business and a good line in sardonic banter.

‘Morning, Mr M. Lovely day.’

‘Indeed it is, Mrs M. Just going out for a stroll along the promenade.’

‘Mind you don’t get too chilled. I’ve known many a pro die from the cold in Brighton.’

‘That’s a jolly story, Mrs M. I’ll look forward to hearing it one evening.’

‘Are you not having breakfast? Can I press you to a kipper?’

‘Charming as that sounds . . .’ Max reached for his hat.

Joyce eyed him with amusement. ‘Not exactly dressed for it, are you?’

Max looked down at his cashmere coat and brogues. ‘This is my arctic attire, Mrs M.’

‘I’ve got some gumboots that belonged to my late husband. Not that it did him any good, poor fool.’

Joyce always talked about her husband as if his death were some frivolous indulgence designed solely to inconvenience her. Max was horrified at the thought of the gumboots but there was no doubt that the snow wouldn’t do his shoes much good.

‘That would be very kind. Thank you.’

‘Don’t thank me, thank Arthur. If he can hear you where he is.’

*

‘Max Mephisto in gumboots. Never thought I’d live to see the day.’

‘Well, now you can die happy.’

Lou Abrahams, the stage manager, didn’t seem in a hurry to die. Chortling to himself, he put down his paper and retreated into his cubbyhole. Max hoped that he was making him a cup of coffee. He sat down and pulled off the boots. In their ugly, rural practicality they reminded him of his father, who liked nothing better than striding over fields looking for wildlife to kill. Still, there was no denying that they’d kept his feet dry. He took his brogues out of the paper bag given to him by Mrs M and put them on. He was feeling better. The smell of coffee was emanating from the cubbyhole and it was pleasantly warm in Lou’s office. He pulled the paper towards him. It was the local rag, the
Evening Argus
.

‘Desperate search for lost children’ screamed the headline. Max read on: ‘Police are continuing to search for Mark Webster and Annie Francis, who vanished yesterday whilst playing outside their homes in Freshfield Road, Kemp Town. The children were last seen walking to Sam Gee’s corner shop to buy sweets. Mr Gee says that the children never arrived. Detective Inspector Edgar Stephens, who is leading the hunt, says that the police will leave no stone unturned in their search for the missing youngsters. “We know how much the parents must be suffering,” said DI Stephens, “and we ask everyone to be on the lookout for Mark and Annie.” ’

The paper was yesterday’s. Max thought of the snow covering Upper Rock Gardens. If the children were still outside, surely they’d be dead by now. He thought of Edgar continuing to search, marshalling his men, knowing that he would have to face the grieving parents at the end of the day. He would take it hard, Max knew. He didn’t think that Edgar would have used the cliché about ‘no stone unturned’ either.

Lou placed a cup of black coffee in front of him. ‘Terrible thing about those kiddies, isn’t it?’

‘Yes,’ said Max. ‘Terrible.’

‘They’ll be dead now, mark my words.’

‘Maybe not,’ said Max. He felt curiously reluctant to accept Lou’s gloomy prognosis, though it was what he’d been thinking a few moments ago. ‘They could just have run away. They could be with grandparents or friends. I ran away from school a few times.’ Once he’d run to an old nanny who’d been good to him, once he had caught the train to Portsmouth and tried to join the navy. Both times he’d been sent straight back to school. He’d never thought of running to his father.

‘No, they’ll be dead,’ said Lou. ‘There are a lot of bad people out there.’

Max could hardly argue with this. He looked out of the tiny porthole window. The sea ran grey and silver all around them. The garish colours of the pier had been softened by the snow, the helter-skelter a spectral white tower. Brighton itself had disappeared.

‘My money’s on the shopkeeper,’ said Lou.

