Stage Fright (11 page)

He sat down again.

‘Any relatives she might have gone to?'

‘Her parents are dead – oh, not recently,' Kevin said, answering the question on Fisher's face. ‘There's a sister, but she's in Australia.'

‘A close friend she might have gone to?'

Kevin hesitated. ‘I can't think of anyone in particular. She has friends, of course, but … no, I can't think who…' His voice trailed off.

‘To go back to that phone call. What did she say?' Fisher asked.

‘Nothing special, really. She wanted to know how I'd got on with my agent. She said Cassandra had been over and that she was tired and about to go to bed.'

‘She wasn't angry or upset?'

Kevin frowned. ‘We didn't have an argument, if that's what you mean. She seemed just as usual.'

‘And was that your impression, Dr James?' Fisher turned to me. ‘Any sign of depression, would you say?'

I thought back to the previous evening. I saw Melissa's pale face, the weary way she had brushed her hair back.

‘Not depressed, exactly, but she did look tired. She found the play a bit of a strain. I know that.'

‘She did get a bit upset earlier in the day,' Stan said. ‘She was having problems with her costume, nothing that couldn't be sorted, but she did get a bit emotional.'

‘Any post-natal depression?' Fisher was looking at Kevin now.

Kevin pursed his lips and shook his head. ‘Not really. It was a worrying time, of course, Agnes was six weeks premature. Had to spend a week or two in an incubator. But she's fine now. Melissa was coping all right.' He appealed to me. ‘Don't you think so, Cass.'

‘Better than me to tell you the truth. She was much better organized.' I wondered why I was speaking in the past tense. I hoped Kevin hadn't noticed.

‘So, nothing else out of the ordinary in the last day or two? Apart from the upset over the costume?'

‘Well,' I said, ‘there was something.' I told him about the anonymous letter. The expression on Fisher's face, sympathetic, concerned, didn't change, but still I got the impression that his interest had been aroused.

‘An anonymous letter containing a poem by Byron,' he said thoughtfully. ‘What did you make of it, Mr Kingleigh?'

Kevin shrugged. ‘Not much, really. Actors get a lot of letters from cranks and people with a screw loose. There's nothing in it, usually.'

So Melissa had told him after all? Kevin glanced at me and quite suddenly I knew that she hadn't. I saw the four of us as people sitting down at a game of poker, each wondering what cards the others held. And Kevin, I thought, was bluffing, though I couldn't imagine why.

The telephone rang. We looked at each other, then Kevin sprang up. He snatched up the receiver.

‘Yes?'

We watched the hope die in his face.

‘Oh, Richard. No,' he said. ‘She's not back yet. I'm talking to the police at the moment, can I ring you back? Yes, yes, Stan's here.' He held the phone out to her.

‘Tell him I'll ring him back on my mobile.' She looked at Fisher. ‘Do you mind? It's the theatre manager, I think I'd better…'

Fisher nodded and Stan disappeared into the kitchen. Kevin sat down wearily.

‘I need to know what Miss Meadow was wearing last night,' Fisher said.

I thought for a moment. ‘A long, floaty dress. Pale yellow, I think.'

‘Ghost,' Kevin said. Fisher and I stared at him. ‘Ghost,' he said again. ‘It's the name of the designer. She never wore the same thing two days running, so she won't have been wearing that. Unless…'

His voice trailed off. He leaned forward and put his head in his hands.

Unless she never took it off, and that would mean that she had been gone for – how long? It was nearly six o'clock now, so it was around nineteen hours since anyone had seen or spoken to her. How long had Agnes been alone here?

Stan came quietly back into the room and sat down next to me.

‘And you're sure you can't think of a friend she might be with?' Fisher asked Kevin. ‘There's usually someone—'

‘No! No! No! What have I just told you! I can't think of anyone. Don't you think I'd have already rung them if I had any idea who she might be with! I can't believe she's done this!' He was half-rising from his seat. The force of his anger was such that I found myself leaning back. He clenched his fists and I thought for a moment he was going to jump up and grab Fisher by his shirt.

‘Kevin!' Stan spoke sharply.