*

Other people also suspected Sam Gee. He was a married man with children but, as Frank Hodges had pointed out that first day, that didn’t stop him from being a murderer. Edgar had interviewed Mr Gee himself and had found him believable, if slightly nervous (and that too was only to be expected). Sam Gee had known the children by sight but had been certain that neither Mark nor Annie had visited his shop on Monday afternoon. ‘I would have remembered,’ he said. ‘They were quiet kids. Polite kids. Not like some of the others. But I would have remembered them. The girl had red hair and the boy had glasses. Nice kids.’ There had been nothing odd in the way that Gee had recalled Annie’s red hair and Mark’s glasses. He’d just been anxious to help and concerned for the children. Even so, Edgar had told Bob to go back to the shop today. It wouldn’t be the first time that a member of the public had faked concern to hide their own part in a crime.

That was Annie’s grandfather’s first question when he opened the door of his Brunswick Square flat. ‘Have you arrested the shopkeeper? He was the last person to see them.’

‘But he didn’t see them, Mr Warrington,’ said Edgar. ‘Can I come in?’

The flat in Brunswick Square told him what he had suspected before: that Sandra Francis had married beneath her. The house in Freshfield Road was a basic two-up two-down, housing parents and four children. Annie’s father, Jim, was a labourer. But this flat boasted antimacassars and side tables, even an upright piano. There was a coloured photograph of all four Francis children on the piano, their bright hair rendered almost orange by the colourist. Annie, the eldest, was in the middle, seated with her youngest brother, still a baby, on her knee. The other two – twins, Edgar seemed to remember, a boy and a girl – squatted awkwardly on either side.

The red hair obviously came from their grandmother. Mrs Warrington’s hair, pulled into a neat bun, was a faded version of this colour, liberally streaked with white. She saw him looking at the picture. ‘Annie was a little mother to her sister and brothers,’ she said. ‘Such a lovely girl.’ Edgar rather doubted this. There was something stiff in the way that Annie was holding her little brother, something in the way that her head was tilted. She didn’t look like a girl who saw motherhood as her vocation. Annie was clever, everyone agreed that. Edgar wondered what dreams she had for her future. He hoped to God that she still had a future. He noticed that her grandmother, unlike her mother, used the past tense.

‘Does Annie come here often?’ he asked.

‘Yes,’ said Mrs Warrington. ‘She comes most weekends, sometimes in the week too. Gets the bus here by herself. She likes to look at the books.’ She gestured proudly to a small glass-fronted bookcase beside the door. ‘She’s a lovely little reader.’

Edgar wandered over to look at the books. He sometimes found it easier to ask questions without eye contact.

‘Does she sometimes find it a bit much at home?’ he asked. ‘All those siblings.’

‘Sometimes,’ Mrs Warrington admitted. ‘She shares a room with the others, shares a bed with Betty. She doesn’t get much time to read or do her homework. She likes the peace and quiet here.’

‘Does she take after her mother?’ asked Edgar, examining the spine of
The Golden Bough
. ‘Did she like to read?’

‘Oh, our Sandra was ever so clever. She could have been a teacher if she hadn’t married that Jim Francis. Michael was a teacher. He’s retired now.’ She pointed to her husband in the same way that she had gestured towards the bookcase. Michael Warrington frowned.

‘This isn’t getting us anywhere. Why haven’t you arrested that shopkeeper?’

‘I’ve got no reason to arrest him, Mr Warrington,’ said Edgar. ‘But I promise you I have interviewed him and I’ll do so again. I’ve got officers going door-to-door in Kemp Town at this very moment. But it’s possible that Annie might have gone missing of her own accord. As you say, she’s a bright girl. She might have planned this. So I wanted to ask you, please, to rack your brains. Apart from her parents, you’re the people who know her best. Is there anywhere you think she might have gone? Anyone she might have run to?’

The grandparents sat side by side on the chintz sofa. They looked at each other for a long moment, during which Edgar heard the cuckoo clock in the hall strike eleven.

‘There’s Uncle Brian,’ said Mrs Warrington at last. ‘He’s friendly with all the children.’

Bob, who liked order, had made a list of the children involved.

The children sat in a circle on the wood-blocked floor of the school hall. Bob sat awkwardly on a chair apparently designed for midgets but Emma immediately squatted down on the floor next to the children. They were in the primary school attended by all the children and once attended by Annie and Mark, who were now at separate grammar schools in Hove. Outside it was break-time and they could hear the joyous cries of the pupils playing in the snow. Occasionally there would be a soft thump as a snowball hit one of the high, reinforced windows. From the kitchens came a smell of cabbage and boiled meat. It reminded Bob so forcibly of his own schooldays that he felt a wave of nausea rising in his throat. He had hated school. He didn’t share this feeling with Emma because she was obviously the type to have been teacher’s pet (white socks, neatly plaited hair, hand constantly in the air).

He did think it was odd that all the children were younger than Mark and Annie. There might only be two years between Mark at twelve and Kevin, Betty and Richard at ten but Bob knew that the gulf between primary and secondary school was a vast, unimaginable distance. Besides, Annie and Mark had passed the eleven-plus. They had entered the new, cloistered world of grammar school, the first step in the process of moving away from their childhood playmates. Bob had failed the eleven-plus. Another reason not to mention schools to Emma. He was sure that she had passed with flying colours.

Betty and Richard were Annie’s siblings. Maybe she had been asked to keep an eye on them. Mark was an only child. Maybe he was nervous of children his own age (he had been described as shy and quiet) and preferred the company of these youngsters. Bob looked at Betty Francis and was surprised to find her staring at him. She was very like the photograph they had of Annie (a picture now imprinted on Bob’s brain): pointed face, red hair in long plaits, freckles, greeny-blue eyes. Richard was thicker-set and his hair inclined more to chestnut. He stared up at the high window as if wishing he was elsewhere. There was a febrile atmosphere of fear and excitement in the room.

Emma tried to diffuse the tension by chatting about the snow and elicited the information that Lionel and Louise had travelled to school on a sledge pulled by their big brother Lennie (someone in that family enjoyed alliteration). Betty and Richard had slid down the hill on coal sacks. ‘Mum thought we should go to school like it was an ordinary day,’ said Richard. Bob looked at the twins, sitting very close together on the floor, and wondered if they’d ever see an ordinary day again. Kevin didn’t offer any information about his trip to school and Agnes looked near to tears.

‘We wanted to talk to you about Monday afternoon, when you were playing with Annie and Mark,’ said Emma. ‘I know we’ve already asked you some questions but there might be something you’d forgotten or thought it wasn’t important. There might even be something you didn’t want to say in front of Mum and Dad. You can say anything to us. You won’t get into trouble, I promise.’

The children stared at her, round-eyed.

‘So, you came home from school and you played in the road. Is that right?’

The children were silent and then Betty said, slightly defensively, ‘We’re allowed to play in the road until it gets dark.’

School ended at three, Bob knew, but it got dark around five in November. Those two hours could be vital.

‘Who was playing?’ asked Emma. ‘Just you lot?’

‘Yes,’ said Richard, ‘until Annie and Mark got home.’

‘And they joined in, did they?’

Another silence and then Betty said, ‘Yes. Annie wanted . . .’

‘What did Annie want?’

The children said nothing. Emma looked at Bob. He said, ‘What game were you playing?’

‘I’m trying to remember what I liked to play at your age,’ said Emma. ‘Hopscotch? Skipping?’

‘Tag?’ suggested Bob. ‘British Bulldog? Kiss chase?’ This last got a giggle from Agnes at least.

Eventually Betty said, ‘We were doing a play.’

Emma and Bob looked at each other. ‘A play?’

Betty looked around the circle before continuing. ‘Annie writes these plays and we act them out. We’re her acting troupe.’

Her acting troupe. This explained why Annie sought out the company of younger children. Presumably they were easier to control and direct. Annie, Bob was beginning to realise, was quite a girl. Is quite a girl.

‘What was the play about?’ asked Emma.

‘It was called
The Stolen Children
,’ said Betty. ‘Richard and I were the parents.’