He looked at her as though he didn't know who she was. Then the anger left his face. He sat down again.

No one spoke for a few seconds. Then Kevin said:

‘I'm sorry. I'm beside myself with worry. I can't imagine what can have happened. It's so unlike my wife, leaving Agnes like this. And there's the play as well. I just don't know how we're going to manage.'

Fisher had stopped writing, but his pen was still poised over the form. ‘That's all right, sir.' He spoke with equanimity, but he didn't look up from his clipboard. ‘However I will still need whatever names you can give me. And I think it's time I had a look round. Mr Kingleigh, I'd like you to look in the wardrobe and see if the dress is there. And perhaps, you will be able to tell if anything appears to be missing.'

‘I always helped Melissa choose her clothes so I've got a pretty good idea what should be there.' Kevin stood up. His shoulders were drooping. Now that his anger had subsided, he seemed meek and anxious to please.

The two men went upstairs together. In silence Stan and I collected the teapot and cups and took them into the kitchen. We sat down on either side of the kitchen table.

‘I thought Kevin was going to lose it there completely,' I said. ‘I've never seen him like that before.'

‘It's no wonder, is it. It's not just his wife that's missing, it's his leading lady as well. It's Wednesday today and we open on Monday!'

‘What's going to happen?' I asked.

‘That's what Richard rang up about. And why I didn't want to take the call in front of Kevin. You see, if Melissa doesn't come back, we'll have to ring round the agents, see who's available to take her place.'

She saw the expression on my face.

‘Sweetie, I'm just as worried as you are, really, I am,' she said. ‘It seems hard, I know, but…' she shrugged.

‘The show must go on?'

‘Just think about it, Cass. How many actors are there in the production? A dozen or so? And then there's all the technical crew, there's the big opening that's already been publicized, the sponsors, the tickets sold. We have to open next Monday, come hell or high water. It's a cast-iron rule. Everyone accepts that. Melissa knows that as well as anyone.'

‘But what if she's had some sort of crisis and she comes back in a day or two?'

Stan shook her head. ‘We can't wait on the off-chance. We'll have to act soon. Richard said that if she's not back by nine o'clock tomorrow morning, he'll be ringing round the agents to find a replacement.'

‘Will he find someone at such short notice?'

‘Oh, he'll find someone. But who? That's the question. We'll be lucky if we can get anyone a tenth as good as Melissa – and it's such a big part. Will they be able to learn it in time?'

At 6.30 Stan went into the garden and smoked a cigarette. At seven o'clock she made cheese sandwiches. At ten past seven Jake rang to find out what was happening. At seven I fed Grace. At 7.30 I gave Agnes another bottle and put her to bed. At 7.45 Tim Fisher rang to say that the police had gone round to the flat in Camberwell. There were no signs of Melissa. And there were no reports of an accident involving her car. Stan went out into the garden for another cigarette. At eight o'clock Clive rang to find out what was happening. At 8.30, Richard rang to find out what was happening. At nine Stan rang home and told her husband she'd be staying the night at Kevin's. At 9.15 she had another cigarette. At 9.30 she told me to go home and get some rest. I didn't need much urging. My head was buzzing with fatigue. Kevin had spent the whole evening by the phone. I was exhausted by the strain of watching him pace up and down, by the adrenaline rush every time the phone rang, and by trying and failing to think of reassuring things to say.

I drove slowly home. I brought Grace in from the car. The unusual day had worn her out and she didn't wake up. I went up to my bedroom and put her in the bed with a pillow next to her to stop her falling out. I was so tired that as I undressed the floor seemed to rise up to meet me. I dropped my jeans and shirt on the floor and fell into bed.

Almost instantly it seemed I was on the stage of the Everyman theatre. Stephen was explaining to me that he would have to be back for the opening of the play, because he was going to take the part of Lady Isabel. Of course I'd have to rewrite it – and could I please be quick about it, because the play was going to start in half an hour.