‘I was one of the children,’ said Agnes suddenly. ‘I was called Star. Louise was my long-lost brother.’ The younger children started to giggle. ‘And Lionel was the policeman.’ Lionel smiled shyly at Emma and Bob as if to acknowledge their kinship.

‘What part did you play, Kevin?’ asked Bob. He had already identified Kevin as the potential leader of the group. He was a large boy with a definite presence, cropped-haired and fiercely freckled, saying little but frowning when it seemed that the others were getting too voluble. Bob noticed that Betty had glanced at Kevin before telling them about the play.

Kevin fixed Bob with a steady pale gaze before answering, ‘I was the Witch Man.’

‘The Witch Man?’

‘The Witch Man who steals children and eats them,’ explained Agnes, who seemed to have recovered her spirits. She leant forward now, eyes sparkling. ‘He steals children and keeps them in a cage until they get fat enough to eat. All the villagers are scared of him. At night they say to their children, “Children, children say your prayers . . .” ’

To Bob’s surprise the other children – except Kevin – joined in.

Emma didn’t look at Bob but he could see the shock in her shoulders and spine.

‘Did Annie make that up?’ she asked.

‘Oh yes,’ said Agnes. ‘She’s good at making up songs and rhymes.’

‘What about Mark?’ asked Bob. ‘What did he do?’

‘He was her assistant,’ said Betty, sucking on the end of her plait.

I bet he was, thought Bob. He betted Mark had played second fiddle to Annie from the day that they met. It probably suited him just fine.

‘So, in this play,’ said Emma, shifting position on the floor, ‘the Wicked Witch Man steals the children and eats them?’

‘No,’ said Betty proudly. ‘That’s what you’re meant to think but in our play it’s the parents who’re going to kill the children and blame the Witch Man. It’s a twist, you see. Annie likes twists.’

*

Brian Baxter (the ‘uncle’ was purely courtesy) lived at the top of Freshfield Road, near the racecourse. His house was bigger than the terraces where the children lived and boasted a large, overgrown garden.

‘Can you wait for me?’ Edgar asked the driver. ‘I might need you.’

The man saluted silently. On the way there they had passed the first jeep and a group of soldiers searching the undergrowth opposite the racetrack. Edgar had a sudden awful presentiment that the hunt for the children would end here, under the snowy piles of rubbish in this suburban garden. Don’t jump to conclusions, he told himself as he negotiated the icy front path. Brian Baxter is probably a perfectly harmless man who just enjoys the company of young children. He was already imagining the arrest. It was why he’d asked the jeep to wait.

The path was icy but it showed signs of having been cleared recently. This must mean that Brian had been out of the house today. To go where? It was a long walk to any shops and there was a bitter wind on the race hill sending whirlwinds of snow eddying into the air and falling in drifts on either side of the road. Even the jeep had had trouble at the brow of the hill. Why had Mr Baxter felt the need to leave the house?

Edgar knocked and the door was opened almost immediately. The man who answered was not the seedy monster who had begun to grow in Edgar’s imagination but an eminently respectable-looking man in a blazer and tie. He was grey-haired, slightly below average height, wearing owlish glasses and a belligerent expression. He looked like a retired bank manager.

Edgar introduced himself. ‘I’m Detective Inspector Stephens from the Brighton police. We’re speaking to everyone in the area about the disappearance of two children. Can I come in?’

‘You’d better,’ said Brian. ‘It’s freezing out there.’ He said it accusingly, as if the weather was Edgar’s fault.

The house was unexpected too. Neat sitting room, hardback books standing to attention, large gramophone, small table with
The Times
spread out on it. Was that why Brian had ventured out in the snow, to buy his daily paper? Maybe he, like Edgar, was a fan of the cryptic crossword. Try as he might, Edgar couldn’t imagine a child in this room.

‘We’re investigating the disappearance of Annie Francis and Mark Webster,’ he said, taking a seat on a hard-looking sofa. ‘I believe you know them.’

Brian didn’t attempt to deny it. ‘I know all the children,’ he said.