I woke with a jerk. The red numbers on the digital clock told me that it was ten. I'd been asleep for ten minutes. I was wide awake. Without putting the light on I padded over to the window and opened it. The cool night air made me shiver. It was a clear, cloudless night. The sky was the colour of slate, but soft like flannel. Far across the fields I could see that the lights were still on at Journey's End.

Twenty-four hours ago I'd been saying goodbye to Melissa. Was there anything that could have warned me about what was going to happen? I saw her as I'd seen her the night before, leaning over the cot, brooding lovingly over her baby. Had she been too anxious, perhaps, had it all got too much for her? Somehow I didn't believe it. But what was the alternative? I was too tired to think it all through, and yet I couldn't stop the events of the day going round and round in my head. If only I could talk things over with Stephen. But it was mid-afternoon on the West coast. He was somewhere in the bowels of the huge organization that was employing him – and I couldn't even remember what it was called.

I got back into bed beside Grace. Sometimes having the radio low in the background helps me to sleep. I switched it on. Grace must have grabbed it earlier and shifted the tuning knob. It was always happening. Instead of
A Book at Bedtime,
there was a blast of music. Even before I consciously recognized the voice and the song, my stomach flipped over. Elvis Costello singing ‘My Funny Valentine'. I hadn't heard it for years. Perhaps it was because I was so tired, so strung out, but the memory it brought back was so vivid that I could see the little flat in Birmingham as if it were yesterday: the bed on a metal frame that came down from the wall, the narrow galley kitchen full of flecked fifties Formica, the surprisingly large and very cold bathroom. I saw the books on the floor, the cheap, spindly furniture, the absurd jungle-pattern wallpaper, the windows misty with condensation.

The barrier between past and present wavered and dissolved. It almost seemed possible that if I caught the bus from New Street station, as I'd so often done all those years ago, and walked in through the door of that flat, my old life would be waiting for me there. Joe was in the kitchen, making spaghetti and meatballs. Elvis Costello was on the hi-fi. We knew that LP –
Armed Forces
– by heart. He'd hold his floury hands apart and I'd walk into his arms. I felt the pressure of his wrists as he crossed them in the small of my back and locked my body into his.

His hips moved against mine in time to the music. We fumbled for each other's mouths. Without taking his lips off mine, Joe walked me backwards to the kitchen door. The flat was so small that it was only a few steps to the bed.…

The telephone rang, slamming me back into the present. My heart was beating fast as I picked up the receiver.

‘Cass?'

‘Joe!' It was as if I had conjured him up.

‘I hope this isn't too late to ring? I rang a little earlier … didn't want to leave a message.'

‘Oh, no, it's fine.'

‘You sure? You sound as if I've woken you up.'

‘No, no, it's not that. It's just that…' I cast around for something to say and what I came up with was the truth, even if it wasn't the whole truth. ‘I'm so worried about Melissa.' And I told him what had happened.

‘Jeez, you've had quite a day, haven't you? But the most likely thing: it's all got too much for her and she's gone off somewhere to get her head together.'

‘But leaving her baby like this?'

‘It does happen.'

‘Joe, I can't help thinking that something awful might have happened to her. To have done that – perhaps she was feeling really desperate, perhaps she's…'

‘Don't let's even go there,' he said firmly. ‘Hey, now listen, shall I tell you what happened to me one time? Amy once did something much the same.'

‘She did?'

‘That's right. She went off, booked herself into a motel for the weekend. I didn't have a clue where she'd gone. Left me holding the baby. Literally. Josh must have been – oh, about nine months? Yeah, that's right and Daniel was about three.'

‘But why?' I found myself relaxing back on to the pillow, like a child listening to a bedtime story.

‘We had a row. She thought I wasn't helping enough with the kids. She wanted to teach me a lesson. She did that all right.'

‘But Kevin would have said if it had been something like that.'

‘Well, now, would he? People are funny, you know? Might be too embarrassed or ashamed.'

‘You're right.'

‘You're on your own out there, aren't you? When does that man of yours get back?'

‘Stephen? Not sure. Maybe not for another week at least.'

‘If you want to talk, give me a ring. Any time. And you know what? Things'll look better in the morning. She'll probably have shown up by then. Let me know what happens, OK?'