Edgar waited. Brian took off his glasses and polished them. ‘I suppose it looks odd to you,’ he said at last.

‘Why don’t you explain?’ said Edgar, trying to keep his voice neutral.

Brian stood up. ‘Let me show you.’ Edgar followed, his skin crawling. What was he about to see? A gruesome collection of teddies, puppies and other child-bait? Was he about to encounter the dark side of this strange, neat little man? He wished that he had called for backup before knocking on the door.

Brian led him through a large, chilly kitchen with yellow linoleum and blue Formica doors. Then he opened a door at the back of the room.

‘Converted the garage,’ he said laconically. ‘Through here.’

Edgar took a look around the kitchen. He should be able to overpower Baxter if it came to a struggle. Maybe he should just grab one of those saucepans as he went past.

He stepped through the door. Brain switched on the lights and Edgar blinked from the stalls of an exquisite mini theatre. Red curtains framed a small stage, which showed a backdrop of woodland. An actual chandelier swung overhead.

Edgar turned to look at Brian, who was smiling proudly.

‘Did it all myself,’ he said. ‘Took me over a year.’

‘Why?’ asked Edgar.

‘I’ve always loved the theatre,’ was the unexpected answer. ‘My wife was an actress and, when she died, I hit on the idea of doing this as a tribute to her. One of the teachers from the school heard about it and she asked if she could bring some of the children round to have a look. Part of a project she was doing. One of them was Annie. Bright little thing, is Annie. Turned out she loved writing plays and she asked if she could put them on here, in my garage. That’s when it started.’

‘When what started?’

‘Annie’s acting troupe. She’d write the plays and they’d put them on here. It’s a really good little outfit. The younger children act and Annie directs. Mark’s her assistant. Nice boy but a bit shy.’

Edgar looked around the room. Apart from the garage door at the end there was nothing that betrayed the space’s original purpose. There was carpet on the floor and flocked wallpaper on the walls. The seats were laid out in two rows.

‘Who comes to see the plays?’ he asked.

‘Friends, family, teachers,’ said Brian. ‘I give the proceeds to the church organ fund.’

Dear God, thought Edgar, they even sell tickets. Why hadn’t anyone mentioned the theatre group before? He turned to face Brian, who was fiddling with the curtains. They were tied back with gold tassels.

‘Mr Baxter, Annie and Mark have been missing for nearly two days. Do you know anything about their disappearance?’

‘No,’ said Brian. ‘I only heard about it when I went to the shop this morning.’

‘When did you last see the children?’

‘I saw Annie at the weekend. She came up to tell me about the new play she was writing. Sometimes she comes to do her homework. She likes it here because it’s so neat and tidy.’

Just like her grandparents’ place, thought Edgar. Annie, the eldest child, the perennial big sister, had obviously craved a calm, adult environment. But, all the same, was it really that innocent? There was undoubtedly something odd about the garage theatre, so shiny and glittery, hidden away inside this dull, utilitarian house. Was it really an elaborate trap to lure away lonely, stage-struck girls like Annie? But the parents and teachers had obviously known all about it and no one had even mentioned Brian. Even Annie’s grandparents had only referred to him as someone who knew all the children, not as a possible murderer. It was Edgar’s nasty policeman’s mind that had made that connection.

‘Mr Baxter,’ he said carefully. ‘You obviously know all the children. Is there anything you could tell me about their disappearance? Did Annie say anything to you? Do you have any idea where they could be?’

Brian looked at him and, suddenly, his face seemed to collapse. He took off his glasses and wiped them. Tears ran down his cheeks.

‘They wouldn’t have run away,’ he said. ‘I was going to take them to the pantomime next week. They were looking forward to it.’

‘The pantomime? The one on the pier?
Aladdin
?’

‘Yes, it’s got that magician chappie in it. Max Mephisto. Have you heard of him?’

‘Yes,’ said Edgar. ‘I’ve heard of him.’

‘They say he can make a person disappear into thin air.’

And he’s not the only one, thought Edgar.